Heart Chakra Toolbox
Yoga
Yoga is one of the healing modalities that has been around for centuries to help people bring balance to their body, mind, and spirit by focusing on their breath and life force energy. Imagine your breath becoming bright green energy as you inhale and exhale. With each inhale, you will fill your heart space with loving energy; as you exhale, you spread loving energy out to the world.
Ustrasana - Camel Pose. Start by standing on your knees with the tops of your feet on the ground. Next, you can make a fist with both hands and measure the space between your knees or keep your knees together. Next, activate your moolah bandha, lifting your abdomen, rolling your shoulders back and down, and opening your heart. Inhale and gently begin to look up, lifting from your belly and arching backward. You can support your lower back with your hands, and when you feel comfortable, grab ahold of your heels. Focus on your breath, breathing regularly. Try to keep your hips in line with your knees, so push your hips forward, keeping your thighs verticle. Do not strain your body. Your arms should anchor and support your shoulders to help maintain the back arch. Inhale and bring your body back to starting position.
Bring yourself out of the pose if you feel any strain in the back. It is vital to do a forward bending asana after completing this asana. I usually move into child's pose and suggest you move your body into child's pose. Bring your awareness physically to the abdomen, throat, spine, or just the natural breath. Spiritually you can focus on the Heart Chakra. This asana is excellent, bringing benefits to the digestive and reproductive systems. It helps loosen the vertebrae, stimulates the spinal nerves, and improves posture. It can also be great for the Throat Chakra if you can fully stretch your neck. It can even help people who have asthma.
Cat/Cow Pose is One of my favorite go-to yoga poses to open space. Begin by coming onto your hands and knees in a tabletop position. The spine is straight. Hands are underneath the tops of the shoulders. The knees are under the hips, and the tops of the feet are on the floor. Moving with your breath, inhale into cow, dropping your belly, rolling your shoulders back and down, opening your heart space while looking up towards the sky. Allow your bottom to push toward the sky. As you exhale, curl the back tucking the chin and the tailbone in cat. Move with your breath. Feel the movement in your spine. There should also be an inward and outward rotation of the elbows as you inhale and exhale. In cat, the inner crease of your elbow should be facing inward. In cow, the crease of your elbows will be facing forward. Do this as often as you feel comfortable, at least five times. Each inhale and exhale count as 1.
Puppy Pose- Melting Heart Pose After a few cat and cows, find yourself again in a tabletop pose. From here, bring your knees together and slowly walk your fingers forward, allowing your chest to melt into the mat. Keep your hips above your knees in a perpendicular, rolling the hips up to the sky. Relax your back and feel the stretch and release of your lower lumbar sacrum area. You can keep your arms engaged reaching in front of you, or you may choose to rest your forehead on your mat or blanket and stretch your arms to the sides at 10 and 2. Keep your elbows off the ground if you can, keeping your arms engaged. Hold this pose for at least a minute, up to three minutes. To get out, slowly walk your hands back into a tabletop pose, and stretch the spine by moving with your breath in some cat and cows again.
Crystals
Fill your pockets and open your heart.
Ruby in Zoisite is associated with the root, heart, third eye, and crown chakras. This stone works well for manifesting ideas and will offer strength to accomplish your dreams. It can help align the chakras and transmute negative energy into positive energy. It can improve psychic abilities while providing courage and strength. It promotes growth and fertility in all aspects of life. This stone is excellent for someone just starting their spirituality and is recently "awakened" It can help you along your journey of rediscovery.
Green Calcite is a stone that will amplify its energies and positively impact your life. It can cleanse negative energy and remove stagnant blockages. It can help you tap into your psychic abilities and stimulate your thoughts. It can increase motivation and remove laziness. It can help you feel more brave, wise, and more confident. It is a classic healer with energies that resonate on the physical, emotional, and spiritual levels. It can even help you let go of things that no longer serve you.
Rose Quartz symbolizes truth and brotherly love. It is known as the stone of love, starting with self-love first. It can help improve the quality of your sleep. It can strengthen friendships and can open the mind to beautiful things. On the other hand, it can rapidly release emotional stress. It also uncovers the underlying causes of other problems relating to self-image and self-love.
Mudra and Mantras
The Namaskar mudra is an excellent hand placement mudra to activate the heart chakra. The palms of the hands come together in a prayer pose in front of the heart space. You can feel and imagine the energy of your hands leaving the right and entering the left, circling the body. It is one of my go-to's when opening and closing my sacred spaces, when I am giving thanks to higher powers, and when I require connecting to compassion. A quick and easy way to connect to the root chakra would be by placing my hands in this mudra and repeating the seed sound for the root chakra, YAM. Or using a meditation mala and chanting YAM 108 times. Besides OM, YAM is one of my favorites. I chant it until I can feel the vibrations in my heart chakra, depending on how much time I have. If I can feel the vibrations immediately, I chant Y-A-M at least 3-10 times. "I Love" is another excellent affirmation you could work into your practice also.
Essential Oil Blend
A great way to activate your heart chakra is by using the sense of smell. So I invite you to get witching in the kitchen and brew up your very own Heart Chakra Blend. This essential oil blend took me countless hours of trial and error and might be my favorite second to the root chakra—a great mixture of oils to add to your bath before bed or during self-care rituals.
I hope you enjoyed this toolbox. Stay tuned for Magic in the Throat Chakra coming up next.