I am finding Princess of Mahakala's knowledge about the different schools of Shaivism to be quite informative and comprehensive.
It is actually very refreshing for me, after what has transpired over the past few days on here...I felt bogged down always having to "dumb things down".
I am a Shaivite myself, but I am not really pinned down to any one school, however, because my initial introduction to Shaivism was very "mainstream", I will always have a nostalgic preference for the whole Dualistic, Puranic Sāṃkhya Shaivite philosophy as the most popular version among the Bhakta persuasion...in that regard, the Vishistadvaita application of Pashupata Shaivism (Lakulisha Shaivism) comes closest and is also a nostalgic representation of the Indus Valley Civilization...however, I also feel close to the Tamil Nayanars (Sambandhar, Basavanna, Allama Prabhu etc) but I digress.
I have studied Abhinavagupta's Tantraloka and the Yoga Kundali Upanishad (I don't know who wrote that) and the whole notion of Kundalini was codified for the practitioners of Yoga (in general) back in the 14th century by Swami Svatmarama when he composed the Hatha Yoga Pradipika.
I have also studied the Vignana Bhairava Tantra and I believe Matsyendranath (of the Nath tradition) composed that one and I have studied Arthur Avalon's/Sir John Woodroffe's books "The Serpent Power" and "Shakta and Shakti" but I never read "A Garland of Letters" because I went on to study the Mahanirvana Tantra instead...which was also an offshoot of "The Tibetan Book of the Great Liberation" in much the same way as the Radiance Sutras are a spin off of the VBT..
Yes, according to Tantra..and especially the Sri Vidya, Kundalini is Bindu and there is a reason why I have the Sri Yantra as my avatar...because all of the tattwas can be traced back through and to a single point of origin..however, the mathematical permutations through all 11 dimensions are mind blowing...tetryonics:
https://www.google.com/search?q=sri+...SgmcVDuZ1Pg4PM
Yes, I don't know about others, but my Kundalini awakening was precisely how Princess described it...like dying while awake...like one of those NDEs that Shamans have which lead them to commune with the spirit world....like a scene out of "Flatliners"...heart and breath slows down to being almost imperceptible, brain activity becomes negligible and you think "this is it then... goodbye cruel world..." at first I really became freaked out by it but now, as you ALL know, when Shakti is doing her thing, the best thing you CAN do is not to resist... resistance is futile anyway, but the ego still tries to hold on, to keep consciousness established in the third dimension instead of letting the spirit break free of any confines the mind sets for it ..and this can be as scary as hell.
I am also joyous that someone on here is finally using Sanskrit terminology that I can understand...I have been waiting for another to understand what I mean when I break into Sanskrit mid sentence because I can't find any English equivalent and it seems I may have finally met my match...but only time will tell.
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