Chakra Anatomy Series - Throat

5th Chakra - The Throat

Western Anatomy:

The 5th chakra governs the throat, largely the thyroid and parathyroid glands. The thyroid is a butterfly-shaped gland situated low on the front of the neck. It lies below your Adam's apple, along the front of the windpipe. The thyroid is the production house for two major hormones that modulate metabolism and growth. Despite it's small size, it has a big influence on the function of many of the body's most important organs, including the brain, heart, liver, kidneys and skin. It is attached to the larynx, or the voice box, which not only aids in breathing, talking and swallowing, but also protects the lungs from inhaling foreign particles.

Eastern Energetics:

The place of communication, creativity, self-expression, sense of hearing, the voice of the body, speaking your truth, accepting your originality, honesty, saying "No" and "Yes" when you need to

East meets West:

There's a butterfly perched on your throat! God is truly an artist. It's made of human tissue, but no less magnificent. Butterflies have always been a symbol of renewal and metamorphosis and it's presence along the airway and voice box bespeaks the power of truth spoken and the ability for our words to create. That the thyroid gland governs metabolism in the body (the conversion of food into energy) also seems quite pertinent to the art of self-expression (converting words into life). Both processes take something dense (food/words) and break it down into something that gives life and vitality (energy/life). In the Hebrew language the word DABAR means "word" or "thing". In English those two things would seem very difficult to use interchangeably, but perhaps the ancients understood that words and things were essentially the same "stuff". Even more explicit is the origins of the hocus pocus word "abra-cadabra" wielded by magicians for ages, deriving from the Hebrew DABRA. The word "abra-cadabra" became a gibberish-imitation word to express the concept that "It came to pass as it was spoken". Here we have not East meets West, but Ancient meets Modern.