Different risings

14. Kundalini - AYP Practice-Related
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Thanks a lot for your detailed reply Tristan!

My personal experience with KA was quite violent and was a spiritual emergency (it wasn’t far off from Gopi Krishna’s experience, but thankfully less extreme), so I have stopped doing all spiritual practices and opted for grounding. This tamed the Kundalini over the 8 months period since she rose. I am still quite traumatised over the KA and am hesitant to do any spiritual practices due to the fear of K rising again…

I was doing various spiritual practices for 5 years prior to KA, including daily asana practice, various meditations and pranayama exercises (although never consistently and rigorously), and generally had a very healthy lifestyle. I am not sure how purified my system was already…but I still had a very chaotic KA.

I did have a non-dual experience two months in, that I call ‘the lifting of the veil of Maya’ and was probably some samadhi state that came on spontaneously. It feels like a crown chakra experience, whether it was an opening, I don’t know! And what it means in terms of which Nadi was involved here I am also not sure…

I am just not sure how to continue spiritually from here. I don’t want to trigger Kundalini again so she rises in such a violent manner through spiritual practice. But I also don’t know how I can prevent it from happening (she can rise again through different life circumstances from my understanding). I could try gentle spiritual practice and hope for the best. Is this what you’d advise?

I also hope if my rising was indeed Vajra, that K will eventually enter one of the favourable Nadis so that the process at least leads to where it is supposed to and all the pains of it are justified. Although I am not sure whether I want spiritual progress anymore…still quite freaked out.

Thanks a lot Tristan for all the work that you do.

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22

Hi Veronika,

Sorry to hear about the issues you have been having.

To be honest, the most likely cause of your problems is a premature crown opening. The crown is a very unstable chakra and can lead to the kinds of issues you are describing if it opens too soon. You did the right thing by stopping the practices you were doing and focussing on grounding. Hopefully you are feeling much better now.

You did not mention what practices you were doing specifically? If we know this, sometimes it is possible to pin down the exact culprit. However, some people simply come into this life with an unstable crown, and pretty much anything can seem to trigger it.

It is not likely that the vajra nadi is the cause of your issues, as that is not an unstable energetic channel. You can read more about the crown chakra and how to best manage it here:

And also here:

And yes, if you feel stable, and grounded and you have the desire to tip-toe back onto the spiritual path, then starting again with a few minutes of easy meditation each day would be a good way to get back into it. If you take one step at a time, watching out for any negative effects, then you should be allright. You can always take a step back again if needed, and you can do that as many times as you need to.

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23

Thanks so much for your help Tristan, I really appreciate it!

I did different Yoga asana classes for 5 years (vinyasa mostly), ecstatic dance and kirtan once a week for 2 years. For 6 months prior to KA I did the Hum Sau meditation technique as taught in Kriya Yoga and also repeating ‘Om Namah Shivaya’ silently in my head. In my meditations I mostly focused on the area between my eyebrows. I have inconsistently tried other meditation methods from Sadghuru and Vipasana. I did a couple of plant medicine retreats too, all good experiences.

What do you mean Vajra is not an unstable energetic channel?

How can I make sure my crown closes and doesn’t open prematurely again?

Thanks a lot Tristan!

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Hi Veronika,

Most of those spiritual practices that you mentioned are quite safe, stable practices and are very common for people to use in yoga. The only real “red flag” is the plant medicine based retreats. It depends on what the plants used were, but if it was Ayahuasca, then that is known to cause the premature activation of the crown chakra, leading to difficult or painful kundalini awakenings. Even things more mild like magic mushrooms can activate parts of the subtle nervous system fairly randomly, leading to difficult awakenings. There can often be delayed reactions between taking the plants and the awakening happening.

The only other thing I would add is that the mantra “Om Namah Shivaya” does contain the mantra “Shiv” which will activate the crown. So, if you are concerned about not re-activating the crown chakra too soon, then avoiding that mantra could be a good idea. Mantra Japa is a questionable practice anyway because people often engage in it for hours every day. So, there is little regulation over the speed of purification of the subtle nervous system.

The reason I said that the vajra nadi was not an especially unstable nadi is because it is not known to cause instability in the rest of the subtle nervous system, the way the crown chakra can. But, in your case, I don’t see any reason to believe that the vajra nadi is involved at all.

As for how to ensure that your spiritual awakening remains stable going forward, I would say take small steps, continue with the grounding practices that you have been doing, introduce a gentle daily meditation practice and stay away from plant medicines and from Mantra Japa.

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25

Thanks so much Tristan!

Yeah it could have been the plants, but 99% of people I know who did plants have never had any issues with violent KAs afterwards. So I wonder if it’s just a sensitivity of the person that is the main trigger, rather than the plants. Whether this sensitivity came through from past lives or it’s just a natural quality of their system we’ll never know. So whether it’s plants or any yoga practice, the person is susceptible to KA without knowing it. After all, KAs could happen to people completely spontaneously without any spiritual practice whatsoever. So who knows!

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Hi Tristan,

I am not understanding exactly what is meant by ‘premature crown opening’. Could you please clarify what you mean by premature and opening? Why is it that this event can be so hellish, is it because too much is getting released all at once? Rather than being cleared gradually over preparatory spiritual practice and then when the crown opens the system is pure enough for it to be a gentle event.

Is there any silver lining at all from premature crown openings? Is there any impact on other chakras?

Thanks a lot for your help.

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27

Hi Veronika,

Yes, that is correct. Whenever the crown opens, huge amounts of prana can soar up through the body. The crown is like a spiritual vacuum cleaner! If this happens after sufficient preparatory work has been done on the energy channels and chakras, then it is not a problem. In fact it is a very beautiful, ecstatic and blissful event. The experience of an open crown, when the body is prepared for it, has been compared to “heaven on Earth” and even with enlightenment.

However, if there are still many blockages in the energy channels and the chakras, and the energy channels are still quite narrow, then this same experience can be very uncomfortable and painful.

So, the “premature” part simply means “too early”. There is a description in this lesson of how someone can test at the crown chakra periodically to find out if it is too early for them, or not.

The good news is that if the crown is opened too soon, the situation can usually be fixed fairly easily simply by cutting back on spiritual practices and focussing on grounding practices. Most cases that I have come across involving instability due to a prematurely opened crown could be stabilized within a week. Occasionally it took a month, or two, and in very extreme cases, where things had become very out of balance, six months to a year. Usually in cases where it took a very long time for someone to become stable, the person involved was not actually self-pacing their practices downwards. They were wanting to continue with some practices such as prayer, or tantric sexual practices, because they had developed an addiction to those practices, or they felt that they did not want to turn their back on God.

A premature crown chakra opening can have an effect on other chakras in the body, as the intense flows of prana will move through those chakras as well. This can cause them to open too early as well. But, as I said, it is all fixable. There is no lasting damage that can be done, and everything can be brought into balance eventually.

There is a Self-Pacing and Grounding flowchart that you may find helpful which can be downloaded for free here:

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Hi Tristan, is there a similar effect referred as a premature root chakra opening ?

Thanks and Happy New year, Albert

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Hi Albert,

Any chakra can be activated too soon, either resulting in uncomfortable, or painful symptoms at that chakra, or a difficult energetic (kundalini) awakening. This is the reason that AYP uses global purification techniques such as Deep Meditation and Spinal Breathing Pranayama.

The reson the crown chakra gets mentioned so often in terms of the risk of a premature awakening is because the effects can be so much more severe than with the other chakras.

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