Three Practical Tips for Protecting Your Energy
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When things don’t go to plan, plans can change.
I find myself writing this on yet another gray, cold day. Tomorrow, I was supposed to leave for a week-long trip to Costa Rica to celebrate my wedding anniversary. Honestly? I feel really relieved I'm not going.
When I told a close friend we had cancelled the trip just 10 days before we were supposed to go, she said, "Wow, I really admire that. I think so often we push ahead even though things are very fragile around us." See, nothing is in crisis for us personally, but she was right—things are just complicated and unstable. Our son is still struggling at school, despite bringing out all available resources (it helps to have a mama in mental health), and I've been feeling unsettled with all the instability on a macro level.
For me, it just felt like an odd time to consider a vacation. I say "odd" because of the dissonance between the experiences I'm witnessing. I have had really heavy weeks lately and been feeling the weight of the world. I told my teacher yesterday that I fell into such heaviness a weekend ago that, for the first time in a long time, I felt like I just "couldn't do it anymore". I was not having active or even passive thoughts of self-harm, but I was so fatigued. I felt heartbreak, hopelessness, and despair at the unrelenting weight of it all - parenting, politics, feeling so helpless as people starve and are taken from their homes… it was all just too much. It still is.
3 Tips & Tools for Protecting Your Energy
As a helper, healer, and empath, I'm prone to taking on the energies around me. Last week, I presented at two local schools for their professional development days. My second workshop was tough - three hours in a community I have less connection with. I noticed an area of the room —or, more so, felt— a subset of people regarding me with such indifference and maybe even disdain. I could just feel their negative energy. It was challenging to manage and definitely didn't help the heaviness I was already carrying from the weekend.
So, as I was teaching them tools, I realized I needed them too.
1. I notice, I wonder, I think
The first one I did is the one I taught all of you a couple weeks ago - the mindfulness exercise of "I notice, I wonder, I think." Here's what I said to them: I notice that there are a lot of people here who'd rather not be here. I wonder if they don't like me and are talking badly about me. I think…I don't care.
Hah! You all, you could hear a PIN DROP. I've never experienced a silence that profound from a group of educators. But you know what? I needed that mindfulness exercise as much as they did - for us all to have an exercise in awareness and choice.
I know I'm not alone in feeling this way - the compassion fatigue, the energy absorption, the sense of responsibility for others' well-being. I can say that over the last 18 months, I've prioritized my recovery from being a co-dependent people pleaser and have found my boundaries. More often than not, I can maintain my energy reserves even in the face of others' woes.
2. Energetic Drain
Another exercise I taught the group was the energetic drain. I've been doing this one a lot lately. It goes like this: I stand up, feeling my feet on the ground. I imagine a drain, like a shower drain, below my feet. Then, I call in a rush of golden light from the top of my head and "shower it" through me, washing away all the negativity and any energy that is not mine or not for my greatest and highest good. I let all that just drain down and away. I imagine Mother Earth absorbing it, alchemizing it, and then returning it to the ecosystem. Still there, but no longer mine to hold.
As I've been tuning into a collective heaviness, especially as the weather changes and the sudden approach of winter destabilizes, I find myself reaching for my tools more often. They are always a practice. Sometimes I get so overwhelmed that I lose them for a bit, but that's okay. I find that I can always recover, eventually.
3. Sleep & Rest
What helped me more than anything else last weekend was a good night's sleep. No substances to numb me, no late night scrolling, reading or watching TV. A solid bedtime with a sober brain and body, and I was restored. Sometimes, what is most essential is simply deep rest. We forget how vital it is to sustaining everything else.
Bonus Tip: Deep Breaths & Regulating Mantra
Lastly, a mantra I've been trying on this week is, "I observe, don't absorb." When I notice others spinning out, exhibiting moodiness, or feeling stressed, I take a deep breath and repeat to myself, "I observe, don't absorb." I then create a bubble of light around me, protecting my energy and inner resources. Big breath out.
Staying Hopeful Amidst Hard Times
Not all of us are as porous as others, but regardless, tuning into your own energetic vibration and having a sense of accountability and ownership for it is essential. When we're not in tune with how our lower vibrations or negativity are impacting others, we leak and leach. We attach to a victim mindset, point fingers at others, and can lose hope.
Above all right now, we must retain hope. Hope that we can be okay. Hope that things can be not okay but still can be. We do this through practice, through awareness, through offering ourselves love and protection.
I hope you find your inner resources and if not, you ask for help. You're never alone. Truly, we're all in this together.
Support for Your Mental Health
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Conscious Transparency: This newsletter was edited by AI for grammar, spelling, and sentence structure, but every idea, tone of voice, perspective, and word choice was my own. This newsletter is imperfect because a human wrote it. Thank you for your graciousness.
This week’s Tools, Gratitude, Innovation, Feels
Tools: I’ve been using an all-natural sleep aide for years now. This supplement is my favorite and doesn’t give me any residual effects the next day. It may also be a slight placebo effect, because I swear I cannot get good sleep without it and believe in its effectiveness so much.
Gratitude: A weekend ago, when I was really in the depths of despair, I had a 7-year-old birthday party to attend. While I felt very little motivation to go, it was exactly what I needed. Seeing friends, watching my kiddos be joyful, allowing my friends to listen and help me—healing and connecting. When in doubt - connect with others. It’s humanity’s greatest salve.
Innovation: Have you seen this new show on AppleTV? I’m obsessed with it. It hits on all my interests: collective consciousness, telepathy, aliens… without all the gore and zombie apocalyptic nonsense.
Feels: Oh my oh my…my three celebrities in the mental health field came together for one epic, mindblowing 2-hour podcast episode. It took me weeks to get through, but it was worth every moment. I felt so validated, supported, and hopeful listening to them. What they share is all about what Reset was founded on and continues to evolve with purpose towards. There is a better way.