The Third Eye - What It Is and How Kundalini Yoga Works With It
Most of what's written about the third eye lands at one of two extremes. Either it's treated as a mystical superpower: seeing auras, predicting the future, stepping into other dimensions. Or it's dismissed as spiritual nonsense with no basis at all.
Somewhere in between is what actually happens in practice.
The third eye, or Ajna Chakra, is the sixth of the seven main chakras in the yogic system. It sits in the center of the forehead, between and slightly above the eyebrows, connected to the pituitary gland. It governs intuition, inner clarity, and the ability to see clearly, not just with the eyes, but with the deeper part of us that already knows.
Kundalini Yoga works with it in a direct and simple way, in every practice. We feel it before we can explain it.
Table of Contents
What Is the Third Eye?
The Anatomy Behind It
What Actually Happens When It Opens
Is Opening the Third Eye Dangerous?
How Kundalini Yoga Works on the Ajna Chakra
What Changes Over Time
Frequently Asked Questions
What Is the Third Eye?
In the yogic system, the Ajna Chakra sits at the command center of the energetic body. "Ajna" means command, or to perceive, in Sanskrit. Through this center flow clarity, discernment, and intuition.
Physically, it's connected to the pituitary gland and the pineal gland. Both regulate hormones, sleep, and deep states of consciousness. The third eye isn't purely metaphorical. It has a physical correlate.
When this center is blocked or underdeveloped, the mind takes over. Mental noise gets louder. The constant loop of doubting, planning ahead, rewriting the past. When it's more open, there's a quieter kind of knowing. A sense of direction the mind doesn't have to work out first.
The Anatomy Behind It
The usual explanation names one gland: the pineal gland or the pituitary gland. A fuller picture shows three, working together.
The three are the pineal gland, the pituitary gland, and the hypothalamus. Each has a primary function that keeps the body running day to day, and a secondary function activated through practice.
The pineal gland regulates the circadian rhythm, our inner sleep-wake clock, through melatonin. In meditators, it's credited with a secondary function: it's said to release microdoses of a compound called pinoline - a naturally occurring substance chemically related to melatonin - which some spiritual and esoteric circles associate with expanded states of consciousness, though this hasn't been conclusively researched scientifically. A possible reason, still, why we get up early in our practice: the pineal gland is thought to be most active between 3 and 5 a.m.
The pituitary gland is the main regulator of the hormone system. Through the crossing optic nerves, activated when the eyes are closed and relaxed, it also generates images in deep meditation. That's the physiology behind what can happen in a strong sitting practice.
The hypothalamus sits at the center of the brain and gathers signals from the body. Its secondary function: it receives the vibration of the voice. When we chant mantra, the tongue pressing against the upper palate stimulates the hypothalamus directly. The effect of mantra on the body isn't just symbolic. It's anatomical.
When all three work together in coordination, that points to what tradition calls the third eye.
As with Ayurveda or TCM, the same holds true here: what ancient health systems recognized long ago through observation and lived experience, science is only now beginning to confirm.
What Actually Happens When It Opens
People expect visions. What they usually get is something quieter and more useful.
Mental noise decreases. The feeling of "I don't know what I want" or "I can't make clear decisions" starts to lift. The ability grows to know what's true for you without needing outside confirmation.
It doesn't happen all at once, and it doesn't stay permanently. What develops over months of consistent practice is a gradual strengthening of this inner signal, so it becomes easier to hear and easier to trust.
Is Opening the Third Eye Dangerous?
This question comes up often, and it's worth taking seriously.
The short answer: not when the practice happens within a structured tradition, with proper preparation and community.
The longer answer: any practice that works on a deep energetic level can stir things up. If the Ajna Chakra starts to open before the rest of the energetic system is ready, the result can be disorientation, a feeling of being overwhelmed by perception, or losing the grounding needed for daily life.
That's why Kundalini Yoga builds from the ground up. The lower chakras, grounding, creativity, and personal power, are worked on first. The nervous system is strengthened through breathwork and physical practice before the subtler centers are opened. Nothing is forced. Preparation is the point.
How Kundalini Yoga Works on the Ajna Chakra
Kundalini Yoga has specific kriyas and meditations aimed directly at the sixth chakra. What happens in practice:
Trataka - fixing the gaze on a single point, often the tip of the nose or the third eye point. Calms the restless eye movements that mirror a restless mind.
Mantra and Naad Yoga - the vibration of specific mantras resonates through the skull, stimulating the pituitary and pineal glands directly.
Meditation with focus on the Ajna point - directing attention here over time builds the capacity to sustain inner concentration.
Breath of Fire - oxygenates the blood and activates the nervous system, creating the conditions for deeper states of consciousness.
What all of these have in common: they slow the mental noise enough for something else to come through. It's not about forcing the third eye open. It's about clearing away what's in the way.
What Changes Over Time
After months of consistent practice, people describe a shift in their relationship to their own knowing.
Less doubting. Less of the loop that says, "But what if I'm wrong, what will others think, am I sure?" Not because the ego disappears (it doesn't), but because a quieter signal has become more audible.
And something else: a growing sense of being part of something larger. When the Ajna Chakra is more open, the sense of a separate self loosens a little. Not permanently. But in moments, when the loops of the mind stop, and there's just the feeling of being here, connected, part of everything.
These moments are the real gift of the practice.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the third eye?
The third eye, or Ajna Chakra, is the sixth energy center in the yogic system. Located at the center of the forehead, it governs intuition, inner clarity, and the ability to perceive beyond the surface.
Where is the third eye located?
Between and slightly above the eyebrows, physically connected to the pituitary gland. In meditation, attention is often directed here to activate this center.
Is it dangerous to open the third eye?
Not when practiced within a structured tradition with proper preparation and grounding. Forcing it through intense breathwork without preparation, or other shortcut methods, can be destabilizing. That's why Kundalini Yoga builds up the whole system before working on the subtler centers.
What does it feel like when the third eye opens?
Usually calmer than expected. Less mental noise. A growing sense of inner clarity and direction. Sometimes a physical sensation of warmth or pressure at the center of the forehead during practice.
How do you activate the third eye with Kundalini Yoga?
Through regular practice: specific kriyas, mantra, trataka, and meditation on the Ajna Chakra. Not through shortcuts or force, but through consistent work over time.
The third eye isn't a superpower. It's a capacity: for clarity, for knowing, for seeing what's true rather than what the mind insists on. And like any capacity, it develops through practice, slowly, gradually, in a way that's often hard to name until it's unmistakably there.
If any of this sparks curiosity about how the practice actually feels from the inside: at Gobinde Studio in Zürich, we practice Kundalini Yoga together every Monday and Wednesday evening. We get up early, we chant mantra, we sit, not only because we know what happens in the pineal gland, but because it feels true. The explanation came later. Come by and experience what the practice really does.
This article was written by Judith Ender, founder of Gobinde Studio in Zürich and Kundalini Yoga teacher with over 15 years of practice and teaching. She works with people ready to step out of the loops of the mind and discover what a consistent practice can open.