We can be so body-centered that we forget that everything is energy in motion. We are made up of far more energy than matter, and yet we rarely pause to tend to the energy system that regulates every physical and emotional aspect of our lives.
Science actually backs this up in the most humbling way. When you break down an atom and look at its parts, within that tiny particle there is more space than mass. The nucleus contains 99.94% of the atom’s total volume, yet accounts for only one hundred-thousandth of its whole mass. We are, at our most fundamental level, mostly space. Mostly energy. And that changes everything about how we understand health, healing, and what it means to be human.
It is a concept explored in the ancient texts of the Vedas, woven into the oldest questions we have ever asked: who are we, and why are we here?
The fascination with energy, with all that cannot be seen with the eyes or touched with the hands, has occupied great minds across every civilization for as long as we have existed. And what the sages arrived at through meditation, breathwork, and deep communion with source, modern science is only beginning to confirm.
That shifting our energy not only heals the physical body and quiets the mental disturbances that plague us, ancient yogis also believe it can lead to an enlightened state that transcends the ego and the body itself.
In yoga, we talk about the subtle body and energy systems throughout and beyond that transfers energy as a mode of communication and regulation. The chakras are part of that system and is often brought up in yoga classes on how aligning the chakras brings our entire life into balance.
But what does that actually mean? What happens when they are blocked? What can we do about it, and why should we care? If we return to the understanding that everything is energy and we are more space than matter, we begin to see that our energetic health is not supplemental to our wellbeing, it is the foundation of it.
When energy flows openly and without obstruction, the body moves toward homeostasis, and the mind becomes calm and resilient in the face of life’s inevitable fluctuations.
Understanding Charkras: The Energy Centers That Shape Your Life
What Are The Chakras?
The chakras are the energy centers of the body, spinning wheels of life force that regulate every physical, emotional, and spiritual aspect of who we are. The Sanskrit word chakra literally means wheel, a perfect image for the way energy moves through these centers: not stagnant, not fixed, but constantly in motion, constantly responsive to how we live, think, feel, and breathe.
We have seven major chakras that align vertically with the spine along the body’s main energetic channel, the Sushumna Nadi. Each one governs a specific dimension of our experience, from our most primal instincts of survival and safety at the base, to our highest capacity for spiritual connection and divine awareness at the crown.
They are not separate systems. They are one continuous conversation, happening inside you right now, whether you are aware of it or not.
(We actually have more than seven, minor chakras exist in the hands, feet, and above the head, as well as other areas, but the seven major centers are where we begin, and they are more than enough to transform a life.)
What Makes a Chakra Special?
What makes a chakra more than just a spiritual concept is that it has a precise physical address. At each chakra point, meridians, nerve bundles, blood vessels, and energetic pathways all converge in one location. These are not arbitrary points, they are the body’s own crossroads, places where the greatest concentration of information, energy, and intelligence meet.
Modern anatomy confirms what the ancient sages mapped thousands of years ago. The major nerve plexuses of the human body correspond almost exactly to the locations of the seven chakras. Science and sacred tradition, arriving at the same intersections by entirely different roads.
This is what makes working with the chakras so potent. When you direct your breath, your awareness, or your practice toward a specific chakra, you are not working with a metaphor.
You are working with a real, physiological, energetic hub, one that influences the organs, glands, and nervous system tissue in its immediate vicinity, and sends ripples through the entire system connected to it.
The Sushumna Nadi or the central energetic channel running the full length of the spine, is the highway that connects all seven. The spine is not just structural. In yoga philosophy it is the passageway of consciousness itself, the axis around which your entire energetic life is organized.
Connecting + Aligning Your Chakra System
The chakras exist in the energetic body, but make no mistake, they are not separate from the physical one. They are two expressions of the same living intelligence, in constant dialogue with each other. The chakras regulate energy flow to the physical body through the meridians, the twelve main energetic pathways also known as nadis, which correspond directly to our nervous system. Tend to one, and you inevitably influence the other.
The Sushumna does not work alone. Running alongside it are two equally essential energetic channels — the Ida and the Pingala. The Ida nadi begins at the base of the spine and spirals upward along the left side, governing the feminine, lunar, cooling, and receptive qualities of our energy. The Pingala mirrors it on the right, carrying the masculine, solar, heating, and activating current.
These two channels weave around the Sushumna like a double helix, a pattern so fundamental to life that we see it echoed in the very structure of our DNA and they intersect at each chakra point along the way. It is precisely at these intersections that the energetic charge is greatest. When the Ida and Pingala are balanced and flowing freely, energy moves effortlessly through the Sushumna and the chakras open naturally.
When they are out of balance, as they so often are in the push and pull of daily life, addressing their imbalance can be a powerful step to healing just about anything. This is why practices like alternate nostril breathing, Nadi Shodhana, are so powerful. They are quite literally balancing the two primary currents of your energy body, clearing the path for prana to rise.
How Chakras Influence Your Physical Body
The chakras are connected in a continuous flow, beginning at the root chakra, our most foundational center of identity and survival, traveling upward through the Sushumna to the crown, where individual consciousness opens into something far greater than itself. This is not a one-way street. Energy moves in both directions, and every chakra in the column influences the ones above and below it.
Energy can even be connected between any chakra to another, not only is sequential order in either direction based on the other nadis that travel throughout the body. This adds to the potent healing potential through shifting energy for any ailment or imbalance. Reiki Healing or other Energy Healing modalities can be a powerful aid to shifting energy through blockages, connecting chakras to each other and assisting wellness on any level.
When our chakras are active and balanced, we naturally bring the body toward its peak state. We feel it as vitality, clarity, emotional resilience, and a quiet sense that we are living in alignment with who we actually are. When we bring deliberate awareness and focused energy to an individual chakra, through asana, breath, meditation, or intention, we are doing maintenance on the most essential infrastructure of our health.
What Happens When a Chakra Becomes Blocked?
Life leaves marks. Stress, trauma, grief, chronic patterns of thought and behavior, the emotional experiences we never fully processed, all affect our experience in the world, our body and our chakras. And when a chakra becomes blocked, stagnant, or imbalanced, the disruption is never just energetic.
It shows up in the body, in our moods, in our relationships, in the recurring patterns we can’t seem to break no matter how much we understand them intellectually.
In yoga we call these deeply embedded impressions samskaras, or emotional residue stored in the body and energy field that quietly shapes how we move through the world. The blocked flow of what ancient traditions call Qi, Chi, Ki, or Prana creates a kind of internal traffic jam. Left unaddressed, that stagnation can manifest as emotional dysregulation, mental fog, or over time, physical illness and disease.
This is not abstract philosophy. This is the body keeping score in the most literal sense, and the chakra system gives us both the map and the tools to read it.
The 7 Chakras Explained: A Complete Guide to Each Energy Center
There are seven chakras running along the main energetic channel of the body, and together they connect every aspect of our being — physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual. Each chakra carries three essential aspects within it: an element, a quality of consciousness, and a specific expression of energy or prana. Earth, water, fire, air, space, mind, and spirit — the full spectrum of existence represented within you, right now, waiting to be tended.
Here is a closer look at each of the seven chakras, what they govern, what they feel like in balance, and how to begin working with them.
The Root Chakra — Muladhara
Grounding | Safety | Belonging
| Location | Perineum, base of spine, pelvic floor |
| Color | Red |
| Element | Earth |
| Symbol | Four-petaled lotus with a lingam — a symbol of creative potency — inside a square |
| Associations | Legs, feet, bones, large intestine, adrenal glands |
When Balanced A felt sense of safety and security. Connection to the body and the earth. A quiet knowing that you are worthy of all good things.
When Blocked Anxiety about money, work, and the future. Overattachment to material possessions. Paranoia, fear, procrastination, and defensiveness. A rise in instinctive urges around hunger, sex, and sleep.
Practices to Open and Align Yamas and Niyamas, Lotus pose, grounding breathwork, and time in direct contact with the earth.
Our spiritual journey in the universe of the body begins here — awakening the divine potential of kundalini energy at her resting place, so that she may rise to unite with the infinite at the crown.
The Sacral Chakra — Svadhisthana
Creativity | Pleasure | Flow
| Location | Sacrum, lower abdomen |
| Color | Orange |
| Element | Water |
| Symbol | Six-petaled lotus |
| Associations | Abdomen, kidneys, bladder, circulatory system, reproductive organs and glands. Governs taste, desire, and pleasure |
When Balanced A natural ease with pleasure, creativity, and emotional expression. Healthy enjoyment of intimacy and connection. The ability to move with life’s changes rather than resist them.
When Blocked Inability to enjoy life or intimacy. Difficulty processing emotions and feelings. Suppression of natural needs alongside cravings, attachments, and addictive patterns.
Practices to Open and Align Yamas and Niyamas to work with the strong pleasure drives, Baddha Konasana, Gomukasana, hip-opening flows, and creative expression in any form.
Svadhisthana means “her own abode” — the place where kundalini awakens from her slumber and begins her ascent. Here, desire is no longer governed by personal likes and dislikes alone, but begins to reflect the deepest currents of our being.
The Solar Plexus Chakra — Manipura
Personal Power | Courage | Vitality
| Location | Several inches above the navel, in the solar plexus |
| Color | Yellow |
| Element | Fire |
| Symbol | Eight-petaled lotus |
| Associations | Lumbar spine, digestive system, muscles, pancreas, adrenal glands. Also governs eyesight, locomotion, sensitivity, ambition, and the ability to achieve |
When Balanced A strong sense of personal power, direction, and identity. Capacity for laughter, joy, and healthy anger. Enthusiasm, vitality, and glowing energy.
When Blocked Anger without direction, vulnerability, and a sense of victimization. Issues with aggression, control, and ego. Digestive disturbances and a depletion of physical energy.
Practices to Open and Align Pranayama — particularly Kapalabhati breath — to ignite digestive fire and mobilize healing energy. Core-strengthening asanas and practices that build confidence and inner authority.
Manipura is the center of our emotional life and the seat of our will. It is here that we discover what we are truly made of — and choose, again and again, to show up as that.
The Heart Chakra — Anahata
Love | Compassion | Connection
| Location | Heart center, center of the chest |
| Color | Green (Pink) |
| Element | Air |
| Symbol | Twelve-petaled lotus with the Star of David at its center |
| Associations | Thoracic spine, lungs, immune system, and the sense of touch |
When Balanced An open capacity for unconditional love, compassion, harmony, and peace. A feeling of genuine connection — to others, to life, and to yourself. The house of the soul, tended and inhabited.
When Blocked Immune dysfunction, heart and lung challenges. Inhumanity, lack of compassion, and a tendency toward manipulation. Feelings of abandonment, isolation, and despair. Allergies and asthma.
Practices to Open and Align Pranayama and breathwork to expand and quiet the heart. Supta Vajrasana, Matsyasana, and heart-opening backbends practiced with gentleness and intention.
Anahata is the intersection point — where the lower chakras of earthly experience meet the upper chakras of spiritual awareness. It is the bridge, the meeting place, the location of unconditional love. Everything rises and falls from here.
The Throat Chakra — Vishuddha
Communication | Expression | Truth
| Location | Neck and throat |
| Color | Blue / Turquoise |
| Element | Ether |
| Symbol | Sixteen-petaled lotus — one petal for each of the sixteen vowels of the Sanskrit alphabet |
| Associations | Cervical spine, voice box, thyroid and parathyroid glands, speech, taste, smell, and hearing. Governs metabolism |
When Balanced Inspiring ideas flow and find their voice. Inner healing, transformation, and purification. The ability to articulate thoughts, feelings, and truth clearly — and to listen just as well. Comfort in both expression and silence.
When Blocked Sore throat, mouth ulcers, swollen glands, thyroid dysfunction, voice problems, gum and tooth issues, and asthma. Difficulty making decisions and a lack of personal authority. Fear of speaking one’s truth — or of silence itself.
Practices to Open and Align Lion’s Breath, Halasana, Sarvangasana, chanting, and any practice that invites authentic self-expression.
The throat is the gateway between the inner world and the outer one. What we allow ourselves to speak — and what we allow ourselves to hear — shapes the entire energetic conversation above and below it.
The Third Eye Chakra — Ajna
Intuition | Wisdom | Inner Vision
| Location | Center of the forehead, between the brows |
| Color | Indigo / Purple |
| Element | Ether |
| Symbol | Two-petaled lotus |
| Associations | Brain centers, pituitary gland, throat, and the senses of taste, smell, and hearing |
When Balanced Cosmic vision — the ability to see clearly, without the distortion of past experience, expectation, or judgment. Confident, decisive, and deeply trusting of inner knowing.
When Blocked Mental rigidity, selective memory, and depression. Headaches, migraines, and dizziness. Difficulty making decisions or seeing perspectives beyond one’s own. A sense of mental confusion and disconnection from intuition.
Practices to Open and Align Drishti practices, Adho Mukha Svanasana, Balasana, and deep meditation. Relaxation practices that invite the mind into stillness and conscious awareness beyond the physical.
Ajna is where the opposing forces of the lower and higher chakras finally converge — where intellect and feeling, earth and spirit, integrate into profound self-knowledge. It is the seat of our dreams, our deepest memories, and the gateway to the wisdom that lives beyond thought.
The Crown Chakra — Sahasrara
Divine Connection | Pure Awareness | Enlightenment
| Location | Crown of the head |
| Color | White / Prismatic |
| Element | Ether / Cosmic energy |
| Symbol | The thousand-petaled lotus |
| Associations | Cerebral cortex, central nervous system. Governs information, understanding, acceptance, and bliss |
When Balanced A felt sense of divine protection and guidance. Deep peace. Connection to the universe and to something greater than the self. A natural trust that life is working for you — that the world is beautiful, and you are a reflection of that beauty.
When Blocked Psychological disturbance and an inability to quiet the mind. Disconnection from the world and from meaning. Inability to release fear. Depression, confusion, and a pervasive sense of spiritual isolation.
Practices to Open and Align Sirsasana, Paschimottanasana, silent meditation, and any practice that cultivates surrender — the willingness to be held by something larger than the thinking mind.
Sahasrara is the destination of the kundalini’s long journey from the root. It is the point of connection to enlightenment — where the individual self dissolves into the infinite, and we remember, if only for a moment, what we have always been.
How Yoga Balances and Opens Your Chakras
Yoga means the union of mind, body and soul. Yoga practice is to balance our body and prepare for concentrated mind and meditation. Yoga poses, asanas are to open these chakras and to boost the energy flow of the body. By practicing yoga we accelerate the energy in the chakras, opening and controlling the breath, pranayama, the control of life force.
As your yoga practice is a connection of asanas and prana, the breath and its life force have a balancing effect on our body. In yoga we say that each Asana is a pearl in a necklace and prana, the breath the life force is the string that holds the pearls together.
Therefore by inviting the prana, the breath, the force into our body and letting it travel through our body activating and nurturing the chakras and meridians, we can balance our body. Through Asanas, we give more space and attention to the prana to flow and heal in the chosen area of chakras.
The Relationship Between Asana and Energy Flow
Every yoga posture, every asana, is more than a physical shape. It is an invitation.
When we move into a pose with genuine awareness and correct alignment, we are directing prana, our life force energy into specific areas of the body, through what some texts mention utilizing more than 350,000 channels (nadis). We are creating space where there was compression, opening channels that habitual posture and emotional holding have gradually closed off. Each asana, practiced mindfully, becomes a direct conversation with the chakra system at our core.
Think of it this way: the physical body and the energetic body are not separate systems. They are two expressions of the same living intelligence. When we work with one, we inevitably influence the other. A deep, well-aligned backbend doesn’t just stretch the chest, it opens Anahata, the heart chakra, creating the conditions for greater compassion, connection, and emotional release. A grounded standing pose doesn’t just strengthen the legs, it speaks directly to Muladhara, our root chakra, reinforcing our sense of safety, stability, and belonging, the stance we take in the world.
This is why a truly transformative yoga practice cannot be reduced to fitness or flexibility. When you practice with full presence, you bring your awareness into the body rather than simply moving the body through shapes, you are doing energetic work. You are clearing blockages and opening up communication.
You are restoring flow. And sometimes, as many of my students have experienced, that manifests as unexpected emotion on the mat. Not because something went wrong, but because something is finally moving that has been held in place, kept locked away, for a very long time.
Pranayama: The Breath That Connects All Seven Chakras
If asana is the structure of the practice, pranayama is its life force.
I often describe it this way to my students: each asana is a pearl, carefully placed along a strand. Pranayama, the conscious control and direction of the breath, is the thread that holds every single pearl together. Without it, the necklace falls apart. With it, something cohesive, beautiful, and alive emerges.
The breath is the one function of the body that operates both consciously and unconsciously. We breathe without thinking, and yet we can choose at any moment to take deliberate control of the breath and fundamentally shift our internal state. This is no accident. The breath is the bridge between the physical body and the energetic body, between the world we can see and the world we can feel but not always articulate.
When we practice pranayama with intention, we are directing prana through the nadis, the energetic pathways, and into the chakras themselves. Specific breathing practices activate specific energy centers. Kapalabhati breath ignites Manipura, our solar plexus chakra, building heat, courage, and personal power.
Nadi Shodhana, alternate nostril breathing, brings balance to the entire chakra column, quieting the nervous system and creating the conditions for deep meditative awareness. Ujjayi breath, the gentle ocean breath we carry through an entire asana practice, keeps the thread of prana continuous and alive from the root to the crown, and warms our body from deep within.
To practice pranayama is to remember something essential: you are not just a body moving through poses. You are a living, breathing energy system, and the breath is the most immediate, accessible tool you have for keeping that system open, balanced, and fully alive.
The Next Step In Your Chakra Balancing
You don’t have to wait for the next chakra course to be offered in your local yoga studio or healing center. Blue Osa has an online resource called the Yogi Club to practice at home in a variety of ways including a comprehensive chakra course that will leave you feeling more balanced and inspired to live in accordance with your purpose.
This course will help you to:
- Identify you goals and intentions.
- Harness your personal power of inner knowledge.
- Change your habits.
- Find more stillness and clarity.
- Have a deeper relationship with your spirituality.
Head over to The Yogi Club and check out the chakra alignment and mastery course. It will change your life.
About The Author, Yogi Aaron
Yogi Aaron is the founder and creator of Applied Yoga Anatomy + Muscle Activationâ„¢ (AYAMA), a revolutionary methodology that challenges conventional approaches to yoga. Using a science-backed approach, he prioritizes muscle activation over traditional stretching.
With over three decades of dedicated study, mentorship, and hands-on experience, he has established himself as a leading expert in yoga therapy, alignment, and pain-free movement.
As owner and operator of Blue Osa Yoga Retreat + Spa in Costa Rica, Yogi Aaron leads transformative programs that combine his expertise in yoga instruction, retreat facilitation, and wellness business operations. His work spans both in-person immersive experiences and digital education through The Yogi Club online platform and the AYAMAâ„¢ Certification Program.
Yogi Aaron’s teaching methodology represents a paradigm shift in modern yoga practice. AYAMA focuses on activating and engaging muscles to enhance range of motion, build strength, improve stability, and optimize alignment—while reducing pain and injury risk. This evidence-based approach has positioned him as a thought leader challenging the status quo in the yoga community.
His mission extends beyond the mat: to liberate individuals from chronic pain and guide them toward discovering yoga’s authentic purpose through intelligent, body-informed practice.
Learn more about training opportunities with Yogi Aaron at Blue Osa Yoga Retreat + Spa.
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