The "Just Fold it in" Series: Clearing Your Energy

Hey everyone it's Amanda, and I'm back this week with another video for you in the "Just fold it in" series. If you missed last week, we talked about grounding your energy. I used the example from the show, Schitt's Creek. There was a scene where the mother was telling the son to "just fold it in", when they were cooking, and he had no idea what she meant and she just kept saying just fold it in. I feel like there are many terms in the spiritual/self help arena that people use that aren't very clear and I'm not sure that they're ever really well defined. So, I was hoping to do this series to shed a little more clarity on some of these terms. For this week, I was hoping to talk a little bit about "clearing your energy" or "cleansing your energy".

So, when might you need to clear your energy? When you're feeling a little bit heavy, you're feeling a little bit scattered, a little bit sad, or a little bit anxious. Sometimes you may be experiencing these undesirable feelings and maybe you're not even sure why you're feeling some of these. Sometimes what can happen is we can pick up energy from others around us. When you're in a crowded environment around a lot of people, you may pick up the energy from others (the frequency that they are putting out into the world), and some of the emotions that they are feeling. It can be helpful from time to time to clear your energy, as well as the energy of a room or a house or an environment.

There are several ways that you can do this, and one of them is using sage or Palo Santo. Sage is sold in little dried bundles and you can buy them anywhere in local natural shops or on Amazon even. What you'll do is burn the end of the bundle for just a short period and blow it out, and then spread the smoke around the environment. It's good to have the windows open during this process to help with the clearing. Palo Santo is another option for clearing out a space. Palo Santo is a considered a holy wood, and this wood is only harvested once the tree has naturally fallen. They don't cut down the trees to harvest the wood. I personally prefer the scent of the Palo Santo better than sage, it has a really nice sweet scent to it, and both will help to cleanse or clear the energy of a space or yourself. You can also use the smoke (carefully!) around yourself with the intention of clearing your energy as well.

Another method you can use for clearing your energy or cleansing your energy is using crystals. A really great one is Selenite. Selenite is a really nice cleansing, clearing crystal. You will just pass the crystal over your body while holding the intention to clear your energy. You can also keep them around your home to help cleanse the energy of your space.

Another one is water. Water is a very cleansing, clearing element. Taking a bath with Epsom salt or sea salt can also be really cleansing and clearing. Other ways to utilize water to cleanse or clear your energy is through a shower or swimming in the ocean or other natural waters.

Next, meditations can be a great cleansing practice. There are many meditations that are meant for clearing your energy. I have one that I've recorded (I can attach below) that visits each of the seven chakras and sets the intention of clearing each one, helping the energy to flow through each, so that the energy flows through your system as it's supposed to.

Lastly, the practice of Reiki can be an excellent way to clear your energy. Reiki is an energy healing modality that works to re-establish balance within your energetic system. Negative stored energy is released and your chakra system is cleared so that energy can flow through the system. Following a Reiki session, you will feel lighter, balanced and more grounded.

So those are some ideas for cleansing and clearing your energy. After clearing your energy, you'll notice lightness ... lightness in the room ... lightness in your body ... an overall feeling of balance and lightness.

So that's what the phrase "clear your energy" means ... to let go of any energy that's not your own ... let go of energy that is negative ... let go of any energy that's not serving you and keeping you moving forward in a positive manner.

The "Just Fold it in" Series: Grounding

This week I wanted to start a new series. I'm going to call it the, "Just fold it in" series. So if you're not familiar, there's a show called Schitt's Creek. In this show there's a scene where the mother is telling the son to just "fold in" the cheese into the dish that they're making. He didn't understand what she meant by "just fold it in" and she kept saying "just fold it in". This was a very funny scene, but I feel like it relates to a lot of these spiritual terms that people throw out, and a lot of times we're not always exactly sure what they're talking about. Most of the time they don't actually ever get defined well enough and we're left confused and unsure. So one of those terms for me was grounding. People would say you need to ground yourself or you have to ground your energy. I felt like in the beginning of my journey, everyone kept saying, "just ground your energy" and I was like, Okay? What? So it felt like that "just fold it in" scene for me. So I was hoping to do this series to hopefully bring a little more clarity to some of these terms.

For today, I want to talk about grounding, or grounding your energy. This practice is very important and helpful and it's not as complicated or involved as it sounds. So first I'll start with why what grounding is, why you might want to do it, and when you might need to do it. So grounding basically means to bring yourself back to the present moment, to immediately connect within, and to connect with your physical environment and your physical body. Grounding is pulling your mind back down, out of that other time/other place where it is. It's about balancing your energy between the spiritual, emotional, mental, and the physical. So, anchoring is another good word for it, anchoring yourself here in the physical body in the physical environment where you are.

Sometimes we can find ourselves getting lost in our mind and in our thoughts. Even possibly our spiritual connection can at times leave us feeling disconnected. We also need to make sure that we are balancing our energy and connecting back with the physical because we are here on Earth and in our physical bodies.

The question now is, when might you want to do this? You might want to do some grounding exercises when you feel scattered, or disorganized. When you notice that you are all over the place, when you're making mistakes left and right, when you can't get yourself together, it may be time for some grounding. Also, when you're feeling anxious or you're focusing too much on the future grounding will be helpful. Also, when you're feeling really disconnected from reality, or disconnected from others. Any kind of disconnection is a sign that it's time for some grounding. Lastly, if you're feeling really depressed, or really stuck on past experiences, and you find you are continuing to ruminate over and over, you might want to bring in a grounding exercise.

There are several different ways that you can ground your energy and there's no wrong way. Find what resonates for you and what feels right, or just doing whatever you can remember in the moment. I think sometimes we don't do practices that can be helpful for us because we get stuck on trying to do things perfectly.

The first way you can ground your energy is to connect with nature. Whenever you're in nature, that's a great start. Feeling your bare feet on the earth is a really great way, feeling the grass, or the dirt. Being in the ocean. Being at any natural water source, listening to the sounds of nature, or observing nature, just getting out there is the number one way you can start to ground yourself and bring yourself back to this physical connection with the physical.

The second way to ground your energy is through visualization exercises. This is one that I often do and is really my go to. I use this a lot as part of my Reiki sessions for others too. When I am working with a person who has a lot of anxiety, or has a very busy mind, I'll try to help by doing some visualization exercises during our session to ground them. These exercises will help to bring them back down, keep them feeling stable and steady. When we're anxious we're not feeling safe or secure. That's part of what grounding is about. So one type of visualization you can do is to picture roots growing from the bottom of your the soles of your feet, and then the visualizing those roots growing deeper through the building, down through the floor of the building, down through the ground underneath, and all the way to the core of the Earth. I sometimes visualize those roots going out connecting to all living beings. This exercise will also help us to remember that we're all one and that we're all connected. When you visualize that nice, deep root system, it helps to give a feeling of security, that we're connected to this earth, and that we have a nice stable wide base to help us be steady.

The next exercise you can use to ground your energy is a one-minute, 5...4...3...2...1 countdown. When we do this we're going to use our five senses, which are always here in the physical. For this exercise you will start by noticing five things that you can see in your immediate environment. Then noticing four things that you can hear in the present moment. Then noticing three things that you can feel in that moment. Then noticing two things that you can smell, and then ending with one deep breath. Don't worry if you mix up which number goes with which sense! It doesn't matter! This is another great exercise to pull you out of your mind and into the present moment, and help you to connect with your immediate physical environment. This is a great strategy because it only takes one minute to do, you can do it anywhere, and you can do with your eyes open. So, whenever you're feeling scattered or anxious, just do a quick 5,4,3,2,1.

Another way is holding, carrying or meditating with grounding crystals. So there are certain crystals that are really great for grounding. One that I used a lot in the beginning of my journey that I really like is, hematite. Hematite is a darker gray crystal that is usually very shiny. Black Tourmaline and obsidian are two other crystals that are great for grounding. Those are just three, but there are many other grounding crystals. Usually you'll find that they are a darker color. They're going to be gray, black, or dark reds. You can put them in your pocket and keep them with you (my favorite), you can sleep with them under your pillow, or you can do some kind of meditation while holding them.

Lastly, physical exercise, outdoors would be better because you can connect with nature at the same time.

So, those are five ways that you can ground your energy. I'm hoping that this, "Just fold it in series" will be helpful for you.

The first term in this series that we talked about was grounding. Basically I am trying to bring some clarity to these spiritual terms that get thrown out a lot. Grounding again is, pulling your energy back to center, back to the present moment, feeling connected with your physical body, your physical environment, and feeling safe, stable and secure.

I hope that that is helpful for you, and please let me know if you have any more terms that you would like to see explained or talked about further. Also, let me know in the comments if you have any other grounding exercises that you'd like to do.