Flowing with our creative force: the Sacral Chakra

Lockdowns aren’t great for about a million-and-one reasons… but if we can’t travel externally, let’s travel internally. With so much going on in the world around us, there couldn’t be a more valuable time to nurture our inner and spiritual worlds.

Today we continue our series on the seven chakras, as we shift from first  root chakra, to the sacral chakra. Each of these energy centres hold very specific vibrations and purpose – and accordingly, working with them can bring transformation to the corresponding aspects in our lives.

From the solid earth element, we now move to liquid water element.

Let’s dive in!

What is the Sacral Chakra?

Located in the centre of the lower belly, the name for the Sacral Chakra is Svadisthana. The term comes from the Sanskrit sva, loosely translates to ‘one’s own’ while adisthana, can mean ‘home.’ The word in its entirety can also translate to ‘sweetness.’

Now that we’ve established our centre and sense of grounding with the root chakra, we move upward. Upon moving, we shift our focus and recognise that just the act of making a change, expands our awareness. We move from the earth element, into the water element and the watery realms of emotion.

In this framework we can consider our physical bodies as the psychical containers of a fluid essence that flows through them; our emotions. Structure provides form, but water fills that structure… allowing it to flow and change. Like water, we too must learn to let our energy flow, shift and when necessary – release.

Movement

With the Root Chakra we sought grounding and stillness. With the Sacral chakra, comes movement. The water element asks us to acknowledge our feelings and desires…and with that comes change. Desires become the basis for movement – an instinctual pull to expand ourselves, by experiencing the unknown. The Sacral Chakra also reflects the ideas of duality, and choice. We make our choices by navigating through our feelings and desires; by flowing one way or the other.

Emotion

As John Bradshaw once observed, our emotions are simply the movement of energy within our bodies: energy in motion.

As awareness enters our bodies, it creates a subtle emotional reaction. To flip it around we could also say that emotions are the physical aspect of our awareness. Have you ever noticed that you sometimes feel something before you mentally know it?

We feel the polarity of the sacral chakra in our emotional fluctuations – as we range from happy to sad, empowered to anxious and so on.

This chakra reminds us of the importance of allowing ourselves feel the full range of emotions. We want to be able to feel both polarities, yet remain centred and balanced within their range. If we only experience one side, then we become emotionally unbalanced. On the other hand, if we’re so caught up in the fluctuations that we cannot feel the centre, we lose our sense of self – and become victims of our own emotional flow.

To prevent either of these cases, we have to embrace the polarities; the good, bad and the ugly! We have to feel these emotions, without losing connection to our own centre.

The centre of the polarity is a space of deep presence. Here, we form the basis of our personal power, the energy that arises with the next chakra!

WORKING WITH THE SACRAL CHAKRA

Our sacral chakra goes out of alignment when we live lives that oppose our natural essence. When we experience shame around our natural – we tend to lose our vitality, passion and personal power. When this occurs, we also inhibit our natural creative abilities.

So, what can you do if any of the paragraph above resonates? We’ve listed some of the key ways you can begin your own journey of connecting with your Sacral Chakra.

• Create

 Creativity can take on any form. Create, create, create! This could mean preparing a delicious meal, scrapbooking, a DIY home project, playing music – anything and everything that involves pouring your energy into creating something of beauty. Here, try to adopt a playful attitude, rather than goal-oriented; you’ll thank yourself later.

• Sound Healing

Try and find binaural beats or beautiful crystal singing bowls specific to this chakra. Another method is to stimulate this chakra by making the sacred sounds: Vam and Oo. Toning with this sound is very effective. Try closing your eyes and playing with the pitch of the sound, taking it up or down with your voice – until you find the note that causes you to feel the most relief in the physical centre of the sacral chakra.

• Indulge

Allow yourself to indulge in activities that brings you pleasure, especially sensual pleasure. That means pleasure for your smell, taste, ears, sense of touch, eyes, emotions, and spirit – whatever that looks like for you! Allow yourself to feel as deeply as possible. Life is simply isn’t meant to be numbed out and dull – you must be willing to feel for the sacral chakra to be healthy.

• Yoga

The movement and deeply releasing qualities help us to remove blocked and stagnant negative energy from our bodies. Here are some Yoga asanas to encourage an opening of the sacral chakra.

• Goddess Pose
• Pelvic Rocks
• Child’s pose (with open hips!)
• Downward facing puppy
• Cat-cow 
• Warrior I