The sacral chakra is located three inches below the belly button, above the first lumbar. (It is also sometimes called the spleen chakra and thought to be over the spleen in certain systems).

Sanskrit name: Svadhighthana. The Chinese call it the Dan Tien and in Japanese culture it is called the Hara.

Typically associated with the color orange.

The sacral chakra has 6 petals or spokes.

The gonads are the endocrine gland it is connected to.

The ovaries or testicles are the related organs. This chakra governs the reproductive system.

Planet: Sun.

Astrological signs and planets for the sacral chakra are: Cancer/Moon (receptivity, fertility), Libra/Venus (sensuality, pleasure, care of the self), Scorpio/Pluto (giving up of one's ego in sexual encounters).

Associated sense: taste.

Associated element: water.

Musical note: Re.

Hindu mantra: Yam.

The sacral chakra is often associated with vitality, emotional states, and sexuality. It is the lower emotional aspect of the auric field, emotions pertaining to human existence in particular. A power that might appear when this chakra is fully awakened is a clear understanding of the cycles of creation and destruction, birth and death.

Author Comments:

Man Myth & Magic, Vol. 3 (1985) editor in chief, Richard Cavendish writes that vivification of this chakra "means coming to terms with those feminine aspects of the psyche which Jung named the anima."

In The Chakra Handbook (1999), Shalila Sharamon and Bodo J. Baginski say, "The second chakra is the center of unfiltered primordial emotions, sexual energies and creativity. It is assigned to the elements of water, the source of all biological life, and corresponds to the emotional sphere on the astrological plane. Water fertilizes and continuously produces the life. Through the sacral chakra we participate in the fertilizing and receiving of energies which permeate the whole of nature."

In his book Chakra Breathing (1994), Helmut G. Sieczka says that open energy flow in the second chakra invites vitality and sexual energy, a harmonious sex life, well-balanced physical constitution, feelings of connection and security toward oneself and others, a rich emotional life and a developed sense of empathy. Blockages in this chakra result in doubt, lack of interest, indecisiveness and lethargy in daily life, depression, low energy, clinging to the past, and physical and sexual inhibitions.

In Healing With The Energy Of The Chakras (1998), Ambika Wauters says, "Depression is literally a closing down of this chakra's energy." She also notes that when there is a blockage in this chakra, it is often related to childhood abuse at an early stage of development. The tendency after abuse is to block of the flow of love and pleasure into our lives and continue the self abusive pattern into adult relationships, work situations and relationships in general. She also notes that sexual dysfunction is a direct result when this chakra is impaired.

Shirley MacLaine's personal account of the second chakra, in Going Within (1989), is that "from it flows our creative energy and our attitudes to sin and guilt." She claims that meditating on this chakra is "a way of confronting one's fear of being uncreative, unproductive."