Photo: Microgen / Shutterstock
The throat chakra is your body's communication center.
By Anna Thea — Last updated on Nov 11, 2022
Ever felt like you had something to say? That is the throat chakra at work.
Chakras assist the flow of energy within your body, like wheels of energy. There are seven in total and they are all interconnected. If one is blocked or imbalanced in some way, it affects the other six. This can also affect your mental, physical, spiritual, and emotional health.
It's important to know what each chakra is for, and how to open them should they become blocked. It's essential to learn about each individual chakra, especially the throat chakra.
What is the throat chakra?
The fifth chakra is known as the throat chakra because it's located at the throat. The Sanskrit name for the fifth chakra is Visuddha; it's colored blue with the element ether.
The fifth chakra is not only about learning how to speak your truth, but also about learning how to speak from your heart.
If your throat chakra is shut down, you won’t be able to express what is in your heart. In order to express yourself clearly, especially in intimate and emotional situations, it’s important to know yourself.
The throat chakra represents the color blue, sound, and to speak and be heard. It's responsible for finding one’s voice, self-expression, and speaking the truth.
Photo: Atarax42 via Wikimedia Commons
What does the throat chakra represent?
As one of the higher chakras, opening, balancing and healing the throat chakra results in a level of higher spiritual maturation — getting to know yourself and your personal power.
Your fifth chakra superpower involves expressing your truth, expressing your creativity, and expressing your needs. This is the chakra for communication and expressing yourself, which means that your words are powerful. How you choose them is what creates your reality.
Communication allows you to express yourself and connect with others. Your words determine the depth to which you can connect with another.
The throat chakra teaches you how to get your needs met, as well as create deeper connections with others, resulting in true healing. Therefore, this chakra is how you assert — or don’t assert — your will and the choices you make.
Are you making choices that reflect the true you? Or are you making choices based on social norms, people-pleasing, limiting beliefs, fears, guilt, or from within someone else’s stronghold on you?
Healing the throat chakra is about developing a strong personal authentic will by making choices that reflect your true heart’s desire, as well as your mind’s knowing.
How do you know if your throat is blocked or imbalanced?
If you are feeling anxious to speak, scared to tell the truth, or even have a difficult time expressing your thoughts, it could be a sign that your throat chakra is blocked or imbalanced.
If your throat chakra is either blocked or imbalanced you will start exhibiting negative expressions of the chakra. It affects your ability to communicate.
Signs your throat chakra is blocked or imbalanced include:
- Needing to control relationships and life situations
- Yelling, or giving someone the silent treatment
- Not listening and honoring your inner voice
- Letting other people’s opinions sway you in a direction that’s not in your highest good
- Lying and manipulation
- Your words don’t match your actions
- "Chatty Cathy" syndrome
- Fake or masked personality
- Sore throat
What causes a blocked throat chakra?
Developing the fifth chakra involves a level of spiritual maturity, which means having the ability to be upfront in your communication and ask for what you need, without feeling like you have to resort to yelling or throwing tantrums.
From childhood, most of us were not taught how to ask for what we need because we think that if we did, it would mean we are needy. But needs are normal and natural.
Being able to clearly understand and express your needs to another, instead of having a fit or pouting, is part of learning how to open your throat chakra.
But the biggest culprit for a blocked throat chakra is eating unhealthy foods and breathing in polluted air. Other causes include digestive issues, ulcers, heartburn, eating disorders, and indigestion.
If you have experienced stress, an illness, an emotional upset, or conflict, it could lead to a blocked throat chakra.
How do you know if your throat chakra is healthy and balanced?
A healthy open and balanced throat chakra will allow you to speak fearlessly, confidently, and passionately. You will be able to be clear and concise with your words, and able to communicate your thoughts in a healthy way.
Not only are you able to communicate well, but you listen openly to others. You feel comfortable speaking with others and are an active listener.
Signs of a healthy and balanced throat chakra include:
- The ability to speak your truth in a clear and centered way
- Knowing yourself well enough to make clear decisions that you can stand by
- Having a sense of personal authority and a strong sense of self without being egoistic
- Having faith
- Having self-knowledge
- Having personal authority
- Keeping your word
How To Open & Unblock Your Throat Chakra
1. Learn how to honor your needs.
In order to honor your needs, you first need to know what they are.
Often, people are very disconnected from knowing what they need, especially in a triggering or upsetting situation. We often relate by being a people-pleaser instead of taking the risk of rejection and standing in our truth.
For the next week, notice where you might be compromising your truth in order to keep the peace. See if you can express your truth to another without making them wrong. Simply state the way it is for you.
When you're being pulled in a direction that you don't want to be pulled in, you can simply and calmly say, "That doesn’t work for me." Then, state what you would prefer.
Speak from your center. Know what you want and state it. Give it a try and see what happens.
2. Sing.
The easiest way to accomplish this without adding another task to your self-care list is to sing while you're in the car. Either pick your favorite songs or find some yogic chants, and sing them while you are driving.
Snatam Kaur has some wonderful yogic chants and easy-to-sing songs that are uplifting and will exercise your voice box. Your fifth chakra can be beautifully activated and opened by using your voice in a joyful way.
3. Spend time self-reflecting.
Ask yourself questions about your current daily life.
How is your fifth chakra expressing itself in your day-to-day life? How strong-willed are you? Are you passive-aggressive? Can you speak your truth in a loving way without disrespecting the needs of yourself or others?
By opening, balancing and healing the fifth chakra, how would it enhance your life?
4. Surround yourself with the color blue.
Blue is the color associated with the throat chakra, so incorporating it into your life could help open your fifth chakra.
You can even try some fifth chakra gemstones like aquamarine, azurite, blue apatite, turquoise, or lapis lazuli to heal your throat chakra. Wear these crystals around your neck, or place them around your home.
5. Try neck stretches.
Stretching your neck can alleviate any stress or built-up tension, which will open the area around the throat.
One exercise to try begins with dropping your chin to your chest. Then, relax your shoulders, and lean your neck to the left, trying to touch your ear to your shoulders. Hold for 30-60 seconds. Finally, drop your chin to your neck again and repeat on the right side.
6. Practice your breathing.
The lion's breath is a breathing technique that has been linked to helping open the throat chakra. It's believed to remove toxins in your body, relieve stress, and stimulate your throat area.
To do the lion's breath, breathe in through your nose with your eyes closed. Then, open your eyes and your mouth. Stick out your tongue and breathe out, audibly, in the sound of a "roar."
7. Practice yoga.
Yoga is not only good for your body, but your mind as well. To begin opening your throat chakra, focus on doing poses that release your neck muscles.
Some poses to try include head rolls, Supported Fish Pose, Plow Pose, or Supported Shoulderstand.
8. Do a Reiki healing session.
Reiki healing specializes in unblocking chakras all over the body. But to open the throat chakra, request that your Reiki practitioner spends more time and sends more energy to your throat, neck and chest.
9. Keep a journal.
Journaling is a great way to express your thoughts. Because the throat chakra is associated with hearing yourself, reading back over your passages will help you do just that.
10. Work on your posture.
Be mindful of sitting up straight in order to keep your neck in line with your spine. This will help you avoid straining your neck and thus keeping your throat chakra blocked.
More for You:
Anna-Thea is an author and Certified Divine Feminine Educator. She educates people on how to claim their bodies as sacred. If you’d like to open and balance your chakras, check out her Guided Chakra Meditation for beginners.
This article was originally published at annathea.org. Reprinted with permission from the author.