This article is an excerpt from chapter 5 of the book “7-Day Chakras” by Shai Tubali.
At the lowest point of your abdomen—at the level of the pubic bone, just above the genitals—the sacral chakra (Swadhisthana) resides. The Tantric scriptures speak of it as the repository of our dormant life force, the potent source of all passion. Whereas the traditional worldview treats this chakra as a spiritual barrier that might lead to attachment to sensual temptations and desires, its positive side determines your capacity to fully enjoy and appreci- ate life’s tastes, juices, and pleasures. Tuesday is your opportunity to celebrate the sensual dimension of your life and to color your entire week with the sacral chakra’s colorfulness.
Feel the Day of Joy
Good morning. You have just woken up to a day when your five senses are invited to expand and let in all the possible joys of life. Before anything else, smile. Even if you are still somewhat hazy or full of thoughts, never mind. By letting a wide smile spread on your face, you will contact Tuesday’s frequency, informing your sacral chakra that you are game.
Notice how beautifully located this Day of Joy is. Happily sand- wiched between the Day of Grounding and the Day of Power, it helps break any excessive sense of linearity and progress. While all three days belong to one phase that is wholly dedicated to the cul- tivation of your basic relationship with the material world, Tuesday acts as a naughty disruptor, making sure that you do not get stuck in the groove of only focusing on duties, details, and tackling chal- lenges like any adult “should.”
Tuesday is a celebration of life itself. In so many ways, the uni- verse is a party of eruptive energies, bodies, and passions. The many interactions between these elements offer countless thrill- ing and delightful experiences. Tuesday allures you to leave your routine behind and join this party. Your daily commitments and engagements, which are all future-oriented, show you the mean- ingfulness of a carefully built life. But Tuesday is all about life in the here and now, life’s meaning in this moment that generously stretches in all directions.
Shake off your concern that in following the Day of Joy, you might lose precious time required to make sufficient progress this week. First of all, the chakra week offers you three full days to act seriously in the world: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Second, progress is endless, and if you suppress that nagging feeling in your lower abdomen that tells you that life cannot be only that, you might end up having all your life’s juices and passions dry out. When you were a child, you embodied the knowledge that life in itself is pure joy that requires no justification. You do not need to work hard to deserve it. It is your birthright to enjoy this gift today.
As much as possible, do not rush today; you have enough time to pause and be conscious of life’s beauty and the very fact that you are alive. Breathe this simple recognition into your lungs. Then ask yourself what is truly and deeply enjoyable for you. Let enjoyment be your guiding compass today; it connects you to this dimension of your life.
Are you still in bed?
Recognize the Blessings
As you begin your day, open up to receive its radiant wisdom, gifts, and powers. The sacral chakra is the center in you that determines the degree of your excitement about life. How much passion is burning in you to start a new day? A new day is not the equivalent of another day; it is the feeling that the day is an unexplored potential of experiences, revelations, and creativity, not a repetition of what has already been fixed as your routine. Tuesday is all about regaining the sense of exciting freshness. It is your precious opportunity to contact life’s flame in you.
Give spontaneity a chance. Pursue impulses and feelings rather than thoughts and concepts. Surprise yourself. At least for today, life does not need to move in straight lines. When did you last consider your day an unpredictable adventure? Often, dis- rupting routine opens a door to brilliant, out-of-the-box ideas or to solutions for lingering problems that our linear thinking has overlooked as a result of its narrow and fixed perception.
Spontaneity is one way to feed the sacral chakra. Indeed, it is a hunger-stricken center in you, and as you find more ways to sati- ate it, it will repay you with a restored energy, equipping you with an overflowing life force and releasing any trace of exhaustion or depression. It will fill you with the lost sense of the child that you were, feeling that life is a playground and that you are a player.
But what do malnourished sacral chakras like to eat? Pleasur- able impressions and sensory participation in life’s delights, from feeding your eyes with beauty and aesthetic pleasure, to allowing your body to experience intimate touch, to the intoxicating sensa- tion of sweet foods and artful cuisine, to laughter that spreads with healing forces throughout your body. There is no need for cautious moderation today. There are enough chakra days to restrict your passions and channel them in more “refined” directions. Today’s teaching is to feel more strongly and experience more totally. While it is good to tame some of your self-destructive impulses, make sure that you do not throw the baby out with the bathwater; don’t become morally “good” at the expense of your colorful—even wild—parts. Indeed, many addictions and obsessions are twisted forms of this suppression. As soon as you water this chakra, joy reappears in its original and pristine form.
Tuesday’s message to you is to activate your body and its senses as extensions of nature’s explosive energies. Think of but- terflies, rainbows, and spring flowers; all are bursts of life’s joy of creativity, generously brushing our vision of the world with intense colors. Your body is not merely a vehicle that leads you from the office to your sofa; it is an inseparable and vibrant part of nature, and through its senses it has the power to explore this life of sights, sounds, tastes, smells, and sensations. Follow the elementary powers of your senses to literally get in touch with life’s many offerings.
Connect with the Day’s Happiness
There are two major types of meaning and happiness. One is found in the way we steadily build a stable life that, at the same time, keeps growing and expanding. This sense of an unfolding realization of our potential is deeply connected with the feeling that there is a future to aspire for. But this is only half of the pic- ture. The other type of happiness cannot derive from the future. In fact, it can be known only by rejecting even the subtlest form of waiting. This is the happiness of the here and now.
The happiness of now reveals itself when you do not rush to participate in the grand project of the future. Instead, slow down and look around. Rest your attention upon the simpler, mostly overlooked realities of life. For instance, that you are alive and breathing, or that the clouds create breathtaking formations against the background of the vast blue sky, or that the happy and sweet voices of playing children infiltrate your office. Indeed, if you take a deep look into the heart of the moment, you realize that it is problem-free. It transcends the subconscious obsession with searching for problems and struggling to resolve them. At the core of the now there is a bubbling, gushing sense of joy, and from it, the cosmos spreads with its immensely artful expres- sions. Acknowledging all that, you may realize that you hardly contain the riches of this moment, so how can you possibly yearn for anything more besides it?
Seek this type of happiness today. And, as an expression of it, engage yourself as much as possible in activities that are driven by passion and that are not measured by their outcome. Do things for no good reason: paint, write a poem, stroll in the park, or take pictures that capture minor details of life and the world. Not all actions should be purposeful, intended for achieving another cause; some things just happen, out of sheer impulse, and disap- pear without leaving a trace.
Pleasures are a good example of activities that arise from the happiness of the now. They appear and disappear. Dancing with totality is meaningless; you will not be able to retain that ecstasy, so what is the point? There is no point. Pleasure is meaningful only in the now. Therefore, enjoy pleasurable experiences and know that you cannot keep them. Experience them deeply; they hold unknown depths of feeling and sensation. There is so much to discover in the realm of feeling, yet only your deep devotion to the now can let you into this kingdom.
“Today …
Repeat These Affirmations
… I am following my enjoyment instinct.”
… I release the joyful child in me that only wants to experi- ence and explore.”
… I allow the force of spontaneity to show me the way.”
… I acknowledge life’s beauty in the here and now.”
… I am becoming aware of the celebration of nature and the cosmos.”
… I am noticing life’s bright colors.”
… I am opening all my five senses.”
… I am feeling the river of life force gushing inside my body.”
… I am dancing my way through life.”
… I keep my inner smile no matter what happens.”
Continue to read the full chapter
