Kuṇḍalinī and the many Spiritual Emergencies

When did Kuṇḍalinī transform into a source of distress? Global gurus such as Yogi Bhajan, Swami Muktananda, and Osho, who emphasized Kuṇḍalinī in their teachings, played significant roles in shaping the fears within the experiencer communities. By the mid-20th century, Kuṇḍalinī had become a widely recognized aspect of spiritual experience, with each teacher promoting their unique approach as superior. A few decades later, in 1980, Christina and Stanislav Grof established the Spiritual Emergency Network (SEN), later renamed the Spiritual Emergence Network. The Grofs introduced a typology of spiritual experiences that further contributed to the discourse surrounding Kuṇḍalinī emergenc(i)es. On their website Kuṇḍalinī is classified alongside such extreme experiences as episodes of unitive consciousness (“peak experiences'), the crisis of psychic opening, Near-death experiences (or NDEs), and so forth.

In this paper, the co-authors examine the swift evolution of distressing Kuṇḍalinī experiences, spanning from the influential gurus of the mid-20th century to contemporary social media groups. They will also explore how these narratives diverge significantly from the limited texts that reference Kuṇḍalinī.