Have you met Manipura? Otherwise known as your Third Chakra, Manipura is where your ‘inner fire’ resides along with the secret to uncovering your personal power.
When Manipura energy is flowing, you feel it…& so does everyone around you. You’re confident, self-assured and bursting with get-up-and-go. Life is an adventure ready to be conquered and you feel feisty, fearless and fabulous.
Strong Manipura chakras can be seen in our greatest world leaders, sportspeople and entrepreneurs.
But Manipura (like all energy centres) needs to be kept in balance. Too much fire and we’ve crossed the line from empowered to ego-filled and arrogant (think Donald Trump!) Too little fire and we’re flakey, riddled with self-doubt and lack the energy to make anything happen in our lives.
So, how do we connect with this crucial Chakra and use it as a force for good?
We start by cultivating Tapas….and not the kind that accompanies Sangria! Tapas in the Yogic world means Self Control. In Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, the second limb of Yoga is dedicated to Niyamas or self discipline…. and this is where Tapas features.
Tapas literally translates as ‘heat’ and is where we build the inner strength to create the best version of ourselves. And we do this by going against what’s comes easiest to us. BKS Iyengar describes Tapas as “a burning desire to cleanse every cell of our body and every cell of our senses, so that the senses and the body may be made permanently pure and healthy and leave no room for impurities to enter into our system
And where do we find the tools to cultivate this burning desire? At Manipura Chakra.
Why is Manipura so important?
As the third chakra, Manipura is arguably one of the most crucial energy centres in the quest for enlightenment. Sitting at the navel, above our primal root and sacral chakras, Manipura is the gateway to our upper chakras, where our intuition, creative potential and capacity to love comes from. If energy is blocked in our Manipura Chakra, all of these ‘higher’ functions are compromised..because they all depend on motivation and the discipline to keep on getting better .
Fortunately the science of Yoga also offers some suggestions for igniting your inner fire both on and off the mat.
- Get twisted Twists offer a chance to rinse out old, stagnant behaviours and beliefs and create space to start something new. By detoxifying and flooding our bodies with fresh blood, we’re flooding our lives with fresh possibilities
- Get to the core: Whether you reach them through a series of Pilates ‘hundreds’ or in a killer chaturanga, your core muscles are the fastest way to fire you up from the inside out.
- Breathe victoriously: If you’ve heard the ‘Darth Vadar’ breathers on the mat and wondered what they’re up to…now you know. They are cultivating Tapas! The famous Ujjayi breath is an amazing way to build inner strength, detox & reinvigorate a frazzled nervous system.
- Turn off the technology: There’s no greater test of self discipline than disconnecting from your devices! So give it a try. Introduce some tech-free time or ban mobiles from the bedroom…& see what appears in the space you create.
- Don’t avoid the hard stuff: Instead of avoiding that dreaded task othat’s been clogging your to-do list, get up early and do it first. Once it’s out of the way, you’ll feel incredible.
- Sit still: Ironically, when we’re forced to do nothing for a period of time, our energy is allowed to build and we’re ejected back into the world with a newfound ‘oomph’ and zest for life. This is why Meditators are able to achieve so much
- Start something new: If you feel like you’re stuck in a rut, the best way to reset your life is to try something new. And if you limit it to a finite amount of time you’re more likely to stick with it. That’s why we’ve created The Transformation Project: a carefully crafted health & wellbeing program designed to create lasting change over 28 days.