By Art of Living Volunteer | Updated on: June 29, 2021
This simple beginner’s guide to the chakras in the body will help you raise your energy with a FREE 7-day guided chakra meditation experience. Sign up now.
If you’ve been on the yoga and spirituality scene for a while, you’ll have come across the word “chakra”.
Perhaps someone offered to “balance your chakras” for you, or a yoga teacher might have told you that a certain yoga pose would open your solar plexus chakra, and you’ve found yourself wondering what even is a chakra, and how do you work with them?
You’re in the right place!
The purpose of this guide is to give you a deeper understanding of the seven main chakras from root chakra to crown chakra, an introduction to the energetic eco-system within which they exist, and an understanding of what makes the chakras tick.
Let’s go!
Discovering the chakra system
What is your energetic infrastructure?
Before we can really understand the chakra system, we need an understanding of the energetic infrastructure of your body, as the 7 chakras don’t exist in isolation. They’re part of a bigger system of subtle energy that exists within you.
So, first things first, you have a body.
If you think about your physical body, you’ll know that you have veins and arteries, through which blood flows, as well as nerves and organs.
According to traditional yoga, you also have a subtle body, made up of energetic pathways. These pathways are called nadis, and rather than blood, it is life-force energy called prana that flows through them. You have 172,000 nadis in your body.
So far, so good?
This is where the chakra system comes in.
How many chakras are there?
You have 109 of them. Can you guess what they are?
A chakra is a nerve center, where the nadis converge. (As a quick note on pronunciation, it’s “chak-ra” with a “ch” like “chair”, not “shak-ra” with a “sh” like “shoe”.)
You actually have 109 chakras, of which seven are particularly well-known and important (and will be covered in this guide).
You might like to think of a chakra as a convergence point.
"Chakra" literally means “wheel”, so you might even like to think of the chakras as junctions, or roundabouts, where roads converge. Due to the convergence of nadis/roads, there is a focus of energy, which we can understand as a nerve center, or a chakra.
Each chakra or nerve center is associated with particular qualities, emotions, and energy patterns.
So how does all of this work together, and why does it matter?
So, to quickly recap the chakra system, your subtle body has subtle energy pathways, called nadis. Where there is a convergence of nadis, you have a nerve center or a chakra. While there are many, 7 chakras are the most famous and important.
Through yoga and meditation, you learn how to work with these factors to create physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being. And through these practices, you can experience profound awakenings and internal transformations.
By bringing gentle, conscious attention to the energy centers, yogis (and you!) are able to raise the energy and experience awakening, joy, and lasting well-being.
Balancing your chakras (your energy flow!)
Many people speak about “balancing” the chakras. For our purposes today we are less concerned with the idea of balancing them, and more concerned with the flow of energy through them, and approaching them as part of a holistic system, rather than isolated points.
When energy is moving upward from the base to the crown, that is from bottom to top, you’ll feel good! Energy is moving in the appropriate way and you may have this feeling of “all being right with the world”!
Your chakras will feel “balanced”.
If energy is moving downward from the crown chakra to the root chakra, from top to bottom, you may feel lethargic and “unbalanced”. This is falling energy.
The upward flow of energy is associated with joy, enthusiasm, insight, and well-being, whilst the downward flow is the opposite! Lethargy, fear, a lack of enthusiasm, and a lack of clarity.
The final thing to consider when it comes to this energetic ecosystem is the direction the energy is moving in.
The 7 chakras
Now that we have an overview of the chakra system, let’s look at the 7 chakras more closely.
MULADHARA meaning basis of existence - mula = root + dhara = basis (of existence)
Element: Earth
Location: The perineum, or the base of the spine
Qualities: Enthusiasm or inertia
The first chakra we will look at is the root chakra, or muladhara. It is often described as being associated with safety, and our survival instincts.
A vibrant and happy root chakra, with the energy moving upwards, invokes feelings of enthusiasm for life. A happiness to be here. A desire to be involved in life.
When not flowing well, we experience inertia and dullness. A lack of interest in life, and no desire to be involved.
SVADHISTHANA - meaning where you are established - swa = self + adhisthana = established
Element: Water
Location: Behind the genitals, below the navel
Qualities: creativity, (pro)creation or lust
The second chakra, the sacral chakra, is associated with creativity. When energy is moving up and flowing well you will experience creativity, new ideas, brightness.
When energy is moving downwards, the sacral chakra becomes associated with lust. This doesn’t mean that sexual desire is bad, or is even a sign that the sacral chakra isn’t flowing. Creation, be it in the sense of painting a picture or in the sense of sexuality and procreation, has an expansive quality to it. Like breathing new life into something, or creating something new.
Lust, on the other hand, has a tightening, obsessive quality. It doesn’t create anything new and very often strangles life and creation. When you’re feeling lustful you’re not feeling creative. Rather you’re obsessed with someone or something!
Sexuality is a sensitive topic for many, and one that can bring up a lot of shame. We’re not suggesting that a healthy sacral chakra means that you have no sexual desire, but rather that flowing energy here has an expansive, creative, and joyful quality, rather than a contracting, tight, and shameful feeling.
MANIPURA CHAKRA - meaning “city of jewels” - mani = jewel + pura = city
Navel chakra
Element: Fire
Location: The navel region
Qualities: Joy, generosity, jealousy, greed
The third chakra, the navel chakra, is associated with the sun, with fire, with vibrancy and generosity. This quality of the sun, or fire, can also be very transformational, with some schools of yoga seeing this center as the internal fire of transformation.
When energy is moving up through the third chakra you will feel joyful and generous. A feeling of shining, or exuding. A feeling of radiating and expanding out into the world.
Conversely, when energy is moving downwards, you’ll feel the opposite. Rather than moving out, you will feel yourself moving in, a contraction resulting in feelings of jealousy or greed. A closed fist, rather than an open hand.
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ANAHATA CHAKRA - meaning “unstruck sound” - anahata = unstruck
Element: Air
Location: The heart space
Qualities: Love, hatred, and fear
The fourth chakra, or the heart chakra, is associated with the qualities of the heart, namely love and hatred. Fear is also connected to the heart chakra -- we can notice our chests feel tighter when we feel scared.
When energy is moving up through the heart chakra, you will feel loving. Not towards anyone or anything in particular, but simply a feeling of love and acceptance towards life and creation. Perhaps a sunset moves you to tears, or the breeze seems to be so gently caressing your skin that you feel happy to be alive.
Conversely, when energy is moving downwards, you experience the opposite, hatred and fear. This feels tight, contracted like there’s no light or love in the world. You might see the most beautiful sight or the most wonderful person and not be touched by it at all.
Where there is love there is no fear or hatred, and where there is fear or hatred there can be no love.
VISHUDDHI - meaning “complete purification”
Element: Space or ether
Location: The throat
Qualities: Gratitude or grief
Often associated with speaking or vocalizing, the throat chakra is also associated with gratitude or grief. As the energy moves up to the fifth chakra you feel a sense of gratitude, of appreciation, or perhaps even just a feeling of “Yes”.
When there is a blocked throat chakra and the energy is moving downwards, this center will be experienced as grief, as loss, as a “No”.
Have you ever been so happy, so grateful that you’re at a loss for words? Alternatively, when you get bad news, are overwhelmed with grief, and can’t speak?
This is the throat chakra in action.
AJNA CHAKRA - meaning “command” or “knowledge” - ajja = order or command and jna = knowledge
Element: Light
Location: The third eye, the space between the eyebrows
Qualities: Awareness, alertness, anger
The sixth chakra, or the third eye chakra, is commonly associated with insight and intuition. It is located very close to the pineal gland, which has long been recognized as a significant gland when it comes to insight and mystical experiences.
When energy is moving up through this center, you will experience alertness and awareness. This looks like being awake to your surroundings, be it on a physical or more subtle level.
When energy is moving downwards it creates anger. You might have experienced this, as when many people get angry they find their head hurts. According to an ancient story, when Kama Deva (the angel of desire) shot a meditating Shiva with an arrow, in the story Shiva opened his third eye and burnt Kama Deva to ashes! This ancient tale symbolizes an arrow of desire dissolving in the light of awareness.
Reboot your energy and your chakras with the FREE 7-day guided chakra meditation experience!
SAHASRARA - meaning “thousand-petaled” - sahasra = thousand
Element: none
Location: The top of the head
Qualities: Bliss
The seventh chakra, the crown chakra, is associated with bliss, awakening, and higher consciousness. It’s less of a center, and more of a gateway, being our connection or gateway to The Universe.
When one is able to bring their awareness and energy all the way up to this chakra, one experiences great bliss and spiritual freedom.
This is where it all gets a bit formless and goes beyond words into the sphere of consciousness! While the other chakras are more concrete, this one moves into a highly spiritual place, with some saying you can experience samadhi (a deep state of meditation or expanded consciousness) by moving energy up to this point.
How to work with the chakras
Now that we’ve looked at your energetic ecosystem, and the seven chakras in more detail, how do you use that in your everyday life?
We spoke a lot about the direction of energy, which might be a new idea for you. Often when speaking about the chakras people will focus on the individual chakra, rather than the whole system and the central energy pathway on which they are located.
You might like to think of the central channel as a flute, and the chakras as different shaped holes on the flute. Each shape produces a different sound, and in order for the sounds to play, the air needs to move from the base of the flute, not the other way around.
The air is the energy we spoke about earlier.
Kundalini has become such a glamorous idea that many people try to force the energy up. This is like blowing too hard into the flute, it will break!
It’s tempting to focus on the coiled energy, represented by a serpent, and want to “awaken” that, and push it up the spine as quickly as possible.
Instead, it’s important to consciously, gently bring your awareness to the energy centers without trying to force anything.
The good news is you can join the FREE “Secrets of the 7 Chakras” meditation experience! It’s a guided meditation journey with spiritual leader and meditation master, Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. Each day you’ll receive a new guided meditation, one for each of the seven chakras. Join and experience personal insights into raising and transforming your energy!
