Sooner or later on the spiritual awakening journey, we all taste the mysterious and intense phenomenon known as kundalini energy.
It might be smooth and subtle, or intense and explosive, but whatever the case, kundalini is a primal force of awakening.
In fact, sometimes people can experience full-blown kundalini awakenings spontaneously without any prior experience (or interest) in spiritual growth or transformation.
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Have you experienced a kundalini awakening?
If you’re curious to discover whether you’re going through a kundalini awakening or something else entirely, keep reading.
Table of contents
What is a Kundalini Awakening?
Put simply, a kundalini awakening is a form of energetic awakening that causes us to transform on the mental, emotional, and spiritual levels.
Kundalini itself is a Sanskrit word that means “she who is coiled.” It refers to primordial life force energy contained at the base of the spine that is often depicted as a snake.
This serpentine energy, once awoken, travels up the various energy centers (or chakras) of the body and into your crown chakra where higher consciousness is triggered.
The result of this higher awareness is a greater understanding of your Soul (or True Nature), life purpose, and the nature of reality itself.
19 Symptoms of the Kundalini Awakening
As divine feminine energy, kundalini usually lies dormant in the root chakra (base of the spine).
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However, there are a number of different situations where kundalini can be suddenly awoken spanning from trauma to drug use, all the way to years of targeted practice (such as tantra or kundalini yoga).
Below, I’ve divided kundalini awakening symptoms into two groups: “light” and “dark” signs.
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Please note that kundalini energy is neither good nor bad, instead, it’s a primordial force that simply lives within us. However, to the human mind, some of these experiences are pleasant, and others are extremely unpleasant:
‘Light’ Kundalini Awakening Symptoms
- You feel a spiritual connection with the Divine that transcends the ego
- You are bathed in bliss and boundless love
- You experience periods of Oneness where your compassion for humanity increases
- You tap into extrasensory abilities (ESP) and/or develop extraordinary gifts
- Pleasurable sensations pulsate through your body
- You’re inspired to make big, life-altering decisions and authentic changes in your life
- Synchronicity (i.e., meaningful or miraculous coincidences) increases tremendously
- You have profound insights into your behavior and past experiences
- Your empathic abilities strengthen, and you can feel everything at a profound level
- You begin to understand the nature of the mind and how it influences reality
- You keep receiving big, cosmic “downloads” of information (soul communication)
‘Dark’ Kundalini Awakening Symptoms
- You experience intense, involuntary shaking of the body that can be alarming
- Your nervous system becomes hypersensitive to external stressors (bright lights, TV violence, loud noises) and shuts down or craves total solitude
- You struggle to sleep properly
- You experience sudden and shocking moments of ego death
- You have visual disturbances that can feel alarming (e.g., objects seeming to vibrate)
- You experience intense heat, vibrations, or electricity surge through your body
- It feels like you’re having a bad drug trip while sober
- You struggle to distinguish what is real from imagined (psychosis) and feel like you’re going crazy
If you would like to learn more about each of these symptoms and the stages they correspond to, you can read my article on Kundalini Awakening Stages.
Other Kundalini Awakening Symptoms
The above kundalini awakening signs are fairly common. However, as someone who has experienced the energy of kundalini move through me, I can say that it doesn’t happen in the exact same way for everyone.
One of the most recent experiences I’ve had with kundalini, for instance, was preceded by two weeks of low-scale feelings of ‘impending doom,’ followed by the kundalini energy gently moving from my head and down through my body into my stomach.
The energy felt gentle, like a soft breath of wind, and when it reached my stomach, it felt like it was ‘working’ on something there. Then it melted away and vanished.
Here are some other, and perhaps less common, kundalini awakening symptoms:
- Feeling shattered (fragmented) or like you have no center
- Dreaming of snakes or seeing snakes everywhere (this is an alert from your subconscious mind)
- Feeling raw and extremely vulnerable, like a newborn child
- Manic and exuberant energy or the opposite, chronic fatigue (sometimes alternating)
- Frequent lucid dreams or vivid dreams
- Seeing lights or hearing music that isn’t there
- Tapping into your past life experiences (or other people’s)
- Entering spontaneous yoga poses (known as kriyas), mudras (hand poses), or pranayama (yogic breathing)
- Developing a Savior Complex or feelings of grandiosity
- Feeling intense grief for the planet and all suffering beings
- Out-of-body experiences where you (may/may not) connect with your Higher Self
- Visual and hearing changes
- Panic attacks and feelings of terror
- Strange food cravings or aversions
- Spontaneous orgasms
- Developing strange, undiagnosable physical symptoms that may manifest as autoimmune conditions, digestive issues, nausea, etc.
Have you experienced any of the signs mentioned above? Feel free to share your experience in the comments. This might help others who have undergone similar experiences to not feel alone.
Is Kundalini Awakening Dangerous?
This is a fair question, especially considering some of the symptoms mentioned above.
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To answer the question, yes and no. Kundalini energy isn’t innately dangerous or bad. It’s our energy blockages that limit the flow of kundalini that make it a painful, scary, and sometimes dangerous experience.
In Georg Feuerstein’s book Tantra: Path of Ecstasy, he explores why kundalini can go haywire:
Without prior cleansing of the nādī system, raising the serpent power (kundalinī-shakti) along the axial pathway is not only impossible but also very dangerous to attempt, for instead of entering the central channel (sushumnā-nādī) it is likely to force itself into the idā- or the pingalā-nādī, on either side of the central channel, causing immense havoc in the body and mind.
In other words, when kundalini is prematurely stimulated or aroused in an incorrect way (aka., through inadequate preparation and clearing of our energetic body), the results can be disastrous. Thankfully, the experience doesn’t last forever, and we’ll explore what to do if you’re experiencing the ‘dark side’ of kundalini awakening a little later.
But to further illustrate, Feuerstein goes on to quote the experience of yogi and mystic Gopi Krishna during his spontaneous kundalini experience. He writes:
There were dreadful disturbances in all the organs, each so alarming and painful that I wonder how I managed to retain my self-possession under the onslaught. The whole delicate organism was burning, withering away completely under the fiery blast racing through its interior. I knew I was dying and that my heart could not stand the tremendous strain for long. My throat was scorched and every part of my body flaming and burning, but I could do nothing to alleviate the dreadful suffering. If a well or river had been near I would have jumped into its cold depths, preferring death to what I was undergoing. . . . I racked my distracted brain for a way of escape, only to meet blank despair on every side. The effort exhausted me and I felt myself sinking, dully conscious of the scalding sea of pain in which I was drowning.
I’ll stop there because I know that this might be alarming to you (or alternatively, affirming, helping you to see that you’re not alone if you’ve experienced this).
In short, kundalini is a mighty potent force.
If you’re seeking to awaken it, be sure you know what you’re doing and seek out trustworthy guidance. This is not something to be trifled with.
Spiritual Awakening vs. Kundalini Awakening – What’s the Difference?
While the two sound the same, they’re slightly different in nature.
The spiritual awakening process (or what we refer to as the spiritual wanderer’s journey) tends to be emotional and psychological. Kundalini awakening, on the other hand, is energetic: it’s a surge of energy that may be either gentle and gradual, or sudden and intense.
While kundalini awakening usually comes further down the road after someone has experienced a spiritual awakening, it doesn’t always.
As mentioned previously, kundalini can arise suddenly in response to psychedelic drug experiences, sexual encounters, or even traumatic situations.
Another distinguishing factor is that kundalini energy is felt very physically whereas the spiritual awakening is usually more mind and heart oriented.
So while intense vibrations and heat may be felt in the body during kundalini awakening, during spiritual awakening there is more of a soulful quality of deep questioning, insight, and transfiguration (some refer to this as spiritual alchemy).
Can someone experience both spiritual awakening and kundalini awakening at the same time? Yes, absolutely.
It’s for this reason that both tend to lead to the experience of the Dark Night of the Soul (or the inevitable after-effect of having felt like one has ‘lost touch’ with the Divine). Ultimately, they are two sides of the same coin.
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5 Hidden Traps of Kundalini Awakening
The kundalini shakti bestows liberation on yogins and bondage on the ignorant.
– Svātmarāma (15th century yogi master)
Kundalini awakening is a life-changing mystical experience that can feel magical, ecstatic, and profound. And it is. But there are also many hidden traps we can fall into after we’ve emerged out of the other end.
Some of these traps involve:
- Spiritual superiority – seeing yourself as “more awake” than others and looking down on those who are not as advanced or still “asleep” (also known as spiritual narcissism)
- Savior complex – adopting a disproportionate sense of self-grandiosity and specialness, believing that you’re sent to “save the world” (e.g., for those who have undergone kundalini psychosis, this can even mean believing they’re Jesus Christ or the next Buddha)
- Grasping and attachment – desperately trying to hold onto the blissful experiences of the kundalini awakening and being miserable (even entering crisis mode) when it’s inevitably lost (this can result in spiritual materialism and the dark night of the soul)
- Spiritual nihilism – taking universal truths and misapplying them to a human level, e.g., “all is an illusion,” “nothing ultimately matters” which breeds a sense of dissociation, emptiness, and cynicism
- Avoidance – avoiding or spiritually bypassing everyday responsibilities and focusing only on “higher spiritual matters” (this is essentially a way for the ego to avoid growing up and integrating the experience at a human level)
I explore a variety of different spiritual issues that can arise on the spiritual wanderer’s journey which you can check out in the Traps & Pitfalls section of this site.
How to Handle a Kundalini Awakening
If your kundalini has awoken and you’re feeling overwhelmed, here’s some guidance:
1. Be gentle with yourself and take care of your nervous system
Likely, your nervous system is going into overdrive if you’re having a painful kundalini experience. Some ways to calm your nerves can include:
- Taking a warm bath with essential oils like lavender (you can also try magnesium salts). If a warm bath doesn’t sound like your cup of tea, try a cold shower. Be mindful and notice how your body and mind respond to the temperature of the water.
- Find something/someone that brings you a feeling of safety. This might be cuddling your dog or cat, asking your partner or friend to hold you, finding a cozy nook in nature, or relaxing in a corner of your house that brings you comfort.
- Listen to calming music.
- Try slow guided breathing using an app like Calm or InsightTimer. (Be mindful of how your body responds. Stop immediately at the first sign of discomfort.)
- Ground yourself outdoors in nature.
- Eat grounding foods (potatoes, root vegetables, organic meat)
2. Stop all spiritual practice temporarily
Yes, your spiritual practice might be amplifying the effects of your kundalini awakening. So stop. Let yourself rest. If you crave a replacement practice, try mindfulness as it helps to ground you in the present moment. Read my article on the spiritual emergency for more helpful ideas.
3. Seek out compassionate help
If you still struggle with the kundalini energy being too intense, I strongly recommend seeking out the guidance of a transpersonal or depth psychotherapist. The best guides are those who understand the importance of integrating the mind and spirit (or spiritual psychology).
There are also people who specialize in kundalini awakening help that you can find online – but tread carefully. Trust your instincts. If you feel worse or if you get weird vibes about someone, you don’t owe them any explanation. Leave. Find someone else. You have the right to get the guidance you need.
Kundalini Awakening FAQ
Here are some other questions you might have about this powerful experience on the spiritual journey:
Usually, there is a period of long integration after the kundalini awakening experience. In other words, it takes a while for the mind, heart, and soul of a person to fully comprehend what they’ve been through and translate that into daily life. For some (extremely) rare people, kundalini awakening results in liberation from the separate self and the realization of non-dual awareness (also known as ‘enlightenment’).
There are many methods out there that help to stimulate kundalini energy. Most involve either Tantric and/or Yogic practice. Visualization, plant medicines (like psilocybin mushrooms and ayahuasca), certain breathwork techniques, belly dancing, and meditations also help to awaken kundalini energy. But remember to always be gentle, go slowly, and know what you’re doing. Kundalini energy is powerful and not to be messed around with.
The answer is that it varies for everyone. Some people experience the awakening of kundalini early on their spiritual path (indeed, for some it actually triggers the spiritual search). For others, kundalini awakens after many years of spiritual practice. There is no set-in-stone rule here: it depends on your unique energetic blockages, destiny, soul, and many other factors.
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As the kundalini awakens, you naturally become aware of your true nature, the nature of God, and the purpose of your existence. It is an accelerated path to God-Realization, and can create many extraordinary experiences and realizations.
– Steven Sadleir (Looking For God)
Kundalini awakening can happen gradually and subtly or explosively and rapidly on our spiritual awakening journeys.
Known as the Serpent Power, the Inner Woman, and the essence of Shakti, kundalini energy can be a force of tremendous awakening or deep enslavement. The key is to be mindful, practice spiritual discernment, trust in your soul’s strength, and seek help where needed.
Remember that the ultimate purpose of kundalini is to dissolve the inner knots that keep you small and limited, helping you to awaken to your Eternal, Primordial, True Nature.
Have you had a kundalini awakening experience? What was it like? I’d be fascinated to hear below.
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I have or am experiencing every one of these symptoms. I have also had visuals of things that seem as though “steam” is rising off of objects. (I first noticed this after getting out of the shower and automatically assumed it was just steam from the shower. But then i started noticing it outside as well.) And I have had sensations over random parts of my body (my leg, knee, arm, chest) that felt like boiling hot water was being poured on me I considered possible nerve damage..? Very interesting.
I don’t need a Kundalini experience. My only goal is to better myself to be a more conducive companion of The Source. I have had many of the symptoms described. Except for the spontaneous orgasm. I laughed for about ten minutes when I read that. How inconvenient. Especially if your on the bus. I don’t pay much attention to chakras. I know there may be something to them. But I’m not far enough along to worry about them. Although, I did buy a 528htz tuning fork and I harmonize my Aums to it in different octaves. Right now, I feel that it’s most important that I practice my new mantras. Kindness, empathy and forgiveness. If you practice these, you don’t have to look for God. He will find you. And you’ll find that he was there all along. In you. Because you are a product of his mind. Do I know that? No. Do I hope that? Yes!!!
Hi.. i dont know if what i experienced was kundalini awakening or something different but it was like an electric sensation in my body and i also experienced little physical pain in my lower back as if some kind of blockage. Along with this i also heard a sound in my right ear and thats it. I do practice meditation and yoga for few minutes. I would love to know more about this.. thanks
The electric shock feeling is a very tell tale sign of kundalini awakening!
Hi,I am aware that I am experience root chakra blockage/unbalanced. And reading this, how one is related to other. How do I actual know, I am not experienced, I had Reinke session last month, and it is good for Kundalini awakening as well, to know, I have most of the symptoms for both sides. I was introduced to your page last week, and already read a lot, specially about chakras. Please guide me. Thank you
Hi
I had one just a few months before pandemics. I thought i had crossed a line. It was dark dark dark. Lots of phisical pain and unexplicables. The thing is that since then i was aware that many of these things have been happening to me since child.
I had been on retreat for several months because i wanted to stop any kind of addiction and i was suffering from a long time pain for loss, fear, and a general slightly consciousness difference from the general idea of what i thought was normal.
I did wander about being mentally ill, but not really because i am quite sane when you get to making important human profound decisions. I just dont fit on everyday stuff. At some points i thought i was gifted but not really because i have not developed a good outlet.
There were many times in my life were reality just dropped but somehow i experienced all through intense pain.
So when the time of the supposed K thing happened it was somehow as an abuse, there was someone else there, i was not looking for that, i wanted to be cured, but i found myself as being manipulated by an external to experience that (spiritual religious like occidental culture people)
Since then the abuse idea appeared more significantly, and this is the reason why i am VERY cautious of who i relate to, i found so many people preaching the thing and being so violent and cynic and abusive of authentic empathetic loving people. Be careful with what you let in.
I am still struggling now, because i get very intense feelings and certain awareness and from time to time reality cracks and just leaves me thinking or cannot deal with everyday normal stuff like working or having to get my food.
I stopped any kind of meditation or practice. I hug trees and connect to nature, try to get my hands on tools and stay quite alone, only open up to non violent people and have become a better friend to myself. I have a huge loving capcity and still have friends and partner.
It is hard. I am working on transforming my concept of pain and changing the significance. And trying to play out small changes on reality to see were this gift can slowly take me.
Thank you for the space and reading.
Thanks a lot for the insightful article and all the work you do on this site.
Do you have recommendations for online guides or consolers? I think I have an unintended kundalini activation during my trauma inner work process. It is very intense and is showing many of the negative symptoms in this article, the traumas are causing me frequent panic attacks, I am not sure if I should keep on my trauma inner work to reduce the panic attacks or to keep going on to help the kundalini energy release? Your guidance is highly appreciated.
Hi Razaz,
Whatever practice you engaged with that triggered or evoked the kundalini activation I recommend stopping immediately – kundalini is a powerful and unwieldy force that requires direct guidance from someone highly experienced with it, so if you don’t have that, I encourage you to stop. I also recommend using your search engine to look up “spiritual emergence therapist” for those who can guide you through this process. I’m not affiliated with any particular therapist or therapeutic practice so can’t recommend any specific ones, but you can also check out the spiritual emergence network for more guidance: https://www.spiritualemergencenetwork.org/
This article of mine can also help: https://lonerwolf.com/how-to-ground-yourself/
Best to you ♡
My head pressure won’t go away ever since I started this terrible Kundalini experience that debilitated me after an intense head pain after I had self-hate/destruction state, leaving me with debilitating head pressure, tinnitus and a blocked/dulled and constantly heightened nervous system. How do I get help to relieve my pressure block/s?
Aletheia,
THE DARK SIDE ISN’T permanent, it’s just that I am a freak now, and constantly reminded how ugly I can be. I inherited some type of negative outcome, and it never changes most times. it’s been since 2017 that I’ve been in the dark and so much to love and live for. It sucks. Have a blessed day and you can always email me if possible.
I do not really know what to say,the thing though is that infinity took me to consciousness that so high i have a hard time integrating into my now although the infinity still shows me that time is an illusion.
All! I also have intense itching and headaches
How do we get rid of the head pressure?
I came across this enlightening article this morning and it was so nice to read something that gave me more insight into what happened to me. I read the spiritual awakening article several weeks back, which also explained a lot, but now after reading this one it appears that somehow I had both experiences at the same time. This all happened in February of 2021, and to be honest I’m surprised that I made it through the worst part. I believed in a higher power at the time, but that was about it. I was raised catholic but did not practice once I left home at 16, this experience happened two months before my 55th birthday, and I was not in anyway prepared for the experiences to come, I wasn’t even aware at the time that there was such a thing as a spiritual awakening. At the time, my health was not doing well at all, so I had started to change my diet and also started coming off a slu of medications, 18 to be exact, a few of them being antidepressants and heavy pain medications. This was all done under the supervision of my physician, so when it all hit the fan I didn’t realize that a lot of what was happening had been triggered by stopping the medications, even though I had come of slow according to the physician it was actually still maybe to fast for me. The choice to come off all those medications so close together and as quickly as I did without prior understanding of what could happen, most definitely played a big role in my experiences and my opening up, and all though I am extremely grateful to have been blessed with this awaking experience, I would never recommend doing it that way ever. I felt really good in the beginning of my “cleansing”, lol, until I started to “wake up” and notice things around me were I never noticed before, and things were foreign to me and not totally as I remembered, so I started asking a lot of questions because I was so confused, how could I not remember all of these things I felt I should have remembered. My perception of the family I knew had changed, their behaviors had changed. They were more angry, my husband mostly, I didn’t understand, the man I married 35 years before was suddenly someone else to me, he seemed to more than just mad at at me, he seemed to be vindictive as well, I was so traumatized by the situation, so much so that on that very traumatic day that for some reason I just made the decision to let go of all my resentment, anger and past “shit” and move forward to live and enjoy my life, and it happened, I saw in my minds eye a smokey mist that seemed to hold within it my past memories and they just floated away and then the most beautiful feeling of love filled my body, it was like feeling love for the first time. I had somehow let go of all the resentment and anger I had apparently held on to since I could remember, and I felt alive, but it was to be short lived because what happened next would have me question my entire reality as well as my existence, I was so ready to be happy and live my life and have fun, and yet everyone around me in my family seemed to be angry and also very angry with me, they weren’t how I remembered them to be, I was so confused and scared. Then they started to question my sanity, and so was I. I was seeing and experiencing things that I still really can’t explain to this day, I became paranoid, paranoid of everyone and everything around me, my sense of smell, taste, sound, hearing and even my voice changed. I lost 75 pounds in about 2 months. I was experiencing physiological changes and I was freaking out. It got so bad that my body eventually started to shut down, my muscles were becoming so weak and my legs were in so much pain I had to use a wheelchair to get around, I believe I was actually paralyzed by fear. I tried getting help though regular channels, but was unable to trust anyone. I eventually ended up driving by a place with my husband that just caught my attention, and when I looked it up, it mentioned that there was a shamen there, so I made an appointment, and thank god I did, because that place was my saving grace. My husband and I started going there and they helped both of us down our spiritual path. It’s been over 2 years now, and even though it’s been a very hard journey it has been a most enlightening journey as well. I have been healing physically, more than I thought possible, especially at my age 😉, as well as healing spiritually, mentally and emotionally. I don’t know right now what to do with all this down loaded knowledge and awareness except to continue to heal. I do feel that something is coming, but I’m not sure what exactly. The physical healing has been the most painful, but probably not the most challenging, I believe that Oscar goes to the mental and emotional side of the healing, lol. I thought I was losing it, I went through just about everything mentioned above, if it hadn’t been for the first feelings of love and freedom that I felt at first I’m not so sure I would be where I’m at now, I held on to that feeling and I believe it’s what has gotten me through. The only other thing I have to say is that even though I wasn’t prepared in anyway for any of this it was the universe that put in my path everyone and everything I needed to find my way to healing. I’m just so grateful I didn’t react to some of the crazy things in my head. I am so much more grounded than I was, and I so needed that. Bless you all in your journey.
Thank you for sharing. I had a spontaneous kundalini awakening in 2018 and went through many of the emotions that you did. Really, it was traumatic because I was unprepared and wasn’t aware of any of these concepts. I feel like I finally have an understanding and calmness about what happened to me, but NOW I am dealing with the effects physically and realizing my nervous system got blasted out and continually keep having physical ailments pop up on my left side (the feminine side). Now I’m on a quest to heal and I do feel like the answers keep coming to me slowly as far as what supplements I need to take, how I need to move and massage my body, but I definitely have a long road ahead of me. It is nice to know you are not alone though, so thank you.
My experience was more shocked,but with gratitude I accepted as a gift of honor.I have wrote a Book,it give inner knowledge.And also gifts from the unknown Facts