6 Ways to Connect to & Balance Your Heart Chakra
We are in February, the month of love, which if you’ve been following me on Instagram you’ll know, I have dedicated to everything Heart Chakra, so it only felt right for my first blog to also follow this topic.
The Heart Chakra (Anahata in Sanskrit) is the 4th of the major Chakras or energy wheels in our body and serves as our centre of empathy, compassion, forgiveness and love for self and for others. It’s also known as the Heart Centre because it connects three upper body chakras and three lower body chakras. It is associated with the colour green (representative of love energy and transformation), and is located in the centre of the chest.
Our Chakras can become blocked or unbalanced by stress, anxiety or emotional upheaval. Blocked chakras can affect our entire existence, even manifesting as physical and mental illnesses or disease.
But how can I tell if my Chakra is blocked?
When your Heart Chakra is balanced you are able to connect with yourself, your loved ones and the world around you. You will feel open to experiences and the ebbs and flows of life. A balanced Heart Chakra enables us to direct love to ourselves, to truly love and accept ourselves and our bodies as and where they are. A balanced heart chakra also allows you to be who you are instead of attempting to mould yourself to external expectations.
Signs of a blocked Heart chakra can include co-dependency or manipulative behaviours, an inability to trust yourself or others, depression, feeling unworthy, loneliness, an inability to forgive others or yourself, having hateful beliefs or holding grudges against people you love, fear of intimacy or love, continually putting yourself in the position of either the victim or the saviour, struggling to maintain healthy connections and relationships with others. Physically, a blocked Heart chakra can also show up as problems with circulation, extreme highs or lows in blood pressure in the body, and issues with the heart, lungs, chest, arms or hands.
Okay, I have signs, how do I fix this?
Well the first thing to do is not panic! With the lifestyles most of us have today, our Chakras can easily be knocked out of balance, but it’s possible to bring it back to balance. Here are 6 ways to connect with, heal and balance your Heart Chakra.
1. Meditation
Meditation can help you to restore energy flow so is great for healing and keeping the chakras in balance. I recommend a Heart Centred meditation to allow you to bring focus to the heart and the Heart chakra, either your own or a guided meditation (there are lots out there!). The key is to find what works for you, do it in a space and at a time that you won’t be disturbed, and make yourself comfortable.
💡 Tip: Team with a heart associated crystal such as rose quartz, rhodonite, green aventurine or emerald for extra healing power. You can check out our crystal powered goodies here.
2. Loving Kindness Meditation
Another meditation but one that deserves it’s own entry. Also known as a Metta meditation, this is a centuries old practice that originates from the Buddhist tradition.
A Metta or loving kindness meditation involves repeating a set of phrases that send out your wish to yourself firstly and then to all other beings to be happy, peaceful and healthy or well.
You begin saying the phrases to yourself (may I be happy, may I be peaceful, may I be well) , then expand to an increasingly wider group beginning with someone you love or are close with, then someone you are neutral toward, then someone you have negative feelings about, then to all beings, replacing the “I” in the statement to you/we accordingly.
💡 Tip: I’d recommend doing a guided Metta meditation first, as this will help you to relax into the meditation.
I’ll leave a disclaimer here: Metta/Loving Kindness Meditation is not for the faint-hearted! Metta practices require you to dig deep, but the outcome is that with time you will become more connected to yourself and those around you, and you open to compassion, forgiveness and empathy towards yourself and others.
3. Heart Chakra Affirmations
Positive affirmations are short statements that can help you to increase the levels of positive energy associated with the Heart Chakra. You can recite them at intervals throughout the day, incorporate them into your meditations, write yourself notes with them on, write them on sticky notes and stick them to your mirror or your computer screen, or set them as a screensaver on your phone or tablet.
Examples of heart affirmations include:
I am open to receiving love
I am open to giving love
I am wanted and I am loved
I forgive others and myself
💡 Tip: Our Chakra Pocket Busters come with affirmation cards. Check them out here.
4. Journaling (& Specifically Gratitude Journaling)
Journaling is a method of expressing and releasing thoughts and feelings and can be a powerful tool for healing It can be very helpful in accessing both the left analytical and rational and the right creative, emotional sides of the brain. This specific act of writing taps into your brainpower, improves mental wellbeing and gets your creative juices flowing.
Gratitude journaling is particularly effective for activating the Heart Chakra. If your heart chakra is blocked, you may feel like nothing is going right for you, that you are alone in what you are facing; it can feel impossible to see any kind of silver lining in things. Gratitude journaling helps you to see and train your mind to see the positive in your life, opening you up a little to more love and joy.
Gratitude journaling can be as simple as writing down three things that you are grateful for every day. In no time you’ll find yourself seeing positives in whatever situations you find yourself in.
💡 Tip: Don’t overthink the things you feel thankful for, it could be as simple as enjoying a nice meal, the weather being nice, or a phone call you’ve had with a friend or loved one.
5. Essential Oils
Essential Oils have been used for different types of healing for centuries. Essential oils are said to tonify the chakras, meaning they bring the positive gifts forward and help bring balance to any shadow parts. They can also help to balance your heart by elevating your external environment which in turn will then elevate your inner state.
Essential oils for opening and balancing the heart chakra include:
Rose
Geranium
Jasmine
Mandarin
Pine
Neroli
Sandalwood
Ylang Ylang
Essential oils are often used in diffusers, but you can also reap the benefits of these incredible oils through using the oils in a bath, adding them to a carrier oil for a massage or through candles and wax melts.
💡 Tip: To get the most benefit from essential oil candles and wax melts, ensure they have been made with 100% pure essential oils, with a natural (non-paraffin or kerosene) based wax. Explore our wax melts here.
6. Reiki & Quantum Reiki
In dealing with an energetic block, you need to get the energy moving which is what Reiki does. When energy flows through the whole body, through your chakras and meridians, it creates harmony and releases imbalances. Reiki assists to bring the chakras into alignment and balance.
Quantum Reiki is the most potent and advanced style of Reiki to date, and takes healing to new, deeper levels. At a basic level, Quantum Reiki is Reiki combined with quantum consciousness theory that provides more profound results into the subconscious mind. Quantum Reiki focuses on diving into the subconscious mind to pull out any trauma buried deep down in ourselves. Once the trauma is located, it is healed using universal life force energy. It is delivered through distance or in-person non-invasive light touch via a certified practitioner. They can identify energetic imbalances within your chakras and help clear out any negative or stagnant energy.
Quantum Reiki Healing is launching on 1st March! Join the priority list here.
Once healed and fully opened the energy of the Heart Chakra is capable of bringing healing to your entire existence. Healing your heart chakra is a process, but once you become aware of this powerful energy centre, and restore its energy flow, it sets you up for evolution.
If you want to know more about your chakras, Quantum Reiki, energy healing tools and how these can elevate your life, make sure you’re subscribed to my emailing list, and follow me on Instagram or Facebook (links below). You can also visit our shop here.