CHAKRA MEDITATION 4

THE HEART CHAKRA

Sanskrit name: Anahata

(literally meaning “unstuck”, “unhurt”, “unbeaten”)

Colour: Green

Element: Air

Keywords: Love, compassion, balance, serenity

The heart chakra is the source of love, compassion and joy in our life. It is located in the middle of the chest, at the level of the biological heart – balancing the world of matter with the realm of spirit. From here are woven our profound and sacred bonds with our fellow beings. The heart chakra emits a unifying force, moving us towards wholeness. Accordingly, this is a key chakra of healing. From its energy we learn to see that we are bound into the great web of relationships that spreads across the world, and indeed the cosmos.

Meditating on the Heart Chakra Mandala on the opposite page can open up the mind and spirit to such interconnectedness. As we undertake the meditation, we feel an inner expansion, enlarging our being.

Symptoms of a blocked heart chakra may include a feeling of loneliness or isolation, or sometimes resentment – an inability to find peace through forgiveness. Jealousy and being over-judgmental about other people are also suggestive of a problem in this crucially important region of the body.

SIGNS OF AN OVERACTIVE HEART CHAKRA

Uncontrollable jealousy; grief; anger; despair; sadness

SIGNS OF AN UNDERACTIVE HEART CHAKRA

Negativity; indifference; alienation; recklessness; ennui

THE MANDALA’S KEY ELEMENTS ARE

Twelve-petalled lotus

Interlocking triangles:

At the intersection is a smoky area, called a shatkona. This relates to the union of male and female within the self.

“The heart has its reasons which reason knows not.”

Blaise Pascal

Sit comfortably and focus on your breathing / Enter a relaxed awareness / Gaze at the mandala, working from outside to inside via the twelve lotus petals / Think of the lotus growing from mud, like the soul housed in the body / Focus on the heart chakra glyph with the six-pointed star / Locate the heart chakra in the mandala, in your mind and in your body / Feel a green light emanating from the heart chakra inside yourself, filling you with love

HEART CHAKRA MEDITATION

OPENING YOURSELF TO WHOLENESS

The heart chakra becomes so easily blocked, under pressure from competition and perpetual striving. This meditation focuses on unblocking the heart and opening up the channels of empathy and compassion. An unblocked heart gives us a better foundation for the healing of bodily ailments.

Sit comfortably with the Heart Chakra Mandala (shown on the previous page) in front of you.

Let all preoccupations and anxieties drift out of your conscious mind. Be aware of the rise and fall of your breathing. Inhale and exhale slowly, becoming more relaxed with each in-breath and going deeper into awareness with each out-breath.

Now turn your attention to the mandala. Run your gaze over the image, from the outside in. Contemplate the twelve lotus petals, arranged in two rows. Think of the symbolism of the lotus: the purity of sacred being emerging from the body, just as a beautiful lotus flower emerges from roots in the mud of a lake; and the six-pointed star representing spirit and matter coming together.

Once you have mentally progressed through the double rings of lotus petals, concentrate your gaze on the centre: the glyph that represents the heart chakra. Locate this in your own heart and consider the fact that it exists, supremely, in three places simultaneously: on the page, in your own heart, and in your mind as you do the meditation.

As your gaze rests on the six-pointed star symbolizing the unity of body and spirit, imagine at the same time that a pure green light is radiating from the heart chakra inside yourself. It is filling you with love and peace.

Don’t worry if you find yourself mentally flipping between the image on the page and your own visualization of the light; if you do, remind yourself that, despite such apparent separation, all is in fact one – an integrated whole of transcendent experience.

Filling your being with glowing love, feel the green light of the heart spreading through your body. Let this sacred light radiate outwards, into the universe. You are love. You feel the power of love making you happy and mending your hurts. You know that, as your emotional hurts heal, your physical hurts are more likely to heal too.

Be aware that you exist in loving balance with all human beings and the cosmos. You need not be other than what you are. All differences – the mandala, the biological heart, the heart chakra, the feeling of infinite love – dissolve into unity. Let your consciousness divest itself of all distinctions.

Remain in this state of loving, healing being for as long as you wish. When you’re ready, return your attention to the mandala on the page, using it as a bridge for your return to the everyday.

“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.”

Rumi