Introduction Guide – Rebalancing the Chakras

The root chakra: Muladhara

This chakra is related to our beginnings; the time just before birth and the early years of a child. It is connected to survival, stability and a safe and stable connection to family. This chakra focuses on self-care and body awareness: the right food, the right sleep and the right health for you and to get yourself moving in any way appropriate for you so you feed your body with energy. 

When our root chakra is in balance we feel secure, stable, full of health, energy and vitality.

A deficient Root chakra makes us feel weak and low in energy, alienated from ourselves and/ or from others. Physically we can be underweight, mentally scattered and spiritually ungrounded. We overlook our own needs. It could result in the following difficulties in our lives: we might never get angry, we fear change and we might feel stuck in different aspects of our lives; we have an unquenchable thirst for affection, we need lots of help to accomplish anything, we feel unworthy.

When this chakra is excessive you might feel heavy, think only about yourself and become egocentric and physically we can be overweight and feel lethargic and are easily angered. 

A lot of us come into this world with parents that are for some reason not capable of making the child feel safe and secure; the child might experience rejection and the incapability of the child to change anything about the situation might create a deep sense of unsafety: “I don’t belong here”. 

If you experience many health or financial problems, feelings of fear, panic, feelings of disconnection and alienation around you, you may need to work on this chakra.

How do you treat yourself? Is there an area in your life where you experience insecurity? What is your relationship with anger? What can you still do today to take even better care of yourself?
The root chakra is our beginning, our family and our upbringing. Not a lot of us come into this world feeling safe and connected. The level of security we will feel is formed in the first 18 months of our lives and it starts with a safe connection to our mothers. During the early years we learn if our primary needs (food, shelter, warmth) are being consistently met. As we grow older our mental needs (stimulation) and emotional needs need to be met by our parents as well. A parent can be neglectful or overprotective of our emotional needs which can have short and long term impact on us up until adulthood.  
When our basic needs are not being met as a child we can lose trust in ourselves and others and we can feel unsupported. We struggle to find a sense of belonging and this will affect all of our relationships, including the one with ourselves.
The root chakra is connected to our adrenaline gland, when it is in overdrive it might be difficult to relax and to sleep. Therefore it is very important to calm down your nervous system by grounding poses, stress – relief exercises and deep belly breathing.

1. How was my relationship with my parents?
2. What is your relationship with yourself and with others? Are you a conflict avoidant or conflict seeker?
3. How are your boundaries? Is it easy for you to say no, or do you find yourself over planning/controlling people and situations?
4. How do you treat yourself? Food, sleep, exercise?
5. How are you talking to yourself? Treat yourself as you would treat your best friend.
6. Practice forgiveness for yourself and for others. Take small steps every day. Be with your emotions, adress your pain and practice empathy in being with the truth. This could lead to compassion and eventually maybe forgiveness. 
7. Keep your promises, to yourself and to others.
8. Relax and just be instead of doing something all the time. Make time to just do nothing.

I used to resist stability and structures and thought it to be boring and bourgeois. So therefore I was always busy doing something with someone, I was never alone and always on the search for my next adventure. I had a period in my life in which I said “Yes” to everything: jumping out of an airplane, partying, learning how to snowboard, dating, living abroad and travelling. At some point I was doing more harm than good to my body, mind and my spirit. There was absolutely no consistency in my life and I thought of myself as a ‘free spirit’ and a ‘hedonist’. I was always searching for pleasure and fun.

I ignored the nagging feeling of exhaustion creeping up on me and the adrenaline kicks I got in the beginning, I confused for happiness. A part of me had chosen this lifestyle out of fear of being alone. Much more often than I would admit to myself I had the feeling of floating around, not really connecting to myself nor to others. It was way more comfortable to be out and about, occupying myself with the well-being of others than being confronted with the cobwebs and darkness inside of me.

Another part of me thought that happiness and success was to be found outside of me. And so I became a hunter for happiness. A new job, a new adventure, a new date, I said yes to everything. I thought as long as I take this journey, have this amount of money and success or this adventure I will finally find happiness. But the moment I achieved the desired object or situation the moment of joy and happiness evaporated quickly.

The hunting left me utterly exhausted mentally and physically and I started to wonder ‘but what am I’ and ‘what is it that I like’. I could not find these answers as fast as I wanted to and one day when wandering through the streets of Cape-Town where I lived at that time and feeling utterly lost I saw a mural that said: “may the long-time sun shine upon you, all love surround you and the pure light within you guide your way on’. I felt as if these were two strong arms wrapping around my body and a voice whispering in my ear: ”come in, you will be safe here”.

I have learned through my yoga practice that we need stability in order to rise up. We need to feel safe in order to go out and fully but healthily explore the possibilities the world has to offer. If we have wobbly legs and an unaligned core, we will never be able to come to the full expression of poses such as tree or dancer’s. We will most likely fall out, stop trying and start searching for something else. This is a wonderful metaphor for life as most of our yoga practice is actually off the mat.

Ask yourself: what is my relationship with me? Do I treat and talk to myself as I would treat and talk to my best friend? Am I taking care of my body in the healthiest way possible? Do I feel safe and secure? Which steps can you already take today to slowly feel better? I am constantly checking in with myself if I do something because I want to or because of any pressures that are coming from friends, family or colleagues. I learned to say no and take rest for me even if it meant disappointing people. The ones that truly matter in our lives will come to understand and who knows; you might even inspire them to take better care of themselves as well.

As I started to take better care of my body, mind and soul my outer world started to change as well. Toxic people disappeared, relationships improved, synchronicities started to pop up like mushrooms telling me I am on the right path. I now need less external impulses to make me feel better. Love is what we are born with. Fear and shame is what we learn. Through yoga and meditation I learned the unlearning of fear, shame and judgments so I could reveal my true self which is unconditional love.

Love is the essential reality and our purpose on earth.