Balancing Chakras: Your Ultimate Guide to Healing These Sacred Energy Centers

Have you been getting more sick than usual lately? Or maybe you're feeling a bit "off," but you're not really sure why? It might be time to take a deep-dive into balancing your chakras.

Chakras — energy centers that control our most vital bodily processes — determine how we feel and act on both a physical and spiritual level. Balancing chakras is a lifelong practice that helps you nurture your soul, connect to your willpower, and maintain your vitality.

Properly functioning chakras enable us to feel happy, healthy, inspired, and free from physical and emotional pain. In contrast, blocked chakras can cause a myriad of disruptions to our daily lives.

Whether you're new to chakras or you simply need a refresher, here's how you can learn to identify blocked chakras and restore balance to your most sacred energy system.

While there are seven main chakras discussed in yogic healing, hundreds of chakra systems are throughout the body. The seven chakras most commonly discussed are the ones that influence our most vital physical and emotional functions.

When balancing your chakras, it's important to remember that they all work together. When one chakra is blocked, it can throw off the entire system (especially those directly in line after it). If you feel that you may have more than one chakra out of balance, that's completely normal! Chakras can open and become blocked on a weekly or even daily basis.

The good news? Conducting a body scan that through the chakras can help you identify which of your chakras is blocked. Then, you can move on to healing each one.

Learning to balance your chakras is an essential step in honing in to your power and creating the life of your dreams. When it comes to balancing chakras, here’s what you need to know about each energy center.

Located at the base of your spine, your root chakra (Muladhara) governs everything that keeps you feeling grounded and secure. Signs of a healthy root chakra include feeling energetically connected to the earth, and having a strong sense of security about your home and family.

When your root chakra is out of balance, it can cause low self-esteem, anxiety about one's place in life, and insecurities around home and family. Physically, an imbalanced root chakra can manifest as lower back pain, immune disorders, sciatica, and depression.

How To Balance Your Root Chakra

Besides using essential oils and spending time in nature, yoga postures like child's pose can help you feel more grounded and connected to the earth. Since your hands are an extension of your root chakra, simply placing your hands on a tree or the earth can send positive healing vibrations throughout your body, bringing balance to your root chakra.

The sacral chakra (Svadhishthana) is located below the navel and between the hips. It determines sensuality, balance, and creativity. The sacral chakra represents our ability to birth new things into the world. Feeling inspired and balanced and taking part in healthy relationships helps our sacral chakra stay open.

A blocked sacral chakra can manifest as blame, guilt, imbalances of power, and moral confusion. It may also show up as a creative block or the inability to move forward with making family plans. Infertility, pelvic issues, urinary problems, and libido imbalances are all tied to the sacral chakra.

How To Balance Your Sacral Chakra

Hip opening yoga poses like Butterfly, Frog, and Pigeon Pose can release blockages in your sacral chakra to get creative forces and sexual energies moving back through the body.

Personal power, courage, and sense of self are all contained in the solar plexus (Manipura). Whenever you feel a sensation in your "gut,” that's your solar plexus sending you messages about a situation, person, or experience. It is located in the soft space between your ribs. Listening to these messages and claiming your power help your solar plexus stay strong and healthy.

When your solar plexus is out of whack, you may struggle to follow your truth and take action towards the life that you want. You may be overtaken by fear, especially after facing rejection or criticism that threatens to damage your sense of self.

How To Balance Your Solar Plexus

Balancing your solar plexus chakra starts with reclaiming your power. Trying new things, spending time with trusted friends, and doing the things you love most will help this energy center get back in balance. Sun Salutations and yoga poses like Bow, Mountain, and Warrior I can rebalance this chakra.

Continuing with balancing chakras, we’ve now arrived at your heart chakra (Anahata). Your heart chakra isn't just about loving others—it's about your ability to receive love as well. Keeping your heart chakra balanced allows you to feel compassion, joy, kindness, and respect. The heart chakra also governs your ability to love yourself and feel whole, as well as the ability to forgive yourself and others.

Having a blocked heart chakra often manifests as a result of betrayal or heartache. You may experience jealousy, codependency or feel closed off to those around you. Being in an unhealthy or toxic relationship can stem from issues with the heart chakra. Physically, bronchitis, lung problems, and circulatory disorders can manifest.

How To Balance Your Heart Chakra

Opening your heart requires that you create space in your chest, both emotionally and physically. Cultivating self-care and compassion, nurturing yourself with beauty and art, and engaging in activities you love can help the heart chakra. Gratitude and forgiveness are ongoing practices that can heal the heart chakra, too. Lastly, heart-opening yoga poses like Supported Fish, Locust, and Mountain all help bring light and love into your heart's center.

If you've ever felt a lump in your throat, that's your throat chakra at work. The throat chakra (Vishuddha) is all about our ability to speak our truth, to see and be seen. The throat chakra allows us to say how we feel, to communicate with others, and to share our ideas and creations with the world. It enables us to take what is in our heart out into the world and allow that longing to become a reality.

When this chakra is blocked, you may feel like you're not speaking your truth. Having a shy or low voice, overeating, oversharing, telling lies, or sharing secrets can signify that the throat chakra is blocked. Neck pain, thyroid problems, a sore throat, depression, and anxiety can manifest as a result.

How To Balance Your Throat Chakra

Fortunately, speaking your truth is a great way to balance this chakra. Confiding in close friends, writing down your feelings, and singing are all ways to share your authenticity with the world. Yoga poses like Camel and Bow can also help to balance your throat chakra.

Intuition and inner wisdom reside in the third eye chakra (Ajna). This is your source of divine psychic power, and your connection to your higher self. The third eye chakra is located between the eyebrows, right above the bridge of the nose.

People with an open third eye will experience more visions, which may come from dreams and meditative experiences. Having your third eye open also means you're aligned with your higher path in life.

What happens when it's out of balance? An overactive third eye may cause unrealistic fantasies and ideas; an underactive third eye may make it hard for someone to visualize their future or engage in spiritual practices.

Hot To Balance Your Third Eye Chakra

Balancing the third eye requires that you open yourself up to all the possibilities life may have to offer. Get grounded in nature, pay attention to your dreams, work with creative expression, and allow your dreams to soar. Child's Pose, Warrior III, and Eagle Pose are all examples of yoga postures that can balance your third eye.

The crown chakra (Sahasrara), located on the head's crown, is your connection to the universe. It governs your ability to live humbly, confidently, spiritually, and mindfully in the world that you've created.

Feeling depressed, bored, or greedy are all signals of a blocked crown chakra. Physically, endocrine and neurological system problems may stem from a malfunctioning crown chakra. Sleep disorders and mental illness can also result.

How To Balance Your Crown Chakra

Meditating, immersing yourself in silence, and being surrounded by nature can help you nurture this chakra back to health. Get outside and spend time in the sunshine; light is the ultimate healing source for your crown chakra. Being in the fresh air can also welcome clarity into your mind's eye.

Since quiet and stillness are essential for this chakra, a slow Kundalini or Hatha yoga practice can help you feel connected to the world around you. Rather than forcing things into fruition, allow your crown chakra to be your guide by getting still and listening as your spirit guides you to what your need.

Ready to take your yoga practice and knowledge to the next level? Check out our online yoga teacher trainings to take the next step of your yoga journey. All of our trainings include in-depth information on balancing chakras, including going beyond 7 and moving into 13 chakras.