Shiva and Shakti

In the ancient Sanskrit language of the fully enlightened, this process of growth of consciousness is described as the ecstatic union of Kundalini Shakti with her divine lover, Shiva. Shakti sleeps in the first chakra at the base of the spine; Shiva lives alone in the crown.
When enlightenment dawns, Shakti rises from the base and marries Shiva in the crown; they then move together to dwell forever in the heart. Their merging expresses the experience of Ascending: subject/object duality is abandoned for Infinite bliss, Eternal love.
Kundalin means "coiled" or "spiral" and refers to the spiral patterns of energy found throughout the natural world, from the DNA molecule to the shape of sunflowers, from Earth's orbit around our sun to galaxies. With an "i " added on the
end, Kundalini, it becomes a feminine noun which also means snake. A serpent rests in a coil and releases its energy when it straightens and strikes. Kundalini is therefore symbolic of the primordial essence of nature, pre-rational, pre-verbal, capable of inflicting death if misused and yet also capable of giving complete healing if properly channeled. It is a symbol of the regenerative powers of the deepest levels of the
personality, the source of creativity, intuition, miracle-power.
The Ascendant (the Absolute unchanging One) is often personified as Shiva, which means "kind, friendly, gracious, pleasant, auspicious, prosperous, happy."
Shiva rules the Ananda (bliss) quality of the Ascendant. The physical structure of the Universe is Shiva's lover, Shakti: "ability, capacity, power, strength, skill". Shakti
represents the Holy Spirit in Christian terminology, the Power of God manifest in the created Universe, Mother Nature. When giving form to the formless, She is called
Maya Shakti. Maya means illusion; it comes from ma,
"that not" & ya, "which": "that which is not", or from ma -- "to measure, to form, to display:" "that which displays or
forms". From Her divine imagination, Maya Shakti conjures up the great illusion of the Universe by veiling the Ascendant in matter. The True Nature of life is hidden from our obscured minds because of Maya's power.
Shakti is also considered the Revealer of Truth and the Great Liberator. All she brings into temporary existence will someday return to its original essence in the Ascendant. This function is personified as either Kundalini or the awe-inspiring Kali
(lit., "time, strife, dissension"). To the ego-centered person attached to the material world, Kali is a wrathful and horrifying goddess of destruction. But to those in search of liberation from the illusion of suffering and ego-identification, she is a saviouress.
The imagery of Shiva and Shakti as lovers points toward their interdependence. Although apparently separate, they are in truth two complementary aspects of a single Unity; one does not exist without the other. The double-sexed
Supreme Deity is thus both temporal and Infinite. Shiva is the unlimited whole, Shakti is the ongoing convergence of parts that make up the whole; Shiva is transcendent and changeless, Shakti is phenomenal and mutable. Shiva is the Lord of the Ascendant; Shakti is Mother Nature, creating the appearance of duality on the surface of perfect unity. (Note: In Symbolic form this is also represented by the Cross. Shiva the absolute, Ascendant, unmanifest, "Male" [vertical], and Shakti, "feminine" [horizontal] Manifest creation spreading outward from the absolute.)
The seventh chakra, at the top of the head, is related to the original transcendental union of Shiva and Shakti. In the sixth chakra, in the center of the head, Shakti separates from Shiva and creates the mind and the intellect. The five
remaining chakras, located from the neck to the pelvis, represent the five stages of progressive crystallization of the Ascendant into matter: ether, air, fire, water and earth. Each stage is denser as it contracts out of the previous element, until the ultimate limit of solidity is formed in earth.
Shakti is often pictured as dancing, wearing a tinkling anklet. As the rhythms of her dance increase in complexity and passion, the fabric of the Universe is woven in seven layers of increasing density. Thus the seven chakras of the microcosm in the human are the reflections of this seven-fold division of the macrocosm.
After Maya Shakti creates the world, she as if hibernates in the depths of the material Universe -- in the root chakra at the base of the spine, in the earth element.
While Kundalini Shakti sleeps, our lives are dominated by the blind forces of the instincts, desires and concepts of the ego. The purpose of Yoga is to withdraw this divine energy from the ego's belief systems and direct it back up the central channel in the spine, the sushumna. When this happens, Shakti manifests in each of the chakras and reveals higher and higher levels of consciousness. Ultimately our awareness is
released from the limitations of the ego and partakes in the divine pleasure of Shiva and Shakti's ecstatic union: individuality rises consciously back to its source in Universality.

~Taken from the appendix of "Enlightenment" The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali by MSI~