The Chakras

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The Chakras

Yoga as a practice, a study and a thought system has changed my life. Yoga wasn’t on my radar most of my life; I wasn’t aware that I needed it then either. My injury put yoga on the top of my list of urgent and important when I realized that regaining strength, mobility and just comfort wasn’t going to just happen naturally. I became an avid practitioner of hot yoga. I began to practice 4-6 times a week. The practice for the body is astounding: you must blend a mental transcendence of acute muscular discomfort caused by sustained postures with creating breath and safe space in your mind. In lifting and other activities I often push through discomfort, but never tried to find stillness in it. It literally teaches the mind and body to meditate and regulate in fight or flight. Yoga became my sanctuary. This drew my attention to the history, philosophy and idea systems behind the ancient art of yoga. The Chakras- a system of delineation of the human energy centers- are one of the most integral systems in yoga. This system alone is a transformative way of thinking to the Western mind. We think and treat the body separately from the emotions, the mind and the spirit or soul. The human organism is far more connected than Western medicine can address. The chakras connect realities in the body to realities in the emotional and psychological world and vice versa in a way that is difficult to honestly ignore. This drawing series is a deep personal exploration of ideas that have and are changing my life for the better- giving me greater holistic well-being. I hope that on creating these others can resonate in that discovery and share in it themselves.

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Excellent resources for Yoga and Chakra reading:

-“Yoga and the Quest for the True Self,” Stephen Cope

“Wheels of Life,” and all other works by Anodea Judith, PhD

“The Four Agreements,” Don Miguel Ruiz

“The Universe in a Single Atom,” His Holiness The Dalai Lama

The Root Chakra

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Muladhara

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मूलाधार

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When we “ground” lightning, we take a massive potentially very destructive force and effectively diffuse it by planting it into the ground. This Chakra is such a crucial one- especially for trauma survivors. The Western Hemisphere values the higher chakras- we love largely in our minds, and our analytical minds at that. We are largely out of touch with our emotional, physical and spiritual bodies. Often in living in the head, we can be overcome by intense feelings that we can’t even place or understand.

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Why is it that if you’re upset- a hug, a kiss from a dog or person, a cup of tea, a blanket… can bring you back. It feels like returning home from wherever the feeling took you. That is the function of the root chakra. Grounding. Rooting. The seat of this chakra is at the tailbone. Rooting is associated with the physical cleansing of the body and with the longing for spiritual awakening and freedom. This is such a great beauty of the chakras- physiological functions as natural as cleansing the body of waste and impurities is seen as as natural, necessary and sacred as it’s spiritual and emotional equivalent. It is even seen as intertwined and correlated. A physiological problem associated with this area or function could be caused by an emotional or physiological misalignment or vice versa. It doesn’t seem a stretch at all to imagine a correlation between a buildup of physiological and internal toxicity to be correlated.

The Sacral Chakra

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Svadhisthana

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स्वाधिष्ठान

The womb, sacrum and genitals are the seat of the second chakra- Svadhisthana. This chakra is water- apt parallel for the womb. The root chakra is earth, making solid, planting… the sacral is water and feeling, making fluid, flowing. This is the source of love, pleasure, and reproduction. In yogic philosophy this chakra is considered a kind of portal to Kundalini- or a state of higher spiritual sensitivity and awareness when open- as I understand it. It is believed that an open, healthy sacral chakra not only allows for a healthier relationship to love, pleasure and reproduction, but it is thought that a blocked sacral chakra can manifest as anxiety in the cardiac or diaphragmatic areas. We must accept ourselves as the emotional, flowing creatures we are to function at our highest, or indeed even be healthy. We cannot live in conflict with our emotional selves and even be our most physically healthy. This is such a beautiful connection to me- water is the medium of womb- the canvas of creation. Water is also the most instructive metaphor for our emotion, our passion and our ability to connect to others. We aren’t one thing, one function or one task- but many. We root ourselves solidly in the physical world and find stability, strength and peace; we flow and pour in our emotional and sexual world and find wonder, passion and joy. We do both; we are both. Simply human and sacred simultaneously.

The Solar Plexus Chakra

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Manipura

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मणिपूर

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The solar plexus is a personally fascinating energy center to me. I have had a strained relationship with my will- which is seated energetically in the solar plexus- at times in my past. Women are culturally programmed to be nice more than understand their own boundaries oftentimes. This can lead to a lack of a sense of power, self-efficacy and a repressed relationship to the cleansing force of anger. Anger is meant to be the emotional equivalent of pain; if we cannot hear it, we may remain in destructive situations. My journey to healing my relationship to my solar plexus has left me feeling as I see this image: the figure is an homage to “Shiva: Lord of the Dance,” who embodies vigor with serenity, energy with balance. Fire is the associated element of the Solar plexus, so our Lord Shiva manages his dance in perfect harmony with his fire.