I first heard people talk about energy at a meeting (circa 1998) where the presenters demonstrated how magnetic insoles in our shoes could help us feel energized. Those people couldn’t control their excitement. The more they talked the more excited they got. In fact, the more they talked the whole conference room suddenly felt very different, like the energy was contagious.

I wore those insoles for years and, for some reason, I felt better with them in my shoes. When I asked a friend if she noticed any difference wearing them she said, “I don’t know but when I wear them it’s like my feet are happy!”

The next time I heard about energy was from an expert on clutter.  I learned that, since our physical space is finite but our personal energy is infinite,  the energy of our stuff could make the energy of our space feel stagnant. More importantly, daily interaction with this kind of stagnant energy in our environment can impact us in ways that make our lives feel stagnant. 

The more I heard about this perspective on energy the more interested I became. I studied the Asian belief system around the concepts of Ch’i, Ki and Prana. In other words, in Eastern thought, there’s  a life force energy present in all things. I studied how the energy of our environment can affect our own energy because we’re always interacting with our environment

It all made sense to me - the energy of the universe is in everything. In fact, everything in the universe is energy, including us!

For example, energy is color, texture, shape, material, plants, animals, food, medicine, objects, circulation, digestion, transportation, weather, soil, clouds, technology, oceans, lakes, ponds, kitchens, rivers, mountains, metals, wood, fire and so on.  Some energy is obvious and the impact on us is predictable. On a cold day fire warms up our bodies. That’s a good thing.

Meanwhile, some energy may not be so positive but may be a lot more subtle. Objects that we’ve kept from a person who treated us badly can have negative energy. Keeping objects like this can emotionally drain our self confidence without us even noticing. Our minds can see the obvious but our subconscious minds always pick up energetic clues from who and what we surround ourselves with.

Energy is a feeling thing, not a thinking thing and if we’re not aware of our feelings we may miss it’s affect. That’s why I chose to study Feng Shui. I was curious about how the energy of our environment could effect our daily life.  Then I tried teaching it. That’s where the challenge is - trying to translate Asian philosophies about life-force energy to Westerners. 

Most people I’ve met through this work aren’t interested in energy because, in our culture, energy is talked about in a different way.  To us, energy is something outside of us. It’s something we think we have or we don’t. At one point we’ve all heard ourselves say “I just don’t have any energy today.” But, according to Albert Einstein, “Energy can not be destroyed only transformed.” So yes, our energy is always there, it can be described as low or depleted energy. 

Most of us Westerners don’t see the impact (on us) of the quality of energy in our environment and what we may want out of life like being happy, healthy, abundance or just feeling supported in our efforts. Some of us only believe in what we can see. Energy is something we can’t see, but, if we’re sensitive, we can feel its affects.

To further expand on these ideas, our thoughts, feelings and belief systems are also energy and very vulnerable to the energy around us. For example, when we surround ourselves with energy that is alignment with what we want or who we see ourselves to be we feel supported and encouraged.

The opposite is also true, when we surround ourselves with the energy (of people and things) from a time when we felt “less than” or “not enough” we may unknowingly reinforce our own negative sense of self and sabotage our own efforts.

Indigenous people, worldwide, embrace energy but they refer to it as Spirit. They see Spirit in all things.  It’s their vocabulary - it’s how they navigate their history and honor their presence while respecting everything and everyone who came before giving all credit to the “Creator.” In their culture, everything with a capital “E” has meaning and purpose.

By contrast, our culture sees energy as something we learn about in science class or something that serves us through wind turbines, solar panels and coffee drinks. We don’t see energy as a state of being within ourselves. But what if we did? How would that change our lives?

That’s what I continue to be inspired by - discovering ways to include ourselves in this concept of energy so we may help ourselves move forward in the direction of enlightened beings who use our free will to act out of love and compassion.

I’m no scientist but, just for fun, I borrowed Einstein’s famous formula E=mc (squared). His formula explains that energy and matter are the same.  I played with his formula to westernize the idea that we, too, are energy with the hope that we can use this idea to help ourselves and others be whole and complete.