Positive Energy Guide

Energy-savvy placement of the objects within a space amplifies the impact of these objects. Small shifts of objects–like moving or turning something even half an inch–can alter its energetic resonance and its relationship with other objects. In the story several posts back about tuning the stone circle, small, intentional changes made a huge difference. So did linking various stones by putting them into energetic relationship. Use the objects in your environments to activate potentials.

When setting up an intention for a space and tuning it up, pay attention to:

• The size, shape and location of the room or area
• The materials it is made out of
• The energies in the list above
• Colors, light, angles, and shadows
• Its relationship to the environment surrounding it
• The objects within it
• Exact positioning of such objects
• What you leave OUT
• Your intention to generate a particular energy via this space

Before tuning space it is highly useful to pay close attention to the energy that is already in the space. The existing energy may impact your selection of an appropriate space to use for a specific intention. A dark, heavy atmosphere would not be useful for child’s room or for joyful expression. It might be adapted for sleeping or reading.

These types of energy accumulate in the environments we inhabit:

• Energy established from accidental and intentional thought forms–energy residue from what we think
• Emotional energy from current and previous people in the space
• Energy broadcast from the exact state of our bodies
• Energy generated by objects in the space
• Energy from building materials
• Energy from harmonious or disharmonious placement of objects
• Energy from the land, including underground water or metals
• Energy from electromagnetic sources such as power lines and cables
• Subtle energies such as power spots or portals
• Energies related to subtle dimensions

Yes, learning to CLEAR space is an essential skill. Clearing non-useful energies is an art in itself. It can become complex depending what you are addressing. Fortunately a large percentage of the energy we usually wish to clear out is from thought and emotions. This energy is fairly ambient and not difficult to remove.

The easiest way to clear the bulk of energy build-up from thoughts and emotions is to burn frankincense in the space. Done correctly, frankincense is more effective than sage. It works on its own without directing intention through any type of prayer or ritual.

Space can be cleared of non-useful energy build up with the power of intention and prayer alone–if you have developed the skill and focus to do it. Guidance skills come in handy.

Learning to clear space with intention alone took me years of practice, after encountering an advanced healer who could clear my home from his office! I would go home and the previously-cloudy and dense atmosphere left over from some incident would be like alpine air. I still use frankincense for heavily congested homes or buildings. (I will post a link with detailed instructions for effective use of frankincense if several of you request it via Comments.)

Once the area has been cleared of nonconstructive energies, establishing or tuning space starts by pruning out everything that doesn’t invoke an atmosphere that will nourish your intentions for that space. This step can be as simple as removing personal belongings in a room dedicated for work, or as decorous as creating a sanctuary.

Remove objects that:

• Are not relevant or distract your theme or intention
• Do not contribute positive energy
• Cannot be harmonized with the objects that serve a useful purpose

Kinesthetic Space-Tuning Exercise:

Extend your sense of your environment into your body, almost as if the space around you is an extension of your body and visa versa. Feel. Allow impressions to come to you. Sense into the space. What does it feel like?

Make a change in the space by moving something and see what happens. Start with things that are fairly obvious. Pay attention to the way you feel in your body, mind, energy fields, and emotions as the ambiance of the space is altered. With practice you will be able to sense what will shift BEFORE actually moving anything, at least to an extent. This subtlety uses visualization and sensation together.

What rooms, buildings or areas have had a profound impact on YOU?

What made them stand out?

What kind of focus did you bring to this place that allowed you to experience it so much?

Tuning space is a skill that supports attending to Guidance. You use the area around you to magnify your ability to receive information from your environment.

Tuning space by intentional placement of objects is similar to tuning a musical instrument. You are working with energy resonance related to spatial relationships rather than qualities of sound.

You do not need to use a formal system to activate the space around you–although you may enjoy learning and practicing. Systems are formalized ways to sensitize yourself to possibility.

Sacred Geometry creates positive energy and specialized atmospheres through the relationship of objects and shapes. Feng Shui is used to “tune” or harmonize environments in order to:

• Bring forth specific potentials
• Decrease undesirable and increase positive influences
• Select environments that support certain types of experience
• Promote personal development

Again, you do not need to use a system. You can also explore simply by using your innate sensitivity to energy and your Guidance, paying attention to how you respond to changes in your environment.

The energy in a physical location holds specific intelligence and latent potentialities that impact what it is possible to create within that environment. A charged place like an energy portal or power spot holds different possibilities than a library or a bar.

Working with the spaces you occupy changes the potentials for what can occur in that space.

Exactly how we tune space depends on the use to which we intend to put it.

When you tune space you are tuning yourself, just as an excellent musician trains ear, heart and mind while tuning an instrument. You are reaching into your sensing function, opening yourself, and discovering what shifts as your environment is changed. This practice develops the ability to use exterior space to make adjustments to the way you feel inside. Our environments reflect and impact consciousness.

Aim to tune the spaces you occupy in a way that powerfully evokes feelings, images, and actions that invite the possibilities you want to bring forth. For example, if you want to experience peace and increased concentration, bring in energies and images that evoke within you feelings of openness, stillness and focus.

I have been talking about the esoteric aspects of tuning space. Intentional use of space is also a practical skill. It shows up in perfectly mundane contexts. For example, I was at a field and track while a friend played soccer. I noticed that in the sport-saturated and dedicated atmosphere I was able to run and even to kick the soccer ball in ways I had never done before.

Examples of naturally tuning space:

• Cleaning the kitchen before you cook
• Decorating your home for a holiday
• Setting the tone for business in your office by removing personal affects
• Getting things like newspapers and electronics out of the bedroom
• Dedicating an area for reading or writing, to assist with focus
• Flowers and candles for a romantic atmosphere
• Clearing out closets, paper piles, and old things to release stagnant energy
• Spring cleaning

If you are establishing a healing center, making a meditation spot, or creating an altar you will obviously use more subtle skills and intention than day-to-day tasks require.

Some objects and conditions bring down the vibration in a room:

• Soon-to-decompose gunk in sink strainers
• Dirty toilets
• Anything stagnant or neglected like piles of paper or unfinished projects
• Anything associated with bad memories
• Things that evoke resistance

A friend recently cleaned his blocked gutters. His entire home feels notably different from removing this low-vibration, stuck energy.

Bringing in light, clean air, fresh flowers, appropriate colors, and objects of beauty help to establish positive energy almost anywhere.

Using the way we interact with the spaces in our lives to invoke specific energies is a wonderful way to live with awareness. This practice establishes an active, living, and supportive relationship with our environment.

What kind of environment have YOU created with intention, for a particular purpose?

How did this space impact you?

Intentional use of space both relies on and develops Guidance skills. Our relationship to the spaces we occupy can intentionally enhance rich experiences.

Following from the story in the last post, about tuning a stone circle:

A stone circle IS a space. It is also a way of “Holding Space.” To “Hold Space” means to maintain intentional concentration in a way that brings in and contains energy in service to a specific purpose.

Holding space can be seen as a type of invocation–a way to call forth, focus, refine, and apply energy to create internal and external outcomes. This process resembles prayer more than magic. It is about bringing parts of ourselves forward and making them sacred– for lack of a better word–through the quality of our attention. We’ll explore invocation shortly.

Here are several applications of “holding space:”

• One can hold space through intention alone, like staying open for moments throughout the day when you can watch your breath or meditate
• One can hold space for another person, like watching for them to do something praiseworthy
• One can hold space for an event, such as an ideal moment to introduce a topic in a group
• One can hold space to notice and appreciate a particular feeling or energy, such as gratitude

“Holding space,” can be related to several different experiences in the stone circle story:

Locational: The stone circle was holding physical space. It also created a specific atmosphere. This atmosphere was different from the surrounding area, and had its own potentials.
Energetic: My S.O was holding space for me with his energy, allowing me to experience a different set of feelings and energies than I would have felt on my own.
Social & Emotional: He was also holding space in the conversation between the three of us. The quality and intention behind the way he was listening to me created an atmosphere that supported me to bring forth Guidance.

I will go into more detail about using space over the next few posts. First let’s launch into the energetics of “Holding Space.” Holding space as an invocation is profound. What does this mean?

Space As An Invocation

What is Invocation? Some see Invocation as calling forth and bringing forward specific Beings or energies, such as calling forth the Virgin Mary, or calling on the spirit of the North in a Native American ritual. This view or intention is like asking for something from outside of yourself or bringing something IN to yourself.

Others see invocation as calling forth the qualities or energies of a Being FROM WITHIN SELF. This intention supports bringing forth a real facet of your Self, which naturally attracts connections with like Beings. What you invoke is a State of Being. It is your own. It is not dependent on intervention from the outside.

When we call forth qualities from within, invocation is less like channeling and more like stepping up to resonate with the energy frequencies that great Beings occupy.

Calling forth from the outside is might be considered occult. It holds an element of manipulating power. Calling forth from within and matching resonance is more mystical. It carries the implication of joining in a natural way, from our greater and shared Wholeness.

Clear intention, emotional engagement, and activating as many of your senses as possible empowers Invocation. Bringing yourself to bear in this way and stepping into or invoking positive qualities can enhance the focus and discernment that empower Guidance skills. You become able to recognize, read, and reproduce different frequencies of energy, along with the streams of Guidance associated with them.

Using space as an Invocation means to draw qualities forward and intentionally imbue that space with these qualities or frequencies. Doing this intentionally is an advanced energy practice. A basic level of this skill may take place for us naturally and instinctively, in a casual manner. You might do it when you say Grace, for example, or when reading aloud to children.

How to YOU bring positive energy into your environment?

What do you focus on to do so, and how does it change your experience?

The space around us can be tuned up or modified to increase our awareness of energy, enhancing receptivity to Guidance. The energy we bring forth through our focus of attention and power of intention alter what becomes possible in that space.

What is “space”?

I am using the term the way energy-sensitive people do, referring to in interior of a room, and area, or an environment. “Space” may mean something different in technical languages such as physics. When I say “space” or talk about how it is impacted by “time” this may or may not be accurate according to a physicist, but it will describe in commonly used terms how I experience the phenomenon I am discussing. This type of description can help activate your ability to bring about powerful results and experiences.

Let’s start on Tuning Space with a story. This story reflects using intention to magnify the energy in physical or social environments, to create possibilities and enhance Guidance:

A friend was building a stone circle on his property using principles of sacred geometry. (Intentional organization of objects in space for the purpose of enhancing positive energy.) He had been having some new and interesting Guidance experiences. Voices he heard inside were instructing him as to which rocks to use and where to place them. These particular voices were taskmasters and not very articulate. He figured they were gnomes.

Whether or not the voices my friend heard were gnomes or whether actual gnomes exist is not important in this context. This was his lyrical experience, and it was working. He was having a grand time playing with gnomes and stones in a meditative manner. Intrigued, I came over to check all this out.

The stones were rather small, but carried energy nicely. In contrast, I visited a nearby nature preserve that boasted several large stone circles. Those stones were large and powerful but placed poorly, giving them a jangling effect. They had not been placed intentional communication with one another.

I was exhausted at the time of this visit. My S.O. (significant other) and I were resting with our friend in the middle of his stone circle. My S.O. had me kind of tucked in to his energy so I would feel contained and peaceful and rest more easily as they talked.

When I was half asleep, lucid recommendations for specific adjustments to the stone circle started coming through. This included which stones needed to be in further communication, whether or not stones needed in certain spots were on the property, and how to use a copper pipe to anchor the entrance so the opening would not dissipate energy from within the circle. Seating the copper pipe correctly, for example, involved linking it to the fire pit.

The three of us scouted about, found a stone we expected to find, placed it, and “tuned” a few other stones. Tuning means we subtly altered their placement, exact angle, rotation, energy, and instructions to put them in intentional communication with the area and the other stones. Look at this like moving an antenna around to get good reception.

When we were done we sat down again. I got a vague impression of a few gnomes in certain places near the circle, slowly and cautiously peering at our adjustments. They seemed to approve. I did not trouble myself with whether or not this was “real.” The fact that all three of us humans distinctly noticed the same energy changes on the land suffices for me. The energy potential of that space was activated and could support more-powerful energy experiences.

Later in the day our friend finished the rest of the recommendations that had come through. He said, “The circle was practically singing!” when he was done.

(In the next post we’ll talk about Holding Space, and then move on to Part 2 of Tuning Space.)

Have YOU noticed energy changes in your environment after moving things around?

Have you moved things around with a direct intention to change energy? What happened?

Our relationship with our environment can be a useful source of guidance. Reading the atmosphere in the room is a one of several guidance skills that involve paying attention to the energy in the room or area around us.

The term “reading the room” is generally refers to paying attention to a group of people within the room. A speaker or presenter will “read the room” by sensing and observing the audience’s level of engagement. Tuning in allows the speaker to gear his or her presentation to the listener’s needs and interests. Some intuitive presenters extend this skill to the extent that they can directly address the inner needs of their listeners.

I am using the term “reading the room” to include the energy in the room or area itself. Energy-savvy people naturally notice what is going on in their environment and tend to “feel into” a room when they have reason to do so. The energy in an area holds and shapes–to a varied extent–what can occur there. Energy can impact mood and influence sensitive people, whether or not they are aware of it.

Reading the room to become aware of its influence gives us more choice about they ways we allow ourselves to be influenced. Being aware of the impact of our environment gives us the option to make changes in order to optimize our experience.

Here are several example of energy that may influence the mood and the current potentials of a room, building, or plot of land:

• Land may carry impressions or energy from events from the past, such as tribal warfare
• The atmosphere may be congested from an accumulation of emotional energy from repeated domestic conflict
• The area may have been used for intensive mental work and hold energy that makes it hard to access the heart
• It may feel wonderful after housing a saint
• It may feel “off” from underground streams or metals, electromagnetic issues, the shape or angle of structures, or adjacent objects
• It may be on a positive power spot
• There may be odd rifts or portals that interface with other dimensions and create unusual influences

Sensing this type of influence develops guidance that supports masterful and intentional action. As with other guidance skills, becoming attentive to the environment begins simply, at your own level. You can start by paying attention to the impact of your own room, home or office.

Here are some possible ways to focus your attention:

• How does your fridge feel if leftovers are getting old in there?
• How do you feel when piles of paper accumulate?
• What do you feel when you enter a home where people have been fighting?
• How does your home feel after a period of intense stress, illness, or loss?
• Is there clumpy, smeary, side-ways, or dissociated energy around your bed, left over after a night with odd dreams?
• How do you feel after a particular relative or friend stays at your house?
• When you move, can you sense the people who lived in the house before you?

The guidance we derive from responding to our environment begins with natural responses to fairly obvious cues. Sensitivity to energy develops with practice, making us more and more adept at sensing ever more subtle influences.

Sensing influences has two big advantages. First, awareness gives us the opportunity to learn to filter out influences that are not optimal for our well being. Second, we can now develop the ability to alter the energy in the places we spend time, to optimize it for specific purposes. We will continue to explore our relationship with energy and environment over the next few posts.

What type of energy or impressions most impact YOU when you enter a room or building?

Are you passive to the impact of your environment or do you find ways to to change the energy?

Following from the last post, let’s look at internal and external authority in action:

Leaders who rely on external authority tend to suppress participants who are more developed than they are themselves. Participants asking sincere questions may be perceived as a threat to the leader’s authority. These seekers usually have no idea that they are developed or that their innocent questions trouble the presenter. They may well be seeking clarification because the material being presented is out of synch with the energy behind it, mistakenly thinking their sense of disconnection comes from their own lack of understanding. I’ve seen clients in this position and been in it myself.

With respect to transformative work, I am not generally thrilled with one-size-fits-all trainings. Programs aimed at the general public rarely provide measures to support those who don’t fit the proposed mold. It’s too easy to fall outside that mold and think there’s something wrong with you.

A sincere, diffident client needed my support after being treated to the following during a several-day, live-in event. The famous leader in the field of transformation:

• Shut her out and refused to take her questions
• Demanded a one-to-one session to answer a relevant question
• Charged exorbitant rates for the same
• Became defensive, calling her defensiveness “boundaries”
• Projected on the client instead of seeing and owning her own control issues or responding to the client’s distress

Some general indications of power issues:

• Threatened by questions
• Unilateral decisions
• Not open to discussion
• Present as if their way is the only way or the best way
• Ignore input that does not fit their model
• Fail to resolve confusion or distress after difficult interactions
• In-groups or cliques among “followers” rather than a feeling of group unity

In contrast, my current Teacher exemplifies internal authority. During intensive events he makes himself available for several periods throughout the day for interviews in case anyone runs into problems. He interviews every participant before the event to get clear about their individual needs. During the event he listens for confusion or distress and addresses it effectively. He has actually paid attention to remarks I have muttered under my breath and legitimated my concerns by bringing them forward with compassion, as if I had presented my concern clearly.

Let’s look further at positive use of authority:

A excellent Guide can function like an extension of your own internal authority. This is done by aligning with you deeply enough that what the Guide says is a direct reflection of the part of YOU that is being addressed. You, by your own inner authority, sense in yourself the resonance of you own inner truth and allow the Guide to assist you. This does NOT feel like giving your power away to an external source.

You are your own authority on yourself. Be careful to whom and to what you extend authority. Remember that authority is something we actively extend to one another, as a participant.

No one can TAKE your inner authority; you have to give it. An excellent Guide is interested in helping you to develop your inner authority, not to relinquish it.

A good guide is like a tug boat. Tugs bring ocean liners into dock or set them out to sea, safely and reliably. A tug serves the liner, which has its own power but allows the tug to navigate in tight spaces. The movement of the liner is the point, not the tug.

It takes internal Guidance to trust a particular Guide. Receiving guidance is not about giving over your own sense of truth to another but allowing another to ping, extend, polish, and strengthen your own sense of truth. In a way you use Guides to magnify your awareness, or your piggy-back on their capacities for your own development.

Guidance from another person best comes like an offering on a platter. It takes volition to reach across and lift it into your hand. If it is crammed into your face you will push it away.

Does power-over increase or decrease YOUR sense of responsibility about your influence on others?

How do you feel when you exert yourself and the result is not welcome?

“Don’t believe everything you think.” ~bumper sticker

This post consists in part of a self-awareness or journaling exercise to get you in touch with your own attitudes, beliefs and feelings about holding authority.

Staying open to the validity of other viewpoints and maintaining keen self-observation are essential counterbalances to inner authority.

Balance expresses a healthy state. Like so many functions in inner life, healthy balance with power and authority relies on accurate self-observation skills. (Inner Work series.) Too little authority in Guidance is ineffectual and confusing. Too much creates karma as your influence taken into people’s lives and acted out.

Getting accustomed to holding the bottom line or being right is a one pitfall of acting as a guide. One has to cough up deep humility to balance any tendencies to enjoy power. Even if a guide tends to be right almost all the time in sessions and we carefully confirm our intuitions, this does not mean we will be free from errors or assumptions when we are casually thinking, judging, interpreting, and bumping around through life.

When one is correct almost all the time it is easy to get into a rhythm of thinking we are correct when we are not, or assuming and not checking, or feeling entitled to or unconsciously assuming power and influence in situations in which we are simply another human being filling a seat like anyone else.

What are YOUR issues about authority?
Consider printing out this list to use as a basis for Homework:

• Do you have too much or too little inner authority, or it this patchy depending on the type of circumstance?
• What kinds of situations challenge you to maintain your inner authority?
• What kinds of situations challenge you to remain more humble and allow others their own timing and processes?
• Are you prone to projecting authority onto others?
• What type of people do you react to in this way?
• Who do you think of in your life when you contemplate authority?
• How do you feel about these people?
• If your response to the last question was one of discomfort, can you think of anyone whose authority you trust and appreciate?
• Would this person be a useful role model for you?
• What do you like best about the way they deal with power?
• What is the difference between the people’s authority that makes you uncomfortable and the authority you trust?
• Do you tend to comply to authority, resist it, or alternate between the two?
• If you alternate, what–exactly–is going on inside you when you make a swing from one to the other?
• How does the way you relate to external authority impact the way you hold or reject authority yourself?
• What would you need to resolve or develop in yourself to feel comfortable with your own authority?

Please comment on your experience with doing this exercise, whether you did it internally or on paper.

Did you have any surprising insights?

Externally-sourced authority is based on social agreement. Such authority derives from the opinions of those who accord power and prestige to individuals who have jumped through hoops in their field of study or practice.

External authority does not confer ethics or personal integrity. Consider an abusive public official.

Information used for power and externally-based authority may or may not be valid. Consider authorities who are behind the curve on scientific discovery yet impose methods of operation based on information already proven incorrect.

Internally-based authority is grounded in the bedrock of integrated personal experience. It is a personal expression, not a means of control. This type of authority arises from confidence, comfort and direct experience.

Inner authority exists with or without social agreement. A world expert in orchid propagation grows great orchids whether or not anybody has heard of him. Mastery and results take the place of social sanction.

Note that authority in one field does not confer authority in any other. A policeman is not automatically a scientist. A trance medium is not automatically a healer. Truths we can declare from personal experience may or may not apply to other people.

No matter where it is derived from, the more authority we hold the more compassion and respect we need for other peoples’ processes. Someone who feels compelled by a guide to make changes and then gets into unexpected circumstances is likely to be angry with the guide.

A long-term client was making a choice to take on some difficult work at my recommendation. I told her it was absolutely her choice, if it felt right. I would not, I said, press her take it on. She said, “I know that. You have never made me feel I had to come in, or buy anything, or do anything unless it was totally my choice.”

In this field of work, being clearly and consistently of service is essential. Yes, there are gains. The gains come not because you are trying to get something or to make someone do something but because they trust you–for keeping THEIR needs primary.

The more powerfully you influence other people’s lives the more essential it becomes to maintain pure intention of service.

Authenticity:

Natural authority exists in authenticity, which can remain free from issues about control while enhancing full freedom of expression.

Natural authority is not about telling people what to do. Natural authority means to rest on the bedrock of direct personal experience. This experience is what we draw on to clarify, ground, and actuate (make real) the information that comes through any avenue of Guidance.

The naturalness of authenticity carries its own authority. The authority that springs from authenticity is free from issues of control. It expresses a balance between accountability and freedom. Authenticity carries a clean, direct type of power that can operate within appropriate boundaries without causing us to feel unnecessarily limited by accommodations we choose to make for the greater good.

Natural authority inspires trust and supports clear guidance. People trust us when we are authentic. In the process of becoming authentic we learn to trust ourselves; to be in our own court.

When we develop self-honesty and accept who we are inside, we also see others more completely. As we no longer need to hide from ourselves we see more clearly too. We can now see in others the traits and issues we once turned away from in ourselves–without getting confused about whether we are seeing their issues or our own. This clarity assists Guidance.

Trying to be something other than you are sets dramas in motion. Pretense invites projection. When people are tangled up trying to figure out where you are coming from and whether you are being totally straight with them they are more likely to have trouble taking your lead. Or they take your lead and might wish they hadn’t.

When you are inauthentic, your words and deeds are out of synch. This results in murky or disjointed energy, which causes people to over-think what you say to them. This incongruence causes slop in your verbal and non-verbal communication with others. Slop means entanglement, inefficient work, and an increasing likelihood of ethical issues.

Authenticity supports clarity and inspires confidence. Resulting authority is not about telling people what to do. It is about standing clearly in your truth and walking your walk as a representative of what you say.

How do YOU respond to externally-based authority?

How much do you trust the groundwork of your own experience?

Therese, one of my readers, asked me to clarify what I mean by power and why power might be given greater expression. In this supplementary post I will address these questions. We will take a closer look at power balanced by spiritual surrender.

What do I mean by power? To get on the same page we need to take the load of associations off of the word “power.” When I speak of clean power that is not associated with force or domination I am talking about FOCUSED INTENTION. This type of power is the ability to direct will. And will need not be self-will. It can be will that has been refined and saturated by the energy of love.

This type of power is not power over others. It begins with power over our own reactions.

In the context of this discussion I like the word “mastery.” Mastery is the ability to use focused intention with ease, efficiency and discernment. It takes focused intention to step into the Highest Possible Option or to surrender reactive, ego-based thoughts and reactions in favor of more ideal responses.

Power can be seen as the ability to amplify intention. My spiritual teacher has enough focused intention and mastery to broadcast different energy frequencies with intensity. His ability to amply his intentions is masterful. He may expand the energy of a particular quality of love, peace, blessing, or healing into a room, around the globe, or into the universe. This capacity is so developed that it is almost palpable to those in the room.

Fortunately this immense power is under the yoke of love. The man has effaced his personal ego through intensive spiritual practice. His power expresses no element of domination. His power is expressed almost entirely in service. In this case power is an expression of love.

Why would one give power greater expression? When we allow others to walk on us we need a type of power to assert healthy boundaries. Before we can do this our attention and intention become dissipated into confusing interactions that waste our time and energy. It takes focused intention to move beyond survival strategies that lead to over-giving, and over-accomodating or defensive reaction and control issues.

Healthy, balanced power helps maintain discernment and good boundaries. For example, someone powerful was screaming in my face last week. She had assumed I had done something that I had not done. I was able to diffuse the situation quickly, without discomfort. She gave me a kiss on the cheek and left.

It took power to remain loving and present in this encounter. Had I felt powerless in this encounter I would have caved in and felt blamed or victimized. As it was I looked to see what she needed and gave it to her. Spiritual surrender allowed me to be open to greet and learn through this experience instead of resisting it. I actually felt invigorated and strong. I did not judge her.

When we feel powerless we are prone to resisting, blaming, defense and conflict. We struggle and get confused about whether to give over to the other person or use force to make them see or do things our way. Weakness and fear divide us. Healthy power helps diffuse conflict. Healthy power allows us to walk through the world with comfort and confidence, knowing we can keep ourselves intact. We are more relaxed because we know we can take care of ourselves.

Healthy personal power stems from recognizing and accepting our own feelings and needs. This is a form of self love that is based on kindness, not ego. We are willing and able to take care of ourselves in our interactions. We do not have to fight to take care of ourselves because we trust ourselves to step in if and when we need to, leaving us free to focus on others without being overcome. This kind of power supports love because it springs from love. Confidence in our inner support allows us to assert conditions that favor the expression of love.

Power in service to others is also an expression of love. Some moments call for intense, decisive action. Healthy power to allows us to stand up and assert ourselves to create a positive outcome for the benefit of all. For example, several people were talking loudly right outside the room as my teacher was leading a class. He can shut out noise just fine, but the group was distracted. He stepped to the window and asked the talkers to take their conversation somewhere else or join the group. This assertion of power served the group.

What would it take for YOU to trust yourself with power?

How could you use this power to enhance your ability to serve?

“Craving blocks deeper experience. Nothing of value can happen to a mind which knows exactly what it wants.” -Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

At the risk of sharing a pet peeve, the following incident expresses one of the common glitches that occur if we give guidance without solid self-esteem:

In a small, metaphysical master mind group I asked the group for feedback. One woman started in with, “I’m an intuitive channel and my guides are telling me that you should. . . .”

Her preamble sounded as if she said it constantly–in a squeaky little girl voice. In this context everyone was highly intuitive and this unnecessary proclamation was extra-annoying. Her “guidance” was way off base. My truth meter was going “ugh,” and my stomach began to tighten as she began to push her point of view my direction.

“That doesn’t fit for me,” I said, “Please tell me what YOU think yourself.”

Okay, I might have been more polite. I did NOT say, “Quit hiding behind your Guides”–although the highly competent psychic on the line heard me think it. I felt her corresponding flow of agreement– along with compassion for the speaker.

There’s nothing wrong with getting information from Guides. Using the fact that you have Guides to assume a “special” (and perhaps false) form of indisputable power stinks.

No one can answer to a declaration of absolute truth from a supposedly superior source that they cannot verify. Of course most of us have no idea whether the person is channeling Aunt Jemima or WHAT. As my first spiritual teacher used to say: “There are just as many liars without bodies as there are with bodies!”

The woman in this incident had a sweet urge to serve. Mixed motivations stemming from low self-esteem made some of the energy behind her comment manipulative and unclean. Her motivations were not “bad,” but they did express her unresolved issues.

Don’t we all have unresolved issues? Yes, of course we do. The question is not whether we HAVE them but whether we are staying in touch with them and using Guidance cleanly. “My spirit Guides made me do it” is not clean use of power.

Claiming to offer Divine Guidance without actually being in touch with expanded consciousness is an abuse of power. In this example it may be minor, but this is an unhealthy tendency and one to avoid.

We are responsible for whatever we bring through, even if we are choosing to act as a mouthpiece.

A compromised sense of “personal power” usually springs from self-esteem issues. (See previous post.) Feeling powerless or unworthy can stimulate a desire for power. Developing self-esteem is a safer and more effective road to healthy expression.

Increasing power without increasing self-esteem is not necessarily an advantage. Then we get weak people with mixed motivations wielding power.

The term “personal power” has drawbacks. It is too easy to confuse HAVING innate power with “power-over” others. “Power” gets associated with domination or force. Changing the name of the aim to “personal authority” or “personal agency” goes farther to suggest capacity, accountability, and freedom to take the initiative from a strong and balanced sense of self.

Power–to be a blessing–must be balanced with compassion, beauty, and spiritual surrender. Power without spiritual surrender invites unintended consequences.

In personal development, it is an art-form to develop power in the face of weakness and love in the face of power. Alternating between these goals is like climbing a ladder hand over hand.

Spiritual surrender and working with the Highest Possible Option support skillful expression of power mediated by love. Practicing these LEARNED SKILLS makes it possible to develop and express power and authority without undesirable consequences.

In YOUR current life balance, which is more predominant, power or love?

Which one scares you more?

What might happen if you gave that trait greater expression?