This is a photo of me in June of 2024, around the time I began a Kundalini Yoga Teacher Training program, as part of my desire to deepen my spiritual studies and to heal many wounds and mistakes in my life. For the two years prior to my enrollment, I spent my time reconnecting with my spiritual curiosities, which brought me back to Kundalini energy; something that I discovered when I was 13, in my search for a spiritual system that resonated with me. I watched many videos regarding Kundalini and was introduced to the practice of Kundalini Yoga through a channel on YouTube, known as YogaVision. The channel contained videos of Kundalini Yoga practices that aided my healing of various forms of trauma and helped me regulate my nervous system through resurfacing c-ptsd, and helped me confront situations in my life that needed my attention and accountability, with less anger and more awareness.
Along with practicing the videos on the channel, I also read books about the chakras, the auric system, and mudras, and enjoyed practicing the balancing of my chakras by chanting the bija for each of my chakras to deep droning meditative tracks. All of this was aiding my healing process on a mental level, a physical level, an emotional level, and an energetic level. It also helped me on the path to expressing myself as a creative artist as well. It got to the point where I began sharing techniques that I had learned, to my audience on social media. Salimah, who leads YogaVision, took notice and recommended I invest in learning to teach Kundalini Yoga more efficiently, and with a wider understanding of the practice.
I’ve experienced many traumas in which my autonomy was not always respected. Whether my boundaries weren’t being respected, I wasn’t being seen or heard, or whether my own beliefs and actions were good enough for those around me. These wounds accumulated throughout my life, and I didn’t have the understanding or awareness to deal with them in healthy ways. I became easily triggered into aggression and violence and resorted to wearing masks just to get through life. As life happened, the moments where I felt I could be myself felt less and less frequent, and my whole outlook on the world, people, friendships, and relationships became cynical, especially after my grandfather died. For most of my life, I modeled my drive, entrepreneurship, and character after his presence in my life, and it served me well for the time it did. However the nature of him becoming ill, and his quick passing, I started to just give up on everything in my life. I believed my social interactions and relationships were inherently transactional, and conditional, and my relationships gradually reflected such at the time. I overworked to keep my brain occupied, which didn’t do my health any favors and it reached a head when I crashed out and was out of work for some time. It affected my finances and the finances of others I considered close, and combined with other issues at the time, I completely lost it. I ended my relationship, grew attached to someone I barely knew simply because they seemed capable of fixing me, I fell out with people I considered friends, and I even distanced myself from family. I needed to work through a lot, and the tools I had that kept me holding on, were my creative projects and spiritual practices.
As of this entry, I am just over halfway through the teacher training program. Over that time, I’ve learned quite a lot regarding the origins of Kundalini Yoga, the sacred language of Gurmukhi, and its connection to Kundalini Yoga, and how to use what I’ve learned both on my yoga mat and in my studies, out in my waking life. As I evaluate my progress, I realize that I’ve changed from when I started, and how I see myself teaching in various capacities moving forward. First, I’d like to briefly disclaim why I practice Kundalini Yoga in the first place, and why I meditate at all.
Much of my spiritual truth is tied to my understanding and my curiosities of the afterlife. I previously struggled with talking about my honest beliefs, fearing being misunderstood. However, if I’m going to be efficient in my teaching and my expression in life, that requires me to be fully authentic in my viewing, and being. My near-death experience straight-up changed me (see No Divinity Eluded). Early in my spiritual awakening, I felt immense waves of energy coming and going from my body. With them, would be resurfacing memories, and various thoughts and visions (some spiritual communities may refer to these as ‘downloads’) of what the nature of this life is, for my own situation. It felt as if my awareness increasing, was leading to the realization that I had died and I was doing some last-minute healing before passing on. As wild as this may sound, it was very much real to me in those moments. Feeling my body recreate the sensations of what may have happened in my moments of being unconscious, to having my mind show me the various ways things could’ve or perhaps did play out, leading me to my present moment. These situations would arrive early in my meditation journey. They were so intense that I would sometimes gag from re-experiencing the sensations. It felt like all of my resurfacing memories were a form of my life “flashing before my eyes”, in waves. Kundalini Yoga helped me, through its elements of breathwork, kriyas, mantras, mudras, and meditation, helped channel these energies that came up within my body, and regulate how my nervous system experienced stimuli and not-so-subtle energies. I also realized that meditation comes in more than just one form of sitting still and trying not to think of anything. Meditation can be anything that gives me a focal point to channel my energy while allowing the energies of my body to flow more efficiently and evenly and gives me a way to ground in my awareness as best I can, through the spectrum of sensation and my perceptions.
For me, Kundalini Yoga is a process of training my consciousness, which had grown very attached to my physical body, to accept expansion within itself and beyond my physical body. It feels like I’m physically healing the wounds of my past that accumulated in my body, to better move and show up in my present. It also feels like it’s a gradual process of expanding my consciousnesses capacity for sensation, so that I do have a smoother transition into what comes after life, whenever my time here is up. Think how you would gradually warm yourself up to an exercise to prevent injuring yourself, or acclimating your body to a temperature as to not shock your system through a sudden change.
Meditation, is like the element that helps me remain grounded through such a change, no matter how fast. When I go through the physical healing in this life, I sometimes need a moment of respite to adjust to the changes, or to calm an aspect of myself, or simply to have a moment of just being. No judgment, no to-do’s, no tasks, just the moment. Its a time where that singular point of focus gives me an anchor as I integrate new lessons, new perspectives, and an opportunity to reapproach any past sensations or memories with increased skill. That’s the best way I can describe it at this moment, and so far, it’s been working.
In regard to healing my traumas with death, I have less fear of the unknown and more courage in who I’ve grown to be. I recognize I’m more open to changing my views if such moments truly resonate with me or if I’m brought new perspective through synchronicity, and my relationship with life and death is much healthier. I don’t approach my life with shame and guilt anymore, and I realize that for me, death is not the final frontier of consciousness, however, what I learn, experience and express in this life, will help me in my travels when I do transition from this life.
While I am still here and now, I have also managed to heal my relationship with life. My perspective on life has become less cynical, and when I do express my doubts, I’m able to refer to a method, or breathwork, mantra, mudra, or full practice that helped me channel that energy in a non-destructive way. I handle my traumas better, I make better effort to see society in a healthier and more hopeful light, and I have a greater capacity to give grace, patience and compassion to others in my life It’s not always easy, but I do my best, because in retrospect of where I was two years ago, I would want the same. When things don’t seem to go so well, I recognize my improved ability to set and reinforce boundaries, and realize that my choice and my voice matter whether I’m alone or in a community.