Your Sacral Chakra Is The Key To Cultivating Creativity, Pleasure & Joy In Life
Feeling uninspired, uncreative, or struggling with your sense of self-worth? Chances are, you might be experiencing emotional blockage in your sacral chakra. The sacral chakra (also known as the Svadhisthana) is the second chakra of the seven chakras according to ancient Indian tradition. Located just a few inches below your belly button, the sacral chakra is all about unlocking your creativity, basking in the joy of life, and forming deep connections with your emotions.
This energy center is all about unlocking your creativity, basking in the joy of life, and forming deep connections with your emotions.
What is the sacral chakra responsible for?
Creativity
Are you into painting, writing, or even creating videos or content for fun? That's your sacral chakra doing its thing! When this chakra is in harmony, you'll find your creative juices flowing freely. Your inner creative will be brimming with ideas, and you'll be able to express yourself in ways you never thought possible.
Emotions
The sacral chakra houses the emotions of your energy system. It allows you to connect with your feelings, both the highs and the lows. When this chakra is balanced, you'll find yourself observing and riding these emotional waves with grace and understanding.
The sacral chakra is also your passageway to embracing sensuality and pleasure. Sensuality looks like enjoying life's little luxuries, whether it's relishing a meal at a new restaurant, soaking in the beauty of art galleries, or finding tranquility through yoga. When this chakra is in sync, you'll feel a deep sense of contentment and comfort in your own skin.
What blocks the sacral chakra?
Because the energy of the sacral chakra is all about creativity and emotional flow, a blocked chakra can manifest in different ways energetically as you move through life. Things that block the sacral chakra include:
- Carrying emotional baggage
- Feeling stressed or overwhelmed
- Repressed creativity
- Unhealthy relationships
- Negative self-perception
- Ignoring pleasure or experiencing a lack of pleasure in life
- Fear of vulnerability
How do you know your sacral chakra is blocked?
Your body and emotions have a pretty awesome way of dropping hints when your sacral chakra is blocked. Though this is not an exhaustive list, here are some signs that your sacral chakra might be blocked:
- Experiencing creative blockages
- Low libido
- Riding an emotional roller coaster
- Lack of passion
- Self-doubt, especially in your creative abilities
- Avoiding joy and pleasure in life
- Resisting change
- Difficulty in self-expression or emotional expression
How do you unblock your sacral chakra?
Release your emotions.
Address past emotional wounds through practices like journaling, talking to a therapist, or engaging in meditation to release those old feelings.
Practice effective stress management.
Practice mindfulness, yoga, or deep breathing exercises to manage stress and keep that chakra from getting all tense.
Indulge your creative side.
Make time for your creative passions, whether it's drawing, painting, writing, or any other form of self-expression that speaks to your soul.
Embrace self-love rituals.
Practice self-love and affirmations to increase your self-worth and create a positive environment for your sacral chakra.
Set healthy boundaries.
Establishing healthy boundaries in work and life protects your energy by ensuring that you are being nurtured in life rather than drained.
Indulge in pleasure.
Take time to indulge in life's pleasures without guilt, whether it's through delicious food, love, art, or simply a moment of pure relaxation.
Cultivate vulnerability in the way you show up.
Gradually work on opening up and embracing vulnerability. Vulnerability is vital to connection, including the connection you have with the self.
What happens when the sacral chakra opens and is unblocked?
When you unblock the sacral chakra, it opens the energy center up. Then, energy flows freely, and it's like opening up to receive a whole new level of creativity, emotions, and overall well-being. You will express yourself in new ways as your mind becomes a playground for new ideas, artistic pursuits, and innovative thinking.
As we previously mentioned, with an open sacral chakra, your emotions flow smoothly. You'll be able to understand and process your feelings more easily, leading to emotional clarity and balance. Your connection to your senses deepens. You'll fully appreciate the pleasures of life.
Your ability to connect with others on an emotional level blossoms. Your empathy and understanding grow, leading to more meaningful and fulfilling relationships. As that self-love and creative energy flow, your confidence will flourish. You'll feel a strong sense of self-worth and radiate positivity from within.
Adaptability becomes more possible. Change becomes less scary. Releasing old emotional wounds becomes a thing of the present instead of the past. Life takes on a new vivid color. When your sacral chakra is in harmony, you'll feel energized with a new lease on life, a deep sense of joy, and a passion for exploring new avenues. All in all, you'll feel more alive.
How do you balance your sacral chakra?
In order to balance your sacral chakra, take time to pamper yourself and enjoy life's pleasures without guilt. It could be as simple as treating yourself to a day of doing nothing or immersing yourself in the world of art in a local gallery or museum. Below are some additional ways to balance your sacral chakra:
- Tune in and listen to your body and emotions and notice any mood swings or creative blocks
- Engage in activities that speak to you on a soul level to get the chakra's energy flowing again
- Practice yoga and recite affirmations that target the sacral chakra to encourage flow
- Meditate and visualize while focusing on the chakra's area to release stagnant energy
- Address past wounds and emotional baggage through therapy, journaling, or inner child healing
- Surround yourself with healthy relationships that support you and your growth
- Develop self-care routines that nourish your soul and prioritize your emotional well-being
- Use crystals like carnelian or orange calcite to aid in balancing your chakra
- Engage in dance and movement freely
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This Black Woman-Owned Creative Agency Shows Us The Art Of Rebranding
Rebranding is an intricate process and very important to the success of businesses that want to change. However, before a business owner makes this decision, they should determine whether it's a rebrand or an evolution.
That's where people like Lola Adewuya come in. Lola is the founder and CEO of The Brand Doula, a brand development studio with a multidisciplinary approach to branding, social media, marketing, and design.
While an evolution is a natural progression that happens as businesses grow, a rebrand is a total change. Lola tells xoNecole, "A total rebrand is necessary when a business’s current reputation/what it’s known for is at odds with the business’s vision or direction.
"For example, if you’ve fundamentally changed what your product is and does, it’s likely that your brand is out of alignment with the business. Or, if you find your company is developing a reputation that doesn’t serve it, it might be time to pump the brakes and figure out what needs to change.
She continues, "Sometimes you’ll see companies (especially startups) announce a name change that comes with updated messaging, visuals, etc. That usually means their vision has changed or expanded, and their previous branding was too narrow/couldn’t encompass everything they planned to do."
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The Brand Doula was born in 2019, and its focus is on putting "the experiences, goals, and needs of women of color founders first," as well as brands with "culture-shifting missions."
According to Lola, culture-shifting is "the act of influencing dominant behavior, beliefs, or experiences in a community or group (ideally, for the better)."
"At The Brand Doula, we work with companies and leaders that set out to challenge the status quo in their industries and communities. They’re here to make an impact that sends ripples across the market," she says.
"We help the problem solvers of the world — the ones who aren't satisfied with 'this is how it's always been' and instead ask 'how could this be better?' Our clients build for impact, reimagining tools, systems, and ways of living to move cultures forward."
The Brand Doula has worked with many brands, including Too Collective, to assist with their collaboration with Selena Gomez's Rare Beauty and Balanced Black Girl for a "refresh," aka rebrand. For businesses looking to rebrand, Lola shares four essential steps.
1. Do an audit of your current brand experience — what’s still relevant and what needs to change? Reflect on why you’re doing the rebrand in the first place and what success would look like after relaunching.
2. Tackle the overall strategy first — before you start redesigning logos and websites, align on a new vision for your brand. How do you want your company to be positioned moving forward? Has your audience changed at all? Will your company have a fresh personality and voice?
3. Bring your audience along the journey — there’s no need to move in secret. Inviting your current audience into the journey can actually help them feel more connected to and invested in your story, enough to stick around as changes are being made.
4. Keep business moving — one of my biggest pet peeves is when companies take down their websites as soon as they have the idea to rebrand, then have a Coming Soon page up for months! You lose a lot of momentum and interest by doing that. If you’re still in business and generating income, continue to operate while you work on your rebrand behind the scenes. You don’t want to cut existing customers off out of the blue, and you also don’t want so much downtime that folks forget your business exists or start looking for other solutions.
While determining whether the rebrand was successful may take a few months, Lola says a clear sign that it is unsuccessful is negative feedback from your target audience. "Customers are typically more vocal about what they don’t like more than what they do like," she says.
But some good signs to look out for are improvements in engagement with your marketing, positive reviews, press and increase in retention, and overall feeling aligned with the new branding.
For more information about Lola and The Brand Doula, visit her website, thebranddoula.com.
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Women's Voting Organization Supermajority's CIO Talks Election Issues, Minus The Drama
Voting has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. As a child, my parents would pack my sister and me up in the car and allow us to take in the excitement of the polls during local and national elections.
Years later, in 2008, I voted in my first election for Barack Obama and emotionally celebrated his win surrounded by fellow classmates from Clark Atlanta, Spelman, and Morehouse.
I remember calling my grandmother, who has since transitioned, and hearing the passion in her voice when she explained how she’d never thought she’d see something like this happen and how much it meant to her. As I reflect, I realize it’s a combination of memories like this that undoubtedly encouraged my will to vote.
However, as an adult, my reasoning behind the practice has developed. It’s no longer just about “the right thing to do.” I feel a responsibility to myself and my future to know the issues, how they impact me, and make a difference for others.
In the times we’re in, there's so much “news” everywhere. It’s hard to distinguish fact from opinion and bias from beliefs. This is why it was such a pleasure speaking with Jara Butler, Chief Impact Officer of Supermajority. Supermajority is an organization focused on making women the most powerful voting bloc in the country. During this authentic and informal conversation, we talked about so much.
I learned about her time working with the Obama campaign and how she masterfully worked in multiple industries, and we shared some of our favorite female rap moments. However, in the snapshot you’ll read, we focused on the issues. Jara walked xoNecole through what’s most affecting women of color in this election and what we can do to be more aware. Whether you’re a politics girlie or like me, just trying to gain more insight, hopefully this convo connects with you.
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xoNecole: Let’s just jump right in. What are some of the most popular issues that you hear Black women discussing related to this election?
Jara Butler: Our sister organization, the Supermajority Education Fund, recently did some research specifically looking at young women in the age group 18 to 35, and young Black women identified their economic well-being as a priority. Right now, we're in a place where a lot of us, especially young Black women, are finding that meeting those basic needs are harder and harder.
Secondly, is Project 2025. I think Black women see it as not just something that could happen, but actively happening. For example, we’ve all been watching the case with the Fearless fund, and how it's been targeted. We know Black women are very entrepreneurial. We can go back to Madam C.J. Walker and others who have opened the door for all of us to achieve. But if those barriers are in place, we're just not going to be able to meet that.
Lastly, Repro is a very big issue. But I think looking at it holistically and not just about abortion is important. Black women are more likely to talk about this from a perspective of our reproductive health care and the lack of access due to medical racism. As a Black woman myself, who's over 40, a lot of the changes that I am making in my life are because I have to do everything I can to put myself in a position, because I know no matter what my economic status is, if I walk into a medical office, there's a good chance I'm gonna face medical discrimination. Breast cancer screenings, colon cancer screening, ovarian cancer screening, cervical cancer screenings - all of those are part of that network of reproductive health.
xoN: Another issue I’d love your insight into is our missing girls. I think it's so unbelievable how much this is swept under the rug. There are so many stories about Black women that are continuing to go missing; I don’t understand how that’s not a bigger conversation. Is this something that can be pursued on the government level and what can we do to bring more attention to this issue?
Jara: We have this list of majority rules on our website, and my favorite one is: that our government represents us. I think that we have to continue to apply pressure to our government to meet our needs. And again, women are the majority of voters. Black women, especially, are the most reliable voting bloc across all groups, and our interests right now are not being met. So yes, there is something that we can do, but I also am a big proponent of us having these conversations.
My great-grandmother was enslaved, my grandmother was born into Jim Crow, and I watched my mother face economic insecurity. I say that because, as a Black community, we have to have an internal conversation to talk about these issues, and we have to do it upfront. I think we have to get into a position of realizing that we do have power, and how we activate that power.
Our power comes from being Black folks because Black people organizing has been enough to shake up and scare people. There were laws that prevented us from congregating together, even at church, because they knew what would happen when we got together. We have to get back into that. It's not that we are not doing it, but the urgency needs to be greater. And finally, we have to get away from depending on one individual to take us there. It's gonna take all of us.
"Our power comes from being Black folks because Black people organizing has been enough to shake up and scare people. There were laws that prevented us from congregating together, even at church, because they knew what would happen when we got together. We have to get back into that. It's not that we are not doing it, but the urgency needs to be greater."
xoN: I agree completely. Now, when we started, you mentioned money. So let’s talk about it. So many of us are starting businesses and getting degrees, and I love to see it. But everyone seems to still be having a lot of the same issues around finances. What are some of the underlying reasons behind this debt that we're dealing with, and how can voting influence these challenges without getting into the individual candidates?
Jara: Hello! Let’s talk about the money! Black women have been told that if we want to move ahead, we have to have that master's degree. We have to be twice as good. So we met that measure, right? But in order to do that, we have to pay for it. Up until about the 1970s college was absolutely affordable. You could work one job and pay for college with some money left over. That has changed.
Realistically, student loans are a barrier. They are a barrier to access housing. They impact our credit, and really and truthfully, depending on how much your loans are, they could affect you paying rent. It basically creates a cycle of debt. And I have real problems with people who say, get a degree in something that's going to make money. It’s about your skills, and if you have the skills, you should be able to earn a living. That covers that.
But the fact is that student loan debt continues to increase, and there have been attempts, more than once, to try to relieve some of that pressure. The reality is that this is a squeeze. It is a conundrum, and we see efforts by the current White House administration to try to alleviate those things, even when they are stopped.
But truly, Congress needs to step in and support this, but I would take it a step further. We should be considering and looking at what it would look like if we had free community colleges. Because what we have now is two generations of borrowers, because older millennials’ children are beginning to age. Black women have the highest degree of second-degree secondary education, but we carry like 1.7 trillion in debt or something like that. I can't remember the exact number, but basically, the majority of the student loan debt is ours.
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xoN: Speaking of college, obviously there’s a lot of discussion around affirmative action in the schools and the undergoing changes. How important is it to consider this topic, and are there any new laws or policies being proposed around this that we should be aware of?
Jara: Oh my goodness, affirmative action is one of the things that we saw that our sister site, the Supermajority Education Fund, found last year as a number two issue for young women. I actually hypothesized that it was a real thing, and it was. And the reason for that is that affirmative action as a whole has been something that benefited white women more than any other group.
However, what is happening is that we’re using the word DEI in a way that is derogatory. I’ve heard people refer to it as: “didn't even earn it.” And as a Black woman who attended an amazing school, I remember being in class and having someone make that comment, knowing my grades were higher than theirs.
The fact of the matter is that we would not need these policies if we lived in an equal and equitable society. It doesn't do us any harm for us to face the facts that this country was built off the backs of enslaved people and the blood of indigenous people, and off the sweat and the tears of immigrants. But because we are unwilling to face that, we now are demonizing programs that are actually meant to create some symbol of balance.
xoN: Finally, I’ll close with this, what can we do to provide information to young people, and how do we combat all of the less than researched info?
Jara: One thing I encourage is to look at the source. At Supermajority, our social channels are information-based. We strive to provide up-to-date accurate information that is digestible to all. Media literacy is something I believe in, and unfortunately, it is something that we have a responsibility to continue to share with the community at large. So much of our world is centered on immediate info, a lie spreads faster than the truth.
We just saw that with the Olympic women's boxers, and we have to ask ourselves often: is this information accurate? Who is telling the story? Most importantly, how am I an original contributor? Not everything said needs to be shared, and not every thought needs to be public.
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