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Kundalini is synonymous with Shakti, which literally means “power.” In this case, we are talking about the innate divinity of the universe, which our sources call Shiva. His shakti is personified as a goddess. While Shiva is the supreme god, the source and transcendent witness of the phenomenal world, Shakti is that world it- self.
Shiva and Shakti
She is the ceaseless play of divine energy, the ongoing dance of phenomena. Together, Shiva and Shakti are the divine male and female modes of existence. But, in truth, they are not separate from each other, but an integral unity. This unity is also called nonduality.
This is not just metaphysical speculation or mythology. It’s a description of your own experience, and is meant for you to understand at an experiential level. So the idea of Shiva and Shakti is not supposed to describe some remote state of affairs, but a very personal and intimate thing. It is an immanent reality, right now, the very dynamic of your own consciousness.
Subjectively, consciousness is experienced as two polarities. There is the con- sciousness itself, which has no particular color, shape, or attributes of its own, but simply reflects whatever it experiences. It is the eternal still point of awareness, changeless and untouched. At the same time, this consciousness manifests as the endless plurality, color, and fanfare of experience. This experience is both your own inner world and the world of your senses. That creative, energetic play of expe- rience is Shakti, and your own still point of awareness is Shiva.
Nor are these poles separate things with an independent existence. The creative manifestation of experience is always happening within the changeless sphere of pure consciousness. That consciousness is the space within which our lives un- fold. Shiva is the ultimate Self and the ground of all being. Ultimately, we are identical with this Self. But he also takes individual, limited forms to explore the potential of his own being.
The capital-S Self is not the same as the lowercase self of individual egohood. “Ego” is called ahankara in Sanskrit. It is that part of the self which thinks “me” and “mine,” which tries to appropriate and possess experience, to freeze it into something solid and manageable, and which constructs elaborate sto- ries and self-images. These thoughts are just that, thoughts—completely fictitious, with no more substance than a puff of smoke.
And yet they persist and have a powerful grip on us. Most of us live and die under ego’s spell. We never get so much as a glimpse of what lies beyond the fictions that we spin about “I,” “me,” and “mine.” The fabric of self-deception is woven from the filament of such thoughts. What possibilities would await us if we tore away that veil, if we unraveled this bewitchment?
Make no mistake, getting to that point is slow, painstaking work. It takes guts and a steely determination to work with your mind and experience, come what may. But somewhere along the way a breakthrough can occur. Your body and mind can sud- denly be zapped by the energy of awakening, as if brought to life for the first time. It’s not just an idea. It’s a real possibility. That makes it both attractive and risky.
Kundalini yoga energy
This can come about by conscious effort or by accident. In fact, the energy that we work with in Kundalini yoga is the very same energy that goes into the construction of ego. How could that be the case? When this energy is invested in protecting your personal identity and serving your own limited and selfish agenda, it mani- fests as ego. When it is awakened and aimed at spiritual liberation, it is known as Kundalini and quickly rises to meet its goal. So while awakening and egohood are
opposite modes of being, the underlying reality that brings them to life is the same.
Spiritual path of Kundalini Yoga
The spiritual path is not a matter of fixing yourself or “destroying” your ego as if you were something broken that needed to be replaced. The message of Kundalini is that your own present awareness, pristine and eternal, is already divine. Even egohood and negativity are just dynamic expressions of your inherent divinity. So the spiritual path is not about a process of making yourself better. It’s about a process of preparing yourself for the recognition of the reality that already exists in
the here and now.
