This blog post is in response to Chapter 2 (“Facing the Future”) in Shakti Gawain’s book, The Path of Transformation.

There is a storm brewing out west that is headed our way. The latest maps show that Baltimore is dead center in its path, and we are on target for “plowable” accumulations of snow.

Within this storm is a great deal of energy. The path of the storm, and the amount of snow (or rain) it dumps on the Mid-Atlantic states, depends on how well it organizes itself, and how the various energy forces combine all at the right time. With the just-right combination of elements, the storm we could see in about 48 hours might be, in Bobby Weir’s words, Just Exactly Perfect.

Energy. Much of this chapter deals with the negative forces of it that exist in our contemporary society and that bring a lot of stress and violence in to our world.

Although this is a frightening time, it is simultaneously the most powerful time that has ever existed in this planet. (7)

This energy that is swirling around us — not so much from the approaching storm but in life itself — is being used haphazardly and negatively because we do not know what to do with it. We have so many options and avenues available to us — too many, it seems, and we just don’t know how to narrow our focus. We don’t know how to discriminate and select what is best for us, what is best for others, what is best for this world.

Instead, we spread our energy too far, too thin, and we are left feeling exhausted with very little to show for it.

I like to think of myself as that approaching storm. When I was much younger, my first teaching colleagues called me a “whirlwind of energy.” I spent my energy, all those years ago, haphazardly, and I think that I had dispersed my energy too far and too wide, causing little more than a dusty storm of desires and hopeful expectations.

I burned out in less than six years doing that. I had to learn the hard way.

Now, I am invested in energy that extends far beyond me. I will gather strength and energy where I can to live fully and genuinely, and I will use that energy in a positive way to give back and love unconditionally. But to do so without losing any of me or who I am or what I stand for.

Here is to today’s energy. Embrace it fully, and recycle wisely.