What is the Sacral Chakra?

The sacral chakra is the second chakra, located just below the navel. This is the very center of ‘You’. The Sanskrit word Swadhisthana translates as “one’s own place” and refers to the true and untarnished aspects of the real you. The energy associated with the Swadhisthana is a vibrant orange color, symbolic of your inner flame – the eternal, infinite flame that is your true nature.

The Sacral Chakra symbol

The sacral chakra is your pleasure center and the human emotional drive. It helps you experience pleasure both from physical and emotional sources and gives you a richer life experience. It is a valuable teacher, pointing you toward things that give you pleasure and away from things that cause you pain, which, if the sacral chakra is open, will lead you to a happy, healthy, fulfilled life experience. The energy that gives you the ability to experience pleasure helps nurture your sense of abundance, happiness, resourcefulness and well-being.

The sacral chakra is orange – the color of positive emotions, pleasure and success. The optimal way to succeed is to follow your heart and do something in alignment with your natural gifts and talents… or, find bliss in being who you are.

The Swadhisthana allows you to find pleasure in self-expression. You define ourselves by what you do, and from the personal relationships you have. A great way to find out if your sacral chakra is healthy is by looking at your activities: are the things you do bringing you healthy pleasure or are your activities based in a need to escape or satisfy a purely physical urge? If your self-respect is high; if you’re enthusiastic, sociable, energetic and self-assured, your sacral chakra is strong.

Watch this video to learn everything about your Sacral Chakra and how to heal it

What Happens if Your Sacral Chakra is Blocked

Humans are emotionally-driven creatures, but we are also rational, thinking beings who have the ability to balance emotion with logic and reason. When the emotional side is unhealthy (when the sacral chakra is blocked), it often manifests as a loss of control over emotions. That’s why road rage exists, why we are so drawn to drama (we can relate) and why we make rash, emotional decisions instead of taking time to weigh the consequences.

An imbalance of the sacral chakra can lead use to become emotional, dramatic, and irrational.

This chakra is particularly prone to emotional influences. Any difficulty in life can affect us, including problems in relationships, jobs, money and health. Any unpleasant emotional response can cause an imbalance or blockage in the sacral chakra. Many people with a blocked sacral chakra become very cold and materialistic – seeking pleasure in objects and possessions rather than in relationships and experiences. Others develop a distorted relationship with pleasure, leading to even more feelings of guilt and shame (feelings that what gives you pleasure is wrong).

On the far end of the spectrum of imbalanced emotions, there is severe depression, withdrawal, unchecked anxiety, substance abuse and destructive behavior. People with closed sacral chakras often take their problems to the extremes. Sexual needs and desires become unhealthy and emotionless (sex becomes a purely physical release). Addiction is common in people with closed sacral chakras. As with the sexual urge, the pleasure derived from substance abuse is emotionless and unregulated.

Physical disorders such as irritable bowel syndrome, fertility issues, kidney stones, ovarian cancer in women or testicular cancer in men are common among people with blocked sacral chakras. Healing the Sacral Chakra

One of the most positive things about healing the Swadhisthana is that all it really requires is for you to do more of what makes you happy. Make an effort to spend more time doing what you love and what makes you feel good in a healthy way, and doing less of the things you don’t like and that make you feel bad. The best, healthiest way to do more of what you love is to find ways to express your talents. It feels so good, so perfect and right, to be doing what comes so naturally and easily to you so indulge yourself and spend more time developing and utilizing your innate talents and unique gifts. Nurture the powerful sacral energy through addressing what makes you happy and mindfully expressing your creative, pleasure loving and sides.

Journaling is an effective trick for balancing the sacral chakra as it allows you to recognize irrational behavior and become in control of your emotions.

Journaling is a wonderful way to help open the sacral chakra. In a journal, you can become very aware of the emotional drivers that pull you toward certain activities and recognize addictive or unhealthy urges; and then, practice meditation to develop the emotional self-mastery to overcome unhealthy urges and allow yourself the pleasure of healthy enjoyment of life.

Eat orange colored foods like oranges, nuts and carrots. To boost positive emotions, wear orange; and introduce orange into your home environment.

The orange glow of the sacral energy should be treated as the flame it represents, and a fire requires frequent attention. Life should be enjoyed and your talents and gifts should be freely expressed. Through the process of joyful self-expression, we can begin to see ourselves as we truly are: emotionally free, sensual, lovable and valuable.

The sacral chakra is what makes you ‘you’. So take some time today to remind yourself just how special you are, and nurture yourself by doing more of what you love and less of what you don’t. Use orange to stimulate positive emotions so you feel good about doing what you love and even create a life of doing what you love!