Spiritual and Energetic Wellbeing

The Modern Guide to Energy Clearing is making its way out into the world, beyond my wonderful team at Llewellyn. Some reviewers are starting to share their opinions. Here are a few from NetGalley:

I received this book for free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. As an introvert and empath who is into all things spiritual, I very much enjoyed this book. The author's tone was friendly and down to earth, but she also takes these concepts and her work seriously and I admire and respect that. The book does a wonderful job at showing why energy work is important to learn and practice. I do wish more attention had been given to the cord cutting section, but overall, this was an amazing read. The blessings section was particularly beautiful and expounds on a practice I already regularly include in my life. Will recommend and will read again!
~Emily S.

Great guide to Energy Healing. The information includes not only energy clearing (which is the primary focus), but also touches upon containment and cultivation. The author gives a good number of techniques, all of which are easily accessible. Importantly, she advises that each practitioner use those ideas that speak to them individually. These are simple to perform as well as to incorporate easily into everyday life. Recommended.
~Tracy D.

To give you a better idea of my approach, here is an excerpt:

Spiritual and Energetic Wellbeing
            Energy clearing and cultivation are great practices for making your home, office, or even your car feel good and safe. You can use these ideas to help support your own physical, mental, and emotional wellbeing. Good energy management can create a life with greater balance and peace, but energy work goes much farther than that. In fact, consistent energy clearing and cultivation is essential to living your soul’s purpose and that’s pretty exciting.
            The idea of your “soul’s purpose” is a powerful but often misunderstood phrase. Too often we think that our soul’s purpose is like a glorified career guidance counselor that will tell you what to do to earn a living, as if our soul came to this earth to gain a specific job title. It makes sense that we think that because our culture really drives home the point that we are what we do for a living. The truth is that our job title can be part of how we express our soul’s purpose. Our soul’s purpose is the reason and the way we do what we do rather than what we. To complicate things further, your soul’s purpose isn’t just one word or sentence. It isn’t something finite but rather an ongoing dance between you and the Divine. With each step of the dance, we are changed so our soul’s purpose or at least our conscious understanding of it evolves. The more we live it, the more it reveals itself to us. Perhaps the simplest way I can describe it is that your soul’s purpose is the collection of ideals that you hold most dear, the ideals that you are willing to do whatever it takes to live up to.
            But who among us fully lives up to our own ideals each and every minute of every day? I know I don’t. This means that our soul’s purpose is something we express in the world and it is also our North Star that guide us through the dark and confusing times as well as affirms our steps during easier, clearer times. I heard an interesting tidbit: airplanes are off course ninety percent of the time and pilots are always course correcting. Pilots learn that they have to continually adjust for changing circumstances.[1] Sometimes I feel like my life is like that, that I’m kind of heading in the right direction but also kind of not. During those times, I find it’s important to pay attention to my energy and the energy around me in order to correct my course. That is another benefit of good energy health. The more robust your energetic health is the easier it is tell when you are off track. 
            Thinking about energy work, living your soul’s purpose, and just plain old living life as a continuous sequence of course corrections is actually a relief. Knowing that the point is the journey and that we are not required or even meant to ever completely “arrive” takes the pressure off. We are allowed and expected to make mistakes. Mistakes are valuable teaching moments especially with energy work. We cannot quantify and measure and label this work in any sort of scientific manner, so we really do have to rely on our experience. Because of that, energy work does not require a complete lifestyle change.
            In fact, overhauling your life would be more of an effective distraction from the real work of developing sustainable practice in your life right now. For example, Minimalism is very popular right now and while it does draw from ideas about energy work, some of the Minimalist techniques are just too overwhelming for most of us to adopt easily. I rarely have time to clean a drawer or closet; it’s unlikely my family and I would have the time for a Packing Party. A Packing Party is where you invite people over to help you pack up your house as if you are moving in one day, even everyday essentials. Then you unpack what you need as you need it. After three weeks, whatever isn’t unpacked gets thrown away, donated, or sold. For some this is the perfect approach, but it can make others feel defeated before they begin. Instead, the energy clearing and cultivation that I practice simply involves one good decision at a time within the life you are currently living.
            In order to make good decisions, to make appropriate course corrections, and to live your soul’s purpose, you have to be energetically clear. Think about your ideals. In fact, write them down. What beliefs mean the most to you? When you are between a rock and a hard place, what ideal helps you decide what to do? What matters to you? Those things are the essence of your soul’s purpose. Once you have your list, think about your past twenty-four hours. In what ways did your behavior, actions, words, feelings, and thoughts reflect your cherished ideals? Which ones did not? If you are like me, some things really are expressions of your values and some are not.
            Joshua Fields Millburn (one of the The Minimalists) often says in his podcasts that if you show him your budget and your schedule, he can name your values.[2] He means this in a slightly provocative way, because for most of us, our budgets and schedules do not reflect our true values but rather what we think we are supposed to value. It is a statement meant to make us think seriously about how we spend our time and our money. If we are human beings with free will and the ability to make conscious decisions, why do we make decisions about our time, money, and behavior that separate us from our values rather than embody them? That is a great question. In fact, it might be the question. “Why do I behave in ways that are not in alignment with my beliefs and ideals?” One answer is “well, I am only human.” That works but it is also a cop out. No one likes to think about where they’ve fallen short, unless they (like I’m ashamed to admit that I do) like to beat themselves up about it for a while. Yet, these moments, these mistakes or failures are road signs that point us to where we can find energy issues that need attention. In order to live your soul’s purpose, in order to live your values in your daily life, you need to be free from energetic disharmony. We identify our points of departure from our guiding values, figure out what caused the discrepancy, and deal with it. Then we can more easily correct our course toward becoming the people we truly want to be. The alternative is to be controlled, reacting to life rather than engaging with it in a mindful and meaningful way.
            The next two chapters lay the foundation for our exploration of energy clearing. First we will establish a shared vocabulary. After that, we will discuss the basics of energetic health.
            Spiritual and energetic health and wellbeing is about so much more than waving around a burning stick of sage or plugging in a salt lamp (although those things are really useful!). It is about knowing what you value and keeping yourself free so that you can live those values in the world in your own beautiful and unique way. You have great medicine in you that we desperately need. So pick up that sage bundle and let’s get to work so that you can express your glorious soul, support other glorious souls, and heal our world.


[1] I don’t remember where I heard the original mention, but when I looked into it to verify the facts, I found this: Airplane Flying Handbook FAA-H80833B, (OK, Oklahoma City: US Department of Transportation, 2016), 6-2.

[2] Millburn, Joshua Fields. Minimalist Podcast. http://www.theminimalists.com/podcast/.

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