Kundalini is an esoteric term, spiritual in nature and beyond logical understanding.
- Kundalini activation or KAP facilitator
A kundalini activation facilitator will undergo intense transmissions of energy in their training for prolonged periods to unlock their energetic pathways, enabling them to serve as a conduit for transmitting the energy that they are attuned to. This is different from receiving shaktipat although some schools still require facilitators to surrender to a guru. Not all schools will accept people without seeing that they are already receptive to such energies by working with other facilitators from their school.
In practice, the facilitator surrenders to the energy or consciousness that they are attuned to, while the client who’s lying down surrenders to the energy through them. This can also be called a lineage when all people are connecting to the energy of the person who attuned them.
In reality, most kundalini activations seen on the internet are not an expression of kundalini energy but excess chi and prana (and often sexual energy) running through the body. This can have a positive and healing effect when done correctly, but it can also leave the body tired and depleted.
In some cases so called kundalini activations are actually foreign energetic entities entering the body, which may or may not activate your kundalini. These may be positive or negative experiences. Extreme caution should be used when surrendering to such entities. A number of clients seeking Kundalini Bodywork are doing so to recover from such negative entity experiences (which can also be picked up in plant medicine circles). Kundalini Bodywork supports us to develop a grounded spiritual practice from which kundalini can naturally rise while we also utilising activation practices in safe, mature and responsible ways.
In Kundalini Bodywork, we learn various modalities and what’s behind each practice, including: KAP; energetic orgasms; network spinal, and spinal energetics as well as darker occult practices in order to protect ourselves from them and support clients out of them.
The mechanics of these practices are all inherently simple, while the personal development work that allows us to practice in a way that creates positive karma is more complex.
- Shaktipat guru
A true shaktipat guru VS a lesser shaktipat guru
A true shaktipat guru is not easy to find and you will be hard pressed to find one on Instagram or YouTube. They are likely to require that you undergo years of spiritual development and training before giving you shaktipat which traditionally would end your cycle of karma making this your last life on earth (presuming you believe in reincarnation and the cycle of samsara).
Such an authentic shaktipat guru (as I understand it) will take both your positive and negative karma and leave you at one with god/the universe, there will be no separation between you, your guru (or god) afterwards.
Lesser shaktipat. Many people may claim to give shaktipat and many will give it to a lesser degree than above, which may leave you feeling amazing, or potentially robbed of your positive karma and life force energy, thus much discernment is needed before surrendering. Likewise our darkness is also valuable. Surrender in this sense could be to look so deeply into the eyes of a master that our darkness dissolves into them, which gives them more power. This may be fine if they are using this power to heal us, or if our darkness is so big that it is likely to consume us (in this case surrender to another may be a wise choice).
I would only suggest working with a real shaktipat guru if you truly feel done with humanity, the illusion that we live in and no longer wish to reincarnate.
Lesser shaktipat guru’s are easier to find and maybe they can give you great spiritual insights, or as just mentioned maybe they are potentially harmful for both your physical and spiritual health. You have to choose wisely.
In Kundalini Bodywork we explore the concept of surrender and integrate the realisations into our practice. We do not learn a process for shaktipat, but we do learn a process to embody the higher-self. This process is similar to giving lesser shaktipat, as are the effects. Distinguishing and understanding why this is not shaktipat and how to work from a non-dual state when practicing is crucial to ensure all clients receive the maximum benefit from the practice and non-suffer because of it.
- Kundalini Bodywork practitioner
Kundalini Bodywork is an intention-based therapy practice that gives discernment to what we surrender to. It is a personal development practice that leads to spiritual development (although clients may wish to stop at the personal development level when they are only seeking therapy).
In sessions, clients transform dense emotions and negative energies within their bodies using their own own free-will. Rather than solely surrendering to external forces to heal, we learn and are supported to align our heart, mind, and sex (our physical, mental and emotional bodies) which is often an intricate and emotional process. We learn to change the vibration within our own body, and then ground the new vibration in, so become both grounded and high.
As we progress through the practice, we incorporate more surrender-based techniques that allow us to connect into the collective consciousness and into higher dimensions of reality as we are now a vibrational match to external energies and higher intelligences.
Therefore in Kundalini Bodywork you do not surrender to a guru but develop more sovereignty and your ability to surrender. Your body does not already need to be activated and you do not already need to be healed or have a spiritual practice to work with a Kundalini Bodywork practitioner or to attend a training as in both cases the process is teaching you to activate yourself through transforming your own traumas while doing your required inner work for personal growth.
Kundalini activations are not inherently bad, although they may be experienced negatively when ill-prepared. They are a part of a Kundalini Bodywork practice, meaning energetic activations are safely brought into the therapeutic process.
To understand the differences between KAP, Shaktipat, and Kundalini Bodywork beyond the explanations above we must first understand:
- The left and right hand path of tantra or occultism (tantra being a complete science of spiritual awakening and occultism meaning hidden knowledge)
- How energy flows in our central channel (the spine or sushumna)
- And how energy flows through our chakra system (the common analogy of the masculine snake Pingala and the feminine snake Ida moving us into a state of oneness and unity)
- on the emotional level of our chakra system
- on the astral level or dimension of our chakra system
In such a short article we can only come to a basic understanding of the above topics, therefore they will only be explained informally:
Since 2022, there has been a huge increase in modalities that work with kundalini energy with the aim to reach non-dual states of awareness. Kundalini Bodywork is a holistic practice which means we first work with trauma and other energies in the body, learning from them and transforming them to clear the path of kundalini.
While also working with direct energy transmissions Kundalini Bodywork includes physical de-armouring practices, breathwork, shadow, non-dual psychology, tantric embodiment and energetic practices, so it is a more encompassing approach. Primarily used in 1-on-1 therapy, group sessions may also be given when general education on nervous system regulation and the transformation of trauma is also provided along with intention work. It is described as the middle path as both surrender and the use of free will are vitally important. In both shaktipat and modern western kundalini activation the intention is focused on complete surrender.
Although no esoteric practice can truly be categorised into two parts, using polarity to view such topics brings insight. One definition of the left hand path is ‘the path of surrender’, and another definition is the ‘deviant path’, so to divert and take an alternative path to truth. The deviant path is largely about connecting to intelligences and consciousness that are higher than us but lower than god, so they are impure. A tantrika or an adapt will approach the concept of ‘surrender’, with less judgment than most. Knowing the aim is surrender only to to god (or oneness) and that everything in reality except ‘samadhi’ this ‘being in oneness with god’ is impure. They also know that god is also within everything that is impure, and by surrendering to certain deities and aspects of god/oneness that they can come closer to god/oneness.
In Kundalini Bodywork we explore the concept of surrender and what it means to us in relation to universal law and how our reality is orchestrated. We develop discernment within surrender as we intend to surrender to both ourselves and to god. We learn to connect to and embody virtues such as compassion, forgiveness, grace, and joy through intentional practices instead of through deities while still seeing how such an experience of deities connecting to us could add value to our lives.
A deviant path is not necessarily bad, but poses the risk of being negative, and this is one reason why some kundalini activation practices (and practitioners) suffer negative feedback.
In Kundalini Bodywork we give space for the personal experience of spirituality, understanding that we are part of any higher power that exists and can never fully be such a higher power. It would be arrogant to think that we are god and know everything, and it would be foolish NOT to want to know more of ourselves through experiencing god (which in this sense is unity and bliss) or levels of consciousness higher than our own.
The right-hand path (how I explain it) is related to will power, so depends on our effort and practice to awaken kundalini and enter the non-dual state.
Although this in of itself is a paradox as any non-dual teacher will tell you the only way to a non-dual state is through having no desire for it. While this non-dual perspective is true, the right hand path is needed to take us to this esoteric and paradoxical place of having no desire for this place. The right-hand path also includes practices such as yoga (kundalini yoga) and meditation
Kundalini Bodywork is explained as the middle path, awakening is achieved through healing and healing is achieved through both surrender and free-will. One of the first things we must surrender to is our pain and traumas if we are to truly heal and transform them.
Regarding energy: in Shaktipat, KAP, and modern Western kundalini activations, higher knowledge descends down our spine, we surrender to it, and it activates our lower store of kundalini and rises back up, through the chakra system; through the spine, or both.
In kundalini yoga the practice is to activate the lower kundalini through: pranayama; asana, mantra and stillness meditation.
Kundalini activated through yoga is largely through our volition, so without the initiation of a guru or the decent of a higher intelligence into us. A true shaktipat guru is enlightened so they can be the higher intelligence which enters and activates us, where as a kundalini activation facilitators channels a higher intelligence by surrendering to it. So a shaktipat guru and a kundalini activation facilitator are very different.
In Kundalini Bodywork we work with the decent of higher consciousness as a kundalini activation facilitator does while also working with our own energetic system as a kundalini yogi does, but as a healing modality we also welcome in and allow ourselves to experience our sexual, emotional and other lower vibrational energies through our chakra system in an act to transform them instead of bypassing them. We do this with the support of gaia consciousness, teaching the body to ground, and to feel safe while taking an abundance of earth energy in, which we later transmute and sublimate.
If someone attempts to give shaktipat, (descend an energy down the spine) who has not both attained and sustained non-dual awareness (which goes for most people on our planet) then the consciousness and information that descends down is often not pure, close to god or non-dual. Unlike a true shaktipat guru they are simply surrendering to an energy and then supporting you to surrender to the same energy, but this could be any energy.
Again this is not good or bad and it can lead to very healing experiences, but it has the potential to be negative, leaving negative energies and entities in the body or leaving us connected to them. One of the practices we learn in Kundalini Bodywork is to remove such energies and entities, so supporting people out of bad spiritual experiences and premature awakenings and back into their sovereignty. These negative energies and entities can be picked up in a variety of places such as plant medicine circles, pornographic sites and on public transport to name a few.
Another phenomena that we witness in activation practices is a single ascending energy which is only present in the chakra system. This can lead us into continuous shaking or physical spasms as well as into energetic orgasms, all of which can be very healing, but also depleting unless we also learn how to work with the spiritual dimension of our spine.
Without spiritual development trauma work will never be enough to transform our relationship with reality into a higher order and understanding of reality. Generally when the activation is also in the spine, more asanas and mudras will be present but there is no exact rule here. Only your experience and the relationship between your nervous system and external energy.
Activating our lower kundalini through left-hand practices and neglecting our spine can also be detrimental and depleting as we burn away our life force. In Kundalini Bodywork we put much focus into increasing the energy in our body through meditation, tantric and other practices, while opening all of our energetic pathways and working with both ascending and descending flows of energy. Some practitioners will advise against working with lower and descending flows of energy but from my perspective this comes down to a lack of education in shadow work and self-trust.
Experiences with Kundalini are personal and depend on spiritual practice or a teacher/guru/or facilitator that you feel safe with, unless you are one of the rare exceptions who experience a spontaneous awakening. When you work with a Kundalini Bodywork practitioner you are working with someone who is teaching you and guiding you through a process that supports you to heal and activate yourself. This is not the same process for everyone as we are all unique, so it is important to find a practitioner who you resonate with.
The act of of the practitioner being present and aligned helps you activate, but they are not giving you shaktipat in these sessions, they are simply entering the highest non-dual state they can attain which allows an experience similar to shaktipat to occur, generally to a lesser degree as you’re opening up to your own karma. The differences between a shaktipat guru, a kundalini activation facilitator and a Kundalini Bodywork practitioner may seem subtle at times and immense at others.
In short Kundalini Bodywork is a tantric practice that supports us to heal ourselves and it is simply more in-depth in its teaching to the modern KAP and group kundalini activation sessions that are now widely available. Kundalini Bodywork invites you to surrender to yourself, your intention and to your higher self. It teaches you to take responsibility for your personal development and supports you in creating your own unique path into spiritual development where you are free to draw upon the many teachings and doctrines that our society has been blessed with over the last 700,000+ years.
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