What’s a Chakra? Part 1

Marla Hoover writes a concise, information-packed article explaining the 7 energy centers in the body called Chakras. Chakra is a Sanskrit word that translates into wheel or disk and refers to the psychic energy centers in the body that supply the energy for the body to function. Did you know that the energy for the chakras comes from sunlight?

What’s a Chakra?

Marla Hoover – PVNN

Chakra is a Sanskrit word that translates into wheel or disk. However a chakra is also thought of as a concept referring to wheel like vortices. Much of the original information on Chakras comes from the “Upanishads”, Hindu scriptures that constitute the core teachings of the Vendanta, Hindu philosophy, which are difficult to date because they were believed to have been passed down orally for approximately a thousand years before being written down for the first time between 1200-900 B.C.E.

Judith Anodea, author of “Wheels of Life: A User’s Guide to the Chakra System” makes this definition: “A chakra is believed to be a center of activity that receives, assimilates, and expresses life force energy. The word chakra literally translates as wheel or disk and refers to a spinning sphere of bioenergetic activity emanating from the major nerve ganglia branching forward from the spinal column. Generally, six of these wheels are described, stacked in a column of energy that spans from the base of the spine to the middle of the forehead. And the seventh which is beyond the physical region. It is the six major chakras that correlate with basic states of consciousness…”

Chakras are part of the “subtle” body and not the physical body, meaning they cannot be seen as they are energetic fields. They are more like aspects of our consciousness in the same way that auras are, but are more dense that auras but less dense than our physical body. The seven main chakras are aligned along the spinal column from the base to the top of the head. They are said to be connected to every organ, gland and body system. This is because they interact with the physical body through two major vehicles, the endocrine system and the nervous system. Each is associated with one of the seven endocrine glands and with a group of nerves called a plexus.

The seven chakras are thought to vitalize the physical body and to be linked with interactions of a physical, emotional and mental nature. They are considered to be the pathway of life energy or prana also called shaki or qi, which is thought to flow among them along other pathways called nadis. The function of the chakras is to spin and draw in this energy to keep the spiritual, mental emotional (subtle) as well as the physical health of the body in balance.

This energy is said to come from sunlight which consists of many different forms of electromagnetic waves and light rays, both visible and invisible. As we know light rays can be broken down into the visible spectrum by a prism giving us the seven different beams of color. Thus, light consists of the seven color energies: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. Color and light are inseparable. Each color of the visible light rays has a different wavelength and vibrational frequency, which affects us differently. Red has the longest wavelength and the slowest vibrational frequency, which we innately recognize as warm and stimulating. Whereas, violet has the shortest wavelength and the fastest frequency that we recognize as a cool and calming energy. We receive light and color information through our eyes, which then stimulates the retina and its cells, rods and cones. These impulses, which travel through the optic nerve to the visual cortex of the brain via the pituitary, trigger other glands and their hormone secretion to various parts of the body. Many body functions are stimulated or retarded by light and the different colors of light and thus affect our chakra system.

This becomes even more interesting when we realize that as humans we exist within the 49th Octave of Vibration of the electromagnetic light spectrum. Below this range are barely visible radiant heat, then invisible infrared, television and radio waves, sound and brain waves; above it is barely visible ultraviolet, then the invisible frequencies of chemicals and perfumes, followed by x-rays, gamma rays, radium rays and unknown cosmic rays. Cool huh?

Continue to Part 2

Source: http://www.banderasnews.com/0906/hb-chakra.htm

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Tags: aura, chakra, energy, hindu, light, prana, qi, vedanta, vibration, yoga