Kundalini Splendor

I continue to be fascinated by Jan Frazier's book called "When Fear Falls Away." It is, as they say, a "compelling read," one of finest accounts of inner transformation I have encountered.

One of the most striking features (for me) is her descriptions of her personal experiences that in fact are reflections of universal aspects of the journey. And I recognized in her account many similarities to my own transformation, expressions of the same dilemmas and delights, sometimes as virtually identical responses.

Jan, as a writer and teacher of writing, is determined to describe her experience fully and accurately, yet--and this is the great irony--what is happening to her--this intense inner experience of joy and freedom from fear--is by its own nature indescribable. How can you delineate those inner currents,those wondrous waves of feeling that have taken over your psyche and now sweep you along in a tumultuous rapture? By definition, these subjective states are ineffable. As well try to catch the wind in a butterfly net or look for god in a petri dish as capture these indefinable states in words.

She also enters what mystics call the experience of Oneness, the realization that all of our perceptions, based as they are are on the separation of one thing from another, one creature or item from all the rest, are false, for we are all--every person and sentient being and even the non-aware components of our world--part of a wholeness, a single unity. She uses the term"sponginess" to describe the porous and permeable quality of reality.

She includes as well an eloquent description of a glorious sexual experience with her husband. Often, when spirit awakens, flesh is filled with great joy that then expresses itself as sex on a new level, reaching what many would call ultimate Tantric experience. It often feels as if the gods and goddesses have come to earth and imbued oneself and the partner with divine attributes. Jan does not speak in such terms, but rather writes with grace and wonder of the event itself as transcendence beyond past pleasures.

And then there is the happiness, the constant euphoria, of her new found state. She not only is relieved of her past anxieties and fear, but realizes that she has found the strength and stability to face any challenge that may arise in her life. She is, in fact, now a new being, for she has literally been "reborn."

So far I have read only the first section of the book, but I am delighted to discover so many parallels with my own and others' experience as we move ahead on our personal journeys of transformation. Though universal in its overall scope, each voyage is at the same time new, each telling fresh, for each is a unique encounter with the mystery that takes us back to source.

(Here are some views from my window this morning. The snow has now stopped (at least for now) and the temperature is 37 degrees, so it should melt in a day or two. It is another "winter wonderland" outside. I am warm and cozy in my apartment looking out on the beauty outside, as if someone had dropped a lovely white silk shawl over the trees and landscape.)