Vissudha Chakra: TRUTH

Of all the chakras, this one speaks most loudly to me. For many reasons. Mostly what I realized while revisiting Vissudha chakra is this: Its all about truth. All of it. Every chakra, every bone in the body, every cell, every breath, every thought. The throat chakra is where truth is expressed and heard from within, from below, and above. 

Do you speak your truth?

The human voice is powerful beyond belief. A vibration, calibrated by human emotion. What comes through the voice is an expression of what's inside body, heart, soul, mind. Righteous and real. Angry and fearful. Sad and shy. Creative and wild.

Through the power of the voice we can sing a baby to sleep. Express love or cause pain. Cause a revolution. Take a stand. Alter our entire existence through mantra. Yet, words are limiting. The power and effectiveness, lies within the emotion, the feeling underneath the sound of the voice. Sound is created, expressed, heard and felt deep within the human psyche. Sound travels through ether in waves. The pranic body, or energetic body (maybe even the intricate web of fascia), picks up on these waves. We are all affected by what is expressed within the world around us no matter how far or near the distance between its source and receptor. 

Sound is vibration. Vibration is everything.

What we say, what we think, what we tell ourselves, our prayers, and intentions all have a vibration and travel in waves ready to be received. We will resonate with similar wavelengths. What we hear, is what we are tuned into.

Truth and love have a strong recognizable vibration to all of us (we were born this way). If we choose to be honest no matter what the consequences are, we release the blocks that hold back our true essence. We can than resonate with truth, we vibrate at a higher frequency; we attract more truth in our lives and further align with our soul's true purpose.

The truth shall set you free! 

Its not always pretty. Removing the obstacles that hold back truth might mean a total disintegration of things that have been jamming the path. Its vulnerable. Its painful. This is the point where we need to stay committed to ourSelf, to a practice, and trust with all thats left, that there is a divine plan at work.

There's a saying, "speak up even if your voice shakes."
My voice shook for a long time when I would speak. Even the most simplest of things. Family dinner. Making an important phone call to a supposed stranger. But I knew I had to keep talking. What was inside me needed out. I practiced (and still do) raw rough vulnerable honesty.

Being honest and true requires a commitment to practices that uncover the authentic power of truth and love.

Its through yoga that I smoothed out my voice. Even before my first yoga teacher training. The yoga asanas silently opened my body up and moved some blockage. Traumas surfaced and healed. Eventually I had to face my biggest block head on (see How Yoga Changed My Life). The lump in the back of my throat. The noose around my neck.

It loosened, because I continually showed up to teach. Not because I always wanted to (yes, there were times I secretly wished no one would show up, so I wouldn't have to). But because I knew deep within that it was the right thing for me to do.

Now, I use my voice wholeheartedly to deliver truth. When it sounds like crap, I trust. When its smooth and to the point, I trust. When it shakes, I trust. When my whole body vibrates, I trust.
I trust I am heard.

Muladhara Chakra: TRUST

Muladhara chakra. The root. One of the most significant qualities of this foundational chakra is Trust. For me (and I know I am not alone), this has been a life long process of building strength, stability and a firm ground to stand on. 

Trust is subjective, until it is second nature. To trust implies that there is something to trust in. At first, I learned to trust in many many external sources. It was a necessary experiment in the journey that ultimately led me to the bindu point of my heart. I trusted my family as they reflected back to me, who I am and who I was not and who I chose to become. I trusted my yoga teachers. I trusted my therapists when she told me what she saw. I painted the word TRUST on the entire side of the garage.  I trusted the Swami in India when he intentionally neglected and ignored me when I asked for help and guidance. 

Still, inside I crumbled with fear and doubt into a spiraling mess. 

It wasn't until I had my daughter that the trajectory of my big lesson on Trust started to shift from a longing for external validation to an internal knowing.  Maybe part of it was I didn't have the time to occupy myself with so much doubt. It was no longer about me and my problems. There was no time to stew. I was responsible for another life. It was my duty and responsibility to ensure that this other little precious human could trust the world she just entered without an inkling of doubt. So the awakening and rebuilding of the root chakra began for me, as hers was only developing.

As we bring the root chakra into consciousness this week, my experience at the ashram in India resurfaces. As it was the most potent lesson on trust for me.

Here is a excerpt from a blog post I wrote during my time there:

How do we trust our experiences are real, and are for our benefit to evolve? How do we trust ourselves when we have been shaken, stripped down to the core, when there is nothing to hold onto?

Trust begins when you're simply so tired of not trusting anymore. When you reach the threshold of mental conflict; when you start feeling motion sickness from waves of indecision; when force feeding yourself something that makes your stomach churn takes away every bit of energy to hold it down; and when your head hurts from banging it against the wall so many times. 

"Enough already!" Screams your real Self. 

Once this trust sets in and starts working, it is ultimate freedom. Freedom from worry and expectations; and freedom to really experience life in its grandeur and beauty.