Balanzs Chakra Workshop

Two week ago, after brunch at Crunch (don’t order the scrambled eggs) and cava at Clarence*, Lin and I towed through cold The Hague to the Balanzs Chakra Workshop. The Balanzs yoga studios (The Hague and Rotterdam) are nice and they offer different types of yoga and workshop.

We would be doing a workshop on Chakras! Here’s how that was.

*I love this sentence. Rhyming and alliteration. It’s so nice when things work out. 

Chakras are my Weird Interest of 2016. It used to be Reiki (and it still is, as I use it during meditation as well as a 15-minute-to-fall-asleep technique AND it is compatible with the chakras) but chakras are my jam this year.

I’ve been doing chakra-focused meditations since my experience with them in New York, and I wrote about how I do them. Lin wanted in on it, and found us a workshop in The Hague. I was excited, I love learning about things with energy.

CHAKRAS? Chakras are energy centres, starting from the base of the spine up until the top of your head. They are connected to each other, to smaller energy centres, to your physical body, your mind and your emotional state.

If the chakras are all equally active, the energy flows in the right way and you’ll be healthy and happy. If one or more of your chakras are out of whack, i.e. under active or over active, you’re out of balance and your mental or physical health could suffer from the imbalance in energy.

To me, additionally to the energy woo-wooness of it all, chakras are a representation of different aspect of our lives, and our selves. If you think all this energy stuff is a load of crap or not your thing, investigating chakras and how they work can be an informative undertaking just for this.

However, I’ve had chakra healing and energy work done, and believe you me, it beats Botox.

So I believe these energy centres are a thing, at least for me, and knowledge is power. I wanted to learn more, understand more about them for my own benefit.

THE WORKSHOP 

The teacher introduced herself (can you believe I can’t remember OR find her name anywhere online?), a cute Canadian woman who now lived in The Hague with her husband and two daughters. Then she started us off with some yin yoga before she would start her chakra lecture.

I sort of half ass my way through the postures, because this is not what I came for and the yoga sequence is a little dime-a-dozen to me. A side spine twist here, a child pose there..I’m not into it.

But! Afterwards the lecture on chakras start and I listen like a schoolchild who hears Harry Potter for the first time.

She reads quite a bit from the Powerpoint slides, but adds her own extras and stories to it, which makes it nice to listen to her. We go from the root chakra all the way upto the crown chakra, and she tells us what bodily parts and functions the chakra is connected to, its color, the symptoms when it’s not balanced and what to do about that.

It’s super interesting, and a little disconcerting. Based on all my symptoms (a.k.a. me being a human) ALL MY CHAKRAS ARE TOTALLY FUCKED OH MY GOD PANICKED FLAILING ETC.

My favorite part, surprisingly, is the mantras she provides to strengthen the different chakras. I normally don’t like affirmations but these, with their clear purpose, I appreciate.

ROOT: “I’m grounded in my life and within myself.”

SACRAL: “I open myself to others naturally.”

SOLAR PLEXUS: “My personal power is getting stronger every day.”

HEART: ” I open my heart and share it with others.”

THROAT: “I hear and I speak the truth.”

THIRD EYE: “I am perfectly attuned to my vision.”

CROWN: “I’m open to goodness and abundance.”

Afterwards there is another element where she explains what we can do to connect to our chakras. It goes from going out in nature to connecting with food (I connect with Ben&Jerry’s REALLY WELL, so alright.)

We then do a chakra meditation, and I totally space out for a second. Afterwards we leave all nice and relaxed.

I haven’t abandoned my chakra meditations, but I haven’t gone all balls-to-the-walls in terms of chakra focused meditation and healing either. Maybe I will sometime, but not right now.

Have a great Sunday!