Kundalini.Tantra.by.Satyananda.Saraswati

Swami Shankardevananda: I would also imagine that depletion of testosterone,
excessive sexual activity, depletion of adrenalin, excessive fear and anxiety, etc., all lead
to a depressed state.
Swami Vivekananda: That is right. I have often suspected too, that when the moon is
new for instance, then people tend to function to some extent on the energy of the lower
chakras. The other ones are functioning too, but it is the lower chakras that are carrying a
lot of the energy. And actually, the normal person experiences a depressed feeling lasting
a couple of days during that phase. Then the moon starts activating the other chakras and
the person comes out of it.
Swami Nischalananda: This relationship is also indicated by the fact that some people
go crazy at the time of full moon. It means that energy comes up to and accumulates at
ajna chakra. The high energy affects the mind.
Swami Vivekananda: It is strange that the medical profession denies that the full
moon has any effect on the mental state of people, and there are very comprehensive
statistics from psychiatric hospitals to show that the admission rate is no higher at the
time of the full moon than it is at the time of new moon. To this I say that there are
different conditions for which people are being admitted at the time of the full moon and
at the time of the new moon; this is most clearly seen.
Swami Shankardevananda: In hospitals, all the nursing staff know that when the full
moon comes there are going to be problems. There will be more road accidents, more
crazy people coming in and people going off their heads, etc.
Swami Muktibodhananda: What is the difference between fear, anxiety and phobia?
Swami Vivekananda: Fear is a normal response to a threatening situation. If a tiger
came into this room, nine people would be frightened and that would be a natural
response. Anxiety, on the other hand, is really a collection of symptoms which go on for
a long time, usually not provoked by an external situation.
Phobias are immediate responses, just like fear, but the responses are to a nonthreatening
situation. A mouse a hundred yards down the corridor, for instance, would
not affect any of us, but someone with a phobia about mice would panic.
Swami Shankardevananda: Phobias are actually a displacement from an original
object on to a different situation.
Swami Vivekananda: That is the ego-defence mechanism that Freud used to talk
about. Freud used to talk about anxiety, psychic complexes and all that, but the man in
the taxi who had butterflies in the stomach did have an accident which may have
activated some old samskara somewhere, which turned into a full fear of getting into his
taxi. But the whole thing was cleared so quickly; it was not deep-seated. Sometimes I
believe these things just build up in a susceptible moment rather than in a susceptible