3 Ways to Beat Stress Now
Are you stressed out? Perhaps even at this very minute you’re feeling overwhelmed. Stress is part of your body’s natural fight-or-flight response to danger, and it’s necessary. Your ancestors needed that adrenaline rush so they could run away from tigers, avalanches, and enemy tribes and you need that adrenaline to escape real physical danger as well. The stress response can help you pull through a difficult time, as long as it’s only temporary. What you don’t need or want is a constant underlying stress—that type of all-the-time stress is often the result of an imbalanced first chakra, and is hugely detrimental to your health and quality of life.
But there’s hope! In fact, clearing and balancing your first chakra is something you can do relatively easily with energy healing techniques to help ground you and reconnect you to your body.
Chakras: the Governors of Your Health
If you’re familiar with yoga or energy healing, you already know that chakras are focal points of energy in your body that line up along your spine. There are seven body chakras, and each one corresponds to different body parts and emotional and mental arenas. Together, the seven chakras govern all areas of your life, from relationships to affluence, communication to career, and every aspect of your physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health.
When a chakra is clear and open, it spins gently, moving energy in and out between your personal field and the universal field of energy. You need this fresh energy from the unified field to nourish you and keep you healthy. If your chakras are imbalanced or blocked, your energy flow becomes blocked as well, which can result in all kinds of health problems. A distorted first chakra can lead to issues with your immune system, your legs and feet, your tail bone and colon, and your bones.
Chronic Stress and the First Chakra
If any of your chakras are distorted, it can cause stress, but the most classic cause of chronic stress I see in people is the generalized anxiety created by an ungrounded first chakra. This is the stress that sometimes fades but never disappears, and often occurs even when there are no external stressors.
If you experience constant stress even when life is relatively calm, and you have some of the physical symptoms mentioned above and/or any of these other common symptoms of an imbalanced first chakra: a “spacey” or “floaty” feeling, trouble with organization or focus, fatigue, problems sleeping, or feeling like a victim, your first chakra probably needs some attention and healing.
Causes of an Imbalanced First Chakra
Distortions in the first chakra can be caused by any type of violence or trauma that made you feel unsafe, especially if you experienced the event as a child. Abuse, abandonment, divorce, accidents, and illness are all common triggers for distancing yourself from your body because it’s too painful or scary to stay. This is a defense mechanism I employed myself—shutting down my first chakra and leaving my body to survive the pain of an abusive childhood. What it took me years of energy healing courses, working with spiritual teachers and healers, and meditation to learn was that the only way I could heal the trauma was to be in my body. You can really only protect yourself from harm if you stay present and stay connected through your root chakra.
Your Base, Roots, and Foundation
Your first chakra is your foundation. It is located at the base of your spine and it’s the base of your whole chakra system. What happens if you try to build a structure on a wobbly foundation? The structure will be unstable at best, and at worst, collapse completely. Trying to construct a strong chakra system with a weak base chakra is like trying to build a house on a lot made of Jell-o.
You need this base, this foundational first chakra, to be charged and healthy, or all the rest of your chakras and your greater wellbeing will suffer. This is why a blocked or distorted base chakra leads to chronic stress: how can you relax if your whole energy flow is unstable? Feeling unsafe and uncertain is a likely indication that your first chakra needs a tune-up. http://www.amazon.com/Truth-Heals-What-Hide-Hurt/dp/140192302X
You can also think of it this way: your first chakra is like your roots. It keeps you firmly planted in your body and grounded. In fact, in Sanskrit, the word for the first chakra means root support. The root chakra governs your connection to Mother Earth and its job is to support and sustain your life. In order to grow tall and strong, a tree must spread its roots far enough into the soil to be able to holds its ground while also accepting nourishment from its surroundings. In order for you to heal yourself and grow your spirit, you must plant your roots and get grounded.
Here are three great ways to get grounded and beat stress:
1. Spend time in nature.
Because the first chakra is so closely connected to earth energy, one of the best ways to clear, charge and balance, your root chakra is to interact with nature. Reconnect your body with the earth by walking barefoot directly on land—a grassy field or a sandy beach is a pleasant and soothing way to absorb earth energy. Go for a hike, sit next to a tree (or hug one!), or let the sun warm your skin. Just being outside or touching stone, wood, or water will help to ground you.
2. Meditate.
Twenty minutes of meditation twice a day is ideal, and the more you do it, the more you will notice the grounding and calming effects. Like energy healing, meditation is cumulative, meaning the results build on the previous efforts, so keep it up and the benefits will continue to increase! If you don’t already have a successful meditation practice, please let me teach you. https://deborahking.com/courses/learn-to-meditate-with-deborah/
It only takes several hours to learn how via download and it will totally change your life; it certainly did mine.
3. Focus on your body.
Body-focused activities like yoga, pilates, massage, martial arts, or other forms of exercise are a great way to become more body-centered and grounded. Remember, one cause of first chakra distortion is disassociation from the body, so reaffirming your bond with your body can go a long way in healing your first chakra.
If you’d like to learn more about charging and healing your first chakra, and the rest of your chakras, check out my free video training here