Why it is so Important to Love the Sick Parts of Your Body

I don't think there's a person on this planet that isn't, at some time, plagued with at least a pesky ailment, illness, or disease. Our skin is frequently affected, like with warts, fungi, bacteria, eczema, acne, etc. We also get indigestion, sore throats, runny noses. Then there are a plethora of more severe illnesses that we can contract.

I've been fortunate enough to never have battled a life threatening illness, which is something I'm incredibly grateful for. But, since I am indeed human, I have had pesky ailments hit me at an alarming frequency. Over time, I've come to learn what ailments are associated with certain energy imbalances (I'll be sure to go through these more in depth in later posts); when the imbalance is severe enough, my body reacts by producing or becoming susceptible to an ailment. That's how my body (and it seems a lot of spiritual practitioner's bodies) work. Someone once said to me "When are you in a state of 'dis-ease,' or not at ease with yourself/your energy, it's more likely your body with have a disease."

For a couple years I've battled certain conditions which have really destroyed my psyche when it came to my body. I felt dirty and secretive about the shameful ways my body was susceptible to disease and illness. Although I was still strong and, fortunately, able-bodied, these conditions distressed me. I found myself ashamed of the sections of my body that were afflicted, and I was hesitant to even think about them for fear of giving the condition more powerful. I wanted to cut off my foot, tear away a toenail. (Literally, that would have hurt and caused a lot more damage, but my level of distress over even small ailments was severe enough that it made me wish these acts were possible). Most likely, not everyone is so distressed about small and harmless conditions, but I (and probably others) sometimes are.

It was only the other night, after doing a lot of work with my root chakra, that I realized it was harmful to be afraid of interacting with afflicted areas of my body (or even seeing them as something other than me--"the diseased skin", not "an afflicted patch of skin that's also me"). I was laying under my sheets, incredibly aware of the contact this area was making with my bed and feeling like it had poisoned that entire spot with infection. Of course, infection can travel through contact, but my fear was a little extreme in this moment.

I became aware of how I had not actually considered these affected areas to be a part of me. My body: me. They were the other, I was the untainted me. But I was wrong! These afflicted parts of my body were me as well. My body was saying "hey, pay attention, there's something in you that I'm showing you is wrong. You're not at ease!" Before this awakening, I wasn't thanking my body for sharing this information, I was pushing it away and harming me mental state and energy body more.

I've come to understand, after years of energy work, that almost all illness and disease has energetic and spiritual roots. (It has physical ones too, and everyone can catch illnesses, but there's also a reason why practices like Reiki have alone cured cancer). My root chakra has been really off lately, so of course my feet were afflicted with things. Thank you, body, for showing me that I really need to work through the emotion and physical consequences simultaneously.

I really learned that it was only harming me to reject the ill places of my body. We all struggle through different states of health, often we can't control what our bodies are afflicted with, but our mentality about these areas is something we most often have control over. When I focused intently on the sick areas of my body and told myself, internally, that they were me and a part of me I loved, something really changed. I felt calmer, more still and peaceful.

The Root Chakra: An Overview

The Root Chakra is the first chakra in the seven body chakra system. It is located at the base of the spine and is the energy center that ultimately grounds you to both your body and the earth. The root chakra has many qualities and traits to it, so I'll be breaking this post up into easy to read sections (and the format will remain the same for future chakra posts as well!).

General Characteristics: 
The Root Chakra is the first chakra in our subtle energy bodies. Through this energy center, we can feel what it is like to live in a physical body. We become aware of bodily needs, from nutrition, to safety and survival to primal sexuality. Our physicality, and the energetic presence of such in this chakra, allows us to connect to the earth, which means that this chakra governs our physical will (instead of the upper chakras that govern the spiritual will). Through our body connection, the root chakra relates to our material connection to that around us. This chakra is the first chakra that must be worked through to create a stable base for the entire subtle energy body. It has the capability to fully support your safety and keep you grounded (sometimes spiritual practices can make us a little flighty!), so it is ultimately important to understand and heal first.

"Mūlādhāra" is the Sanskrit word for the Root chakra. According to the Chopra Center, this breaks up into two other Sanskrit words meaning "root" and "support." In essence, it supports the root of our being. The Root chakra is like the foundation of our energetic house. It is the very source of our life force, and the resting place for kundalini energy.

A summary of traits related to this chakra are: grounding, protection, safety, security, ancestry, tradition, roots, material/matter, beginning, body, primal, food, sex, shelter, and trust.

The Root chakra develops usually in early childhood, when the ideas of trust and safety are at their peak. Normally, by age 6 or 7, the Root chakra is fully developed and active. People who suffered abuse in their childhood, were neglected by parents, or had an unstable home often have deeply affected root chakras.

Elemental Connection:
Earth

Color:
Red

Physical Places it Governs: 

• Anus, Rectum, Excretory System (including kidneys, though they are also governed by the solar plexus chakra)
• Tailbone to the fourth vertebra in the sacral vertebrae
• Genitalia, Reproductive System (not including the uterus)
• Suprarenal glands (adrenaline/epinephrine, noradrenaline/norepinephrine, cortisol hormones; adrenaline also by the solar plexus)
• Legs and feet
• Quality of blood
• Large intestine
• Senses of taste and smell
• Lower back
• Skeletal System
• Prostate or Vagina

Stones Associated to it:
Stones can be used for healing a chakra, often by meditating while holding or placing the stone/crystal above the chakra. It is often best to keep the stones wrapped in a colored cloth (silk if you can get it) that corresponds to the chakra color of the stone. For instance, keep these stones wrapped in red silk or fabric. It tends to keep their energy less tainted and swaddles them for a little bit of compassion. It's also important to cleanse the crystal before using it. The short version would be to imagine white light around your hands and hold the crystal for a few minutes while the light swirls around it, but I'll go more in depth on crystal meditations in a later post. You can also wash the stone under warm water for a minute.

The more care and attention you put into the subtle details of energy work will never harm you or your practice. 

Here are some stones associated with the Root chakra and how they affect the chakra: 

• Carnelian (Balancing)
• Uncut Sapphire (Calming)
• Garnet (Balancing/Restoring)
• Ruby (Awakening)
• Bloodstone (Balancing/Calming)
• Obsidian (Stabilizing)
• Red Jasper (Awakening)
• Smoky Quartz (Soothing)
• Chiastolite (Balancing)

Scents and Foods Associated to it:

• Dandelion root tea
• Root vegetables (carrots, potatoes, radishes, parsnips, beets)
• Onion
• Garlic
• Tomatoes
• Cherries
• Strawberries
• Apples
• Pomegranate

Scents:

• Cedarwood
• Frankincense
• Myrrh
• Angelica Root
• Smoky scents, burning fires, candles

Things that can Negatively Affect This Chakra:

The universe throws a lot of things at us, sometimes really severe things. Our chakras are sensitive, so they are easily affected. When affected, they can really stop us from fully realizing the joy of being, but often we cannot control everything that happens to us. This is just an explanation of what could have caused Root chakra issues, so that your awareness can be expanded and you can begin a journey towards healing.

Severe or Longterm:

• Past childhood trauma (neglect, abuse, insecurity, near death experiences): You were never able to form a completely stable foundation in your childhood. 
• Sexual abuse: You reject your body or sexuality, or you feel like sexuality is unsafe.
• Financial insecurity: You aren't sure if you can continue to provide necessities for survival, like food, water, and shelter.
• Family: Issues in your familial structure, particularly distrust or dislike of your parents, can cause a rejection of your ancestral roots. This can also go farther into history, like if you reject an ancestor that was a part of Nazi Germany, for example.
• Adoption and Foster Care: Rejection of those who raised you, not having a childhood home.
• Moving a lot in Childhood: Never had a stable home or friend structure as a child.
• Divorce: Seeing a stable structure you were raised with disappear.

Milder, More Common, Self-induced:

• Volatile emotions, especially stress induced: Uncontrolled energy, makes the chakra unstable.
• Lust: Overactive chakra, seeking too much sexual release.
• Addiction to sex, pornography, or masturbation: Also seeking too much sexual release, over-expending energy.
• Intentionally getting into unsafe relationships: Consciously ruining stability, especially if it's an egoic call for attention by intentionally getting hurt (Granted, unsafe relationships that you are in are not always in your control, this isn't speaking about that type).
• Excessive risk taking: Overactive production of adrenaline, exhausting the root chakra (or can make it overactive).
• Distrusting friends and family, despite no actual breaking of trust: Rejecting a fundamental feeling of the root chakra, trust.
• Breaking promises: Ruins your own self trust and the trust others have in you.
• Materialism/Hoarding: Overcompensation, placing a sense of security in things other than yourself.
• Processed food, Preservatives, Food additives: Toxic for all chakras.
• Skipping breakfast: Doesn't give you a metabolic foundation to start your day, weakens your energy level and in turn, you root chakra and life force.

Health Issues Associated to this Chakra:

• Osteoporosis 
• Allergic reactions
• Some autoimmune conditions: Lupus, Rheumatoid Arthritis 
• Digestive disorders (especially Diverticulitis, Crohn's Disease, and constipation)
• Hemorrhoids
• Varicose Veins
• Sciatica
• Warts and Fungus on feet
• Anemia, Hemophilia, Blood Disorders
• Pain disorders (Fibromyalgia)

Affects of an Overactive Root Chakra:

• Restlessness
• Need/dependence on material objects
• Over-obsessing over a material object
• Selfishness
• Overexercising
• Uncontrolled sex drive
• Aches on tailbone, legs, feet
• Wanting to manipulate or deceive others
• Being untrustworthy
• Feeling like you're constantly watching your back
• Body image struggles

Affects of an Underactive Root Chakra:

• Lack of energy
• Loss of interest in the physical world or being in your body
• Dissociation and outer body experiences (that aren't intended)
• Aches on tailbone, legs, feet
• Inability to sexually perform
• Low sex drive, relative to you normally
• Apathy to the world, your goals, future, and other people
• Not identifying anyone as your family or community
• Unclear of your life's purpose
• Confusion
• Feeling unsafe or violated
• Inability to stand up for yourself
• Laziness
• Body image struggles

Ways of Healing This Chakra: 

Habitual Healing:

• Rebuilding a foundation: This is particularly good for ancestral rejection, family issues, adoption, or childhood trauma. Sometimes it's impossible or unhealthy to reconnect with what you should traditionally feel stable by, like your birth family, so you need to rebuild a structure that you feel safe in. Perhaps this means a new home, seeing your friends as family, marriage, living alone...perhaps this means seeing your body as a home you always dwell in and are safe within. 

One Time or Specific Method Healing:

• Color: Surround yourself with everything red! Red food, red clothes, red flowers, red paintings, red red red. You'll be shocked at how aware of your root it makes you, and how quickly your root chakra heals as a result. 
• Crystal healing meditation: Using the crystals listed above and meditating while holding them or having them secured against your tailbone. 
• Yoga: Specific asanas for the root chakra include: Lotus, Tree pose, Squatting poses. Check out this link here!
• With the food you eat: Red, fresh foods and root vegetables are great for this chakra. There's a list of great foods earlier in this post!
• Mantras and affirmations: Just say these as many times as you feel you need throughout the day, or for many days. 
• Chanting: Sing a long "LAM" sound, usually in repetition for a whole slow exhale (then a slow in breath). It's pronounced "Lah-m." Do it loud enough to feel it vibrate in your chest! You might even feel it at the base of your tailbone. 

Mantras and Affirmations for the Root Chakra:

• "I love my body. I honor that this is the form my spirit chose to inhabit in this lifetime."
• "I trust in you, universe, and that you will guide me towards my life's purpose and provide for me at all times."
• "I am firm and stable. In every step, my feet are well connected to the earth."
• "I honor you, earth, for providing me with all I need to survive."
• "I know all I am is safe within my body."
• "I am one with my body."

Image source here

What are the Chakras?

We are complex and layered beings. Almost all spiritual and religious cultures have some belief that we are more than just our body and mind. At the very least, we are made of three parts: body, mind, and spirit. Some beliefs state that we are an infinity of complex and intertwined layers. I'm more drawn to the last idea, since I think every action, thought, and atom in us allows us to become the complex selves we are. 

It is most commonly understood by spiritual practitioners that we all have an etheric or energetic body. This fabric weaves throughout our bodies, minds, and spirits, and both informs and responds every part of our existence. Building an awareness to these subtle energies can be one of the first, and most powerful, steps for spiritual evolution. I hope to explain the basic structure of our energies by covering the most commonly understood layers and structures in our energy systems: the chakras. 

The word "chakra" comes from Sanskrit word meaning "wheel" (or sometimes "turning" or "whirlpool"). It originated in Hindu, Tantric, and Yoga beliefs, but has spread to almost all major energy practices present today. The chakras are seven wheels or balls of energy along the midline of our body. They are considered absolutely vital energy centers, despite existing in the subtle (non-physical) body. Each chakra does tend to correspond to one or more bodily systems that are essential for a healthy human life. Often, chakra damage (cause by a variety of factors) contributes to physical ailments. I know when my chakras are closed or wounded, my body reacts almost immediately! This association, to specific organs, was most commonly expressed through Western adaptions of chakra beliefs, though I've found it to be insightful and intuitively true in my own experience! 

We all have energy and matter as a part of ourselves, the chakras are just a specific concentration of these energies. Our cells respond, electrically, to emotional and thought based signals (that's how signals travel along our nerves and to and from our brain!), so this energy is well accepted in the scientific community. The chakras are an energy specific body that functions in a similar way. It works with your physical body by means of energy, and this energy is affected by similar things like emotion and thought. Our energy bodies are similar to our physical nervous systems. 

The chakras themselves are the main points of integration between the physical, mental, emotion, and spiritual bodies we all contain. They are central organizations of these connections and vital parts of our complete selves. Chakras can become blocked if they are overcome with negative energy, and can reopen through many healing techniques. First, though, it takes a learned awareness of these energy wheels to begin to understand where you need to heal your subtle energy system. Since these chakras connect all parts of our being, healing them heals us completely. Your chakras are like flowers, they need nurturing and love to blossom. 

The Chakras themselves:

Beliefs about the chakras differ from practitioner to practitioner, but there are several generally understood concepts about them. There are usually seven main body chakras, which span the spine and up through the skull. Sometimes this seven body system is expanded to twelve chakras, some of which expand past the body and directly connect to more ethereal realms. Chakras are an essential part of the subtle energy body, and work with other energetic pathways (like nadis, vayus, meridians, even auric fields). The chakras usually correspond to the rainbow arrangement of colors, red at the bottom/root chakra and violet or white at the top/crown chakra. 

I'll briefly expand on the main principles of the seven body chakras, though I plan on studying each in depth in future posts. 

The Root chakra "Mūlādhāra": The first chakra of the system, located at the base of the spine. Generally known to be in charge of primal urges, safety, protection, and security.

The Sacral chakra "Svādhisthāna": The second chakra, located around 3 finger widths beneath the navel (generally around the womb). Generally known to govern sensuality, sacred sexuality, emotion, creativity, and femininity. 

The Solar Plexus/Navel chakra "Manipūra": The third chakra, located between the base of the ribs and the belly button. This governs willpower, strength, assertive behavior, and self-control. 

The Heart chakra "Anāhata": The fourth chakra, located in the middle of the sternum or towards the top of the sternum (wherever feels right for you!). This is the chakra of love, compassion, kindness, and harmony.

The Throat chakra "Viśuddha": The fifth chakra, located at the base of your neck under the Adam's apple. Generally known to govern communication, expression, speaking your truth, and talking. This chakra starts to relate to less physical states and more spiritual expression.

The Third Eye chakra "Ājñā": The sixth chakra, located between the eyebrows or on the lower forehead. This is in charge of intuition, spiritual sight, non-physical communication, visualization, and insight.

The Crown chakra "Sahasrāra": The seventh (and last!) main chakra, located at the top/crown of the forehead or right at the top of the head (sometimes even at both). This controls your divine expression, your connection to the Source/Universe, wisdom, completion with the world, and full potential through spiritual awakening. 

Each person's own energy system is variable. Often the locations of the chakras is not directly where the "textbook" location is said to be, and sometimes the colors shift hues. It's all about trusting your own energy system and learning from it. 

Things that affect the chakras:

The chakras are such a sensitive part of our being, and everything affects them. Our thoughts, emotions, diet, exercise, health conditions, the people we interact with, the place we live, the air we breathe, the energy we work with. The chakras control so much of our being, especially our connection from physical bodies to divine spirits; it is so crucial that we all begin to pay attention to even the smallest parts of our lives. We don't have to be perfect, especially with thoughts and emotions, but we do need to begin a path towards awareness. Understanding your chakras are being able to feel when they are negatively affected by something will start you on an intuitive journey to heal and protect your energy.

Ways to explore and begin to work with your chakras:

A great way to explore your chakras through a small creative endeavor is to whip out some drawing or painting materials. Use something with a lot of colors and pick what each of your chakras looks like, drawing them in sequential order from the top. Choosing your favorite colors for each chakra is an easy and enjoyable intuitive way of accessing the colors that your chakras actually radiate. If you're struggling to find a color, place your hand over the location of the chakra and breathe for a second, telling yourself that you know your energy and will be able to know which color is best, and that there is no pressure or permanence to choosing this color right now. Then open your eyes again and you may have a clearer understanding of the color you wish to place on the paper for that chakra. After all are complete, look at how beautiful your energy system is! Also, feel free to leave an image of your chakra system in the comments of this post, so we can all bask in how beautiful all of our energy is. 

When doing chakra work, it tends to work best when cleared/healed sequentially. They provide a stable base for your energy to rise through and around your spine, so if you open only your crown (if all other chakras are in a closed state), it might make you energetically "top heavy." Working from the first to the seventh allows you to work from the most physical planes of expression to the most divine, naturally raising your entire energetic system. 

A way of beginning to connect with each chakra is to place a hand over its location and taking an in-breath and imagining white light coming through your nose or mouth, holding the breath for a moment and watching the white light swirl and mix with the colored chakra, then exhaling and imagining any negative energy from the chakra being released. You can repeat this as much as you like, though I usually suggest between 1-5 minutes for each chakra. If possible, do this every day or night, it can really do wonders for your energy system. Naturally, if breathing meditation could be a health concern for you, adapt this to any needs you have.

You can also do healing or chakra guided meditations. I'm a huge fan of "The Honest Guys" on Youtube. Also, I highly recommend the books "A Handbook of Chakra Healing," by Kalashatra Govinda, "Chakra Foods for Optimum Health," by Deanna M. Minich, and "The Chakra Bible," by Patricia Mercier. 

Just to note, there are speculations about more than seven chakras, which I have also worked with and experienced, that I plan on talking about in later posts. :) 

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this article, and I really hope it was helpful and insightful for you!