images

THE HARA

When I was in my early thirties, a shaman I had trained with years earlier was given a message to help me. He checked my energy field by waving a large feather over my body as he hummed. He said, “This is unusual, but it seems you are dying.” He was silent for a while and then said, “You have completed the purpose of your present life. If you so desire, you can leave now.” After I recovered from the shock of his remark, I chose to stay, as I knew I had more to contribute. The shaman helped me to integrate the new consciousness I was being given, and I began a new lifetime in my same body. Later he asked me if I felt different. He said, “You now have a brand-new hara line!”

What Is the Hara Line?

While your body’s energy centers—the seven main chakras—are like a totem pole that runs from the base of the spine to the top of the head, the hara line goes up the spine at a deeper, more profound level.

Your personal energy field actually develops from the hara line, and your physical body develops from your personal energy field. When your hara is aligned, you have accepted your life task, you are living with integrity, and your personal purpose is in sync with your soul’s deepest desires. You are well-grounded, with no need to defend yourself or prove that you are right. You respect yourself, others, and the planet.

When your hara line is not in alignment or is distorted in some way, it reflects various problems. Distortions, like splits in the line, reveal inner conflicts. You might feel like you can’t cope and want to leave this earthly plane, feel lost or alone or just plain stuck, or feel like you’re not able to move forward in a meaningful way. You may have no confidence that you are fulfilling your purpose, and you may even be having a hard time understanding who you really are and why you are here. And you can also lose your ability to utilize healing energy.

Working to align your hara helps to clarify your life’s purpose and your task in this lifetime. It stimulates your entire chakra system and energy field. By clearing the hara, repressed energies are released and psychological problems like depression or anxiety can clear up. It’s like strengthening your internal tree trunk so you stand taller and straighter and can see where your life is going.

Where Is the Hara Line?

The vertical line of the hara runs right down the center of the energy body, connecting at three main points, the tan tien, the soul seat, and the individuation point, along the way.

images

images The tan tien (pronounced DAN tien) is an inch or two below your belly button and is the center of intention and power. It connects you to the core of the earth and then runs upward to the soul seat. The tan tien is a balance point in the body. When you watch people who are really good martial artists, you can see that they are solidly connected with their balance point.

images The soul seat is above the heart and over the thymus, just below the throat. This is where your purpose and sacred goals are. Usually the soul seat is no bigger than an inch, but a regular meditator’s will be quite expanded. The soul seat connects up to the individuation point.

images The individuation point is three to five feet above your head and connects you to Source. If the point is somehow blocked with old, stagnant energy, you might not have any connection to Source or spirituality.

The chakras exist on the fourth dimension, while the thin blue hara line exists on the fifth dimension. What exactly are the dimensions? The third dimension is our ordinary physical reality—the 3-D world our body inhabits. When we are identified with physical matter, we become somewhat dense ourselves and live in the illusion that we are separate from Spirit. The fourth dimension is the astral plane, where the forces of light and darkness, heaven and hell, compete for dominance in your ego. This is where astral travel takes place, and where healers and shamans go to bring back information. When you reach the fifth dimension, where the hara line is, you have entered the plane of light, and now actions are based entirely on love rather than fear. Fear simply does not exist at this level. In near-death experiences, many people find themselves traveling out of their three-dimensional bodies through a long dark tunnel (the fourth dimension) toward the white or golden light (the fifth dimension).

Exercise: Connect with Your Hara Line

Sit, close your eyes, and visualize a line from the individuation point straight down to your soul seat, down to your tan tien, and right into the core of the earth. Now stand up and bend your knees a bit. Point your toes out to protect your knees, and tuck your fingers into your tan tien. Check out the illustration of the hara line on page 162, for the exact location.

Keep your eyes closed. Once again, visualize the hara line, starting at the individuation point high above your head, and mentally bring that thin blue line down through the center of your being, down to your soul seat, then down to your tan tien, and finally straight into the center of the earth.

Open your eyes. Looking down at the floor, imagine the energy of the earth is rising up through your hara line and filling your tan tien. It’s important to keep your eyes open when you connect to the earth (and when you are conducting healing energies to someone else) because you need to stay very present when working with the first four chakras if you want to effect change on the physical level. Closed eyes are for sleeping and meditating.

First, see your tan tien as gold in color. As the hot molten energy from the earth rises up your leg and heads into your tan tien, the tan tien turns red. You may feel it heat up to the point that you get physically hot.

Place your right hand at the tan tien and your left hand even lower, pointing down toward the earth. Move your right hand to your upper chest over your soul seat, and bring your left hand up to your tan tien. Raise your right hand above your head and point toward your individuation point. You’re connecting your hara line.

Now move your right hand again in front of your soul seat. See how easy this is?

This is a great exercise—short, sweet, and very effective. It pulls the earth energy up into your field. Maybe you don’t have time to do yoga or Pilates or T’ai chi, so this is a great quick exercise for charging yourself with energy at any time but especially as you start your day.

Intentionality

The hara line is the axis for your present incarnation and is the expression of your soul’s intention for this birth, which includes your life task and your soul’s purpose, as well as the ease with which you move through life. Charging the hara lets you live joyfully, in a state of flow. You will be empowered, have a strong inner authority, and know how to maintain healthy boundaries.

Most important, the hara anchors your aspirations, your goals. Your life progresses based on your intention. Everything is possible when you focus on your intention—moving mountains, getting that job you want, stopping addictions, even healing the sick.

I started practicing intentionality when I was a lawyer and would set my intention on winning. No, it wasn’t very spiritual, but I learned how to carry through on my intention. You can’t float around in an airy-fairy way. It’s necessary to have an intention and then manifest it through action on your part.

I further developed my intention when I rode dressage. You don’t kick a horse to make him turn—not in dressage. You’re largely motionless, using little more than your intention (and your core, I might add) to make the horse turn. And the horse hears your intention. Of course, horses hear better than we do.

If you have a desired goal—let’s say you’re determined to find your soul mate—and he or she is not showing up, there’s a high probability that you’re at odds with yourself and your hara line is distorted. One part of you may be saying, “I really want a loving partner,” but another deeper part of yourself may be terrified of being hurt (again). There are only two major powers in existence on every level: love and fear. In this case, the fear is stronger.

The Core Star and the Hara

The core star is a point of light that’s located in between the solar plexus chakra and the heart chakra. When it connects to the hara line, the core star sends divine light out through your aura into the environment, bringing you into greater balance and harmony within yourself and out in the world.

When you are able to sense the hara line of others, you are on the fifth dimension of the energy field. At this level, you are pure consciousness and can be the witness of their life as it unfolds before you. You sense them beyond time, beyond space, beyond their incarnation in that particular body. As you are flooded with their sacred light, you can feel the qualities of their core star: wisdom, serenity, courage, and above all else, love. It is not grasping or resisting. There, fear is not getting the upper hand. When you are in the place where the hara line and core star meet, there are no problems or obstacles that cannot be overcome with intention.

images

You can feel the energies of creativity and healing that radiate from their core star as they filter through the hara. You can sense their intentions—and the accompanying feelings, thoughts, and will—coming from the more refined etheric levels down through their energy field level and percolating into their physical body. When both the hara and the chakras are healthy, the individual is open to experiencing dimensions beyond the ordinary plane of existence.

Another way in which you’ll reach higher levels of awareness and create change in your energy field is through the simple lifestyle practices that are discussed in the next chapter.