Positive Energy Guide

What does it mean to realize Self?

The more developed we become the fewer people are able to fully take in who we are, or recognize where we are coming from. Since we are social animals, we instinctually tend to bond by becoming like those around us, to fit in. This urge toward social adjustment is most intense during youth. It is limiting. Teens, for example, may conform rigidly in their group’s particular brand of nonconformity.

Individuation is a step toward Self Realization. Individuation—becoming a fully developed individual—challenges us to step into our uniqueness. As we do so, we may well find that our values, preferences, and ways of spending time are out of step with the herd. Our insights may be intolerable to those who live more superficially.

In this context of personal development, self realization can mean:

–Becoming who we genuinely are
–Making ourselves real
–Bringing forth our essence and expressing it in the outer world
–Realizing—as in having insight into—who we are

It can be strange to be around people—perhaps even stewing in the energy they are putting out—and realize that they do not and cannot recognize where we are coming from, how we feel, and what is important to us.

After the difficult process of separating the fibers we have entangled in group, family, or couple identity to weigh in as our authentic and unique selves comes figuring out how to relate all over again. How do you realize who you are without viable reflections from the people around you?

One way is to develop friends, healers, and/or spiritual associates who are at or beyond your own level of development. Relating being-to-being, in a two-way flow is a blessing. We all need accurate mirrors. Love, clarity, support, and co-creation bless such encounters. They enhance insight, clarity, fortitude, purpose, and confidence.

Until we stabilize authentic self knowledge, the way we experience ourselves may be markedly different among the projections and misconstructions of those who are unable to mirror us, who may in fact oppose or obstruct us. Those of us who are empathically open are often challenged to maintain our realization of who we are, feeding clarity, understanding, and love back into our Selves around confusing input. This process is an opposite of seeking to bond with a group that requires conformity. It may take some practice to learn to bond with groups open enough to encourage authentic participation.

The urge toward self realization, actualization, self awareness, awakening, and so forth is a major driver in the Universe. It provides the impetus to grow, supplies meaning, and gives us myriad processes that develop character, substance, positive values and mastery in the personality. Holding this aim, no matter what we call it, offers us the chance to take whatever experience we have and to dignify it by applying it toward something of ultimate value.

How do we become real to ourselves?

How do we become self aware?

What stands in the way of becoming self aware?

Preparation for the Ultimate Retirement (Death) is not about some external standard or ‘being good.’ It is about establishing a personal relationship with our values and ideals, from moment to moment. It is also about surrendering our concepts and opinions about life in favor of accepting Life as it is. The first step may be to shatter limiting preconceived ideas gleaned from our culture, parents, or associates.

Learning to let go (without giving up) prepares us for living fully in the moment, and for sliding smoothly from this life to our next adventure.

As we begin to age—if we get the chance—we find it more difficult to learn new things. What we have learned in the past has established solid neurological pathways. This later becomes easier to recall and to rely on than our more recent acquisitions of learning and behavior. The longer we wait to develop positive habits and inner qualities the more difficult they become to fully establish and maintain.

We often get caught up in life, thinking that we’ll have more time available for spiritual endeavors after retirement. Taking time to meditate, for example, may occupy the same inner suitcase with having time to travel, and relaxing.

Most of us experience awkward feelings when we consider how to manage money for retirement. In order to plan, we live knowing that we will die, not knowing when, yet having to manage our resources to support our aims. We don’t know who we will BE then, or what will still motivate us. It’s a conundrum. Avoiding the questions may leave us helpless and destitute, or utterly dependent.

Culturally, we look forward to retirement to enjoy a reduction of compulsory activity and commitment. When the actual day comes, we may find ourselves challenged to orient ourselves and create structure in this new timescape. We tend to focus of how we use time, but this disorientation is more extensive. We are moving toward the End Game. Our choices become less important in some ways—and paradoxically much more important in others.

I would like to suggest that creating MEANING is more important than creating structure. Beginning now is like saving for retirement.

Building the inner capacities we most value NOW may well be what makes a happy retirement possible. We can, for example, learn to inspire others by radiating love and peace, declining with grace.

Each time we practice inner cultivation it accumulates with us and adds value throughout the course of our lives. Spiritual practice becomes like money in the bank for your Ultimate Retirement.

Is there anything you have been putting off ‘until retirement’ that you can begin sooner?

Is there any way you would like to BE or that you keep hoping to become in the future? How can you cultivate the states and energies that develop it now?

How do YOU make your life meaningful?

“In order to become myself I must cease to be what I always thought I wanted to be, and in order to find myself I must go out of myself, and in order to live I have to die.”  ~ Thomas Merton

Questioning the purpose and value of our lives need not be morbid. It arises from a longing for something more, something important. Beyond distraction, looking to relationships for belonging, or seeking to diagnose these feelings, they can be seen as a call of the soul for meaning.

Let me make a quick aside and say that belonging is meaningful, but does not substitute for being able to create an internal and a more universal sense of meaning. I am saying that if our only source of meaning depends on belonging with specific persons and groups, this may be insufficient. We can lose people and groups can disband. In addition to belonging with people or groups, we need to develop a sense of belonging in, of, and as our Selves, as citizens of and participants with the Universe.

As we mature emotionally, we learn that life purpose is not all about what we do in the outer world. We learn that meaning supplied by external situations and relationships is transitory, and can be eroded by life’s inevitable losses. This realization can hit hard around retirement. I have also seen it arise in the young and brave, the profound, and in those struggling with illness.

When we are truly able to know that we will die, how we spend our time and what it means to us become vital.

While we may well have meaningful projects and purposes in the world, daily life is our foundation—and may eventually become all that we can sustain.

When we do not create and imbue our days with a sense of meaning, we feel hollow and unsatisfied. Daily life can become like going through the motions, or even drudgery. We seek something to make it worthwhile.

Enacted with Presence and Love, taking care of day to day needs is inherently meaningful. Our experience is a matter of what we bring to it.

Remembering that we will die supports living fully.

Suppose we consider death our Ultimate Retirement. There is much we can do to prepare, and this particular type of Inner Work has inherent meaning and value. Living well in preparation to death has similarities to planning for retirement. Unlike planning for retirement, planning for Ultimate Retirement does not involve putting things off or holding things back for later. It consists of doing things now that will appreciate over time in addition to making daily life more meaningful.

Earning for retirement supports hope for a golden period. Whether or not that period is indeed golden will depend in part on these preparations. It also depends on being able to support a sense of meaning without the organizing principles and structures of work life, and in the face of unavoidable losses that accumulate through the course of life.

What makes retirement happy and helps us to decline with dignity and grace?

Part of preparation for retirement or death depend on coming to grips with losses; taking joy in having had experiences in our lives, even if they are no longer be available. Part of it is also gratefulness for what we are able to experience in the moment. We can learn to appreciate the past, but still release it—without being bitter or destroyed by the difficult experiences or angry about losing the pleasant ones. Without denial or being insincere, this means practicing surrender to the realities of life. It is never too soon to do this Inner Work.

Short of a near-death experience we rarely become suddenly able to accept life and death gracefully. It takes practice and intention. It is meaningful Work. This Work begins as soon as we are able to do so.

Think about those you have seen who are preparing for death. Many become bitter, regretful, contracted, and fearful. Some bring forth a precious courage and generosity of spirit that inspire the living.How and when do we become like that? 

Do you have any role models for aging or dying positively?

How do/did your models inspire you?

How do YOU create a sense of meaning during daily activities?

People who are highly empathic, who feel the energy and emotions of others, often experience a backlash of ambivalence toward the people we experience the most directly. Since empathy calls forth compassion, we also tend to feel bad about it when we do. Empaths, for example may feel bad about wanting a break from their children.

Making our own needs important around other people can be difficult. When we are worn out, even the process of having to decide whether to address the needs of another person or our own can feel like one more unavoidable thing to do. These factors can cause a backlash of ambivalence—which means having conflicting feelings and reactions; feeling pulled in two or more different directions at once. We may love someone, and at the same time feel a need to get away from them, or feel beset by bouts of indifference. Temporary indifference, about which we might also feel conflicted, can function as a buffer for caring too much.

We may have learned early on to take care of the people around us, out of compassion or in self-defense. Feeling unable to ease off one’s own discomfort without the additional burden of feeling called upon to take care of someone else can lead to wanting to get away from them, hence ambivalence. We need ample time alone to feel OURSELVES, without other input, so we can sort ourselves out from the noise.

Ambivalence can be like a secret and perhaps guilty inner place we go to when we feel overwhelmed by impressions and energy from other people. When the onslaught of impressions and the discomfort of experiencing other people’s pain, confusion, anger, grief, lust, and so forth becomes overwhelming, an empath may feel ambivalent about being in contact with people. Without ample recovery or alone time, we can become burned out, and feel like avoiding even the people we care about the most. When ambivalence is present, we may feel ESPECIALLY like avoiding those we care about the most. They are the ones most likely to make claims upon our time, energy, and attention, who pluck the strings of our hearts and get under our skin.

Any type of stress can magnify and exacerbate the intensity of noticing other people’s feelings and energy. The additional stimuli becomes overwhelming. This accumulation of too much stimuli may also be one of the reasons why we tend to react to non-ideal foods, chemicals, and so forth. Even a small amount of additional stress can at times intensify sensitivity and provoke overwhelm.

When we are balanced, empathic sensitivity is a great asset. During moments of stress and imbalance, the same sensitivity can become almost unbearable. Being stressed and being around people who are not processing their negative emotions, so that their energy is hanging around in the room, can make an empath highly uncomfortable.

Ambivalence as a response to the multiple frustrations of having to sort through other people’s energy and impressions must be carefully distinguished from the common pattern of trying to manipulate how others feel about oneself. The more one is invested in being “nice,” and trying to “make others like” them or approve of their performance, the more likely they are to experience a backlash of resentment from doing so.

When attempts to control how other people feel are unsuccessful, these attempts to control them can escalate. Then comes resentment, or even feeling that others are the ones trying to exert control. When one disowns an underlying motivation to control the feelings and responses of others, it often appears as if the other person is seeking control. This can be a very convincing illusion. Honesty about feelings, needs, and motivations offers real freedom.

It is of course possible to be an empath, with the ambivalence I mentioned above, to also have a pattern of seeking to control other people’s responses. Discernment is enhanced by paying close attention to motivation. The empath experiences discomfort from overwhelming amounts of input. In contrast, if we seek to control how we are viewed, we are likely to become confused about what we want and where our sense of pressure originates.

Does your sensitivity to others ever bring up ambivalence?

If so, are you able to be kind to yourself when it’s going on, or do you judge yourself for not being even kinder to others at your own expense?

At my recent retreat I was doing a sound practice that generates a sense of spacious, eternal power. It was comprised of three different Divine Names, combining their energies. I chose to practice this one fairly loudly, while walking, to bring it into my body and integrate it.

Participants had been invited to use the main hall if it was free. I chose to practice there, to feel contained and focused, with plenty of space to move. Everyone else was practicing outside, or in their rooms.

So here I was, bringing in a quality of divine power, an intense flavor of longing for the Divine, and an attunement with Eternity, trying to ground all this in my body and taking up most of the hall. I heard the door click and feel someone enter. My eyes were open but my focus was right in front of me to eliminate visual cues. I glanced up for a second, saw that it was my Teacher, went “ULK!” inside, skipped a few beats, and went right back into my practice. I had forgotten that my Teacher planned to meet with individuals who had questions in the hall. He had come early.

I am kind of a funny creature. I know that he REALLY SEES me, and accepts me, yet I get awkward or glitchy if he watches me directly during group walking or energy practices. He made himself almost invisible, harmonious with my energies, soft, spacious, and fluid, and crossed the room without a ripple, seating himself in his customary chair. It seemed dumb to run out of there, so I determined continue. I thought he would want me to.

My Teacher began to meditate. He was very much in his own space, but probably noticed that I was walling him off. I was afraid I would get glitchy—which was stupid. So I connected, and let his energy in. As we connected it felt like he was enhancing or amplifying the work I was doing.

Suddenly I got so high I began forgetting the words. At first I would get something similar to the word, or reverse and combine two of the words. I was able to stop, feel for the words, kind of reset, and start again. As we flowed together more I lost the words completely. This was odd because I had just repeated those three words at least 500 times! I looked askance at him and said, “Oh no! Now I’m going to have to go get the sheet and read them!” I began to cross the room. He said them quietly, giving them to me.

In retrospect, I should have sat down and meditated with him on the energy behind the words, which was the next step of the practice, but I didn’t think of it. Instead, I resumed practice. I was starting to change it out a little, lightening it up and getting it smooth by speeding up a bit when his assistant showed up. She stayed out of the way as far as the energetics went, but I realized they were about to do interviews and got out of there. Someone was waiting in a chair outside.

This experience felt almost like a mini-initiation because it took so much effort to keep my mind and ego from butting in on the practice while feeling on display. It was also rather humorous, and at the same time staggeringly intimate and precious.

What events have intensified your ability to sense and magnify your awareness and mastery of energy?

How did you feel about these experiences at the time?

I recently attended a five day silent spiritual retreat during which most of each day was spent doing intensive practice on one’s own. Each day participants were given specific sound practice and meditations, tuned to suit our spiritual needs.

When I attend such an event, I initially feel confined. The practice schedule allows almost no point in the day to think whatever I might normally think, or use my mind in the ways I usually do. Starting the first retreat or two I actually felt panic. I also doubted whether I might be able to subdue or redirect my mind for the purposes of the retreat.

After several days of intensive spiritual practice, I begin to experience a sense of freedom. By the end of the retreat, I realized that what seemed like freedom in the beginning—like mind chatter, reaction, judging, and the various proclivities of an unfocused mind—are habitual, but certainly not free. Even using my mind intentionally, such as for planning and structuring events, produces a kind of confinement or restriction. Mental filters limit experience.

On retreat I have the opportunity to use my mind in open contemplation and to focus FEELING and SENSING to open to new experiences that have ongoing internal value. The mind is used to direct intention and to stay on track, and released if real mystical experience arises. The experiences that can take place are beyond what we think. BEing this way is ultimately much freer than we are when we let our thinking go along in the ways it generally goes. This freedom requires considerable discipline to access, but it has inherent beauty and value.

The rooms at the retreat center I stayed at have an upper walkway and a lower walkway, with steps connecting to the main building. Considering that everyone there is on silent retreat, and we do not necessarily want to encounter one another, walking around the center seems like moving around inside a huge Escher painting. Everyone is in motion within eternity, in their own universe, yet sensing one another too.

Far from being somber, there is something of delight in the way the group I am in relates on retreat. Anybody who feels like it and wants to will smile, share a glance, or send love on the way by. We can smile, or laugh, or share non-verbal humor and intuitive rapport, or point at what we want someone to pass at the dinner table. If someone is not receptive and keeps his or her energy pulled in, everyone respects their privacy and does not look at them directly. Communication is, mutually, on an Invitation Only status. I love the freedom of that!

It’s a wonderful feeling to be able to wander around in the woods on the property, feeling perfectly safe, and being able to open completely because there will be no encounters with people who do not support deep inner work. For an intuitive, the safety to stay wide open without having to erect social boundaries is a luxury. This allows for a peace that is difficult for sensitive people to achieve among the demands and projections of daily life.

I am coming to enjoy the freedom of spiritual discipline–or is it the discipline of spiritual freedom?

In what way has discipline increased YOUR sense of freedom?

Have you been in situations in which you could be totally open and be yourself without having to be anything for anyone else? What was that like?

The wife of one of my best friends died eighteen months ago. He told me that one of the most painful aspects of that huge loss was that “she was the keeper of my memories.” She had been and beside him, sharing countless, varied experiences and life events for several decades. She remembered the names of friends and acquaintances, what they had shared together, their birthdays and their family members. She remembered his personal history, what things meant to him, and the value that people, words, humor, and events held for him in his evolving context.

With feeling rather than mechanically, a person can become almost like the external hard drive on which we have been backing up our life. Shared memories confer a special value on those with whom we remember them. Losing these people can be like losing a chunk of our minds, feeling less connected to ourselves and less connected to people and things that have been important.

Memory is essential to meaning, and life becomes two-dimensional without it. I’m thinking of some neurological cases in “The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat,” by Oliver Sacks. When we can’t remember what things or people mean to us we have lost something vital.

Memory plays a central role in intimacy. Remembering the context of another person enhances sensitivity, depth of feeling, consideration, and rapport. Shared humor develops through memory, and accrues more and more value over time. It’s a shared emotional context. We remember what the other person finds funny and build on it. We remember what events mean, and can anticipate response.

When a loved one loses his or her memory, the impact on intimacy is usually devastating and confusing. Devastating because our shared world may be shattered or gone. Confusing because we are left with the icons of that world, yet only whiffs of its emotional substance.

We have been exploring memory and healthy loving connection in the face of loss. Our personal process of dealing with loss varies widely. There is a difference, however, between memory and obsessive nostalgia, between dealing with painful loss and being stuck in the past. A healing process morphs and changes as we go along. This is different than having a stranglehold on the past.

I’ve seen people drive themselves to despair obsessing about positive memories. Intensive focus on the past can function as a way to avoid making decisions leading to an unknown future. When longing and nostalgia become a way to stay stuck, they drain the present of our Presence.

Moving closer and closer to our own essence makes change and loss more bearable. When we are gaining freedom, self-expression, or spiritual development, change is easier to embrace—even when it entails loss.

Learning to embrace loss is challenging, but it can also be engaging and awakening, especially if we can bring ourselves naked into the next phase that life has to offer.

We can begin practicing at any point to age gracefully and ultimately to die well by learning not to struggle to against unavoidable loss. Learning to stay open to possibility is one of the many benefits of cultivating Presence and essence.

Do you ever resist growth by focusing intensely on your past?
If so, what does it cost you and what do you gain from doing so?

What do you do for yourself to support yourself when you experience loss?

In my last post I mentioned cutting my hair to let go of the past. Let’s talk more generally about letting go of the past, and about loss.

Sometimes we are able to welcome releasing things that hold us to our pasts. We do not experience this as loss, or if we do, it is bittersweet. By releasing the past we feel freer, more alive, and more awake in the moment. Withdrawing our energy and attachment from the things we hold to us recoups this energy to enrich Right Now or invest again.

It is illuminating to consider how the losses or absences that we agree to strike us differently than losses about which we feel we have no choice. It’s totally different, for example, to cut off your hair by choice than to be forced to do so, like being drafted into the military. It is different to sell everything to move onto a boat or to travel than to have your possessions stolen, or disappear in a fire.

We have a strange and uneasy balance between letting go of things to embrace new spaces, and suffering loss when we have things taken away from us before we are ready to release them. Choice makes an enormous difference.

One of my clients (I’m sharing about her with her permission) loves spending time in hotel rooms, with almost nothing along with her. She feels herself and her essence keenly, without the distraction of objects. Possessions call out to be managed, or remind her of who she might be in another moment. I’ve had that feeling too.

The same woman, who so enjoys freedom from her own possessions, lost all of her possessions in a fire. She had a great attitude, which allowed even this painful loss to be freeing.

Many of her possessions are now hand-me-downs. “They are like dribs and drabs of other people’s energy and their taste,” she said, lacking the particularity of something she would intentionally choose for herself.

We vary so much with respect to objects acquired from others. Some people value gifts more than items they choose for themselves—even when they dislike the gift. They may feel conflict about shedding a gift that was not chosen with sensitivity to their needs and preferences.

Our possessions reflect what we feel and who we are. Letting go of them can challenge our sense of identity.

Holding onto things can be driven by trying to hold on to states, memories, and moments of life, symbolized by objects or mementos. Many of us do an interesting dance between longing to free ourselves by letting go of things and wanting to hold onto them.

When you hold onto things, why do you want to hold onto them?

What is it to which you are actually attached?

How does holding onto them make you feel?

The energy at some spiritual centers is very powerful. Every time I have visited certain places I have experienced strong energy activation. I felt somehow changed, felt lighter, and returned to my daily life—only to face various unusual challenges. The nature of these challenges has always been unexpected, unrelated to my behavior, and seemingly random.

My primary healer describes this phenomena as “push back.” Push back shows up as having to face significant challenges immediately following significant spiritual growth.

Pushback can be seen partly as training to be able to fully establish and maintain a new state, partly as resolving karma, and partly as resolving more completely ways of being that do not fit with one’s new state. It’s an opportunity to clean up leftover energy that no longer works with the up-level.

My last shakedown had to do with personal safety. When I was at the spiritual center I met a man within whom I had an almost immediate rapport, including a strong sense of safety and friendship. We also had background in common, in bodywork, service, and healthcare, and we are both truth-sayers. He also cuts hair.

During my stay at the spiritual center this man almost insisted in cutting my hair, to liberate me from my past, bring out my power in a new way, and reveal parts of me that I was holding within. This caught my attention because when I had my hair cut two weeks prior, I was thinking that I really ought to cut it short to release the past and move into a new framework. I didn’t feel like initiating it, and didn’t feel quite right. I didn’t feel safe enough. My new friend’s offer came n the terms I had considered, with good energy and with love. I gave him carte blanch to to what he was inspired to do.

Out on the beach, he cut my hair within an inch of my scalp. I avoided looking in the mirror for a few days, feeling, “OMG! He scalped me!”

When I got home, his intentions and his desire to reveal my beauty came forth in his work. Rather than looking butch or harsh, I discovered that I looked soft and open. I never got so many compliments on a haircut in my life! I had been afraid people wouldn’t like it, even though it felt like the right thing to do.

A few days after I got home someone tried to break into my house. He torn off a lock, pulling the bolts through the door with great violence. But he did not make it into the house. Push back on feeling safer to be more exposed in the world showed up this way, compelling me to consider personal safety in a detailed way. I reconsidered my related attitudes and energies and made some changes, including beefing up my home security.

In my healing practice I see push back frequently. It often shows up in the form of illness when someone is on the brink of a frightening life change, really doing it. It shows up when we decide to live differently, or to open ourselves in new ways. The way we respond clarifies our willingness and demonstrates our ability to make the changes real in daily life. It’s like passing a test.

When have you faced a strong challenge following spiritual opening?

What did you need to do to turn that challenge to your benefit?

Are you holding the Universe hostage to your capacity to comprehend it?

Most of us carry about our lives as if the mysterious and unfathomable Universe conforms to our concepts and beliefs. If we sincerely explore life, we begin to attract and allow experiences far beyond the limitations of what we can conceive.

We all have our styles of obstructing ourselves from actively exploring our potentials and ideals.

The quote (Hazrat Inayat Khan), “Shatter your ideals on the rock of truth,” speaks not only to the process of discovering that life itself may not accommodate our beliefs. It speaks also to discovering that our ideals may fall short of what we later discover to be possible.

Exposure to people who allow possibilities that we restrict is refreshing and inspiring if they are people for whom we feel deep respect.

I have met people with traits, capabilities, and development far in excess of what I initially believed possible. My ability to recognize and to take inspiration from these people rests on allowing prior assumptions to be shattered. When we cannot release our opinions in the face of actualities, we close ourselves down and judge others instead of seeing them. That is prejudice, not discernment.

Here are some fairly common patterns that arise when in the face of potential inspiration:

• Turning away from your ideals for fear you will be too hard on yourself, placing demands on yourself to actualize them.
• Focusing on getting other people to live their ideals instead of minding your own.
• Treating your ideals as performance standards instead of sources of inspiration.
• Projecting that those you emulate would view you as unworthy, blameworthy, or in some way shameful for falling short.
• Believing that you lack the time and energy to develop yourself instead of doing it in the midst of life if need be.
• Being consumed by doubt and fear, based on negative speculations, without actually opening to experience.
• Dissipating your interest in too many directions without addressing underlying distress.
• Fearing that revealing your ideals will make you vulnerable, or that those who would help you along might seek to dominate you.
• Living in pretty fantasies about your ideals and acting nice instead of digging in to the gritty actualities we must negotiate to integrate ourselves in daily life.

What is your style of limiting what you are willing to explore and recognize?

Chinese finger traps capture your fingers if you attempt to pull them apart to free them, and release them when you push them further IN. This toy elucidates a number of life lessons, such as the way leaning IN to distress helps to free us, while our efforts to escape distress often keep us trapped.

We gradually free ourself from fears and projections by determinedly practicing accepting life as it is. Whether our concerns prove to be real or imagined, this powerful stance allows us to look inside to see what we are creating. Freed from the terror that we might be responsible for what is going on in our lives, we are far more able to see ourselves, own our creations, see other people clearly, and make effective choices.

How do YOU tend to trap yourself with limiting beliefs?

What do you do to free yourself from these mental traps?

“The worst form of ignorance is that of someone who refuses to accept something they know nothing about.”  Bumper Sticker