Pace yourself. Watch your energy. Make use of the breath to reinvigorate and re-energize throughout the day. Pacing allows for calm assessment and study of how you use your energy, where it goes and whether for good or for waste. Good use of energy involves honing your desires, your creativity, and your enthusiasm into the best use of the energy you have on hand, while also encouraging new energy to form. Eat and sleep well. Take time to be in nature, the best of all healers. And sometimes, just sit in the sun. It will do you good.
Maintain balance in all you do so that your body, mind and spirit are in balance as well. Make decisions based on whether something is right for you, whether it will keep you in balance, or at least not take you too far off so that it is difficult to reset. Sometimes the body says no in dramatic ways and sometimes its communications are more subtle. Get to know your body so you are aware of how it communicates to you on a daily basis. To maintain balance is to offer yourself a smooth ride through life, with enough energy to do the things that really matter to you. For when you are engaged in something that you are passionate about you might notice that you have all the energy in the world. And, thus, you learn what it really means to be in good balance.
Stand by your idea to enact change in your life that is meaningful and fulfilling, change that is lasting and for your greater good. If you change yourself the whole world will benefit. For if your energy is stuck and stagnant so is the energy around you. But if your energy is released from stagnation in a positive way, it will flow with ease and the energy around you will too, thus allowing for better flow of energy overall. Hold yourself to a high standard. And with the intention of releasing energy that is stuck within you, release yourself, purposefully, into the greater flow of life and all that it has to offer. Take advantage of what is available to aid you in your growth process. After all, you are responsible for your decisions and choices in life, as well as how you choose to use your energy, within and without.
As the day unfolds, notice your energy. When is it strong and flowing and when is it flagging? When is your mind clear and your intuition strong? Are you naturally more present and alert in the morning and less so in the afternoon? Schedule important things around high energy times and save self-contemplation for quieter energy times. Everyone has a natural ebb and flow of their personal energy. Have you studied your own, and are you going with the flow of it or are you fighting against it?
We live in an age where direct access to the tools of manifestation abound. As human evolution has shifted to the psychic plane, we are all waking up to latent powers that allow us to tap into both elemental and subtle resources to manifest our desires.
One question that emerges as we expand our consciousness and deepen our access to psychic powers is, how we might appropriately use them.
Robert Monroe provided explorers with an affirmation in their journeys, “to Use such greater energies and energy systems as may be beneficial and constructive to me and to those who follow me.”
Clearly, Bob is stressing here that we hone our intent to the benefit of all humankind. In fact, the mission of the Monroe Institute is, “Helping people create more meaningful and joyful lives through the guided exploration of expanded consciousness.”
I participated in a recent intensive retreat at the Monroe Institute where the theme of mandalas emerged in many participant’s journeys. I personally, during one journey, came upon the face of my round wristwatch at the center of a rectangular door. A mandala typically includes the juxtaposition of a circle and a square.
Experientially, this encounter with a mandala coincided with a very powerful vibrational energy that I was experiencing at my heart chakra, which provided the energy, via this sensation, to come to acceptance of a disturbing dream image from the prior night.
Carl Jung brought to the attention of the modern world the archetype of the mandala as the central organizing symbol of life. The circle encompasses infinity; the square, our humanness. For Jung, at the center of the circle was the Self, or Spirit, and not the ego, which is the center only of the conscious personality.
The path toward fulfillment in life requires one to square the circle; that is, to align one’s life with the core intent of one’s Spirit. Expropriating one’s psychic resources for ego gain, which is out of alignment with Spirit, would be considered an ego inflation, where ego assumes the identity and authority of Self. Humans have the amazing tool of free will, which all too often leads to ego decisions that throw them out of psychological balance and negatively impact the world.
Mandalas frequently appear in waking life and in dreaming, as trail markers from Self, as we suffer challenging experiences and make decisions in our lives. The mandala in my experience guided me to raise the vibration in my heart chakra to be able to activate love to accept the unacceptable.
Carl Jung’s Red Book is his diary of his journeys into the collective unconscious, which became the foundation of his contributions to the field of psychology. His communications with entities during his discovery process are documented alongside countless mandalas he painted that enabled him to maintain psychic balance throughout this extraordinary process.
Stan Grof, initially through the use of psychedelics and later through holotropic breath work, has deepened the mapping of the transpersonal regions of the psyche. His protocol strongly encourages all participants in his workshops to paint mandalas as they restore inner balance and recapitulate their soul retrievals and adventures in infinity.
The highlight of the mandala in my recent retreat was a collective reminder to be sure to not forget to ask if it’s right. It refers to one’s intent, decision or ambition for manifestation.
The Self often spontaneously and creatively provides some semblance of a mandala-like symbol to provide guidance. These can take the form of a dirty, heads-up penny on the ground, or a circular or rectangular pool, or a grouping of 4 objects or people—the permutations are endless.
One may also have to wait patiently for this guidance or validation to appear. Sometimes the Self requires that the ego go it alone, taking full responsibility for decisions made. The effects of decisions and actions taken are often the best teachers.
When mandalas do show up, give the ego the worthy job of contemplating their messages. Or, to get in alignment with Self, simply start drawing a mandala. Or use a finger in the sand, and like the Tibetans and Native Americans sculpt a mandala with the intent to align with Spirit.
See what happens. Remember Bob Monroe’s affirmation to make constructive and beneficial one’s use of greater energies and energy systems.
