Flavie Fournial Causse
Coach and yoga teacher, for over 10 years.
In search of inspiring methods and approaches from coaching, personal growth, yoga philosophy, Reiki, neuroscience, NLP, EFT… with one goal in mind, to bring more consciousness and balance into everyone’s daily life, making it exceptional. “Well, in one’s body, in one’s mind, and with others is my motto”.
The literature around the chakras has been a revelation for me, the common thread, and the crossroads between all my learnings.
Today, I share a bit of this fascinating world of chakras through my classes and retreats, making it tangible through simple exercises and experiments that bridge the gap between a world of matter and the world of subtler and more spiritual energies. Often overlooked, delving into the chakras means delving into self-discovery and self-awareness, into something greater than oneself, into the connection between the body, mind, and universe to live in harmony in the world.
We are spiritual beings experiencing human life.
In our world of distractions, noise, and disorder, it’s difficult to be attentive to what’s happening within us, it’s difficult to let go of bodily desires, material desires, performance.
Our second energy center, the Sacral chakra, named after the vertebrae that house it, allows us to enter alignment. Svadhisthana in Sanskrit means “Residence of the Self,” where you access one’s personality, individuality, through internal sensation.
In this chakra of the DEEP BEING, we feel our center rising from our roots. (cf. previous article “Stay grounded in all circumstances”)
Alignment and polarities
In this chakra we move from the singularity of the body to duality: from the self and the other, the body and the mind, the inner and the outer, stretching and contraction, etc.
In yoga, we work with these polarities that allow the flow of energy between the earth and the sky. We contract and stretch our muscles, ground our feet into the earth and extend our head toward the sky, strengthen and release, simultaneously and from our center…
In this second chakra, we align ourselves, whether in our body, in our mind, with others, in our attitudes and intentions. Everything converges.
Its energy manifests through creativity, shaping thoughts. It creates a bridge between our primitive “being” and the “raw” expression of our ego.
It is through this chakra that we flourish when our desires find the opportunity to express themselves.
The Japanese call this center the “Hara”, our “personal power.”
Sensations, feelings, and emotions
Desires, needs, and wants emerge from this chakra and we experience it through pleasant or unpleasant sensations.
Our limbic system, responsible for affective behaviors and well-being,
processes our experiences and seeks to increase pleasure and decrease pain.
When we experience suffering, the limbic system warns us at a conscious level so that we give it importance. In the case of chronic pain, consciousness stifles the sensation to allow us to function, but this comes at the expense of blockages that develop and contract energy until more serious illnesses develop.
In the practice of yoga, this translates into the search for the subtle boundary between the pleasure felt during a stretch, which if it becomes too intense can become harmful to the physical body.
Sensations and feelings contribute to emotions, another aspect of the second chakra. Emotions are the expression of an accumulation of sensations, they tell us how we interpret, judge the external world, resonating with our fears, desires, anxieties, expectations, etc. Our emotions thus tell us about ourselves.
To develop flexibility in the body and in life, we must be willing to experience our emotions, whether pleasant or unpleasant, old or recent.
Its element, Water, symbolizes the movement and flow of our emotions and thoughts. Repressing them blocks energy and limits their movement in the body. Conversely, movement releases energy and emotional blockages.
While this chakra is associated with the world of emotions, it remains physical. It is the raw expression of our spontaneity, our “wild child.”
Power of sexual energy and creative impulse
In this chakra resides sexual energy, a force that can be generative or destructive.
This chakra has an energy that drives us towards relationship with others and with life. It is the instinctive need to develop a particular personality to connect with others
Our impulses and appetites may be tainted by old beliefs, linked to our upbringing where pleasure comes after obligations.
Letting go is part of the teachings of this chakra. It helps us to accept and appreciate through our perceptions what is given to us and the impermanence of things.
3 exercises to experience this chakra:
1/ Start in the body with a belly breathing exercise
Lie down on your back or sit up. Close your eyes. Place your palms lightly on your belly, a few centimeters below the navel.
Breathe slowly. Feel the belly inflate and round. Exhale slowly and feel the belly start to flatten.
Focus on your sacral chakra and visualize its bright red-orange energy flowing from this center, warming your body, mind, and spirit.
Make your inhalations and exhalations long, slow, and deep while focusing on your second chakra. Continue for 1 to 3 minutes. Keep in mind the following thought: “I am alive and joyful.”
This very simple exercise improves awareness of the flow of energy inside and around the body, releases tension and anxiety.
2/ Continue with the energy of water
Use your daily shower as a meditative ritual: visualize the water cleansing your negative thoughts, worries, blockages, pains… Imagine them flowing down your body and then disappearing. Then imagine all the positive things you want in your life and visualize them flowing over your head and absorbing them through every pore of your skin.
3/ Finish by connecting with your emotions by becoming aware of your thoughts
What do your emotions say about you?
As soon as you feel an emotion, positive or negative, anger for example, ask yourself what does it touch in you? What need, what value, what belief?
When you are emotionally reactive to a situation, observe the part of assumption and the part of reality. What are the facts?
Look the situation in the face and be honest with the information (thoughts) that you are going to generate. The boundary between sensations, judgments, emotions is blurry for most of us, put discernment into your thoughts and then act.
We are not our thoughts! Let’s observe them! Live fully aware, knowing that our ego, or mind, amplifies our worries, regrets, self-judgment, anxiety. Thoughts create an illusion of reality.
Lower the volume of your incessant mental chatter, the only real time is here and now.
Namaste