Universal Energy

The first law of thermodynamics says that energy cannot be created or destroyed by only changes form. Now we look at the physical world around us and we look at the trees, the sun.

The sun is radiating energy down to us. That sun warms us. It lands on the leaves of plants. Plants take it in. The plants are also pulling up nutrients from the ground below. They are using the energy from above and the nutrients from below. They produce food for us, food for other creatures. The creatures are eaten by other creatures. Somewhere in the line the creatures may also become food for us.

We are consuming the energy from the sun, the nutrients from the earth. That energy is now part of us. We are that energy.

How will we use this energy?

What feeds your joy?

What feeds your heart?

When we are living in what feeds us we will be able to blossom. We will support and nourish others just by being.

This cycles of energy continues and continues. However, the plant, our bodies they do not continue endlessly. They are finite. We will die one day. We have lost others. There will be births and joy. There will be death and loss. This cycle will continue if we continue to nourish the cycle.

Breathe. Remember the sun and the plants. Remember those who came before us. Those who shared their energies with the world. That energy stays with us. Those words, experiences, lessons; they stay with us. And we will stay with others, when we share our energy.

The laws of nature will not change, but we can change the way we view our world, the way we act or react.

Tomorrow is a new day.

Be grateful.

Use your energy well. Take care of yourself. Take care of beings beyond yourself. Check in with others. Check in with yourself.

Love.

I morphed this meditation into a guided meditation video, if you are interested. Meditation on Universal Energy

Impermanence

When I sit and breathe, I sit with just one thought: everything is impermanent. My mind often goes to the negative: everyone I love will die, everything I enjoy will disappear. These thoughts bring up an anxiety, a frustration that I cannot stop this. I want to control things, I want to hold onto precious moments and make them last. However, a shift in perspective brings relief: I fear losing loved ones because I have so many loved ones, I fear not having my joyful activities because I have so much in life that I do enjoy.

Yes, change will happen and people we love will die. We will do what we can to nurture each other and keep each other healthy, but we cannot stop nature. What we can do is be fully present in the moment. We can learn and share with those we love in each moment and carry that energy forward. Check in with those that matter. Engage yourself in activities that bring you joy. Share that joy with others.

Impermanence also means that pain will pass, that hard times will pass, that there will be togetherness again. We must stay mindful so that as we fill our days, we are sure to fill them with what really fills us.

Yes moments will move on and so don’t miss this moment, this opportunity to love.

Faith

Looking at the cherry trees starting to flower, I am grateful and I am worried. I am scared for them. Is it too early? What if we get another frost? They are not scared. They continue to open up, more today than yesterday. Opening up wider, spreading their petal wings. Soaking in the warm sun, holding fast against a cool breeze. The early ones already falling before so many others have even bloomed. But by blooming early or late, they prolong the chances of pollination. So for those that bloom early or late, they may not have much company but they are helping ensure more years of blooming. This is faith.

Faith is knowing that they are doing what they are meant to be doing and that is all they can do. They do not worry about what is beyond their control. As humans we can imagine what the future might hold. This is beautiful, but when we get stuck in the negative what if’s, we create worry for ourselves. We must recognize them and release them back to the universe, these worries are not ours. Holding them does us no good. We must hold onto the gratitude toward the beauty of nature. Recognize that nature is moving through its cycles, knowing that there may be imperfections but as long as each part does their part then we will move through another cycle and another. This is the beauty of nature, it’s perseverance, it’s complex interdependence.

Beauty is the quality place on the recipient of our appreciation. When we learn to appreciate all parts of nature and ourselves even the imperfections are beautiful. The gratitude towards imperfections gives me hope, renews my faith in a future filled with appreciation. So if I can remain grateful to the nature around me blooming, going through its cycles, this gives me the faith to do the same.

Waiting

Sometimes I can find myself “killing time” waiting for something to happen. What? I don’t know, but something great. It doesn’t. Instead it’s just me passing the time. I find myself doing menial things: watching TV shows that I didn’t know existed 5 minutes before, playing a repetitive game on my phone, milling about my house “doing chores” but not really making progress on anything specific.

Patience is a virtue but I need to stop expecting things to come my way just through patience. I need to seize opportunities to create when the time is present before me. What is it that is stopping me?

Sometimes I think it is the feeling of hopelessness, “What does it matter even if I do create something? Who would care?” And although it is important to me that I create something others would enjoy, I must remember it is important that it brings joy or fulfillment to myself. Giving myself this gift of creation, expression is enough of a reason to put in the effort.

Sometimes I stall because there are too many things that I want to accomplish or the goals seem to lofty, I become overwhelmed on where to start. I just stall. Like driving a manual vehicle and putting it into a gear before the engine is ready. Then there is no power to move forward at all. I need to remember to break my goals down into steps and take one at a time.

I need to remind myself that if I am not working towards my own goals and if I am just waiting then that waiting will be filled with someone else’s goals. And that is not always a bad thing to be there supporting the goals of others but it needs to be intentional.

Intention is the point here. I need to stop allowing the anxiety to put me into a passive mode and I need to find my contentment and use my energy to that end.

Imperfections

Look for the beauty; ignore the negative; appreciate the imperfections.

When we acknowledge our imperfections, we acknowledge our vulnerability, our humanness. We humble ourselves to be part of this universe and not in control of it. We acknowledge the collective forces that are greater than our individual desires. When we submit ourselves to the universal collective goal of peace for others, we find peace for ourselves.

If, in contract, we are causing pain and disruption for others then even if we think we are building a peaceful bubble for ourselves, those disruptions reverberate into our highly designed but false life. There is no peace for one being, if there is not peace for all beings. Our environment must remain in harmony. This is the purpose of finding balance within ourselves to help maintain harmony for those around us.

When we find balance within ourselves and serve to find peace for others, then others can find and hold balance more easily and peace is available to us all.

Ritual (2)

The cycles of life. The plants sprout in spring, come to fruit through the summer, in autumn the fruits ripen and plants begin to die back, and then they hibernate through the winter gathering energy for the next spring. Sunrise, sunset and the moon follows suit. We are born, we grow, we learn, we bring offspring and we leave this life. Every thing in life comes and goes in cycles. Our own rituals for birthdays, holidays, holy days . . . they are also part of the rhythm of our lives.

As humans, we have a self awareness that is trying to make sense of all of these cycles, these rhythms. It is good to embrace that. If the rituals of the past do not suit your current understanding and principles then create new rituals that do best represent your beliefs.

When we know better, we do better.

Generations of the past were celebrating the rituals that gave them meaning, comfort. As you reflect in this time of holidays, you may find, as I have that many of these rituals do not hold the meaning for yourself that they are intended for. And so for a long time, I ignored all rituals around these holidays. However, I found I missed the connections of shared rituals, the moments of honoring the sacred. I am now working towards creating rituals that honor what I find sacred. I am also reshaping old rituals so that they still fit and hold sacred meaning for myself. I am asking those close to me to share in my new rituals. It’s taking time for me to find what feels right and who I feel most comfortable with sharing but it is happening.

Ritual

I take a few minutes and walk out side. It’s rainy, it’s hot, it’s snowy, it’s an easy warmth and pleasant breeze. It doesn’t matter the conditions, each day I take a few moments to feel the air, feel the weather, observe the trees in my space, look for other life. Along the highway, I find a Cooper’s Hawk, I see osprey nests on the highway signs, I see a great blue heron fly over the same highway bridge almost every morning, heading east. He’s on his commute and I am on mine. Meditation, mindfulness it is sacred but that sacredness is found everywhere when you treat it as sacred.

Today, I walked the yard; walked along the woodline behind the house. Prints in the icy snow that is still in the areas of the yard that gets less light. The crunch of this melting snow beneath my feet. The crisp, icy air on my cheeks and nose. The dryness of the air. The quiet of the woods. The peep of a bird that was traveling from tree to tree. The gentle crash of snow falling from limbs.

Each day I try give myself time to be with myself for reflection and self growth.

Rhythm

On a nice summer day, I was walking through my neighborhood with my woven bag slung over my shoulder. After completing my walk, I sat down with friends and took the bag off to sit it down on the ground. That is when I saw my leg and the pen marks. It took me a few moments but I realized that this was the result of a pen that was sticking out of my bag and the bag swinging back and forth as I walked. It created this wonderful design.

This brought my attention to the rhythms we all go through daily. Sunrise, sunset, wake up, go to sleep, wash, rinse and repeat. I was pleased with the steadiness of this design when it was done unknowingly. I felt that I was in a rhythm that was comfortable. I felt in the flow.

To me, being in the flow is when I am in motion, getting things done but not feeling frantic, not feeling rushed. I’m accomplishing tasks with the full confidence that they are happening in the proper time and that there will be enough time for all that is suppose to happen.

There are two thoughts that have helped me find this more frequently. The first is to make time for that which I deem important. The second is to accept that if something takes more time than I expected, then it was needed. That may mean that I am late to something else but the task I’m involved in deserves my full attention and deserves to be fully completed. If those things are not true then it probably wasn’t that important to begin with. That is okay to recognize too.

The other part of that is that I continue to be mindful of the responsibilities which I take on and to give a bit of buffer time in between. I am highly bothered if I commit to something and fail to follow through and so I work harder these days to not over-commit myself. I also work to remind myself that if something is not getting done, I will simply communicate that clearly to anyone else that would be affected and see if there can be an alternate plan to get the necessary tasks done. What I won’t do is shame myself for not accomplishing everything all the time. That harms my own spirit and still does not accomplish the task. I will be patient with myself and others.

What does being in “the flow” mean for you? What prevents you from feeling this harmony in your routines? What can you change? What do you not have control over to change? When have you felt in “the flow”?

I also believe that my rhythm doesn’t always stay the same. Some times I feel the need for my rhythm to be slower and other times I can be happy with a quicker pace to my day. The change in rhythm might depend on my mood, my physical energy, or the type of task that I’m involved in. Through it all, I am working to be aware, to be mindful of my rhythm and how I feel as I am completing the tasks. It is not just the accomplishment of tasks that is important but how we feel as we are in progress.

Struggle

This has been a tough week for me. I have experienced some extreme high and low emotions. I have been incredibly frustrated at obstacles in my path and incredibly grateful for friends around me. Through it all I have seen how these struggles that force me to ask for help, then strengthen the connections with those around me that I go to for support. Asking for help means putting yourself in a place of humility and so it can be tough for those of us with a fair amount of pride, ego. Learning to loosen my grip on my own ego and accept help means that I then feel closer to those friends who are able to help.

Our attachment to our ego causes a lot of pain. It is important for us to remember that we are all imperfect humans doing our best. It is also important to remember that you can ask for help but should not expect it. If someone says they cannot help, understand that they have their own reasons for that and do not allow yourself to judge their situation. Then when you find those that can help, remember to express your gratitude and allow yourself to be vulnerable with them. It is important that we find those people who we can be vulnerable with.

Hawk and Squirrel

Yesterday, while I was watching the sky become grey and a hawk landed on my fence less than 10 feet from me. It was impressive and I could see the beautiful striped tail feathers and speckled body. I believe now that it was an immature Cooper’s hawk. Then a large squirrel hopped up onto the fence and was watching the hawk. I realized the hawk had something in it’s talons. It began eating this smaller creature which seemed to have been dead by now. It was incredible to watch nature, to wonder what the context of these two animals has been.

In nature, sometimes one creature must be sacrificed to nourish another creature. I don’t know that there is some grand lesson in all of this other than the simple reverence for the beauty and brutality of nature that I felt in that moment. That I could hold that dichotomy in my spirit and not feel a conflict in those two impressions: beauty and brutality.

Boundaries

We have all heard that we need to have healthy boundaries for ourselves, but knowing what that looks like for each of us is difficult. It can also change depending on the context of the situation or relationship in which we find ourselves. If we are too protective, we risk cutting ourselves off from others. If we are too soft, we risk over-sharing our own energies.

I have been learning to recognize both the patterns that deplete my energy and the habits that can help renew my energy for myself. We can find support in others at times but the benefits of self care can go much deeper and be more sustainable. By demonstrating love to yourself, you free yourself from the expectations of others and you remind yourself of your own power. Keeping in touch with my own power of love, keeps me more emotionally stable. I can then more effectively navigate the stresses in life that I will inevitably encounter that are beyond my control. This may sound like simple logic but can be difficult to implement when you have people you love who are in need themselves.

If you have been able to tap into your own well of strength and positivity, then others will be drawn to your energy. They see in you what we all want for ourselves, energy. When people are coming to you as the source, this can become draining for you. They do not do this out of malice but rather a lack of understanding of how to find their own well of love and energy. For me, I saw this happening as I have been setting myself up to be happier in life. And as a loving being I want to others to be happy as well. Sharing my happiness with them helps to a degree, however, there does come a point where I cannot just be their source of energy but need to renew myself. So with setting up those appropriate boundaries for my own renewal, it can also be an opportunity to inform others that this is what they can do for themselves. So when I find myself becoming emotionally imbalanced or energetically depleted then I need to pause and give myself some time.

In order for this time to truly feel restorative, I need to impose those boundaries clearly and with love. I also need to be aware of the habits to employ that actually help renew my energy.

Imposing boundaries lovingly has taken some practice but I find myself getting better at it. I state clearly that I need the space and that this will benefit myself but also those with whom I am setting up the boundaries. By taking this space, those relationships will be healthier, happier and sustainable. I then must follow through and truly not allow myself to be too easily drawn out by the all too-common distractions of life, such as: a phone call, texts, emails. . . I also must be disciplined with myself to employ healthy habits like: meditation, yoga, writing, pursuing a passion, etc. . . Those things which I always say I wish I had more time for. Well, now I do. I must also avoid the easy distractions of escapism, such as: TV, video games, etc. . .

Now that I have the time and the space for myself, I must be responsible to myself and take charge of my own happiness. When I do that, I am grateful to those who have helped demonstrate these healthy habits, I am grateful to hose around me who have respected my space and most importantly, I am grateful to myself for the self-care. The renewed present self is grateful to the past, tired self for taking the time and creating the space to renew.