"Please help me to be in alignment with Divine flow, right timing and the Highest and Greatest Good."
Right timing.
I've been thinking a lot about this idea lately. In case you missed last week's article on Wu-Wei (the art of not doing), know that this has been a prevalent theme for me. I find myself asking, how can I be more in alignment with the flow of energy as it wants to move, rather than how I want it to or think it "should" move? And, in doing so, how can I align my own desires more authentically with the natural rhythms and currents of universal energy?
In addition to themes of slowing down and turning our energy inward, one of the signature energies of Autumn, according to Taoist philosophy, is righteousness. Let's look at this for a moment in contrast with self-righteousness:
Self-righteousness: my time, my reasons, my place, my people.
Righteousness: right time, right reasons, right place, right people.
Self-righteousness asserts a degree of ownership and control over the flow of energy, whereas righteousness itself infers a co-creative process of being in right relation with the flow of energy.
When you consider that distinction, what do you notice? What feelings arise in your body? I don't know about you, but when I consider the idea of right time, right reasons, right place and right people, it feels as though my whole body softens with a sigh.
What a relief.
In continuing with the theme of Wu-wei and the active process of not-doing, I am practicing paying radical attention to how self-righteousness is showing up in my life, and how I can surrender attachment and ownership and remove my sense of control from the equation. The sensation and energetic frame this requires feels much like what I find myself practicing when I work with horses.
Last week, the ranch owner asked me to demonstrate to a group of newcomers what it looks like to move a herd of horses with energy and intention. Entering an arena with five horses who are all doing their own thing, getting their attention and asking them to move cohesively as a group with focus and power is the ultimate practice in righteousness. (Oh, yeah--it was also my first time doing this exercise.) I dropped into my breath, noticed my posture shift automatically to a stance of grounded empowerment, and felt my attention move from my conscious mind ("how am I going to get them to do this?") into my subconscious, subtle awareness... the same place my attention shifts when practicing healing or psychic work.
Merely from these small changes, the horses shifted their energy and attention to me. Using the energy of their attention combined with my subtle awareness, I began to move my energy. The horses responded. As we cycled our energy and intention together, we created a feedback that resulted in the five horses running effortlessly together in a weaving pattern, with me simultaneously following their energetic flow and directing and shaping the current.
I'm not trying to be deliberately vague about this--the point is that it's not really a conscious thing. By being in a state of righteousness--reading their energy of right direction, right place, right timing and aligning myself with it--we were able to co-create flow and momentum. If I had kept my energy in my head and tried to assert my direction, my place and my timing, it probably would have fallen flat, resulted in the horses ignoring me or scattering and avoiding my direction.
Last week's very embodied experience of this simple distinction has me looking out for all areas in my life where I can practice righteousness over self-righteousness. The process feels like living constantly in that state of subtle awareness, and noticing how the universe weaves in co-creation with me when I allow it to show me the natural flow. So far, the result has been less effort-ing, less tiring, less time spent, and a whole lot more being quiet and paying attention, while making subtle shifts in response.
If you would like to join me in this ongoing practice of playing with righteousness with the universe, see below for meditation and journal prompts! Thank you for taking this journey with me into the subtle realms... 'tis the season.
This teaching comes from I AM Alchemy, and how to work with allowing energies to flow through you rather than "making" it happen.
Want to know more? Apply now for I AM Alchemy 2020
Many blessings,
Journal prompts:
Where in my life am I living with righteousness? Where in my life am I living with self-righteousness? What in me needs to shift in order to align with righteous living?
Meditation prompts:
