Introductory note: In order to help identify the two types of triggers, Kundalini and spiritual sex, the author has asked us to reproduce the following information taken from Chapter 1 of her book:

An Intense Transcendent Sexual Experience
In chapter 10, I will go into more depth on how to evoke this experience. For now I will give an example of a spiritual awakening where, like the others, this was not anticipated.

A typical experience might be a couple engaging in sex who have always enjoyed each other, and who are suddenly aware of a deeper sensation. First it radiates from the point of contact in the genitals and then spreading through their bodies, like ecstasy or bliss or something they cannot identify. They are able to verbalize, although briefly, because the feelings are overwhelming and move them away from speech. They feel as though they have entered a sacred temple and have become an altar to each other. They feel a kind of peace they have never experienced before. Time has no meaning. Their sense of unity with each other is complete and they also "know" God or a Higher Power is in unity with them. Some people also report out-of-body experiences and transcending to other realities.

A Kundalini Experience
Kundalini is a term used in the East, but full-blown experiences of Kundalini awakening are being heard more and more frequently here in the Western world. Because of this there is a group of researchers who recently have created the Kundalini Research Network to encourage and report on the scientific study of this phenomenon. Chapter 2 is from my keynote address to this group, which opened its first international conference, called "Kundalini: Dawn of a New Science." Chapter 5 has a list of signs of Kundalini opening or arousal. We have demonstrated in several research projects that [spiritual] experiencers have almost twice as many signs and manifestations of what we call the "Physio-Kundalini Syndrome" as do our control groups (Greyson, Ring).

Whether this opening or arousal happens during our original experience, or our first experience becomes a subsequent trigger for a later experience of Kundalini, is not known. And experiencers many times tell of signs and manifestations of Kundalini arousal without having a dramatic Kundalini experience at all. Anyone who desires to awaken spiritually can invite this energy into their lives to guide them through the journey of spiritual awakening. The more we read and learn, the more powerfully this energy may appear to us as signs and manifestations. At the same time, coincidence beyond the average and possibly even psychic abilities will appear (see chapter 8). Before reading on, if this is happening in your life at an overwhelming rate, turn to and read the section on the first chakra, especially the part about grounding.

A full-blown experience contains a sense of energy surging up the spine, sometimes fanning out over the upper back and shoulders. Possibly there's a roaring noise in the ears or isolated pockets of heat somewhere in the body. A sense of bliss, joy and peace fill the mind. A feeling of sweet nectar can seem to flow over the face and then energy moves through the throat, heart or navel. This is possibly described as a piercing sensation, but also pleasant. After that, or intermixed can be incredible colors, lights, aromas and/or sounds.

CHAPTER TEN
Spiritual Sexuality

This chapter is not only about sex; it’s also about spirituality and commune-ication in psychologically mature intimate relationships. It’s about spiritual beings having a human experience.

Originally, I became aware of a shift in attitude and experience in sex when I started lecturing. Women confided after my talks that they’d had some kind of spiritual awakening and then experienced what can be summed up as Divine Energy shared in lovemaking. Or their spiritual awakening happened during lovemaking and was preceded by this rush of energy. I was fortunate to have been able to talk later with their intimate partners, who confirmed these reports and shared the other side of spiritual sex.(1) Now I bring up spiritual and transcendent sexual experiences in my talks, explaining them as a way of having a spiritual experience, and audience participants ask questions and add knowledge from their own experiences.

In achieving this type of lovemaking, there is an energetic bonding that demands future respect. Without loyalty, these experiences can destroy a relationship. I’m not advocating that spiritual sex should replace Western sex, but it is an option that we can experience occasionally, either through spontaneously desiring it or planned as a ritual to celebrate the intimate relationship we have with each other and the Universe. In other words, it is an intimate sharing of primal and Divine Energy that bonds, and shouldn’t be overdone or taken lightly. In the spirit of celebrating the love between two mature adults, it bonds them to each other and to the Universe.

Over the last ten years, I have heard beautiful ecstatic accounts of lovemaking from both women and men. They reported the same psychological, psychophysical and spiritual aftereffects I have described in this book. Because of the spiritual nature of these accounts, all approached and shared without any inhibition or embarrassment. Being psychologically and spiritually mature, we know it is time to share this with our brothers and sisters who are also spiritual beings learning to have a human experience.(2)

Our Nature
Spirituality and sexuality are the two sides of one coin, the coin being our nature. One side is physical. Its nature is innocent and earthy. This means we can express ourselves in uninhibited free sex. This doesn’t mean that we have a different partner every night. That’s sexual addiction. I’m talking about letting our bodies take over and express themselves without our minds getting in the way. The other side of the coin, the other side of our nature, is spiritual. Humans crave their spiritual nature, the direct experience of spirit. We have a natural ability to directly experience spirit through our bodies, just as we were meant to express our earthy, innocent side through our bodies, too.

Sex is about surrendering to our body’s natural instincts to move and be what it wants in this perfect moment. Our body wants to be in the now. We want to lose our minds and gain our senses. Sex is also about surrendering to our body’s spiritual instincts, to not move and be what it is in this Holy Moment. And sexuality is a key. It is a doorway to the higher realms of transcendent consciousness.

The Path of Intimate Relationship
On the threshold of the millennium we approach the next peak in our evolution. As more and more people awaken to their spiritual nature and heal their True Selves, history will write its first chapter of authentic human selfhood experienced in mass numbers. Those who have patiently worked hard to transform will seek intimate relationships with other healthy people or heal the relationships they already have.(3) Our evolution will quicken again from these sacred and secure relationships. However, because we have no past experience to fall back on, we realize we are standing on uncharted ground. Now we want, need and desire with all our hearts to have relationships that are different. We are different and we want to be who we are with someone who is also whole and can share authentically.

We desire to be fully ourselves and be with someone who will honor our individuality and whom we can trust. At the same time, we have a need to let go of centering on our self and lose ourselves to our partner. The paradox is scary. We must be able to be authentic and stand our ground, and, at the same time, let go. Being genuinely present and intimate with another person forces us to live on the edge of the unknown. As John Welwood says, “We dance on the razor’s edge where we feel vulnerable, sharply pierced by our need to love and be loved.” Yet we need to feel pierced in this way or we won’t be capable of the kind of love that we have intuited is possible. We need to discover and learn to dance in the shakiness of love’s great balancing act. Then we also learn to dance with the flux and change continually occurring in all our relationships. By balancing back and forth we find a new equilibrium. We come to realize that an alive relationship is continually going in and out of balance. Each moment of uncertainty indicates different aspects of ourselves and/or the other trying to come into balance. We can only discover how to proceed in these moments by daring to feel, acknowledging both sides and seeing where that leads.(4)

Of course, balancing on the razor’s edge, being fully present with another person without holding on to any formula or strategy, is still scary. However, the fear and rawness we feel when we have nothing to hold onto from past experience indicate that we are on our growing edge. Every time my partner and I start to feel disconnected, this spurs us to explore and talk about what is happening between us. This can help us to connect again, often in a new and richer way.(5) When there is conflict and it is resolved, deeper levels of intimacy result. We learn from experience that conflict does not have to lead to abuse. Conflict can be fertile ground for the discovery of new areas in our self, our partner and our relationship. Learning to trust this process helps us to live more and more with ambiguity. Patiently learning to trust this process ripens the relationship to a level of companionship and friendship perhaps unknown to us before.

Intimacy involves a sharing in the spirit of desiring to be known and to know more about one another. Anything that is shared can serve to enhance the relationship. Trust develops by sharing our innermost thoughts and feelings gradually and seeing how they are received. True trust is felt, not willed. It’s a feeling that develops gradually over time through this process of sharing.

It is also important to be able to risk asking for help, acknowledging vulnerability in occasionally feeling helpless. During many moments of our journey, we may have felt painfully lonely and then turned that feeling into the more neutral one of being alone, and finally into the positive sense of being independent. Now that we have achieved healthy independence, it is time to practice occasionally leaning on another person in a healthy dependent way. This then invites the other person to lean on us when needed.

The most difficult ongoing task is to watch for and prevent projections from our past relationships.(6) It’s necessary to clear the negativities surrounding our sexuality. We get to see our present partner instead of projecting a previous relationship onto this present one. Not projecting, we are no longer living in the past and are better able to be in the joy of the present moment.

As all of the above ways are experienced by two people who have offered themselves to each other in intimate relationship, deeper levels of fear can dissolve. This loss of fear is crucial to intimacy and spiritual sexuality. We can finally abandon the fear of what our partner may think of us during lovemaking. “That’s not the way nice girls behave,” or “I’m not supposed to feel this way,” or “I’ve got to perform to satisfy her” may be thoughts that walled us off in the past from being in our bodies. Now we no longer hear those old tapes in our inner life. Or if we do, we are aware of them and can let them go. We can be in our bodies so completely that our mind need not negotiate anything. Then we may move in complete abandonment not only in sex, but in every facet of our relationship. And we may also not move in complete abandonment. We can abandon the fear of what our partner may think of the way we are all the time. We can move and be uninhibited as if we are alone—only now we share our alone time.

The path of intimate relationships may not be for everyone. It may even be inappropriate for some or in some situations. The rewards, however, include personal growth, authenticity, personal freedom and a sense of fulfillment. The prerequisite is courage to risk by two whole people.

Before and Beyond Words
Throughout this book I have suggested opening to possibilities that are beyond words, sometimes talking about primal senses or higher sense perceptions, other times using metaphors to try to describe concepts that stretch our imagination beyond words. Much of what I have shared is so mystical that it is not contained in ordinary physical reality. I hope this has prepared us for a discussion of the type of loving intimate relationship that my intuition told me existed, and that I am now dancing with myself. The dance begins when we move into the emotionality of the moment by experiencing our feelings rather than just the sexual stimulation of the body.

Telepathic abilities and other higher sense perceptions give new possibilities to our deepening experience of love. The love we share with our intimate partner no longer needs to be expressed primarily through words or language, but through the quality of one’s presence, one’s being. As our language-based culture makes room for the emergence of telepathic possibilities, our ability to experience love deepens. Words are still important. Nothing can ever replace “I love you.” But with or without words, we can now experience greater intensity and depth in loving. In a few brief moments all the words can disappear and we feel our joining with the other. The possibilities between two spiritual beings having a human experience are limitless. No longer is it the two of us. Sometimes we feel as one. Other times the larger spiritual Presence is felt. Divine Energy makes itself known personally. Two then understand and experience the sacred three (God, you and me) becoming One. We are not only sharing this healing energy in selfless service to others, but now it makes Its Presence known with our intimate partner in love.

We Are One
My sense is that before God created us, there was no polarity. God has no gender, no separate Yin and Yang energy. God is before the split, polarity or duality. Because we appear separate, every time we get closer to God we therefore experience more paradox. Our split brain, left and right, can’t reconcile this paradox. Only experiencing union with God heals the split. But this union is not an intellectual decision. Our spiritual awakenings show us that union with God is a direct personal experience. Prayer and meditation can continue to confirm the union, and may have even connected us the first time. Sexuality connects us into a frequency of ecstasy that then connects us back to our Divine Source.

When two share, or join energy in spiritual sex or even in just holding each other,(7) they unite the split and feel a deep oneness. Their separately polarized energies join and form the one energy again. The energetic tension that is usually felt subtly between the two lovers when not joined can transform into a balancing of the energy, back to its original form, Unity. God can know Godself through the union of opposites. When we share the charged energy until it merges and equalizes, creating oneness, we are co-creating with God. Opposite ends of the polarity melt, bonding into a balanced continuum. Peacefulness and clarity result. Over the next several days the tension or charge builds and is again transformed in the next celebration of loving sex I am about to describe.

The Action of Spiritual Sex
To comprehend this type of union we can think in subtle terms, terms before words, and action unlike the type of sex we have practiced here in the West. The action of spiritual sex has practically no action. It is a being with and a letting be. It uses the same level of sensitivity as in a healing or a telepathic communication. It is as in meditation, breathing in a relaxed manner but also occasionally focusing on the subtle feelings at the point of contact. Eventually, this point may radiate through our bodies, a higher sense perception acting in the most primal way.

The sense of reverence or sacredness that we have felt in other ways may now be revealed for our selves and for our partner. We also realize that as subtle as this shared energy is, as gentle as its stream feels, that is how powerful its effects are. It creates new paths for the energy, which in its emotional component is unconditional love. The creation of these new paths burns through blocks, as described in the chapters on Kundalini. If the false self, or ego, is still in control of us, this spiritual energy will operate to dissolve it. The ego will react as if it is being attacked, or at the least being threatened, not necessarily during sex, but sometime after. If both people in an intimate relationship have their True Selves in charge of their life, this type of union is appropriate. And if not, they may want to wait until later.(8)

Letting Go
NDErs talk about the moment of letting go, of surrendering to their death scene and then the NDE starting. Effective meditators experience that surrender of control every time they meditate. So do biofeedback experiencers and athletes when they move into a peak-performance state. Athletes will describe such altered states of consciousness as runner’s high, with a sense of their bodies flowing with the moment and spirit moving in and merging during the experience. On both sides of our nature, spiritual and physical, we surrender or let go and let whatever we are doing, do us. Singers talk about the song singing them. The feeling is one of freeing ourselves to be ourselves. So it is with sexual spiritual wholeness. If one lets one’s body move or rest freely while concentrating on the direct perception of feelings and sensations, this will happen naturally.

Wilhelm Reich, psychoanalyst and natural scientist, recognized that “People who are connected to their energy, including their sexuality and their passion, are in tune with the divine, for expressing the inherently loving side of human nature is the core of unfeigned spirituality.” Reich said that making love is humankind’s attempt to return to the original, unimpeded flow of cosmic energy.

During lovemaking we need to forget about our training, our beliefs and our spirituality. We simply are there with the moment as we are in meditation or centering.

The Three Elements of Transcendence
Three basic elements are experienced when we come into the blissful moment. First, we transcend time. Time ceases to exist. As in our spiritual awakenings, there is no past and, no future. This moment becomes the only real moment. Second, we transcend the ego. We and our beloved are completely lost into something else. And third, we are totally natural. We are a part of nature, as a tree or a flower or a bird. We are also in something greater, the Universe. We are floating in it. We are taken by the current. These three things give us the ecstasy. Sex is just a situation in which it happens naturally. Once we have experienced these three elements in sex we can also experience them in meditation, or vice versa.

In 1949, Rudolf von Urban, M.D., wrote Sexual Perfection and Marital Happiness. Von Urban was a general practitioner and a psychotherapist. He recommended this type of sex to couples to rekindle love. Brave and ahead of his time, he said:

This may be an over-simplification, but let me explain
. . . No one can attain the goal of sex perfection unless he [sic] possesses or acquires certain qualities of character. Chief among these are unselfishness, honesty, reliability and emotional maturity, which means development from the state of taking to the state of giving.
I do not advance this doctrine on religious or ethical grounds, but purely from the psychological point of view. A person whose character has developed in this way is at peace with himself; his energies are not dissipated in battles with his more or less unconscious feelings of guilt; he does not waste time on self-reproach. How necessary the state of relaxation is to the achievement of sex perfection I hope to make clear. . . . If both partners are cooperative—it is my business to see that they are—and if no outsider interferes, the miracle happens, their love is re-born.
When this is done, and full sex satisfaction is attained, their old love for each other returns in full force; indeed it is often deeper and truer love than before. During my 45 years of practice I have become convinced of the important part which sex satisfaction plays in molding the marriage relationship. Real sex satisfaction leads inevitably to a deep feeling of love; and with love and patience, faulty traits of character can be corrected. . . .

True, the science of sex cannot be grasped in a day, but anyone who wants to, and who will persist, can attain this goal. Such mastery will not only bring incalculable benefits to the lives of the next generation, but will also add immeasurably to the happiness of adults today.

What these experiences have in common is a gentle quality, where one or both of the partners feel a beautiful energy shared in a closed circuit between them, dipping into an altered state containing a sense of peace, tranquility and connection to the divine. Similar to meditation, they remain in this relaxed state while connected genitally, with no thrusting movement except if the erection is being lost. If the erection is being lost, then there is gentle thrusting until there is enough erection to continue penetration. Full erection is not necessary. Both partners should lie at right angles to each other, the woman on her back with one leg between the man’s thighs and the other leg resting on his hip. In this way the contact is purely genital and the whole relationship between the two pours through this center. While this is a good way to begin in this experience, there is no need to make it a fixed rule.

There is usually no talking, because that creates a disturbance. This union becomes as peaceful as the surface of a pond with no breeze. Here we don’t use our minds at all. We use our bodies. The mind is only used to sense what is happening. We don’t think; we just feel the warmth that is flowing, the love that is flowing, the energy that is in contact. Be aware of it. And all of this should not be a strain—rather, in it we are effortlessly floating. Only then, after a while, in “no time” the valley will appear. And once the valley appears, transcendence happens. Once the valley is realized—the relaxed orgasm—transcendence is already achieved. Sex is no longer there. Now it is a meditation of peaceful ecstasy.

The orgasm in this experience is totally different from traditional Western sex, which is always thought of as a peak or burst, or throwing off of the energy. If that is a peak, then this is a valley, a long peaceful pause deepening into a transcendent peaceful ecstasy. We do not reach the peak of excitement, but come into the very deepest valley of relaxation. There is only excitement in the beginning, for the man to enter. But once the man has entered, both lover and beloved can relax. No movement is needed. They can relax in a loving embrace, or just the genitals need touch. Meditation or centering is then all that is needed. If no other parts of the body are touching, the current felt deep within the point of contact will be subtle and apparent, sooner and easier.

When the couple come out of the valley orgasm, they maintain the sense of peace and quiet joy that they experienced while connected. Usually the sense remains until the next encounter. This is a peaceful surrendering that brings us back a little higher and more joyful than when we started, as shown on the right of the figure. According to von Urban, the energy cycle becomes apparent and the bliss sets in at about 28 minutes, then continues for a prolonged period. All whom I have spoken with say that it happens sooner and that there is a timeless quality that transcends worrying about the clock. Regular meditation lasts about 20 minutes or a little longer. Spiritual sex seems about the same. What does change, however, is our sense of vitality, a feeling of being younger and livelier. When we meet with our beloved in such a relaxed state, our energy is renewed. The realizations that accompany these experiences may be expanding, but start with:

Transcendence doesn’t come through friction and conflict—It comes through tension, letting go and awareness!

FOOTNOTES
(1) Also, I’ve had many audience participants and other speakers tell me of periods in their journey where they wanted celibacy. The time span I’ve heard, and practiced myself, is a year or two. For some it becomes a permanent choice.
(2) Psychological and spiritual maturity is defined here in terms of Whitfield’s recovery stages, described in his foreword. Those completing Stage Two and who feel comfortable in Stage Three are probably ready for this deep intimacy. For those individuals who jumped to Stage Three without doing the psychological healing of Stage Two (spiritual bypass), this new form of intimate relationship will not likely work long-term. I warn of this hazard several times in this chapter. The false self, or negative ego, will usually be energized by this type of sharing, and negativity will commonly result.
(3) Read Whitfield’s Co-dependence: Healing the Human Condition.
(4) Welwood, The Healing Power of Unconditional Presence.
(5) Ibid.
(6) See Healing the Child Within or Co-dependence.
(7) I have also heard reports of these experiences happening while being held, regardless of sexual preference.
(8) One who is still living from the false self may have trouble understanding this concept.
(9) The orgasmic sensations are no longer exclusively dependent on genital interaction but are often perceived as an altered state of consciousness (Anand).

To order this book click here.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Barbara Harris Whitfield is a thanatologist (thanatology is the study of death
and dying), workshop presenter, researcher, near-death experiencer and transpersonal body-centered therapist in private practice in Baltimore and Atlanta. She is presently on the faculty of Rutgers University's Summer School of Alcohol and Drug Studies, where she teaches two classes: "Feelings, Affect and Emotions in Recovery" and "The Spiritual Psychology of A Course in Miracles."

Tthe author of many published articles and two books, Full Circle: The Near-Death Experience and Beyond (Pocket Books, 1990) and Spiritual Awakenings: Insights of the Near-Death Experience and other Doorways to Our Soul (Health Communications, Inc., 1995), Barbara spent six years researching the aftereffects of the near-death experience (NDE) at the University of Connecticut Medical School. She is also a member of the executive board of the Kundalini Research Network and has sat on the executive board of the International Association for Near-Death Studies. She is a consulting editor and contributor for the Journal of Near-Death Studies.

Barbara has been a guest on major television talk shows including Larry King Live, The Today Show, Unsolved Mysteries, Donahue, Good Morning America, Oprah, Joan Rivers, CNN Medical News, Man Alive, and others. Her story and her research have appeared in documentaries in Canada, Japan, Germany, France, Belgium and Italy-and magazines such as Redbook, Woman's World, McCall's, Psychology Today, Maclean's, Common Boundary and Reader's Digest. An interview with Barbara on her cutting-edge research appeared in Deepak Chopra's first newsletter, Infinite Possibilities: For Body, Mind and Soul, in October 1996.

Barbara resides in Atlanta with her husband, Charles L. Whitfield, M.D., who is the author of five books, including the bestselling Healing the Child Within. You can contact Barbara by sending a SASE to: P.O. Box 420487, Atlanta, GA 30342, or email her at
bw11@mindspring.com.