Awakening differences; Descending & Ascending

Originally Posted by dryad

Descending grace isnt really anything to do with kundalini. Its something else entirely. Its sometimes referred to as the descent of shakti which would be why people get it mixed up with kundalini because kundalini is also referred to as shakti. But shakti is just another name for powerful energy. Kundalini is waking up your own dormant energy. Descending shakti is receiving energy from outside. Its safer because the incoming current will match itself to what your system is capable of handling whether thats because its given by an ascended master or if you connect to source yourself the size of the link will determine how much can flow through. Open a bigger link and you get more energy. Kundalini doesnt do that. There is no restriction on the incoming flow because it comes from within.

That is an interesting post.


How would one open a bigger link?
Intriguing stuff.

[dryad]

Energy flows like water through a pipe. Imagine a bigger pipe.

[durgaa]

The ascent of Kundalini Shakti is the Energy or Divine Force that comes down from above the head or from below-up - it's still called Shakti. Only difference is that the kundalini at the base is coiled up and asleep and has to be woken up for it ascend up the central channel (sushumna) in the subtle body. The Shakti above the head is always awake and descends gradually (not like the volcanic ascent method). The ascent method belongs to the old Yoga's. The Descent was really only introduced by the famous Yogi Sri Aurobindo, who made it an important part of His 'lntegral or Supramental Yoga'.

Descent experience
In Integral Yoga, after the constant practice of mental silence and concentration of the consciousness above the head, one inevitably experiences what may be called a “descent“, in which there is a palpable feeling of a Power/Force descending from above the head and working its way down the Brahmarandhra (door of Brahman, AKA anterior fontanelle) through the back of the head and down the spine. With progress, it is this Power that fills the heart and other parts of the lower being and gradually brings about a change of consciousness.
This “descent experience” has no equivalent in other Yogas where the focus is on raising the Kundalini upwards towards the head from the Muladhara at the base of the spine

Satprem: But then what is this consciousness we feel like a force inside us? For instance, sometimes in meditation it rises, then descends; it’s not fixed anywhere. What is this consciousness?

Mother: The Shakti!

Some receive it from above; for others, it rises from below (gesture to the base of the spine). As I once told you, the old system always proceeds from below upwards, while Sri Aurobindo pulls from above downwards. This becomes very clear in meditation (well, in yoga, in yogic experience): for those who follow the old system, it’s invariably the kundalini at the base [of the spine] rising from center to center, center to center, until the lotus (in an ironic tone) bursts open here {gesture at the crown of the head). With Sri Aurobindo, it comes like this (gesture of descending Force) and then settles here (above the head); it enters, and from there it comes down, down, down, everywhere, to the very bottom, and even below the feet – the subconscient – and lower still, the inconscient.

It’s the Shakti. He said, you know (I am still translating it), that the shakti drawn up from below (this is what happens in the individual process) is already what could be called a “veiled” shakti (it has power, but it is veiled). While the Shakti drawn down from above is a PURE Shakti; and if it can be brought down carefully and slowly enough so that it isn’t (how shall I put it?) polluted or, in any case, obscured as it enters matter, then the result is immediately much better. As he has explained, if you start out with this feeling of a great power in yourself (because it’s always a great power no matter where it awakens), there’s inevitably a danger of the ego meddling in. But if it comes pure and you are very careful to keep it pure, not to rush the movement but let it purify as it descends, then half the work is done

This force is the Yoga-Shakti. It is here coiled up and asleep in all the centres of our inner being (Chakras) and is at the base what is called in the Tantras the Kundalini Shakti. But it is also above us, above our head as the Divine Force - not there coiled up, involved, asleep, but awake, scient, potent, extended and wide; it is there waiting for manifestation and to this Force we have to open ourselves - to the power of the Mother.