16 Signs You’re Having What’s Known As A Kundalini Awakening

Kundalini is your life force energy. It’s believed that in those who are unawakened, their energy remains coiled at the base of their spine. For those who have an awakening event and become conscious, the energy spirals upward, activating each chakra, and making the being transition into an enlightened guru.

So, yeah, it’s a lot.

Many people believe that a Kundalini awakening is a process of coming into complete nirvana, and that’s true – to a degree. A Kundalini awakening is talked about a lot in spiritual circles because prior to experiencing bliss, the energy first cleanses and purifies, and the shifts that you experience can be unnerving at best, and downright painful at worst.

A kundalini awakening can be one of the most traumatic and confusing times of your life. What you cannot tell at the onset is that you’re actually undergoing a deep purification process, in which you will come out on the other end stronger and more level-headed than ever before.

Here’s how to know whether or not you’re in the process:

1. You begin a process of emotional reckoning. You find your mind circling through past experiences that you either miss and feel sad about no longer having, or are mourning for, and feel sad that you had to go through in the first place.

2. You are unpacking years of pent-up energy blocks that have prevented you from being present. This means you’ll spend a lot of time thinking through the past: what happened, and what you wish were different. This is a time to come to peace with it and to release.

3. You may feel physical symptoms, such as waking up at random hours of the night, sweating, crying, or even literally feeling an intense rush of energy going up your spine.

4. You feel a sudden need to make radical changes in your life. This can include everything from your diet to your job to the people you spend time with. More than anything, you realize what isn’t working.

5. You become conscious of how your mind has been the sole force holding you back from presence, and from happiness. You begin to realize that your ego has kept you trapped in trying to “prepare for the worst,” when in reality, it was a ploy to keep you from the current moment, wherein your energy has its most power.

6. Incredible synchronicities begin to appear in your life. Things just have a random way of working themselves out and leave you thinking: hm, that was perfect. 

7. Your empathetic abilities strengthen like never before. It’s as though you can think and feel exactly what another person is experiencing the moment they are experiencing it. This might be overwhelming at first, but it’s really a sign that your third eye is opening and you’re becoming acquainted with your true nature, which is connectedness.

8. You feel a strong urge to be outside, in nature, as often as possible.

9. You feel a strong urge to declutter your life in as many ways as possible: broken relationships, messes in your home, old habits that are holding you back… it all has to go.

10. You begin to seriously question many of the systems and structures that currently exist. You begin to look at things like religion and politics and tradition in a way you never have before, identifying the root need they serve in human beings.

11. You experience “random” influxes of emotion. In reality, you’re dealing with old feelings you never fully addressed.

12. You feel a profound need to be of service to others. You understand that as we are all essentially one, devoting your life to the aide of other people is the noblest and gratifying thing you can do.

13. You begin to feel angry for what you were and weren’t given, for all the pain you did and didn’t have to cope with. Eventually, that anger melts into acceptance, as you see each part of your experience as part of your journey, not an adversary to it.

14. You realize that life was never happening to you, it was simply a reflection of you. What you were putting out into the world was precisely what you were getting back.

15. You feel a mystical, intimate connection with the divine. You see yourself as a god and recognize the god in every other human being alive.

16. You realize that you cannot wait another moment to start living, because life is happening right now, and always has been. You begin to realize that you have denied yourself your joy by waiting for it to begin. Thought Catalog Logo Mark

January Nelson is a writer, editor, and dreamer. She writes about astrology, games, love, relationships, and entertainment. January graduated with an English and Literature degree from Columbia University.