For many years I refused to believe in chakras. I didn’t have any. They didn’t exist. They were a New-Agey Eastern thing for fluffy hippies and baby Wiccans that had no relevance for me as a polytheist in Britain.
Then I came across the following in Alberto Villodo’s Shaman, Healer, Sage:
‘“I thought the chakras were Hindu,” people often say to me. The chakras are part of the anatomy of the Luminous Energy Field. Simply because kidneys were named by Europeans does not make the kidney exclusively European. Similarly, the chakras are not exclusively Hindu. Every living being has chakras.’
‘Regardless of where they were born, everyone has a skeleton with the exact same number of bones. In the same way, we all share the same luminous anatomy, which includes the chakras and the acupuncture meridians.’
I had an aha moment – these words all made perfect sense to me.
Around the same time I was presented with a chakra clearing exercise in the Way of the Buzzard Mystery School’s Spiritual Protection Course that helped me with getting rid of negative energies at a low point in my life. It worked. My chakras were there. I just didn’t know very much about them.
That changed when I started practicing yoga, which I see to be connected with Brythonic polytheism, as a shared Indo-European tradition. I have since learnt much more about the chakras as they are presented in the yogic system.
For this I am indebted to an excellent article and course by Swami Nischalananda and other meditations with the Mandala Yoga Ashram*. These have provided me with a grounding in the yogic conception of the chakras and have helped me relate to them on a much deeper level.
However, the Sanskrit names, symbols and imagery (for example elephants and lotuses) have been difficult for me to connect with as somebody living in Britain. Therefore, with guidance from my mentor, Jayne Johnson, I have been inspired to put together my own associations for each chakra.
What follows are my personal explorations of the chakras. They are based on those found in the Satyananda yoga tradition espoused by Swami Nischalanda and the Mandala Yoga Ashram but differ in some instances based upon my gnosis of what fits personally with me here in Britain.
The Sanctuary of Vindos 