CHAKRAS
THE GREAT MISUNDERSTANDINGS:
and
WHY THEY MUST BE DONE WITH A PURE MIND AND “HEART”
©2007 Mark B. Anstendig
The usual understanding of chakras is wrong. Far from the original concepts, the current understanding of chakras is a perversion of them that has occurred through word of mouth transmission of the Path over thousands of years.
First of all, there are various words for chakras. Here, in our work, we usually use "funny bone" as a more modern designation that is closer to what these phenomena are like that were usually called chakras by the ancient originators of The Path. But we also use the word chakra.
The first great misunderstanding is that there is only a fixed, small number of places in the body that act like chakras. So to begin, I must first describe what chakras do.
In the original sense of what they are in our bodies and how they work, chakras are balanced tension-energy centers in the body which, when activated cause releases of related tensions throughout the body, which tensions are connected to the tension-energy center that is being activated. Pursued correctly over time, these releases of interconnected tension centers throughout the body result partly in those sections of the body detaching themselves from their interaction with the sections of the body making up the chakra that is being activated and partly in those tensions realigning themselves to each other in a better way (if pursued correctly, of course. They can just as easily realign themselves in a worse, less healthy/furthering way if pursued wrongly or when negative influences are around the candidate at the time of activation). This separation of parts of the body from unnecessary interaction with each other is part of what is called the "liberation". That is because, as already said, those parts of the body that separate themselves from the parts of the body forming the chakra, in effect, liberate themselves from their interaction with those parts of the body that make up the chakra. This release of unnecessary tensions throughout the body, in turn, causes a heightening of sensitivity as well as some greater flexibility in some areas of our bodies and, most importantly, some expansion of our consciousnesses. What those areas are for the particular release that is activated and how great the results of the release will be is different every time, depending upon the state of the body and of the actual tension complex at the moment the chakra is activated.
Contrary to accepted beliefs, there are not 7 or any fixed number of recognizable chakras, but very many possible chakras everywhere in the body. Hundreds, probably thousands of them. Considerably more than any human being could recognize and remember. Almost every place there can be a tension in the body as well as every place that can be related to some tension in the body can be a chakra. Whether or not any part of the body will be a chakra and when, depends upon the state of interactive tensions of the body at the moment. And those states of the body can be and usually are constantly changing in relation to the way we move through our day. And, for the Path, there is absolutely no need to remember any of them. When well taught, the candidate will always recognize the chakra (tension complex) that is strongest at the moment and, therefore, is the one to activate.
To be absolutely clear about what chakras are and are not: Chakras are purely physical. They are not in any way, shape or form mental, abstract, ethereal, conceptual, or any other non-physical, immaterial things. They are physical tension centers in the body with some similarities in the way they feel to what people call a "funny bone", but without the painful potential involved if one hits a funny bone. They must best be explained and shown by a teacher/guru. When correctly activated in certain very precise, controlled physical ways, chakras cause releases of related tensions throughout the rest of the body. And that release of tensions throughout the body when the chakra is correctly activated also causes a heightening of sensory sensitivity and a freeing of some conscious awareness. This freeing or conscious awareness can be expanded consciousness (awareness) and/or even positive higher mental activity, but it does not have to be. It can be positive or definitely negative and even disturbing, depending upon the circumstances and influences on the person at the moment. These characteristics/results, when they work positively, are what gave rise to the ideas that chakras are mental, etc. But they are merely by-products of the results of physically activating a chakra, attributes that could follow the activation of the chakras or not. They are definitely not the chakras. Whether or not these results will be beneficial, furthering and experienced as positive, or will happen at all, will depend upon the person's state of mind at the time, on the influences on the person at the time, and on the purpose of the person in activating the chakras.
Why does the purpose of activating the chakras play a role? An explanation is in order:
The body must be neutrally aligned (we call it polarized) with equal tensions on the right and left side of the body at the time the chakras are activated, in order for the releases to remain neutral in physical effect and release uneven, negative tensions in the body, evening them out, rather than merely changing them from one negatively influencing/affecting physical pattern to another. The desired, positive release of a chakra frees, or "purifies" the body of at least some of its up-to-then-in-its-life established uneven, negatively influencing physical patterns.
Therefore, the right and left sides of the body have to be as neutrally balanced as possible at the time in both physical tension and electrical energies when a chakra is activated if the results are to be a step forward, and not just a realigning or worse of all the negativities in that person at the time! That means the person has to be emotionally neutral, with no emotional qualities present at activation. And impure purposes for using the chakras, or any other furthering possibility of the Path, are emotional qualities. And there are no abstract emotions! All emotions are physical, with their attendant physical attributes in the body! To have them, the body must assume the shape, tensions, and other requisites of those emotions, because it is the body itself that has to become/produce the emotion, or there will be no emotion. Therefore, any negativity at all (which, as forms of emotion, is tension patterns of the body), any likes and dislikes or impure purposes at the moment of chakra activation, any non-neutral quality at all of our bodies and minds at the time of chakra activation (as well as during most other work of the Path) will cause the result of the chakra activation to go wrong. The results of the chakra activation will proceed in the patterns of the emotion or attitude that is present at the time and not produce a neutral furthering result that would produce progress on one's Path. The Path will not progress correctly, because the tensions, shape, and characteristics of the body that are causing the emotion will color and determine the release that ensues. Only a chakra-release when the body and mind are perfectly neutral will work correctly and be furthering, and not potentially harmful to one's progress.
That is why it is so often said that only the truly pure of heart can reach higher levels of being and the highest experiences of God, himself. Because any impurities of mind or body will color the experience of God with their own qualities and the experience will, therefore, not happen.
This is also the meaning of the "purification of the Soul" that runs through religious beliefs, including those of the Catholic religion as expressed, for example, by Ernest Cardinal Newman in his "Dream of Gerontius", which was set to music by Sir Edward Elgar.
(End of Paper)
The following replies to someone who inquired about my first writings on the Chakras. This is included, because it gives more insight into how the concept of the Chakras is indiscriminately used without any understanding at all of what they are:
Quote:
I would like to say, though, that I do activate my chakras regularly by simply focusing my attention on them as I move my thought processes from one to another. It seems to me and others that this energy that is vibrational and can be felt within the body at the various energy centers (chakras)...is most definitely an intelligent energy that does indeed respond to the mental thought process & that is what I find so phenomenal. I am able to move this energy at will to any part of the body and activate the various chakras and I often move it to a painful part of my body for relief of that pain. I have no explanation for this phenomenon but it is definitely real and wonderful to me and others. It does as you say, though, require deep concentration & mastering the ability to shut out distracting thoughts that would interfere with this process. It has also been my experience to simply lie down at bedtime with the intention to go to sleep & yet having had no intention to go into meditation, my entire body will begin to vibrate and it is quite relaxing as it is sort of a humming sensation that at times can be heard within & sounding similar to wind swooshing through the head. (end of quote)
You have, essentially by accident, stumbled upon small parts of the phenomena of tension-energy centers of the body as they affect the mind and have acquired a knack of starting activities in your mind and body that are helter-skelter and not related to any progress in your physical or mental development. It is possible to stumble upon activities similar to chakras and their effects, but there is no point to it beyond the effect you can initiate, which specific effects cannot be immediately initiated any time at will, and never are the same. The phenomena you experience in those ways are out of context with their relationship to the rest of the body and the ways you activate them are not the reasons for those phenomena being possible. Your understanding/belief of what those phenomena are and are doing is also wrong. You are doing potentially powerful things that can just as easily result negatively as positively, if you are not taught them from the very beginning, which teaching would include how to do all processes so they will have positive results. Those processes would never simply keep repeating, but would progress further into the next steps of the Path, if one comes to those phenomena in their correct progression as steps of the Path. You are experiencing them without real understanding of what is going on, and are, therefore, pawn to the various circumstances and knacks you have developed that bring them on, and are not in control of the phenomena. In your case, if you are not leaving out negative experiences with these phenomena, it is a positive experience so far. But you have no control over the phenomena. They are quite helter-skelter and involve other things indigenous to the path that you have not recognized and are not solely connected to the chakras (here, one example is the vibrating, which is the result of a combination of other releases having happened within your body that were brought on by other things than the chakras).
First of all, one has to reduce things to their lowest common denominators, which would be the various polarities, such as time and space, or physical and mental. Here one must understand that ALL of those physical things really ARE physical, not mental. The vibrating, the various physical moods that may be conducive to fine mental states, etc., are physical. The mental qualities occur because the body has relaxed and refined itself in key ways and the basic normal vibrating of the body itself (not the noticeable vibrating you mention) has become finer. The body is a complex machine, made up of many separate, individually vibrating machines, each vibrating at its own speed. How finely the intestines, lungs, heart, and other components vibrate and how finely each meshes with the other vibrating parts of the body determines the quality of our being at any given moment, and determines our perceptual abilities: if you feel ill you aren't very perceptive. If your body is wiggling in the undulations of the intestines, which is mainly what happens when one is drunk, for example, you will not be able to perceive much of any delicate musical nuances or other refined sensory stimuli. And you won't be able to perceive and/or experience worthwhile mystical phenomena, because those phenomena are usually of a finer, more intense nature than usual human experience.
So the body's states are the prerequisites for most all mental states. The body must be vibrating in a state that is as fine as a particular mental state, if one is to experience that mental state. Otherwise one will experience a different, coarser mental state that was coarsened and, therefore, changed by the vibrating of the body itself. But, the two are intertwined. The mental can also influence the body. But the more direct way to influence and refine our mental states and experiences is to physically refine the body through direct physical influences, whereby the mind (the mental) can help by deciding and directing what physical interventions one will initiate. Otherwise the mental is pawn to whatever physical state one happens to be in and cannot be finer or experience anything finer than the refinement of the vibrating of the body in that moment.
The ckakras are purely physical balance-points of the body. That seemingly simply thinking of them in itself causes certain effects can be quite real. But "thinking about them" is roundabout, is always accompanied by some usually delicate physical influence one is not aware one is doing, and is not the most rationally efficient (rational in the sense of the most effect for the least effort) way to go about it. And the results one experiences can just as well be the result of other things one has initiated in order to use the chakras and not the result of the particular chakra itself. If you go to all the trouble you describe in order to affect your chakras, something good could possibly happen even if you don't think of the chakra. But that will depend upon surrounding circumstance. If a construction crew is working loudly outside, you probably won't have much refinement of being. And if you have, as you say, arrived at deep concentration, etc., you have probably already activated and released a number of other chakras that you weren't even aware of, which caused a good part of the quality of experience that you think was the result of the supposedly single chakra you were trying to access.