A Guide to the Chakras

Chakras are centers of spiritual/magickal energy, found along the midline of the body. There are seven major chakras, and hundreds of others located all over and around the body. Here is a quick yet in depth guide to the seven major energy points.

The first chakra is called  the Root Chakra. This particular energy field deals with our survival, and the way we have developed our beliefs about this. These beliefs are primarily issues about food, money, rent, shelter, natural disasters, man-made disasters-anything that affects your personal sense of safety in the world. It is in this chakra that we ‘ground’. A healthy Root Chakra creates and supports a feeling of safety on the planet. You feel grounded and your life flows along easily. Out of balance, this chakra cannot support our feeling safe and secure about many of life’s issues.  RED

The second chakra is called the Sacral Chakra. This particular energy field deals with our stored memories, emotions, and info about how you deal with others. It is a very demanding chakra, often filled with drama when imbalanced. Relationships issues, addictions, violence, deception, emotional upset, hurtful gossip, & creativity are some of the things that operate from this chakra. When this chakra is imbalanced, many of your interpersonal relationships can be filled with drama and negative excitement. When in balance, you maneuver easily through deep and even superficial relationships.  ORANGE

The third Chakra is called the Solar Plexus Chakra. This particular chakra deals with control, power and boundaries. When this chakra is imbalanced feelings of helplessness, anger, resentment or victimization are present. Our personal use of power, or lack of it is highlighted here. The burning, tightening sensation of being ‘kicked in the stomach’ is an indication of actually having been (on an energetic level) kicked in the stomach. Eastern belief places your ‘chi’ here. It is where harmony, balance and grounding are. When this energy is blocked you may experience criticism and judgment. When this center is in balance, you’re in touch with your heart and have great compassion.  YELLOW

The fourth chakra is called the Heart Chakra. This is the center of your being. It is the bridge and support for the lower three and the upper three. This is where Heaven & Earth integrate. As you open and balance this center you begin to open yourself to your Higher Self. You begin to truly love yourself and truly love others. A heart chakra out of balance can display too much love and being to mothering or protective. This is draining and can feel painful. This center is also connected with identity…all healing takes place in this center, so your newly emerging self transforms here. Trouble with emotional expression can indicate imbalance in the Heart Chakra. Bringing this center into balance asks that you explore your self and identity, and learn to love freely with gentle boundaries and awareness of your won needs as well as those of others.  GREEN

The fifth chakra is called the Throat Chakra. This particular energy field deals with communication, personal expression and speaking your truth. This is also where your ‘inner voice’ speaks through to you, enabling you to hear & identify the truth. Indications of imbalance include sore throats, mouth ulcers, swollen glands, and laryngitis. Taking a moment to see if you have any of these symptoms, as a chronic condition will help you notice an imbalance here. Thinking about how easily you speak your truth or how difficult it is can help to shed light here as well. This is the energy center where you speak as well as listen. Being an active listener is a sign that this center is closer to balance.  BLUE

The sixth chakra is called the third eye or brow chakra. This is the energy centered associated with clairvoyance, higher mental wisdoms, personal vision, intuition and visualization, insight and imagination. This area is always in danger of being judged by ourselves & others-when we express our ‘feelings’ or a sense of knowing about something, it may seem hard to trust this. If when we were children, creativity and imagination were not encouraged, then there can be imbalances here. Do you give yourself permission to see things clearly? This is the center of clarity. This chakra can influence how you see yourself in the world, how others perceive you, or how you think they perceive you.  VIOLET

The  seventh chakra is called the crown chakra. This is the center associated with your free will: your Higher Self, Divinity, consciousness and higher consciousness. If this chakra is not open and balanced, the other chakras will not find balance. This is the first chakra to develop in an infant, the first chakra being the last to develop as the baby enters the physical world. Through the seventh chakra we get our Divine inspiration, our Divine creativity. It is our visionary center. This is where everything comes together. This is where pure intention manifests, and where the purity of all things are felt and recognized. When this chakra is balanced you are at peace and you feel connected. When it is out of balance fear and disconnectedness can occur.  WHITE

Information within this article was gathered from various sources.

39 Days of Prayer – Day 39

Day 39 – Gratitude

I inhale and receive your love

I exhale and share it with the world.

Goddess/God/Spirit

I thank you for walking with me on my life path

Thank you for guiding the evolution of my mind,

for opening my heart and spirit to receive.

Thank you for transforming me so that I may live a positive existence

and influence all I come in contact with.

May I always serve your divine will.

Blessed be.

Dawn Song

I’ve gone to bed with the dawn chorus a fair few times at festivals, and woken with it too – sleeping on hillsides and under canvas. Now, with an east facing bedroom, the dawn itself wakes me and I lie in bed listening to the birds each morning. The dawn chorus is one of those many miracles that occurs on a daily basis, largely unnoticed.

It begins with one or two lone voices. Not full blown song, but odd chirrups and calls as the birds rouse themselves. The sounds grows, becoming richer, louder, until every tree and bush seems to be singing in the new day. In the summer it can last for quite a while. Then it ebbs away, as birds start the flying and foraging essential to their lives.

Why do they do it?

Birds have to maintain a very fine weight balance – light enough to fly, resourced enough to survive. They have to meet any night ready for the worst, and so if the night has been gentle, they have energy to spare and can use it at dawn in their singing before the day fully begins. My experience of dawn choruses are that they are bigger, louder and more enthusiastic in summer, so perhaps this is true. But why sing? Why not channel the spare energy into something more obviously useful? What evolutionary purpose can the singing serve? The interesting truth is that while we can speculate, we don’t really know. Perhaps it has no practical purpose at all. And in truth, I hope that’s the case.

Much of the beauty in nature is functional – it is there to gather sunlight, attract mates, or pollinating insects. Some of it, like the contours of a landscape happen by chance. A pebble polished by a stream. Perhaps it says something about humanity that we have the capacity to look at this collection of random and functional things, and experience a sense of beauty and wonder. The beauty of a flower is more than its usefulness as a tool of pollination. It would also be fair to say that this capacity for appreciating beauty doesn’t seem to have any particular ‘use’ either. Sometimes it helps us to lure a mate, but as perceptions of beauty are individual, it’s no guarantee of anything much.

I want to claim that the way we perceive beauty is evidence of spirit, of soul. Something moves in us that is more than about practicalities. Beauty is not about need, resources, power or ownership, it is the simple wonder inspired by encountering something lovely. Seeing, hearing, touching beauty in whatever form, nourishes the heart and mind, and gives more than the useful things alone can.

We can choose to be functional, or we can choose to make our functionality beautiful. We can invest time, care and love in what we do, make poetry of our speech and dancing of our footfalls. That is the bard path – to walk in beauty. We don’t need to focus every action on material or personal gain. Sometimes, it is good to sing, heart and soul, not for an audience, but for the sheer, wild pleasure of being alive and doing something lovely. Sometimes it is good to be a voice in the chorus, part of the effusive celebration but not separately audible. I have yet to find a day when it hasn’t been good to lie in bed for a little while, listening to the voices of the birds, loving what they do, and hoping with all my heart that no one ever pins down a practical, rational explanation for it.