Energy: physical and emotional

The energy that emotions carry is not the same kind of energy we get from filling our gas tanks or having a good meal and a good night's sleep. When I am low on gas I know that my car is about to run out of energy and I need to stop and get gas. When I have had a long hard day I am tired and hungry and I need to eat and sleep. Physical energy is finite. When we run low, we have to fill up.

Emotional energy is infinite. We don't run out of love if we love too much. We cannot hate someone so much that we quit hating them. I may become accustomed to being afraid of someone, but I don't stop being afraid.

Emotional energy is an eternal resource. It is prana in Sanskrit and chi or qi in Chinese. It is the force of the universe present in all things and flowing through everything, most especially through us.

One way I sometimes think about this energy is that it is like the vision that Neo had at the end of the Matrix when he became able to see the foundation of the material world as a flow of 1's and 0's coming down through the walls with an eerie green glow. All matter is energy.

When we are in a harmonious relationship to everything which arises around us we can be open and relaxed and can allow the energy to flow fully and freely. We have an experience of shalom. But when something happens which invokes esuba we feel fear or anger or sadness and we constrict around the flow of energy. This constriction impedes the flow of energy. Just as when there is resistance in a wire which is conducting electricity, we start to get hot. The constriction causes a change in the quality of the energy which can both draw our attention to the problem and can be a source of energy for addressing it.