In tantra and yoga, kundalini is described as a dormant energy at the base of the spine that can rise through the chakras toward the crown. In 1989, Stanislav and Christina Grof named intense experiences like this 'spiritual emergency' — episodes that can look like crisis and may need real care, not just endurance.
Why this is hard
The tradition describes kundalini as coiled potential, usually pictured as a serpent, that can move upward through the body's energy centers when it wakens. Experiences described this way — intense heat, shaking, or overwhelming emotion — are sometimes reported outside any formal practice too. The Grofs' 1989 'spiritual emergency' framing treats such intensity as potentially meaningful, not simply pathology to suppress.
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Kundalini is pictured as coiled energy at the base.
Because tantric tradition describes it as latent, resting until practice or circumstance stirs it.
An old image of a serpent, asleep until it isn't.
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It's said to rise through the chakras.
Because the tradition maps its movement upward through a sequence of centers toward the crown.
A rising sensation traced, in the tradition's account, along one central line.
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Intense experiences can happen outside formal practice too.
Because people sometimes report sudden, powerful states without ever having trained for them.
A sudden flood of heat or emotion, with no practice behind it at all.
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The Grofs named this spiritual emergency in 1989.
Because they framed intense spiritual experience as a crisis that can also carry meaning.
A frightening episode reframed as something moving through, not just something broken.
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Intense or frightening experiences deserve real care.
Because a doctor or a qualified teacher can tell what's happening and help someone through it.
A hard night, and a call made to someone who actually knows what this is.
The practice
This page isn't a technique — the tradition holds that kundalini practices are learned directly from a teacher, not from a description. If anything like this is already happening to you and it's frightening, bring it to a doctor or a qualified teacher rather than sit with it alone.
The rise is the tradition's image. Where it gets frightening, bring it to real help.
Tantric and yogic tradition; Stanislav and Christina Grof, Spiritual Emergency, 1989