The Chakras Course - Lesson One: What Are They and Why Are They So Important?

These days, it's hard to go to a psychic, healer, massage therapist or even beauty therapist without being offered some kind of chakra-based therapy. You can have chakra balancing, chakra alignment, chakra clearing treatments just to name a few. So what are the chakras and what do all these treatments do for us? In this article you can read a simple clear outline of the chakras, what they are, how they work and why they need to be worked on.

Most people these days have heard of chakras, but what are they and how do they affect our daily lives? Let's start with the idea that everything is energy. Literally everything from rocks, trees, furniture and fuel to human skin, bones, even thoughts and the space around you. Everything is energy. Although all things are energy, they each resonate at different levels to create different 'things' – for example the wood in a dresser drawer resonates at a different rate to the drawer's metal handle. This is true even of thoughts – a negative thought resonates at a lower rate to a positive thought.

Chakras are energy centres. They are doorways or portals between us as individuals and the rest of the world. The chakras are where information in the form of thoughts, ideas, beliefs and emotions both come to us from the outside world, and are expressed by us out into the world. These chakras don't just gather information randomly, they are instead an organised system of doorways, each chakra focusing on a unique theme, gathering and relaying information relevant to that theme. Here is a list of the main chakras with a broad outline of what themes they each cover, where each chakra sits in relation to your physical body and the colour the chakra resonates at.

• Crown – on top of your head, purple, spiritual knowledge, intellectual information, wisdom.
• Brow (third eye) – between eyebrows on forehead, dark blue, insight, psychic vision, imagery
• Throat – at base of throat, sky blue, communication, expression and receiving information
• Heart – centre of chest, light green, love of all kinds, true resonant connection to the Divine.
• Solar Plexus – base of ribs, yellow, power, confidence, independence
• Sacral – just below navel, orange, creativity, procreativity, sexuality
• Base – perineum (between vagina or testes and anus), red, safety, security, money, family, connection to the world,
• Earth Star – about 24inches or 50cms below your feet, golden brown, connection to the earth, groundedness.

The Chakra system is a finely tuned instrument. A lot of energy comes and goes through these doorways and so over time, they get battered about. In the same way a guitar has to be tuned to remain in key, so does the chakra system. Further more, not all of the energy that comes through these doorways is gentle, some of it can be quite harsh and even traumatic (think of a big argument or seeing a terrible car accident). This energy can really impact on the chakra it comes in through, causing damage and leaving scarring that effects how that chakra performs. In the next lesson, we will look at chakra system maintenance. The different kinds of maintenance, including some self maintenance tools and methods to help get you going.