Find Inner Peace: The Mental Health Benefits of a Kundalini Yoga Practice
Unpacking the Impact of Kundalini Yoga on Mental Health and Focus
The Essence of Kundalini Yoga: Understanding its Holistic Approach
So what is kundalini and how do I get it to rise within me? As I shared in my blog, Kundalini Awakening 101, kundalini is a subtle feminine, life-force energy that is stored at the base of the spine in the root chakra/energy center. It is described visually as a coiled snake. From a more ethereal perspective, it is also sometimes described as the Holy Spirit, Divine Within, among others. This dormant kundalini energy is raised through applied breathwork and intention that mixes positively and negatively charged energy at the root chakra. Through postures/asanas with body locks, breathwork, meditation, and mantra (all components of a kundalini class), it is possible to raise/awaken the kundalini energy up through the subtle central channel, the sushmana, which runs parallel up the spine through all the chakras. Whether or not the energy reaches a full awakening by reaching the crown chakra, is a function of the methods applied and the readiness of the kundalini yoga student. It is important to remember that our spiritual practice is more about our path and what we learn about ourselves through greater awareness than about a particular end goal. Honestly, our systems wouldn’t be able to handle the shock of an immediate kundalini awakening. Focus on increasing and maintaining a higher vibrational state or higher consciousness.
It is the components of a typical kundalini yoga class - postures/asanas with body locks, breathwork, meditation, mantra, and gong that holistically support body, mind, and spirit. For me, it is as much a spiritual practice as it is a physical and energetic one. Let’s break down the elements of practicing kundalini and the science behind how they benefit the whole self.
Can Anyone Practice Kundalini Yoga?
Absolutely! New students are sometimes a bit intimidated by kundalini yoga. Most teachers and many students wear all white to increase their electromagnetic fields, and then there are the chanting and breathing exercises. But after experiencing its benefits and understanding that like in any yoga class, there are modifications, most students get hooked. Most students share that it is a more spiritual experience than other forms of yoga.
What to Expect in a Kundalini Yoga Class
As I shared in my blog, Kundalini Yoga for Beginners: A Primer, a typical Kundalini yoga class has the following 6 parts:
Tuning in by chanting the mantra Ong Namo Guru Dev Namo 3 times with hands in prayer pose. It translates to I bow to the creative wisdom, I bow to the divine teacher within myself. It begins the process of going within.
A few warm-up exercises prepare the body for the class.
A series of movements is called a kriya. This is the heart of the class. There are thousands of these prescriptive series, each addressing a particular condition, such as taking care of your adrenal glands, relating to and communicating better with others, and releasing subconscious fears that are holding you back from your true path.
Deep relaxation can be accompanied by the teacher playing the gong, which supports the movement of energy in the body, or relaxing mantra music.
A meditation, which is complemented by the kriya. As little as 3 minutes of meditation supports your circulation. With only 11 minutes, you affect your nervous system and your pituitary gland, which controls your hormonal system. The posture for meditation should be comfortable.
Closing Prayer
Elements of a Kundalini Yoga Class
The key elements of a kundalini yoga class are:
Postures: If you’re a yogi, you will find many postures that you may have practiced in other yoga classes. The difference is that you may hold them for longer periods of time and that you will incorporate different breathing techniques, mantras, and mudras. The purpose is to move energy in a particular part of the body that is involved in the theme of the class.
Breathwork: It is much more than just inhaling and exhaling. There are many different breathing techniques. They can support your sympathetic (sense of fight or flight) or parasympathetic (sense of rest and digestion) nervous systems, support your immune system, as well as digestion. Once you learn some of these pranayams, you can apply them any time you need that particular type of support.
Mantra: The use of sound current, or mantra, is applied during certain postures and/or during meditation. Not only are you creating an internal vibration but the tip of the tongue also activates the acupressure points on the roof of the mouth, which supports the glandular system. According to Frontiers in Psychology, chanting can also reduce stress and provide similar benefits to meditation.
Mudras: There are thousands of different hand and finger postures to channel energy in the body. The mudra applied in a particular posture or meditation will be specific to coordinate with the other elements of the class.
Eye Focus: There are several eye focus techniques. The most common in Kundalini Yoga is to close your eyes, roll them up, and in to focus at the brow point. It crosses the optic nerves over the pituitary gland bringing energy to this point of intuition and master gland.
How Kundalini Yoga Impacts the Mind: A Journey to Mental Well-being
Kundalini yoga has multiple positive benefits for the mind and overall mental well-being. Kundalini yoga incorporates techniques such as specific postures, breathwork, chanting, and meditation. These practices help to calm the mind, increase mental clarity, and enhance focus and concentration.
How exactly does kundalini yoga calm the mind? The practice encourages deep breathing, relaxation, and mindful awareness, which can counteract the negative effects of stress on the mind and promote a sense of calm and tranquility. The practice of kundalini yoga also stimulates various parts of the brain, leading to improved cognitive function. Breathwork and meditation have been shown to increase brain plasticity, improve memory, and enhance overall cognitive abilities.
Elevating Productivity with Kundalini Yoga: Mindful Work and Focus
Kundalini Yoga can be a powerful practice to elevate productivity. By incorporating specific techniques, it can help improve mental focus, increase energy levels, and promote overall well-being. Kundalini yoga encourages practitioners to start their day with a morning sadhana practice. This dedicated practice helps to set a positive and focused mindset for the day ahead. Kundalini yoga also includes various meditation techniques that can improve focus and concentration. These meditation practices may involve focusing on a specific point of focus, such as the breath, a mantra, or an image. Regular meditation practice can enhance your ability to sustain attention and stay present in the moment.
Kundalini Yoga Practices for Strengthening Mental Resilience
Because kundalini classes, or kriyas, target specific meridians, students may find themselves holding poses for long periods of time or repeating exercises for what sometimes feels like an eternity. In addition to increasing the flow of energy through these meridians, this aspect of kundalini yoga can strengthen the mind and build mental resilience. As teachers, we always invite students to see these challenging exercises as an opportunity to push through discomfort and challenges - those sensations that often in life make us give up or find distractions. As a result, practitioners who commit to a regular kundalini yoga practice may develop a greater sense of inner strength and the capacity to face life's difficulties with a more positive mindset.
Kundalini Breathwork: Elevating Mental Health and Concentration
Kundalini Yoga applies what is called pranayam, controlled breathwork. As I shared in my blog, Pranayam: Controlling Your Life-Force, Prolong Your Life, The breath can be an amazing, zero-cost tool to support your well-being. Benefits include:
Calms the mind;
Reduces anxiety;
Increases focus;
Boosts the immune system;
So how exactly does pranayam affect your mind? According to MasterClass, the increased intake of oxygen through the breath exercises helps purge the body of carbon dioxide, which benefits the brain and nervous system. By giving yourself a calming focus, you can help clear your mind and reduce stress and anxiety, which can improve your cognitive brain function.
Stress is also the #1 cause of illness, so by reducing your mental stress levels, you are supporting your immune system. Also, according to a 2018 study from the Trinity College Institute of Neuroscience and the Global Brain Health Institute, breathing can regulate levels of noradrenaline—a chemical released when you focus. Your body produces too much when you’re stressed and too little when you’re tired, but just the perfect amount when you slow your breath down and practice calming pranayama. Researchers found that shallow breathing tends to keep the body in a cycle of stress, which can make you more prone to illness.
It should come as no surprise, as shared in the Harvard Business Review, “When we are in a highly stressed state, our prefrontal cortex — the part of our brain responsible for rational thinking — is impaired, so logic seldom helps to regain control. This can make it hard to think straight or be emotionally intelligent with your team. But with breathing techniques, it is possible to gain some mastery over your mind and reduce your stress levels. Research shows that different emotions are associated with different forms of breathing, so changing how we breathe can change how we feel. For example, when you feel joy, your breathing will be regular, deep, and slow. If you feel anxious or angry, your breathing will be irregular, short, fast, and shallow. When you follow breathing patterns associated with different emotions, you’ll actually begin to feel those corresponding emotions and develop the ability of emotional regulation.
I also shared in my blog on pranayam, the following breath exercises:
Balanced breath, which builds lung capacity, increases blood flow to the brain, and interestingly coordinates the circulatory and nervous systems to ideal efficiency;
Breath of fire, which stimulates the sympathetic nervous system and gives you a boost of energy;
Alternate nostril breathing, Left nostril breathing is associated with the parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest). It is connected with lowering blood pressure and reducing anxiety. It also shifts blood flow to the right side of the prefrontal cortex, which is critical for decision-making.
Go to my blog for instructions on how to apply each breath exercise so that you can add them to your self-care toolbox.
The Meditative Power of Kundalini Mantras for Enhanced Focus
Mantras, sacred sounds or phrases that are repeated either silently or aloud during meditation or throughout the day, can help focus the mind and increase concentration. They help to calm the mind, bring awareness to the present moment, and cultivate mental clarity. The first mantra you learn in kundalini yoga is sat nam. It translates to truth is my identity. In practice, you mentally vibrate Sat on your inhale and Nam on your exhale during asanas. Also visualizing the words in your mind’s eye can help increase focus and quiet an overactive mind. There are scores of kundalini mantras written in Gurumukhi. Many engage the tongue against the roof of the mouth, home to over 60 acupressure points that affect the brain. There is also a benefit to reading the translations (in your native language) of these mantras for a deeper experience. So that as you are chanting these sacred words, you are also focusing on their meaning and internalizing their vibration.
Cultivating Mindfulness: Kundalini Yoga Techniques for Centered Living
Mindfulness is the practice of intentionally bringing one's attention to the present moment with non-judgmental awareness. It involves paying attention to one's thoughts, emotions, bodily sensations, and the surrounding environment, without getting caught up in or reacting to them. Mindfulness encourages an attitude of curiosity, openness, and acceptance towards whatever arises in the present moment, enabling individuals to have a direct and non-reactive experience of their thoughts and sensations. Through mindfulness, individuals cultivate a greater awareness of their thoughts, emotions, and behavioral patterns. This increased awareness helps individuals to better understand their experiences and respond to them in a more intentional and skillful way, rather than reacting automatically or impulsively.
Kundalini Yoga practices emphasize the importance of being present in the moment and cultivating mindfulness. Through the focus on breath and movement, students develop greater awareness of their thoughts, emotions, and sensations. This heightened awareness allows individuals to better understand their mental patterns and make conscious choices, leading to improved mental clarity and decision-making.
Kundalini Yoga's Transformative Effect on Emotional Stability
Emotional Healing through Kundalini Yoga: Balancing the Inner Self
Kundalini yoga can be a powerful tool for emotional healing and well-being. The practice incorporates specific techniques and meditations that aim to balance emotions, release emotional blockages, and promote emotional resilience. Kundalini yoga also helps individuals develop better emotional regulation skills. The practice cultivates self-awareness, allowing practitioners to observe their emotions without judgment. Through kundalini Yoga, individuals can learn to understand, accept, and respond to their emotions in a healthy and balanced way.
Addressing Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Complex PTSD
Kundalini yoga includes various dynamic movements, breathwork, and specific postures that can help release emotional tension stored in the body. The practice often involves shaking, twisting, and powerful breathing techniques that promote the release of stagnant energy and emotions. This can lead to a sense of emotional catharsis and provide a healthy outlet for emotions to be expressed and processed. Kundalini Yoga recognizes that emotions are energy in motion and offers specific practices to clear and balance the energetic body. kundalini meditations and mantras can help shift and transmute negative or stuck emotions, allowing for a greater sense of emotional well-being. Practices such as the Kirtan Kriya, which involves the chanting of specific mantras, have been shown to have positive effects on emotional well-being and mental health.
According to ptsduk.org, “Kundalini yoga has also been found to be effective in minimizing the symptoms of PTSD and C-PTSD – in particular, perceived stress and anxiety, resilience, and sleep. Studies looking at kundalini yoga and PTSD found that those who participated in kundalini yoga experienced a significant improvement in their PTSD symptoms, a greater change in their ability to sleep, in how they perceived anxiety and stress, and in their resilience to everyday life. Afterward, the participants also saw improvements in their mental clarity, higher self-esteem, and a greater ability to self-reflect. One of the main symptoms that people who have PTSD or C-PTSD experience is feeling frightened or stressed even when they’re not in danger. Their nervous system remains in a heightened sense of activity which can lead to them either feeling hyper-aroused or disassociated. Through kundalini yoga, people can safely start to move out of these states of being and can start to find a sense of relative safety. They can then also start to explore how their body is feeling, accept some of the problems they have been dealing with, and find the ability to be ‘present’ in their body.”
Kundalini Yoga practices aim to strengthen the nervous system and cultivate emotional regulation and resilience. By engaging in challenging physical postures, breathwork, and meditations, practitioners develop the ability to stay calm and centered in the face of emotional triggers or challenging situations.
Kundalini Yoga also encourages individuals to develop self-awareness and cultivate self-compassion. Through practices such as meditation and mindfulness, individuals learn to observe their emotions without judgment and develop a greater understanding of their emotional patterns and triggers. This self-awareness helps individuals respond to emotions with greater compassion and kindness towards themselves and others, promoting emotional healing and well-being.
Nurturing Emotional Intelligence: Kundalini Yoga's Profound Impact
Kundalini Yoga has been found to have a positive impact on nurturing emotional intelligence. One way kundalini Yoga helps cultivate emotional intelligence is through its emphasis on awareness and mindfulness. Being present and more aware of one's thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations without judgment is a powerful tool in gaining insight into their emotional patterns and learning to respond to them more effectively.
As shared earlier, kundalini Yoga techniques such as pranayam (controlled breathwork) and chanting, have been shown to have a calming effect on the nervous system and promote emotional balance. These practices help individuals cultivate a sense of inner peace and resilience, enabling them to navigate the ups and downs of their emotions with grace and compassion.
Kundalini Yoga for Stress Reduction: Empowering the Mind-Body Connection
The mind follows the breath. So if you want to slow down the mind, apply conscious breathing. One of the key components of kundalini yoga is conscious breathing, which involves deep and rhythmic breaths. This type of breathwork stimulates the vagus nerve, a major component of the parasympathetic nervous system. According to the Biology of Kundalini, “activation of the vagus nerve helps initiate the relaxation response in the body, leading to decreased heart rate, reduced blood pressure, and a general sense of calmness.” In addition, specific kundalini Yoga physical postures, or asanas, are designed to release tension and activate the relaxation response in the body. The Stretching movements, coupled with the focus on slow and deep breathing, help relax the muscles, calm the mind, and promote a sense of well-being.
Kundalini Yoga to Combat Anxiety
Because kundalini yoga takes a holistic mind/body/spirit, there are specific classes/kriyas that can combat anxiety. They target specific meridians associated with anxiety. The combination of breathing exercises with postures supports the realignment of energy in the body. According to the Kundalini Research Institute, a growing body of evidence suggests that contemplative practices such as yoga and meditation may also be effective at treating generalized anxiety disorder. Indeed, yoga and meditation, through engaging the activity of the attention networks in the frontal lobe, is a form of self-regulation that can inhibit and regulate activity in brain areas, including the amygdala, that are associated with fear and stress responses. This regulation thereby decreases the emotional intensity and perceived stress levels and improves the ability to manage everyday stressors and emotional reactions. The inclusion of meditation in each kundalini yoga class brings an additional opportunity to address anxiety. Yoga Journal also shares several kundalini meditations that target some of the root imbalances associated with anxiety: meditation for emotional balance, meditation for a stable self, and meditation to remove the fear of the future.
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About SoundWellness
Monique Derfuss is the founder and President of SoundWellness offering gong sound therapy, Reiki, Kundalini Yoga, and meditation. Her wellness business is based in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and has helped thousands of people over the past 9 years move beyond only taking care of their physical bodies to taking a more holistic approach to their health by integrating support of their energetic, or subtle, bodies. Check out what others have said about her services.
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