Posts In: Chakra Meditation

by Monique Minahan

I invite my body into some gentle asana next to a dwindling fire. Only after movement do I find the stillness necessary to enter the city of jewels, manipura chakra; mani meaning jewel and pura meaning city. Now focused, I contemplate the literal flames before me then look to my internal place of fire, manipura chakra.

While its frontal location is at the navel, the chakra itself is said to reside at the level of the spine. I guide my attention horizontally there, to the inner wall of the spinal column and whisper the beeja mantra ram until it settles in my bones like the hum of my breath.

I let my inner vision focus around the space of my solar plexus, literally a complex of nerves in the abdomen that delivers the intuitive “gut feeling” or sinking sensation in the pit of our stomach. The fact that there are no bones in front of the solar plexus seems fitting as this chakra embodies willpower and action; an ability to hold one’s self up. It is the center of heat and strength physically and energetically. The Japanese refer to this area of the body as the hara, or “sea of energy.”

Discerning what’s at the heart of this chakra for me requires patience. Below this chakra is the energy that creates me as an individual. Swadhisthana chakra: my ego, self-esteem, my individuality. Above manipura lies anahata chakra, the energy to channel my unique offering to the world. But here is where those two energies meet. Here is where I find empowerment, authenticity and responsibility. Here is where I transition my individuality to universality. Here is where I struggle with holding on and letting go.

I choose the unifying pranayama of breath retention for this chakra; one that balances both prana-vayu (upward and inward energy) and apana-vayu (downward and outward energy).

I visualize the two forces traveling to the navel simultaneously on the inhale. Only when I feel that they have arrived at the same time do I then perform a gentle breath retention before the exhale. I repeat this for a few minutes before letting my breath return to normal.

When I open my eyes, the fire has dwindled to hot embers. I acknowledge the times in my life when I’ve barely had an ember of light to guide me through the darkness. And I acknowledge the times when a full flame has burned through limitations and freed me to be more authentic, empowered and alive.

I bow my head to that.

Part 4 of a 7 part series. You can find part 3 here: Swadhisthana, The Sacrum.

Monique Minahan
Contributing Writer

Mo is a writer and yoga teacher who believes in peace over happiness and love over fear. She likes to set her sights high and then take small steps to get there. You’ll find her walking the dirt path behind her house with her little fluffy dog, practicing walking her talk by keeping her head high and her heart open. Contact: moniqueminahan.com

by Monique Minahan

The womb. Love is made here. Life is made here.

Swadhisthana is the seat of our right to feel and represents the duality (and sometimes dueling nature) of separation versus attachment, two concepts I became intimately familiar with while carrying and birthing my son.

A chakra often characterized for its sexuality, I find its watery dimensions to be layered with both humanity and divinity. Growing up in a society that exploits sex and a religion that denied it, I observed it too often reduced to one or the other. The sexual energy this chakra represents spans desire, sensation, pleasure, need and emotion. Much like water changes form to become ice or snow, this chakra’s energy can shrink or expand commensurate to our awareness of it.

As the life inside me grew from hiranyagarbha, the universal womb where all is in its potential state, into my baby, I began to tune in to this chakra on a physical level like never before. The process of creating and carrying life plunged me down into my fears, opened up new depths of emotion, and baptized me more fully into my humanity. It didn’t wash away the ugly or the shameful or the unacceptable – but they were revealed to me without the lens of judgement. I could feel it all, be it all, allow it all.

The space of the womb expands greatly in weight and size during pregnancy. Once baby is born the energetic space is still expansive, but the weight is gone. For weeks I stacked heavy blankets on top of my pelvis to physically weight down swadisthana chakra. The sudden weightlessness felt ungrounding to me, as if the watery energy was struggling to find its boundaries after the enormous experience of childbirth.

I choose a simple mantra for my practice today, the beeja mantra vam.

Pressing on the chakra’s front-body location with one finger, the pubic symphysis, and with another on its back-body mirror image, at the level of the sacrum, I recall that during labor the downward pressure in this space was enormous, an oceanic surge of power I didn’t know I possessed. I release the memory but keep the feeling of intensity in my body as I repeat the mantra.

I free my hands but not my attention. Emotions, memories and judgments surface and I practice allowing them instead of trying to repress them. Some days my mind is as wild as the ocean and all I can do is cling to the anchor of the breath while it swirls me around and around. Today my thoughts feel peacefully contained, like a river flowing downstream content within its banks.

As I end my meditation I return to hiranyagarbha. Some call it god, others universal consciousness. While I cannot grasp its mystery, I can understand it on a level that does not require words. Just presence.

Part 3 of a 7 part series. You can find part 2 here: Mooladhara, The Root.

Monique Minahan
Contributing Writer

Mo is a writer and yoga teacher who believes in peace over happiness and love over fear. She likes to set her sights high and then take small steps to get there. You’ll find her walking the dirt path behind her house with her little fluffy dog, practicing walking her talk by keeping her head high and her heart open. Contact: moniqueminahan.com

by Monique Minahan

I start with ajna, the third eye chakra. It might seem like any chakra practice should proceed from bottom-up, but working with the lower chakras can dig up some dirt… so to speak. Connecting with ajna first helps me step back and observe the meditation process as it unfolds.

“Ommmmm,” I chant it slowly, visualizing the sound vibrating at the center of my eyebrows, waiting until it fades completely to begin the next one.

Each chakra has what’s called a beeja mantra or ‘seed sound.’ Om is the seed sound for ajna chakra.

This practice is settling and slow. Questions about my vision begin to float to the surface. Literally my vision (I started wearing glasses at 7 years old); metaphorically my vision (where do I see myself in five years); and spiritually my vision (who do I think I am and who am I really?)

Instead of reaching for the answers with my mind… I just sit with the questions, letting the om soothe my need to know, my need to define myself.

Each chakra has a color associated with it. Ajna is a two-petalled silver-grey lotus flower. I imagine silver beginning as a small dot of color in my belly and watch as it expands through organs and limbs until my whole body is filled with silver, until I am radiating silver. Until the sound of om and my silver being fill all my senses.

The oms naturally begin to wane. The silver color dims and fades completely.

The silence that follows is so crisp, so clear. As if I can hear the everything in the nothingness.

I blink my eyes open slowly, pausing as I take in my surroundings with my actual eyes, grateful for the ability to see where I’ve been, where I am now, and to discern my next step clearly.

This is the first of a 7-part series on the chakras. Check back soon for the next installment!

Monique Minahan
Contributing Writer

Mo is a writer and yoga teacher who believes in peace over happiness and love over fear. She likes to set her sights high and then take small steps to get there. You’ll find her walking the dirt path behind her house with her little fluffy dog, practicing walking her talk by keeping her head high and her heart open. Contact: moniqueminahan.com