Currently the director of research for the Kundalini Research Institute and an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, Sat Bir Singh Khalsa has practiced a yoga lifestyle for more than thirty-five years and is a certified Kundalini Yoga instructor. In the following essay, he shares an analysis of the therapeutic aspects of the practice of Kundalini Yoga that Yogi Bhajan brought to the West. He reviews research on how kundalini yoga has been used to treat health problems, including obsessive-compulsive disorder and sleep disorders, among other health challenges. He raises the compelling likelihood that Kundalini Yoga can treat a variety of disorders, improve one’s quality of life, and restore health—and that clinical research can validate this possibility.
The word Kundalini and the much more specific term Kundalini Yoga have been used widely in the literature of yoga by a variety of different authors and yoga schools. In yogic philosophy and theory, Kundalini generally has referred to subtle, etheric energy that flows in the spinal column and has been associated with Kundalini awakenings or spiritual/mystical experiences. These are indicative of the states of consciousness that are the goal of yoga practice; in general, the goal of all yoga disciplines is to achieve a unitive state of consciousness, or samadhi. Therefore, it can be argued that if the Kundalini energy is at the root of this state, then all yoga practices are in some way aimed at activating the Kundalini energy, not just those practices that have been referred to as Kundalini Yoga.
Despite this argument, in modern practice, different styles and schools of yoga have adopted a variety of names. Most common is the generic term Hatha Yoga, which, depending upon the teacher and the school, incorporates yoga postures and may also include additional techniques associated with yoga including meditation, breathing, or mantra practices. There are also a number of yoga styles that are essentially Hatha Yoga associated with a particular school or yoga master and have adopted names that distinguish them (e.g., Iyengar, Ashtanga, Bikram, Kripalu, Integral, etc.). Fewer schools practice Kundalini Yoga, the most prominent of which incorporates the style taught by Yogi Bhajan. (This school is usually distinguished from other Kundalini Yoga schools by the phrase “Kundalini Yoga as taught by Yogi Bhajan.”) In essence, all of the Kundalini Yoga-style practices overlap a good deal with the practices associated with Hatha Yoga and are similar in overall goals and philosophy. Since Kundalini Yoga as taught by Yogi Bhajan incorporates many of the same postures and breathing exercises of generic hatha yoga, a casual inspection suggests it is indistinguishable from the typical hatha practices. A closer exploration reveals a significant difference in its use of kriyas, protocols for particular problems, and a seamless integration of profound meditation practices and a great variety of exercise sets. This makes it a rich source of techniques to study the comparative differences for therapeutic applications as well as the universal mechanisms underlying most meditations.
Yogi Bhajan began teaching Kundalini Yoga after his arrival in North America in the late 1960s, and although it has little presence in India, it is now one of the major yoga schools in the West and is practiced widely here. There are now very active formal teacher training programs. These are developed and regulated by the Kundalini Research Institute, a nonprofit established by Yogi Bhajan in 1972. They assure authenticity and quality of teaching and promote research and application. There is also a Kundalini Yoga teacher’s association as part of the 3HO Foundation. Yogi Bhajan’s Kundalini Yoga is decidedly focused on inner psychological and spiritual growth and development, and it is therefore consistent with the deepest goals of yoga and yogic philosophy. Accordingly, this style of yoga has somewhat less relative emphasis on the physical asanas than on the incorporation of specific mantra and meditation practices.
Although yoga in general originally targeted inner development, its capability to engender positive psychological and physiological changes has naturally led to its use as a therapeutic intervention. This relatively recent application of yoga began formally in India in the early twentieth Century. However, “yoga therapy” is now widespread in both India and the West as a preventive and therapeutic practice for the general public. The International Association of Yoga Therapists holds annual meetings and sponsors a peer-reviewed research journal and a professional newsletter.
It is likely that much of the therapeutic benefit of yoga practice may be general in nature through positive effects on mood, fitness, stress, and lifestyle. However, it is also certain that some yoga practices are particularly active upon specific physical and psychological processes, and therefore may be especially effective as adjunctive therapeutic practices for specific medical and psychological disorders. Many effects have been ascribed to the variety of different yoga practices, and the nature of these purported effects can vary depending upon the yoga master, instructor, or yoga school making the claim. But from a scientific perspective, there has been very little research conducted to support these assertions: this question represents an area of future interest in yoga research.
Kundalini Yoga as taught by Yogi Bhajan incorporates a wide array of practices, and Yogi Bhajan attributed specific effects for most of them on both normal, healthy psychophysiology and on medical and psychological abnormalities. Kundalini Yoga practitioners and instructors are endowed with a wide menu of practices to choose from, targeting specific areas of physical and psychological development as desired or needed; thus it may be well suited as a therapeutic intervention.
Yogi Bhajan formally expanded and elaborated on the therapeutic use of Kundalini Yoga by developing an associated set of teachings and body of knowledge he called Humanology. Furthermore, he inspired the formation of the Guru Ram Das center for Medicine and Humanology, an institute devoted to the practical medical application of his teachings; it provides instruction in Kundalini Yoga and meditation for people with chronic or life-threatening illnesses and their family members, offers continuing education and professional training to health care providers, and conducts outcome studies on the health benefits of Kundalini Yoga practice. There are now training programs for the therapeutic application of Kundalini Yoga techniques offered in New Mexico by the Guru Ram Das center and in other venues, including a program in Sweden.
Yogi Bhajan’s rationale for yoga as a therapeutic intervention shares many of the common principles used in the modern application of yoga therapy. In addition to serving as a fundamental practice for reducing arousal and improving stress tolerance and resilience, yoga practices are also claimed to be capable of restoring imbalances within the body and mind; such imbalances are believed to be the underlying cause of many medical and psychological conditions. Yogi Bhajan was particularly and perhaps uniquely specific on the exact mechanisms through which the yoga practices had their effects. He frequently referred to the subtle energy centers and processes within the mind-body complex that are often discussed in yogic theory, including Kundalini, prana, chakras, subtle energy fields, and auras. He would often add to these a description of other subtle energy systems such as acupuncture, pressure points, and meridians. In his practice as a therapist and counselor, he often diagnosed a condition and then prescribed for it a meditation, a set of exercises or postures, or even dietary recommendations that were to be practiced over specific periods of time—often forty days or longer.
Given this history, it is not surprising that Kundalini Yoga practices have been considered effective for a number of different disorders and for special populations. Numerous books and manuals on Kundalini Yoga have been published containing yoga exercises and meditations recommended for a variety of physical and mental states. Authors and researchers Mukta Kaur Khalsa,[1] David Shannahoff-Khalsa,[2] and Dharma Singh Khalsa[3] have all published books that provide Kundalini Yoga techniques that target a number of psychological/psychiatric conditions. Publications in scientific and alternative medicine journals and chapters of books have discussed the medical utility of Kundalini Yoga practices as either adjunct or primary treatments for a number of medical conditions including heart disease, gastrointestinal disorders, infertility, depression, and anxiety.[4]
A growing body of scientific biomedical research has addressed the utility of a number of Kundalini Yoga practices, both in normal subjects and in patient populations. However, in this essay, I review only the Kundalini Yoga research that has been conducted in patient populations. My hope is that this will provide a sense of the broad potential application and utility of these practices. This research is particularly important as the vehicle by which such practices can be validated and, therefore, ultimately accepted as valuable adjunct medical mind-body interventions, not only for the treatment of existing disease, but also for disease prevention.
Perhaps the earliest effort in the application of Kundalini Yoga for special or clinical populations was what has been called the 3HO Foundation SuperHealth program. This was an addiction recovery program started in the 1970s in Tucson, Arizona; it was a comprehensive residential intervention that incorporated not only intensive Kundalini Yoga practices but also dietary and lifestyle changes Yogi Bhajan prescribed as being helpful for treating addictive behavior and for substance abuse recovery. Although the program did not undergo published research evaluation in Tucson, it was largely successful, and it received continuing grant support from the state. In one unpublished evaluation, it was shown that the program had strong outcomes for both alcohol (76 percent recovery) and drug abuse (73 percent recovery). Furthermore, its collateral effects, such as improvements in overall job performance and peace of mind, were also notable.
A recent SuperHealth addiction program conducted in the Indian city of Amritsar also underwent a research evaluation, and results were ultimately published in a substance abuse research journal.[5] In that program, ten patients with a variety of substance abuse profiles underwent a comprehensive ninety-day 3HO Foundation SuperHealth lifestyle and residential treatment program. Substantial and statistically significant improvements were found in a number of key outcome measures important in substance abuse, including impulsive and addictive behavior, depression and anxiety, daily living and role functioning, and quality of recovery. There is a continuing active interest in, and application of, Kundalini Yoga practices for addiction recovery among a number of Kundalini Yoga instructors, and it is likely these programs will continue to be conducted and researched.
With support from the National center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine of the National Institutes of Health, David Shannahoff-Khalsa researched the efficacy of a Kundalini Yoga protocol for the treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder in a clinical case study of five patients who completed a one-year treatment protocol.[6] The patients experienced statistically significant reductions in a number of psychological characteristics, and some patients were able to reduce their medication doses. This study was followed by a more formal and comprehensive randomized controlled trial conducted at Children’s Hospital in San Diego.[7] Results of this study confirmed those of the previous preliminary study and showed significant improvements over a three-month period on a number of clinical measures for this disorder, including the Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale and the Symptom Checklist-90-Revised Obsessive Compulsive Scale. Shannahoff-Khalsa was able to conclude that the Kundalini Yoga protocol was an effective treatment for obsessive-compulsive disorder. Furthermore, Kundalini Yoga treatment was without negative side effects. Importantly, it demonstrated an efficacy that compares well with that of standard pharmacotherapy for this disorder. Given that obsessive-compulsive disorder is a subclass of the anxiety disorders, it is likely that Kundalini Yoga may also prove useful in treating other anxiety disorders such as generalized anxiety disorder, panic attacks, and phobias.
My own research has been evaluating the efficacy of a Kundalini Yoga breathing meditation called Shabad Kriya that was taught by Yogi Bhajan as a technique to help with sleep. Although he provided a number of yogic practices for sleep, this particular meditation was especially suitable in that it was simple to learn and could be practiced by chronic insomnia patients who did not have the strength or flexibility to practice vigorous physical postures. In a preliminary trial of twenty patients with chronic insomnia, an eight-week treatment including up to thirty-one minutes of Shabad Kriya was evaluated with daily sleep diaries. This was delivered in a self-care format; subjects were given a one-hour instruction session with a brief in-person follow-up one week later and were provided detailed written instructions. They then practiced the prescribed technique on their own, daily, just before bedtime. The outcome of this preliminary trial indicated that subjects on average showed statistically significant improvements over the eight weeks in a number of key sleep measures including sleep efficiency, total sleep time, and total wake time,[8] with no reported negative side effects. Subsequently, a randomized controlled trial has now been completed with the same intervention. The outcomes from that trial have indicated that the results were as good as or better than those from the preliminary trial.[9] These results suggest that Kundalini Yoga may prove to be a valuable adjunct to existing conventional behavioral treatments for insomnia as well as for other disorders that, like insomnia, are characterized by high levels of physiological arousal.
Another technique Yogi Bhajan taught for therapeutic purposes is called Breathwalk. This technique incorporates Kundalini Yoga meditation, mantra, and breathing into a variety of walking techniques, and has been promoted by Gurucharan Singh Khalsa, one of Yogi Bhajan’s senior teachers, the director of training for Kundalini Yoga, and principal author with Yogi Bhajan of a book on Breathwalk.[10] It is a particularly practical therapeutic approach for Westerners who have difficulty with the practice of specific yoga techniques and may be drawn to the fact that this technique is already socially familiar and can be practiced under ordinary life circumstances. Recently, a Breathwalk intervention was used in a clinical trial in chronic hepatitis C patients with insulin resistance syndrome at the University of Guadalajara. The results of that study revealed significant improvements in fitness, body composition, lipid profile, liver enzymes, and metabolic and mood state.[11] The authors concluded that “Breathwalk is an innovative exercise technique that is easy to perform which could be implemented as a tool for patients with chronic liver diseases, especially at early stages of disease and in other chronic pathological conditions such as obesity, metabolic syndrome and type 2 diabetes.” New research is continuing at University of Utah Pain center to study the effects of Breathwalk on alleviating pain in fibromyalgia and continuing pain syndromes.
A recent study has suggested that Kundalini Yoga may also have utility in stroke rehabilitation through improvement in aphasia as well as in fine motor coordination. A small pilot study on three stroke patients was conducted using a twice weekly, twelve-week Kundalini Yoga intervention at the Continuum center for Health and Healing in New York City.[12] Using standard methods for evaluation of dexterity and aphasia, the authors found that all three patients showed substantial improvement in both outcomes. The authors concluded that “this study illustrates the potential benefits of Kundalini yoga on speech impairment and demonstrates the need for further studies of the effects of Kundalini not only on stroke-induced aphasia but also on other speech disorders such as stuttering and speech impediments. The combined positive effects of Kundalini yoga on both the cognitive and physical conditions examined in this study suggest that many other medical problems could be benefited as well.”
In addition to the published studies described above, there are also a number of unpublished clinical Kundalini Yoga studies. In addition to my research in insomnia, two other studies have been conducted to evaluate improvements in sleep. An unpublished Swedish study by Goran Bol found improvements in sleep through a vigorous set of Kundalini Yoga exercises recommended for “conquering sleep.” This particular set of exercises makes extensive use of a posture referred to as “bridge pose” in Kundalini Yoga but known as “table pose” in Hatha Yoga, a posture that Yogi Bhajan taught specifically as a useful practice for sleep improvement. In a recent thesis dissertation of a controlled study conducted at Alliant International University in San Diego, participants with sleep disturbances practicing Kundalini Yoga were found to have significant improvements in wake time after sleep onset and quality of life, compared to control subjects.[13] Ongoing studies by Dharma Singh Khalsa through his Alzheimer’s Research and Prevention Foundation, in association with University of Pennsylvania researchers, are demonstrating the efficacy of a Kundalini Yoga meditation called Kirtan Kriya in treating mild cognitive impairment (or early Alzheimer’s disease). This work is aimed at providing a potentially useful adjunct treatment for prevention or treatment of Alzheimer’s. Other unpublished research work conducted by researchers at the Guru Ram Das center for Medicine and Humanology has evaluated the benefits of Kundalini Yoga for patients with diabetes. These studies showed improvements in a number of important mood and psychological outcomes in this patient population. These studies represent a small sampling of the Kundalini Yoga treatment initiatives currently under way. The Kundalini Research Institute is dedicated to facilitating these programs and providing support for proper and thorough research evaluations of these programs to document their effectiveness.
In summary, it is clear that Kundalini Yoga has potential utility as a therapeutic treatment for a wide variety of medical and psychological conditions. Whether its efficacy can be attributed to the general ability of mind-body practices to induce the relaxation response, and thereby reduce arousal and promote stress tolerance and resilience, or to specific physical and psychological effects of these practices remains to be determined by future research. Another scientific question of interest that may need to wait for future studies is the role played by subtle energy processes, including the Kundalini energy itself, in the health and healing process.
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