Mobilizing the Energies of the Subtle Body

I’ve enjoyed reading books by Lama Yeshe on the subject of tantra. He speaks simply, with great wisdom, but with reasonable caution as to the use of tantra to mobilize the energies of the subtle body for healing and regenerative purposes. As he would describe it:

“Any path utilizing the powerful and potentially destructive energies of desire can be dangerous. If followed improperly or with a selfish motivation, tantra can lead the misguided practitioner into realms of greater mental and physical suffering.”

The mental and physical suffering that Lama Yeshe is speaking about here, I assume, are the everyday sufferings we all experience as we get caught up in our own obsessions and illusions.

The purpose, as I understand it, for mobilizing the energies of the subtle body is to erode and dismantle the influences of the ego, to bring us to that state of equanimity where we become less driven by our obsessions and illusions. Can we, through tantra, become more indifferent to the influences of pleasure or pain, loss or gain, praise or blame, fame or shame? Can we become less obsessive in following what we perceive to be attractions or in avoiding at all costs what we perceive to be our aversions? This only happens as we diminish the influences of “ego."

When mobilizing the energies of the subtle body, always in the back of my mind are the questions: “What is my underlining intention for doing so? Is it for the purpose of spiritual growth and of becoming less attached, or is it for the purpose of seeking enhanced pleasure, greater and greater bliss for bliss’s sake? The three tests of the Sutras, for me, provide the means to discern my intentions:

• Am I better able to renounce the things of the world as the source of my overall happiness and well-being? Do I see these things for what they are?
• Is my attitude of service and concern for others increasing in its multiplicity of forms?
• Can I better experience the impermanence of exterior things in order to more fully embrace the “absolute” that lies beyond “self,” but nevertheless remains mysteriously united with “self.”

This “absolute” is a state of being we all have and possess. We are created in the nature of the absolute. The trouble is that it is covered over, obscured by the clouds of illusion of the ego. Just as the clear light of the sky cannot be seen when obscured by clouds, the blissful presence of the “absolute” cannot be experienced when obscured by the deep, penetrating conditioning of the ego.

When I keep my intentions in their proper order, the mobilization of the energies of the subtle body can and do lead to spiritual regeneration and growth. These blissful energies can disable and transcend the ego and its attachments to enable us to experience the fourth dhyana where all sensation ceases and only mindful equanimity remains. This is the realm where both suffering and pleasure are extinguished, where sorrows or worries no longer exist. This is the stage of the beginning of pure mindfulness.

As I mentioned in a previous post, these energies can be mobilized through five types of activities: vibrations generated through:

• Breath,
• Physical movement,
• Visualization,
• Sound,
• Touching or stimulation.

In my years of practice in Christian Meditation (pre-kundalini), my focus was primarily on repeating and listening to the sound of a mantra. My focus was on the silence, stillness, and simplicity of meditation. Any attention given to activities other than repeating the mantra were discouraged and minimal. For example, we were told to sit in a comfortable position, back straight, feet flat on the floor, breath normally. In other words, let your attention to everything else go. Just repeat and listen to the mantra. I attribute my kundalini rising to this simple practice over many years.

However, my post-kundalini activities include components of all five of those vibrational activities described above. So I’m not sure what effect these additional activities would have on those who may have not experienced kundalini rising. But they have certainly enhanced my post-kundalini years, and have led to many changes.

For the methods that I use to mobilize the energies of the subtle body, please refer to my post entitled The Four Dhyanas.

I have found that one of the most significant of these activities is sitting in a siddhasana posture. Siddhasana is often described as the perfect posture. It involves crossing the legs, sitting with the perineum firmly on the heel of one foot. This seat provides stimulation of kundalini energy upward through the nervous system, ultimately, creating a constant flow of ecstatic conductivity throughout the meditation practice.

The story of the wood worm illustrates how this takes place. The worm comes into birth through the wood of the tree in which it resides. Yet it is this same wood that it consumes in order to re-generate itself. It destroys that which gave it life in order to generate new life. The subtle body’s blissful vibrational energies, mobilized under the right intentions, although impermanent in themselves, provide the means by which we can de-rail and dissolve the very thing that they are prone to create in order to generate a new level of consciousness where all sensation ceases and only equanimity remains.

My Early Visual and Affective Journey

“Wow! This description of the renovation and restoration process of kundalini is sure in line with my own experience.”

 

This was my reaction while reading sections of Kundalini Vidya: The Science of Spiritual Transformation several months after my forty day retreat.

 

At the time of my retreat, I had never heard of kundalini, nor did I know about the layers or sheaths making up the subtle body. Written by Joan Harrigan, this book uses an Eastern archetypal model that resonated with my own profound kundalini experience. This model was described in detail in my previous posting.

Beyond our physical bodies, but emanating from our physical systems, lies the energy sheath made up of energy channels intersecting with six major chakras. Next to it is the mental sheath of our conscious and unconscious minds that can be broken down into “chitta,” the unconscious storehouse of past impressions and imprints, “manas,” our sensory motor system that carries out automatically the many biological and psychological functions of our metabolism, and the “ahankara” or ego, defining and giving us that sense of I-ness or separate identity with all of its attachments and boundaries. Next to that lies the discernment sheath, reflective consciousness often referred to as our inner voice. With this blueprint in mind, I will try to describe how this model is connected with what I experienced.

In Christian Meditation (which I had been practicing for nearly three decades before encountering kundalini) we are told to breathe normally. So breathing becomes principally an unconscious response. You just let it be what it is. I would describe this as “manas” or an automatic response. If you wish to change it by holding your breath or breathing faster, you can, but normal would be to inhale, exhale with no special attention.

On the thirty-eight day of my retreat, the first noticeable and unexpected change was in my pattern of breathing. This changed in two ways. While I was meditating, it seemed that “manas,” or the automatic response system, temporarily shifted my breathing pattern to a deep inhaling and holding of breath for as long as possible. This inhaling and holding of breath created pressure which was then systematically directed towards certain areas of my body. First to the diaphragm, then to the left and right sides, to the upper chest, back, neck and head. I described this in my journal as an opening up of areas in my body previous devoid of air and energy flow.

The second thing I began to notice was the development of a new pattern for overall breathing. My old normal breathing pattern was comprised of a shallow inhale, exhale; an in and out routine. It began to change into diaphragmatic deep breathing, but of a circular nature, clockwise to be more specific.

In the past, I've seldom had, or paid much attention to, visions. In fact, I was quite suspicious of them, but during the kundalini process these mind pictures become a fairly common event. And these psychological pictures and affective impressions were of a great assistance in helping me understand what was happening during this unusual time.

During this change in my overall breathing pattern, the picture that frequently popped into my mind in respect to circular breathing was my breath following the curvature of a large wheel (positioned perpendicular to my body) that was circling slowly in a clockwise fashion. Upon exhaling, the breath followed the downward descent of the part of the wheel that was closest to my body. As the full exhale changed into the beginning of the inhale, the breath would follow the curve of the wheel through the bottom of its cycle to begin its upward climb until it reached the full inhale as it curved around the top to begin again its descent with the beginning of the exhale. Amazingly enough, it was the breath that was pulling the wheel around in its circular motion.

 

You may ask: What’s the significance of this? The significance is that "manas," the autonomic motor system, seemed to be changing my breathing pattern in a manner that was necessary to arouse the flow of kundalini energy up from the lower chakras to the brain as part of its transformation agenda. It seemed that circular breathing was continuously being called upon to facilitate this process.

 

In the following days, particularly during meditation time and at night, kundalini relentlessly took control of this agenda leaving me as an observer. The journey up the spine and into the brain became an ebb and flow over a period of weeks. This ebb and flow revealed some repeating patterns of mind pictures and affective experiences that I had no explanation for at the time, but were ultimately tied in with the archetypal model I discovered some months later in Kundalini Vidya.

Repeatedly, as kundalini made its journey, it was as if it was entering the mental sheath at the level of “chitta,” the unconscious storehouse of past impressions and imprints. The first repetition of images began with a scene where I was looking, as if through a window, at the bottom of the sea that was filled with murky, dirty, filthy and polluted water. The water had gross sea monsters and creatures swimming about like predators. Dark seaweed swung about, sometimes covering me. There was no fear associated with this mind picture as I was only an observer. Could this have been a psychological image of unresolved issues, cultural conditioning, repressed habits and drives, defense mechanisms, etc., accumulated over a lifetime, content that was never dealt with?

As kundalini continued its journey, it was as if it passed into the “ahankara” or the ego area of the mental sheath. Consistently here, I became aware of a side of myself I did not like. I became consciously aware of my deceitful and manipulative side, of boundaries that prevented me from living in accordance with a deeper truth. It was an awareness that many things I thought were true were not true at all. It was an awareness of attachments and constructs of my own making. These affective experiences caused, at times, a deep emotional grief that brought up sobs of remorse.

This experience would invariably move to mind pictures of things falling away; more specifically a truck going down a hill in reverse out of control, buildings, crosses, churches crumbling to the earth, pieces of the earth falling away into space.

As kundalini continue its journey, finally it was as if it entered the discernment sheath, “buddhi,” with its silence, its expansiveness, the clear sky without any clouds, a place with the absence of “self” — home.

With each ebb and flow, each cycle of kundalini through the sheaths of the subtle body, a renovation and restoration was taking place, noticeable changes in the way I saw the exterior world around me. There was a freshness, a newness. There was a connection with others, those close to me and strangers, that I never experienced before. Episodes that would have previously triggered an emotional response were now neutral. And many of my own constructs and boundaries, some of which were the values, beliefs and assumptions that I held as an important part of my life, were mysteriously absent. It was confusing, but at the same time liberating, and the ecstatic bliss associated with the whole transformation process provided the assurance I needed to move with its flow.