Bright and Dim Chakras

Here's a very brief other kind of description of the main functions of each chakra. There are many many such descriptions, often very different from one another. These I have adapted from one of my favorite spiritual teachers, Jo Dunning.

These form answers to a series of questions about self and life, starting with the most basic which must be answered first. Each one can be answered only in terms of the answer to the previous one. Each chakra has a unique and valuable function in our lives.

FIRST CHAKRA  “I am.”

Will I survive? Am I safe? Will my existence last? Will this embodiment continue to exist for awhile? Will my needs be met? Is the universe in which my embodiment exists friendly, or hostile, or in different to my existence?
 
SECOND CHAKRA  “I can.”

Now that I feel reasonably safe, do I have any ability to do anything? Do I have any influence on anything? Am I empowered to act and change and create?

THIRD CHAKRA  “I will.”

If I have the ability to do something, what do I want to do? What do I will?  What will or want or desire is being me, flowing through me, seeks expression as me?

FOURTH CHAKRA  “I connect.”

Where do others fit into my wanting and willing to do something? How do I take others into account? What is my relationship to others, as I can and I will? What is my feeling-connection to the Whole, as I can and I will?

FIFTH CHAKRA  “I express.”

Now that I am safe, and I can, and I will, and I relate in all that, how do I express my will, put it into manifestation? Do I express my abilities and my wants as separate or part of the Whole?

SIXTH CHAKRA   “I know.”

What wisdom or knowledge do I bring to bear to shape and influence and help choose my expression? How do I express what I know? Am I expressing blindly, or guided by what I know and by my wisdom, combined with the Larger Wisdom available to me? Do I “know” as separate, or as part of the Whole?

SEVENTH CHAKRA  “I AM.”

Am I separate from everything else, or am I – and all of my safety, my ability, my will, my relating, my expressing, and my knowing – in a vast context of which I am one expression and one part? Is my true and largest identity a part of the Whole. How do my safety, my ability, my relating, my expressing, and my knowing embody the Largest Self I AM?

The I AM of Chakra 7 returns to the I am of Chakra 1, but in more Wholeness, more Unity of the embodiment with the All. The I AM self-identity is more than, vaster than, the I am self-identity, but it includes the I am self-identity. Both are equally “true” and equally important.

If I could map this into the discussion above, I would, but it seems a different perspective. Useful, I hope.

Blessings, OM Bastet

Alex and Nicole, I appreciate your comments !! Thanks for stopping by, I am honored you would comment.

Nell, that is a wonderful classic exercise; lots of people experience beneficial effects. I now see that the way I worded the sentence you questioned is indeed ambiguous. I did not mean there is not a flow up or down the body from chakra to chakra; clearly there is, and in between as well.

By  “no directionality or progression” I meant that the “higher” chakras are not automatically and universally more spiritual, better, closer to God or to godliness. Nor are the lower chakras more “base,” or automatically darker, or less refined, or less godly.

Thus in Tantra, when they talk about taking sexuality as an automatically “lower” vibration – lower in every sense of the meaning – and moving it up through the other chakras, refining, ”purifying” it til it reaches the “purest” crown chakra – that to me is a very mistaken notion. Since each chakra can be its pure version or impure version, going “up” or “down” has nothing to do with purifying or impurifying energy from one chakra to another.

The flow is good, the flow is healthful, and as your exercise suggests, the flow needs to be free in BOTH directions. That is simply healthy energybody functioning.

Another way to say what I meant was, I was trying to say that the upper chakras are not universally and automatically more evolved than the lower ones. Any chakra can be more or less evolved than the others.

That said, if we use the rainbow color metaphor for chakras, red is certainly a slower vibration than violet, and we normally associate slower vibrations with density, dimness, contractedness, negative emotions, and decreased consciousness, thus less of “godliness.”

So there must be SOME kind of difference between lower and upper chakras, but I will have to say I have not yet concluded what that difference might be.

Hadn't thought of that, that interconnectedness of chakras is promoted by their brightness, excellent point. And interconnectedness, ease and openness of flow, is a healthy thing.

Oh, and that reminds me to comment that many people regard a healthy chakra as “open” instead of, or in addition to, being “bright.” I have thought and sensed about that, and I think openness and closedness of a chakra is somewhat related to health, in this sense: a healthy chakra is flexible, can be opened or closed to any degree, with ease and freedom, depending on how appropriate the situation is. There are some situations in which one wants to keep one's energetic radiations/expressions pulled in, and others in which one wants them to radiate out to the max. The only problem is when a chakra gets STUCK open or closed. Does that make sense?

A stuck-open chakra leads to energy drains, lack of appropriate personal boundaries, weakness, ill health. A stuck-closed chakra leads with being withdrawn, ineffective, unpowerful, no empathy, and ill health. That's my impression, anyway.
 
If people are interesting in learning more about chakras, one nice resource right here in the community is The Chakra Club cultivated by my Friend Marianna. There are some great posts there, and she has an ongoing in-person group which inputs to the Club here.

Blessings, OM Bastet

Thank you, Mila. I value your opinion !

Hugs, OM

Gee Nell, I guess I am glad the original comment never arrived, 'cause I sure like THIS one !!!!!!

I would always presume your intention to enrich, not to take away, that's just who you are !! I'm glad you were inspired to add your thoughts, much appreciated.

Also, in my perspective I see chakras instead of open and closed, more like clear and active, or blocked and inactive, and its energy directed inward, outward or both.

Yes, I too mostly see chakras as clear/blocked, and more or less active, and sometimes energy mostly inward or outward at the moment. These are all metaphors, as is Bright/Dim and open/closed. If a chakra is completely closed/blocked/inactive, I think, the person is not alive! These “engines” are all necessary to being alive. So it's really a matter of degree. 

And by “dimness” I am not referring to level of activity; I have clarified this, I hope, below. Not that you made that interpretation, but I see now that someone might.

Perhaps one could say that every chakra has its own unique frequency which resonates in support of its purpose. Every chakra resonates in harmony with the intention(s) behind it, and if these intentions are attuned with a divine source, then they are all just as godly or divine.

I might tweak some of the wording a bit differently in my own perspective, but we seem to be in basic agreement.

If I didn't say so explicitly, I do think each chakra has its own unique frequency which expresses and supports and is the activity of its purpose in our lives.

My list of the functions of each chakra, in my first comment, gives what I think of as what you might mean as the “intentions” behind each chakra, and the “brighter” or more open or clear the chakra, the more of the Divine Being/Light/Love is flowing into and AS the activity/expression of that chakra in the world.

Does that wording resonate for you as yours does for me?

WRT “open” or “closed” I think some of the time we are referring to inward or outwardly directly. There are circumstances in which it is not appropriate or optimal for a chakra to be operating in outward expression at full blast, and just as our eyes close sometimes, so the chakra decreases the energy of its expression outwardly, while maintaining its full “brightness” inwardly. This is not the same as becoming “dim” in the sense I meant it in the blog. 

Closed does not mean “blocked.” And is not “dim” either.
Glad to have a chance to clarify that.
 
Thanks again for your contribution, Nell !!

Namaste, OM