My problem has been my indoctrinated ideas about what constitutes a healthy diet. When my body has needed fresh fruits and vegetables, I've had no trouble obliging it, since I was a vegetarian long before my Kundalini awakening. But when my system violently rejected what I considered to be a good, balanced menu, I was concerned. During these times, I subsisted on a seemingly non-nutritive mono-diet of nothing but blueberry muffins and cereal with milk and honey. Yet any deviation from this fare would bring on nearly instantaneous diarrhea. You'd think I would learn after several bouts of this sort, but no, I kept trying to add "wholesome" foods even while my body was making it very clear to me that these were not digestible at the time.

It did immensely help me that Gopi Krishna, lacking our own "scientific" cultural bias, regarded milk, butter, dried fruits and "sugary substances and cereals" as "all nourishing and purifying articles of food," and described how important these foods were to his own well-being during the purgation period of his awakening. It dawned on me that these types of foods fall into the category described in yogic literature as sattvic. Dairy foods, grains, fruits and sweets are all considered highly sattvic. The yogis believe that eating certain types of food produce specific states of consciousness. Sattvic foods are said to promote the most spiritual level of bodily vibrations.

I think the converse is true: when the bodily vibrations are at a certain level, only sattvic food can be tolerated. Glenn Morris speaks of the Kundalini awakening of his ninjutsu master, whose digestive system rejected everything but rice and yogurt, which he lived on exclusively for eighteen months.

Other people have told me of similar needs for these foods. One woman in the midst of a Kundalini awakening told me, "I'm hungry all the time. I'm eating tons of cheese and dried fruit and honey..." She was surprised at her ravenous appetite for these specific foods. At certain phases of my process, I found myself craving sweets and dairy products -- cheesecake in particular. Another woman told me she was downing gallons of ice cream and couldn't get enough cheese. A metaphysical teacher who went through a long and severe Kundalini awakening found that drinking lots of milk is very soothing to the system. She now recommends this for others going through this process.

The craving for sweets seems to correspond to intense energy vibrations in the body. Hypoglycemia can occur during these high-energy states. I found that if I didn't heed these cravings, I would experience sudden and acute reactions. Like a diabetic in insulin shock, I'd become irritable, dizzy, confused and rapidly hostile and hysterical until I drank some fruit juice. Having no medical history of such episodes, these radical behavior shifts were unnerving for both Charles and I. I soon learned never to ignore my hunger.

Cravings for high protein foods are also typical for Kundalini awakenings. I had been a vegetarian for over fifteen years, but there were times during my Kundalini process when I had an insatiable need for fish and poultry. I haven't had cravings for red meat, but I've heard that this is also common, even for previously devout vegetarians.

Numerous people who were meat eaters prior to risen Kundalini eventually develop an aversion to, and inability to digest flesh foods. Nutritional needs also seem to move in cycles. I went through a period where I craved eggs, then into a long stretch were they were completely indigestible, then back again to needing and being able to assimilate them without problems. Digestive disturbances predominate in some people's Kundalini process for years, with the system so fickle one never knows from one day to the next what the body will accept.

I've had periods when I was voraciously hungry and times when I was indifferent to food. For stretches of time, I was hungry but could barely eat. When my throat chakra was blocked for three months, I felt strangled all the time and could swallow nothing but liquid. I also had difficulty eating when the energy was in my mouth, causing my tongue to spontaneously move in strange and uncontrollable ways. When Kundalini moves into the face, some people suffer long periods of "lockjaw", which prohibits eating. When the energy is strongest in the stomach and abdominal area, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea can become a problem. Weight loss is common during these phases of awakening. Weight gain is also frequent during the voracious eating stages. And those who are prescribed psychoactive medications generally experience weight gain as a side effect. This is an especially difficult issue for women in our current anorexic-adoring culture. When the process makes us insatiably hungry, many women try to fight these urges out of fear of eating too much and becoming fat. This is as much a mistake as trying to eat what we think is correct rather than what our bodies are telling us to eat. I have found that any "feast" episodes in which I put on pounds are shortly followed by "famines" in which I shed weight rapidly.

What's more surprising is that weight gain and loss also occur independently of food intake. A woman who could take nothing but water for several weeks was amazed to find that her weight did not change at all. There were periods when my own weight went up and down like a yoyo, regardless of how much or what kinds of food I was consuming. At times, I've registered a ten-pound difference from one day to the next. Sometimes, when I've felt sure I must be putting on weight, I've been astonished to find I was losing it, and vice versa. For awhile, I thought my bathroom scale must be defective. Then I began hearing from others who reported the same phenomena.

Because I've had specific food cravings at many points in my process, I let myself be led by these in choosing what to eat. The body gives me clear messages about what nutrients it needs at the moment. I've never yet had digestive or other physical problems when I've succumbed to my food cravings, no matter how peculiar they've seemed. Conversely, ignoring the craving, or trying to select an appropriate meal according to my dietary theories of what's good for me, has caused havoc.

My choice in foods, like every other facet of my personality, has undergone remarkable alterations. Many foods I used to eat regularly before my Kundalini awakening have little appeal to me now. And foods which are now my staples are those I rarely ate previously. In her book Shakti Woman, Vicki Noble tells of a similar shift: "I used to be able to abuse my body with alcohol, sugar, and meat without direct, felt consequences. But once I began the purification process of awakening to the energy, releasing the toxins and negativity from my past, and channeling greater healing power, it became impossible to eat fast foods without getting immediate diarrhea or to drink wine without headache or to eat too much sugar without the back of my neck seizing up in a spasm."

Spiritual Nutrition

Giving thanks for everything I eat is, to me, an important spiritual element of nutrition. Some say that blessing food supplements and medications before taking them will make them more effective. Whether or not this is true, I find this a beautiful idea. Giving our blessings and gratitude for all that comes to us keeps alive our reverence for life. The alternative medicine expert, Dr. Andrew Weil, says that "nutrition in its broadest sense has to do with everything taken into yourself, everything you associate with and what influence that has on you." When we are being transformed, we become much more aware of all the things that are nourishing or toxic to us on all levels. Our old routines, habits, attitudes, activities and associates no longer suffice. In everything we do, in every dimension of our beings, we are being refined and restored to our Original Wholeness.

Who Can We Tell?

Trying to explain our situation to people who have no knowledge of Kundalini is like trying to explain the desert to a fish. The dynamics of Kundalini fly in the face of so many consensual reality beliefs that people think we are talking lunacy. When I am asked how Kundalini experiences can be broached in a way that will be acceptable to one's neighbors and friends, I am tempted to advise: "Tell them you have malaria!"

Genevieve Lewis Paulson, whose Kundalini awakening was not so severe as to prevent her from working, said that rather than offer "long definitions and treatises," she told friends and co-workers that her symptoms were due to "menopause and low-blood sugar." This explanation was not entirely untrue in her case, since she "was of menopausal age, after all, and did have some low-blood sugar problems." Throughout my life, I've experienced psychic and spiritual phenomena which, with the exception of a few carefully chosen confidants, I had kept to myself. Since these experiences were primarily of an interior nature, and had no visible effect on my body or my behavior, these secrets were not hard to conceal. But when my Kundalini arose, it was no longer possible to pretend that nothing out of the ordinary was going on. Where my previous unusual experiences comprised a small portion of my life, Kundalini monopolizes my life. It is not something I can keep in the closet while carrying on an ostensibly "normal" daily life.

Still, not everyone connected to me knows the truth about my situation. Relatives who keep in touch with my mother have been told I am suffering from a strange illness my doctors have been unable to diagnose. (From my doctors' viewpoint, this is true.) To my neighbors, I am some kind of eccentric recluse with health problems. (This also is not far removed from the truth.)

Yet even these unsuspecting neighbors have not been spared some of the wilder paranormal manifestations of the riproaring Kundalini. During the most spectacular period of my process, the elderly couple next door (who had no inkling of my condition) asked Charles, who is an electronics engineer, if he knew what might be causing a very peculiar "malfunction" in their TV set. With considerable embarrassment (and fear that we might consider them crazy), they told him that for the past week, the set had been turning itself on full volume in the middle of the night! They hoped Charles might be able to offer some mechanical explanation for this bizarre development.

Charles told me he almost replied, "Maybe it has something to do with my wife." Instead, he discretely answered that he knew of no logical explanation for the phenomena. (These were two very conservation, Methodist-Republican senior citizens who were not likely to find reassurance in the discovery that they were residing next door to a human psychic-power-dynamo!)

During this same period, Charles and I had gone to a bookstore to see if we could find any books on Kundalini. The clerk asked us if we had read Gopi Krishna's biography. We told her that we had. "Isn't it incredible what he went through?" she asked us. "It's hard to imagine such a thing." We both smiled and nodded. Little did she know it was all I could do to keep my arms held stiff at my sides to prevent them from going into sweeping mudras. In The Stormy Search for the Self, Christina and Stanislav Grof observe: "Spiritual disciplines have varying attitudes about whether people should talk about their inner journey. Some schools believe that it detracts from the power of the experience to talk about it and that such discussion may lead to undesirable traits such as pride... Other traditions encourage expression, however limited, as a way to integrate these inner states into daily life. By talking about your experiences with people who understand, you will further comprehend what happened to you."

Overall, they advise that it is safest to confide only in "people who are receptive -- someone who has been through a similar process, a knowledgeable therapist or spiritual teacher, or a support group." While it can be very helpful to discuss our visions and mystical experiences with trusted advisors, Native Americans such as the holy man Medicine Grizzlybear Lake warn that it is best to wait at least a year before openly sharing such things. Indiscriminate sharing can dissipate the power of these experiences.

I did tell my closest family members and friends the truth about my situation. Yet even among the most receptive and open-minded, there was misunderstanding. One person thought I had deliberately decided to precipitate a Kundalini awakening. Appalled that I would initiate such a dangerous undertaking, she tried to talk me out of it. Another imagined Kundalini to be some kind of tantric sexual practice. Some assumed that I was using a religious metaphor to help me cope with my terrible disease. Several feared that I had lost my mind under the strain of my illness. Initially, my sister was afraid that I was in denial about an undiagnosed manic-depressive disorder, and my son asked me if having a risen Kundalini meant that I was now a "pagan."

Repeatedly, people undergoing transformation remark that they find little tolerance or real knowledge of the Kundalini process even among their most spiritually oriented acquaintances. Unless someone is personally undergoing the process, or has read a substantial amount of authentic literature on this phenomena (or has been in close, constant contact with someone experiencing transformation), it's a good bet they won't have a clue as to what you are saying. I solved the problem by sending nearly a dozen copies of Bonnie Greenwell's Energies of Transformation and half a dozen of Lee Sannella's The Kundalini Experience to family members and friends who were valiantly struggling to comprehend me.

Many of those I know who are involved in lengthy transformation processes have simply given up trying to explain it to anyone. Some who are undergoing unmistakable Kundalini awakenings won't even use the word Kundalini any more, so weary are they of being misunderstood. For years, I managed to avoid mentioning anything about Kundalini to my doctors for fear if I did, they would not only dismiss what I said, but would likely diagnose me as some kind of neurotic/hypochondriac space case and stop taking my legitimate medical needs seriously. When my spine injury forced me to seek medical help, I first saw a general practitioner. When she witnessed my kriyas, I explained that this was a lingering neurological condition that previous physicians said might be the result of a virus. (Not the whole truth, but true enough.) She sent me to a neurologist; again, on the examining table, my legs jerked spastically several times. The neurologist assumed this was because I was in pain and tense; he told me to "just relax." (Actually, the more relaxed I am, the more vigorous the kriyas. I did the opposite and tensed up; the kriyas subsided.)

Sometimes it seems as if the Spirit wants to be known, and pushes us into situations where telling is unavoidable. After eleven months of relentless back pain, my neurologist became insistent that I switch from a very small daily dose of codeine to antidepressants for pain relief. I had told him previously that I did not want to take these drugs because there was "too much controversy" surrounding them, but he wouldn't let it go at that. He kept questioning me as to why I was so dead set against taking these medications. Finally, I broke down and confessed to him that I was in the midst of a Kundalini awakening, and that antidepressants were known to be antagonistic to the process. I said that I knew it sounded weird, and that I was very uneasy talking about this because I knew that others who revealed their condition to their doctor were met with disbelief and hostility -- and in some cases, a refusal to provide further medical care.

Much to his credit, although he was skeptical, my neurologist did not berate me, and was willing to drop the argument. It helped that I was able to tell him that the DSM-IV (issued by the American Psychiatric Association and relied upon by mainstream doctors and therapists) has accepted the new category of spiritual emergence! In a March '93 memo, SEN told its members of this groundbreaking medical recognition of the mind/body/soul connection: "Because any diagnosis that appears in the manual must be included in medical school training, physicians and therapists will be educated on the subject." (A standing ovation for doctors Robert Turner, David Lukoff and Francis Lu for working hard to get this category recognized!) Who and how and when to tell are not easy decisions -- and, as in my experience with my doctor, the decision is not always in our own hands. I have been wonderfully blessed in having a husband with whom I can share the whole of my truth, and with connecting to others who not only understood, but who were experiencing many identical manifestations to mine in their own emergence process.

People experiencing Kundalini difficulties are one of the most socially disenfranchised of all groups, in large part because they are not only invisible to the culture, but also invisible to each other and, when not understanding the spiritual nature of their process, estranged from themselves. Surrounded by a collective negating voice that intermittently speaks through friends, family, associates, doctor, minister, alternative healer, swami, roshi, etc., the individual is constantly told that her Kundalini experiences simply cannot (or should not) be happening.

Of all the demeaning forms of prejudice, aspersion that categorically denies the validity of one's experiences is most undermining. Even blatant hatred is not so corrosive to one's sense of self-trust. This is why networking and forming support groups is so important for Kundalini initiates. When we know others who are in the same boat, it is far easier to withstand onslaughts of the immense forces of ignorance. This is not simply a matter of having some chums to trade tales with. People's lives have been badly damaged through inappropriate medical treatments, poor "spiritual" instruction, and an overall lack of personal understanding of the transformational process.

Unless we use discretion, telling the truth about our Kundalini experiences may get us branded as liars or weirdoes, jeopardizing our jobs, reducing our standing in the community and threatening our survival. But gradually the social climate is warming up to the mysteries of the Spirit. Up until recent times, admitting to a telepathic or precognitive experience, or to making contact with the "ghost" of a loved one who had died, were met with blank stares and serious question about one's sanity. Now these and stranger things are featured topics on popular TV talk shows. If, as it seems, the planetary vibration of the Aquarian Age is inducing ever increasing incidents of spontaneous spiritual awakening, perhaps not too far in the future, there will be so many of us and enough honest discussion of these experiences that we all will feel free to speak openly of such things.

Blessing or Curse?

In the overall sense, what may help or hinder us most is our regard for the process itself. Both the energetic activity in the body and the psychic deluge from awakening chakras create a strong impression of internal "otherness." Women who have borne children are familiar with this physical and mental/emotional intimacy with the "other" within. In fact, many of the Kundalini manifestations bear resemblance to the flutterings and stirrings and even the bold kicks and contortions of the infant in the womb. If we are able to welcome this inundation of more-than-self into our bodyminds, the process is far easier to bear than when we recoil in horror at the seemingly alien invasion. Transpersonal psychotherapist Bonnie Greenwell, who works with clients undergoing spiritual emergence, has commented: "If Kundalini awakens and one is contracted against the consciousness it brings, it appears that nothing of value can happen, although much struggle may still occur."

I have witnessed this in several individuals who furiously fought against the difficulties of their awakening process. Not only was this negation futile in preventing further symptoms; by taking an adversarial stance, they denied themselves the one thing that might have made their pain endurable: a sense of purposefulness.

In my case, some part of me must have been secretly awaiting this stage of my development in great anticipation, because as soon as I accepted I was experiencing the risen Kundalini, I was overcome with joy, reverence and gratitude. Such immediate readiness to receive the process as a gift is unusual. Most people need a bit more reflection and evidence before they can believe that the painful symptoms and losses incurred during the cleansing period are actually preludes to profound healing and regeneration.

"During and for a period of time after the awakening, it may be quite hard to accept the reality of the Kundalini," points out Tontyn Hopman (who worked closely with Gopi Krishna). He sympathizes with those who are "going through a turmoil of both beatific and upsetting visionary or synchronistic experiences," and want "nothing more than to return to the old, uncomplicated state and have nothing more to do with the new situation." Hopman suggests that we try to humbly "live with, even for, the new energy in us," and if possible, to surround ourselves "with persons with whom we have a harmonious and loving relationship. " More exuberantly, Vicki Noble encourages us "to keep a sense of excitement and joy about the process, to affirm the actual sensations of life-force and passion that are flooding through the body... Trust the basic goodness of the process, the positive direction of the high-voltage healing energies."

Yet even with such a rallying attitude, those of us who accept the benevolence of the transformational experiences may still face episodes that shake our faith. There have been countless times when I seriously doubted I would survive my process intact. Yet even in my most harrowing moments, I have been sustained by my gratitude. Going through severe illness and staggering losses brings everything into razor sharp perspective. Either one remains teetering on a precipice of bitter resentment, or one gains a deep appreciation of every aspect of one's existence, which is not wracked in pain and sorrow. Genuine gratitude is a reward unto itself. Even in the throes of devastation, it fills us with a sense of the holiness of life. Gratitude is the recognition that Something here is touching us with Love. This is such a joyful release from the egocentric and self-torturing belief that Something here owes us a good life, or that any painful experience is a sign of punishment or personal failure.

I'm afraid I'm starting to sound moralistic here, which isn't my intention. I don't think feeling thankful can be taught as a spiritual virtue; it arises by itself when enough inner debris has been cleared away. I think it is crucial to remember that each of us has our own innate style, our own exquisite relationship to the whole that no one else can spell out for us. The transformational process reveals to each of us the best way to embrace and be embraced by all that comes to us. Finding this way for ourselves is our personal search for the grail. The qualities of character stressed by many spiritual teachers as essential to completing transformation are courage, faith and not least of all, a good sense of humor. More succinctly, what helps most is to take heart, keep searching, keep watching