Quote of the Week 77 - Gopi Krishna

The following is excerpted from an article appearing in a long-defunct magazine that had been published in New York City called Inner Paths. It is about a man by the name of Gopi Krishna, who experienced a kundalini awakening. He often authored articles that appeared in this magazine. Many years ago, I went to a New Age type of conference in New York City specifically to hear him speak, because I was very taken with him. I was not as impressed with him in person as I had been with his writings, and it was clear that he was not interested in taking on students. However, my impulse to see him led me in another directions. For it was at that conference that I first encountered people associated with the Himalayan Institute, which led to my ultimate involvement with the Institute and its founder, Swami Rama, who became my primary spiritual mentor.

The story of Gopi Krishna’s lengthy ordeal can be taken as a cautionary tale to be careful about what you wish for. It had a happy ending for him, but not without much turmoil and instability preceding it. Part of his problem may have been due to the fact that he never appeared to have been involved with a protective lineage that generally assures that one is never given more than they can handle, although one is still challenged, sometimes fairly uncomfortably, to expand one’s “comfortable capacity”. Rather, it appears that he was able to experience his awakening through sheer determination and sustained effort, but he suffered certain consequences from his crashing the Divine Wedding Party before he was really ready. If you Google his name, you will find a wealth of references and some extraordinary materials in which he describes his experiences.

“At the age of seventeen he began to practice concentration exercises because he felt his own mind was shamefully undisciplined. His interest soon led him towards meditation, and within a few years he was sitting three hours daily, concentrating on the top of his head, where he visualized a luminous lotus. When he was thirty-five, after eighteen years of practice, he felt the stirring of intensely pleasurable energy at the base of his spine, which soon moved up into his brain, filling it with an infinite, blissful light. Instead of forever vanishing his suffering, the experience depressed him tremendously. Nevertheless, after about a decade of physical illness and mental instability due to the intensity of the force released in his system, his condition stabilized. Now he enjoys a blissful state and considers himself an authority on spiritual matters, based upon his own realization.”