Kundalini Splendor

Dear Friends,
I am going to be out of town for a few days, and will not be posting to this blog site. I'll start posting again about April 5. Enjoy!
Dorothy

Preparing to Greet the Goddess

Do not think of her
unless you are prepared
to be driven to your limits,
to rush forth from yourself
like a ritual bowl overflowing
with consecrated wine.

Do not summon her image
unless you are ready to be blinded,
to stand in the flash
of a center exploding,
yourself shattering into the landscape,
wavering bits of bark and water.

Do not speak her name
until you have said goodbye
to all your familiar trinkets--
your mirrors, your bracelets,
your childhood adorations--
From now on you are nothing,
a ghost hovering at the window,
a voice singing under water.

from Unmasking the Rose

The Besotted Follower

To dance in this field
of radiance,
what will I give?

My good name, long since
taken from me.
My tattered robe,
with mud for its hem--
haven't seen it for days.
Family, friends--all
have turned their faces away.

Still, I dance,
moving this way or that,
following the inner feelings,
celebrating the hidden bliss,
my lone partner
Krishna and his silver flute,
the music which plays only for those
willing to be shattered
again and again,
ravished by sweetness,
torn by joy.

copyright Dorothy Walters

The Merchant's Son

At dawn I rose
and went to the
field of rice
at the edge of my father's land
.
The sun ascended,
branding the earth
with its scarlet stain of love.
I said my prayers,
chanted my verses,
drank the golden air.
Shiva came into my body.

One day
I heard the cry of Ganesha
thunder through the valleys,
echo over the fields.
That day I left,
went into the forest
to find him I yearned for,
my betrothed,
bridegroom of the blazing locks,
body of fire.

copyright, Dorothy Walters


The Devotee Arrives on the Banks of the Ganges

O, my beloved, what
is this torrent
pouring down upon us,
o, my secret soul,
I am drowning
in this flood of feeling,
this rushing through my body,
my cells,
even my bones
are shaking in quiet joy.

I will stand here forever.
I will remain fixed
always, day and night,
locked in holy embrace with you,
sage of the burning locks,
the one who ceaselessly dances
the earth aflame in beauty.

copyright, Dorothy Walters


THE STAGES OF SPIRITUAL TRANSFORMATION

YEARNING

The time of yearning is one of the most important stages in the spiritual journey. It may last months or years, or lifetimes, even. The disciple must want, beyond all else, some sign or token or intimation that there is hope for connection with something yet unseen. It is the ache of the heart for the invisible other, the something more that is sensed but not yet manifest.

CONCLUSION: Always attend to the inner voice. When you are ready, it will speak to you in a distinctive tone, and focus your psyche on what is after all most important--finding who you are.

SEEKING

This is the period of active search, through books, teachers, practices which one tries out to see what ensues. One tests and explores. One seeks and either finds or rejects. Often it during this period that a "false teacher" will arise. If one is victim of such spiritual fraud, one may turn away from the path entirely, or else try other approaches. Now the devotee is a wiser, less vulnerable pilgrim. Innocence has been lost, but a certain protection has been gained.

CONCLUSION: Find the approach that is right for you. You will intuitively recognize it, in the way you discover the right life partner or the perfect vocation. Avoid the "one size fits all" approach.

UNION

Ecstatic union may or may not come in this lifetime. Earnest practice will not guarantee it. Service in the name of a higher power will not insure that such an epiphany will occur. Grace alone operates in this sphere. Whatever form the revelation takes, it will be a monumental surprise. It may come suddenly, as in the "lightening flash" of awakening. It may be the result of long effort over time. Seeming lack of success in no way means your efforts are in vain, or that you are somehow a less worthy person. There is great benefit for both you and those about you if you are steadfast in your search, for you are "making your soul," as Yeats put it. But now you are entering the world of pure Mystery, and no one can be certain how it will unfold.

Conclusion: Love comes to us in many ways, and all are of value.

INTEGRATION

This is one of the last stages (for most of us in this incarnation). We seek to bring together the old and the new beings within, we give ourselves now to one, now to the other. We pursue our chosen practice, and may feel that we have been kissed by the divine. But we also try to reclaim our place in the world, looking perhaps the same as we did before but utterly transfigured within. We try to perform our usual functions in society, with greater or lesser success. We may suddenly reject our old occupations, and even withdraw completely from the world for a time. We long to find others to tell our story to. We are "reborn," but who are we now?

CONCLUSION: This process will continue one way or another for the rest of our lives. We will constantly discover new experience, novel revelation, experience fresh infusions of mystery. We will never know exactly what it is which has occurred, but we will follow with trust and assurace. We cannot name it exactly, but we know that this transformation is why we have been born.

RETURNING THE GIFT

Now our foremost desire is to give back to the world some of the fruits of our journey. We will find ways to share according to our individual talents and capacities. What we want most of all is to help others who are struggling in a similar search. In this way, the benefit becomes universal, not merely personal.

CONCLUSION: These are some of the traditional stages of the archetypal journey. It is the most important of all life experiences, for it has to do with the soul's discovery of its true nature and place in the universe. Each person will experience the process in unique terms, for each being is truly of a special design.

What Is Happening

Moment to moment
we ask, what is happening?
The sound of shattering everywhere,
is it the world, fragmenting at last,
or our own hearts cracking,
the final break-up of ice?

from Marrow of Flame


Refining the Essentials

All right, then,
give me a cave.

I'm sure I could learn
to live there.

Dried figs, a few thistles and thorns,
the occasional gift
of meal.
Constant whispered prayers.
What else is needed?

The heat, glistening like shaken mercury
by day,
the moon winking suggestively at night,
brazen old temptress, beckoning.

Sometimes an owl song
in the distance.
Sometimes a desert bird
or the cry of a doomed animal.

Mostly just silence,
the wind speaking
to itself,
the rain crooning
its ancient unknowable song.

copyright, Dorothy Walters


Friends and Life Jackets

No question about it, ours is a difficult time. We all know the challenges and difficulties on every side. We read about it constantly in the papers, are bombarded in the news. We are standing on the edge of a precipice and the ground is shaking under our feet. An old era is dying. A new age is coming to birth. And we are the ones struggling to survive in the midst of chaos, to maintain our lives in some sort of equilibrium, even to discover joy and purpose as the world seems to be collapsing all around.

Do we withdraw into our caves and cease to be concerned about the issues of our time, or do we stay in the middle of it all (everywhere is the middle of it all these days) and do the best we can to hang on to the raging tiger which is our world?

How do we keep going in such circumstances without falling into total despair? How do we sustain ourselves, support those around us, focus on what is purposeful and real, especially on those days when even bliss itself is not enough?

For me, one of the major sources of affirmation and courage is the friends I have encountered along my way. They are my "life jackets" in this sea of troubled waters. And of these, Patricia Lay-Dorsey (to whom this site is dedicated) is among the most important.

This is how I met her. About ten years ago, another friend told me about a talented woman who was temporarily living in San Francisco who wanted to learn more about the craft of poetry.

It turned out that Patricia lived only a few blocks from me, and soon we were meeting regularly for tea and writing exchanges at a coffee house exactly in between our respective addresses. She showed me her work, and I shared mine--at that time I was also working on a journal manuscript recounting my kundalini experiences (ultimately it became Unmasking the Rose). I gave her some pointers, and she read my preliminary manuscript, about which I had many qualms. She returned it with praise and encouragement--she had in fact gone over it with a fine tooth comb, her keen editor's eye noting every slip and typo, and pointing out many needed changes. It was a major gift.

And since then, Patricia has continued to give me many other major gifts (such as this blogsite, which she set up for me); in fact, she has devoted her life to the very act of giving to the world.

As I got to know her, I discovered her many areas of involvement. She is an artist, a singer, a social activist, a volunteer in many causes. Her great and continuing passion is peace itself. She goes out in sub zero weather with others to demonstrate for the cause of justice. She has organized her own branch of the Raging Grannies to help awaken the public conscience. She keeps always up to the minute on key issues, and sends out reprints from cutting edge activist groups to a large audience of readers. Her art and poetry often focus on contemporary concerns. She takes up the cause of immigrants caught in the net of deportation frenzy, not just by shaking her head and sympathizing, but by going to court for their hearings, writing to them in solitary confinement, getting to know their families, and publicizing their cases. She speaks for the rights of those unjustly exploited in our society whoever and wherever they are.

When Patricia goes down the street, she makes friends with everyone she meets. When a homeless person asks for help, she not only gives him/her money, she stops to ask how he/she is, whether he has a place to stay, how his health is today. Each recipient is filled with gratitude to be recognized as a worthy human being. When she goes through the transit station, she stops to chat with the "lowly" employees whose task it is to scrub the escalator steps, and takes their picture to include on her journal site. She volunteers at a local church to serve supper to the homeless, who are delighted by her presence.

Once a week, she goes to a public school in a very diverse neighborhood to assist the art teacher instill a love of art in very young students. The kids adore her, and compete for the chance to help bring her wheelchair into the building. She comes home with good stories. One innocent youngster even asked her what she wanted to be when she grew up.

For a year she met with a group of singers who produced a stunning CD under the direction of Carolyn McDade ("O Beautiful Gaia--Love Songs to Earth").

She belongs to a women's reading/discussion group. She swims an incredible number of laps several times a week.

To know her better, look at her website (windchime walker.com), which she created and set up by herself (to me, a remarkable achievement). It began as a site devoted to "creative disability" and has now expanded to include many areas. Among other sections, it includes her daily journal, which is read by people all over the world. Some are, like Patricia, "other abled," and she acts as their window to the world.

Patricia is a living testament to what we can do in our lives at whatever place or in whatever state we are at the moment, if we focus and give our energies to our efforts. In her younger days, she was a long distance runner, an active social worker, a prolific artist. Today, she continues her amazing work in the world, still moving at a fast pace. A list of her accomplishments would fill a very long page. My admiration for her is endless.

For, with all of her many talents and abilities, Patricia is above all a good friend--to me and innumerable others. For me, she has been mentor, wise woman, and unfailing support. She urges me always to have faith in what I am creating or pursuing. Although she follows no explicit "spiritual path," she is a living exemplar of the dedicated life--the life of compassionate action exalted by every spiritual tradition. She is our inspiration and our guide. How could we fail to keep our spirits aloft when such evidence of human goodness and creativity are before us?

A famous sage once wrote a book called Meetings with Remarkable Men. Meet Patricia, one of the most remarkable women the world has known.

Not a Thousand Prostrations

You do not have to
change your name
in order for god
to love you.

You are not required to rise
at a certain hour
nor wear a robe
of a specified color
because that's what
the others have chosen to do.

You needn't make
the thousand prostrations
nor circumnavigate the mountain
a hundred times
nor dwell on an image
of an imaginary form
until you think
it is who you are.

But you must
wash your heart
again and again
in the pure fountain
where sanctity dwells.
You must cleanse your spirit
many times over
in the cauldrons of love.

Only love, my friend,
will take you there.
Only the constant seekers
find the way.

copyright, Dorothy Walters


The only constant in kundalini is constant change. However you begin, whether in slow progression from stage to stage (do people really do this?) or in some sudden, shocking opening--your initial state won't last. Your energies may shift from faint stirrings to strong pulsations, or go the other direction--from dynamic to soft. You may have periods of extreme bliss interspersed with painful or even dry spells, when it seems that nothing much is happening to move you forward. You may think you have finally arrived at stasis, only to find yourself plunged once again into tumultuous feeling.

No one knows why these dramatic shifts occur, who is most susceptible to them, what the outcome will be. We only know the variations are endless, like the undulating colors which comprise a sunset, or the endlessly changing patterns of waves striking against the shore.

Some people wish to "control" the ceaseless interplay of the energies, to tame them through harsh disciplines. Others prefer to follow the inner guide, enjoying the play within as the unseen teacher leads the way. In a real sense, this dichotomy reflects patriarchal vs. matriarchal attitudes, mechanical vs. organic approaches, controlling vs. allowing.

I am of the latter persuasion. For me, too much discipline is intrusive, an arbitrary imposition of form on an intrinsically formless experience. I look on kundalini as ultimate gift, visitation of the divine. How then could I presume to override such majestic intelligence which has graced me by entering my life and leading me to ever deepening mystery?

This is not a melody already scored, nor a drama previously scripted. It is an ever new, constantly fresh revelation, just as this year's blossomings are not those of the year before.

The Ascent

Yes, there is a mountain.
Yes, you are on it,
struggling upward,
stumbling over boulder
and rock.
There are others climbing with you.
Sometimes you nod
to one another,
sometimes you move in silence.
Occasionally, the clouds break open,
and you see something up ahead,
a scene of green and gold
like a fantasy kingdom
in a children's fairy tale.

You think there must be an easier way,
a shortcut or secret tunnel.
Someone will surely
come for you.
But if you imagine you are, one day,
going to be lifted up
by an angel
and whisked to the top,
and there be fitted with shining golden wings
to carry you
to farther reaches on beyond,
no, that will not happen.
Your path is here,
plodding over hard rubble
and scree
in a light that is failing,
an atmosphere that
ever thins.

Sometimes you're not sure
there is a mountain.
If you are there, moving upward,
toward some destination,
some supposed journey's end.

copyright, Dorothy Walters

Shiva’s Bridegroom

(After the ceremony for his arranged marriage, the Shaivite poet-saint Sambandar begged Shiva to unite with him and thus liberate him from all earthly ties. At this word a great blaze of light enveloped him as he, his bride, and all the guests entered final union with his god.)

Then he became a flame.
Tendrils of fire played
along his lips, his brow,
his cheeks blossomed in tiny petals of light.
His body shone, like a god
coming to birth.
A sudden crimson flare.
Then nothing remained but a halo of gold,
a bronze shadow gleaming, translucent,
to mark where he had been.

Dorothy Walters, June 21, 2003, S. F.

Ours is perhaps at once the saddest and the most exciting time of history. Our violence is unsurpassed in its scale and long term consequences. And, in addition, we have lost the romantic vision. Always in the past, there was the aura of the transcendent, the other misty realm of poetry and meaning suffusing and elevating the manifest human sphere. Even warriors were imbued with a sense of honor, and higher purpose--e.g., the codes of honor which supported the protectors in "Beowulf," the high vision of divine guidance in The Iliad, one of the bloodiest of all epics. There was real good, real evil--as Dante witnessed and catalogued.

But today the myths are exploded, rejected entirely or else reduced to the jingoism and slogans of the masses, cheapened by political exploitation--shams that any thoughtful observer readily rejects.

But there is one area where myths survive and are yoked to mystery in their ancient marriage. That is in the spiritual realm, where experience outruns analysis, and transcendent vision is authenticated by inner alchemy. This is the mythic made real, the archetypes brought to life through crisis and confrontation.

Some reflections from last year:

Today I realized that I have written nothing in my journal since September. This has been a busy period--last Thursday I went again to Andrew's class and talked both morning and afternoon. This time things were not as intense as previously. In the morning class, I spoke on "Rumi as Poetic Inspiration" and read some of my poems which were inspired by or were responses to Rumi. In the afternoon I described my spiritual practice (mainly deep listening to sacred music, with some slow movement included.)

I was gratified that the classes were extremely responsive. They understood that my "journey"--though not the same as theirs--and my "practice" both gave them permission to follow their own paths, whatever those might be. One said she loved the energy path, but had been made to feel that she should do quiet sitting as "real meditation." Another woman said that as I read from "Unmasking the Rose" she could see my face in the rose on the cover. Then she began to sob, lamenting that she too wanted a lover (I don't know if she meant human or divine.) I held her in my arms for several minutes--clearly this was what she longed for.

My journey now consists to a great extent of sharing with others, and supporting them on their own journeys. I have kept up a heavy correspondence with an interesting "kundalini initiate" who lives on an organic farm in Washington state and can bring up the energies whenever she chooses by placing her tongue on the roof of her mouth. It seems that this has become a pattern--to discover a new friend and then to explore the relationship in some depth via e-mail (Laurence Edwards, Alice Howell, Cheela, Diana Douglas, Diane Knoll). The internet makes for a delightful way to meet new friends with similar (spiritual) interests. Indeed, Brian the psychic was right: he told me I was going to meet "many new and wonderful friends." Most recently I have connected with David Baum, who had a seeming heart attack in Peru at the base of Macchu Picchu, and subsequently wrote an incredible account of his recovery experience, and Beverly Fontaine, a remarkable social worker from southern California who is writing a dissertation on social work and the spiritual path.

The circles are closing--the networks are forming at an ever increasong rate, on many levels of consciousness.


July 31, 2003

I may have written entries since the above, but can't remember. Here is a recent "bliss events" of note (just to keep a record that "it' is still happening.)

Last week--on Friday, I think, I was moving slowly and listening to music--don't recall what--when it happened. For half an hour or so I felt once more the "exquisite bliss" of the divine energies. I stroked my "aura" (mostly arms and chest) for many minutes--my head opened, chest, torso, arms, wrists, hands--everything was merely bliss waves.

At this stage, what many of us are learning is how to swing back and forth from "bliss consciousness" to ordinary, or rational, consciousness. To swoon in sensuous delight, then focus our minds on the ordinary, the familiar--to write coherently about abstraction, follow a movie, read the newspaper, interact with others socially, run errands--all the necessary activities of the quotidian. And that is the trick--now one, now the other, now exaltation, now the daily, to "live in the world and out of it."

In the Botanical Gardens

I have come here
to see you naked.
To witness your hidden
geometry of passion
laid bare, here,
in this winter's time.

The brilliant hues of summer
have vanished--
the shimmering pinks
and blazing blood-orange reds,
the boisterous yellows
and radiant peacock blues--
all have faded,
melted into
the earth's pale mouth,
leaving behind this stark revelation,
the denuded underpinnings of desire.

Before me the slender needles
of this reedlike plant
gather and thrust upward
in a bold rapture of grey and white
like an arrangement
in a still life set free,
splinters of liquid light
lifting against the sky.

I pause and marvel
at this muted bliss,
unclothed conspiracy of all
things which remain
and rise in joy.

Yeats said truth arrives
when naked to naked goes.

Something releases deep within.

I am shedding my garments
as I go.


Dorothy Walters, January 21-31, 2004

copyright, Dorothy Walters

It Arrives as Music

When the universe blazes us
into being,
O, what is it we find?

Is it Mozart
patterning our lives
into a crafted tempest of sound?

Mahler, with his rich darkness,
exultant tones
lifting us to those peaks
of celebration
where the sonorous horns
eternally dwell?

Or is it cellos--
think Dvorak,
think Saint-Saens--
think colors
radiant and bold,
infusing us with sudden glory,
token of beatitude,
remembrance of all we left behind.

Dorothy Walters
September 22, 2003


September 10, 2002

So very much has happened since the publication of the book. I mentioned above the trip to Mendocino, but not the absolutely rapturous experience in the orchestral rehearsal tent. One afternoon I was walking on the trail above the cliffs, and heard music coming from the tent. I went up to investigate, and found the Mendocino summer orchestra rehearsing for the night's performance of Mendelssohn's Piano Concerto # 2. First I took a modest seat near the back. Then I slipped down about midway. (The tent was almost empty of listeners.) Finally, I went forward as far as I could go, so that I was all but under the piano.

And there she was, an incredible pianist I had never heard of, (was it Barbara Nisson?) playing with great energy and flair, each stroke a dynamic gesture which aroused impulses of exquisite bliss within my body. Each pore seemed to open, and I felt as though I was literally trying to leave my body in ecstatic levitation. I was totally rapturous, totally ravishing, touching every single cell and membrane. Afterwards, I approached her and told her she had truly opened my charkas. "Me too," she said, "at least on a good day." Here is the poem I wrote:

The Rehearsal

(Mendocino, Barbara Nisson, June, 2002)

'An ornament of the eternal,'
that poet said.

As, indeed, that pianist there
in the huge tent billowing on the cliff
overlooking the sea,
practicing with nothing
but her fingers and notes
and keys laid out over a huge black box,
and the orchestra swelling
against her in the background,
and what that did to
our straining bodies,
every pore illumined by bliss,
our hearts speeding
as if we were being
lifted up,
ascension of levitation,
even our hands opening
to a dense pleasure,
shameless intensity,
hopeless vibration of ecstasy,
the kingdom discovered at last.

Dorothy Walters
July 30, 2002, S. F.

As it turned out, this was but one of a series of intense ecstatic experiences. I talked to a class at UCS on Women's Spirituality, did a radio interview with "Mysteries of the Mind" (Santa Fe, N. M.), and then had a totally transcendent and totally draining two days with Andrew in his class and the next evening as part of a joint performance with Andrew, Eryk, and Mary Ford Grabowsky. The excitement was intense. Andrew included dancing both in the class and at the evening fund raiser. In the class, he performed some rituals, such as prostrating himself at my feet, and having the class surround me and send loving energies. Everything was charged, as if we all entered an energy field together, a field of vital love and sensuous feeling, a preview of the future, perhaps. I think of this state as "group spirit," the sharing and intensifying of energies through common realization.

After that, I was totally exhausted for the next week. When I finally felt a bit more normal, I played the "Trance Tara" tape of Jonathan Goldman (I had been playing it off and on for several days) and had what I could only call "Supreme Ecstasy." All I can say is that it literally went beyond all other experiences, so much so that I had to quit after only 15 minutes, and lie down. But, of course, I felt terrible the next day, and actually thought I would not want to continue this process if the price continued to be so high. So I vowed "Eschew ecstasy...walk more in the park, and eat more strawberries." In other words, follow a middle path between extremes, and enjoy a more "normal" state of being. But of course after a few days, I succumbed once more to temptation, and again felt engulfed in exquisite bliss waves--intense but not at quite the same level as before. And since then, I have repeated the experience, always with the same tape, and walking afterward when I could.

Today I started out feeling great, energized and well balanced. I did my laundry, carrying the basket back and forth across the street. Then I decided to try the Trance Tara tape again, but it didn't feel right. I had a few pleasant sensations, but nothing like previous sessions. And I even felt a bit nauseous, so I quit after some 20 minutes. It is as if something else decided. I cannot make the raptures happen. I can simply "show up" and be ready in case "they" decided to manifest. Again, I am groping my way forward, not knowing exactly what or how to approach the experience, hoping that I am doing the right thing.

In any event, my life has been filled with sensuous rapture many times since the entry in late May--the "anniversary" plus the approaching publication date of the book.

Here are some questions I have been asked on Kundalini:

1. Is Kundalini an orgasm, or something like an orgasm?

My own answer is no to the first, and maybe to the second. However, kundalini affects different people in different ways. Some report intense sexual arousal, others lose interest entirely. It has (for me) no sexual provocation, nor a sexual outcome. In fact, sometimes the blissful experience seems to include virtually every part of the body but the lower chakras. How can there be an orgasm if the sexual centers are not involved, and there is no sense of the root or genitals awakening? Then one wonders, where is the energy coming from if not the root? But it is definitely delightful and sensuous. The orgasm is perhaps the nearest thing in human experience to compare it with. It is as though the entire nervous system were awakened in waves of sensuous bliss, which may be gentle or quite intense.

2. Is the experience always the same?

Never. It varies remarkably, just as one's experience of anything (music, sex, viewing art, etc.) is never the same. Sometimes the energy flows from the skull downward, sometimes from the root upward, sometimes it is very strong ("like a brass band") and sometimes it is delicate ("a flute playing in the distance"). It has a million guises and disguises, and varies not only from time to time but from person to person.

3. Is it a "nothing but" experience?

Those who seek to reduce the full visitation to a "nothing but a stirring of chi from breath or meditation or whatever" and who imagine they have had a similar experience which they can easily explain ("it was only...") haven't had it. It is the descent of the holy ghost (sacred divine) in such a way that it catapults one into a new reality, and totally transforms the life. Anything less is a "sip" but not the full cup.

4. What is the purpose of Kundalini transformation?

To divinize the human race, to raise humanity to a new level of vibration in order to prepare it for its advance to the next level of evolution. We don't know exactly what that state will be, when it will occur, or exactly how it will occur. But this is part of a divine process, and it will be executed by divine intelligence. Our role is to acquiesce, to allow the process to play out in our own bodies, to allow the change to occur "creature by creature, being by being."

5. Why is this phenomenon occurring at this time in history?

Because of the acute world crisis. Crisis triggers transformation. And transformation is needed for survival, the race lifted to a revised condition.

6. What awakens the Kundalini flow?

Kundalini can be awakened through a myriad of stimuli--yoga, breath, sexual practice designed for the purpose, music, poetry, art, emotions of all sorts including sadness as well as joy. Its initial arousal can be swift or gradual, through specific intent or accidental triggering. No one knows exactly how to awaken it, nor why it chooses to appear when it does. Most of the descriptions are of an ideal model of awakening (energies proceeding in orderly fashion from chakra to chakra), but in fact almost no actual experience conforms to that model.

7. When we feel the energy of the earth itself, is that Kundalini?

According to some, yes. The kundalini energies are the life force, the impelling dynamic of all that is. So--what flows upwards from the earth is cosmic kundalini. Sacred sites often are located at places where people have felt the earth energies coming forth from time immemorial.

8. How widespread is the kundalini phenomenon at this time?

Again, no one knows for sure. Twenty years ago, few had heard of kundalini, much less experienced it, especially in the west. Now there are countless reports of personal experience, many books, web sites, talk sites, and so forth. Kundalini consciousness is growing at an increasingly rapid rate, as if humanity as a whole were approaching a point of critical mass, when planetary initiation will occur.

9. Is full kindalini awakening evidence of "enlightenment."

Enlightenment is a state often talked about and seldom achieved. To go through kundalini arousal may take one into a temporary "enlightenment state." It may offer a glimpse or taste of the full enlightenment experence. Certain initiates even claim that they are enlightened. However, I wonder if one in complete and sustained samadhi wouldn't by the fact become totally disconnected from "this world," and its activities. Is it enough to know that "we" are unreal, that we are mere phantoms of our own imagining? Is the person truly enlightened whose private behavior is exploitive of or dishonoring toward others? Isn't something lacking in a guru who knows only a certain technique passed down by his own teacher. but cannot converse on matters such as art, or literature or contemporary issues or western philosophy? Do we really need "enlightened" beings here at this moment of history, or do we rather need "bodhisattvas" to aid us all in these most desperate times? The latter is of the world, but not in it. She puts her personal salvation to one side, in order to attend to the immediate challenges of humanity and our planet.

The ideal is both saint and seer, one whose background embraces familiarity with both western culture and eastern practices, left brain and right, compassion and commitment. In my view, there may be hidden saints among us, but those who openly claim enlightment aren't.

copyright, Dorothy Walters


Don't Make Lists

Every day a new flower rises
from your body's fresh soil.
Don't go around looking
for fallen petals
in a fairy tale, when you've
got the golden plant
right here, now,
shooting forth in light from your eyes,
your awakening crown.

Don't make lists, or explore ancient accounts.
Forget everything you know
and open.


At the Very Moment

No matter what you know,
someone is always wanting
to correct you,
to sell you a bill of goods,
from the shop marked
"authority."
All the "authorities" got
frozen into stone years
ago after the great flood
wiped out original knowledge,
and left behind only these granite shadows.

Reality is always
soft clay,
ever shifting and changing
its shape.

Fire it into form, and
at the very moment
you are hailing it as
final truth
it will break in your hands.


In the Tent

Everyone wants to gaze on
the mystery,
there, in the center
of the tent,
all draped in darkness,
like a writing of ebony
inscribed on night.

The crowd, impatient, shuffles, sighs,
becomes an edge of melting snow.
Only the god-haunted few
remain,
staring into the purple cleft,
waiting.

from Marrow of Flame

Each year, around the end of May (the date of my original awakening), I experience a renewal or revisitation of the original energies. For the most part, these are now quiet through the year, with only a few occasional stirrings . So I had more or less assumed that the process was now virtually complete, that I could settle into a comfortable state of equanimity, my psychic system functioning more or less as "normal," except for these occasional reminders.

But two years ago, as the anniversary date approached, I began to notice some unusual happenings. For one, my upper spine itched mightily for two or three weeks, and I had to scratch with a wooden fork. Then, on May 19, Cheela, Autumn, and I met for our first session of study of the ancient text of Kashmiri Shaivism called Vijnana-bhairava (The Yoga of Delight, Wonder, and Astonishment.) When Cheela did some Sanskrit chanting, I noticed with delight that pleasurable sensations were awakened within, as if something long dormant was stirring. A few days later, I again noticed blissful energies playing here and there. So I decided to do some of my familiar "practice" from earlier times. I put on some Sanskrit chanting (Guru Mai, actually) and quickly fell into a transcendent state. I stood quietly before the speakers and made very slow movements, mostly with my arms and hands. Then the energies came in full force, running up and down the spine in exquisite bliss, traveling here and there throughout the body. I put on Vyaas Houston's tape of chakra meditation, and found I could in fact raise the energies through the chakras one by one, all the way to the top (usually I can't do this). I also could trace Sanskrit "om" on my left palm, with the fingers of my right hand positioned about two inches above it. The energies were, in fact, in many respects, as rapturous and intense as those of the beginning, as if the initiation were repeating itself.

Well, I thought, what a nice anniversary celebration. Maybe I am not finished yet with delight.

About a week later, I went to my friend Helen's house for a birthday celebration. Soon after I arrived, I noticed that the energies of this house were very sweet--in fact, I seemed to breathe the sweetness in and out as I stood there near the kitchen counter. Both Helen and her partner Richard have done serious Buddhist practice. They have even gone trekking in Tibet. They are both very loving, spiritual people. Then, the rest of the guests arrived, and I no longer noticed the special atmosphere.

I practiced occasionally for the next week, and had some flowing energies. During this period I printed up some material on Vasugupta (one of the early rishis of Kashmir Shaivism) and noticed that sweet energies were running even from this small connection with the ancient holy one. It was that day that I discovered that Unmasking the Rose was now published, though no one had informed me ahead of time. I suddenly felt abandoned, as if I were about to cross a threshold (reveal my most private experience to the world) but with no one to support or guide, no helping hand. I was, in fact, terrified.

I felt as though I had stripped naked in public, and now was frantically groping for a sheet--but it was now too late, of course. Finally, I played a tape of Hildegard of Bingen, and felt the intensely subtle and very high energies of that music. I sent forth prayers for the many I know who are undergoing extreme agony and loss in their lives. After only a few minutes, I stopped, but felt better, more grounded.

It was cold and overcast in San Francisco that day, not at all like the sunny Kansas morning in 1981 when I received my initiation. But the experience itself was similar in many ways--energy in the root as well as elsewhere, flowing sweetness when I lifted my arms slowly to begin "chi gong." I also tried a bit of yoga on the floor, and found I was too stiff to do much at all, but there was indeed some bliss. Now I have a backache from my exertions.


These energetic stirrings were clearly related to the anniversary as well as anticipation of the upcoming publication.

And, I experienced a similar (but shorter) period of anxiety and excitement (as well as slight illness) when I began this blog site. Going public to an unknown audience isn't easy.

-On Kundalini and Growing Older-

When I was younger, I said it was difficult to distinguish between the symptoms of kundalini and menopause. Now I say much the same about kundalini and the aging process. Who knows which is which? Am I younger or older in my body because of the kundalini experience? Is it more or is it less difficult to sustain the energies? Have I harmed or helped myself by my prolonged experience? Would I be better off--able to make a more effective gift in return--if I were now 40 (or 50 or even 60)?

What will people think when they see me, with all the attributes and manifest imperfections of age? What will they make of the fact that my physical energies are limited, and other difficulties are apparent (stiffness, slowed movement, etc.)?

I am not a perfect specimen, either from the standpoint of health or appearance. I look like an ordinary woman, with ordinary features for a person in her seventies. So--where does all this lead?

The psychic who did a brilliant phone reading for me a few years ago spoke to this concern in that early session. He said people would be willing to listen to me because no one--absolutely no one--was less pretentious, less intimidating. That part seems to be quite right.

The bottom line: I must, like anyone else my age, do whatever I can to "sustain the vessel," to maintain good health and well being in order to fulfill the rest of this curious destiny, which I have chosen, or which has chosen me.

I think I have reached the age when I am more ready to take risk. Why not?

No doubt about it, Kundalini is like a marriage. First comes the ceremony (the preparation) followed by the night of love. This is the bridal night, the time of discovery, of intense, unbearable bliss (and some pain as the virginity of the old spirit is relinquished), and continuous, wild inner celebration. At last, the inner voice says, I have found it. Finally, I have arrived at my true destination, the home I have dreamed about, the lost Eden I have sought for so long.

The world without wears a face of luminous beauty. Every one and everything is exquisitely lovely. All of humanity reflects the perfection of the divine, and there is no separation between the self and others.

And the ecstasy, the lovemaking, continues unabated for days, for weeks, months even. It is said that some never return to their prior state, but remain always wafted onto another plane, somewhere beyond the merely human.

Then one day, there is an interruption. Something doesn't feel right. There is pain, unease, a general sense of malaise. One senses that this is not a perfect union after all. Bride and groom discover they are not an ideal match, the house is too small to accommodate two such separate beings. There are differences, disagreements--and the newlyweds realize they are not really a single entity , but dual selves who have cast their lot together, made eternal promises they can never undo. And, in the case of kundalini, it is as if two individual consciousnesses, two very different natures, are trying to occupy the single house of one body/psyche, trying to meld themselves together into a wholeness, each striving to merge with a stranger.

And from this point on, the struggle continues. Amidst the pain, the suffering, are nights of utter euphoria, days of unimaginable transcendent bliss. But, sooner or later, ecstasy is replaced by suffering, anguish takes the place of joy, and one wonders what sort of bargain has been struck.

And so it continues, month after month, year after year, until at last the warring partners make peace, each having given up something of value, each having received some priceless treasure in return. The merely human has surrendered a major portion of ego in order to know this unsuspected reality. The energies which emanate from the "higher" source as kundalini have entered and transformed matter, but this physical home lacks many of the freedoms of the totally discarnate state. It learns not to call upon its partner so often, to respect the limits of the other. And like a fickle lover, it sometimes disappears without warning, seems to abandon altogether the faithful spouse left waiting behind, wondering what has changed.

But, somehow, the energies always return, manage through now familiar paths of seduction to enjoy once more the good graces of the ever forgiving partner. And after a difficult and seemingly endless process, they are finally fused together, they are indeed a New Being. They are ready to set forth, to become visible to the world and reveal the results of this arduous alchemy, humanity not perfected but indelibly transformed.

(copyright, Dorothy Walters)


The Woman Who Slept with Shiva

I called him down,
and when he came,
I opened my arms,
as if to a lost husband, or child.

I thought I would turn to ash
in that brilliant flame,
my body, lustrous
as a star,
surrendering its defining atoms of gold,
its threads of memory, even,
to that blinding dance.

Everything dissolved
into a wave of feeling
till nothing was left
but the essential light.

Then I came back.
I slipped away
to the scullery,
and my bed at the top of
the attic stairs,
where I keep my amulet,
and my bracelet of stone.

At first I stayed silent,
thinking of what it might mean.
Now I am telling my story,
but no one wishes to hear.
They say they must tend to the weaving,
the harvest ready to come in.
They worry about sons
who complain of the brides they have chosen,
about daughters who scorch the rice,
and forget to put salt in the soup.
They think that the heat has gotten to me,
recall that my mother's father
was always a bit strange.
I think I have been
on an improbable adventure;
at night I dream of a face
I can't quite see,
although I almost glimpse it, at times,
in the pitcher I carry
from the stream at morning,
in the violet clouds
that gather at dusk.

from Marrow of Flame


God's Mistress

The other bears
his ring and name.

I lurk in doorways,
clothed in shadow,
waiting for a touch
so intense
I no longer care
what they call me,
or whisper about in the kitchens.

I am the wanton who keeps close company
with what the fathers denounce
and the many shun.
When god comes calling on
his whore,
the sidewalks empty,
and all curtains close.

from Marrow of Flame

By now, my spirit had confronted its ultimate terror. The ideal love relation, the mythology which had supported it, the sense of unassailable trust--all had been shattered irrevocably.

But, in the midst of such emotional devastation, some small seed of hope was beginning to stir. For loss also brings with it freedom, the unleashing of the self to pursue its own destined ends, to find its own inner reality. The inner death had prepared an opening.

On this sunny morning, I sat quietly in my living room, writing in my journal. My elm-lined street carried little sound other than the drone of an occasional passing car. It was spring; the trees were already heavy with green, and the flowers were coming to bloom along this typical Midwestern city street. I was contemplating the notion of balances, the desired midpoint between extremes of either too much or too little in the various realms.

And then, I was awakened. It was as if the limits of mind had been reached, as if the intensity of events pressed through, and I was catapulted into a new level of awareness beyond thought, beyond concepts, beyond all intellectual formulation or description This is what happened:

The book I was reading mentioned kundalini, but did not describe it in detail. It spoke of the ancient yogis who could raise the "serpent power" from the base of the spine to the head. On impulse, I decided to see if I could raise my own energies in this way. I meditated on an image of the god and goddess in union (Shiva/shakti, from an illustration in the text) and focused on my breathing. Almost instantaneously I felt an ecstatic surge of energy in the lower chakras and then, within seconds, this intense force rushed upward and into my head. My very crown seemed to open in rapture, and for many minutes I felt the energies of the unseen immensity flow in, as if petal after radiant petal were unfolding in my crown. As long as I did not think about what was happening, the experience continued, but each time self-awareness intruded, the process was interrupted.

In that moment of grace I realized that the notion of personal identity was an ongoing illusion, a myth that the small being recites to itself in its state of lostness and isolation. I knew that we were each one but atoms within the larger frame, the boundless real. . . . I did not return immediately to ordinary consciousness. I remained in a state of exalted awareness and rapture for months thereafter. I seemed to undergo a prolonged initiation directed by unseen guides. I saw the light around my body and heard my new name. I experienced deep rapture each time I called up the image of the god/goddess in union. Even when I was not meditating, I was filled with strong, ecstatic energies.

During this time, I "discovered" certain initiatory implements, such as a tiny bell, a vajra (for me, a crystal prism, in the shape of a barbell), and a design I thought of as a yantra (an image for meditation). With these instruments and with much inner guidance I completed a major weeklong initiation. On the final day I saw in vision an inner image of Christ on the cross.

The world was now lit by an inner beauty surpassing everything I had experienced before, as I saw the beauty beneath the beauty. Every face was my own, every leaf or bloom an aspect of my being. I felt that I had, at last, fused all levels. I knew, finally and incontrovertibly, that spirit and flesh are one, matter and the transcendent but different faces of a single essence.

from Unmasking the Rose



The Runaway

The Place where you are right now
God circled on a map for you.
Hafiz

The poet says
god has put a circle around you on a map
to locate you in sacred space.
Then why do you keep tunneling
underground,
carving labyrinths for your escape?

from Marrow of Flame


Going Over

This poem of Kabir,
the one beginning,
The flute of interior time is played
whether we
hear it or not . . . .
How often can we let ourselves
say these words in silence,
without danger of losing something,
our foothold, our grip on the rail,
the tiny thread in our hand connecting us
to something we have forgotten or lost,
until we at last give up and go plunging over
into that waiting, roiling sea?

from Marrow of Flame

How We Are Apprehended and Claimed by the Invisible

When I was in my early fifties, something happened to me which changed my life forever. I did not go out of my body and float beneath the ceiling, I did not fly down a tunnel toward a lighted figure waiting at the end. This experience was something other, something almost no one in my circle had heard of at the time, and which I knew only by rumor, brief allusions in certain texts and one autobiographical account by an Indian mystic.

The name of what occurred is "Kundalini Awakening." Kundalini is a Sanskrit word meaning "coiled." According to ancient seers, the Kundalini energy is a snake resting (for most of us) at the base of the spine. When it is roused, it raises its head and climbs upward, activating various energy centers (chakras, or "wheels") as it goes. The student is cautioned to approach this process warily, for premature awakening can easily lead to imbalance of the system. Acute illness, even death, as well as major psychological disturbance can result. The practitioner is warned to proceed cautiously under the supervision of an experienced teacher, one pure of heart and well versed in the nuances of energetic transformation. The reward of successful arousal is ineffable bliss and union with the divine--in other words, enlightenment itself.

Now, my Kundalini experience did not follow such a pattern. I was, at the time, 53 years old. I was living in a Midwestern city teaching English and women's studies in a state university more dedicated to the production of engineers and M.B.A.'s than in supporting the humanities. I had never meditated nor done yoga. I lived primarily in my head, not in my body. I had never even had a massage.

I had in this life, just as I have always done wherever I have been, constructed a secret universe, an inner world to serve as a refuge from the hostile elements without. My first secret world, that of childhood, was simply the world of books and nature. In the woods near my house I sensed an unknown but compelling presence, a reality unlike any I encountered elsewhere. At home I read, and then spent long hours dreaming by the fire of my imaginary encounters. Then in my teens, I was introduced to a church whose beliefs and practices went so far beyond the familiar institutions of my time that I felt I had been inducted into a secret society. My next experience of the hidden--as a young adult-- arose from living as a lesbian. For me, this was a totally private experience, which had nothing to do with public revelation or political involvement. Indeed, in those days, even friends who recognized each other as lesbian sisters often did not acknowledge the discovery to one another.

Then, when I was in my forties, I began to explore still other unfamiliar realms. Once more, I was seduced by books, but now the authors were writers such as Carlos Castaneda, Jane Roberts, Carl Jung, Joseph Campbell, Mircia Eliade, and John Blofield. I plunged into a deep study of W. B. Yeats, where I discovered the Golden Dawn and the lure of communicating with invisible spirits. By now my partner Kate and I were in a state of psychic merge; we could make the letters on the ouija board flash with iridescent light, as the planchette flew to spell out tantalizing answers to our questions. But one night a very startling message came through, one which frightened and disturbed us both. We renounced our project, and I returned to my teaching pursuits.

So when, after several years of avoiding psychic and/or intense spiritual encounters, I was (it seemed) singled out and captured by a new spiritual energy, one which appeared to originate within my own body, though connected in some mysterious way to an outside force, I felt that something entirely novel had entered my life. It took many years before I realized that what was now happening was linked to, indeed was a direct consequence of all the prior events of my life, as if an inner intention, thwarted at one gateway, had simply withdrawn, and later, at the propitious time, entered swiftly through a different door, seizing me and claiming me as its own. For, once Kundalini flashes upward through the channels, once it floods the higher centers, unlocking the crown to receive the streaming effulgence of the light beyond, one knows, forever and indisputably, that the atomic crystal which carries our name is but a fiction, a tale repeated by the (small) self to the self to lure us into the belief of separate identity, until the dream-armor is shattered and nothing remains but silence and being.

I knew almost nothing of this strange power called Kundalini. To my notion, it was the essential energies of the being, which lay collected at the base of the spine, coiled like a serpent. Kundalini is traditionally imaged not only as a snake, but also as a goddess who awakens. (Indeed, she is held to be the "goddess of goddesses," the fundamental force of the universe itself.) According to the ancient texts, she may be experienced in her fullness only when Shakti, the personal energies of the self, are aroused and brought up (lifted) to the head, there to unite with Shiva (the cosmic energies which give life to the universe and all its elements). When this union occurs, the head will "open" and fill with the delight of "a thousand petals unfolding." Thus, the tradition holds, after many years of dedicated practice, the initiate may attain "enlightenment," blissful union with the divine.

My awakening did not come about in this manner. It was, rather, abrupt and unforeseen, my life transformed in a single instant of grace. From one point of view, I was totally unprepared to be plunged into such an unfamiliar state. From another, I had been preparing my entire life for this transition, and the actual event was merely the culmination of circumstances which had built as if from a foreordained plan. In any event, I was plunged into a time of unimaginable bliss and bodily ecstasy, as well as periods of intense pain and suffering. Indeed, for the "unprepared" initiate, Kundalini exacts a long period of balancing and integration, until the system at last finds it own inner stability and calm. For me, the process was well worth the extremes of its rocky course, for it opened a path of union with the divine. Each deep encounter provided verification of sacred reality, the essence which engenders, enlivens, and sustains all that is, and whose energies can literally be felt in our own bodies, if we but open to them. The "Beloved Within" is not a metaphor. It is a reality to be known and acknowledged in the undeniable evidence of our own subjective experience.

Because this account includes journal entries, kept in notebook form over a period of years, it includes a variety of voices and tones--some narrative, some lyric, some reflective, and some playful. "What I was thinking" was often the primary content of "what I was experiencing," especially in the preliminary stages, the time of preparation. These insights seemed to come as divine teachings, inner instruction as to certain fundamental realities, particular truths the student must grasp as part of the initiation process. And at times, the voice is quite clearly that of the inner teacher, answering specific questions or dictating certain passages.

I have included in the primary text a few of these early sections of abstract speculation in order to show how mental exploration can serve as preparation for spiritual renewal, and to reveal the abruptness of the shift from a primarily mental to an essentially experiential focus. Other such entries appear in the appendix, to emphasize that thought itself--the seeing into the invisible--was a key element in the experience, in both early and later stages. I have incorporated some examples of Kate's "Dream Speaking" in order to show the closeness of the personal relationship, and because they illumine in a special way how the unconscious functions as a vehicle for puns, word play, and humor. (In part, the entire experience of Kundalini awakening is one of bringing unconscious materials into consciousness. For me, that unconscious is essentially the transpersonal level, present but unknown much of the time. In Jungian terms, this realm of the unknown is the repository of the archetypes, the domain of the collective unconscious, and these, I believe, are not fantasies but realities which can enter our lives to operate in highly significant ways.)

I feel that this experience is distinctive in that the initiate is not, at the end, swallowed by or absorbed into an established spiritual ideology, nor wafted out of the world. Her teacher is the inner guide, the solitary voice within who leads to ever higher levels of spiritual discovery. The student (which is me) frequently functions both as subject and interpreter, seeking out hidden implications of such deep rooted spiritual experience for contemporary society with its many abiding tensions. Though she follows ancient paths, she remains established in the present, able to witness and respond to the events of her time. She acknowledges the shadow on both personal and global levels, and continues to seek the ultimate amidst the contingencies of daily experience. Reality is not defined as a closed system. Rather it--the future and our tenuous vision of truth--remain always open to continuing investigation and dialogue.

Thus nothing in this notebook--particularly in those sections which involve the "processing" of ideas, many of which are drawn from the storehouse of perennial wisdom--is intended as a final statement or definitive pronouncement. This manuscript is a record of transactions, not a presentation of "Truth." Some of these transactions are mental (conceptual), some describe personal experience, and some are "dictations" from an unknown source, the "inner guru" ready to answer the deep queries of the self.

Is Kundalini, as some suggest, the next stage in the ongoing evolution of human consciousness? Gopi Krishna and others have drawn such radical conclusions, and, after careful thought and years of experience, I agree; indeed, universal transformation through stimulation of Kundalini appears to be a process well underway. Twenty years ago, it was virtually unheard of outside of the East. Today, it is becoming more and more common across the globe. Various websites offer discussions and personal accounts of myriad seekers who are undergoing inner transformation engendered by Kundalini encounters of one sort or another. The word is heard ever more frequently in common discussion. Although few arrive at the ultimate gate of "enlightenment" (indeed, the very notion is currently under question), increasing numbers are experiencing this wondrous power in diverse ways. Each encounter is unique, geared to the nature and needs of the novice/initiate. For most, it is an event which transforms the self at the deepest level. It carries us to regions of whose existence we had not dreamed, and yields visions we cannot describe. Kundalini is the source, the point of balance, toward which we all continually struggle. It is indeed a potent healing force for the self and for the world. Manifesting as love, compassion, and oneness, it can carry us to the next stage, humanity transformed and transfigured.

Introduction, Unmasking the Rose



Seekers

Each of us is searching for
a wise man or woman
to lead us,
to present us
a scroll heavy with answers.

Some of us have climbed the mountain,
tracked the glacier's crust,
lain down in snow for days, years,
burning away to essence,
preparing.

Others have clung
to the underside of overhanging rock
until their fingers turned
to stone,
until they were riveted
like lead
to this thin edge of certainty.

And others wander, drifting like mist
through the valleys.

What is it we are seeking?
What will we do if we are brushed
by this lion's mane?

from Marrow of Flame


Smoke Clad

Only the stunned and bewildered ever glimpse the throne.
Rumi

All of us have been stunned enough,
and bewildered enough,
passing again and again over landscape
we could never name,
sun where stars should be,
moon coming forth at noon,
ourselves leaping through exploding
rainbows of flame,
landing, perhaps, at the heart,
the silent core,
hands glowing and empty,
bodies clothed only in ashes and tint.

from Marrow of Flame

Those drowned in God want to be more drowned.
--Rumi

Everything in.
Nothing held back,
not the bewildered face in the mirror,
the memory of the first time,
the quarrel and reconciliation.

This wind will sweep you
from yourself,
the way clouds absorb an ocean,
the way fire seeks out
the marrow of flame.

When it is over
you will be less than a bit
of twisted weed,
smaller than a splinter
of sea-blackened wood.

You will not miss
your lost possessions
nor even remember their uses.
When someone shows you
your cast items,
your familiar appendages
and agendas,
even your flashing ornaments,
you will look puzzled,
and ask, "What are these?
Their functions or relevance?
I have drunk from a deep well.
What are these sips you offer,
'just for the taste?'
I'm looking for a world
sky deep in water."

from "Marrow of Flame"