The Predominance Of The Kundalini

The kundalini is of paramount importance in yoga. It is a serpent who lies in slumber at the base of the human spine, a powerful visualisation of the nerve plexus located therein. In the language of yoga, it is called the mooladhara chakra. The stirring of this nerve plexus or the awakening of the chakra/kundalini is the point of the sum of all yogic practice, whereupon the kundalini is said to rise, slowly and gradually uncoiling itself, in order to traverse up the spine and stimulating all the nerve plexuses (multiple chakras) situated along the same.

The painting that you see on this page is a Tantra-influenced visualisation aid for the potent kundalini. It depicts an uninhibited, unclothed Devi standing along the midline. She is full-figured and has a striking ashen complexion. The crucial aspects of Her woman’s anatomy are superimposed with abstract panels featuring cryptic symbols drawn from the traditional texts of this discipline.

She is flanked by ascetics of varying levels of adhikarita, as conveyed by the colours of the figures. Four of them hold up the trishoola to Her, while the remaining two seemingly emerge from the crown on Her wrathful head. From the hands and thighs of the Devi to the limbs and torsos of the yogis, there are wound around them black kundalini-roopa snakes.