This Business of Chakras…

This post was originally published in November, 2009 as Whose Chakra Is It Anyway.

In a session with a client a while ago, I described the chakras of her business, and how they related to some problems she was experiencing.

If you’re wondering how chakras and business ended up in the same sentence, bear with me-All Will Be Revealed, I promise!

Chakra is a Sanskrit word that means “wheel”. Essentially, chakras are energy vortexes (like bio-computers) that process information from the world around us, as well as from our inner worlds-including our history and biology. They extend from our physical bodies into the subtle-energetic space around us, and link us to our larger, multidimensional selves.

They are the interface between subtle energy and physical matter.

Yet, they’re no more exotic than the mysteries of how blood flows through our veins, or how our marvelous bodies digest food and transform air into fuel for our cells-or any of the other astonishing capacities we have that are more familiar to us only because science has focused its attention and resources on understanding them.

Whether chakras are metaphors or vibrational realities matters little to the empiricist in me. What interests me is effectiveness-if working with them extends my creative capacities, I’ll happily play with them.

So I approach the chakra system as one way of mapping, organizing and working with information to transform and create my life-and my business-in precise, efficient ways. There are sophisticated systems from other spiritual traditions that offer similar technologies of transformation, but this is the one I’m most familiar with. And, after three decades of working with it, I continue to be enchanted by its beauty, flexibility and power.

It’s an efficient, elegant mapping system through which we can explore our reality, and change it.

The implications of this for business are as practical as they are profound.

For one thing, developing skill and precision in working with chakras helps you, as a creative entrepreneur, handle day-to-day situations in your business with an ease that can seem miraculous. (Although the real miracle is that we have these enormous, untapped capacities which we so seldom use.)

An example: You have a big presentation coming up first thing tomorrow. You’ve researched and prepared for it; rehearsed your presentation until its cadences feel natural, easy; and you’ve laid out the clothes you’ll wear in the morning. You’ve gone to bed early so you’ll be rested and ready.

Now, it’s 2 am and your mind is racing. Should you really have used “Oscar the Grouch meets Shrek at the 42nd Street Starbucks” as your central metaphor? What if that funny rattling sound your car made when you were heading home today turns out to be something monumental and the steering wheel falls off just as you’re about to drive to your meeting? Or the car’s okay but you’re halfway there before you realize you forgot your laptop at home and have to go back for it and then you get caught in traffic and then you get pulled over for speeding and then . . . What If?

Sound familiar?

If you knew something about chakras, you would probably realize that the disaster scenarios running through your head while the clock ticks over to 2:30 a.m. are driven by adrenalin pounding through your body. And that by closing down your first chakra (the energy center in charge of keeping you safe from dinosaurs and roving marauders) to a manageable ten percent of its capacity, you can slow down the production of adrenalin in your body almost instantly.

If you were reasonably skilled in working with chakras, you would then clear the debris of the day from the cord that connects your third chakra (which controls your power and energy distribution) to your subtle body; release any energy that isn’t yours; and disconnect from all the other folks who are going to be at tomorrow’s meeting. Many of whom are lying awake, worrying about their presentations too. You’d do this because you’d know that all that worry ends up in your own subtle energy field, unless you consciously disconnect from it.

Because you’re working with subtle energy, which moves much faster than physical energy, you can do all of this work in less than three minutes, without ever leaving your warm bed. Add some simple belly-breathing, fill your chakras with support and safety, and et voila! Before you know it, you’ll be asleep.

In the morning, you’ll be rested and ready for your presentation.

This is just one very simple example of how working with chakras can help you in your business.

But there’s another reason why chakras matter to the health of your business.

Your business has its own presence, its own soul, and its own life. As it grows, it develops a subtle body of its own. Complete (ta-dah!) with chakras.

By exploring the chakras of your business, you can get a clear map of its terrain. You can see the hills and valleys-which areas of your business are strong and can bear heavy loads, which ones are fragile and need care and nourishment.

You can see where your business is leaking energy-this can take the form of money flowing out as fast as it comes in. Or maybe too many clients who aren’t right for you. Which makes you cranky, tired and overwhelmed-not the best way to make decisions.

The good news is, you can change these trends by working with the chakras of your business.

When you remove stagnation and restore subtle-energy flow in a chakra, your business will respond with concrete, positive changes. More of your right clients “miraculously” show up, while those who aren’t right for you leave. Income begins to flow in a steady stream. Miscommunication and missed connections become a thing of the past.

It seems miraculous. Yet these changes are simply a result of using capacities you already have. You may not have developed them yet, but they are there, and they are yours.

Learning to work skillfully with chakras makes you more effective in your business.

How about you? I’d love to hear how you use your extended capacities-your intuition, creativity, genius and multidimensional skills-to help you create and grow your business.