We usually compartmentalize the different areas of our lives. Front and center may be our business, or our romantic relationship. Over there on the right is our family, or maybe our social life. Tucked away in a little corner might be our hobbies, often ignored. We work on our business by doing business-related things, like advertising or marketing. We work on our health by doing healthy things, such as exercising and eating well. Every once in a while we hopefully remember that fun needs to be part of the picture, too, and we tend to our hobbies or social life.
What we often forget is that we are whole Beings. Our business cannot be separated from our relationships, or from our health. Our career and our hobbies are part of the same big picture. On the surface, they may not seem related. Energetically, however, all of these aspects of our lives reflect and mirror each other. Once we recognize that absolutely everything is interconnected, we can use our wholeness to truly manifest the life we want.
Here’s an example: On Saturday, I was inspired to complete a long-overdue home improvement project and installed new shelving in the laundry room. I love working on my house (I own all the power tools in this family!), but haven’t really found the time lately, between my business and my toddler. But off I went to Home Depot, and by that afternoon I had new shelves and a completely reorganized pantry as a result of all that additional storage space. I felt great – energized and nurtured, full of possibility.
A number of wonderful things happened over the course of the weekend:
A babysitter literally showed up on our doorstep (our neighbor’s daughter), and she just happened to be available the next afternoon.
My husband and I went out on a spontaneous, fantastic date. We had great seats at the movies in spite of a very crowded theater, and we had a wonderful table at the restaurant we just happened to wander into.
I had a very financially rewarding day on Sunday – and I wasn’t even actually working.
Some wonderful family friends invited us to dinner at their house tonight.
Superficially, these events could just be a collection of random coincidences, adding up to a very nice weekend. Energetically, however, there is a common thread.
Putting up new shelves and organizing my home was all about self-nurture. The energy of nurture continued into my relationship, and on into my financial life. Finally, the energy of nurture even manifested itself into my social life. Literal nurture through food and money went hand in hand with less tangible nurture, such as feeling organized and comfortable in my home, and closeness with my husband. Coincidence? I don’t think so.
The events in our lives take on new meaning when we start following the energetic chain of events, rather than looking only at logical cause and effect. This is best practiced when we are not in crisis. Pick a project to do this week that calls out to you – dinner with friends, a date with your workbench, or a yoga class. What is the energy of this project? Narrow it down to a word or two. Then go about your life, and notice how this energy comes back to you.
When an issue does present itself in our lives, we have the opportunity to address this as an imbalance within our wholeness. A financial slump may be about a lack of trust in Divine Abundance. This issue may show up in other places – we may feel untrusting of our partner. Or maybe we feel let down by a family member. Perhaps all of the above is true. The answer to this imbalance may well be reclaiming our sense of trust – in others, in the Divine, and in ourselves. How do we do that? Maybe we take a risk, such as singing in public at a karaoke bar. Heck, maybe we even go skydiving.
From a logical perspective, financial difficulties are resolved by working more, or working harder. From an energetic perspective, jumping out of an airplane may actually create better results! Taking action that creates the energy of trust attracts more trust. We feel more confident in ourselves. Our spouse may suddenly come through for us. A business deal may unexpectedly work to our advantage. Along each step of the way, we are called upon to engage with the energy of trust. Each time we choose to trust, we attract more trust. Eventually, our financial slump will be resolved.
Energetically, we cannot treat ourselves as anything but whole Beings. When we begin living our wholeness, we can create truly remarkable results in our lives.
What have you tried to compartmentalize lately? How would you live your wholeness? Leave a comment and share!
Blessings,
Andrea
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Tagged with: energy • intuition • Manifest Your Desired Outcomes
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As much as this is something I know and put into practice most of the time, I needed this exact reminder today – thanks, Andrea!
When our lives are too compartmentalised, we can end up blinding ourselves to the fact that sometimes changing the energy in one area of our lives is best accomplished by changing it in another area where it is perhaps easier to make the adjustments that we need.
A personal example relates to our house-hunting. A couple of weeks ago, everything ground to a halt – no houses that we liked, and our energy and enthusiasm started waning big time, with a corresponding knock-on effect to other areas. The easiest and quickest area to re-energise was my cooking – in my next shopping trip, I deliberately bought things I hadn’t ever bought before and I got creative in the kitchen! Since then, I’ve gotten creative in other areas too. And we had our best day of house-hunting last weekend… if all goes well, we will put in an offer on a house this week
This is a great article, Andrea!
Akemi Gaines suggested I visit your post. Enjoyable, insightful and well-written! I also enjoyed “The Energy of Money” (note: I tried to leave a comment there, but couldn’t locate the comments section for the post.)
Sometimes my To-Do list feels unwieldy. When my energy feels stuck or blocked (usually via procrastination), I do find that doing something – anything – gets the energy flowing again. Everything feels better when the energy moves!
Andrea, I always learn so much from you! Thank you for this very timely post, and for your wonderful blog…. Now to start making use of my creativity and taking risks!
You touched on something here that I recently noticed. This weekend especially I found that once I made the choice to do some things I have really wanted to do but put off for various reasons… things felt better, progressed better. The days seemed somehow brighter and were really quite satisfying. I used to tuck the various aspects of my life into their little compartments. Recently though I began looking at things as a Whole. That change of perspective really makes a difference. I wish I could have learned this lesson sooner, in addition to many other lessons I only just learned (the hard way). I have them now though, and things are improving.
This article is even more interesting when I read it along with your last post on things being “on hold”. I’ve noticed there is momentum of energy. Sometimes, nothing seem to work out despite my best efforts (and this can last quite a long time), and on other times, good things happen like an avalanche.
Thank you for your great insights. I’ve invited a few fellow bloggers in the personal finance area because I thought this is interesting for them.
Andrea, this is a lovely article. We often try to make superficial changes at the logical level, and wonder why things don’t work as well as they should. There’s a much bigger energetic “mathematical formula” that goes beyond our logical comprehension, that works with all aspects of our lives to bring us the balance and harmony we need. The main take-away point I got from this article is “be good to yourself, and the rest will fall into place”. I like that, thanks!
Your post reminds me that one definition of integrity is wholeness. It’s all connected and it all counts. This also made me think of the famous Gandhi quote. “Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.”
Andrea – I love how you tie the concept of wholeness into such a concrete and practical example from your personal life. I feel energized just reading your story! From doing something you wanted (following your energy), the whole day unfolded in perfect alignment that you could not have “arranged” logically. Thanks for sharing in such personal detail to make it all real.
Andrea,
When I’m feeling ‘stuck’ in one area of my life, eventually that ‘stuckness’ creeps into other areas if I don’t address it. But sometimes, addressing the stuck area head-on makes me feel more stuck. So, I go looking for other areas in which to address my ‘stuckness’…and it usually works. This points out to me exactly what you’re saying here, that everything is energetically connected, and at least from my own experience, explains why what Tom says (movement, any movement, is helpful) works, too. Cause and effect are directly related, I believe. Trouble is, they’re not always related in the ways we expect or look for. Just because I don’t see the connection, doesn’t mean the relationship doesn’t exist. So, you’re right – sometimes sky-diving might just be the answer, as odd as that seems on the surface.
Suzanne
Andrea,
I remember a real turning point some eight years ago when I was in not such a wonderful “place” on my path when everything felt compartmentalized as you describe and none of those compartments was working out very well.
I realized that although they felt disconnected from one another, they really were not — the common denominator was ME.
From that point on, an overarching goal has been to integrate as much as possible — for there to be greater and greater overlap between what is my job, what are my hobbies, what my relationships mean. To find — no CREATE — a ME that powers all of them.
My creative hobbies nurture my spirit and energize my awareness, which affects my productivity and my work with clients; my relationships present me with writing material, or the other way around, an opportunity to practice what I preach… The examples go on and on, the more overlap, the more the lines of the compartments seem to blur, the more everything facet seems to be shine and illuminate the others.
Wonderful examples of how this plays out for you in a very literal way — you do this so well!
Slade
Wow, I am really, really behind on replying to my comments! My apologies, everyone!
Mags – Your comment made me laugh – sometimes, the kitchen is my favorite place to crank up the creativity, too. I think buying a weird new vegetable is a great way to break out of a rut!
Millionaire Mommy – Thank you for stopping by! I agree completely – any forward movement is sometimes preferable to that sense of being stuck in the muck!
Barbara and Marilu – Thank you!
Matt – Never knock those hard lessons – they must have been a necessary part of the journey for you! I sometimes get into that “why didn’t I know then what I know now” mode, too. Then I recognize that there’s no way I was ready for “what I know now.” Love the example of how you turned on “flow” and everything flowed for smoothly! Perfect illustration of what I was talking about – thank you!
Akemi – Thank you for inviting more friends to come and play over here! I appreciate it!!!
Irene – Thank you! Can I tell you how much I love your domain name? “Light beckons” is just beautiful! I love the idea of an energetic “formula” for how it all comes together. I agree being good to ourselves – in whichever form is most appropriate at that moment – is a key part of that formula.
Tom – What a beautiful quote! Thank you for adding that, it’s so true and fits perfectly. We do have to come into alignment within ourselves, and it’s not always obvious how to do that.
Deb – Thank you! I did feel like my weekend was full of little miracles – nothing loud or obvious. “Following the energy” is the perfect way of putting it.
Suzanne – Don’t you love that we could solve a business problem by, I don’t know, getting our hair cut differently? I love the total lack of linear superficial connection, while there is a clear cause and effect energetically. And I have to admit, sometimes I enjoy baffling others with my “weird” way of problem-solving.
Slade – What a beautiful comment. Reading what you wrote brought the idea of really embracing all those overlaps, the way the different threads in our lives are all interwoven into one fabric. (Wait … didn’t the whole spinning/thread topic come up in one of your posts?) And if that fabric is bunched up in a knot at one end, sometimes we can pull a thread at the other and come back to a state of flow overall …. hmmm. Thank you!
Blessings,
Andrea