The Seven Major Chakras

Keeping it Simple

By

Joan S. Peck

BEJEWELED PUBLISHING

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA

Preface

I relate growing up in the late 1940s and in the 1950s as a time period of little independent thought or to be more accurate a time period of following “the rules” – society’s rules, that is. It was after the war had ended and people were happy to have it over and done with, and their men back home, ready to get back to the schedules that made us all feel secure. Along with that came the return of the woman’s “duties” that were taught and touted in school books in home economic classes and sometimes reaffirmed in church classes. One of the school books we used in our Home EC class instructed us that, as wives, we had a duty to get dressed up, put on lipstick and make ourselves presentable for our husbands when they waltzed in the door after a day’s work, so that they could have the fine dinner they had earned, along with the attention and service they also deserved.

For many of us of that era, we were taught and expected to fulfill these duties and concentrate on the needs of others, whether it be our husband, children, parents, extended family members, or even acknowledged as the caretaker of the family pet, the dog’s mother! Although the intentions may have been good, much of this type of teaching and expectations left many of us confused and lost. Was this really our role in life? Were our only choices to be a wife, teacher, secretary or nurse? Why did I feel so unfulfilled?

I would periodically think back on the time in my life that as a child I had choked and couldn’t catch my breath, and thought that I was going to die. I clearly remember the bright light, bells ringing, beautiful music and bright, bright colors. I also remember the sense of peace and calm that came over me and it was almost disappointing to have my neighbor whack me repeatedly on the back until I could catch my breath. I had raked in air while trying to breathe and it had made me hoarse for several days … a constant reminder that I’d had a glimpse of something greater, something more. So what did it mean? Why did I always carry this image with me and pull it out whenever I felt low or unhappy? I was in an unhappy, abusive marriage that involved our three children. Things just didn’t make sense to me. Life was nowhere near the “… and they lived happily ever after.” So I started to seek out people to better understand life in the spiritual sense. I began to grasp that I was on my own journey, that life itself was a journey. I learned we are all one and that the most important thing in life is love. Love of all kinds, not just between a man and a woman, not just sexual love. Knowing this, however, didn’t help me much when the one love I most struggled with was love of my body and appreciation for who I was.

Women, in general, have a hard time not seeing their own beauty if it differs from what models look like. We are also taught ‘if you look good, you will feel good.’ We all know that is not necessarily so. The thing that made me want to push myself to look at all of this in a different light was when I was told, “You have a responsibility to take care of the body God gave you!” That surely did it for me. After all, I had grown up with duty and responsibility, so that statement was a very comfortable one for me and I felt, if not excited, certainly obliged to move ahead.

As I began to explore the spiritual aspects of various teachings such as Taoism, read Joseph Campbell, and many various self-help books, I came across the energy cycles of our body, Chakras. I have never been good at history, a subject I found boring when it was reduced to dates and one line occurrences. But the history of people who as early as 2,000 B.C.E. understood their bodies as differing speeds of energy fascinated me. The more I looked at the past in this way, the more it became the present or timeless to me. It all began to make sense. And I became overjoyed with what I was discovering. The more that I read about the chakras, the more I thought back on the time when I was a child and was choking. If all the chakras are in alignment, then the seventh chakra, the crown can open and connect you with your consciousness. Your basic life force is open. If that was what had happened to me, then I’d like that sense of well being again and again.

I began to read more and more about chakras until I became overwhelmed. Just too much information. I kept thinking: There has to be a way to gather all of this information in an easy format, something simple. It shouldn’t be so confusing to read about the basic understanding of the chakras, how aligning these energies can help heal the body, how crystals can aid in that and the ultimate goal of opening up your crown chakra to commune with your higher power.

So after many hours of weeding through information, I offer you, with great enthusiasm and humility, my version of the seven main wheels of life and the important aspects and effects surrounding them.

As you will learn, each of the seven chakras has its own color, and together form the colors of the rainbow. So as we begin to explore the chakras, may each one of us, both female and male, learn to recognize ourselves for what we are “jewels of the universe,” and to use that for the betterment of self and mankind.

Chapter One: Brief History of the Seven Major Chakras

The word “chakra” is derived from the Sanskrit word meaning “wheel” or “disk.” It is often described by psychics or clairvoyants as a spinning wheel of colorful light. The chakras begin at the base of the spine and finish over the top of the head. Although they are fixed in the central spinal column, they are located both in the front and the back of the body, and work through it.

Each chakra has a different color and vibrates and rotates at a different speed. The first chakra, the Root rotates at the slowest speed, and the seventh or crown, at the highest speed. The size and brightness of the wheels vary with individual development, physical condition, energy levels, disease, or stress. When balanced, the seven chakras help us maintain health, are vehicles to personal empowerment, and connect us to the divine.

Chakras are first mentioned in the Vedas, ancient Hindu scriptures. It is difficult to put a date on the Vedas because they are assumed to have been passed down orally for nearly a thousand years before they were first written down between 1200 and 900 B.C.E.

Later, in the 7th century B.C.E., the main message was that enlightenment (and even immortality) can be achieved by meditating with the awareness that your soul is at one with all creation. Newer texts also explored the concept of karma and reincarnation.

The understanding of the chakras was popularized by Sir John Woodroffe, who wrote under the pseudonym Arthur Avalon, in a book entitled The Serpent Power – The Secrets of Tantric and Shaktic Yoga, first published in 1919. This is a guide to kundalini practice (the raising of the energy that lies dormant at the Base Chakra).

The esteemed Swiss psychologist Carl Jung (1875-1961) did much to develop the Western understanding of kundalni. He presented a seminar on kundalini yoga to the Psychological Club in Zurich in 1932, which has subsequently been recognized as a highly significant moment in the appreciation of Eastern thought by the West.

There is much more to understanding the history of chakras that can be found in various books. Anodea Judith is the leading expert on chakras and her latest book, Wheels of Life is excellent, with much greater detail than presented here. Another book, The Chakra Bible by Patricia Merier is exceptionally complete in encompassing the history of chakras with their ancient names, the spiritual, emotional and health issues connected to the chakras and much, much more.

As Eastern Ideas were increasingly explored and accepted by the West, particularly through the practice of yoga, there is a greater understanding and appreciation of our life forces, in particular, the chakras. Knowledge is power, and who doesn’t like to be empowered? So let’s begin.