Chakra; The resulting form of energy produced when Physical and Spiritual energies are mixed together within the body. Then to use it, Hand Seals are performed. This allows the user to expel it out the body in the form of an attack, and requires different Hand Seals for different attacks.







Although somewhat similar to energy forms in animes like Dragonball Z and Yu Yu Hakusho, the Chakra seen in Naruto is in no way the same. In these other animes, users can practically double their "Chakra-like energy" in what feels like 5 minutes. But in Naruto, Chakra takes time and lots of training to gradually build up. This prevents having things like a 12 year old kid with enough energy to blow up a whole planet.









So what's really the key here is not actually having chakra, but being able to sufficiently control it. Because, everyone has Chakra, but only skilled ninja can correctly manipulate it to it's fullest extent. As an in-between stage here, some ninja, can partially control their Chakra. This means they can use their Chakra, but not effectively control it, which results in poorly executed justus, and more importantly, running out of Chakra early in a fight.

Masashi Kishimoto, the creator of the Naruto manga series states the following quote in an interview with Shonen Jump about the series:

"I needed a hook to tie in those points in the story when characters would use powers that were beyond normal human capabilities. The term is Chakra, which is used as an explanation for readers to better understand the powers. It’s similar to “the Force” in Star Wars, or chi (Ki) in "Dragon Ball", or magic points in RPGs."

So from a writer's standpoint, you could see this as a tool that allows for his characters to have super human strengths, while at the same time still feeling realistic and making sense.










Out of the many different types of jutsus: Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, Doujutsu, and so on, all require the use of Chakra. However, one of the types (Taijutsu) is different. It basically requires no Chakra use whatsoever. The ninja still needs Chakra to live, Taijutsu just doesn't use it. A standard attack like a punch or kick falls into this jutsu category.

Since Chakra is the resulting form of energy when 2 other energies are mixed together, having those other 2 energies become more powerful, will in-turn make the Chakra more powerful. These other two energies are Physical energy, which is collected from the body's cells, and and Spiritual energy, which is built up through experience and meditation.









Therefore, practicing a jutsu repeaditly, will build up your expierence, thus giving you more spiritual energy, and then allowing more Chakra to be created. Which as a result then allows you to do that same attack with more and more power. This same cycle applies for Physical energy, except this time, instead of doing things like meditation, you could say, do push-ups.

The process in which you mix these two energies together is known as Chakra Molding. And is explained in the show as seen below:

"Molding Chakra means to extract energies from both the body and the spirit, then mixing them up in your body. And the amount of each energy will differ from the type of technique you wish to execute. In other words, the mixing will be different. You are not able to use your Chakra effectively. Even if you are able to mold a large amount of Chakra, If you cannot control the balance, your technique will only be half as effective or not executed at all. Wasting energy will create a weakness of not being able to fight for a long time."

Now that you understand in the ins and outs of Chakra, make sure to check out our other fun sections in the Chakra guide.

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