There have been so many discussions about kuṇḍalinī that I wanted to find out more about the phenomenon. Kundalini Rising is a collection of a couple of dozen essays by different authors, thus allowing one to hear from multiple voices on the subject.The most informative part of the book for me was its first quarter, where half a dozen writers describe their personal experiences of kuṇḍalinī. These give insider accounts with a minimum of theoretical superstructure.
The remaining three quarters of the book offer medical, cultural, and spiritual perspectives on kuṇḍalinī. I have to say that these ventures into a theory of kuṇḍalinī didn’t inspire confidence. The general impression I’m left with is one of “We don’t really know, but we’re going to speculate anyway.” Perhaps the wisest perspective came from an interview with Gopi Krishna. He compares the efforts of psychologists to understand kuṇḍalinī with the difficulties that medieval alchemists might have faced if introduced to modern chemistry. Ultimately, he suggests, “The Reality which is unveiled in the duration of the experience is beyond the grasp of the intellect and the power of language to describe” (p. 278). This doesn’t stop him, though, from speculating that kuṇḍalinī represents evolution in progress — a view since widely taken up without critical examination. I’m not familiar with the rest of the literature on kuṇḍalinī, but I get the idea we’re still a long way off from anything that might be considered definitive and authoritative.
Lawrence Edwards et al. Kundalini Rising: Exploring the Energy of Awakening. Boulder, Col.: Sounds True, 2009. Paperback. 405 pages. ISBN 9781591797289. $19.95.
