nicole norstrud

The person who put me up to this was my sister. She is a certified counselor who has done a fair amount of work studying meditation and internal energy including chakras. Basically, many people believe that chakras are energy points in the body that can affect your health depending on whether or not they are opened or closed. After I described my anxiety to my sister she immediately told me that it sounded like my third chakra was closed based off of my sense of anxiety and the sensation that I constantly needed deep breaths. (The third chakra is supposedly located on your solar plexus and is typically represented by a yellow flower with a downward triangle. And low and behold, your third chakra is associated with your sense of identity as well as anxiety.) She recommended a simple meditation technique that has really helped me in the last few days. . .

Basically as you breathe, you imagine that air is coming up from the ground through your feet, through your body and up through your head, and then the air turns around and runs back through your body to the ground via your feet. After a few breaths you start imagining that each chakra (there are 7 total) is a round disc that you can spin with each breath. You have to do this mental exercise for each chakra until they are spinning freely or are opened. The whole technique lasts for approximately 5 minutes, and every time my mind derailed and started thinking about something else, I would just come back to my breathing and my mental image of these discs spinning. I admit that I had a hard time imagining my third chakra and my sixth spinning freely, but I eventually got there. And I can’t lie – I feel calmer. My anxiety is not gone, but I definitely feel like it has been lowered to a more manageable level. I still need to take deep breaths once in a while, but its not as often or as bothersome. I’m not a huge follower of energy work and it’s benefits, but I definitely can’t deny that I feel better. I still intend to visit a therapist for my anxiety, but the earliest appointment I could get was three weeks away. So until then I’m going to continue to imagine my body with 7 spinning discs, because although it doesn’t seem like much, it has helped me the most these last few days.