Joseph,

I think watching videos and reading about different techniques is a great way to learn new things that work for you. I believe we are all different in how we learn and how we see or hear things. One way might be extremely beneficial for you and yet another that works for someone else may seem lacking. Use your own feelings to judge this.

When I read about a new method and try it, I immediately sense that I feel great movement or awareness from it.

Another way to think about exercising the chakras is to relate it to physical exercise and the body. You'll want to use a balanced exercise program for all of the chakras. But you'll also want to be aware if one area is already very well developed and may not need so much attention.

Here are some techniques that were helpful to me and made a big difference.

The first basic chakra balancing was to visualize the chakra as a ball about the size of a tennis ball and rotating clockwise.

This was very difficult for me and I really had to focus hard to keep the vision. HOWEVER, when I thought of someone else I wanted to do healing for, I could truly SEE a vision of their chakra. It was many months before I viewed my own. You can practice chakra balancing on a pet and often see their chakras easily. (When I say SEE, I mean see as in a vision).

Once I could see other chakras, I was aware that they came in all shapes and sizes. When I could not visualize the chakra as I knew it should be, I realized that the chakra needed balancing and development.

I learned that you could visualize the chakra able to float up through an opening in the body and allow it to expand as large as it would like. Then I could determine how big a chakra looked and felt to see how well developed it was.

I learned I could apply REIKI over the chakra and feel the power from the REIKI. I used the symbol for "positive energy in" and "negative energy out" (Choku Rei and reversed)

I also found meditating and concentrating on the chakra balancing while holding crystals in my hands to be very impressive.

Using sound (mantras) while working on the chakras was so distracting that I didn't feel the full benefit so I only did it once. However, I did find that using Hemi sync cds (must use stereo headphones) was very impressive and I could feel the chakras respond to the tones.

I do remember in the beginning feeling so inexperienced and worried that I might be doing it wrong. If you do work with your chakras every day, you will gain tremendous experience.

I would work with each of them every day and suggest going from the bottom (to ground you) to the top and then I like to finish by visualizing the Crown chakra as a beautiful 1,000 petal lotus blossom and allow the petals to unfold one by one relaxing you deeper and deeper.