**chakras**

[saphire]

So, for months Aweynsayl and I have been batting around an idea for a chakra workshop. Since at least last summer. The idea is to have a place to share knowledge, experiences, and feelings about chakras.

Many of us have heard about chakras, and some of us are familiar with their basic descriptions. The definition I best identify with describes chakras as swirling vortices of energy located in our etheric body. There are seven “major” chakras that get the most attention, and a multitude of smaller chakras covering much of the rest of our body. Colors, stones and crystals, and sound frequencies are all tools people use to heal and energize chakras. I shouldn’t forget to add yoga, especially kundalini to that list.

The thing I’m interested in is what should I do- with regards to chakras- in order to live my fullest, healthiest life? How does their function affect me? In myself, I notice shielding my heart chakra from news media’s manipulations helps a lot, or how when I don’t voice an opinion, it affects my throat chakra.

Recently in the Treasure Map thread someone suggested the idea of organizing according to chakras, instead of the feng shui baguas often used. That sounds like fun! Don't get me wrong- I've had great success using the baguas to organize TM by, but I'm all about variety too.

Learning about chakra energy centers is something I really enjoy. I’m not an expert- so I’m really interested in what everyone else has to say.

I found a couple links that describe chakras very nicely:

http://www.chakraenergy.com/intro.html

http://www.crystalinks.com/chakras.html

[doubledutch]

off to read links!

[aweynsayl]

yay! i'm so excited we're finally doing this!


i've been having a lot of fun, especially since that idea in the TM thread, playing with chakras in different ways.

i think the thing that interests me the most is the notion of balance--creating balance, living balance, and so on... (yes, i'm a libra, lol!). and also the connection between the chakras, and one's imbalance affecting another, and so on. i cant wait to talk about open/closed/etc... and the "conventional" notion of that functionality, vs. some... less traditional ideas (especially from our dear friend the chakra tapping guy).

i'll be off the computer for a bit, back tomorrow evening, and i look forward to sharing and learning more then!

[wombatclay]

What a neat idea about using the chakras for treasure map outline. And thanks for starting this thread!

I never thought much about chakras till a while after my dd2 was born... her birth left me with a 4th degree tear and an extensively rebuilt "undercarriage". I'd been focused on the physical and emotional recovery but things were still "off" until someone pointed out that I'd basically ripped out and replaced one of my chakra points. It made a lot of sense andI think working on my root chakra was helpful.

And more recently I've been exploring the energy of the crown chakra... I started covering my hair while growing it out and noticed a real (and positive) difference in how I reacted to the energies of others/places. It made me wonder if some elements of head covering may have grown out of a social or spiritual recogniztion of the crown chakra. Even if the idea of "chakra" or "energy point" would have been foreign to the culture/religion involved.

I've also found that covering my hair with a cloth that matches the chakra color I'm focusing on gives my meditations a little extra oomph. Even when I'm not covering my hair while out and about, I find that a ribbon or scarf in the specific color is a good tool for focusing on that energy.

[_ktg_]

Ooooh love me some chakras! I often find myself especially in corpse pose with yoga going through opening the chakras and sort of giving them a tune-up. Its amazing how good -read this as balanced too I feel after that little exercise.

I'm definitely in and will read the links.

[somanythings]

Subbing because I don't know a whole lot about chakras, but I can physically feel my heart chakra and never knew that's what it was until about a year ago.

[doubledutch]

goo.

i did the chakra eval thing at the first link and i only have two, like, remotely functional chakras. not that i'm surprised, because most areas of my life are totally whack right now, but it left me wondering . . . what do i work on FIRST?! start at the root?

[saphire]

Yay! We are gonna learn so much from each other, I just know it. So many books give chakra definitions, but written descriptions of chakras don't tell me enough. It's like reading about love, and intellectually understanding love vs. experiencing love.

After reading a bit I learned how other people described experiencing their chakras. I started by meditating and visualizing sending colored energy to my chakras, starting with red at the base and slowly working my way up to white light at my crown, each time drawing a little energy from the chakra below, until I could feel a flow between them. After a while I tried to feel the spin of them.
Other times I practice opening or closing the flow of my chakras depending on the situation. Groups of people don't bother me, and sometimes I'll try to open my chakras enough to try to get a feel of people around me. The opposite works too.

When I go camping one of my favorite things to do is meditate, with my feet buried in the sand at the lake's edge,(or river, or ocean- but I love the water) and pull energy up through my chakras. When at home, in the summertime I'll just lay a blanket on the ground and do the same thing.

In bed before I go to sleep, I will relax and just try to feel my chakras, and visualize them glowing and spinning.

Let's see, how else do I experience my chakras?
In the shower, I'll place my hand over a chakra and imagine any stuck energy being released to my hand, then I rinse my hand in the shower and clean myself of stuck energy. I'll also tap ( but I want aweynsayl to share that bit!)

OK, that's mostly how I experience my chakras. How do you?

[saphire]

Hi doubledutch, I think starting at the base is a good idea.

Yoga Journal has an article with asanas to correlate with chakras. It's long, but the poses are at the bottom of each page. http://www.yogajournal.com/basics/898

[Aubergine68]

Subbing, back later

[sky*hawk]

Yay! Subbing for now. Will catch up tomorrow on the links posted and also post my experiences so far. I'm the one who had the idea to do the TM around the chakras. I also thought about using the native american medicine wheel (will have to post that idea in the prep thread). So glad to see this here and I look forward to learning and experiencing more.

[sky*hawk]

Checked out that chakra test: apparently my throat and heart chakras need work and I am very in tune with my crown chakra.
Throat chakra - 0
Crown chakra - 4
heart chakra - 1
all other chakras - 2

[Purple Sage]

I think it's interesting that the chakras correlate with the glands of the endocrine system. We learned about this in one of my classes in massage school. I wish I knew where I put my notes from that class because there was some good stuff in there that I can't remember now. The second link in the OP talks about it, too. Good stuff!

Love this thread!

[doubledutch]

Originally Posted by saphire

Hi doubledutch, I think starting at the base is a good idea.

Yoga Journal has an article with asanas to correlate with chakras. It's long, but the poses are at the bottom of each page. http://www.yogajournal.com/basics/898

awesome! that is really helpful.

[aweynsayl]

i'm not really in the best mood for discussing chakras right now, but a quick reply since i couldnt make it on last night, and thoughtful time today is sort of out the window, lol--

re: where to start
i actually have an opinion on that one, which is so odd for me.
i personally found that months and months of traditional "work" on a specific chakra did very little for me, while a week or so of the general chakra tapping as shown in this video "balanced" me (according to the eclectic energies test, here).

that, for me, was just the beginning... but more on that when i can form coherent thoughts....

[saphire]

aweyn- sorry you're having a hard time .

[Tuesday]

I have my Reiki I attunement and can sense chakras with my hands. To balance them, I find kundalini yoga really helps. I 've been doing Ravi Singh & Ana Brett dvds daily over last few months and they've really helped in many many ways. They have an excellent dvd called Dance Your Chakras which includes 2 yoga sets that hit every main chakra.

[sky*hawk]

Originally Posted by aweynsayl

i'm not really in the best mood for discussing chakras right now, but a quick reply since i couldnt make it on last night, and thoughtful time today is sort of out the window, lol--

re: where to start
i actually have an opinion on that one, which is so odd for me.
i personally found that months and months of traditional "work" on a specific chakra did very little for me, while a week or so of the general chakra tapping as shown in this video "balanced" me (according to the eclectic energies test, here).

that, for me, was just the beginning... but more on that when i can form coherent thoughts....

Oh my gosh! My therapist was teaching me tapping! I will have to look at this web site more...
Looking forward to hearing more about your experiences with tapping.

[aweynsayl]

saphire, thanks for the hugs! we're fine, just... well, a little wild and crazy, lol! but good things.


ok, let's see if i can be more coherent...

the thing i like about tapping for a beginning in terms of chakras is that it's systemic. so it helped me get a good "feel" for my chakras. sort of like a "get to know you." especially, i suppose, since i was doing tapping for other things, and it's a technique that really resonates with me (that's probably the biggest reason, of course).

here's the other (and probably bigger) reason i like the chakra tapping as an entry into chakra exploration--

when i was first learning about chakras, and the notion of open/closed/underactive/overactive, etc... it seemed like everything i found said that if you had a closed or underactive chakra, to work on opening it, and if you had an overactive chakra, to work on opening the underactive ones to balance out the overactive chakra. in other words, either way, you're focusing on the underactive or closed chakras, and basically ignoring the overactive ones.

well, now this is just me, but i dont totally buy that being the best or only approach. maybe that's because i tried that for months and months with barely any result, but it's also because i think things in general, and our bodies specifically, are more systemic than that. i've come to feel that an overactive chakra is not simply compensating for one that is closed, but it may be stuck open, it may be somehow preferred by me because of my personality or life experiences...

for me, working on the OVERactive chakras instead of the UNDERactive ones got me faster, better, and more powerful results, in terms of bringing all my chakras into balance. further, i found connections between the under and over active chakras, and so, in one specific case, simply by "clearing out" (with tapping) an overactive chakra, i brought greater openess to an underactive chakra (because of an interconnection between them, for me).

does that make sense at all??

one thing i think i said already that interests me is the notion of Creating Balance thru my chakras by energetically manipulating them in some way-- vs. changing something in my life that might be causing an imbalance. i think the power of tapping for chakra work lies in both. on the one hand, i feel that i can, when i need to, actually Create balance in a chakra that is affected by something in my life, but chakra tapping also makes me more aware of myself and the things in my life that affect my chakras, so that i can bring about changes in my life that will lead to my chakras being, more naturally, in greater balance.

again... make sense??

now, i should note, that not all of this did i achieve with the basic chakra tapping video i linked before, but also thru his... "advanced" chakra tapping workbook (which, alas, is not free). i hate linking to this page, because i feel it's rather on the cheezy side, but here it is in case anyone's interested... two notes of caution: it is intense. at least, it was for me. in other words, dont start it while the in laws are visiting or right before a major project is due. it's also slightly on the woo-woo side, even for chakras. but if you lurve tapping and you lurve chakras, it's worth a try. at least, that's my opinion.

[sky*hawk]

aweynsayl - I've often thought that there is a reason why certain chakras are more open and active than others other than there being a "blockage" or something. I understand what you are saying, it makes sense. For my personality, I tend to rely on certain chakras more than others. Though right now I am feeling that I DO need to work on my throat chakra. I can't seem to make the things coming in through my heart come out of my mouth, does THAT make sense at all?