Peppermint for Breathing Chakras

Mirror Art by Sayy Pauly

Holistically address mind-body-spirit clarity and energy using pure peppermint, an everyday and easily obtainable essential oil. The exercise below can enhance your ability to focus and gain energy while strengthening the chakras.

If you’re unfamiliar with the chakras, this Sanskrit term from ancient India describes invisible wheels of colorful, charged energy or vortexes that are constantly circling within and around you. Seven major chakras are linked to your body organs. The more powerfully they spin, the greater your body’s metabolic activity. This enhances your above-the-line health.

1 — Sit comfortable with the spine as straight as possible.

2 — Sniff peppermint oil by rotating the bottle in front of your nose in a circular fashion. Take three to five deep breaths from enough distance that the  “pepper” doesn’t affect nostrils or eyes. You are “clearing the air,” and allowing the olfactory system, the bio-sense of smell influencing hormones, memory and emotions,  to “get a whiff of” or prepare for the mental and emotional clarity that is to come. Immediately recap the peppermint oil bottle.

3 — Close your eyes. Begin breathing regularly, centering yourself and focusing on the third eye (6th chakra), the area between the brows up to the center of the forehead.

4 — Breathe slowly by inhaling through the nose into the 6th chakra.

5 — Release the breath slowly through the nose, and visualize the breath being released into the throat chakra (5th).

6 — Breathe slowly by inhaling into the throat chakra.

7 — Release the breath slowly, and visualize the breath being released into the heart chakra (4th).

8 — Inhale while visualizing the breath going into the heart chakra, then visualizereleasing the breath into the the next lower chakra, the solar plexus (3rd).

9 — Continue through the sacral/center (2nd) and root (1st) chakras.

10 — Inhale finally at the root chakra then visualizing the breath going UP the spine (your back), from your root chakra (1st) to your sacral/center chakra (2nd) , all the way up to the third eye (6th) chakra.

11 — Strive to do four rounds and eventually  work up to seven rounds.

When complete sit quietly for as long as needed. If you move too quickly you may find you feel light-headed.

Open your eyes slowly.  You will be guided to do the first activity that has come to your mind, based on the focus and clarity the exercise has provided you. You may also note your digestion over the next 24-48 hours is improved.