The function of the upper chakras is to determine relevancy and to perceive the higher forms of meaning threaded throughout the manifested worlds of perception. By sifting through the massive amounts of sensory data (visual, auditory, tactile, and inner world/mind-screen information) the upper chakras orientate and direct us towards a hierarchy of meaning. Initially, we search for what is safe and nurturing, then we begin to individuate and form a separate conscious identity from the group in which we identify, and finally we make new leaps and discoveries outside of that which we have known to date: we transcend the known, and emerge astonished into a new reality, into one that has always been there, but was subsumed beneath competing (or more primal) realities.

This is also why, when the upper chakras cannot function well due to a neurochemical imbalance or a structural problem, we mistakenly assign relevance or meaning to trivial or fantasy elements of our fragmented perception. Inner voices may torment or overwhelm an afflicted individual, creating a world that only they can validate, effectively isolating them from higher forms of meaning that can usually be shared with others. Schizophrenia, for instance, locks an individual into an imbalanced reality, and a life that cannot interlink with others. Meaning is gleaned from unimportant fragments of our everyday awareness, rather than important ones, making it impossible for the higher chakras to synthesize a coherent vision, one needed to transcendent everyday reality.

A normal and yet sensitive individual can utilize the higher chakras by compartmentalizing the processing of reality into only one area of life experience, such as that of the physical sciences, mathematics, or language aquisition. Relevance is assigned to that area, and yet other parts of the self identity remain at a more normal level of development, and easily related to by the average person. The idiot savant as one extreme example of this, where normal social development is impaired and yet a high level of information processing is achieved by some autistic individuals, in a particular human talent such as visual data retention, or mathematical problem solving.

But it is with the mystic, or the psychically-attuned individual, that we can most appreciate this ability to perceive and open up to higher realities that exist beyond commonly-held belief systems. By seeing both the underlying structure of the universe (as noted by others) and then assembling a coherent reality that transcends the normal or everyday perception of reality, the mystic or psychic steps over a powerful threshold. He or she sees what others can only glimpse: a meaningful world full of relevant patterns, and both natural and man-made agendas at work. The analogy of awakening from sleep is very apt to this event, where the fragments of dreaming sleep we formerly experienced as being real are now superseded by a greater and more relevant experience. Our eyes open, and we see the world as it really is, and not as though lost in a personal dream. And we know this is a higher form of perception, and not as a delusion but as deeper reality, because we can function within it, and we can relate to others about it. Where the schizophrenic is lost in the world, and where the everyday man or woman is distracted by personal preferences, the mystic-psychic individual can now see multiple levels of meaning. The Third Eye opens, and we can now see reality layered, and connected, at multiple levels. A higher form of listening also begins to operate, where we can now listen at deep levels of comprehension, rather than the superficial, everyday way. And, our spoken voices may change, permitting our words to take on a precision that reflects what we now see, and hear, and what we now understand to be the “real” world.

How do we achieve the state of upper chakra development? By first creating a safe and grounded life, nourishing the individuating seed of potential lying within us all. Then, through both life experience and study, we may grow that seed into a unique individuated state, unique in that we are different from the normalized reality in which we have been raised. Finally, through the help of both inner helpers in existing spirit, and through the efforts of other human beings, we can come to differentiate the many different levels of reality, and perhaps to operate within them. We become both human and more-than-human, in that our perception helps us to transcend our very own beginning, as well as go beyond the norms accepted by most other people. And whether our upper chakra development is then expressed through art, or through literature, or by creating spiritual opportunity for others to follow us, the same taste will be found in all these ways we share with others: the taste of freedom from the mundane, and the transcendence of our apparently restricted nature, such that we become more than merely human. We now become awakened to life. We now become … free.

Commentary

Basically, this article is addressing the chakras as being a consciousness developmental energy system, of which the upper chakras participate in reality perception but only after issues of safety and the creation of the individuated self has been achieved. Fear, and conformity to the norm, both restrict upper chakra development from flowering as part of the natural life cycle. Anything in life that keeps us in fear, or aligns us with commonly-held beliefs, act as an inhibitor to any Third Eye development, and to the aquisition of a spiritually-awakened state of being.

Related post: Upper Chakra Energy Work

Energy Healing is concerned with physical, emotional, and mental health. By working with the energy body the energy healer adds something vital to the healing process by working with what is not visible and yet underlies the health and well-being of the client. But there is another form of energy healing work that, although it also works with the non-visible aspects of our physical and emotional nature, is focused upon only one outcome: personal transformation. Energy healing that does not orientate itself mostly around physical healing but rather seeks to help evolve the person receiving the healing, can be labeled Transformational Energy Healing.

Transformational Energy Healing includes any approach that sees a change in the consciousness of the client (or student) as the main goal, rather than the goal of a return to health. It acknowledges that the human consciousness system can become habituated or mired into either a lower-functional state of being, or that childhood or social conditioning misleads the client such that they are unaware of their full potential as conscious beings. Spiritual teachers often speak to these issues, using the vehicle of their particular cultural perspective. But the end result is the same, in that they wish to encourage the transformation of an individual from a lower state of consciousness into a higher, and more spiritual, state of being. This is the goal of transformation: to awaken to a higher understanding of how the universe is, rather than the limited perspective we accepted as children, and then transposed into our adult reality.

Why make this distinction? Why not have the boundary between energy healing and transformational healing be all-encompasing, indistinct, fuzzy? After all, both approaches are intertwined with each other, the way treating anxiety issues can be healed with either herbal treatment, medication, psychotherapy, or with a spiritual practice such as meditation or devotional prayer. The reason I would define them as different is that the end point is different. A client who comes to an energy healer may only want to return to health, and then go back to their lives as before. Transformation change, on the other hand, is a huge undertaking, and may mean you cannot return to your old way of thinking, feeling states, or to your goals for the future. I don’t believe clients should be inducted into such radical changes if they only come to an energy healer to get out of their anxiety, or to recover from a chronic illness, or perhaps heal more quickly from an injury. The client should want to change themselves, after insights gained from their personal healing journey.

In other words, Transformational energy healing recipients are students, not clients. They are studying themselves, their lives, and are awakening to their full potential through the act of consciously evolving themselves. If they are using a devotional path, say by following the example of a Teacher (“Guru”), they may call themselves disciples, devotees, or followers of that Teacher. Or, they may align themselves with a certain path or perspective on transformation that has a long track record, such as Buddhism, or Christian, or perhaps even a New Age world view. Joining others who have a similar goal to ourselves is the classic way we humans grow, or are supported in making personal growth progress. We naturally join a group, and usually come to identify with that group as with a new or adopted family. Our Teacher unconsciouslly becomes our divine Father or divine Mother, and we assume such a relationship to be a natural one, essential to our own eventual awakening. This is in spite of cautionary teachings by some, that spiritual transference (seeing the Teacher unconsciously as a parental figure) always holds problems as well as solutions on our spiritual journey.

But probably the main caution we should bring to Transformational Energy Healing is what happens when it actually works, and we confront the denial of what we don’t want to see, and how we come to create fantasy goals that may hinder us from living a spiritually-healthy life. While regular energy healing seeks to return the client to his or her normal life, healed of illness or a traumatic event in their lives, Transformational energy healing automatically creates a separation between the student and the world in which they live. The new self of the student (now “awakened”) will have to face a new set of challenges, and find a new life with new relationships, in order to live a happy life, or to thrive. This is no small endeavor. And, if the client did not ask for it, in coming to an energy healer, should they really be inducted into it without first making an informed decision?

On a personal note, I have dedicated my healing practice to moving back and forth over this line. A major part of my private healing practice uses energy healing to help my clients return to their lives with more vitality and inner growth than before an illness or other challenge to their health, as well as energy healing sessions designed to improve their energetic connections with both their inner self, as well as with other people. I also work at providing transformational energy healing experiences for students (not clients) that are conscious of a desire to evolve, and transcend the limitations of their past by fully embracing their emerging potential. For the transformational energy healing student there is often no difference between healing and transformational work. But for the experienced practitioner the difference is clear: the recipient of the energy healing work is either in the role of a client, or of a student. With one, our aim is to return them to the world as whole, as healthier.  With the other, with the spiritual growth student, we must understand that they may not be able to return to their old world. With the student, the goal is to awaken as from sleep, as from a dream, and then having to deal with the implications of their now-higher form of awareness. We may desire transformation, but once it is part of our lives we can never return to the old way of being. As one of my teachers once said, you can never undo personal growth; you can only learn to deal with the implications of that growth, and learn to live your life aligned to your new understanding of the universe.

Anyone can read the articles of PEH.com, but only members can make comments, or post their own material on the website. For new members, or those thinking of joining up, please go here and read the “Read Me First” article which will explain the basic usage and agreements of the website. This article is also available as an audio presentation.

Along with written articles PEH.com will also be publishing audio interviews with energy or transformational healers of note, to inspire and inform all of us who are devoted to the evolving field of energy work. These files are hosted on my SoundCloud service, and you should be able to stream them either to your laptop, or to your mobile device of choice.

I’m still working on refining and improving the graphics and usage of this website, so don’t be too surprised if the site looks a little different to the screenshots on this page.

To apply for membership you can send me an email (see below), and include your energy healing credentials. Currently I’m accepting both student and experienced energy healers into membership. You will be able to view any PEH.com author’s credentials, which will be included beneath their posts, or you can look them up on the PEH.com Member’s List.

Membership is free until January 1, 2014. After that date there will be an annual membership fee. Not only will PEH members be able to post comments but they can also author articles or promotional posts that showcase their work. There are some restrictions that apply to postings, so make sure you read the “Read Me First” welcome page.

I hope you enjoy the new website! You will always find links to some of the most popular pages on PEH.com here, on www.DeanRamsden.com, over on the right sidebar. Feel free to click on what interests you.

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More Dean Ramsden websites are coming soon: My personal blog of musings and photography, and a website devoted to Astral Energetics.

Most of us have unconscious assumptions about the kinds of foods we eat every day. Traditionally, the Food Guide Pyramid assigned our daily carbohydrate intake at 55-75% of our total diet. Some researchers questioned the food lobby influence on teaching this way of eating to the public, and have come up with alternate approaches such as the Harvard School of Public Health pyramid, which gives greater emphasis to low glycemic index foods and to using leaner meat. Even so, walk into your average Health Food store and you will see a vast array of carbohydrate foodstuffs to consume. In acknowledgment of some of the problems of carbohdrates diets such as The Atkins Nutritional Approach diets that eliminate carbohydrates and substitute them with protein and oil have been used as a way to lose weight rapidly.  But use your search engine  with the key words “low carbohydrate diet” and you will wade through multiple points of view: that this way of eating is “miraculous” all the way to “dangerous”.

Scallops & green beans … No carbs in sight!

If we take our study outside of the food lobby/politically-correct United States and go to Japan, we can find a different take on the low carbohydrate controversy. Dr Ebe, a Kyoto-based physician, has been treating patients with his version of the low carbohydrate eating plan, but from a different perspect. Dr Ebe discovered, out of his work with diabetic patients, that non-diabetic patients could benefit substantially from the eating plan his diabetic patients were asked to follow. His key point is that medium to high carbohydrates (or anything with a high glycemic index) causes a spike in blood suger that puts a lot of stress on the pancreas to pump out insulin to balance things out. It is this constant spiking of blood sugar/insulin production, that creates unnecessary hunger, which leads to eating more calories than your body needs. In other words, we don’t eat to live but rather live to eat … carbohydrates, that is. Along with their friends, starches and high glycemic index sweeteners, like corn syrup. What if we ate according to a low glycemic index/low carbohydrate way, effectively eliminating grains, rice, breads, and anything else that radically spikes our blood suger?

What Dr Ebe found was that if his non-diabetic patients ate like his diabetic patients, they lost slow but consistent body fat over time. Not dramatically, not over night, but over a period of months. The trick was to know which foods you cannot eat, and find substitutes that don’t spike your blood sugar, but also don’t shock the body by totally eliminating carbohydrates. Hence, the Extremely Low Carbohydrate Eating Plan.

Raisin & pumpkin seed soy pulp “bread” for breakfast

If you are a Japanese reader you can go here to read Dr Ebe’s website and articles, including suggestions for food subsitution. For the Japanese this means abstaining from rice, grains, beer, and bakery items. No small sacrifice for this culinary-obsessed culture. Dr Ebe’s books document the slow and steady change in his patients who follow his eating plan: the return to your ideal body weight, and the sustaining of that body weight over time.

When Yui suggested we experiment with the ELCEP I was happy to go along with it for the usual Western reasons: I wanted to lose the stubborn few kilos around my waistline, the ones that my gym routine were unable to shift. But I was unprepared for the emotional and mental clearing effects of the ELCEP. Within three weeks both Yui and I felt clearing in our minds, and in our thinking. Within four weeks I was less monitoring my weight loss than rediscovering my body sans carbohydrate cycling, food cravings, and adding more internal organ fat. As my body adjusted to the new way of eating I found myself losing many of my food cravings, and therefore eating far less calories than before. I started having more energy, and longer (and more rigorous) gym workouts. At the six week mark I cannot imagine going back to loading up my body with carbohydrates and starches again. I like the “thin” and “no food craving” emotional feeling in my body. Even my daily supplements seem to be having a more pronounced effect when I take them. And – and this is for healers, mostly – I’m also tracking a significant change in my Third Chakra functioning.

No carb blueberry muffins baked with soy pulp, not grains

We’ve known for a long time that the Third Chakra is linked to the Pancreas, and to the thinking / tracking process of the human consciousness system. I was also aware of how some psychics always drew their Third Chakras slightly off-center, rather than lined up along the front line of the body. I suspect I have found one reason: excessive blood sugar spiking/insulin production over-taxes the pancreas, and influences the Third Chakra. We become not only addicted to the dramatic emotional swings (blood sugar spikes, insulin kicks in, and then we return to “normal”) but note that, over time, the excess fat layers the internal organs, as well as below the skin. Fat holds emotions, and memories. A normal weight body is more versatile, more able to let go of things that are “holding it back”. A healthy Third Chakra is a low carb Third Chakra. If it is hooked into the spiking, it remains habituated to drama, to survival, to comfort. And the high body fat locks in the feelings, into emotional patterns. This all works against anyone seeking to expand their awareness, because it habituates the body into a constant cycling of loading up/bloating down.

Yui has made our transition to extremely low carb and no grains/no pasta eating very palatable by cooking and baking items for us that are low in glycemic index, yet tasty and nutritious. This is not your standard Akins diet. It only means you have to plan your eating, and even cook or bake your food yourself if you can’t find substitutes for eating your usual carbohydrate-laden friends. This article is written at the seven-week mark of our experiment, and currently I am freed from most of my usual fat-inducing indulgences. The last holdout – potatoes – is limited by me to only 15-20 grams a sitting, far less than I would usually put into my stomach. But because my blood sugar is no long spiking, those few potato fries I do eat are delicious, and satisfying; I don’t need to eat everything put in front of me. And because I’m not saying no to all carbohydrates there is room for the occasional indulgence.

I’m grateful to Yui Wang, for both being an advocate of this way of eating, as well as her creative meal preparation using exotic ingredients such as no-carb soya pulp (refuse) powder, with which no-carbs bread and muffins can be made. I don’t miss my regular bakery items (especially given the on-going Monsanto creep effect, where GMO crops are increasingly being introduced into the supermarkets). I can still drink red wine when needed (but white wine and beer cause sharp blood sugar spikes), so I do not feel unreasonably deprived.

Low carb intake = more energy & a clear mind

So, if this interests you, and your body is up for it, try a version of the Low Carb and zero grain food plan.  Maybe for you, it will only take two or four weeks, to notice a positive shift. When we lose the fat slowly, in this way, we can all drop the past more easily. There’s one reason the traditional Indian Yogis or other spiritual adepts eat very little. What we eat – or don’t eat – changes our consciousness.

This post is also available as a Soundcloud audio narration.

© 2013 by Dean Ramsden. All rights reserved.

The Shaman always fulfills a practical function for humanity, be it prophecy, or physical healing, or spiritual guidance. The Shaman is also a technician, using skills to communicate or interact with the invisible worlds that exist alongside us. And, as a student of the esoteric knowledge, the Shaman is someone who can see through illusions, misdirection, and the hidden agendas of others. The sixth sense – intuitive knowing – is present in the Shaman, and necessary to help us awaken out of the illusory states of identity that imprison us. The functional roles we take on as human beings are viewed by the Shaman as merely temporary. Becoming lost in any partial identification will always restrict our full potential, and the Shaman attempts to awaken us whenever possible.

In our modern world the Shaman is usually viewed as a figure from our primitive past. That is because she no longer dispenses medical potions or sets bones; for that, we now have the medical field of physicians and specialist technicians. No longer does he or she connect humanity with the spirit world; there are now priests, and ministers. No longer does he provide esoteric knowledge when needed by the people; for that, we have “experts”, authors, or media figures who tell us what to believe. It seems the important functions of the Shaman have been dissolved, like salt placed into a glass of water, rendering him obselete in the Twenty-First Century.

But there is one function of the Shaman that cannot be replaced. This is the initiatory role the Shaman plays with those who are ready for transformation. This function combines the understanding the Shaman has of symbolic reality, and of the changing cycles of time, along with a practical understanding of the spirit (or Astral) world and its influence upon the everyday world. The modern-day Shaman is no longer to be found in a remote hut, surrounded by candles and other esoteric instruments of power. The Shaman is now anyone who consciously introduces you to yourself: as a limitless being of energy consciousness. The Shaman is anyone who awakens you to your true identity as spirit, as well as of matter; as someone able to evolve themselves beyond the limits of accepted beliefs.

Some modern-day energy healers may be one of many versions you will find, of the Shaman. When he or she works with your energy body it could be an initiatory experience for you, one where you are invited to awaken into your true reality as a human/spiritual being. The energy healer usually does this by vibrational transmission: they emanate their own personal energy consciousness field in such a way that, through your interaction with them, you are invited to change for the better. Or, your curiosity becomes piqued, and you are influenced enough by them to start out – or deepen – your personal journey towards a specific transformation. Either way, the right energy healer or inspirational teacher, can be a catalyst for your evolution in that they trigger or inspire a powerful shift in you. It’s like the spark of a flint, as it shoots out and ignites dry straw. This may be an idea that takes root in your being, one that leads you into new personal territory. Your energy healings may be focused on your physical healing, or resolving past emotional hurts, or overcoming traumatic events that left you scarred, but there could also be unexpected benefits to this healing work. Those primary goals are important. But whatever your immediate focus, when the energy healer transmits prana into your energy body it may awaken you more than you know. You will come, in time, into contact with more of your true nature, or with a deepened experience of it.

Just a small spark leads to a fire. And with fire, we can change the world. Especially if that “fire” is the awakening energy body (kundalini), an opening of the third eye, and includes the growing awareness of spirit beings around us. Once that initiation through another takes place inside us, we may even start along the path towards become a Shaman ourselves. Or, we may simply find our own path, our unique or creative expression of the work we were born to do. Our awakening triggers new possibilities, for ourselves and for others. It is this function – the assisting in the initiation of others to come into their full potential – that now defines the modern-day Shaman. The shaking of a turtle-shell rattle while chanting, or the following of a native tradition, the use of age-old rituals, these no longer identify the Shaman in the modern world. Those classic expressions are passing into history, as native people become moderns. But there are still those who can help you become initiated into your full identity as a being of both spirit and of physical matter. And when you do find your Shaman (or more than one) and you do begin to change, and when you cannot go back to the old you, you cannot miss it when you finally become initiated. Because you will feel different. And you may even look different, to the eyes of others. Because initiation is always about becoming utterly transformed: the transition from caterpillar to butterfly.

Related Posts: The Failed Initiation, Initiation into Spirit Communication.

This post is also available as a Soundcloud audio narration.

© 2013 by Dean Ramsden. All rights reserved.

This is the first photograph of a series of photographic portfolios I’ll  be hosting on my website in 2013. .

Coming soon: Dean Ramsden Photography of Japan, Dean Ramsden Photography of Thailand, Dean Ramsden Photography of Bali, and Dean Ramsden Photography of The Philippines.

Dean Ramsden: In a nutshell, MF, think of a relational chakra cord as connecting you with, say, your mother. This provides you with a self/other experience. Then, in order to anchor and internalize the various aspects of your mother (“good” mother, “bad” mother, etc) you grow a cord “sprout” from that cord that loops back and hooks into the outer circumference of the chakra head. These “self-cords” hold your internalized parts of self/other within your own chakra consciousness system, and help make it possible to individuate (in this case, from your mother). Otherwise, we would always need to be looking to the other for who we are, and what is our identity. The graphic above gives a simple visual idea of how I see relational cords with self-cords, and here is a helpful article: http://www.blog.deanramsden.com/chakra-self-cords/

Dean Ramsden: It’s hard to give this all justice on this Facebook chat thread, but basically the self-cords create our self-identity via actual life experience plus heritage material (i.e.,influences from our family line) if they are family cords. Nothing is ever free of projection or defense (against pain, or fear); the cords apparently stabilize a full-spectrum awareness of life rather than provide any connection to an “essential” (or non-material) self. The Avatar (2009) movie “connections” is a good insight of yours. In fact, there are a number of stunning insights into the energy field that James Cameron’s Avatar movie presents as “alien” that seem very, very human.

Dean Ramsden: This is the point of this Facebook group, MF: to kick around ideas and options for those of us doing chakra cord work! Anyhow, there are various ways to answer your question but it hinges on two approaches to healing. The first relates to the assumption that we are perfected beings of spirit lost in the material world. Very Christian, in fact. In that viewpoint, we are looking at healing as dissolving the illusion between our spiritual identity and our material reality. We can call it “Essence” or Soul, or any other label that implies we are perfect beings who just need to awaken to our perfection, and then all will be well. The second, alternate option is that we can be worked with as developmental beings, a work-in-progress. That we are a blend of spirit-plus-matter, and our consciousness becomes real and vital by engaging life, by embracing life, rather than slicing-and-dicing all its elements. So, chakra self cords are the ever-evolving internalized flow of outer experience with inner understanding. They are not fixed, even in an idealized state; they constantly attach, detach (when it is time to go to a new level of understanding) and can come to re-attach at a higher level of being. Thus, we are a eternally-upgradable consciousness system! Relational cords to others provide us (via self-cords) the material to upgrade ourselves via experience. In short we are not Beings of spirit that have fallen from Grace; we are spirit-in-relationship-to-matter, and we are evolving through the dance of incarnation and living life.

Re: “this process stabilizes or reinforces the individual’s (very possibly) false conclusions about self/life/others? “. Because the chakra cords are based on life experience, once we gain a new experience, the self-cords will adapt to it. Or, to approach it from the other direction, if we work with the self-cords we can support a new experience being invited into the client’s life. It works both ways.

Dean Ramsden: There are probably lots of ways to work with self-cords, just as there are differing ways to work with chakra cords. I can only talk here about my own clinical experience in working with them. Which is: self-cord work enhances the understanding and integration of life lessons. It’s not up to me as the healer to hold any opinion or preference for what the client’s self cording does. It is only up to me to support a healthy cord/self-cord structure, and let the client’s natural energy system sort out the outcome.

Or, think of self-cord work as being an energy healer-plumber. Your job (as healer) is only to get the flow of water (prana) flowing, without any leaks. It’s the client’s job to then see what happens to their life when their pipes and water flow is working as it should.

Dean Ramsden: Hi SS,  yes that would be a good way to integrate chakra cord work into your existing energy work (which is what I stress when I teach cord work in my tutorials: as an additional skill to enhance your own work). Anahata chakra functions as a self-care / caring for others, so you can look at self-cords as his “self-care issues” or the ways in which his energy system habitually channels relational prana to himself. I’ve always suspected that heart disease is symptomatic of not enough emphasis on self-care, along with an imbalanced flow in the chakra and related organs (physical heart, thymus, and so on). By adding self-cord work into your healings the emphasis can be on how he includes his own needs/care/compassion in balance with the needs of others (as represented by the relational chakra cord: the attachment to the other). In this case, the CH4 self-cord work is the auric anatomy equivalent of psychotherapy that moves a client out of co-dependence and into a more balanced self-needs/needs of the other place.

Everyone on this thread has generously granted me permission to quote them. Some editing has been done for clarity. Thanks to all concerned for their contributions! – Dean.

My Facebook account is here: Dean

Related Post: Working with Chakra Self-Cords

© 2013 by Dean Ramsden. All rights reserved.

But it is possible to find ourselves at a place where earlier teachings are replaced by new and alive responses to life, and that our earlier teachings are retired. Such is an end point; one where we evolve into a simplicity and directness of life built upon the foundational ashes of the past, rather than to come to merely repeat the past, or be subject to any restricted understanding. Learning, if evolving, can eventually lead us to life strategies that are genuinely helpful and supportive of human spirituality-in-action, rather than to merely become a part of maintaining the status quo.

One example of this three-way process has been my appreciation of the energetics of narcissism: one of the important psychoemotional stages of human development. At the start of my training as a healer I was introduced to two differing viewpoints on narcissism, one from my early reading of Asian mysticism, and the other from the Bioenergetics/Core Energetics approach that used the body in personal process. A Western (New Age) reading of Eastern spirituality stresses formlessness and passivity as essential ingredients in spiritual awakening. Having an “ego”, or a strong container of self, is regarded as less optimal than being accepting of all, and non-judgemental of others and their actions. Personal boundaries should be open to all energies, and discernment is discouraged. New Age writers will happily illustrate this ideal way of being using Zen Buddhist or other Eastern teaching stories. But on closer inspection many of these Eastern stories are steeped in orientalism (the Western interpretation of exotic cultures) and more illustrative of the author’s viewpoint than reflective of Asian wisdom.

The second influence upon my formative years as a healer was the Bioenergetic / Core energetic work on personal process; that which used body energy charging and discharging to awaken the aliveness of the client’s “character” style. In these disciplines the issue of narcissim is labelled “psychopathy”, which is unfortunate as this term is commonly reserved for significantly toxic individuals who lack both empathy and human morality, and who often prey upon “normal” people without remorse. I saw this same assumption of passivity being draped like a blanket over the character style of “psychopathy”, misleading people into thinking that control or the seduction of others was a energetic defense rather than a lack of personal development. While there is far more to Core Energetics than this, I have seen the character style of Psychopath being applied during healing work that suggests the client is unevolved rather than struggling with a developmental issue.

I am suggesting that New Age assumptions about “ego” or about the “psychopathic character type” have significant problems for healers (or clients of healers) engaged in modern-day personal growth. I have personally found the need to reformulate my earlier studies in healing to take into account both healthy narcissim in regular individuals, and its necessary function in the formation of a strong ego self identity with boundaries, as well as unhealthy narcissm (an undeveloped self with lack of empathy for others, and infantile strageties to hide any underlying intention). My early ideas about the formation of the evolving ego plus spiritual self crumbled in the face of overwhelming experiential data about this most important developmental stage. Without a strong sense of self-worth, self-value, and self-determination, an individual cannot move into higher states of spiritual development. The attack on having an “ego” by New Age writers in the past is unwittingly doing a tremendous disservice to spiritual seekers. Similarly, the disparaging of the “psychopath character energy structure” as being distastefully “controlling” or “seductive”, and, as such, in need of modification, demonstrates a misunderstanding of the important need for structure and boundaries on the path to spiritual awakening.

As a healer I strive to move into what I would describe as the third stage of learning: letting go of older forms of working with egoic-self structure and its variations and looking towards developing meaningful access points into spiritual growth. In fact, the model in this article (i.e., reforming life experience by the dropping of the past and the embracing of a more fluid and responsive energy field system) tracks some of the important landmarks of psycho-emotional narcissistic development for healers and their clients. First, we become aware of the “created” egoic identity, mostly through the assimilation of the ideas and values of others, and moderated by our personality preferences. Secondly, we face a series of tests, crises, and initiations in our lives, all of which can crack apart previous assumptions about who we think we are, and about how the world actually works. Finally, we recover our infant-like fluidity, and can build flexible and sensitive energetic boundaries with others, as well as with connections to our inner self. We are not – as New Age dogma suggests – striving to imitate the state of being of another awakened adult. The pathways of spiritual awakening must pass through the lands of personality challenges, boundary changes, and relationship crises. Like steel, our individuated ego selves are forged in the furnace of life. They do not simply appear out of nowhere.

So, what does this mean for our practical application, in the world of energy healing? Does it mean a radical departure from working towards ego-self reduction, as some New Age-inspired therapies stress? Yes, absolutely, based on my experience to date. Because if I measure that life experience against the teachings of New Age dogma, then most certainly I must leave behind what is unhelpful. Practical results trump theoretical dogma every time, even with regard to well-meaning spiritual teachings. My private energy healing work now stresses both the clearing of auric field boundaries as well as the support and guidance necessary to form a more clear sense of self, and not a diminished one. It also includes the focus that any increasing sense of self must be rooted in the original energy consciousness of the person, and not the idealized ego image of that person. This is moving towards not a passive acceptance of everything that happens, but into an energetic engagement with others, and with the authentic self. It includes work with what I call Self Cords: the psychic anchoring cords of the outer experience with others into the energetic chakra self system.

The access points for these self cords are to be found around the edge of each chakra head. The self cords themeselves sprout out of the relational cords towards (or from) others, and anchor identity inwardly (via life experience, and not through mental constructs learned at an early age). Additionally, personal process work is orientated around both fully experiencing personal boundaries (often experienced when someone transgresses our boundary, or when someone confronts a weakly-developed boundary) and increasing its development (as in the three stages of dogma, conflict, and evolution) in the client’s energy system. This often results in the client having a growing and sustainable awareness of new and healthier options in their lives. Slowly, in the client’s life, new choices appear and reportedly become far more attractive to my clients than the previous habitual ones. In accepting energy work that not only clears but increases their sensitivity, my clients will often report the emergence of new options. The old, predictable past ways of doing things, of having relationships, begins to shift. And new choices, ones filled with unexpected possibilities, arrives for them. Far from losing their ego, or eliminating ways of controlling or manipulating others to get personal needs met, they begin to naturally access more evolved strategies and interpersonal skills. They evolve further into spiritual adults by way of their humanity, rather than by cherry-picking which parts of human experience they should idealize, or suppress.

Chakra Self-Cord work is only one of many ways in which moving through the three stages of dogma, crisis, and evolution, can work to support our personal development. Psychotherapy, neo-Shamanism, and many and varied transformational practices are pathways to the same result. Used in conjuction, emotional work, energetic healing, and spiritual practice take us towards and into awakening. And then we can not only heal the past, but come to see it as necessary psycho-emotional “fertilizer” that is necessary to grow the rose of consciousness: a state of enlightenment that is fully and empathically human, rather than one that only expresses our narcisistic dreams.

Comments on this article can be found here: The Facebook Chakra Cord Study Group.

© 2013 by Dean Ramsden. All rights reserved.

The interconnectivity of our energy field with others is reflected in many of the common expressions in everyday language. We talk about feeling “connected” to the heart of another, we talk about “cutting the cord” when we want to leave a relationship and move forward with our lives, we talk about “hooking” up with someone, as the precursor to an intimate encounter with them. And now, in our modern age of mobile phones and wi-fi internet, we use the invisible word of interconnectivity daily. It’s not a big leap for many to go from calling your mother’s cell phone to considering the possibility that non-visible chakra cord links you to her.

I see the invisible chakra cord system as one of the ways we extend the reach of the human mind, the consciousness of individuality, so that we can grow (or evolve) our personal mind beyond its self-imposed isolated limits. The communal underpinnings of our connections to others has long been mapped in other fields of study, such as Carl Jung’s concepts of the collective unconsciousness, and Family Systems theory in the psychotherapy world. Most people do not work with the relational energetics of chakra cords directly, but may do so indirectly: exploring dream symbols, working with non-conscious influences upon our lives made more conscious through psychotherapy (transference and projection), or by the need to create and sometimes end (or acknowledge the loss of) a personal relationship. We can draw upon much of this experience, and track important issues in the way we grow in relationship with others, from all these different places. Energy healers can then build practical skills of cord energy work to address relational energetics far more directly. At even the most basic level, energy healers can clean or support energetic connections between their clients and others, with the intention to speed up the personal growth that results in meaningful connections with others.

I was first drawn to specialize in chakra cord work around 2001, but it has taken over ten years of slow and steady in-the-trenches work and research for me to assemble a coherent model of chakra cords that I now use daily, in my private healing practice. Other teachers and energy healers have their own way of working with chakra cords, and their own skill level, all which creates positive change and powerful insights for their clients. Unlike medical surgery, where there will be one or two different accepted techniques to repair the physical body, I fully expect that there are multiple ways to do chakra cord work.  My personal viewpoint is pragmatic: if the healer can effect a significant change for the client using cord work, and can do so in a way that does not violate the client’s free will or implement the healer’s desire for a certain outcome, then all is well and good. However, I have come across some common ways some healers do cord work (such as cord “cutting”) that bear a closer look. While I agree that toxic connections often need to be closed down I suggest that severing any relationship (assuming the healer has the power to do so) must be done with extreme care, and not as a short-cut to the ending of emotional pain. Cord cutting is one of the many sticky issues I have come across in my own research into chakra cord energy healing methods, and I look forward to learning more about it over the coming years.

If chakra cords extend our mind field of personal consciousness, then it implies that the communication is a two-way street: that as we make contact with (and influence) another person, and they – in turn – influence us, and impact our personal energy system. Relationships viewed in this way suddenly take on a new psycho-emotional importance, as it suggests that the quality and intentions of others can easily overpower our own personal choices. It can do this by simple unconscious influence (advertising and social propaganda being two examples) and by socialization (living within a consensual reality not of our making) and often overwhelming our true perceptions (as dramatized in the 1999 Science Fiction movie, “The Matrix”, by the Wachowski brothers. Sorting all this out is part of any spiritual or social greater awakening, and has far-reaching implications.

Additionally, for me the chakra cord work provides a structured framework for understanding the powerful influence of emotional surges of the spirit worlds (also known as the Astral), that brings together endocrine function and non-physical interactions from those Astral worlds. As an example of this, the lower Astral energies are known to feed off first and second chakra functioning: the desire to survive, the fear response, and the desire for revenge against another hurting you. Our personal energetic wiring (each endocrine gland is linked into a particular chakra) is able to be influenced by the corresponding astral energy, essentially creating  a hidden manipulation of the person. In the case of the lower Astral, when blood is spilled (either real blood as in a sacrificial animal, or a proxy “blood” as in watching a violent movie) adrenaline and excitement run through our bodies, which in turn stimulates and feeds the lower Astral beings. Old Shamanic traditions all over the world recognized this, and learned to work with the lower Astral by deliberately substituting the blood of the chicken as a proxy for human blood, thereby mitigating the negative effects of the spirit world upon their community. (For more detail on this, please visit this article on the Lower Astral).

When we bring together the relational energetics of chakra cord work with any increased understanding of the hidden influence of the spirit world upon our extended mind, we have some useful energy healing skills to explore and develop further in the field of energy healing. While we can agree that tremendous work with clients can be done to balance their chakra system, and to energize a weakened energy field, exploring the relational energy field opens us up to a new level of work. In effect, working with chakra cords in addition to the Astral world, allows us to hack into the relational consciousness system of human personal development in a powerful way. It offers the potential for us to speed up the healing or transformation of all our energetic relationships with others, including relating towards ourselves. It helps us end old and restrictive relationships from our past. It helps us refine or grow our healthy relationships right here in the present. And it may well create the foundation for a new future for us: one not built on the repetitive habits of the past, but one rising from our soul’s desire for a better world, and a superior way to relate to others. This is a lofty ambition to lay at the feet of a specialized form of energy healing – chakra cord work – but I do see it as one of many tools for us to head towards such a goal. Along with a rich spiritual life, and psychotherapeutic involvement, I have found it to have much practical merit. Hopefully, more and more energy healers will gravitate towards chakra cord healing work, and we as healers can further research the effects upon our clients. If they speed quickly through their relational challenges, let go of the past and move into a brighter future, then that is reward enough. Energy healing is always about helping others to heal, first and foremost. And then, along the way, and since we are all linked together as one species, we will come to heal ourselves.

© 2013 by Dean Ramsden. All rights reserved.