Following El Collie’s book Branded by the Spirit , here is another work devoted to the phenomenology of awakened kundalini in the human body—one that emerges from the intensity of direct personal experience and lived encounters with this mysterious psycho-spiritual bodily phenomenon.
This is Gopi Krishna’s Kundalini: The Evolutionary Energy in Man, a book that offers something further of inestimable value: the commentaries by James Hillman, which illuminate this process from the perspective of Jungian analytical psychology.
And although, personally, I find El Collie’s writing style more engaging, the value of Gopi Krishna’s book is indisputable. Hillman’s commentaries become a kind of dialogue between himself, as a representative of Jungian analysis, and Pandit Gopi Krishna, who experienced a spontaneous awakening of kundalini. This dialogue, in turn, becomes a bridge that enables a spiritual meeting between East and West, telling us that “spontaneous kundalini awakening” and an “awakened individuation impulse” are two different concepts describing the same phenomenon—the spiritual awakening of the human being.
As a psychotherapist, I cannot fail to appreciate such a contribution. Knowledge of kundalini energy was not part of my training as a psychologist, but knowledge of the process of individuation was. If I do not know what the “diagnosis” is, I cannot know what the “treatment” should be either. Until now, the purely bodily aspect of spiritual transformation processes had deeply confused me. It is one thing to work psychotherapeutically with affects and thoughts that distort the perception of reality—but how does one work with this energy of spiritual development when it manifests through the body?
After becoming more thoroughly acquainted with the phenomenon of spontaneous kundalini awakening, I feel calmer. True clarity came, however, when—thanks to this book—I saw so distinctly the identity between this phenomenon and the processes of individuation in Jungian analytical psychology. Because if the diagnosis is “an awakened individuation impulse,” the appropriate treatment is clear—it is called individuation. This means that the aim of therapeutic work is to support the processes involved in the birth of the unified and indivisible Self of the human being.
In this particular case, however, it is not even appropriate to speak of diagnosis and treatment, because individuation is a concept that extends beyond mental health. It is related to the realization of the full human potential and encompasses the natural processes of maturation and development which, in the second half of life, begin to prepare consciousness for its end—death. In its essence, it is a complex and lengthy process of radical inner transformation, leading to dramatic changes in human consciousness.
In short, pain is not an illness; it is the pain of growth and of the birth of the new. Although the boundary between madness and spiritual breakthrough is dangerously thin, the difference between the two is enormous. In the encounter between therapist and client, again and again the question must be resolved as to what constitutes an appropriate way of dealing with experiences from the transpersonal realm, because unresolved issues on the personal level can lead to serious distortions when the transpersonal touches the personal. This is when personal contents become contaminated by transpersonal ones—and madness emerges. The main psychotherapeutic approaches that take into account the transpersonal level of the human psyche are Jungian analytical psychology, Roberto Assagioli’s psychosynthesis, Stanislav Grof’s transpersonal psychology, and Maslow’s humanistic psychology.
It is no coincidence that psychotherapy contains so many different approaches to the treatment of the soul—the human psyche is an exceedingly complex reality. Ego psychology works very well with the personal level of human consciousness and the unconscious, but it can seriously confuse a person when their experiences originate from the transpersonal levels of the psyche. And conversely—when a person immersed in experiences of the collective unconscious lacks a stable ego center, what is required is the strengthening of ego boundaries, not their transcendence. Ideally, therapeutic work with the same individual should employ more than one method, because different “levels” and aspects of the human psyche require different tools. When it comes to supporting the psychic integrity of the human being, a single therapeutic approach is not sufficient.
A specialist who is familiar with this diversity understands that although these theories sometimes offer diametrically opposed “maps” for understanding the human psyche, this does not mean that they exclude one another, but rather that they complement each other. The mountain is one, but the paths leading to its summit are many. The equipment needed for walking in the lower parts of the mountain is different from the equipment required for climbing the peak. Sometimes we reach places no one has reached before. And the further we advance on our ascent, the more often we are required to create a new path ourselves.
Gopi Krishna’s book is such a path. It shares invaluable knowledge with the person who has set out toward the mountain’s summit. It is not, however, a universal roadmap for this journey. Individuation is a process directed toward the discovery of one’s own unique Self, and therefore no such maps exist for it. Nevertheless, something can still be done: indications can be given regarding meaning and direction, as well as warnings about possible dangers and deviations. As the well-known saying goes, the finger pointing at the Moon is not the Moon itself.
The awakened individuation impulse can best be described as a movement from the middle levels of the scale of mental health toward its highest levels, where usually only a few reside. Yet average levels of mental health are changing. Societies, too, have their levels of mental health, and these levels rise when more people move from the average comfort zone toward the solitary path leading to the summit. This is happening now. Something that was a rare phenomenon in Jung’s time—individuation—is now becoming the experience of a large group of people.
“Clearly, it’s time to read Gopi,” one of my clients used to say whenever a new wave of experiences from the deeper layers of the unconscious arrived unexpectedly and destructively, only to leave just as suddenly. This is why I wanted to share this book here, on my website—for familiarity with this phenomenon is what most helps a person pass through these deeply irrational experiences without being paralyzed by fear.
Kameliya Hadzhiyska
- Kundalini, The Evolutionary Energy in Man
