Reclaiming Kundalini: Returning “She Who Is Coiled” to Her Feminine Form

3 Dec

Kundalini literally translates to “She who is coiled” - the ancient, feminine, serpent-like energy said to rest at the base of the spine.
Yet for many modern seekers, the first experience of kundalini feels… strangely masculine.
Fast. Rigid. Prescriptive.
Up-down-up-down.
Hold for this many minutes.
Practise at this exact hour.
Wear white. Cover your head. Don’t deviate.

I felt this myself the first time I stepped into a kundalini class.
I remember thinking:

How did a practice named after the feminine become taught like a bootcamp?

As I kept studying - with Brett Larkin, Guru Singh, and through my own embodied exploration - the answer revealed itself… and so did a different way of working with this energy.
One that feels softer, slower, grounding, intuitive - and far more aligned with the true nature of Shakti, the divine feminine intelligence within all of us.

This is the path I now weave into our SoulTribe Signature classes.
And today, I want to share why the shift felt necessary… and why feminine-form kundalini feels like a vital evolution for so many of us today.

Why Kundalini Took on Such a Masculine Shape

To understand the present, we have to look back at how yoga has historically been practised.

For most of its history, yoga was practised by two specific groups of men:

Young boys training for priesthood
Elderly men preparing for death - literally preparing to step out of the physical body

In both cases, yoga was primarily a practice of ascension.
A way to transcend the physical, ascend out of form, and move toward liberation.

This “upward-only” orientation shaped much of the tradition - including kundalini.

In classic kundalini teachings, the energy is meant to rise, rise, rise:

Up the spine.
Into the third eye.
Exploding at the crown in a burst of bliss, transcendence or in some case, disorientation and psychological issues.

This is why so much traditional kundalini looks like:

Angles and triangles
Pressure and tension
“Poke, provoke, elevate”
Breath of fire
Precise timing
Prescriptive sequences
A constant drive to raise energy upward

But let’s be honest…

For most of us living modern lives - single parents, business owners, navigating grief, running studios, juggling phones and inboxes and emotional labour -
this kind of ascension-only model doesn’t just feel irrelevant. It feels destabilising.

It can feel like trying to ride a wild horse without a bridle.

Because here’s the truth:

We live on the manifest plane. We are in bodies. We are not meant to bypass them.

A spiritual practice that pulls us only upward can leave us untethered, dissociated, or burnt out.

Why Feminine-Form Kundalini Makes Sense Now

In our modern world, most of us already live “up there” — in the mind, the eyes, the screens, the scroll.

We don’t need help going up.
We need help coming down.

We need Shakti - the downward current -
to anchor us into our body,
to reclaim pleasure, safety, instinct, softness, sensuality.

We need practices that ground the nervous system before activating it and that build capacity for pleasure, not just stress.

And this is where feminine-form kundalini changes everything.

Instead of pressure, it offers permission.
Instead of force, it offers flow.
Instead of rigid angles, it uses spirals, circles, waves.

Instead of only “lifting” energy, it also draws it down, so the two currents - Shiva (upward) and Shakti (downward) - can meet in the heart.

And in my lived experience?

This is the whole point of Earth School.
To learn how to love and be loved - and that happens in the heart.

The heart is where the masculine (Sushumna) meets the feminine (Ida + Pingala).
Where union happens.
Where embodiment and spirituality finally stop living in separate rooms.

Without Shiva, Shakti is chaotic.
Without Shakti, Shiva is static.
But together?
They create awakening that is stable, grounded, and deeply human.

A New Vision for Kundalini

This new feminine-form approach asks:

What if kundalini doesn’t need to be forced upward?
What if she rises naturally when the body feels safe?
What if awakening doesn’t require strain or pressure - but softness, intuition, and grounding?

What if the aim is not to shoot energy up to the third eye,
but to harness both directions…
so they meet in the centre of the chest,
where love, compassion, presence, and connection live?

This is the kundalini I practise now.
The kundalini I teach.
The kundalini that feels true to the word Shakti - not a performance, not a discipline, but a partnership with your body.