Kundalini.Tantra.by.Satyananda.Saraswati

widely known and respected and more and more people are taking up its practice. This
book and this section are an offering to help you to see kundalini in a more total and
easily understood manner, to give researchers guidelines and perspective, and to help you
achieve kundalini as a reality in your own life.
Chapter 2
Kundalini, Fact not Fiction
"As one opens the door with a key, so the yogi should open the gate to liberation with
the kundalini. The great goddess sleeps, closing with her mouth,, the opening through
which one can ascend to the brahrnarandhra... to that place where there is neither pain
nor suffering. The kundalini sleeps above the kanda... she gives liberation to the yogi and
bondage to the fool. He who knows kundalini, knows yoga. The kundalini, it is said, is
coiled like a serpent- He who can induce her to move is liberated." Hatha Yoga Pradipika
v. 105-111
With our present limited state of consciousness, bound by sense experiences which
become dull and monotonous through endless repetition, and unable to break out of our
tensions, problems and anxieties, modern man is facing both a material and spiritual
crisis. This crisis is a two-edged sword, Kundalini both binds and liberates. On the one
hand it is 'bad', for it creates anxiety and depression and has precipitated a plague of
psychosomatic disease and suffering unparalleled in former times. On the other hand, it is
'good', a blessing in disguise which is forcing us to change and grow, to evolve ourselves
at individual and social levels.
We are witnessing a tremendous upsurge of interest in yoga, meditation and spiritual
values. There has been a revival of the yogic lifestyle and knowledge. Yoga and its
related sciences are now recognized as valuable tools within the healing professions and
have added tremendous depth and height, a new dimension to psychology and
philosophy. Scientists have been inspired to probe deeper into the mysteries of yoga, to
investigate the means by which it works and to make the teachings of the ancient rishis
and yogis more readily understood and expressed in modern scientific terminology. We
are seeing that science is not actually discovering anything new but is substantiating the
ancient knowledge of the yogis.
Scientific investigation into yoga and the allied sciences has made this knowledge
more accessible by incorporating it into a whole new set of therapeutic techniques and
new methods to develop our potential, for example, biofeedback, autogenic training,
mind control techniques, psychic healing, and a myriad of other similar processes. New
branches of medicine have come into being, and the recognition of mind, begun by Freud
in the early part of this century, has finally filtered down into common acceptance. Stress
medicine and psychosomatic medicine are examples of our deeper understanding of this
interaction of energy, mind and body, an understanding developed through our
rediscovery of yoga.