Your Heart Chakra, according to chakra experts, is in the center of your chest and develops between the ages of 21 and 27. If your Heart Chakra is in balance, then according to experts, you would completely accept yourself for who you are. Read all about your Fourth Chakra here and learn to use it to get in touch with yourself.
The energy balance in your chakras is said to determine how we feel. This balance could affect us physically, emotionally, and spiritually. If a chakra is out of balance, this could have consequences for the way you experience your environment and on the other hand, how you interact with your environment. The Heart Chakra out of balance, can especially have repercussions for relationships and boundaries.
Heart Chakra Meaning
According to experts, our heart chakra (Anahata in Sanskrit) is located in the middle of the chest, close to our physical heart. This chakra, the 4th Chakra, is located in the middle of a total of seven chakras.
The chakra Anahata is said to be the connection between the spiritual and the earthly. This chakra would stand for love, compassion, and connection with yourself and with the people around you. If we open our heart to ourselves, it could help us to open it to others and create connections. Letting your emotions flow is essential for the well-being of your Heart Chakra. With a well balanced Heart Chakra you can experience, process, and accept, all emotions that may arise.
What Happens in Your Heart Chakra
When it comes to the Theory of Chakra Colors, the Heart Chakra is often expected to be pink by beginners. Although some pink gemstones can stimulate the 4th Chakra, our Heart Chakra is actually connected with the color green and with the element of air. This element represents breathing and movement. If your Heart Chakra is in balance, then you can accept yourself for who you are. Connecting with others feels safe and enriching to you. You can be vulnerable and be present for others and for yourself. Moreover, you could forgive people more easily, and act from trust and compassion towards your fellow man. The color green would represent growth, and the love we need to grow into who we are.
The Heart Chakra could also be seen as the balance of your masculine and feminine sides, or yin and yang. This has nothing to do with gender, but with energies. These energies would again be in proportion to different properties. It is normal for this balance to change throughout your life or even throughout the day! For example, you will behave differently at work than when you are sitting on the couch with your lover at home. Blockages in your Heart Chakra can cause your masculine and feminine energies to be out of balance. You may be subconsciously suppressing one or perhaps you have lost control of one all together.
Heart Chakra Symbol and Color
Each chakra has a specific color, element, symbol, and chakra stone. These special colors, symbols and gemstones can help to open or balance chakras. The symbol of the Fourth Chakra is a lotus with 12 petals. In the middle are 2 triangles that together form a six-pointed star. One triangle represents the spiritual path with more cosmic awareness, and the other triangle represents a path with understanding of life and humanity. So a cosmic and an earthly path, so to speak. Special chakra stones are available with these symbols and colors as decoration. You can read more about it in our blog ‘Chakra Power: Energy Centers for Your Mind and Body‘.
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Heart Chakra Balance
So your heart chakra could increase your ability to connect with yourself and with others. Because your emotions greatly effect the Heart Chakra, betrayal or sorrow can create an imbalance. If then imbalance remains, boundary issues or trouble with codependency may result.
Recognizing a Heart Chakra Blockage
If you have experienced an unpleasant situation, your warm, loving heart may have suffered a bruise. This pain could cause a blockage in your Heart Chakra. You may experience a closed Anahata Chakra as a feeling of loneliness during grief, rejection by the outside world, and difficulty giving and receiving love. Your Heart Chakra is locked, as it were.
Physical Consequences
Although the Heart Chakra is strongly connected to emotions, it is also in connection with the physical body, just like all the other chakras are. For that reason you could certainly experience physical discomfort from your Heart Chakra blockage. You may experience chest pain, shortness of breath or a feeling of restlessness in your body. You could also have tingling fingers and feet.
Heart Chakra Gemstones
The Heart Chakra has to do with receiving and giving love. If your Heart Chakra is in balance, you would be kind, compassionate and work on harmonious relationships. If your Heart Chakra is out of balance, you may be cool and distant and have difficulty both receiving and giving love. You could also suffocate loved ones with your love because your Heart Chakra is out of balance. It can cause you to become quite needy!
A good gemstone Heart Chakra that could help you open it is a stone that is green like the chakra itself, for example Jade. Another Heart Chakra stone could be Green Aventurine. Jade could help you unite your mind, body, and soul. Green Aventurine could balance emotions. However when it comes to gemstone color, Heart Chakra stones can also be pink, like Pink Aventurine or the popular Rose Quartz which both can stimulate an open Heart Chakra.
Other gemstones that match Anahata Chakra:
Tips For When Your Heart Chakra is Out of Balance
Fortunately, you can do some Heart Chakra exercises or follow tips that open your Heart Chakra. Feel the love!
Breathing and Heart Chakra Meditation
A good way to reconnect with our heart (and any other chakra) is through Heart Chakra meditation. Are you breathing with this exercise?
- Put your hand on your heart, close your eyes and take a deep breath.
- Visualize the color green when you inhale, or imagine that you are in a place with lots of greenery. As you’ve read the Heart Chakra’s color is green and the element is air, so a nice lush natural setting with fresh air would be perfect for visualization.
- Imagine yourself giving your love to everything and everyone around you, and getting it back from them.
- During each exhalation, you will feel your body relax.
Try to do this every day, and you may find it easier and easier. You may feel that you are getting closer to your heart and emotions again. In addition, try to involve people who are close to you in what you feel. Express your feelings and ask for help when you need it. It really doesn’t hurt to ask for help!
Heart Chakra Yoga Exercises
Yoga could also help you open your Anahata. Yoga poses that could stimulate your Heart Chakra are the Setu Bandhasana (the bridge pose), dhanurasana (the bow pose) and the urdhva mukha svanasana (the upward facing dog).
Have you also tried the relaxing yoga form Yoga Nidra? This form of yoga is a deep relaxation of about half an hour, and is comparable to several hours of deep sleep. During these sessions you will visit every body part and really go into depth. This could be a good exercise to get closer to yourself.
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Color Therapy with Green
According to chakra healers, the color green would radiate directly to your Heart Chakra. In Color Therapy, green stands for peace, happiness, purity and harmony. The color green could have a medicinal effect and provide self-confidence and strength. So surround yourself, your body and your home with the color green!
More 4th Chakra Exercises
Last but not least: love yourself. Many Heart Chakra exercises are about bringing back peace and balance and accepting certain situations. Love for yourself is the most important thing. Learn to embrace yourself with everything you are and what you feel. Accept yourself when you are angry, sad, or jealous. Healing your wounds starts with accepting every emotion!
How do you balance your Fourth Chakra?
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