Internal and External Chakras
The Chakra System
When I first encountered the chakra system more than 30 years ago, I was studying yoga and working as a modern dancer. The choreographer used them regularly in her choreography. From the very beginning, chakras sparked my imagination. I couldn’t see or feel them. Raised Catholic, I hadn’t grown up believing in spinning energy centers in my body, but I've been exploring this energy system since then.
Over years of movement and meditation, something began to happen. As I shifted my attention from one center to another, I noticed my body would pulse and sway through different subtle patterns.
Was I imagining it? Perhaps.
Was I feeling something? Yes.
Eventually, I became more interested in exploring the human story held within the chakra system than trying to prove its existence. The chakras became a lens through which to see how the life I was living was held in my body.
The root chakra speaks to our connection with Earth—the planet that feeds us, holds us and provides the substance of our bodies. The sacral center holds our sexual creative energy which we can clearly feel in our arousal. The solar plexus is the center of our personal power we access to navigate our life. The heart holds our feelings of love. As a writer and teacher, the throat chakra is big for me personally. Speaking and listening, are central to my work. Intuition and imagination is at home in the third eye chakra, while the crown opens toward those questions we may never quite answer: Why are we here? Where does life come from? What is beyond all this?
The External Chakras
Years later, I became curious about extending my human map beyond my skin.
What if I followed my attention outward—from my body out into the atmosphere, then into space and ultimately into the mystery?
That curiosity is the inspiration for Root to Source, a four-class online course I’ll be teaching this December.
Alongside the seven internal chakras, we’ll explore a map of seven external centers: the halo, atmosphere, Moon, Sun, solar system, Milky Way galaxy and Universe (Source, God, Mystery) This is a way of giving form to an embodied journey – a bridge from where we sit to the limits of our imaginations.
The halo marks a threshold beyond the body. The atmosphere invites us into the air we all share. The Moon offers a focus for contemplating water and rhythms; the Sun, warmth and nourishment. From there, our attention travels through the pull and balance of the solar system and into our galactic home.
Something about this reminds me of children addressing letters to Santa: North Pole, Planet Earth, Solar System, Milky Way, Universe. I suppose I’m interested in finding our cosmic address. No postage required.
At a certain point, even that address runs out. Beyond our galaxy, beyond everything we can picture, we leap to what I call Source: an invitation into mystery, into the question of what gives rise to life. You can bring your own understanding and name of that mystery. You can also bring your uncertainty.
Through breath, sound, movement, meditation and visualization, we’ll explore this pathway in both directions. We’ll travel outward from the body—and return to the place where we’re sitting, breathing and living.
That return matters to me. I want to discover what a sense of vastness can bring to the experience of being here: feet on Earth, breath moving, heart available, voice alive.
You don’t need to see colors, feel spinning wheels or have the universe figured out before the first class.
Bring your body, your curiosity and imagination.
Root to Source
December 1, 8, 15, 22
2026
Online 6:30 - 8:30 pm PST
Come explore your cosmic address—and the journey home.
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