“In so-called ‘occult’ literature you have probably met with the expression
‘Kundalini,’ ‘the fire of Kundalini,’ or the ‘serpent of Kundalini.’ This expression is
often used to designate some kind of strange force which is present in man and which
can be awakened. But none of the known theories gives the right explanation of the
force of Kundalini. Sometimes it is connected with sex, with sex energy, that is with
the idea of the possibility of using sex energy for other purposes. This latter is entirely
wrong because Kundalini can be in anything. And above all, Kundalini is not
anything desirable or useful for man’s development. It is very curious how these
occultists have got hold of the word from somewhere but have completely altered its
meaning and from a very dangerous and terrible thing have made something to be
hoped for and to be awaited as some blessing.
“In reality Kundalini is the power of imagination, the power of fantasy, which takes
the place of a real function. When a man dreams instead of acting, when his dreams
take the place of reality, when a man imagines himself to be an eagle, a lion, or a
magician, it is the force of Kundalini acting in him. Kundalini can act in all centers
and with its help all the centers can be satisfied with the imaginary instead of the real.
A sheep which considers itself a lion or a magician lives under the power of
Kundalini.
“Kundalini is a force put into men in order to keep them in their present state. If
men could really see their true position and could understand all the horror of it, they
would be unable to remain where they are even for one second. They would begin to
seek a way out and they would quickly find it, because there is a way out; but men
fail to see it simply because they are hypnotized. Kundalini is the force that keeps
them in a hypnotic state. ‘To awaken’ for man means to be ‘dehypnotized.’ In this lies
the chief difficulty and in this also lies the guarantee of its possibility, for there is no
organic reason for sleep and man can awaken.
“Theoretically he can, but practically it is almost impossible because as soon as a
man awakens for a moment and opens his eyes, all the forces that caused him to fall
asleep begin to act upon him with tenfold energy and he immediately falls asleep
again, very often dreaming that he is awake or is awakening.
“There are certain states in ordinary sleep in which a man wants to awaken but
cannot. He tells himself that he is awake but, in reality, he continues to sleep—and
this can happen several times before he finally awakes. But in ordinary sleep, once he
is awake, he is in a different state;
in hypnotic sleep the case is otherwise; there are no objective characteristics, at any
rate not at the beginning of awakening; a man cannot pinch himself in order to make
sure that he is not asleep. And if, which God forbid, a man has heard anything about
objective characteristics, Kundalini at once transforms it all into imagination and
dreams.
“Only a man who fully realizes the difficulty of awakening can understand the
necessity of long and hard work in order to awake.”

(P.D. Ouspensky In Search of the Miraculous page 227, 228 in the book 202,203)