A book on Auras and Chakras

For as long as I can remember, I've associated colors with nearly everything, especially sound. This summer I realized I also associate colors with people. I figure this is another aspect of synesthesia, and I suspect it may be a way of encoding "extra" information that the brain has no other way to process. So I went looking for a book that might help me figure things out. Most of them were useless. At least three-quarters were along the lines of: "Open up your Aura and (Become Rich/Find a Mate/Cure Cancer/etc.)" A few were sort of beginner's guides that had little more info than I had already found on the internet. Most of the rest were interdisciplinary, so they might be tied in with crystal healing or divination or some other New Agey thing. I finally found one that actually looked useful: Your Aura & Your Chakras: The Owner's Manual, by Karla McLaren.

I like this book. Especially since all she would need to do to move it from "New Age" to "Self Help" is call her exercises "Positive Visualizations" instead of Aura/Chakra work: i.e. there is little obvious nonsense. She has a no-nonsense, down to earth style that is very nearly Taoist. She emphasizes balance and calls most New Age practices idiotic because they tend to unbalance people. Some of her claims seem a bit overboard to me (she cured a schizophrenic?), but those were parts of minor anecdotes and not the focus of the book.

The focus is on energy exercises/visualizations. Grounding. Clearing stale energy out. Defining and separating the chakras. She gives very specific instructions. And I found that most of what she said agreed with things I'd already experienced. I am aware of the energy centers at the sites called "chakras." In taiji, we generally only work with 3 of them (Root, Heart, Third-Eye), and I suspect that neglecting the others is not good.

Perhaps my favorite part of this book is her manner in dealing with this stuff. At one point, she tells readers not to get cocky just because they know something about the aura and others don't. Why? Some people keep their auras balanced all on their own and never need to worry about fixing anything.

At any rate, I would highly recommend this book to anyone looking for a practical guide to auras, etc.