The Crown Chakra or Sahasrara is the uppermost energy center within a seven-chakra system.

It’s a critical energy center for personal and spiritual growth.

It also has an overarching role in balancing and regulating the body primarily through the endocrine system (hormones).

This blog post provides all you need to know about the Crown Center – what it is, what it does, and how you can support its healthy and balanced functioning.

Crown Chakra Meaning

The Crown Center largely determines how you experience life through a spiritual lens.

It influences your thoughts, opinions, beliefs and understanding of your existence and sense of purpose. It also governs your conscious and subconscious valuations of yourself, people, places, things, and events.

Your spirituality and Crown energy imbue all ordinary everyday life events and experiences with a spiritual (not necessarily religious) tone. This colors your perception, reflection, and responses.

Of course, like all chakras, the Crown Center has a holistic influence extending to the whole mind, body, and spirit continuum. For example, it:

• governs the thoughts within your mind,
• regulates the endocrine system to moderate your emotions and bodily functions, and,
• evokes inspiration and devotion to enliven the spirit.

In some instances, Sahasrara is the key actor or determinant. In other situations, it plays a supporting role. This is the case for all of the chakras.

Sahasrara Chakra Meaning

The Sanskrit word “Sahasrara” means thousandfold or infinity, which refers to a lotus with a thousand/infinite number of petals. The lotus itself is the seat of consciousness or enlightenment.

All energy centers are depicted as a lotus. Each has a different number of petals. The number increases from the Root to the Crown, suggesting a human being’s expanded and deepening conscious connection with the universe or the divine as they grow, experience, and mature.

Crown Chakra Location

The Sahasrara Chakra is located at the top of the Central Light Column (CLC) or Sushumna, which runs along the spine of the human physical body up to and above the top of the head or crown. In the accompanying image, you can see that it floats above the head.

Crown Chakra Color

Every chakra is represented with color which suggests its energetic wave frequency. Frequencies increase from the First Chakra through the Crown.

This is consistent with what we understand about energy waves, the light spectrum, and corresponding colors.

The wavelength shortens, and the frequency increases from the red light waves of the First or Root Chakra, up to the Seventh Chakra. Higher frequencies have more intense energy. Most spiritual approaches follow this pattern and assign lower frequencies to earthbound existence and higher frequencies to the numinous realms of guides, angles, and the divine.

Some representations of the chakras present Sahasrara’s color as white, pink, violet, or deep purple. It can be confusing because the Third Eye Chakra (Ajna) ranges from indigo to light violet to purple, and sometimes even pink or pink-purple.

In the illustration above, Sahasrara is pink-purple and Ajna is a purplish indigo.

The Crown and Your Mind, Body, and Spirit

Each chakra is closely affiliated with specific physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual attributes. A brief non-exhaustive list of Crown Chakra-related attributes includes:

• Pituitary and pineal gland regulation (endocrine system)
• Central nervous system
• Sleep and circadian rhythms regulation
• Light and sound sensitivity
• Headaches and migraines
• Inner knowing
• Overall sensed experience
• Emotional and mood regulation
• Mindset (closed, open, fixed, flexible)
• Thoughts and beliefs (including limiting beliefs)
• Focus and concentration
• Clarity
• Intellect (head brain and embodied cognition)
• Purpose and meaning
• Inspiration
• Relationship with the divine or spirit
• Discernment
• Meditation
• Mystical experience

More About the Crown Chakra

Sahasrara Chakra Element

All chakras are associated with an elemental. Sahasrara’s element is thought, and by extension, its affiliated sense is knowing, or in other words, beyond the body and its senses.

Thought is said to be the barest manifestation of consciousness because other senses such as touch, sight, and hearing are known to you through thought and contemplation.

On a personal note, I believe that your mind is fully embodied both in your body and your head, and you can perceive, internalize, and respond through each of your senses without verbally articulating them in your head brain.

Sahasrara Chakra Planet

The planet most commonly associated with the Crown is Uranus, although I’ve seen references to the Moon, which is not a planet and is typically assigned to the Sacral Chakra (Svadhisthana). The latter pairing is more logical (see Svadhistana, the Orange Chakra for more).

Uranus has various metaphysical meanings. Uranus offers a macro lens or point of view. It’s often associated with awakening, originality, disruption or rebellion, limitlessness, and breaking free of tradition and what is known.

The Crown Center also represents breaking through earthly restrictions and creating a link to the limitless universe and collapse of boundaries.

Sahasrara Chakra Symbol or Mandala

All chakra mandalas vary in presentation, yet there are always several standard themes. The mandala for Sahasrara is typically the most complex and comprises several concentration circles, often depicting lotus petals (see the accompanying image). Each petal is said to represent information, knowledge, or intelligence. Together they signify the collective intelligence of all that there is.

The symbol for Om typically occupies the center. The mandala for the Third-Eye Chakra also contains Om.

Sahasrara Chakra Bija

Because Sahasrara is believed to be beyond sense, it’s often said to be silent. However, some sources assign to it the sound of Om, the seed symbol.

Crown Chakra Healing

As an energy healer and teacher, people often ask me if I can open their chakras. Oftentimes they mean the Third Eye or Crown. All of your chakras are open.

At times they can be blocked, weak (under-functioning), or hyperactive. They can also be entangled with one another. All of these conditions indicate an imbalance. What energy healers can do is balance them and regulate their energy flow. But, as dynamic entities, your energy centers will be in a constant state of change, moving from one state of imbalance, to balance, to imbalance again.

When you do your own personal and spiritual work, you improve chakra performance and resilience. They and your aura layers can expand and contract. When you do energy or spiritual work, you can experience this as well.

Three Chakra Healing Tools

Crown Chakra Crystals

Because healing crystals are vibrational in nature they pair well with the chakras, auric energy, and subtle energy flowing through your energy bodies. Two key Crown Chakra stones are Amethyst and Lepidolite. Clear Quartz and Lemurian Quartz support the entire chakra system.

Crown Yoga Poses

Inversions are good yoga poses for the Seventh Chakra. Some examples are headstands, half-headstands, supported shoulder stands, and wheel pose variations. Corpse pose and Savasana fall into this category because they support integration throughout the mind, body, and spirit.

Cr0wn Chakra Essential Oils

Essential oils have both physical and vibrational qualities. They can treat physical, emotional, and mental symptoms of imbalance or dysfunction. They can also address the chakra system as a whole or specific energy centers. Some common Crown Chakra essential oils include Frankincense (Boswellia cateri), Spikenard (Nardostachys jatamansi), Myrtle (Myrtus communis), and Sandalwood (Santalum album).

For more information, see my blog post on aromatherapy for the Purple Crown or my ebook on essential oils for the chakra.

As a certified aromatherapist, I used to write extensively about the healing properties of essential oils, which included their subtle and metaphysical properties. More recently, I’ve added Lavender (Lavandula angustifolia) to my list of Crown Chakra essentials.

Lavender is calming and lowers your blood pressure among other attributes. Your calmer, softer respiration, lengthens your brainwaves and can shift you from a Beta to Alpha brain state, signaling your central nervous system and vagal nerve, in particular, to settle down and open to connection with others or spirit. Alpha is a typical state utilized by many meditators, energy healers, mediums, and therapists.

In my experience, hyperactivity and a Beta brain state inhibit my and my client’s inner and spiritual work.

Some additional tools are toning with Om, crystal bowls, tuning forks, and meditation. Of course, personal and spiritual growth work and thought work to clear limiting beliefs are appropriate tools as well.