A recent lesson in attention and energy flow seems worth describing – perhaps a contribution to the discourse on attraction, attention, how energy works.
If you’d like the backstory on this post, please see the Chakra Khan post, Messages, Passages, Assimilation. It describes the recent experience I had cleaning out my parent’s house in anticipation of it belonging to a new family.
My final morning at the house was spent writing emails while waiting for the shredder service to arrive. I had a nice sense of completion, satisfaction with my efforts. I sat in a rocking chair, staring out the window to the meadow below, spontaneously recalling memories of times shared with my son and his precious grandfather, the two of them happy to do anything together – including taking the trash to the transfer station.
I felt full – completion, closure, memories, moments. I could also remember some difficult times, moments where I felt unappreciated, invalidated, chastised or shamed. These moments would flicker into my mind and pass through again replaced by some other treasured moment that arose in consciousness. And the tears of gratitude and the magnitude of my forever leave-taking of this place loomed large.
A dear family friend stopped by to see me off, and to ensure that I was all right. He knows me pretty well, and he was aware that I would be feeling the closure deep in my heart.
I stood outside on the lawn, gazing at the pond, the mountain, the bridge over the little brook. We talked about times with my father, his large role in the community, his love of all things associated with his retirement years.
The entire time I was out there, the No See-ums – tiny, little flying insects that land, sting, fly off to return, land and sting again – hovered around our heads and arms. Any exposed flesh was repeatedly subjected to the tiny sting. The treasured memories kept us outside, talking, crying and sharing our love for my father and his life. The No See-ums were noticed, but not worth disturbing the focus and the flow of our conversation.
Driving away, I realized that I had a choice on where I put my attention during that leave-taking. I could have focused on the many sources of frustration, the multitudinous stings that I endured over the years by simply belonging to this family system. Instead, I was filled to the brim, overflowing even, with the treasures, the fun, touching, beautiful, ordinary, family-centric experiences that arise from having a child, a beloved grandchild to my father and mother.
And so in my heart, forever, I can see the value in awareness – the No See-ums are there. They’re the blind strikes, the mean-spirited remarks, the judgments and the anger. But I truly understand that the No See-ums are mere annoyances in the landscape of a beautiful set of experiences. They are the transient moments that can be understood as the poison in the family system – because they are.
Yet where my energy felt fullest, enlivened, most deeply awed and reverent was in holding the treasures.
Energy flows where attention goes. The focus on the treasures yields memories priceless and profound.
The focus on the No See-ums yields irritation, loss and ill will.
In letting go of the physical manifestation, the spawning place of the beautiful memories I carry, I picked up a reverence for the treasures and an increased willingness to notice, but not focus on the No See-ums. They’re not the point, the purpose or the true story. They’re the irritating annoyances that we all face in our lives. This shift in my energy as I swatted the No See-ums was dynamic and clear.
While I do not need to discount, deny or invalidate those aspects of my experience that were damaging and scarring, I have chosen and will continue to choose that which brings me joy. Fullness. Gratitude. Peace. Love.
And that amplifies the treasures and helps the No See-ums recede into the mists from whence they came.
