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Our subject is spiritual energy, where it comes from, and where it goes.
Last time we saw the usual way humans get energy is through “stealing” it from each other in a zero-sum-game. But there is an alternative energy source - a higher one - the overhead grid of common purpose. The moment we realise ‘my best interest is perfectly aligned with yours’ is the moment we can tap this grid. The ultimate source of the energy is Will.
Sticking with the electricity analogy, we note that rooftop solar energy systems are described in kilowatts and kilowatt hours. The first is a measure of power, the second a measure of energy. Similarly, in the spiritual domain, power and energy are closely related. Will is a latent force that can renew the planetary civilisation. It is like a dammed-up potential, but when it flows or becomes kinetic, it is power and energy.
Power is the force of Will - “willpower”- that pushes ideas into reality.
Looked at from the opposite direction, the ideas are “pulled” into material existence, like water can be pulled from a height by gravity. Various religious traditions have used poetic rather than physical language to refer to this great truth : it has even been described as a romance between spirit and matter.
Ideas seek materialisation through four stages that we have elsewhere detailed. It takes power to traverse these stages. The more intense the work, the greater the power. The shorter the time to traverse the stages of manifestation, the greater the power.
Just moving from “my idea” to “our shared purpose” is an expression of power. And it accounts for whatever we experience as charismatic.
It is like the living power that translates a fertilised egg into a clump of cells and then an embryo; and then a fetus; and then a new creation.
As for energy, it is not the pushing force itself but the stuff that flows. It is not exclusively spiritual or material but a blend of both - always a blend.
Subtle energy appears more spiritual than material. Gross energy appears more material than spiritual. But it is all the same energy.
Remember E= mc2 : energy and matter are the same. If energy is the stuff that flows in waves (or pulses), what does it flow through? Investigators have called this matrix “the etheric”.
The etheric is important because it holds the transformers which step down the spiritual “voltage” to a level appropriate for physical world activity.
The etheric centres need to be functioning properly to step down and conduct the life current into our physical bodies and world. Getting them functional is part of the deeper study of meditation. They’re also potentially critical to health and healing - as complementary medicine is investigating.
Every schoolchild learns that energy can come in waves or pulses. Energy in waves can be understood as cycles with peaks and troughs. Energy pulsing is ebbing and flowing.
The spiritual energy available to us will also be experienced as a wave-like flow and ebb. Sometimes it is moving outward in action, sometimes it is withdrawing in reflection.
Having gained a season of experience, we follow with a season of reflective assimilation and refine our mental model about the meaning of life. Then like scientists we formulate a hypothesis to be tested. We say to ourselves in some way, “if life is really as my model describes, then this is how I can operate in it”.
Or like farmers we have seed for the next crop. We are at the “springtime” of our cycle, ready to sow something new. Our implemented plans are our seeds sown here, there and everywhere. Once all are sown we reach the peak of our efforts -- which may or may not look pretty! This is the “midsummer” point of our cycle. From here we increasingly reap what we sow, absorbing the reactions and consequences of our experiments.
That moment when it becomes preferable to distill the lessons of our experiential harvest rather than engage in further activity is the onset of reflective “autumn”.
With the barn holding more attraction than the open field, we may pass through a dark night of the soul or a ‘winter of discontent’ seeking an explanation why our previous mental model was limited in predictive power. The explanation, emerging from the winter solstice point, holds the promise of transforming our lives in the next round of action. What’s happened? Our life experience has regenerated something to disseminate before the next spring sowing, the next round of action.
One of the spin-offs of meditating is the insight into these naturally occurring rhythms.
We develop a capacity to observe where we are in the cycles. This contributes to the harmonisation of thought and action. Like sowing and reaping, there is a time for everything under the sun.