Turn Your Energy Around

Published 6 months ago • 2 min read

Dear Reader,

Lately, I have been thinking about energy: yours, mine, and ours.

Most of us are caught in an outdated paradigm regarding energy. We overextend ourselves beyond what’s sustainable and lean on limited supplies of energy—our anxious drive, that extra cup of coffee, our addiction of choice.

Meanwhile, we neglect readily available and regenerative energy sources—the cheery guy at Trader Joe's asking about your day, your pet bidding for attention, or your body’s whisper to get outside.

We need to ask ourselves: How do we turn our energy around? From empty to full? From limited to renewable? From detached to connected?

We’ve been exploring that on the podcast these last few weeks. And here are three things you can apply today.

Connect. Physicists define energy as the capacity to do work or cause change. And modern attachment theorists argue that energy flows between us. When you catch the smiling eyes of a person at a coffee shop, your body’s nervous system picks up their energy in a form of communication called neuroception. You can shift your energy and that of another with secure relating–use a kind tone of voice and a gentle touch, lean in, and listen. Lately, my favorite connection skill came from Dr. Ann Kelley: Speak in sentences, not essays.

Center Yourself. Wise effort isn’t just pointing your arrow toward your values and going all out. It’s about using your energy wisely. It’s noticing what drains you and what sustains you. One practice that has sustained me for decades is mantra. The sound, the repetition, and the meaning of the mantras are centering and soothing. In this month’s skill-building episode, you’ll learn how to bring a mantra into your daily life. Here’s one mantra you can try out today as you walk, one word per step: Yes, Yes, Thank You, Thank You.

Live Fearlessly. We bind up our energy when we play small, stay stuck in a story, or follow made-up rules. In this week’s real play with confidence coach Michael Herold, I asked him to write a FEARLESS review of this year ahead. Living a five-star life involves being bold, courageous, and intimate with life. If you were to write a FEARLESS five-star review of your year ahead, what would it say? Start living it, and energy will return to you a thousand times over.