Fighting with Kundalini

Spirituality
#1

Hello All,

I am really struggling with my Kundalini practice. Previously when I did yoga it was just for exercise. I have two friends who do Kundalini all the time and I really saw a beautiful change in them, so I decided to try it for myself. From the start all I could do was judge it was “weird and conflicting with science”, yet my heart deeply deeply yearns for a religious path, but there seems to be this pessimistic realist in me who refuses to believe in anything.

Kundalini is really really hard for me. I not flexible/strong enough to do many of the poses in the way that the teacher asks you to. I also This pokes at my ego in a extreme way. Doing kundalini also takes away from time I could be “bettering” myself by doing my normal flow yoga/pilates and getting in better shape. I also really want to believe that the poses help certain things, like my magnetic field or my heart. There is one Kriya in particular that a friend sent me that is almost impossible for me to do. Every time I try and do it I am challenged physically, mentally, and spiritually and I always come out feeling really really angry, sad and confused. It’s almost unbearable. I have yet to do the whole kriya “properly”. I am just frustrated because I see my friends who have fallen in love with a beautiful practice and how they believe these truly remarkable and magical things, yet I am stuck in this judgemental scientific mindset that is killing me and preventing me from embracing something new and different. I just hate feeling so angry. I would like to work through the anger, but the more I do this yoga the angrier I get. I have no idea what to do.

#2

Hi starfishyoga,

do not bother if you are unable to practice the exercises perfectly. Do not be so hard on yourself. This is not the aim of the yoga practice, but to feel yoga. Also my teacher use to say, that when anger comes, this is a good sign, that some purification is going on. Try not to judge yourself but to become attentive.
I often find that many problem come from the misconception of the meaning of yoga. If we go back to the roots of the yoga philosophy in the Yogasutras of Rishi Patanjali. There he writes:

yogaś citta-vṛtti nirodhaḥ |

This means that yoga is the state when the mind dissolves in the soul (atma). So actually yoga is a state of being, not the exercises. The yoga practice is the mean of attaining the state.

Best regards

#3

If I am not able to do more than half the kriya perfectly should I just not do the Kriya and find an easier one? I am very new to Kundalini, so I don’t know how it all works.

#4

Talk about this with your teacher, who thought you this exercises. Tell him/her your problems and talk about them. If an exercise is too difficult for you, s/he should be able to teach you some alternative exercise for the beginning. But you should enjoy your practice, and not get discouraged by it. Yoga is not about muscles.