Advanced Yoga Practices
Main lessons
by Yogani
Note: For the Original Internet Lessons with additions, see the AYP Easy Lessons Books. For the Expanded and Interactive Internet Lessons, AYP Online Books, Audiobooks and more, see AYP Plus.
Lesson 169 - Is This Ecstatic Conductivity?
New Visitors: It is recommended you read from the beginning of the archive, as previous lessons are prerequisite to this one. The first lesson is, “Why This Discussion?”
From: Yogani
Date: Mon Apr 19, 2004 3:22pm
New Visitors: It is recommended you read from the beginning of the archive, as previous lessons are prerequisite to this one. The first lesson is, “Why This Discussion?”
Q: I started Yoni Mudra Kumbhaka two weeks ago and since then I have been feeling a strange new connection between my head and my perineum. I do Sambhavi and I feel it down there. I put my tongue on the roof of my mouth and I feel it down there. It’s pretty nice and sexual, but also pretty strange. Is this the Ecstatic Conductivity you often mention? It seems to be so. Why is it happening, and where is it leading? Where did the term Ecstatic Conductivity come from? I have never seen it in a yoga book.
A: What a beautiful experience. Yes, it is the beginning of ecstatic conductivity, and once it has begun, it will be with you to stay. A level of purification has been reached in your nervous system where your previously learned practices, combined with the addition of yoni mudra kumbhaka, have given rise to that telltale inner sensuality between the brain and the root. It is an awakening of your spinal nerve, which has led to conscious sensations between the upper and lower extremities of it. This is an excellent way to begin a gentle and loving kundalini awakening, with balance of ecstatic energies between head and root right from the start. It means you have good inner silence available to blend in a progressive and healthy way with the rise of ecstatic energies in your nervous system.
How you conduct your practices from now on will determine the rate at which the awakening will continue. If you were to stop practices today, it would likely stay at about the current level of connectedness, or “ecstatic conductivity.” As you continue with practices, which I’m sure you will, the ecstatic conductivity will increase over time. It should be a comfortable and smooth unfoldment as you continue to be attentive to self-pacing in practices according to your experiences. We can thank the purifying and stabilizing influences of deep meditation and spinal breathing for our continuing growth and stability.
I confess that the term “ecstatic conductivity” is something I came up with many years ago to describe my own experiences with it, which were similar to the experiences you are beginning now. It is the awakening of kundalini, and we also use kundalini terminology to describe it. Every tradition has its own language for the experience. In these modern times, where we are able to understand such changes as an awakening of the latent capabilities in our nervous system, we can describe it as the rise of increased conductivity in the electrical circuits (nerves) in our body. That is what it is. And it is pleasurable, as you point out. The pleasure keeps increasing as the conductivity increases, eventually beyond all human comprehension, I might add. So it can be called “ecstatic” conductivity, which it certainly is.
Why is it happening to you now, and where is it leading? Well, it is your time, you know. You are doing powerful practices every day, and the time has come for your nervous system to open. It is like a second puberty that is happening in so many of us as we begin our journey into the internal divine lovemaking that leads to the unity enlightenment stage. When kundalini begins to awaken, the inner union, the marriage of our divine polarities, is in the offing. It could take only a few years, or many years, for the process to complete itself, depending on the remaining obstructions in our nervous system, and the degree of dedication we have in our daily practices. And where will it lead? Union is freedom in unending ecstatic bliss and divine love, of course. It is our destiny – it is the birthright of each and every one of us. We have explored this in discussions in the lessons on the milestones and stages we experience on the journey to enlightenment.
The fruition of the journey is also discussed recently in the Advanced Yoga Practices Tantra Lessons, from a slightly different perspective – the point of view of “Sri Vidya” and its “Sri Yantra” sacred diagram. You may wish to review that lesson (#T25).
I wish you all success as you continue on your journey to ecstatic
bliss and unending divine love.
The guru is in you.
Note: For a detailed overview on building a daily practice routine with self-pacing, see the Eight Limbs of Yoga Book, and AYP Plus.
These lessons on yoga are reproduced from www.aypsite.org