Putting out the Energy in Fires

Energy cannot be created or destroyed…

it can only be changed from one form to another. This is physics, thermodynamics to be more precise.

What about our energy? Our drive and perspective? Our interactions and relationships?

One of our lovely clients came in to class clearly distressed. She had ongoing issues with a long term health condition and was frightened and scared about her upcoming treatment.

Her previous knowledge and experience had determined how she felt – others close to her had not survived their encounters of the same illness. If you can imagine this negative energy in a cup – this was full to the brim with nerves, anxiety, apprehension and fear. The thoughts of the treatment were bearing down on this already toxic soup of negative energy, causing it to overflow and bubble over.

Tears followed.

I had similar knowledge and experience of the same health condition. Yet my thoughts wrapped around it were of fight, survivorship, health, insight and wellbeing. My cup probably has a drop of fear in, but it’s tiny. It is inconsequential.

I couldn’t change her fears, but I could focus her thoughts on something more positive. I could act as a buffer for the high impact waves that were crashing down, and take the sting away. Hopefully then they would morph into something better and more constructive.

I went back to our client, I explained that because of her sad experiences, she was looking at it from an angle that was already steeped in loss and fear. I told her about my good experiences; and how it shaped my outlook.

I showed her pictures of the equipment used for her prospective treatment;

I explained the ambiance of the room, the staff I had encountered. How it was cool – calm and serene. There were pictures of cherry blossoms on the ceiling in the treatment room – so you weren’t staring up at a blank, clinical space. I gave her a big hug, twenty seconds worth to be precise (that’s another scientific idea to explore at a later date – the benefits of a twenty second hug!).

Our lovely client left more happy and at ease than when she had come into class. She was so grateful, and yet I was just relieved to have made a tiny difference in her day. I do not have the fitness experience to deliver the classes we provide, but I do feel like I am becoming valuable support to our clients – someone to chat to.

I gave negativity a nudge that day, a little polite elbow into a different stream, a more pleasant river of thoughts. I had transferred energy, changing it from a darker more suppressive tone into something far more uplifting.

If you find your mind somewhere dark and scary, try to let a positive warm thought come in, let it muscle into the darkness and sit there. Feel it grow and take root. Allow it to dampen the flames, and eventually the negative will morph into something lighter and ultimately more positive. Understand your energy ebb and flows, and learn to balance the light and shade.