By Elizabeth Herman | Posted: January 28, 2020
“Know that you love everyone and everyone loves you and never doubt in the love. It’s something like space. It cannot diminish, it cannot go away. That’s true love. Don’t waste your precious life in all the unwanted thoughts of your mind,” says Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar.
Thinking negatively is one of the obstacles to using your energy the way you want to. But by making better choices in both our thoughts and actions, we can both increase our storehouses of energy and stop wasting it, and increasingly focus on what really matters. Believing in universal love, as Gurudev mentions in the above quote, is one of the things that brings meaning to life. Happiness, being childlike and innocent, and finding meaning and your true purpose are some other examples of what really matters.
Energy wasters
Stress: The stress and tension that can build up in our system makes our energy less useful and less accessible. Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar says, “I see stress as wanting to do a lot but having no energy and no time. To get rid of stress, either you have to reduce your needs or increase your energy. Increasing your energy levels is more practical than reducing your needs. Reducing and eliminating stress is the first thing.”
Insecurity: Doubt that someone will take care of you is one form of insecurity. But when you realize, as Gurudev states, that “there is so much love and compassion on this planet, and there is a higher power which is all love and it will give you what you need when you need it,” then that doubt fades away. Feeling insecure wastes time and energy, and creates anxiety, stress, and toxins in your body, disturbing your health.
Prejudice: Prejudices between generations, classes, races, genders, religions, cultures, and languages, all exist in the world. But these are all external characteristics, and none of them justifies pre-judging or excluding people. Differences among groups of people are inevitable, and fighting against the love that exists across all of these boundaries takes up precious energy that is needed elsewhere, for solving real problems. Prejudice often leads to anger and hate, which gets you and the rest of the world nowhere.
Distractions: It’s easy to get distracted from your true purpose by choosing to fight the wrong battles, becoming overcommitted, delaying action by talking too much about your plans, and convincing others to follow you. With so much media easily accessible, you can start to waste energy looking at your phone and getting involved in other people’s situations that dissipate your energy.
Focusing on what matters
Innocence: About the importance of innocence and being childlike, Gurudev states, “Every child is nothing but a bundle of joy, but as we grow up, somewhere, we lose that joy. A child smiles 400 times a day. When a child grows up and becomes an adolescent, he smiles only 17 times a day, and when he becomes an adult, he smiles occasionally and usually only when someone else smiles. The whole question is, how do we reverse this? How do we get back to the innocence we were born with? This is the quest.”
Joy: Knowing there are good people all around you who will help you if you need it brings confidence and faith. Faith in a higher power that will guide you and help you brings great joy and happiness. In fact, happiness and joy are already in you even when they are covered over by the energy wasters listed above. You just have to uncover and release them into your heart to gain the energy you need to succeed.
Health: With a healthy lifestyle, a little bit of luck, and medical care, you can thrive and continue to grow stronger physically, mentally, and spiritually. With good health, you can gain wealth, relationships, achievements, and contribute to your community in meaningful and rewarding ways. Health is the building block for all of the other aspects of life that truly matter and are worthy of your energy.
Meaning: Where does a meaningful life come from? Work, relationships, goals, helping others, contributing to your community and your world? There are many sources of meaning in our lives, and identifying them and consciously focusing on them is an important first step in making your life more meaningful.
Energy boosters
Energy audit: By checking in with yourself at different times of the day, on a regular basis, you can start to see where and when you need to stop wasting, and start boosting your energy levels. Dr. Heidi Hanna recommends that you assess your habits at bedtime, in the early morning, and at mealtime, movement time, and reset time. Each of these crucial opportunities can be bolstered by simple techniques, including journaling, laughing, and gratitude at reset time, good nutrition at meal time and staying hydrated throughout the day, and positive affirmations in the morning, to name a few.
Reflective awareness: When you look back at your life and see how you’ve wasted energy, and how sad and gloomy you’ve felt as a result, the reason to take up energy boosting practices becomes clear. Writing can often help you reflect on the habits you’ve built up during your early years, so you can move forward to eliminate the destructive thoughts and actions and replace them with constructive, health inducing ones. But don’t forget to write reflections on everything you’re grateful for as well.
Breathing, meditation, yoga: “Life is a play of the prana (life energy). When prana is low, you feel upset, angry, and dejected. When it ebbs even further, you feel life isn’t worth living. When the prana level is normal, you feel yourself. When it’s a little higher than normal, you feel more creative, enthusiastic and joyful. And if it’s even higher, you realize something much deeper. Spiritual practices (breathing, meditation, and yoga) are meant to increase the prana level in you. If your prana level is constantly high, then you don’t even need practices. Enlightenment is prana at the optimum level. The prana gets depleted when the senses go outward and the moment the senses start turning inward, we’re tapping into the eternal source of energy.” ~Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
A broad vision and wisdom: Careful guidance inspired by wisdom can channel anger’s energy into productive work, instead of letting this fiery, sometimes necessary emotion become destructive. In a recent talk, Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar describes the many angry protests around the world and how they are creating havoc and nuisances for everyday people. At the same time, he describes how Art of Living projects intelligently bring water to dry villages in India help to channel villagers’ anger away from fighting and towards rejuvenating local rivers and increasing the water table.
To learn many of these practices and bring about change in the way you use your energy for what really matters in your life, find a Happiness Program, Sahaj Samadhi meditation course, or Sri Sri Yoga course near you!
Elizabeth Herman writes, offers writing support to clients, teaches, and volunteers for a better world. She has a PhD in Rhetoric, Composition and Literature. Find her on Facebook or Twitter.
