Module 6: Chakras

Your Body’s Energy Stations

What are chakras? How do they affect our health, mind, how we perceive the world, release our past trauma, and hold the keys to opening new doors to our future? 

My first introduction to chakras was in 1999 when I was in massage school, but it was only mentioned briefly in my classes. When I attended Scottsdale Community College to do my yoga training, we started to learn in-depth, and honestly, I listened and thought there wasn’t too much substance to know more. Well, over the years in my world of natural healing, I would keep hearing mention of chakras and how if they are blocked, they could affect your health along with many other things. 

It wasn’t until about 2017 when I was asked to teach yoga at a retreat for women with autoimmune diseases and focus on poses to open the chakras that I was now invested in learning more. As I started researching what poses helped open specific chakras and what the characteristics were if they were open versus blocked, it began to make sense, and I could see how this related to my health, blocks, and clients. 

I taught yoga at two retreats for people with autoimmune diseases about six months apart from each other. I focused the sessions around the group’s needs: the root, heart, and throat chakra. I carefully planned the yoga sessions to release these three areas. At both retreats, several women had an emotional release that was beyond their control during the session. I welcomed them not to hold back but to let it flow. Because when we let our emotions release and flow, that is when deep healing is done. This release gave them clarity and insight into what was holding them back or a clue into the next steps of what they needed to do for themselves to continue their healing journey. With those experiences and the clients I have privately coached, I have a deep belief that there is some substance to chakras and how they connect us to our past and future. 

From what I have read about chakras, Donna Eden’s info from her book Energy Medicine provides a wealth of knowledge. I will share different experts from her books to give you a somewhat brief overview of the chakras. As you read through this material, make notes of what stands out to you, especially the quick overview of chakras’ imbalances, etc., you know which chakras you can work on with my help.

Weeks Reading Material

From Donna Eden’s Book Energy Medicine

“The word chakra means disk, vortex, or wheel. Whereas meridians are an energy transportation system, the chakras are energy stations. Each major chakra in the human body is a center of swirling energy positioned at one of seven points, from the base of your spine to the top of your head. Memory is energetically coded in your chakras just as it is chemically coded in your neurons. While an “energy memory” system that parallels neural memory is foreign to Western thinking, it is taken for granted in many healing traditions. An imprint of every important or emotionally significant event you have is believed to be recorded in your chakra energy, and that is exactly how I experience it. If I know your chakras, I know your history, the obstacles to your growth, your vulnerabilities to illness, and your soul’s longings. ” 

Functions of the Chakras, Physiological, Psychological, Spiritual

Definitions of:

Physiological-relating to the branch of biology that deals with the normal functions of living organisms and their parts:

Psychological-of, affecting, or arising in the mind; related to the mental and emotional state of a person. 

“At the physiological level, the chakras envelop with their energies the organs in their proximity, influencing the health of those organs. Each chakra is named after the part of the body over which its energy spins. They are called, from the bottom up: the root chakra, womb chakra (the second chakra has a womblike shape in both women and men), solar plexus chakra, heart chakra, throat chakra, pituitary (third eye) chakra, pineal (crown) chakra. There is, indeed, some strong anecdotal evidence that the equilibrium in a chakra’s energies not only correlates with and influences the health of the organs located in the chakras’ field, but also that imbalances in the chakra’s energies precede (and thus predict) the onset of disease. Clearing and balancing impaired energies in a chakra can head off brewing illness and help heal physical symptoms that have emerged. The psychological aspects of the chakras also play into their physiological function. Because the chakras encode experience, they often reveal how a person’s history plays into current symptoms. By clearing chakras that are still locked into the energies and conflicts of your past, you can open the way for deep healing of chronic or underlying health problems.” 

“At the psychological level, each chakra is charged with specific psychological tasks such as regulation distinct aspects of your personality and integrating difficult experiences into your energy systems. The aspects of your personality regulated by a given chakra are related to that chakra’s developmental theme. Each chakra holds a slice of your story and is associated with a distinct developmental theme. These themes include survival and sexuality (root chakra), creativity (womb chakra), identity and power (solar plexus chakra) love and compassion (heart chakra) expression (throat chakra), deep perception and understanding (third eye chakra), and transcendence of the self (crown chakra). When two chakras are energetically cut off from each other, the aspects of the personality governed by each may become warring subpersonalities, as is seen, for instance, in the classic conflict between head and heart. While your chakras tell your story, they can also hold your story back. Once a chakra that has been energetically blocked is released, your life is able to again unfold according to the progressive guidance encoded within that chakra rather than to be mired in energies that keep you mired in issues related to the chakra’s theme.”

“Spiritual functions attributed to the chakras are based in the way the chakras are believed to be attuned to metaphysical constructs such as “ancestral memories” “past lives,” and archetypes.” Sometimes, for instance, the information that is coded in a specific chakra tells a story to an intuitive healer about a different person from a different era. If that story is interpreted as being about the individual in a previous lifetime, it may perfectly explain an elusive physical or emotional symptom the person is currently struggling with. More fundamental is the way the chakras resonate with certain archetypal themes, patterns of organization that transcend any of us but affect all of us. These universal themes parallel the psychological themes discussed above (such as survival, procreation, identity, love, and expression), and they are no less than forces that structure the unfolding of life on the planet. Each chakra’s energy is the microcosm of one of these universal principles, expressed within the body. They spiral these energetic prototypes into your body, feeding your physical structure and linking your body to Nature’s wisdom as reflected in the subtle energies that surround you. 

If you want to develop in one of these areas governed by a particular chakra, such as the capacity for clear strong expression that is the domain of the throat chakra, you can (1) focus on your throat chakra, (2) use physical techniques that balance and open it (3) direct your consciousness to your throat chakra and beyond, seeking to connect it with the principle of expression as it exists in the universe. When you do, you channel that force into your own center of expression, building the quality in a wholesome manner. “ 

“Each chakra influences the organs, muscles, ligaments, veins, and all other body parts within its energy field. Chakras also influence the endocrine system and so are strongly involved with your moods, personality, and overall health. Your physical and psychological evolution, as well as your spiritual journey, are all reflected in your chakras.”

Basic Overview of The Chakras