Tibetan Knowledge on Birth, PPD, Motherhood, and Childcare

This week on BellaOnline I reviewed The Tibetan Art of Parenting, and while I focused on the Buddhist-oriented knowledge in the review, what really interested me was the info on mother’s and children’s subtle energies and energy systems. As some of you know I have an interest/obsession in the sacral or 2nd chakra, and have written before on its relationship to childbearing and raising (among other things.) Along those lines, here is some of the information I found the most intriguing, and thought some of you might also (and none of this is meant to be a recommendation of any type, although I do have great respect for certain aspects of Tibetan culture):

- Keeping a mother warm just prior to, during, and after childbirth is considered essential, because it is believed that giving birth takes up so much of a mother’s lifeforce that she doesn’t have enough left to keep herself warm. Although the book itself doesn’t specifically mention chakras (some Tibetan lineages utilize chakra techniques and others do not), this little tidbit was interesting to me because the kundalini, or energy that rises through the chakras when they are open, is often called ‘heat’, and many people experience an energetic heat when doing chakra techniques. So a deep or chronic coldness is never just physical, but also energetic, and can indicate blocks or lack of energy in the chakra system and associated subtle energy channels.

Tibetan mothers are kept warm with blankets and warm broth during childbirth. Of course, in most Western hospital settings, the temperature is frigid and birthing mothers are not allowed any food, even broth. This shocked one Tibetan mother who gave birth in the U.S. As she put it, “I told the nurses I was cold and thirsty and they gave me ice chips!”

- Tibetan medicine does recognize post-natal/post-partum depression, and views it as a “deficiency of life-sustaining winds”. First off, it is interesting to find PND/PPD recognized at all, because there are those in homeopathic/holistic medicine communities here in the West that view PND/PPD as a uniquely modern Western condition, exacerbated by the ‘alienated’ way we birth and raise children, as compared to the past or other cultures. But Tibetans generally have strong family support systems, birth naturally, often at home with family attending, nurse, sleep in a family bed, etc. all methods that some believe lower the incidence of PND/PPD. And they absolutely may help, but clearly the fact that this ancient medical system recognizes it shows that it has been with us for some time, and there is a lot more going on.

The ‘life-sustaining winds’ are essentially kundalini/life force (lots of different terms for referring to this in different traditions), and upon doing some further research on Tibetan views of PND/PPD (beyond this book), I found that it’s believed that in cases of PND/PPD either the mother’s energy was depleted prior to birth more than normally for some reason, was blocked because of energetic issues prior to becoming pregnant, or was not sufficiently recovered after giving birth. In other words, for whatever reason, so  much ‘heat’ is lost during birth that it is the last straw, and the mother can’t recover her own energy enough to meet her own physical and psychological needs. The Tibetans use herbal treatments, energy practices/rituals, massage, acupressure, steaming and other methods as treatment.

I do know some yoga teachers that specifically advocate kundalini/chakra work for PND, particularly teacher Gurmukh (whose pre and post natal yoga DVDs I used in both my pregnancies and loved) but hadn’t really come across it within an alternative medicine system before. For me, it really supports my belief that the 2nd chakra is of special importance in women, the seat of their entire personal power really, and requires special care. (And for the record, I personally utilize both mainstream Western and alternative medical methods for myself and children, so this is NOT meant to discredit or judge the use of hormonal treatments for PND, as I know women who have benefited greatly by this.)

- In Tibetan medicine, when a nursing infant/child is ill, the mother is often treated with herbs, energy cleansing techniques and rituals, even if she is healthy. It is believed that both herbs/medicine and energy streams are transmitted through the mother’s milk to the child. This includes a mother’s moods and any external energy influences. In other words, the mother’s entire state is transmitted to some extent to the nursing child, especially young infants.

- Children are believed to retain past life memories to some extent up until the age of 8 years old. They are also considered extremely intuitive and sensitive energetically until this time. Children under 8 are believed to have a purity and openness of mind (regardless of their past-life karma) that connects them to energetic sensations and spirits that most of us lose after this. Young children’s intuitions and sensations are taken extremely seriously – both positive and negative experiences. On the negative side, there are 24 ’spirit disorders’ that children are believed to be especially susceptible to, from night terrors to various levels of possession. Tibetans therefore use a variety of ‘protective’ methods for their children, especially before this age, and Lamas are consulted if disturbances are recurrent.

- Formal schooling usually starts around 6, and schooling outside the home has long been a part of Tibetan culture. In Tibet, this was a major function of the monasteries, and part of the reason they flourished there. I was interested to find that in the Tibetan exile community in Dharamsala, most of the schools are now Montessori schools. I stumbled upon Montessori quite by accident with my own children, and have loved it, partly because many of its tenets meld so well with my own beliefs on consciousness that have been shaped by my own spiritual journey. Upon researching Montessori more, I discovered that founder Maria Montessori was very involved with the Theosophists, and was asked to come to India and found several Montessori schools there, and as a result, Montessori is very popular throughout India. (And as I noted in an old post on Indigo/Crystal children, Montessori is also one of the recommended education methods for them. BTW – my own views of the Indigo/Crystal theories has been undergoing a shift and perhaps I’ll post on it again soon…)

- In family units and in relations amongst children, harmony is emphasized above individual feelings. Although I hate to stereotype, I do think this is a distinction that holds for most Eastern cultures vs. Western ones. Here in the West, a lot of parenting philosophy orients around respecting individual children’s feelings, and acknowledging and respecting all party’s feelings when resolving disputes. But in Tibetan culture, there is usually some kind of judgment made by whatever adult is around regarding which child is the one causing the disruption, i.e. who is responsible for the lack of harmony, and the problem addressed that way. So if a child takes a toy from another, or won’t share, he/she is made to give the toy back or share, no discussion. This is a very basic example, but interesting to contemplate when you expand it out to other scenarios. As the authors of this book put it, “In Tibet, demanding your own rights is not valued, because it doesn’t fit into the concept of being a part of the family.”

- Tibetans spank, and the Dalai Lama was hit with a switch by his parents. I have to admit, I was thrown by this one. I am pretty anti-spanking, especially in our hyper-violent culture, and this didn’t seem to fit with a culture where children are taught to delicately carry spiders and other insects outside when they get in the house. But Tibetans consider discipline essential, and spanking to be a suitable punishment for them. Interestingly, it is often carried out after dinner, much after the event instead of at the time, which at least means it is not just done out of anger in the moment. Overall, I think it reminded me that in parenting perhaps technique and philosophy is less the issue than intent and relationship, which is something that has come up over and over in the last 2 weeks (my karma perhaps for my judgmental mini-rant of parents who drug their children for ADD/ADHD??) And along those lines, if you have not yet read Mon from Holistic Mama’s post ‘When I See a Mother, I Will Assume‘, check it out.

As always, I welcome all thoughts and questions regarding any of these topics….

2nd Chakra Series – 21 Ways to Care for Your Sacral Chakra

This is the last post in a series on the 2nd, or sacral chakra, in women. The prior posts were on Tantric Sexuality, Intuition and Seeing, Motherhood and Creating, and Spirituality and Bliss. Those posts all gave lots of reasons why attention to your 2nd chakra, and 2nd chakra issues, is so important for women. Hopefully you’re convinced!

This turned into quite the thesis, which I hadn’t intended. I have mixed feelings about the size of this list, because most women don’t need any more ’should’ or ‘to-do’ items added to their busy lives (not to mention that many of you probably don’t even have time to read this!) I am very anti-guilt. So understand that I was just trying to be comprehensive, and you should determine – with your intuition of course! – what is relevant to you. As you read the list you will probably be drawn to some and not others, and that may change over time.

Also, I feel like I should add a disclaimer along the lines of those medical ads that say “This is not meant to replace a diagnose from a qualified medical doctor.” While I am a firm believer in our ability to each heal and develop ourselves, sometimes a guide or helping hand is essential. So if you really feel like you have some deep-seated 2nd chakra issues, or want to delve further into the chakras themselves, consider finding a therapist, energy healer, meditation teacher, astrologer, Akashic record reader, past-life regressionist, or whatever resonates with you, to help you do so. Let your intuition guide you to the right approach and practitioner (some of the blogs in my blogroll are written by practitioners of various types.)

Along those lines, I realized I couldn’t post this without including some of my own favorite meditation techniques related to the 2nd chakra, and those are not normally relayed in print. I decided to include some basic instructions anyway, but I have also made mp3 recordings of them, as that is often a more effective way of learning these kinds of things. I have to be in a certain ’space’ to do that, and am not sure exactly when that will be, but I’ll get them up as soon as I can.

THE LIST: 21 Ways to Care for Your Sacral Chakra

The first part of this list has to do with healing any damage that may have been done to your 2nd chakra, or any latent discomfort you may have with your own sexuality, sensuality, or reproductive issues that could lead you to shut it down in some way. I hesitated about including this section, but in the end I had too, because I think it is the #1 problem facing many women. From my perspective, if you are a woman, owning your 2nd chakra energy is owning your personal power, so the cost of not facing these issues is high, and long-term, far outweighs the discomfort of doing so.

1) Face and release any past sexual abuse or assault. ‘Face’ is a vague term, and could mean different things depending on the extent to which you have already examined these events from your past. Of course professional therapy or counseling might be needed, or, if you have already done some work in this area, a briefer revisiting, with the intent of really releasing the past. Details on this are beyond what I can do here, but the important thing is, don’t ignore it. Don’t say ‘it was a long time ago, it was just once, it doesn’t matter anymore, etc.’ if there are ANY unresolved feelings of disempowerment, guilt, shame or fear, it will impact your ability to access your 2nd chakra energy. Of course, there is also always the danger of over-identifying with the past, and taking on a permanent victim-mentality, and that’s problematic too. So work with these ideas of facing and releasing.

2) Review your romantic and sexual history (not always the same thing!), and deal with any continuing attachments to your past, particularly to unhealthy or disempowering relationships. Sex, and even romantic attachments without sex, build some of the strongest possible energy bonds, and if you are holding on to past relationships in your awareness, it can impact your 2nd chakra. Taisha Abelar gives an extreme view of this in her memoir The Sorcerer’s Crossing, and recapitulates every encounter she has ever had, working to reclaim the energy lost in each one. While this method isn’t for everyone, focus on cutting past ties inwardly, and reclaiming attention dispersed in this way. You can even create a ritual to this effect, where you picture yourself cutting a line between yourself and a visualization of the other person with a pair of scissors, and then the energy that was flowing out from you through this line coming back into your own body.

3) Face and release any pain you may be holding onto regarding past miscarriages, abortions, or fertility issues. This is similar to #1, but instead the focus is on issues related to procreation. There are multiple issues here – the first is properly mourning whatever perceived losses  you have suffered, and working at letting them go. The second is letting go of any misdirected self-blame or shame you may be harboring. And the third is the more general issue of sorting out your identity relative to procreation. Women receive so many societal messages tying our worth to our ability or decision to procreate (or not), that we can end up ‘hanging our hat’ on this aspect of ourselves. Own your life and your decisions – this is particularly important for women who decide not to have children, or for whom it just never works out, because there are a lot of ridiculous social messages implying that this leaves us somehow ‘incomplete’.

4) Look at your overall comfort level with your body, sexuality, and sensuality. Do you feel comfortable with your sexuality? How do you use it with others? Do you try and hide it? Do you use it to attract attention? What’s your relationship with your own body? Are you comfortable with it? Look at parental imprinting too – did you ‘inherit’ a generational discomfort with sex and related topics from your mother? Try and unpack your own relationship to your sexuality, and make sure it feels healthy, honest, balanced, and clear.

5) Look at your overall attitude towards being a woman. This is really about facing your own feelings about being a woman, and any negative conditioning that you may have picked up regarding what it means. Are you out to prove something? Have you adopted, or been determined to rebel against, any particular female stereotypes? Face and release any anger you have regarding any situation in which you have been prevented or discouraged from doing something because you were/are a girl/woman.

6) Own your sexual choices. If you are celibate, own it. If you are sexually active, own it. Don’t just let things happen, one way or the other. Of course, these things aren’t 100% within our control, so part of working with this one may be accepting the situation you are in, and trying to work with the benefits it has. From an energetic standpoint, celibacy has the benefit of helping you consolidate and clear your energy field, because you are not dealing with the powerful energy lines to another person that sex creates. Sexual activity, in a healthy situation, has the energy benefit of helping you clear and activate your 2nd chakra through release. Own your situation, whatever it is, and work with it. And, if it’s possible, consider working with periods of one or the other by choice when you need to.

The next few items have to do with the absorbent nature of women’s energy bodies, because of the centripetal action of our 2nd chakras, as discussed in the Intuition post.

7) Work to refine your awareness of the energies you absorb from others. This is very important, because otherwise over time your awareness will just get more and more dispersed from the constant stream of energies you are absorbing, and you will not be able to focus well or draw on your personal power (let alone access your intuition.) Developing this awareness is mostly a matter of just starting to pay attention to it. Monitor how you feel before and after group situations, and before and after individual encounters. Review times when your mood or mental state dramatically shifts for no apparent reason, and see if you can identify an energy source for the shift. Don’t get paranoid about ‘negative energies’ (this is a slippery slope that leads downhill fast!) The goal isn’t to become a hermit – the goal is to develop your ability to recognize when this unconscious absorption is happening, so that you can halt the absorption, or use the awareness of energies to foster your intuition.

8 ) Protect your subtle body. Over time, you can learn to make your subtle body less absorbent when you need to – to shield it in a sense. One simple way to develop this skill is to try the following exercise, which is available as an mp3 file here:

- Sit quietly with your eyes closed, and place your hands over your navel chakra, about one inch below your navel. This is the 3rd chakra in the system I use, not the 2nd as in some systems, and is associated with will, intent and personal power. Some systems place the 3rd chakra higher, up by the solar plexus, so experiment with what placement feels right to you. Belly breath for several breaths.

- Imagine a red-orange sphere of light sitting right under your hands.

-Visualize this sphere growing larger and larger until it surrounds your entire body. Sense how you are holding this protective shield in place with your awareness.

Because the 3rd chakra is associated with intent and personal power, a more yang energy, by focusing on it in this way you can learn to ’solidify’ your energy field a bit. Eventually, the visualization will not be not necessary – you will be able to trigger this sense of protection in an instant. Try this whenever you are heading into a crowded place or potentially difficult situation. (And BTW, this is closer to how most men’s energy bodies feel all the time.)

9) Establish regular routines for clearing your subtle body. Everyone has different ways of doing this, but the two biggies are nature and exercise. The elements from nature that I personally most associate with the 2nd chakra are water and trees. So spending time near one or the either is great (and yes, a nice warm bath is a mini-version of clearing in this way too.) In terms of exercise, intense aerobic exercise can really help push out negative energies you have absorbed. And then of course yoga is entirely designed to clear and open the chakras, although it is not always explicitly taught that way. So find a combination that works for you and your life – when I worked in Manhattan and dealt with a lot of abrasive energies on a daily basis, I needed more aggressive forms of exercise (martial arts and aerobics) to clear my subtle body. For most energy healers of psychics, this kind of intense clearing is usually essential. Now I am more into walking and yoga, and that works for the energies I am dealing with.

One technique associated with physical pelvic health that can also be useful is Kegel exercises (here’s an explanation of how to do them.) Although often associated with childbirth preparation, Kegels are simply one way to exercise and strengthen the pelvic floor muscles. They are also part of many yoga asanas (although not usually called Kegels), and even chakra meditation techniques taught in some traditions.

The next few items have to do with learning to work with your natural cycles and life phases, many of which are ruled by 2nd chakra functions.

10) Recognize the life phase you are in, and contemplate how you can work with it. As women, the phases of our lives are driven by our reproductive phases in a way that men’s are not. Each of these phases draw on and challenge our 2nd chakra energies in different ways. I talked about this a bit in Women’s Energy Bodies – Cycles and Phases, and a book mentioned in the comments on that post, Joan Borysenko’s A Woman’s Book of Life, has a lot of interesting material along these lines.

11) If you are a mother, routinely assess your energetic balance. Recognize the phase of mother/child relationship you are in, and think about pacing, balance, and energy access issues as discussed in the Motherhood and Creativity post. Allow yourself solitude.

12) Learn to recognize, accept and work with your personal cycles of going inward and outward. A lot has been written about women’s menstrual cycles, and how that impacts our energy field and awareness. The general theme is that during the first half of our cycle, from the end of menstruation to ovulation, we are more externally focused, yang-driven, and intent and creation oriented. Then during the second half, from ovulation to the start menstruation, we are more internally focused, yin-driven, and intuition and incubation oriented (and more absorbent.) But I think many women have other larger personal cycles too, of going inward and outward in phases (and of course, if you don’t menstruate or are irregular, your cycles may be different also.) So the point is, try and look for these cycles of naturally turning inward and incubating vs. moving outward and creating. Learn what you need to provide for yourself during each phase, and communicate with those around you regarding them, to the extent possible.

There are thousands of different techniques and methods for balancing and clearing the chakras. Here are just a few to consider in relation to the 2nd chakra.

13) Experiment with different food choices that are associated with a healthy 2nd chakra. There are lots of different theories on what foods contribute to the health of each chakra. But guess what one of the most commonly sited signs of a 2nd chakra imbalance is? An unhealthy level of craving for sweets and carbs. The 2nd chakra is partly about desire, and when it’s off balance, we can attempt to fill the resulting void with a ‘quick fix’ of sweet satiation. Although I hesitate to recommend just one chakra food system, a recent book that I did like was Chakra Foods for Optimum Health, by Deanna Minnich. If you feel you have food-related issues, this book is worth your time (and it has recipes!) Some of the foods she associates with a healthy 2nd chakra are: Water, healthy oils and fatty acids, fish, seeds, tropical fruits, nuts, and orange-colored foods (orange is associated with the 2nd chakra in many chakra systems.) Here’s some of the associated recipes: Honeyed Papaya with Raw Coconut flakes, Grilled Salmon with Apricot Orange Sauce and Baby Carrots, Yam Pecan Bake, and Walnut Pesto. Yum!!

14) Explore other chakra balancing/healing/clearing methods. There are lots out there, so explore what resonate with you. They all work on the same principal – each chakra is associated with a certain vibration, and when you come in contact with elements of that same or a supporting vibration, you strengthen that chakra. Some popular examples are essential oils, crytals/gemstones, sound vibrations, and color therapy.

The following items all have to do with supporting feminine power and yin in your life and endeavors.

15) Explore your creative power. We don’t often put ‘creative’ and ‘power’ together, but for women, this is exactly what it is, as explained in the Motherhood and Creativity post. So make sure you have a creative outlet in your life, of any type. Sometimes you may love it, and sometimes it may torture you, but that’s the muse for you. When you create, you are drawing power through your 2nd chakra, and since that is the seat of the kundalini or life force for women, you are in fact empowering all your chakras, and your entire being.

16) Have some activity in your life that forces you to draw on your personal power, as distinct from creative power. This is especially important for women who are too yin. It is possible to become so absorbed in intuitive and creative processes that you end up swinging your 2nd chakra too far in that direction. Signs of this might be difficulty focusing, difficulty completing projects, chronic indecision, or difficulty manifesting change in your life. If this is so, you actually need to bring some power through your 2nd chakra and up into your 3rd chakra, associated with will and intent. Challenging exercise, concrete goals and target dates, a goal-oriented career or project, and martial arts are all examples of activities that can help you draw on this.

17) Compile a selection of powerful and iconic female images. This might be pictures or statues of favorite goddesses, female symbols, deities, or female saints. As i talked about in a recent Art and Mysticism post, art and symbols are doorways, and we can use them to connect to energies we need. My own favorites are pictures of Tibetan Buddhist female teachers and deities such as Yeshe Tsogyal (called the ‘Bliss Queen’) and Green Tara (deity of compassion.)

18) Consider the yin/yang balance of your surroundings/decor, clothing etc. Does your decor and.or clothing reflect a healthy balance of yin and yang? Do you feel nurtured and supported within it? Do you find it beautiful? Experimenting with color can be very helpful here – red-orange is traditionally associated with this chakra, but I find a healthy dose of colors we often associate with femininity – yes, I actually mean pink – can be nice in this regard. One week when I lived in NY and was feeling particularly stressed and off-balance, a friend into color therapy told me to surround myself in pink all weekend. I wore pink, bought pink roses, burned pink candles, ate pink food, and more. It actually worked. I have occasionally done this with red-orance too, when I felt the issue was more about feeling depleted. So experiment. Everything is vibration.

This last part is the most esoteric, and has to do with the principles behind Tantric sprituality and sexuality. As I discussed in the Tantric Sexuality and Spirituality and Bliss posts, technically this is about 1) going into the 2nd chakra, as a doorway to bliss, and 2) bringing the kundalini up through all our chakras. It is really about transmuting the energy of desire into bliss. While teaching how to do that is entirely beyond the scope of this post, here’s a few meditations you can experiment with along these lines (and here’s an mp3 recorded walkthrough of each too)

19) Meditation 1: 2nd Chakra Bliss Bubble – First a note on location. I mentioned in the Tantric Sexuality post that I use the 2nd chakra location that is low, at the cervix, or bottom of our uterus. But it is a plane of energy, and encompasses our entire lower belly or womb area, and the lower part of our spine, 2-3 inches from our tailbone. So you can use any of those locations to access it, and in fact, I usually recommend that people use either the belly or lower spine locations as a point of focus during meditation, because the internal focus can trigger strong sexual energies that are difficult to redirect. But it’s up to you, so experiment.

- Place your hands over your lower belly and take several deep belly breaths.

- Imagine a sphere of gentle white light centered in whatever 2nd chakra focal point you are working with.

- With each breath in, imagine this sphere getting slightly larger, covering a little larger area. Hold the size on each exhalation. Gradually expand the sphere until it engulfs your entire body.

- See if you can feel a blissful energy emanating outward and engulfing you through this meditation. At the end you may want to move directly into a few minutes of the next meditation, your heart chakra, or another meditation form that you like, because staying with your full attention on your 2nd chakra is often not a good idea.

As an aside, this is a great meditation to do while holding your children, pets or another loved one when they are sick, stressed, or otherwise in need of balance and nurturing. Include them inside your ‘bliss bubble’.

20) Meditation 2: Kundalini Rising – An aside here: Kundalini rising techniques are often considered risky because of the energy that can be released, and lineages that teach them often say that they should only be transmitted through direct student-teacher interactions, so that the teacher can assess if the student is ready. For various reasons, in this day and age, I have decided that I think that is complete rubbish, at least in the context of basic meditations like this. All the same, if you experience any discomfort, stop.

- This actually requires picturing light at all the chakras, so if you are not familiar with them, look at some of the resources listed in the next section, and/or the diagram in the Tantric Sexuality post.

- Picture a white sphere of light at your tailbone (root chakra). On the inhalation, imagine it getting slightly larger, and then on the exhalation, imagine a white column of light streaming up your spine and out the top of your head.

-  Picture a white sphere of light at your 2nd chakra (use focal points described above), and do the same thing – on the inhalation, imagine it getting slightly larger, and then on the exhalation, imagine a white column of light streaming up your spine and out the top of your head.

- Do the same thing with each chakra moving your way up: navel, heart, throat, third eye, and crown. For all the chakras after the 2nd, I usually use a focus point on the front of the body, instead of the spine, but either is fine.

- Repeat, 2-3 times.

- Center yourself in your 2nd chakra for a moment, picturing a white sphere of light there for a minute or so there.

- Repeat for the navel, heart, and third eye chakras (note that you skip the root, throat, and crown.)

- Transition to another meditation form that you like, or just sit in stillness and/or silence. It might take a moment to quiet down your awareness after this, because it activates the kundalini. So sit with it a bit.

As an aside, some form of this meditation is taught as part of Tantric Sexuality – i.e. trying to activate the kundalini rising during sex. So experiment with that if you feel so inclined.

21) Find your bliss. ‘Nuf said.

Other Resources

The 2nd chakra is just one chakra, and I chose to write about it because I think it so central for women. But if you want to learn more about all the chakras, this site Chakra Energy is one of the better ones that I found. It is coming from a healing perspective, which is different from my own, as I discussed at the start of the Motherhood and Creativity post. Also, the site uses the more common 2nd and 3rd chakra locations, as described in the Tantric Sexuality post. But I think it is a good general resource.

As I mentioned in a comment, one of my favorite intro books about the chakras from an overall healing perspective is Anatomy of the Spirit, by Caroline Myss, because she discusses them from a physical, psychological and spiritual point of view (this book has been mentioned in no less than three blog posts I have read this week, so I am not the only one that likes it!) And of course, I’ve already reviewed Cyndi Dale’s The Subtle Body, although that is more of a reference book for healers. (She mentioned in our interview that one of her other books is being re-released this summer, so I might review it at that time.)

I listed some other relevant books at the end of the Women’s Energy Bodies – Cycles and Phases post, and wanted to add a couple more here:

The Chalice and the Blade, Riane Eisler – If you are interested in delving into how yin/yang imbalance gets expressed in our culture, and how it got that way, check this classic out. While I’m not comfortable with some of the historical statements she makes, the premise itself is compelling and a great read.

Liquid Light of Sex, by Barbara Hand Clow – This is an astrology book that discusses several key life passages, particularly the Uranus opposition, which occurs around 42, and is associated with mid-life crises. The author believes Uranus is associated with the rise of kundalini (the energy said to move up through the chakras) and that a spontaneous rising of this energy is what is partly going on during this transit.

Energy Medicine for Women, by Donna Eden. I have not yet read this book, but the outine and premise sounds very interesting, and it has a forward by Dr. Christiane Northrup, whose books I like and listed on the Energy Bodies post.

If you’ve gotten this far, you’ve invested a lot of time, so you might as well comment! I always love to hear feedback and questions…

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2nd Chakra Series – Spirituality and Bliss

This is the fourth in a marathon series I am doing this week on the 2nd, or sacral chakra, in women. The prior posts were on Tantric Sexuality, Intuition and Seeing, and Motherhood and Creating, and the post after this is on 21 Ways to Care for Your 2nd Chakra. As you can see, I am a bit of a chakra geek. We all need our obsessions.

I was trying to decide how to start this post, and finally settled on the question, what is bliss?

I ask this because in the yogic and meditative traditions that address women’s 2nd chakras, it is associated with a certain kind of bliss. Not happiness, or connectivity, or mindfulness, or love, or clarity, or even epiphany, but specifically bliss. So what is bliss?

I’m not sure it can be described by a non-poet such as myself, but mystics in virtually every tradition have described a kind of bliss, or rapture (St. Theresa of Avila’s choice of word), where all boundaries, all sense of a limited self, fell away. A dissolution really, into the pure light – or pure love – of existence. It’s like being a wave in the ocean (I know I’ve used that phrase before, but I warned you I’m not a poet, so my metaphors are limited!)

All of that sounds a bit cliche, and bliss really is very different from other spiritual experiences. Bliss is an integrated mind/body/spirit experience – it isn’t only a physical sensation, or an emotion, or a mental realization, or spiritual transcendence ‘outside’ the body. It is simultaneously experienced physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually, because it is touching the essence of all of those planes.

In meditative traditions that address it, women’s 2nd chakras are specifically associated with bliss, as is the entire female, or yin, aspect of existence. Men can of course experience it too, because any human can experience any state, but energetically women’s 2nd chakras are the most direct access to it. In fact, as I mentioned, this is one of the approaches within Tantric Sexuality – a man and woman both travel with their awareness through the doorway of the women’s 2nd chakra during sex. This bliss is really associated with creation, and as I’ve already discussed in the last post, the 2nd chakra is energetically the root of creation.

I think almost everyone gets glimpses of this bliss, ‘nectar’ it is sometimes called in Eastern writing, throughout their lives, particularly anyone that is actively seeking in some way. And interestingly, the word ‘bliss’ is sometimes used to describe two distinct female physical experiences that are associated with the 2nd chakra – the aftermath of orgasm, and nursing a baby. Of course both of these release hormones that ripple through the uterus and contribute to these sensations. But considering the link between the uterus and the 2nd chakra, it’s fascinating to me that I see that word used so often in that context.

There are all sorts of other spiritual experiences we can have, bliss is just one. In fact, there are distinct experiences associated with each of the four paths I described in my Four Paths to Freedom post, and each can be tied to a chakra: Service is associated with the navel chakra, devotion with the heart, inquiry with the third eye, and yoga/mysticism with the crown. You don’t have to be aware of your chakras at all for this to happen – it just does. Exploring the chakras is just a way for understanding it in a new way, and may open up new experiences.

As I mentioned in the first post, meditative traditions that revolve around the chakras focus on one of two approaches: 1) Raising the kundalini, or life force, up through all the chakras into the crown, or 2) Going through one particular spiritual ‘doorway’, usually the heart for devotional paths that revolve around the realization of divine love, or the third eye for those that revolve around recognizing the true nature of reality. And of course, Tantric sexuality uses the 2nd in a unique way. Of course all paths, and all of life, use all the chakras, because they are the nervous system of our energetic body. Just as we can’t really do much with just one part of our body, we can’t do much with just one chakra. But different paths do ’specialize’ in different ones, much like different forms of exercise use one part of our body more than others.

Regardless of what ‘path’ you consider yourself on (and even if it’s not explicit), if you are a woman I think there is special value in understanding your 2nd chakra, and of caring for and exploring it in certain ways, because of the unique role it plays in our energetic body. That unique role is part of what I’ve been trying to outline in the last three posts. But from a meditative perspective, it has an additional role, if you buy into the idea (as I do) that it is really the primary seat of our kundalini or life force, rather than the 1st chakra, as is usually taught for both men and women. This means that the health of our 2nd chakra is essential to any spiritual experience or realization, because the kundalini can’t move up into our other chakras otherwise.

In addition, because our 2nd chakra is so essential to our being, bliss is a special proclivity of ours. It’s a spiritual doorway uniquely available to us. So find your bliss!

And don’t get me wrong – spiritual experience is not spiritual realization. A good chakra meditator can get very proficient at opening their heart chakra (for example) during meditation, and feeling great waves of love, and then get up from their meditation cushion and still be a jerk in real life. I have been in and out of spiritual communities my entire adult life, and I see it all the time (and have to admit, experienced this myself too!) Opening a chakra, and experiencing its energy, is a technical skill, and translating that into wisdom requires an integrated practice. So I’m not trying to say bliss – or any other spiritual experience – is the be all and end all. But it can sure help open your awareness and loosen your attachments to heavier states. And who doesn’t want to experience bliss?

I’ll talk about caring for your 2nd chakra in the final post tomorrow, but I did want to talk about one way that I think the centrality of our 2nd chakras influences women’s journeys, and that is that we are much more cyclical. We of course have monthly cycles, and as I discussed in my Women’s Energy Body post, we also have life cycles. But I think most of us also have natural energy cycles of incubation and creation, even in our daily lives. This is sometimes wrongly labeled as ‘moodiness’. Banish that word! I think we just naturally move in these inward and outward cycles related to our 2nd chakra energies, and learning to honor and work with that is essential. I’ll talk a bit more about this later too.

I welcome your thoughts and suggestions…

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The final post in this series is 21 Ways to Care for Your Sacral Chakra.

Introduction to the 2nd Chakra and Tantric Sexuality

Awhile back I said I was going to write a series on the 2nd chakra, and particularly the 2nd chakra in women. I’ve delayed and delayed it, because I was having a really hard time clarifying for myself everything I wanted to say. It’s become a bit of a block. I’ve finally just decided I have to spit it all out quickly, over a few days. So, I am going to post on the 2nd chakra related to the following this week: 1) Tantric sexuality (this post), 2) Intuition and Seeing, 3) Motherhood and Creativity, 4) Spirituality and Bliss, and then wrapping it all up with 5) 21 Ways to Care for Your 2nd Chakra.

I usually only post once a week or so, but I’m planning on doing these one a day over the next 5 days. So for those of you that subscribe, sorry if I back up your Reader or Inbox, and don’t worry, it’s not a permanent change!

As background, I talked a bit about why I wanted to do this series in this post, and about women’s energy bodies in general in this one. I don’t think you need to have read those posts to follow this series, but I do want to repeat one theme from those posts: I think anyone, and particularly any woman, can benefit a lot from some contemplation and understanding of the 2nd chakra, even if your own chosen spiritual path does not address chakras.

I don’t want to get bogged down with too much background on the chakras, but I do think it’s worth mentioning that current Western chakra writing primarily focuses on chakras from the perspective of health – mental, emotional and physical health. That’s a relatively new development in the history of chakras, because classic sources (which are mostly Indian and Tibetan) were interested in them for occult and spiritual purposes. I feel both are valid, but my focus here is more on the latter, and thus some of what you read might be quite different from sources that are more health oriented.

One of the differences you find between the traditions is the chakra mappings themselves, particularly the placement of the 2nd chakra. Here’s the map I use, which corresponds to that used in most Tibetan lineages that address chakras (and sorry I couldn’t find a picture of a woman, or at least a cuter guy – for some reason these mappings are always very unattractive!):

Chakra Mapping

As in most chakra systems, the 1st chakra is at the tailbone, and you work your way up to the 7th at the crown of the head. The mapping most Westerners are familiar with places the 2nd and 3rd chakras differently from this picture – the 2nd is typically at or just under the navel (where the 3rd is here) and the 3rd is at the solar plexus (where there is just a black dot here designating a minor energy node.)

As Cyndi Dale discussed when I interviewed her, there are actually many different chakra mappings that have developed around the world, and even pretty profound differences in mappings amongst classic Indian and Tibetan sources. How to account for these differences? I think of them in terms of different types of maps: You can have a roadmap, a geologic map, a hiking map, a natural resources map, and more, all for the same area. They are all equally valid, they are each just meant to serve a different purpose. And none of them is the place itself. So various chakra mappings are tools for helping us identify and work with energy patterns and structures within our non-physical being. And they are each slightly different depending on the purpose for which they evolved.

The chakras are often described as mind/body/spirit nexuses, or intersections of our physical and non-physical energies. Within the Tantric traditions, of which there are both Indian and Tibetan Buddhist lineages, they are often also described as awareness vortexes. Some people describe the shape of them as spheres, others as cones, others as planes. Don’t get caught up on the shape. The important thing, for women especially, is understanding the centerpoint of the 2nd chakra in this system. It is at the cervix, the opening of the uterus. In some women, this corresponds to the g-spot, the semi-mythical point of maximum sexual arousal (hopefully that sentence won’t get me boycotted by the search engines, which a friend warned me about!) Assuming this location, this chakra is associated with some pretty amazing experiences and functions in our physical body: It is associated with internal orgasm, with holding a baby into the womb during pregnancy, and with opening to bring that baby into the world during the birth process.

Is it any wonder then, that as a spiritual doorway, it is pretty intense?

In the meditative systems that utilize chakras there are two different themes or ‘purposes’ to chakra meditation that you find: 1) Bringing the kundalini, or life force energy, up through all the chakras into our crown chakra, and 2) Going through the ‘doorway’ of each chakra into spiritual dimensions of awareness (I don’t like that phrase ’spiritual dimensions’ but the words used are usually something along those lines.) What fascinates me is that the experiences described by mystics from pretty much any tradition – Christianity to Zen to Sufism to Eckhart Tolle to Kaballah to Vedanta – correspond to one or more of those described in the classic chakra texts. So, one of these two things occurs spontaneously whenever we have an experience that we classify as ‘mystic’ or ’spiritual’ – either some kundalini has risen up our main spinal energy channel or we have ‘walked through’ the doorway of a particular chakra. We may not describe it that way, but ‘under the hood’ of our energetic system, that is what is going on.

Ok, on to Tantric sexuality. You may be familiar with this term from the numerous ’sex aid’ books on the market bearing this name. These have little to nothing to do with true Tantric sexuality. Most of these books have just borrowed a few positions and ’sex is union’ or ’sex is sacred’ type themes from the original texts, and repackaged them as methods for attaining maximum physical and emotional pleasure from sex. Which I have no problem with. Life is short, have as much fun as you can. BUT, this is not Tantric sexuality.

I also feel duty-bound to mention that most modern Tibetan Tantric Buddhist traditions do not incorporate actual physical sex into the practice. All those robed Tibetan monks that you see are not secretly having orgies behind monastery walls. Tantric Buddhism does work with themes of desire differently than other Buddhist branches, and often visualizations of male and female deities in sexual union are one of the meditative techniques used, but for most that’s as far as it goes. The best introduction to Tantric Buddhism in this regard that I have found is Lama Yeshe’s Introduction to Tantra: The Transformation of Desire.

For those lineages that do practice Tantric sex (and there are Hindu yogic lineages that do so also, not just Buddhist ones), the same approaches are described as in meditative techniques: The ‘goal’ is either to bring the kundalini up through all the chakras into the crown, OR to catapult through a particular chakra, using it as a vortex into pure awareness or source. The difference is that you are using the incredible energy of sexual desire – one of the most powerful human urges – to drive this process. Properly directed, you use this energy to catapult yourself into experiences that could take years to reach sitting on a meditation cushion. Basically, you are using rocket fuel instead of plain old gasoline. In formal lineages, it takes years of preparatory training before you’re allowed to try this, and even then it’s considered a challenging practice.

So why am I talking about this?

Because the biographies of some of the female teachers within these lineages, and some other completely unrelated traditions (like some pagan texts, the Carlos Castenada books, and the books of female ’sorceresses’ within his group), elude to another possibility within this kind of sexual practice. They discuss the womb – or really, the 2nd chakra, NOT the associated physical organ – as a doorway into creation itself. It is in a way the ultimate vortex, a doorway directly into the creating aspect of the universe/God/Goddess/the tao/nirvana/whatever-name-you-want-to-use. And both partners can walk through this doorway – the doorway of the woman’s 2nd chakra – during sexual union.

This aspect of the 2nd chakra in women – as the ultimate vortex into creation itself – is the background I wanted to provide for the rest of this series, and the only reason I wanted to cover Tantric sexuality at all. I went through all this to support the idea that women’s 2nd chakras are fundamentally different from men’s. (Other contemporary women writing about chakras have said this also – Cyndi Dale mentioned that she believes the 2nd chakra is the true seat of women’s kundalini, rather than the 1st chakra, which is the traditional teaching.) So this is the technical case for why, if you are a woman, you should view your 2nd chakra, and an understanding of it, as particularly important.

Hopefully that didn’t leave you blurry-eyed, and peaked your interested enough to read the next post on Intuition, which should be a little less theoretical…

Please feel free to comment, dispute, or ask any questions you have in the comments, so that I can address them as the series progresses…

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Interview with Cyndi Dale – Chakra Expert and Author of The Subtle Body

A couple of weeks ago I reviewed The Subtle Body: An Encyclopedia of Your Energetic Anatomy by Cyndi Dale. If you read the review, you know I REALLY liked this book. Cyndi agreed to a phone interview with me, and I found talking with her just as fascinating as reading her book. We discussed how she went about researching this material, the many differences in energetic anatomy systems that she found, her view of the chakras, and – my favorite – the unique role of the second chakra in women, including how it relates to motherhood. While I had originally planned to post this interview after I had started my Mystic Spirituality for Women series, I liked it so much, and found it so relevant, that I decided to go ahead and post it now.

This printed interview is an abridged and edited version of the full interview. I hadn’t originally planned to post the full audio file, but Cyndi agreed to it and there is so much interesting material that I couldn’t cover it all here, so I’ve posted the podcast at the end. Enjoy, and feel free to post questions, comments and additional resources.

1. This must have been a huge undertaking, what led you to take on this project?

I have always wanted a book like this for myself, to use as a reference in my own practice, but never found a single source that combined this kind of information. So I really set out to write the book that I would want to have and use. Fortunately, the people over at Sounds True Publishing had wanted to do an encyclopedia of energetic anatomy for some time, and they were very open to whatever I wanted to include. And one of my goals was to create something anyone could understand, including someone who knew nothing about acupuncture, or chakras, or even electricity. I wanted to make the scientific information accessible and useful to anyone. But I also wanted it to be useful to experienced practitioners, whether they were medical doctors or energy healers.

It did involve a huge compilation of information. I don’t think a single source provided even a tenth of the information in any one section of the book. I really wanted to look back over five thousand years of human history, at all these different traditions, and say ‘look how they are different, but look what they have in common – a single word, energy.’

2. I have certainly never found anything else like it, and I thank you for creating it. I am not a healer, but think this is a tremendously valuable book for anyone interested in  this topic, especially because it combines so many different traditions. How did you go about researching all of this, and what did you learn?

One of the surprising things was how much I learned about the world’s different chakra systems. Chakras are my area of expertise, but I hadn’t realized how much variation there was out there, and how hard it would be gather info on some. I hadn’t realized how much variation there was in the traditional Indian or Hindu based systems that most of us learn here in the West. Most of us here have been taught that there are seven chakras, and with a few variations, that is what everyone knows. But when you look deeper into the East, at the Tibetan systems, and the Tantric systems, you can find systems that focus on only three, or even one with as many as twenty-four chakras.

Over time, each lineage and teacher focused on what they thought was the most important, and tailored their chakra system to their own purposes. And they didn’t always write it all down. Some of these chakra systems, I would be reading a book, and it would say ‘there are eight chakras in this system’ and then the book would only describe four. So much of the teachings have been done orally, and for different purposes, so there isn’t a universal agreement, even within traditional sources, on the subject. So there was a lot of culling involved, and I can see why no one had tried to compile all this before. By contrast, the traditional Chinese and Japanese meridian systems are pretty systematic and well-documented.

3. Yes, all the different chakra mappings from different traditions was one of my favorite parts of the book. How did you gather information on some of the more obscure ones, like the Cherokee and Mayan systems?

Well, when it comes to the chakras especially, I have been an avid reader on this topic for decades. As a child I was very intuitive, but I shut that down at about twelve, and opened back up in my early twenties, and since that time have been incessant about gathering information about the chakras, auric fields, intuition, divination, and other energy-related topics. So I had information on many of these systems in my library, and just had to dig a little deeper to get more info. The Mayan system for example, I had probably known about for twenty or twenty-five years from reading, and had also traveled down to the area to receive teachings directly from teachers and shamans.

4. So how about the scientific material, the information on physics and related scientific research that you also include in the book – was that information new to you or had you also been studying that for a long time?

No, it wasn’t new to me. About fifteen years ago I began to wonder if everything I was studying and doing was just so much New Age mumbo-jumbo, or whether there was some scientific validity to what was going on. I learned about the Hunt study, by Dr. Valerie Hunt, a UCLA professor who did research on the chakras. Since that time I have had a burning interest in gathering all the scientific information I could related to my areas of interest. A lot of that drive is personal, because growing up I was very intuitive, and was often told I was weird, or making things up, etc. And I came from a family with several medical doctors, so I was always kind of the black sheep. So subconsciously I do think I have been driven even more to find these kinds of scientific studies, so that I can say, ‘look, there really is something to this, this is science.’ And in fact, not only is there science about these invisible phenomena, but more and more science is saying the invisible drives the visible.

I am not against allopathic medicine at all, that is why I put in the physical anatomy section of the book. But to me, that is just the tip of the iceberg, just what we can see. If something can come out of the energetic realms to help us develop new ways of diagnosing people, or doing surgery, or whatever, then that can really help people. And these are the same worlds – the world of the meridians and chakras is the same world as the one we knock-on and call ‘allopathic’ or ‘concrete’ or ‘real.’ It’s the same world, and only science can explain that. Spirituality helps us experience it, but only science can help us explain it.

5. Yes, I couldn’t agree more, these two worlds are starting to come together. Which raises another interesting question, did you find a lot of difference between the systems derived for healing purposes and those derived for spiritual purposes?

Yes, I did. The meridian systems are very body-based, and so are well-diagrammed and universally agreed upon. And there is more research supporting the use of those systems. But most of the chakra systems have been developed within the context of spiritual teachings, and aren’t very body-based. Part of my life’s work has been to make chakra work more body-based, and actually that has bothered some people. In the past, when I was presenting work on using the chakras for aiding relationships, or manifesting abundance, people were offended by that. They said ‘this is an enlightenment system’. So that was a concern in this book too. I knew some of the kundalini teachings with a spiritual heritage have traditionally been kept private, and that there would be people that would say it was dangerous for me to make these so readily available.

6. Yes, I have run across that attitude too sometimes, in my own chakra meditation teaching. But I am starting to think that some of these things that might have been dangerous or risky in the past are not anymore, because of the heaviness of today’s world.

Yes, that’s a good point. In today’s world, we need every source of light, and passion, and compassion, that we can get to break through. We’ve had enough breakdown recently, we need a breakthrough. So maybe some of these techniques that in the past were considered only safe in the hands of a few are for us all now. We all need to be enlightened now. There’s just no turning around anymore. I think it’s exciting to put so-called ‘ancient knowledge’ or ‘hidden knowledge’ in people’s hands and minds. Because this really is ‘the secret’. The ‘secret’ isn’t wrapped up into some single law, the law of attraction…it’s really all these teachings. And this is really what this book is supposed to be doing, to be making that knowledge available.

7. I think it is a very empowering book in that way. Another question I wanted to ask you about regarding chakras was when you write that although most traditions discuss them as wheels of light, from a psychic’s point of view they are more like loosely connected bands of waves. Can you talk more about that?

Well basically in the world there are particles, or little dots of energy, and waves, or bands of moving energy, and then there is energy like light or photons that are both particles and waves. Chakras are able to convert waves of energy into particles and particles into waves. So chakras that are in the body, that center in the body, are almost like a little particle, but that particle emanates waves – waves and waves of energy. And chakras are able to read or hook into bands of waves that hook into the right vibratory level, and bring those into the system, into the body, and into different parts of us as well. So I think it’s a mistake that people just think of them as conical wheels. The ‘wheels’ are made out of these spectrums of streaming bands of energy. And not only do they emanate to the front and back, if you really look at it, the waves go sideways as well. There are bands of energy that go off the chakras that aren’t the auric fields and go out to the sides – and up and down for that matter.

8. It’s like they are a whole data collection system.

That’s really what they are – data collection, data storage, data interpretation. And information is only as good as what you know how to do with it. So that’s part of the chakra healing process – figuring out what good ‘software’ programs we have in there, and what bad ones, and how can we convert the bad ones. And then we can go a step further and say, ‘what latent programs do we have?’ What programs are programs that ‘came in’ with me, you could say, the ‘spirit’ programs, because those are stored on the inside of the chakras too.

9. Yes, fascinating. Ok, we are running short on time and I have to ask you a question that is personally important to me, regarding the second chakra. I feel like the second chakra functions differently in men and in women, and I haven’t been able to find much information on this. Do you think this is the case, and if so, have you come across anything on this?

I love it! In my first book, New Chakra Healing, which is actually getting reissued in July with more material, I actually do talk a bit about this. It came about because in my own healing work I kept seeing that women’s and men’s second chakras were different. Then years ago I read one of the Carlos Casteneda books, and he talks about the idea that women have an entire universe inside of their uterus. That the uterus itself is like a mini-universe, and it mirrors the outer universe. And because historically women are used to being treated like nothing, because on the outside they have had little, they have actually learned how to travel on the inward planes through this universe, whether in dreams or visions or other means.

So I personally believe that the seat of the kundalini in women is their second chakra. It has to of course incorporate the first chakra, but in women the second chakra initiates it. Which means that women really initiate [the kundalini rising] through second chakra areas such as feelings, emotions, the maternal instinct, and the desire to connect, much more than the desire to individuate [which is associated with the first chakra.] So these chakras are completely different for men and for women. And I think women’s power center is actually the second chakra, not the first chakra.

10. That’s exactly what I think! But I haven’t been able to find any support for that in classical texts. Have you, or do you think they were all written by men and so the information is just not there?

I think they were all written by men, I haven’t found it in any of the classical texts either. The only thing I ever found were the Castenada references. Women haven’t written – they know these things, but haven’t written them. It wasn’t safe – it wasn’t that long ago that women with visions or strong feelings were taken to the hospitals to have their uteruses removed, because they were ‘hysterical’ – that’s the ‘hysterectomy.’ If you look at history, until recently it hasn’t been safe for women to show these second chakra powers. The only other resource I can think of is Diane Stein, she’s written a lot of books about psychic abilities in women, and may talk about this a bit, but not so much from a technical perspective – the energy anatomy perspective.

11. Yes, well and for me my interest in this was really triggered by motherhood. At the point I had kids, at 37, I had already been doing chakra meditation for 15 years, and it took me a long time after the birth of my first child to figure out how to regather my second chakra, and still allow a healthy connection from it to my child. I feel like there is this whole tantric motherhood aspect that needs to be discovered and addressed.

Yes. I had a child first at 28 and then at 39, and I have worked with a lot of pregnant women, and based on my experience I started to track what I call the ‘cords’, a maternal cord between mother and child. I talk about this in the upcoming new edition of New Chakra Healing. It’s like an umbilical energetic cord. And it gradually resides over time, first at 3 months, then at 6 months, etc. Women are often shocked, they feel like they can’t do the things they used to do, and it’s because some of the energy is going to the child. And I don’t think you ever completely get the line back, you just have to learn to work with it. This is why you see a lot of women who don’t hit a stride of success or momentum, especially spiritually, until their fifties, when their kids are older. And of course some of us take that energetic cord and stick it into the wrong people, men or our own mothers or wherever, and feed them our energy, which is where we really lose our power.

Thank you Cyndi. Here’s The Subtle Body at Amazon, or visit Cyndi’s website. And here’s the full interview in mp3 form (please note that this recording is a little choppy – I hadn’t originally planned on posting the audio file):

cyndidaleinterviewmp3

Please: this with anyone you think might be interested.

Review – The Subtle Body: An Encyclopedia of Your Energetic Anatomy

I don’t usually like to do book reviews so close together (just recently did Empowering Your Indigo Child), but I find myself recommending The Subtle Body by Cyndi Dale to everyone I know (including recently in a comment on a healing blog I visit, Heal Pain Naturally), so I decided I should just go ahead and review it already! Plus, this book is related to some of the themes I recently covered in Women’s Energy Bodies – Phases and Life Cycles, and that I will be looking at in more detail in my upcoming mystic spirituality for women series, so it actually provides a nice transition post.

**EDIT**After this review was published, I was lucky enough to interview Cyndi on many topics related to this book, so be sure to check out that post too.

The subtitle for the The Subtle Body is ‘An Encylopedia of Your Energetic Anatomy’, and this is exactly what it is. Ms. Dale, an already respected author, healer and writer on the chakras (and sure to be even more so after this work) has compiled and detailed energy body teachings from virtually every known energy healing tradition. Among these are Traditional Chinese Medicine, Ayurvedic medicine, native and shamanic traditions from around the world, Hindi, Tibetan and Kabbalah chakra systems, ancient Greek philosophy, Western mystic teachings such as those from the Rosucrucians, and many, many others. She has combined this material with sections on basic human anatomy, and coverage of cutting-edge science that supports the mind/body/spirit connection, including work in physics and research into various alternative healing methods.

The result is simply amazing, a masterpiece really, for any healer open to the idea that “All medicine is essentially energy medicine, for energy composes the world.” It is also a gift to anyone like myself who is not a healer but an occult geek interested in any and all energy body teachings. The book is primarily written as a reference manual for healers, and as such begins with chapters on general energy healing principles, and a chapter on ethical guidelines for healers. It then moves into a section on basic human anatomy. Although this anatomy section is pretty straightforward, Ms. Dale intersperses research tying energy theories to physical anatomy, such as one on the energetic principles behind DNA, and a sidebar on the different types of brain waves.

From there the book moves into its core topics, with major sections on Energy Fields, Energy Channels, and Energy Bodies. The Energy Fields section provides a primer on energy fields, from both a physics and energy healing perspective. Part of the value of this book is that Ms. Dale manages to explain things like the Unified Field Theory and Zero-Point Field Theory in terms a non-scientist like myself can understand (or mostly understand, anyway.) She then moves into all different kinds of waves, L-Fields and T-Fields, and more importantly, what all this has to do with various energy body theories. If all this sounds a bit too theoretical, don’t worry – since this is structured as a reference manual, each chapter is self-contained, and you don’t need to read it cover to cover. I have to admit to getting a bit bleary-eyed at the various wave theories, but I perked up in her section on Field Pollution, which covers the potential impact power lines, cell phones and microwaves have on our body’s various energy fields. I also particularly liked her chapter on Sacred Geometry, and the patterns underlying our physical world that help us work with subtle levels, including as part of healing.

The Energy Channels section is mostly devoted to a presentation of the meridian system used in Traditional Chinese Medicine, which serves as the source for both acupuncture and acupressure. Beautiful color pictures detail all the major meridians, and several comprehensive charts break down their relationships to the elements, acupuncture points, internal organs, and more. The Energy Bodies section then covers my primary interest – chakra systems, including the classic Hindi system, the slightly different Tibetan system, the Tsalagi (Cherokee) system, an Incan system, a Christian version derived from the Bible’s last book Revelations, Egyptian and African systems, and a Kabbalah-derived system. As with the meridians, each system is beautifully illustrated, and charts relate them to physical body parts and ailments. Ms. Dale also provides an overview of the role of chakras in the kundalini meditation practiced within some Hindu and Tibetan spiritual traditions. She finishes up with a section describing what must surely be every energy diagnostic and healing practice in the world – from acupuncture, cupping, moxibustion, and crystal use to thai massage,  numerology, radionics and mudras.

As I said, this book is a reference, an Encyclopedia, and is priced as such. But it is also expertly organized and indexed, to assure that a reader can return to it over and over looking for guidance on a particular ailment, energy system, or healing practice. Ms. Dale does compare the systems, but doesn’t try and reconcile the differences between them, or offer judgment on which are more effective or provable, leaving that, presumably, to the healer and/or reader. I would think any healer would want to own this book and keep it close at hand, and anyone interested in energy body theories from a spiritual perspective as well.

To check out quotes from the book, see the associated Twitter account homepage (I’ve been enjoying the daily quotes for a couple of weeks), and the author’s website at http://www.cyndidale.com/. You can also purchase the book at Amazon.

And, although I know book reviews don’t normally inspire a lot of comments, please feel free to use the comments on this one to recommend any related resources you have found, or, if you have read any of Cyndi Dale’s other books or know her personally, provide more feedback. I really enjoyed receiving so many of your comments on my last post, and have vowed to encourage more commenting going forward (unfortunately I found out I can’t install CommentLuv without upgrading to WordPress.org, and I just don’t have the mental bandwidth for that right now, but I do love your comments anyway!) I’ll continue the mystic series I started with my last post later this week….

And if you like, please: