Becoming bigger than your activated energies
The Rhythm of Energy & flowing > forcing
I have at least five Substack drafts half written, a content planning spreadsheet with months worth of ideas, and dozens of Chat GPT assisted outlines sitting in my queue.
I have so many ideas and inspirations to share, I am ripping apart at the seams.
And yet… when I sat down today to figure out which direction to take my action, I got the overwhelming urge to do the opposite. To wait, to be still, to sit in the not yet-ness of whatever is forming inside of me.
I thought, perhaps, that my nervous system was just overloaded and in a freeze state with the sheer amount of things to do, so I leveraged my tools and felt my feelings around all that.
And still, I kept getting the message to wait. When I tune into my own deep knowing, I hear the message, “the details are still being written.”
And then, in accepting that whatever big ideas are still taking shape inside of me, I thought that I would share with you my practice for holding this kind of tension. When the world or my own programming and patterns demand action, but to do so prematurely would abort the much needed growth and gestation that is required.
To illustrate this, I want to share a bit about the natural rhythm of energy.
The Rhythm of Energy
I first learned about this rhythm in The Art of Somatic Coaching: Embodying Skillful Action, Wisdom and Compassion by Richard-Strozzi Heckler. My copy of this book is covered with notes and ah-ha moments because having the rhythm of energy broken down in this way was a game-changer in my personal nervous-system work and my professional coaching.
Strozzi believes that our bodies are intimately connected to the flow of energy and that rhythm plays a crucial role in this process. He suggests that by developing an awareness of our body's rhythms and the energy that flows within us, we can enhance our physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being.
According to Strozzi, the rhythm of energy is not only a personal experience but also influences our interactions with others and the world around us. It is through this rhythm that we communicate, connect, and engage with different situations and individuals. By tuning into and aligning ourselves with this rhythm, we can become more attuned to ourselves and the world, leading to a greater sense of presence, authenticity, and effectiveness in our actions.
Strozzi often integrates concepts of rhythm and energy into his teachings on embodied leadership and somatic practices. He was my first teacher in these spaces and it completely changed my life. He taught me how conscious movement, breathwork, and mindfulness can help us access and harness our energy, allowing us to become more grounded, focused, and resilient in our personal and professional lives.
Essentially, this rhythm of energy is this:
Learning about this model helped me track my system in a new way. It gave me the awareness and agency to choose how to leverage the activated energy instead of being hijacked by it.
For example, whenever I engage in public speaking, I feel an increasing amount of energy in my system. I have come to believe that this extra energy allows me to meet the moment head-on. An older version of me would feel overwhelmed and panicked by this, because my system couldn’t contain all that extra energy without freaking out.
After learning about this model, I realized that I am able to expand my system to be able to hold all that extra energy. Like upgrading to a bigger sized container so I can keep all that energy without spinning out or feeling unsafe. This allows me to feel the rush of excitement when I step on stage or in front of a group of people, while feeling safe, secure, and grounded in my body. My system is big enough to hold it.
This can be true with other activations of energy, too. Do any of you have an upper limit for how much joy you can feel? Pleasure? Appreciation? Creativity? Leave a comment and let me know.
Upper limit problems are matters of containment. If you find yourself unable to feel all of your joy, pleasure, appreciation, creativity, or any of the other higher vibration energies, it’s likely that your system is not adapted to feeling these feelings in a safe manner. Your container is too small to hold all that goodness.
Which ultimately means you’re unable to feel the full expression of your aliveness.
Building Capacity = Getting Bigger Than Your Activations
So how does this all connect to my current state of feeling apprehensive to act prematurely?
Well, what I am experiencing right now is an increase in creative, inspired energy. It’s building up in me and asking that something be created or born into the world through me. But the idea or creation is not fully formed yet.
If my system were smaller, if I were unable to contain this high vibration energy within me, I may feel the urge to act. To launch something too soon. To rush to completion so that this energy will balance out in my system and stop overwhelming me. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it could mean that my creation is launched into the world not-fully-baked. Which could mean some down-stream cleaning up that I may need to do.
But that’s not what’s happening. I’ve been working on building my capacity for years now. I have very intentional somatic practices around building my tolerance for joy, creativity, and pleasure. I have upgraded my container many times over, so now I am bigger than this excited energy, and I can let my ideas percolate until they are ready to be completed.
So that is what I am doing. I am holding the tension of “not yet” and containing this excited energy, so that my ideas can take as much time as they need to develop, so they can be released into the world when they are ready. Because that’s the game I am up to in this life, being a steward of whatever Life wants to create through me, and surrendering to its process as much as my system (and ego) will let me.
How to Build Capacity
If you’re reading this, nodding your head, and thinking to yourself: okay I am totally on board with this but how do I actually build my container?
Keep reading to find out.
I’ll share a simple practice with you below, and I also wanted to pop in here to say that as an embodied leadership coach, this kind of work is common ground with my clients. Being able to hold the tension of activated energies within your own nervous system is critical for effective, authentic, creative leadership.
If you find yourself longing to explore this with a coach, feel free to schedule a consultation with me to get started.
The Practice: Savoring
Savoring is the capacity to notice, appreciate, enhance, and prolong the positive experiences in life, with deliberate attention to and awareness of positive emotions. Increased awareness of pleasurable sensations lies at the very heart of savoring; when time is taken to notice and savor pleasant experiences, not only can we recognize positive emotions, but we can also fully appreciate them.
The goal of this practice is to deliberately create savoring rituals around small, everyday moments of pleasure. In this way, you learn to stop, notice, enjoy, and prolong the positive experiences that can be found in everyday activities, thus building your capacity for them, and increasing the size of your container (your nervous system).
The practice is simple: identify every day activities that bring you pleasure, and experience that pleasure when it happens.
Here are a couple of the things that I savor on a daily basis that have contributed to my capacity building:
How soft my cat’s fur is.
The morning sun on my face.
The smell of early spring.
The first sip of coffee.
Hearing my partner’s genuine, full belly laugh.
Sending and receiving voice notes with my friends.
The sound of the wind chimes outside my office.
The smell of my bergamot essential oils in my diffuser.
Watching my house plants grow.
Watching the wind blow the tree tops outside my window.
Even just writing these down brings in feelings of gratitude, joy, and appreciation. And when those feeling arise, I notice them in my body, I breathe, move, and vocalize them to match my inner experience with my outer experience, and I take three breaths of just savoring the sensations, like I would my favorite meal.
And sometimes, for bonus points, after I have had my fill of appreciating the sensations on my own, I share my appreciation with others.
What are you savoring today? Let me know in the comments. Bonus points if you share that appreciation with others.
You Deserve Full Aliveness
Whatever capacities you are trying to build right now, I hope you know that you deserve full aliveness.
You deserve to feel, experience, and express the total range of your human existence.
You deserve to take your time, honor your own rhythm, and dance to the beat of your unique drum.
You deserve it all, and I hope this framework and practice helps you get there.
May this work benefit all beings, everywhere.
Soulful blessings,
Emily
