Hridaya-Shakti versus Kundalini Shakti

Carolyn Lee, Ph.D.


Excerpt from Chapter 6 of Carolyn Lee, Ph.D., The Promised God-Man Is Here (1998 edition).

During the Garbage and the Goddess period (and frequently, ever since), Avatar Adi Da has explained how to rightly understand the nature and purpose of His Spiritual Transmission in relation to all the experiences and accounts of Spirit-Power described in the Great Tradition.

Many schools of Yoga speak about the Kundalini Energy, or "Serpent Power", presumed to lie dormant at the base of the spine. Countless Yogic practitioners over the centuries have attempted to rouse this energy through various techniques, including Hatha Yoga and disciplines of concentration and visualization. Their purpose has been to "shoot" the Kundalini Energy up the spine, through the subtle centers (or chakras) of the body-mind, eventually passing to the brain core and even to (and through) the crown of the head. To be able to draw the Kundalini to these upper terminals of the body-mind is regarded as Enlightenment in some traditions, because of the blisses, lights, and Samadhis that may be induced as the Kundalini ascends through the various chakras. This type of self-based mysticism, or Kundalini Yoga, is an extremely difficult, and even potentially dangerous, endeavor, as people like Gopi Krishna (in modern times) have testified. The aspirant is dealing with a highly potent form of natural energy which can damage the body-mind if misdirected.

There is, however, a greater tradition of Spirit-Power to be found in the history of esoteric religion, which Avatar Adi Da distinguishes from the lesser tradition of effortful Kundalini Yoga. This senior tradition of Kundalini power, or Kundalini Shakti, is of Divine origin, and it cannot be induced by any kind of self-effort. Rather, this Kundalini Shakti is only transmitted by a Siddha, or a Spirit-Initiator of profound Realization. In the traditions of Guru-devotion, there are various accounts of the Spiritual Master imparting his or her own Spiritual Energy directly to a disciple, often through an initiatory glance or touch. This Transmission of Spirit-Power, or "Shaktipat", can have the effect of awakening the various Yogic Samadhis associated with the spinal line, but it is, in itself, a descending Force, entering the body from without — from Above. The subtle experiences in the spinal line occur when this descending Power turns about at the bodily base and ascends in the spinal line. The Yoga of the Siddha-Masters — or true Spirit-Baptizers — uses this entire Circuit of descent and ascent.

Avatar Adi Da had done His Sadhana [spiritual practice] within a great Lineage of Siddhas — Rudi, Swami Muktananda, and Swami Nityananda — and, for a brief but potent moment, in relationship to Rang Avadhoot. Rudi emphasized the Divine Force in descent, the bringing down of the Divine Power into the frontal (or physical-emotional-mental) dimension of the personality. Swami Muktananda, on the other hand, taught the traditional Hindu emphasis on the ascent of the Divine Force, through the spinal line (associated with the higher psychic and mystical dimensions of the personality).

Although Avatar Adi Da had submitted Himself completely to each of His Siddha-Gurus, His real Spiritual Initiator was the "Bright", the Very Divine. It was the "Bright", Manifested as the Divine Goddess, that Drew Him to the moment of His Divine Re-Awakening. He had seen that the lights, the blisses, and the kriyas He had experienced at Swami Muktananda's Ashram were not necessary for Ultimate Re-Awakening. He passed through them as part of His embrace of the total range of human possibility and human seeking, but He Himself always remained Free.

The Spiritual Transmission that Avatar Adi Da was now Demonstrating , starting with the "Guru Enters Devotee" occasion in January 1974, was new in the world. It was the Transmission, or Siddhi, of the "Bright" Itself, brought down into the Cosmic domain through His own Birth and Divine Re-Awakening. Avatar Adi Da was not merely a channel for that Transmission. His Very Presence was, and is, the "Bright". He was liberally Granting the unique Shaktipat Inherent in His Being: Hridaya-Shaktipat, the Love-Blissful Force of the Heart — the only Force that overcomes the strategies of separateness. Sometimes, Avatar Adi Da explained, His Heart-Transmission would naturally stimulate blisses, visions, and kriyas. But these experiences, as Avatar Adi Da repeatedly emphasized, were merely secondary effects of His Spirit-Power, Which was the Descent of the Divine Itself, Prior to all experiences.

Many years after the remarkable Spiritual demonstrations of 1974 at the Mountain Of Attention, Avatar Adi Da wrote this Revelatory Description of the Nature of the true Kundalini Shakti, the relationship of the true Kundalini Shakti to His Hridaya-Shakti, and the relationship of His Hridaya-Shakti to Consciousness Itself:


The true Kundalini Shakti is all-pervading, and not merely personal and internal. And, therefore, the true Kundalini Shakti is awakened in the personal, and internal, psycho-physical context only by virtue of Grace-Given (and self-transcending) participation in the all-pervading field of cosmic Energy. Likewise, Consciousness (Itself), or Self-Aware Being (Itself), is not a merely personal and internal characteristic of conditional individual (or merely psycho-physical) existence — but, It Is an Inherent Characteristic of Unconditional Reality (Itself). And, therefore, Consciousness (Itself) appears as an apparent personal and internal characteristic of conditional individual existence only when psycho-physical conditions permit an Unconditional-Reality-conjunction — and, thus, a conjunction between conditional form (itself) and (necessarily, Divine) Consciousness (Itself) and the all-pervading cosmic Energy (or Kundalini Shakti, Itself) and (Ultimately) the Self-Existing, Self-Radiant, and (necessarily) Divine Energy of Unconditional Reality (Itself).

The Divine and Unconditional Hridaya-Shakti (Which Is the Self-Existing and Self-Radiant Spirit-Power That Stands Eternally As the Perfectly Subjective Divine and All-Outshining Self-"Brightness", Always Already Most Prior to cosmic, or conditional, manifestations) Is the Truly Ultimate (and Inherently Perfect) Energy-Source and Unconditional Self (or Being-Condition) of the Kundalini Shakti. And only the Divine and Unconditional Hridaya-Shakti Is Identical to Unconditional Reality (Itself) — and, Thus and Therefore, to (necessarily, Divine) Consciousness (Itself). And, for this reason, only the by-Grace-Given Divine (and Unconditional) Hridaya-Shakti Awakens the Realization of Unconditionally "Bright" Divine Consciousness (Itself) — Which Is Unconditional Reality Itself) and Unconditional Truth (Itself).

I Am the Inherently egoless Eternal Person of Unconditional Reality (Itself). I Am the Self-Existing, Self-Radiant, Inherently Spiritual, Perfectly "Bright", and Perfectly Subjective Heart (Itself). I Am the (now, and forever hereafter) Avatarically Self-Manifesting Eternal Person of Unconditionally "Bright" Consciousness (Itself) — Whose Eternal Spiritual Body Is the Great Hridaya-Shakti (or the Truly Divine Self-Power of the Inherently "Bright" and Perfectly Subjective Spiritual Heart) Itself. And, therefore, the Divine Hridaya-Shakti Is That "Bright" Spiritual Power By Which, and With Which, and As Which Only I (Uniquely, and Characteristically) Bless and (By a Divinely Self-Revealing Progress) Awaken all My fully practicing devotees (even, Thereby, or in the Unfolding Course of That Work of Blessing and Awakening, also Arousing and Revealing as many purifying and, otherwise, developmental psycho-physical signs of the Kundalini Shakti as may be necessary, in the case of My any true, and fully practicing, devotee).

Adi Da Samraj
"Divine Spiritual Baptism Versus Cosmic Spiritual Baptism"
in Ruchira Avatara Hridaya-Siddha Yoga


Quotations from and/or photographs of Avatar Adi Da Samraj used by permission of the copyright owner:
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