Chakras and Yoga – A Beginners Guide To Your Energy System

The effects of a chakra-based practice can have a tangible, empowering ripple effect on your life.

(Join us in our Restorative Yoga and Chakra Meditation Workshops to learn how to get in touch with your energy system and how to activate and balance your chakras for a better, more satisfying life)

According to yoga tradition, the subtle body is a part of you that you can’t see or touch—it’s where your energy flows, which is why it’s also referred to as the energy body. There are seven key points in the subtle body that are thought to be vortexes of energy, known as chakras.
When energy becomes blocked in a chakra, it triggers physical, mental, or emotional imbalances that manifest in symptoms such as anxiety, lethargy, or poor digestion.
 A well-tuned asana practice can free up energy and stimulate an imbalanced chakra, paving the way for that wonderful internal shift for which yoga is known.
With just a little bit of coaching, you can tap into the chakras as a potent way of harnessing and shifting your energy in the direction you want it to go.
 
Here's our quick summary:

1. Root Chakra — Represents our foundation and feeling of being grounded.
Location: Base of spine in tailbone area – Color Red
The root centre governs your family ties and feelings of survival, belonging, and guardedness. Your earliest memories are stored here, including whether or not your basic needs were met. When it is blocked or out of balance, you can become needy, have low self-esteem, or have self-destructive behaviors. When this chakra is in balance, you feel strong and confident; you can stand up on your own two feet and take care of yourself.

2. Sacral Chakra — Our connection and ability to accept others and new experiences.
Location: Lower abdomen, about two inches below the navel and two inches in – Color Orange
This chakra corresponds with your reproductive and sexual organs, and represents fluidity, creativity, and fertility. You can take a literal interpretation of this, or associate this chakra with whether or not you feel deserving of a pleasurable, abundant, creative life. When it’s out of balance, you can feel emotionally unstable, guilty, or hard on yourself. When it is in balance, you feel creative, positive, and receptive to change—like the ocean and its tides, you’re in the flow.

3. Solar Plexus Chakra  — Our ability to be confident and in control of our lives.
Location: Upper abdomen in the stomach area – Color Yellow
You’ve heard the expression “firing on all cylinders.” When it is in balance, you feel alive and have the self-esteem and confidence to take action and be productive. When it’s blocked, you lack courage, have low self-esteem, and feel stagnant and inert.
By working on this chakra, you can awaken your true personal inner power and work through your fear of taking risks.

4. Heart Chakra — Our ability to love.
Location: Center of chest just above the heart – Color Green
Awaken to the power of unconditional love within you through compassion, forgiveness, and acceptance. When the heart chakra is blocked, you become possessive and codependent, and may form dysfunctional relationships. You may also stay isolated for fear of rejection. When you stimulate the heart chakra, you can heal past wounds by reopening your heart, learn to love unconditionally, and form healthy relationships.

5. Throat Chakra — Our ability to communicate.
Location: Throat – Color Blue
When it is blocked, you may feel like you can’t find your voice or your truth. You may also be overly talkative and not listen to others. When this chakra is open and stimulated, your voice moves through space to help you communicate your emotions in healthy ways. You also become better at listening to others and honoring their personal truths without judgment.

6. Third Eye Chakra — Our ability to focus on and see the big picture.
Location: Forehead between the eyes (also called the Brow Chakra) – Color Indigo
This chakra is associated with your intuition, or sixth sense, and governs how the rest of the chakras function. When this chakra is functioning well, you have insight, and you trust your inner wisdom to face life’s challenges and choices. When it’s blocked, you feel close-minded, too attached to logic, untrusting, and cynical. Working on the sixth chakra opens your mind to the bigger picture and different perspectives, and it helps you receive the wisdom that cannot be seen or heard by ordinary senses.

7. Crown Chakra — The highest chakra represents our ability to be fully connected spiritually.
Location: The very top of the head – Color violet or White
The crown chakra connects to beauty itself and the spiritual realm. It helps you to understand who you are beyond your physical self—that you are a spiritual being having a human experience. It is not located in the body but actually hovers above the crown of the head. When it’s closed, you think happiness can only come from the outside, and you suffer.
Working on this chakra helps you to feel free in any situation.

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