Some Thoughts on Meditation, Kundalini, White Light

It is a wonderfully convenience that in many contemporary Yogic Systems that the Power of Spiritual Initiation can be passed as easily as by the touch of an authentic Guru – this is called Shaktipat. Otherwise, we can envision taking years of doing the kind of breath retention exercises that are usually the norm with the more aggressive Yogic Programs. But regarding breath retention exercises, one really needs most to exercise caution. You see, it is very easy to suspect that breath retention exercises are most calculated to have the most effect in direct proportion to the amount of brain damage they inflict – hold one’s breath for 4 minutes and one is almost guaranteed to have a very genuine Near Death Experience… perhaps nearer to death than one would wish to hope for. And so it is that Samadhi being passed by the Touch of a Master should definitely be given a chance. It is so much more inherently safe.

So, Shaktipat is a very good thing. But we are left considering the availability of Gurus. Many people have the perception that such Shaktipat Gurus are an extremely rare commodity, and then, even when they are found, may be either too expensive to retain, or may impose a much too forbidding a regiment of conditions – absolute celibacy or absolute obedience, that is, they may ask for more than we are prudently prepared to give. For instance, one of the best Shaktipat Gurus I had ever met was old Kirpal Singh of the Surat Shabd Organization, but he expected his initiates to commit to 6 months of sexual celibacy even before he would give the first Initiation (if I remember accurately), and that was way back during the height of the Sexual Revolution. Well, it would be difficult to give away Bags of Money on those conditions. I and many others waited for more accommodating Gurus while we celebrated the Age of Aquarius.

But are such contracts with these Gurus entirely necessary? While still believing that nothing is more Spiritually conducive than being protégé to an Authentic Guru, I must admit that for someone seeking their Spiritual Beginnings, completely registering under a Guru may not be entirely indispensable. One may make due without. And in this regard, I have found that Shaktipat may be more available than is generally supposed. Allow me to explain – Years ago I read in a translation of a passage from the Upanishads that “In the presence of a God or Saint, the Third Eye will open”. Well, on the very evening that I read that, I saw a poster advertising a lecture to be given by an itinerant Shaktipat-style Guru. One can guess what happened. I felt my Third Eye open in his presence. It was not an overwhelmingly dazzling feeling. Indeed, if I had not been prepared by my Reading to anticipate such a feeling, I suppose it would have been subtle enough to evade notice or slight enough to dismiss as a painless headache. But since I was watching for something of that nature, I felt it. Seeing this as a validation of this Guru’s credentials, I enlisted for his Initiations. And the Shaktipat given officially was not much stronger than what had been felt merely by being in his presence. What this should mean to the keen observer is that Shaktipat can be gleaned from the Spiritual Atmosphere without necessarily subscribing to all of the trimmings and ceremonies that the Gurus would have you suppose are essential and that must come directly from their hand.

But, one might still suspect that “Gods and Saints” are very rare entities. But this is not at all so. Since my Third Eye has become open and sensitive to such things, I find that any number of people are walking around with Chakras open and radiating enough Spiritual Energy in order to resonate with the Chakras of those within their vicinity. Ordinarily it passes without notice – a pressure sensation in the forehead, or in the case of an open Heart or Throat Chakra, a pressure sensation in those corresponding locations.

So, how can a person take advantage of these Atmospheric Shaktipats? Well, simply by being aware. If one is uninitiated but would like to be as one who is Initiated – with open Chakras and control over one’s Energies, Kundalini and Qi – then one need only visit venues and activities where one might suppose one could meet with some moderately spiritual people. In Sanskrit I think it is called Satsang – the beneficial effect of being in Spiritual Company. If one notices that slight feeling in the Chakras, then the Technique for Auto Initiation is to focus on that Sensation and to hold onto it. Ordinarily, such feelings are ignored and allowed to pass. But if caught by awareness and focused upon, they can be as effectively enduring as any Initiation given at a Weekend Retreat for the price equivalent to that of a down payment on a car.

Sometimes even reading a particularly cogent passage from a Spiritual Book, or in thinking of especially powerful Saints or Gurus from the past, will cause the third eye to open, that is, there will be that feeling of Pressure.

How does one maintain one’s Initiation? Well, simply go about your ordinary business, but remind yourself several times daily to keep some attention on what goes on in your forehead -- up slightly from between the brows. And if you ever feel a slight pressure sensation, then lock onto it immediately -- rub your finger into it; make a buzzy noise with your mouth and modulate its tone until it resonates into that Sensation Point. For the first day, try not to let it totally go away -- remind yourself to keep the sensation open. Rub it with your finger and use that buzz tone to vibrate it. If you can keep it there for just a solid day, and bring it back after a good night’s sleep, then you’ve got it. Then, meditate on it for about 10 or 15 minutes morning and night. After about a week you may begin to feel some heaviness in your head, or you may even have developed a headache. Great! Now you will want to bring the Energy down to the base of your spine where you can give it and yourself a bit of a respite. Do the following: get yourself a nice glass of cold water and drink it, and feel that the Sensation is attached to it and that it drops down, all the way to your lowest vertebrae -- your little triangular tailbone. Reach back there and rub that little tail bone and feel the Sensation there. And keep it there for a couple of weeks. Learn to keep the energy down. That is your Safety Practice. Before the Energy gets too strong to handle you must learn to be able to pull it down at will. So don't keep the Energy up always in your head, supposing that unless you do you might be missing something. You have your entire life to raise up the Energy. For a couple of weeks you need to work on the certainty of being able to lower the Energy. You must be able to control it.

After you’ve developed this ability to control your Energy, being able to drop it down at will, you become ready for a new and very powerful exercise. If you do not feel any sensation in your head -- in and around your brain, then my instructions here might be a bit incomprehensible, but if you do feel some sensation in your head, this is what you should do: If your Energy Sensation is up in your forehead, then use your will to guide it back along the top of your pallet to the back of the roof of your mouth to the Swivel Point at the top of your spine. That point is easy to locate -- you just swivel your head around, and, well, the swivel point is the swivel point. Put the energy sensation there. Point your tongue up to that point. Now, it will feel as though the energy sensation is about the size of a golf ball or a bit smaller… maybe a brussels sprout. What you will now try to do is focus the energy smaller and smaller, as though penetrating the layers of an onion. Smaller smaller smaller -- it will take awhile, but not more than a few minutes. The energy will seem as though it is stuck at a particular size, then suddenly shrink down a bit more. Still you want it to center on that Swivel Point. Eventually it will be about the size of a pea and you will feel it oscillating back and forth like a pendulum. This is really the Key to Kundalini. Once you find that Spot, you can move the Energy anywhere in the body -- up to the Crown Chakra, or down to the heart, or in fact anywhere. But you want to move it down to the heart. That oscillating sensation that you feel is the top of the Heart Chakra anyway, so all you would have to do is let the energy just sink down into the Heart. That should give you a bit of stability.

There is also a trick you could use, and I've only found one other person who can do it. It is to flex a muscle in your head in order to start a roaring noise. The muscle is back there at the top of the pallet close to that swivel point, and the roaring noise is great at collecting Energy. It think it may be a reflex like rolling ones tongue or wiggling one's ears and not everybody can do it. It really is a muscle and not a mental phenomena, because it gets fatigued and one can only hold the flex for 7 or 10 seconds.

Do you know any Mantras? Or you can try an easy Power Meditation -- simply count up from 1 to 24 for each of your spinal column bones, moving your concentration up the spine as you count. Your Kundalini Energy, your Chi, will follow up during the count. Now, such power meditations are a hundred times more impressive during a Dream than while awake, making them always an interesting experience when you can remember to do them while dreaming. Indeed, I once had a Dream in which a Dream Guru told me that even a moment’s Meditation in a Dream is worth thousands of hours of waking Meditation. And having experienced Dream Meditation myself, I don’t doubt the Dream Guru’s math even a little bit.

There is another trick that I developed because I could never really find out what the Buddhist One Finger exercise was (it was mentioned in a Buddhist Treatise by Huang Po), but in experimenting around I found that by twiddling the thumbs -- twirling the thumbs -- right thumb counterclockwise and left thumb clockwise, for just a minute or so, that when you stop, the subtle Kundalini Energy centers in the spine and rises up. I think that the Thumb Nadis are in the Central Channel and that by exercising the Central Nadi Channel at the thumbs, it is exercised everywhere else as well. But the energy only begins to rise after you STOP the exercise, so don't twirl your thumbs indefinitely while waiting for something to happen. Just a minute or two is fine, and then stop.

You should be able to get to the point where you can more or less summon the energy sensation. You are allowed to cheat and point your fingers into the Third Eye Chakra. In fact any pointed object can only help. I once studied Pyramid Power and discovered that there is nothing special about pyramids except that they come to a point. The pointier the better, the steeper the better. Cones work even better but apparently the Egyptians could not carve a curve. Perhaps the handiest and best pyramid available to you would be your very own ballpoint pen – a virtual little Magic Wand.

Oh, and recently I may have found an effective White Light Exercise, as I discovered in a dream:
White Light Exercise from a Dream

While my father was alive I did not get along very well with him, but as the years since his decease have gone by, my relationship with him in my Dreams has been improving. Last night we were sitting at the old dining room table. He was at his customary seat, but I was not at my old seat but, significantly, at the seat ordinarily assigned to the oldest brother – apparently I had been promoted. In the Dream my father tells me that he will show me an exercise for communicating with Spirits using this small device that was set up close to the window. All I could infer about this machine was that it emitted white light. So my father begins this exercise, and it is quite simple – he takes a deep breath and then hisses out the exhale, and then his entire cranium began to glow with White Light. So I began to hiss out my breath and my brain case took on the same glow of White Light. It was like our brains became florescent filaments for the White Light and I could see our brains glowing.

When I awoke, I had an open Crown Chakra. Then, throughout the day, I tried the Exercise a few times. It is easy to do, but there are a few details. It seems that the proper ‘hiss’ involves having the tip of the tongue positioned close to roof of the mouth at that spot that is the best compromise between the forward position which sounds very ‘sssssssssss’ and the position further back which is more purely ‘shshshshshshsh’. Coincidentally, that sound that you would be making is very close to what they call ‘White Noise’.

It really does seem to open the Crown Chakra. Now, the thing I have found about the White Light is that one can see it while in the Dream State, or even while in the hypnogogic state, but while awake it resolves into a feeling of a pressure sensation.

Not only is this White Light Exercise appropriate for waking applications, but more particularly it may be useful to try during Lucid Dreaming, since it would be in such a context that the White Light would sure to be visible.

Also, I might suggest the Gayatri Mantra. After having done the Gayatri Mantra for a year, I had a dream in which the space out in front of me rended open and the White Light came pouring out. Since the Gayatri Mantra is fairly an evocation of the Light, I naturally suppose it must have had something to do with it.

The Gayatri induced White Light Dream may be interesting in itself:

White Light Paramahansa Dream

I knew the dream was becoming spiritual when I looked down and noticed I was not wearing shoes. Here is a Hint! When you are not wearing shoes in a Dream, it means you are on Holy Ground. I levitated up and folded my legs into a lotus position and intoned an AUM. The air around me seemed to turn violet (pinkish purple) and the air rippled and shimmered in waves and then about 20 feet in front of me the very fabric of Space tore open and out poured the Pure White Light. It was like magnesium burning before a chromium mirror, bright and real.
The substance of the Light quickly took up a form – a Paramahansa Swan… not a living bird but a very ornate statuesque representation of one. It was large – more than a meter high and wide. And it was amazingly beautiful – in the brightest White Light but still one could discern the textures of the shapes and detail. But there was little time for amazement when the Swan shot across the distance and into my forehead. And then a new swan formed up to replace it, and it too shot into my forehead as well… and again and again and again, each time more quickly, but each time the ornate and elaborate Paramahansa Swan became simpler, more streamlined. As they formed up more rapidly, they became plainer and plainer. Finally they were coming at a rate of 8 or 10 per second, and the birds were mere ‘Vees’, like as in the way young children draw birds flying in the sky, as two joining lines tapering outward. And they were all flying into my forehead.

When I awoke, the sensations I had felt in the Dream persisted. My Agna Chakra was still pulsating with the feeling of this Spiritual Energy, no longer perceptible as Light but tangible as a pressure sensation. The sensation by proximity also energized my Crown Chakra as well as my throat and heart chakras.

Well, all of the above was about getting the Spiritual Energy and the White Light. That should be enough, but often it is asked “what good is it?” “What does it do?” Many people answer that it is conducive toward psychic and supernatural powers, or that such Energies bring Spiritual Enlightenment. It would be wonderful if this were absolutely certain, however, a great many people have experienced this Spiritual Energy and White Light who are not especially remarkable for any of these extraordinary traits. But still I believe there is some value to the Spiritual Energies. My Old Kundalini Guru would simply assert that it would make people smarter, but perhaps it would be better to express the distinction by saying that it increases the faculty of Discernment. And this brings us to a dream I had years ago:

The Faculty of True Discernment

The Dream Scene was a well sun lit grassy field with large rocks and fallen trees that created a natural gathering place for hikers and nature lovers to sit down and rest. There was this woman who was sitting down and playing a guitar and she was... I have to say it ... an extremely ugly woman. But her guitar playing was the most beautiful I had ever heard. Then came along these men, crude fellows, who approached, and gathered around her to ridicule her merely for being so remarkably unattractive. I was concerned that this would annoy her enough so that she would stop playing, and I became irritated that the boisterous laughing itself was making it difficult to hear the beautiful music being played, and so I told the young men, "Listen! Everything else aside, can't you hear the quality of that music. We are in the presence of some real talent here. So Shut the ____ up!" Then the lady, who had seemed oblivious to all of us, suddenly looked up, and looking me square in the eye said, "The faculty most worth cultivating, is the faculty of True Discernment".


In an instant I was transported to a moon-lit arbor. It was a young growth forest with as many bushes on the forest floor as the trees around them, which formed a low canopy. The air was cool, and this felt like a nice place to be. Much of the Moon light came through and gave a silvery glow to the furry little down-covered pods on the drooping branches of the willow trees. I was a disembodied presence, simply witnessing; I would not be an Actor in this Dream; I would just watch. What I witnessed was a beautiful Greek Goddess… I would guess, Diana, Goddess of the Hunt. She was clad in a pearl-white translucent toga, belted at her waist, and she was barefoot. With a bow in her hand and a quiver of arrows slung over her shoulder, she was serenely languid and in no hurry. It was breathtaking, and I knew this was a special vision. But the tranquility was shattered when along came this strong coarse bearded man – too old to be called young, but not old enough to be supposed wise. He was delighted to happen upon such a pretty woman and of course wanted to make her acquaintance. He said, boastfully, as if boasting could endear himself to her, "I am on the hunt tonight and it is a great misfortune for the poor animals, because I am such a good shot that they surely don't stand a CHANCE".

Diana remained silent and seemed in no hurry to reply, but rather pulled a strangely unique arrow from her quiver. She held it out a moment so that the hunter could see that it was probably the most crocked arrow that could still be straight enough to be shot from a bow. She loaded it onto the string and pulled back in preparation of shooting... then turned her head to the side so it could be seen that she obviously had no intention of aiming, and she released the shot. SHHHOOOOPP, the arrow whistled off and lodged inside a bush I could see the arrow’s feathers sticking out. She walked over and took hold of the arrow’s shaft and withdrew it from the shrub, and, amazingly, there impaled on the arrow was a limp dead game bird. Then she spoke, not to the Hunter, but to me, "Chance? Nothing happens by Chance".' Then I awoke.

What does it mean? The first part of the Dream was prelude to the second part. If I had not seen behind the appearances in the First Dream, that is, if I had not recognized the Beauty behind the ugliness, I would not have been shown the Second. The injunction "The faculty most worth cultivating is the Faculty of True Discernment", was to be my guiding mantra if I were to properly understand the next dream, indeed, to understand my subsequent Life. The Night, the Trees, the Moon Light, the Anima Goddess. This was my inner life. The Bearded Hunter was the invasion of my aggressive persona, my conceit, pride, perhaps even my intellect. The Huntress provided a lesson that teaches that a Greater Unity would always subsume and transcend any actions of the Hunter. Could this Unity be understood? No. The Arrow was crooked and no deliberation guided its aim -- it was released into Fate. Yet there was Intention, there was Will. The Goddess meant to hit the Bird. Apart from Design, pure Volition can resonate well enough to evoke its own Results. But the dynamics here are beyond ordinary cause and effect. It happened because it was both destined to happen and willed to happen. So, what is left for True Discernment to discern, if we omit the rational? Why, the Importance of It All, that is what. If we see Life and the World as arbitrary, a conglomeration of accidents, then we dismiss it. But to see it as a riddle with imbedded meaning makes us look at it harder and deeper. We can understand it as Mystery, but in the positive sense.

Allow me to conclude by saying that where normal physical light allows us to see normal physical reality, the Spiritual Light and Energies help us to both see and feel our Spiritual Reality – to see the Meaning of our Lives.