Posts In: chakras

guest post by Hannah Faulkner

this article originally published on Half Moon Yoga and Art Blog

Fangs, scales, or tentacles?

Have you fashioned a monster?

From snake-like, dragon-like, bird-like, or octopus-like, humankind has been creating monsters across cultures and time. Ironically, a fear of certain creatures and the unknown is shared on all continents. On the other hand, one of the important characteristics of historical heroes across cultures is being fearless in the face of big and often lethal enemies. This story and message has been told time after time throughout the human experience.

So, why do we still all use our imaginations to provoke fear?

When we imagine or see strange creatures, we often associate them with something that is large, ugly, and frightening. This triggers an unpleasant emotion, anxiety, caused by the belief that someone or something is dangerous and likely to cause pain to ourselves or someone dear to us.

Accelerate breathing rate, sweating, and alertness are physiological changes in the body that show fear is activated. This reaction is an inborn response for coping with danger. This primitive mechanism can help people to survive by either running away or fighting the threat.

In the exhibit, Footsteps Through Time: Four Million Years of Human Evolution, we can identify tools, artifacts, body parts, habitats, ideas, and other touchable replicas of early humans, primates, and futuristic cyborgs (part human, part machine). Stepping through this display, we piece together some of their story. From the tool shed, we see an assortment of tools they used to fight their threats. These battles can result in either dinner, a peaceful night’s sleep, or both. Because early humans that were quick to fear dangerous situations were more likely to survive and reproduce, caution is theorized to be a genetic effect.

From an evolutionary perspective, according to Human Brain Evolution and the Neuroevolutionary Time-Depth Principle by Bracha in 2006, different fears may be different adaptations that have been useful in our evolutionary past, developing during different time periods. For example, a fear of heights, may be common to all mammals and developed during the dinosaur or reptile era. Other fears, such as fear of snakes, may be common to all monkeys and apes developed during the mammals and birds era. Additional fears, such as fear of mice and insects, may be unique to humans and developed during the early human paleolithic and neolithic time periods (when mice and insects become important carriers of infectious diseases and harmful for crops and stored foods).

As a result, humankind shares a fear of the unknown. 

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Fear may be politically and culturally manipulated to persuade the citizenry of ideas which would otherwise be widely rejected. For example, sometimes customs and beliefs bring more separation amongst the human race. Only a century ago, “anthropologists at the Museum of Man and the Smithsonian Institution worked together to collect plaster life casts of different racial types. These casts were displayed in San Diego at the 1915 Panama-California Exposition as part of an exhibition about the “progress of man” that presented European Americans as racially superior. (Museum of Man website)”

Previous scholars tried to conclude judgements of species and intelligence levels between people with different colors of skin. However, science has now discovered that over of thousands of years, our DNA has adjusted our skin color to relate to the amount of sun/vitamin D that our bodies should receive at a time. People whose ancestors come from the North need less sun each day, so they could stay warm in shelters, while people from more equatorial regions would stay outside all day and therefore not be oversaturated with vitamin D. The skin pigments adjusted accordingly.

In the exhibit, Race: Are We So Different?, artists like Kate Clark strive to connect the dots between the museum’s archive of face molds to the reality of living and breathing people today. She created a series of face molds from museum visitors to break down the stereotypes from these older social constructs. Today, so many different races have blended and moved around that the results are remarkably more united.

Did you know that we share a connection with all living beings?

According to DNA, we are 50% related to bananas,
98.4 % with chimpanzees, and
99.9% similar to the person next to you
as well as all people in this world now.

It has been theorized that the formation of communities happened because people lived in fear. The result of this fear forced people to unite to fight dangers together rather than fight alone.

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Archaeological discoveries of masks, bowls, and figurines highlight the creativity and beliefs of the ancient Maya. Two plates show figures seated in sukhasana pose. For millennia, people all over the world have been sitting on the ground in cross-legged positions.

Despite its name, sukhasana meaning “easy sitting pose” it doesn’t always feel easy for a lot of people, especially in today’s culture with the convenience of chairs. Using our core strength, we make many small adjustments to distribute our weight evenly over our sitting bones, balance our shoulders directly over our hips, and align our head directly with our spine.

A well-aligned Sukhasana produces the conditions for a relaxed, yet alert, state in both the body and mind. Therefore, sukhasana has the power to draw us deep inside, leading us toward a meditative state and revealing the immense joy present within our hearts.

The word sukha can also mean “happy” or “joyful.”
This name is a reminder of the innate joy that is within all of us.  

Is it surprising then that the opposite of fear is calm, assurance, love, courage, heroism, confidence, faith, happiness, and joy?

We have the power to overcome frightful social constructs through connection with our mind and body, we can breathe through fear! In yoga practice we call these breathing techniques pranayama.

Yogic philosophy is a guide and reference point along the journey made by those who have walked it before us. Thousands of years ago, Patanjali created the 8 Limbed Path as a guide towards true yoga and peace. He suggested the practice of asanas (postures) and pranayama as preparation for Samadhi, the very last limb, which means “to bring together, to merge.” Samadhi refers to union. There is an ending to the separation that is created by the “I” and “mine” of our illusory perceptions of reality. During samadhi, we realize what it is to be an identity without differences, and how a liberated soul can enjoy pure awareness of this pure identity.

In the state of samadhi the body and senses are at rest yet the mind and reason are alert, as if awake. There is only the experience of consciousness and unutterable joy. Samadhi, is the ultimate goal of our spiritual journey on earth. Perhaps enlightenment is not your conscious goal right now, but samadhi is the highest state of consciousness that a human can reach in life.

There is no longer any individuality of our experiences: gender, personal history, family and cultural values, education, etc. In samadhi, that filter is removed to make room for being intensely present without a point of view. In samadhi you perceive all points of view of reality at once, without focusing on any particular one. This concept of samadhi brings with it the possibility of a deep hope about our growth as human beings.

Samadhi can be experienced through our purple Crown Chakra, the energy source, resting on the top of our head. This crown represents the invisible dwelling of God consciousness, our divine nature, this connection to our God Self, from which we came and also are destined to return.

We may have glimpses of this state, but it’s very rare to live entirely in this state. Some people have this experience during prayer or meditation, others during physically bonding, and still others while alone in the woods. Samadhi is awareness of the oneness of the Universe blended with connectedness, forgiveness, joy and love. We need the journey of yoga to help us discover what was present inside us all along.

Be still.
Can you find this connection and oneness within yourself and all living beings?

Join us for Yoga under the Rotunda at the Museum of Man as we explore the story of humanity and reach towards samadhi.

Saturday, November 12th, 8:30-9:30am

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Hannah Faulkner
Guest Writer

Hannah Faulkner draws inspiration from her surroundings and seeks to find relationships between the ordinary and extraordinary daily life through her writing. With 4 years of experience as a flight attendant, and many more travels preceding, Hannah’s curiosity and adventurous spirit have soaked in elements from worldwide cultures while growing in her spirituality. As a yoga and visual arts teacher, she combines her passions to create beauty in a variety of ways through her inspiring stories, bridging connections with deeper yoga philosophy and wellness concepts at HalfMoonYogaandArt.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 sit on the Earth herself and hold a smooth rock in the palm of each hand. I dug them up when we moved into our house and I use them when I need extra grounding, like today.

Mooladhara chakra is rooted in survival and threatened by fear. It’s located at the literal “root” of our bodies; the Sanskrit word moola meaning “root” or “foundation.” Its location differs for men and women. For me, I visualize it deep in the cervix. 

“Lammmmmmm. Lammmmmm.”

I start with the beeja mantra Lam because sound has always calmed and focused me on a deep level very quickly. The mantra lets me start low. From there I travel within. Deeper than I want to go. 

I allow my thoughts to keep running, and for the moment I descend into the breath. It changes from a natural breath to ujjayi pranayam, and I focus on it like my life depends on it. Because in so many ways it does. 

Once I feel grounded here, the rocks heavy in my hands and my breath steady and full, I feel safe to explore. 

Now I can dance with fear. Now I can speak with fear directly. Now I can feel my fear without being swept away. I’ve been running from her ever since she showed her face during a recent illness.

Sitting with my fear is uncomfortable. It is sticky. It is all mud and no lotus. I want to run but I stay put. I stay present. I keep breathing, I keep observing, I keep listening.

Eventually I open my eyes for nasikagra drishti, nose-tip gazing. This is one of the traditional meditations for mooladhara and inviting my attention to hover just above the skin anchors my vision, which helps steady my mind.

Before emerging, I come back into my breath.

I visualize each successive exhale traveling down through the root of my body, into the ground beneath me, winding its way through layers of earth and liquid until it reaches the intensely hot inner core of our planet.

Then I imagine my inhale drawing all that earth energy back up, through layers of earth and liquid, up through the ground beneath me and into my root chakra.

Nothing outside me has changed, but something inside has shifted. Like the rocks I dug from the earth, I sense my fear has been unearthed, acknowledged and respected. In the pause before I move, I savor this moment of feeling both connected and free, grounded and lightened, human and being.

Part 2 of a 7 part series. You can find Part 1 here: Ajna, The Third Eye.

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

by Monique Minahan

We all wear our stories in some way or another, don’t we? They make us who we are (and sometimes keep us from becoming who we can be if we let them define us too narrowly.)

I started making what I call “Life Malas” because each marker is placed for a life event. I used yellow jade for manipura chakra (solar plexus), green jade for anahata chakra (heart), green ruby zoisite for sahasrara chakra (crown), and a spiral shell I found on the beach because it feels like home.

I made this one for me, so I placed the green jade marker beads at the times when my life and heart were busted open. Marker 1 is at 25, the age I was when Nathan died. Marker 2 is at 37, when my baby was born. Marker 3 is at 98, the age of my great-grandmother, born in 1917, who is breathing her last breaths this year.

Stringing the beads under the darkness of a new moon, it occurred to me that at one of these beads I will pass away myself (and that this life is not a dress rehearsal, so I’ve got to live it right the first time.)

There are 108 beads in a mala, and if I get to see bead 98 like my grandma, I’ll count myself very lucky. I’ll still count myself lucky to see 39 this month.

I made this mala necklace to remind me that both loss and life are part of the same cycle. They coexist beautifully if I let them, and if I practice embracing both rather than inviting one and rejecting the other, I get to experience the full depth of being human instead of just skimming the surface.

My life mala is an outward representation of the integrity, cohesiveness and beauty that emerges when I allow every experience to support the next one. Broken or fragmented as they appear at times, when I view them all together they form this fragile but beautiful thing called life.

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. 

Read more from Monique on her blog, mindfulmo.com

 

by Olivia Cecchettini

“The Anatomy of the Spirit: The Seven Stages of Power and Healing”

by Carolyn Myss

Summary: Caroline Myss is an acclaimed medical intuitive and motivational speaker. In this book she presents her findings on fifteen years of research into energy medicine as a pathway to spontaneous physical, emotional and spiritual healing. In her discussion of the relation of spirituality to energy medicine, she states: “As spiritual adults we accept responsibility for co-creating our lives and our health.”

Anatomy of the Spirit offers a unique model in which she combines the ancient wisdom of three spiritual traditions – the Hindu Chakras, the Christian sacraments, and the Kabbalah’s Tree of Life, to demonstrate the seven stages of development towards higher consciousness and spiritual maturity. With this model, Dr. Myss shows how you can develop and deepen your intuition, as well as cultivate your own personal power and spiritual growth.

Why I Love It: I love this book because it taught me so much. I strongly believe in the mind, body, spirit connection. In my eyes, we are made up of energy and are all sensitive to it. Our mental, physical, emotional and spiritual health is all inter-connected. To stay in harmony and balance we need to look at all four aspects of health equally. This means seeking connection through self-inquiry, which is the goal of Yoga – union, harmony, balance.

Keep an open mind and an open heart when reading this book. It’s filled with interesting facts and information that may be unfamiliar to you, see what you connect with the most and leave the rest behind. Personally, this book taught me how to slow down to connect to myself, others, and all the energy that is abundantly surrounding me all the time. Take your time reading and let it digest.

Recommended For:  I recommend this book for anyone wanting to discover or go deeper into learning about their own energy. Caroline states that everything pulsates with energy and this energy contains information. If you have been feeling more sensitive to energy lately or maybe just curious about energy work in general, this book may be just the thing. It will let you know you’re not alone, expand your knowledge and also give you tools to grow and protect yourself. I hope you enjoy it!

“This book is both an important revelation and a major call to awakening.” – Christiane Northrup

Lots of love this holiday season!
Ciao, Olivia

Olivia Cecchettini
Contributing Writer

Olivia is a yoga teacher based out of San Diego. With a love for people, life, spirituality, reading, and, of course, yoga she spends her days connecting with students and nature. Getting outside whenever she can to enjoy all the beauty this life has to offer.

Yoga One Family Member, Frank Richardson, has been sharing his practice with our community since October of 2011. We love his positive energy, easy smile and kindness. He writes about how his yoga practice has supported him while traveling in Italy.

For me, Yoga is closely linked with meditation. One has more movement than the other, though both come from the physical mechanics underlying the act of breathing.

Being still in meditation causes us to open up from the rhythm and flow of breath, the expansion and contraction of the diaphragm and lungs starting at the root and progressing up through all the chakras, pausing at the crown, then flowing down again.

Focusing on this flow and letting thoughts go without locking on to them allows us to be aware of the continuing presence underlying the static paths of thoughts.

Yoga builds on this breathing practice by extending the movements created by breathing into practiced cycles that bring the flow throughout the body. Yoga brings Prana, or breath, wherever there is constriction or “stuck-ness” or even pain.

Flow, I am coming to realize, is essential to joy. Yoga opens my body and mind to being joyful by connecting to the flow of life that is happening from moment to moment.

The yoga I am doing now while traveling is not formal. There are no classes defining “practice.” I watch my breathing and my quality of alertness or presence.

How I am standing or sitting? Am I leading with my heart? Is my head up or am I looking down? What’s the level of anxiety I am experiencing right now? Can I breathe through it to get to the other side?

I most likely won’t be able to practice either yoga or meditation formally again until I get home; but the moment to moment check-ins keep me in balance and moving with the flow while traveling through this wonderful and sometimes daunting place called Italy.

Don’t get your yoga pants in a bunch!

It doesn’t matter where you practice, east coast or west, we all know that people who practice yoga are happier and healthier (and dare we say it?) cooler than the general population. Namaste, yo!