Chakras - The Fundamentals

Chakra is a Sanskrit term which means wheel or circle or cycle.  From a metaphysical point of view, it is described as a spinning wheel of light.  Whereas chakras are an intricate part of tantric yoga and have been discussed in the Upanishads, it is generally believed that the Buddhist Hevrajya Tantra introduced the hierarchies.  Auras (the etheric body) were generally treated with scepticism till such time as Kirilian photography came into being.  Today, auras can be photographed with special cameras and also critically examined – there is a strong belief that illnesses can often be identified in the auric body first before the symptoms appear in the physical body.

The seven major chakras are purportedly the energy vortices through which energy flows and circulates throughout the body.  If the aura represents the etheric body outside our physical body, the chakras represent the energy centres or nodes within our physical body.  Not quite so coincidentally, the seven chakras are associated with the seven endocrine glands explained in the table below.  The seven major chakras are also identified with the seven (VIBGYOR) colours.

It is believed that to maintain good health, energy needs to flow freely throughout the body.  When the chakras get blocked, they lead to chronic illnesses.  It is therefore important to understand what each of the seven major chakras represent and what we can do to keep the energy flowing freely.  There are of course, various methods adopted including Reiki, Pranic Healing, other energy healing methods, crystals, chakra exercises, etc.  Here we only discuss what each chakra represents and elsewhere in this blog in preceding and subsequent articles, affirmations to deal with each chakra.

Ancient texts suggest that there are 108 chakras within the physical body that can be worked upon.  Only seven of these are considered to be the major chakras having a significant impact on our wellbeing and behaviour – these are enumerated in the table below.  Note that a severely blocked or afflicted chakra invariably affects the corresponding gland.

Chakra	Color	Sanskrit	English	Location	Keyword	Gland
1	Red	Mooladhara	Root	Perineum	Survival	Reproductive
2	Orange	Swadishtana	Sacral	Just above genitals	Pleasure / Materialism	Adrenals
3	Yellow	Manipura	Solar	Just below Navel	Control	Pancreas
4	Green	Anahata	Heart	Where the rib cage meets	Love and Acceptance	Thymus
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5	Blue	Vishuddhi	Throat	Pit of the throat	Communication and self-esteem	Thyroid
6	Indigo	Agnya	3rd Eye	Between the eyebrows	Insight and Intuition	Pituitary
7	Violet	Sahasrara	Crown	Top of the head	Oneness and Enlightenment	Pineal

1. The Root Chakra represents our foundation and feeling of being grounded, it also represents survival.  Survival issues include financial independence, basic necessities such as food and shelter and of course life itself.  It is blocked by Fear.     

2. The Sacral Chakra is our connection and ability to perceive, acknowledge and accept other people and new experiences. It also represents pleasure and materialistic desires.  It is blocked by Guilt and Non-Acceptance of other people and experiences.

3. The Solar Chakra represents our ability to be confident and in control of our lives.  Control over ourselves, perception of being controlled by others or attempting to control others affect this chakra.  Self-confidence, perseverance, grit, determination and willpower are positive aspects of this chakra.  It is blocked by shame.

4. The Heart Chakra represents love and acceptance of and compassion towards all living beings. Joy, happiness, ability to receive love and express it freely, inner peace, etc. are positive aspects of this chakra.  The Heart Chakra is blocked by Grief, Hatred and Greed.

5. The Throat Chakra represents communication, self-expression and voicing the truth.  Art forms using the vocal chords and our ability to communicate are governed by this chakra.  Where the freedom of self-expression is taken away, or one feels stifled or constricted or unable to express oneself creatively, the chakra gets afflicted.  It is blocked by Humiliation, Lies and Untruths.

6. The Third Eye Chakra is perhaps the one that has received the maximum attention.  It represents insight, intuition, imagination, wisdom and our ability to focus on and see the big picture.  For people who meditate regularly for weeks and months, vibrations in this chakra are often the first thing to be experienced.  For those who practice Nirmiti Nidra, this chakra begins to vibrate within the first week.  My personal experience at our workshop has been several participants who sense their Agnya Chakra vibrating in the very first session. Decision making, affirmations and positive thinking are also associated with this chakra.  It is blocked by Illusion and gets charged by connecting with your Inner Self.

7. The Crown Chakra lies at the upper end of the hierarchy of chakras and represents our ability to be fully connected spiritually to the Infinite Oneness.  This is the chakra that is said to responsible for a feeling of ecstasy, enlightenment and pure bliss.   It is blocked by Ego which keeps us firmly attached to all material things and gives us a bigger-than-it-is identity.

10 Powerful Affirmations for Blood Pressure

Effective affirmations are highly personalized and often situational.  The same word can ean different things to different people.  The positive affirmation statements given below are for inspiration and not to be used directly unless they make complete sense to you.  Make sure you have read this before you proceed.  To explore techniques that go beyond mere repetition, click here.  Affirmations are not a substitute for medical diagnosis and treatment.

An affirmation practised under Nidra is a hundred times more effective than when practised consciously in normal waking state.  This article does not focus on the physiological reasons but on the mind-body connection and probable metaphysical or psychosomatic causes.

Blood pressure is greatly dependent on a balanced heart chakra.  When the heart chakra is balanced, one feels compassion for all living creatures and accepts their individuality and uniqueness.   There is kindness, empathy, understanding, caring and joy.  There is a sense of ease and comfort with oneself and the people around you. 

An imbalanced heart chakra is one where the person is ruled by emotions that are not necessarily demonstrated, i.e. happiness, sadness, grief, anger, despair, envy, greed over which there is little control.  Judgement plays a big role in dealing with oneself and with others.  A positive outlook towards life could be challenging and a feeling of being unloved, unworthy and unappreciated may manifest.  Listening could become conditional, and trusting others could become difficult. 

The physical symptoms of an imbalanced or blocked heart chakra could be high or low blood pressure, palpitations, poor circulation and other ailments of the heart.  A probable cause for low blood pressure could be lack of love or ’whats the use?, its going to be like this only’ attitude.  A probable cause for high blood pressure could be long standing emotional issues which are unresolved.

Here are 2 powerful affirmations that can help both high and low blood pressure -

• ·        I am an infinite being full of Divine Love, which I give freely and easily accept from others!
• ·        I choose to live in the now. My life is happy and full of joy.

Here are 4 powerful affirmations that can help in case of those with low blood pressure -

• ·        I am strong and healthy and love life.
• ·        I am worthy, protected and secure and nourish mysself with love.
• ·        I choose to live in the now.  My life is happy and full of joy.
• ·        I appreciate and trust the process of life. All I need is taken care of. I am safe.

Here are 4 powerful affirmations that can help in case of those with high blood pressure -

• ·        I joyously release the past. I am at peace
• I love and accept myself the way I am, understand my emotions and choose to heal mysef fully.
• I choose to decide for myself and act proactively.  No one can control my emotions.
• I am capable of doing everything that I set my mind to.

How and Why to Start Re-Programming Your Mind

Read the following four statements twice.

It was none other than Albert Einstein who said, “the intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift”.

The Buddha averred, “The mind is everything; what you think, you become”.

Dr. Bruce Harold Lipton, is an American developmental biologist best known for promoting the idea that genes and DNA can be manipulated by a person's beliefs.  In one amongst his many whitepapers, he states that “the subconscious mind operates at 40 million bits of data per second, whereas the conscious mind processes at only 40 bits per second”.

Neuroscientists now affirm that 95% of your life is run by your automatic programs and beliefs of your subconscious mind; and only 5% of it is governed by the conscious mind?

Now read the above four statements again.  How would you like to summarize them?  Simply put, it is the subconscious that is several times more powerful than your conscious mind and is running your life.  If you ever wished to program anything, it would be your subconscious mind.  Because if you can consciously program what your subconscious is doing, can you imagine what you can achieve? 

But that is easily said than done.  Firstly, you need to access your subconscious mind.  That is where awesome techniques like Nirmiti Nidra come in.  Secondly, you need to know how to program your subconscious mind.  For that read the 10 laws of your SM and this article tells you the rest of it.  Thirdly, you need to know the language that you need to adopt for your subconscious mind, follow this blog for more.

Your subconscious runs your life.  Everything you do and feel depends on how your subconscious mind has been programmed.  So far, it has been programmed by your parents, teachers, friends, peers and environment.  And it continues to feed and learn each day from your thoughts and beliefs.  Everything that the media imprints on it visually and otherwise, leaves an imprint on your subconscious mind.

Were you always told by your teacher and/or parent that you were no good at mathematics?  Or that you were shy, useless, wasteul, selfish, ignorant, lazy, etc.?  Well thats exactly what you are, if your subconscious has believed this to be true.  Have you told your children that they are a pain, that they don’t deserve anything, that they are untidy, disrespectful and commonplace?  Well, that’s probably what they will end up to be.  No matter how many courses or classes you attend, what you believe or are made to believe, is true for you.  Do you want to change it?  You first have to become aware of it.  Then you set about changing it.

This is where Nirmiti Nidra comes in. 

By accessing your subconscious, you become aware of what is happening inside you, you become aware of your thoughts and over time, you get better and better at watching your thoughts to understand how you are programmed. 

According to neuropsychologists, behavior is driven by your emotions and your thoughts whereas it is the work of your belief system, which determines the direction of your thoughts and emotions. To put it simply: Your belief system triggers what you do, how you feel and what you can achieve. But it can also sabotage you, like when you tell yourself over and over again that you cannot give a speech in front of 100 people, you just cannot.

Your subconscious mind creates everything in your life. It simply allows you to construct your beliefs according to your thoughts. So what you believe is what you get. Believe that you can succeed and you will. There are a number of techniques to reprogram your mind and achieve your aspirations, and Nirmiti Nidra remains the most easiest, effortless technique amongst them.

What is Nirmiti Nidra vis-a-vis Hypnosis, NLP, Meditation

Meditation is a practice in which an individual trains the mind or induces a mode of consciousness, either to realize some benefit or for the mind to simply acknowledge its content without becoming identified with that content, or as an end in itself.  It would perhaps be controversial to say most people who meditate after learning a basket of techniques from various sources, have no idea why they indulge in it.  The term meditation refers to a broad variety of practices that includes techniques designed to promote relaxation, build internal energy or life force and develop virtuousity.

Neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) is an approach to communication, personal development, and psychotherapy created by Richard Bandler and John Grinder in California, United States in the 1970s. Its creators claim a connection between the neurological processes ("neuro"), language ("linguistic") and behavioral patterns learned through experience ("programming") and that these can be changed to achieve specific goals in life.  It was developed by studying hypnosis, gestalt and allied psychotherapy methods but of late, the balance of scientific evidence reveals NLP to be a largely discredited pseudoscience. Scientific reviews show it contains numerous factual errors, and fails to produce the results asserted by Bandler & Grinder.  In my opinion, the reason why NLP fails (although many people will not admit it to be so) is only due to the fact that the subconscious mind has not been accessed appropriately.

Hypnotism is often stated to be an altered state of consciousness.  But with consciousness itself being difficult to define, an altered state of an undefined state is rendered even more difficult.  We can therefore say that Hypnosis is a state of mind or human consciousness which presupposes focussed attention and an enhanced capacity for suggestion.  It is an altered state where the level of awareness is very different from the normal conscious state.  Focus and concentration are increased manifold and peripheral awareness is minimised to such an extent that sources of distraction are blocked out.  It also makes the person high suggestible so he is more yielding than normal.  A hypnotist communicates and interacts with the subconscious mind. 

Self-hypnosis can thus be defined as a self-induced state of mind resulting in a heightened state of focused concentration and rendering yourself more yielding to suggestions by programming your subconscious mind. It is used to change your thinking, alter your habits, and take control of the person you are—along with relaxation and destressing from everyday life. It's similar to meditation and yet is definitely more effective when you have specific objectives and goals to attain.  It is incredibly empowering!

Nirmiti Nidra uses techniques from medtitation, NLP and hypnosis to easily and effortlessly empower you to program your own mind.  It is not a religion, cult or lifestyle.  It does not use any chants, hymns or prayers.  Nor does it rely on breathing or any complicated techniques that one needs to practise for weeks or months.  In one single day, you are FULLY EMPOWERED to access your subconscious mind, anytime, anywhere.  Once you have learnt the technique, you of course need to use it each day to ensure you create the relevant neural pathways in your mind. 

Nirmiti Nidra is not brain washing, sleep, unconsciousness, mystical state or mind control.  It is a technique to enable you to be more aware, in control if yourself, in a natural blissful state, where you are connected with and communicate with your subconscious mind.  Remember, your subconscious is 30,000 times more powerful than your conscious mind.  It has nothing to do with will power.  Will power is petty compared to the power of your subconscious mind.  Nirmiti Nidra enables you to quickly and comfortably access your higher consciousness and at the same time to disconnect and come out of the state whenever you wish to.

Nirmiti Nidra can be used to rectify physical, emotional, mental, and behavioral dysfunctions. It can enable you to move in and out of various states of consciousness, enable you to guide awareness, enable you to experience mindfulness, and also enable you to enhance or diminish certain patterns of thinking, feeling, behaving, believing, or relating. When used optimally, it can facilitate healing and wholeness at every level of system.

Nirmiti Nidra can be used to modify behaviour, emotions and/or attitudes. You can use it to help deal with the problems of everyday living, to boost confidence and to develop new skills. A phenomenal stress and anxiety reliever, it can also be used to help alter habits, to program your mind with positive thoughts, to achieve your goals and desires, to heal minor health issues, to accelerate spiritual progress, to solve problems and enhance decision making abilities.

The foundation course will empower you to do so much more with your mind.  Advanced levels will empower you with so much more physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually that you will be stupendously surprised to learn of possibilities that you didn’t know existed.  As long as your desires to become who you want to be dovetail with the purpose of your soul’s journey to earth on who you are meant to be, a world of infinite possibilities are at your disposal..... just by establishing a connect with your subconscious mind.

Modern Science Endorses That We Can Heal Ourselves

New age gurus suggest that we can heal ourselves by simply changing our minds, but is this concept grounded in cold, hard science? Lissa Rankin, MD explores the scientific literature, reviewing case studies of spontaneous remission, as well as placebo and nocebo effect data, to prove that our thoughts powerfully affect our physiology when we believe we can get well. 

How do such things happen physiologically? In her book Mind Over Medicine: Scientific Proof You Can Heal Yourself, Lissa Rankin, MD, explains the science behind how a positive or negative thought or emotion in the mind translates into spontaneous repair in the body. As it turns out, the body has built in self-repair mechanisms that fix damaged proteins, repair DNA, correct hormonal imbalances, and gobble up cancer cells, infectious agents, and foreign bodies that our bodies are exposed to everyday. These mechanisms explain the spontaneous remissions that are reported in the medical literature from seemingly “incurable” diseases like Stage 4 cancer, HIV, hypothyroidism, diabetes, and even an untreated gunshot wound to the head. Yet patients often feel powerless to harness these natural self-repair mechanisms.

Not anymore. In this book, Dr. Rankin teaches a scientifically-founded six step process you can follow to optimize the body’s capacity to flip on its natural self-repair mechanisms when the body becomes ill. She also teaches the tools to implement the power of the mind as preventative medicine, to increase the chance that you will one day die of “old age,” rather than dying too young as the result of disabling of the body’s ability to repair itself.

But one extremely important point that you should make a note of is this - the body can only repair itself when the body is in a state of complete relaxation. With Nirmiti Nidra, you can quickly, easily, effortlessly slide into a state of deep relaxation – anytime, anyplace.   

When the mind+body is under a perceived threat, the sympathetic nervous system kicks in to stimulate the body and adopt a fight or flight response.  Whether the perceived threat is physical, emotional, chronic or acute, repetitive or one-time is immaterial.  Self-repair is shut down and priority is given to deal with the stress factor.  Considering that we are constantly in a state of stress – mild or severe – with little or no time for deep relaxation, the mind+body never gets an opportunity to repair itself. 

In Mind Over Medicine: Scientific Proof You Can Heal Yourself, Dr. Rankin shares not just the scientific proof that you can heal yourself, but also tips for using the power of the mind to optimize the body’s natural self-repair mechanisms, so disease prevention and spontaneous remissions aren’t just something that happens randomly, but something you might be able to experience for yourself.

See this video to learn more for yourself.