On the Chakras

Posted on by Esterina Anderson

More often than not, we find scientific “proof” that ancient wisdom passed on through generations—once considered ignorant, hokey-pokey nonsense—turns out to be true. How did they know?

This painting I created is my artistic interpretation of the manifest and unmanifest world. The colors symbolize the manifest world, and the shades of tan, white, black, and gray represent what is on the other side. The colors also represent the chakras.

As humans, we know very little that can be scientifically proven regarding the spiritual world or how conscious life appears and disappears. The energetic body is something that some scientists explore, but again, there is no definitive “proof.”

Eastern philosophies and their ancient texts explain that just as there is a visible physical body, there is also an accompanying invisible energetic body. It is just as complicated and intricate. It has systems, nodes, and channels, as our physical bodies do. Energy can get blocked just as an artery can. Emotions are energetic. They can become stuck and, if not released, go deeper into our being and eventually manifest as physical pain.

Mental health professionals do this type of work and exploration. Yoga is deeply connected to the energetic body and helps energy flow more freely through the practice of physical postures (asana). Hence my interest in the topic. Additionally, my interest in art and color piques my curiosity about how color is combined in various ways.

The chakras are something that has always fascinated me, long before I understood, practiced, or taught yoga. The first time I heard about them, they simply made sense to me—almost as if something deep inside already knew, even though my mind questioned the idea.

For anyone who doesn’t know about the chakras (I was well into my 30s before I ever heard of them!), they are seven main energetic centers in our bodies through which energy flows. They start at the base of the spine, in the tailbone area, and move upward through the body to the crown of the head.

Later, while completing a 500-hour yoga teacher certification, I learned more about the broader energetic system, but the chakras remain the most widely recognized and are depicted in many texts and images throughout history.

The chakras have colors—seven in total—and they coincide with the colors of the rainbow. Their flow is vertical (unlike my art piece). Like the koshas and other systems I’ve learned about through my business education, they remind me very much of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. It also reflects a kind of evolution, beginning with basic physical needs and moving toward higher consciousness and self-actualization. In the chakra system, if something is blocked at a lower level, energy cannot flow upward.

An illustrated diagram of the seven chakras in the human body, highlighting their locations, colors, and meanings, featuring a meditating figure at the center.
An infographic illustrating Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, represented as a pyramid. The levels from bottom to top include Physiological Needs, Safety, Love & Belonging, Esteem, and Self-Actualization. Each level describes the needs necessary for personal development and fulfillment, with keywords highlighting concepts such as basic survival, security, relationships, confidence, and growth.

The chakras are energetic. Over time, I’ve noticed that when I am in emotional pain, there is often a physical sensation located at a chakra point. It often points me in the direction of where I may be blocked.

I’ve studied and read many spiritual and religious texts. I don’t hold a strict belief in any one system, but I have developed a personal understanding of the physical and non-physical worlds—the tangible and intangible. The part where we are alive and moving through this world, and the part that remains unknown. What happens to our consciousness or spirit when the body dies? What is it before we are born? Is it even real?

My artistic expression of the spiritual life cycle is depicted here. Like the Yin-Yang, part of our existence is in the manifest world and part in the unmanifest.

The colored lines represent the manifest world—the world where white light refracts and we perceive color.

The neutral tones represent the unmanifest world. When all colors are combined, they create what we perceive as brown. Adding white lightens it to tan, while black darkens it. White contains all colors, while black represents their absence. Together they create gray—still without distinct color. At dusk, when we are between day and night, color fades, and only form remains.

Our physical life is surrounded by this unknown. Before birth and after death, there is something beyond our current understanding. Perhaps it is not empty, but instead contains everything in a different form—blended, unseen, or beyond our perception.

At least to our current senses. Perhaps with another sense, we would perceive an entirely different world.

The chakras in this painting represent the physical living world we experience. They move from a lower vibration to a higher one—less conscious to more conscious, more connected to the physical world to less so, much like Maslow’s hierarchy.

1st CHAKRA
Color: Red
Sanskrit name: Muladhara
Known as: Root chakra
Location: Base of the spine

Symbolizes: safety, survival, grounding

My interpretation: It is our root. It connects us physically to the earth and to others. It represents the earliest stage of life, where we are fully dependent on others for survival. This foundation shapes our perception of the world.

2nd CHAKRA
Color: Orange
Sanskrit name: Swadhisthana
Known as: Emotional chakra
Location: Lower abdomen

Symbolizes: emotion, creativity, sexuality

My interpretation: This is where feeling begins. It relates to growth, creativity, and the early development of identity.

3rd CHAKRA
Color: Yellow
Sanskrit name: Manipura
Known as: Solar plexus

Symbolizes: personal power, will, identity

My interpretation: This is where we act in the world—through drive, identity, and personal energy.

4th CHAKRA
Color: Green
Sanskrit name: Anahata
Known as: Heart chakra

Symbolizes: love, compassion

My interpretation: This is the shift from intellect to deeper awareness. It connects us to something beyond ourselves.

5th CHAKRA
Color: Blue
Sanskrit name: Vishuddha
Known as: Throat chakra

Symbolizes: communication, expression

My interpretation: When energy flows freely, we are able to express truth and creativity.

6th CHAKRA
Color: Indigo
Sanskrit name: Ajna
Known as: Third Eye

Symbolizes: intuition, wisdom

My interpretation: This reflects deeper understanding gained through experience.

7th CHAKRA
Color: Violet or White
Sanskrit name: Sahasrara
Known as: Crown chakra

Symbolizes: connection, consciousness

My interpretation: A state of peace and connection beyond material attachment.

The base of the system is wider because it is more grounded in the physical world, where most of us spend our time. As we move upward, fewer people consistently operate in those higher states, and the experience becomes more subtle.

In my artistic expression, these colors exist between the known and unknown. The symbols in the painting represent movement through the chakras toward something beyond—something expansive, light, and difficult to define.

This and six other pieces were inspired by contemporary artist Sean Scully. Two weeks ago, Daren and I visited the Wadsworth in Hartford on the last day of his exhibit. He works primarily in stripes.

Thanks for taking the time to read. I’d love to hear your thoughts!

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The Unassuming Pear

Posted on by Esterina Anderson

The pear has little to no reputation. It is in a few desserts. It isn’t as popular as the banana. It’s not used in any popular lessons (such as the famous non comparison- apples to oranges). It’s not considered exotic like a papaya or coconut, it’s not a popular “pick your own” fruit, was never “in” like the avocado, or so heavily used in food or drink like the grape that fields and farms are required to keep up with the demand.

It’s just an unassuming pear, which is why I chose to paint it. 

The pear is like almost every other living thing amongst us. And like most things we don’t give it a second thought most of the time. 

The pear, the apple, the banana, the trees that produce these fruits, the flowers, our pets, sea life and of course humanity all live through a cycle. It’s as natural as nature itself. Humans are the only ones who sometimes fear or fight it. The rest of the planet accepts it as the flow we live in.

The flow and these cycles are shown to us by nature and what governs living. Particularly through the seasons. 

The pear painting goes from left to right, top to bottom through it’s very own abridged life cycle.

Winter
Winter is when most consider their surrounding closest to death. Life as we know it rests and hibernates. We hunker down and wait out the storm, most of us complaining along the way and wishing away the time until spring.

However, in the midst of the storm, under ground, and right below the surface, Mother Earth is preparing for the next cycle. The frost and subsequent defrost are laying the ground work for what is coming. Perhaps we may even consider it to be where life truly begins.

Like the architect on an empty lot where a new building will one day stand, the architect is surveying the surroundings and mentally creating what will later manifest as a structure using what is available in that time and place to make it so. 

In that time where there appears to be nothing, there is a vision of the future bubbling right under the surface- waiting to be put into action once the sketch is complete.

Winter is the sketch. It’s the time to not do, but just be and know that the spring will come, and with it there will be work to do. 

Under ground the trees and perennials are preparing the seeds that will come forth in the spring. Compared to sentient creatures such as us humans, it is the time when the mother’s egg prepares to be fertilized. 

It’s actually where all the magic is taking place. All that we cannot see or understand in the material world. It’s that beautiful dark little slip of space and time where the spiritual world intersects with the physical one. It may be the most auspicious time of the year.

Spring 
The thaw. The flow of water and life. The sun is with us longer. Dirt is tilled. Seeds are planted. The egg is fertilized.

Of all the planted seeds (the seed of man and animal as well in the form of sperm), only a small percent actually sprout forth into life. The lucky seeds that mesh perfectly with the womb of mother/Mother Earth, the ones that happen to have the prime conditions that nurture it’s growth, are so very lucky. We take it for granted, but we are fortunate to be alive and to experience life. The spring is the time of rapid growth where what makes it lives through its early days to survive through to maturity.

If we are looking at spring through a seasonal lens, it’s the time we lay the seeds, nurture what is planted and help it along until its strong enough to be on it’s own for whatever reason it is here to be. 

Ayurveda calls this time “Kapha”. It’s cool, wet and dense, just like the earth in the spring. It is strongly rooted to its source; very grounded. It grows quickly, and puts on weight easily.

In the chakra system it’s close to the roots. It’s red in color like the root chakra. All life needs a strong root to connect to the earth and then hold it strongly enough to keep it safe but light enough to allow it to grow.

Through the lens of a human, it’s the time of fertilization and early growth until young adulthood. Baby fat, rapid physical maturation, rosy cheeks, dense, learning-growing, needing a bit more nurture and support from the source as the child matures. For the mother who housed the egg and was in rest during the “winter” of the relationship with her own child, the work arrives in the form of carrying the child and then helping it arrive safely in young adulthood.

The pear… it isn’t quite ripe. If it is off the tree, it will be light in color; tinged by that red root that held it close to the branch. If eaten it’s a bit bitter, not quite ready. It has yet to mature. It’s a child. It’s in the spring or Kapha cycle.

Summer
Sun. Teaming life. Hot. Moving for purpose. Lighter, a bit dryer & quick to inflammation. 

The earth and it’s fruits are mostly in full bloom. Growth slows but it’s at the peak of maturity. The seeds no longer need help- they have the ability to live on their own, fighting off bugs and weeds without much outside help. The result of those spring planted seeds are here doing and being precisely what they are meant to do and be.

In Ayurveda this is “Pita”. Hot, quick to fire. Sustaining of life as we know it. Chakra-wise it’s lighter, and yellow like the sun. It is the chakra of digestion. It gives and supports life by helping everything keep moving as it should. Like digestion it’s lit by “Agni” or that internal moving fire.

Humans are now young adults to middle aged. In their prime. Taking care of both the young and old. They have an inner fire to make things happen, to sustain life, get things done, and keep the world going. They are the largest source of income generation. They have the energy and drive to keep it all going. They are like the full summer blooms, doing what they were meant to do.

At this time the pear is ripe. Mission accomplished. It’s the time to eat it or bake with it. Despite its color, it’s tinged with yellow undertones.

Autumn 
The change. Colors deepen. The temperature starts to cool and the air is lighter and drier. The days begin to darken. It feels like a welcome relief. The trees start to relax and succumb to nature. The leaves allow themselves to deepen, change, and finally let themselves go. Before the leaves do let go, that tree never seemed so beautiful.

Ayurvedically speaking this part of the cycle is “Vata”. Whether you are a half empty or half full glass type of person, it can be seen as the time of death or the agent of change. The necessary change that needs to take place so the next cycle of planning and development can take place. Chakra-wise we move up the body to the color blue or the throat chakra. The throat representing voice. With a mature and wise mind, humans have less energy but are able to speak their truth and guide the next generation.

Humans at this part of life also begin to slow down and let go. They often feel colder and have a more deep and philosophical understanding of this cycle and their own part it in. They are closer to spirit and that magic time of “winter” so to speak.  Generally they have more trouble keeping on weight and become drier. The skin is tinged with blue and darker undertones. They are like the fall.

The pear, if uneaten, becomes darker too. Blue & brown undertones. Overripe. More age spots. Soft to the touch. But the sweetest and juiciest it will ever be if you can handle the mess! Another proverbial day or two in its own cycle and it just becomes a pile of mush. Mush to turn the seeds inside to something new perhaps? The opportunity to begin the cycle again as we head back into winter.

Circle of Life
It’s a beautiful cycle. It is nature. Each part has its very own purpose and feeds right into the next. There is no real beginning and no real end.

We should keep in mind that there is truly nothing to fight. Try… but we will not win. It’s easier to just understand nature and accept and open up to where we are are in it.

Nature is bigger than us. She will carry us through each awesome, perpetual, ongoing, self sustaining cycle so we can play our own special part.

Like the seed that created the unassuming pear, we are each a seed lucky enough to have made it. 

 

I painted two versions of this. One with the raw primary colors and the other with a softer tint of each.

Below I used photography and light alteration to show the same concept.

The original pear this blog was written about is the one to the bottom left of the first photo.

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