Introduction to the chakras and the body-mind connection
I’ve come to understand that many physical health challenges are psychosomatic, meaning that what we repress emotionally can manifest physically.
As we disconnect and deny what’s true for us, we become disembodied. Essentially we shut down the flow of life force energy to that area of our lives and the connecting functions in our bodies. Said another way, the places that we hold repressed emotions have a frequency that is more susceptible to dysfunction and disease.
The body wants to bring our awareness and attention to the possibility of healing and wholeness. So if we don’t listen to the gentle calls to heal emotionally, mentally, and energetically — the body makes us pay attention.
When I begin working with new clients who are experiencing recurring health problems in one specific area of the body, or have a condition/diagnosis that traditional medicine describes as unusual and unexplainable — I like to ask this question: What happened around the time you started experiencing these symptoms or received this diagnosis? Was there a significant loss or shift in your life?
Often there's a very clear emotional wound connected to what's happening physically.
I first started to learn to ask these kind of deeper questions when I was embarking on my own healing journey in which I realized that my suppressed sexual trauma was contributing to my recurring reproductive health issues. I got really clear that if I didn’t dive deep into the shadow and lovingly confront the emotional and spiritual wounds, that I would continue to have reproductive health challenges. And sure enough, as I healed emotionally, I healed myself physically.
What helped me begin to understand the body-mind connection and examine how our past stress and traumas impact our personality and physical health was the chakras.
What are the chakras?
The chakras are wheels of energy and our understanding of these energy centers originates from India and has become popularized in the West. There are seven main chakras beginning at the base of the spine extending to the crown of the head. We actually have hundreds of energy centers, but we’ll focus on the seven main chakras beginning with the root chakra and working our way up to the crown.
Each chakra is connected to a specific lesson and function in the mind, body, and spirit.
You can consider the chakras a system of self-discovery, deepened self-awareness, and self-healing. They can be a roadmap of liberation, freeing ourselves from the constraints of stories about our past; and a path of integrating our expanded consciousness to be a beneficial presence on the planet. Basically, freeing ourselves so that we can help someone else get free.
Muladhara: Root Chakra
Element: Earth
Survival + safety + basic needs + belonging
Balanced characteristics: all needs met, present, grounded, comfortable in your body, stability, prosperity, peace with parents/guardians and upbringing, felt sense of belonging, connected to the earth, rooted in the strength of your ancestors
Experiences that can disrupt balance: resentment towards guardians, abandonment (physical or emotional), generational trauma around survival (slave trade, trail of tears, holocaust, japanese internment camps, forced migration, etc), colonization, imperialism, racial stress & trauma
Imbalance characteristics:
Under active: fear, anxiety, restlessness, disconnection from body, financial challenges, food or housing insecurity, scarcity mindset
Over active: hoarding, greed, sluggish, tired, lethargic, fear of change, rigid boundaries
Physical challenges: issues with legs, feet, knees, base of spine. Disorders with bowels, anus, large intestine. Eating disorders
Healing practices: grounding bare feet on the earth, farming and gardening, eat root vegetables, honor your ancestors, rest, restorative yoga
The earth can hold all of human suffering like it’s nothing. Lay on the ground. Right ear to the earth, let it all go. Left ear to the earth and listen for the message. Practice from Sonya Renee & Prentis Hemphill
Svadhisthana: Sacral Chakra
Element: Water
Emotions, sensuality, pleasure, sexuality, creativity
One of my spiritual mentors says this is the space where babies, books, and businesses are birthed
Balanced characteristics: prioritize pleasure (you allow yourself to feel good), creative, emotional intelligence, ability to flow and change, healthy boundaries and relationships
Experiences that impact balance: sexual abuse, emotional abuse, growing up in strict household that taught pleasure is sinful
Imbalance characteristics:
Under active: disconnected from passion and desire, low sex drive, sexual shame, emotionally numb
Over active: poor boundaries, violation of consent, addiction to sex. Nuance: I also sometimes see overactive sacral chakra energy for those who have a lot of unexpressed creative potential ready to burst and be shared
Physical challenges: tight hips, reproductive health issues, disorders of the spleen or urinary system, sexual dysfunction (impotence, nonorgasmic, premature ejaculation), menstrual difficulties, low back pain
Healing practices: eat an orange slowly with all of your senses, smell your favorite scent, self-pleasure, self-massage, dance and sway your hips, hip opening yoga poses and stretches, cultivate a culture of consent, honor your boundaries
Manipura: Solar Plexus
Element: Fire
Power, purpose, identity, self-worth, confidence, vitality, agency
Fire up your power center and ignite your will to change
Balanced: Fired up about the change you are contributing to, aligned with ones purpose and feeling a sense of fulfillment, empowering others, confident, and worthy of all that you desire
Experiences that disrupt balance: Marginalization and systemic oppression, white supremacy, capitalism, social privilege, power imbalance, had to grow up quickly, shame
Physical connection: core, low back, digestion, disorders of the stomach, pancreas, gallbladder, or liver
Symptoms of Imbalance
Under active: Imposter syndrome. Projecting power onto authority outside of self (guardians, government, God). Low self-confidence. Feeling unworthy of what you desire.
Overactive: Power hungry, measures ones worth by their productivity, dominance over others, addiction to grind culture. High effort coping (John Henryism, Sojourner Syndrome). Using work and achievement as a distraction from the healing that needs to be addressed.
Healing practices: step into your purpose with confidence and clarity, empower others, collaboration over competition, breath of fire, core strengthening and twisting yoga poses that support digestion, replace “but” with “and” when you speak about possibility in your life (how can you have it all?)
Anahata: Heart Chakra
Element: Air
Love, compassion, peace, service
Balanced: loving, peaceful presence, compassionate, altruistic, radical self-love, in service to the highest good of all beings
Experiences that disrupt balance: loss, grief, abandonment
Death & loss from violence — state violence, police violence, gang violence, domestic violence, imprisonment
“All violence is state violence” ~ Kat Brooks
Under active: walls around the heart, scared to let other close out of fear of being hurt (While you protect yourself from pain and loss, you rob yourself of love and connection), loneliness, isolation, lack of empathy, depression
Overactive: clinging, jealousy, codependency, overly self-sacrificing, holding tightly to love that is not healthy nor serving one another’s highest good
Physical connection: heart, lung, and breast health. Tension between shoulder blades, tight chest, shortness of breath, asthma.
Vishuddha: Throat Chakra
Element: sound
The right to speak and be heard
Balanced characteristics: Clear and confident communication, vulnerable expression, good listener, strong voice, radical honesty, living authentically
Experiences that disrupt balance: lies, verbal abuse, secrets (threats for telling), disempowering stories and narratives about your life
Under active: fear of speaking, Introversion
Overactive: Too much talking, talking over others, inability to listen, gossiping
Physical connection: Neck, shoulders, thyroid, hearing
Healing practice: speaking and living your truth, journaling, letter writing, vulnerable communication, sound healing, lions breath, ujjayi breath, chakra chanting - LAM VAM RAM YAM HAM AUM OM
Ajna: Third Eye
Element: light
Dreams, intuition, visualization, imagination, prophecy, insight
Balanced third eye: Someone with good dream recollection, ability to daydream and also manifest those in reality, imaginative, ability to see and perceive the unseen, trust in the intuition (“sixth sense” “gut instinct”), and can paint a picture in the mind’s eye
Physical connection: vision, headaches
Experiences that disrupt balance: If your intuition and psychic inclinations were denied and invalidated, that impacts the third eye. If what you saw didn’t match what you were told.
Under active: Poor dream recollection. Trouble visualizing/imagining. Disbelief in intuition and spirituality
Overactive: Dissociation. Head in the clouds. Struggles to manifest their dreams. Hallucinations. Nightmares. Over-reliance on spiritual guidance outside of self without discernment
Healing practice: with your eyes closed shift the gaze towards your third eye and notice the pressure building up, connect with & trust your intuition, visualization meditation, psychedelics, vision board, dream journal
Tips for dream recollection: Set an intention or ask a question of your subconscious mind 20 mins before bed. As soon as you wake up, journal what you remember from your dream. Your memory may be foggy at the start of this practice with just a sensation, a feeling, color, vague scene. As you continue the practice, you will be able to remember more and see patterns/themes. Do this for 28 days straight.
Sahasrara: Crown Chakra
Element: Pure consciousness (your awareness of yourself and the world around you)
The lesson of this energy center is to surrender to Spirit and honor the Divinity within. Remember your Soul Self.
Balanced: connection to Spirit, celebration of the Divinity within, transcendence, miraculous achievement, collaboration with higher purpose
Imbalance:
Overactive: obsessive thinking, overconsumption of information without integration
Underactive: view self as separate from others & spirit, confusion, lack of focus and/or clarity
Physical connection: cerebral cortex, central nervous system
Healing practices: silence, prayer, meditation, spiritual connection and community
Integration: Coming home to wholeness
What did you discover about yourself through this information? Where do you feel inspired to dive deeper? As you look at the possible connections between your emotional and physical well-being, I invite you to do so with non-judgemental curiousity. If this perspective really resonated for you, explore my offerings below for additional support.
Additional resources to support your chakra journey:
Book a 1:1 breathwork + energy healing session. In this session, I perform an energy reading to assess which of your energy centers could use a little more love and attention. I’ll guide you on a journey within using breathwork and energy healing to support you gaining clarity, releasing what’s been repressed and stored somatically, and return home to wholeness. Learn more and book a session here.
Gettin’ Free: The Journey Within. 9 week course using the chakras as a roadmap for self-discovery and self-healing. Currently being facilitated 1:1, possibly offering a self-paced and group format again in the future. Join the waitlist here.
Chakra Guidebook PDF (coming soon!). This is essentially the syllabus used in my 9 week course complete with journal prompts, recommended reading, affirmations, and yoga practices.
Chakra Video Library or view my mini chakra lessons on Instagram saved under my “chakras” highlight at the top of my page, or on TikTok
