Physics assures us everything is energy, and I’ve learned by experience that most of us are ultra-absorbent Energy Sponges. A driver flips you off and, wham!, you feel it in your solar plexus, or third chakra. Your teenager manages to be sullen, blaming, and sad in one sentence (if she is speaking at all), and you feel slimed. You are absolutely right; you have been slimed. Possibly on purpose from your hormone-laden teen, but we also routinely absorb energy that isn’t meant for us, aimed at us, or ours to carry. Energy isn’t bound by any delivery system, and negative energy is an equal-opportunity invader. We can look at the news for five minutes and be thoroughly saturated with sadness, disgust, rage, and a million other dense, downer energies. Often we absorb friends’ energy or carry a lot more away from Facebook than is healthy for our psyches. Given the amount of energy and information inundating us daily, it’s definitely enough to absorb only that which is meant for us.
Sadly, our brains soak up negative energy more readily than they do positive. As Dr. Rick Hanson explains in his book Buddha’s Brain, “Our brains are Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones.” Unfortunately, our brains react much as they did in primitive times and tend to compulsively obsess over negatives while sloughing off positive ideas and feelings easily. That fact is high on my list of topics to chat with God about when the time comes.
Luckily, there are ways to protect yourself from unconsciously absorbing others’ energy and cleanse yourself when you intuitively know it’s needed. A few effective ways to be less spongy are to surround yourself with an impermeable bubble of protection, or imagine being enfolded in beautiful angel wings or, as I’ve recently been taught, place a protection rose or wall of roses around you to absorb energy that is not yours to manage. Roses are used because, wherever they appear throughout time, symbolize God at work.
Even the best of precautions may not totally protect us sensitive sponges, but there are ways to metaphorically wring them out and flush unwanted energy from our bodies and auras. Years ago, my cherished spiritual mother and teacher, Annabelle, taught me the following discernment technique. If you feel “off” and can’t pinpoint what is causing it, prayerfully asking the following questions may help:
If this is my feeling or energy, I ask to understand what it is trying to tell me as soon and deeply as possible.
If this is not my feeling or energy, I ask that it be gently, but completely, removed from me and returned to its perfect, right person or place.
Practices such as this one are often more successful when accompanied by mental pictures.
During your day...
Protect yourself from rampant slime in whatever ways feel right to you.
Give yourself an energy bath if needed.
Have fun wringing yourself free from unwanted excess energy.
