Getting Your Energy in Sync With the Season

Source: Chris Holdsworth/Pixabay

In the Berkshires, we went from 20 below zero to 50 degrees above zero in a week. One day I’m looking out at snowcapped peaks, and a few days later at robins dotted across the fields out back. We’re still good for those late-coming acres of snow, but spring is announcing its arrival. Outside the scent of spring bonfires fills the air, especially on the weekends now as neighbors, eager to get back to warmer days, are outside hustling with cleanup: stacking piles of fallen branches, chainsawing trees that didn’t make it through winter, and raking leftover autumn leaves. The air is filled with the bittersweet scent of damp earth and grasses. Plumes of smoke drift across the sunny—yet chilly—sky. Deer, foxes, and bobcats are making their way back into our fields, in their own hunt for food and sleeping quarters. Woodpeckers are starting to drum away looking for mates and the frozen world around us is waking into the rising energy of spring.

You may wish to check out my previous post, "3 Ways to Balance Your Seasonal Energies," in which I introduced the notion of seasonal energies last autumn. To recap, in Eastern traditions, these energies are depicted as five seasons or five universal movements. Easy to see in the seasons, these energies are referred to as rising from spring to summer (where they will peak) and then declining into autumn, downward to winter. The cycle is continuous. The same energy cycles are apparent within moment-by-moment living, day-by-day, event-to-event, feeling-to-feeling, lesson-to-lesson, and so on. They can apply psychologically, biologically, and for some who explore further… as part of a spiritual journey as well (I mean this in a nondenominational sense).

Illustrated in a circle that looks like a clock, summer is at the 12 o’clock position, winter at 6, spring at 9, and autumn at 3. At the center of the circle is the fifth season, or late summer. It is centered for several reasons. It is the season associated with the self, your innermost you, the headquarters for all activity. This means that without its input, all actions become happenstance at best. Whenever in doubt or simply moving from one goal to another, holistic traditions maintain one should stay close to the center... the self.

As we head into March, daylight is lasting longer each week. It’s easy to start feeling anxious, depressed, or out of sync about activities as nature’s energies rise and head toward their peak. But you can try to catch spring imbalances in advance.

These areas can indicate an imbalance:

1. Feelings of over-energy with which to meet tasks.
2. Feelings of scattered focus.
3. Feelings of being overwhelmed.
4. Feelings of indecision and depression.
5. Feelings of stress, anxiety, or anger.

The energy of spring can be a great time to brighten your focus, identify problems and potential solutions, and “seed” a plethora of potential fixes. However, if you are experiencing any of the above imbalances, especially as we enter nature’s rising energy cycle, you may want to try one of these practices:

1. Find a quiet space. I recommend this practice for evening hours, as your energy wanes. Let your mind “cool off” and relax. Widen your perspective so you can clearly see what goals you have been seeding. Be aware of these and pay attention to where they are headed. Balance what you see with introspection on how these directions can best be nurtured and how they will affect you. Visualize images of change in your life each seedling (or goal) may bring. But don’t get hung up on any one of them. One reason you lose energy in spring is that you may be too outcome-oriented. Just observe. Remember this is the time to use your energy to find and start planting new ideas to see which take root in the most positive way. When imbalanced, spring's high-torque energy can be destructive. So look for the best “ground” to plant your ideas and goals. Don’t push things to accelerate unnaturally or in adverse locations or with too much expectation. Just observe. See where things begin to advance on their own, with an eye on where they may lead. Be plentiful and diverse. Widen your focus, see as much as you can ... and reflect.
2. Explore spring’s climactic changes sensually—indoors and out. Try to discover, work in, and recreate in environments that support your energy needs and goals. Take note of what environmental details affect you positively and negatively. Certain environments will affect you differently depending on circumstances, such as days of the week, time, how much sleep you’ve gotten, nutrition, overall mood, and other environmental factors as well as the day’s events. Being aware of these details as well as your energy needs will help you better match physical and emotional goals with environmental elements that will promote them.
3. Don’t get too busy. Instead, especially if you are feeling overwhelmed, try to actively do nothing for a day. I suggest this holistic concept for balancing all seasonal energies. It is achieved by literally taking a day off to do nothing. You are not avoiding this or that and doing something else instead, but “actively and purposefully” doing nothing. Your only goal is to do nothing. Sometimes solutions bubble up out of nowhere while you are restoring yourself, doing nothing at all.

Let spring’s brighter days and bigger sky literally open your eyes. Let the seething energy you experience with all your senses incite you with bursting brightness, clarity, and richness. Enter this forward momentum, and flow.