In these green mountains, renewal is in the air. Every thaw reminds us of the promise of Spring’s return. We need such promises, not only in our out-of-doors, seasonally aware lives, but every day. Indeed, as we age, the promise of renewal takes on a spiritual heft that is absent in our youth. Renewal is the internal spring that visits us no matter the number of years we’ve lived on Earth.
Over the next few weeks I’ll be writing about specific ways to open to the renewing energies that make life exciting and fresh. In this post, to introduce this theme, I’m concentrating on the possibility of renewal and the way tapping can support the optimism that floods us when we live our lives as growing, evolving creatures no matter how old and disillusioned (or young and disillusioned) we may sometimes feel. Tapping on our desires to grow into our fullest, most evolved selves is a great place to begin the daily habit of renewal.
If renewal feels like an absurd idea – because of family challenges, job loss, climate change, and/or personal defeats – tapping on the karate chop point while using a script such as the following helps to transform this possibility into an achievable goal. “Even though I feel played out, empty, and exhausted, some small part of me that I trust has opened me to the possibility of renewal. Even though my current exhaustion and despair is attached to very real and challenging circumstances (and here you can name these), I trust that like the most beautiful of trees, I too am being grown by life and that this current sense of emptiness is but a pause between growth rings. Even though I feel too tired to renew anything, I open to the positive energies all around me that support my ability to grow into a more optimistic, resourceful, and resilient version of my current self.”
The reminder phrases we use to follow this psychological-reversal setup script can be as simple as “I don’t believe in renewal,” and “I feel more like a dessicated broken-off branch than I imagine a living tree feels,” and “I’m finished; no more growth and joy for me.” Phrases that capture the heaviness of winter feelings spoken or thought while gently tapping with the fingers of the right hand on the 9-gamut point of the left hand as it is resting on the heart or fourth chakra acknowledges and therefore honours these very real feelings of fatigue and defeat. Tapping gently between the eyebrows soothes the nervous system. Starting with bladder meridian and following the simple tapping sequence that ends with the fingers gently tapping on the top of the head as we repeat our most despairing reminder phrases completes the process. Tapping on the top of the head point, home to our seventh, spiritually-oriented chakra and junction point for many of the subtle energies that nourish the body, helps to affirm, at least physically, our openness to change. And so renewal, in the form of harmonizing and liberating stuck energies, begins.
Renewal comes in many forms. After we move through our tapping sequence two or three times while naming our honest feelings, we may find ourselves weeping, yawning, or taking a deep cleansing breath. Often we find that we’re called to go out into the world, to walk, to witness the beauty of whatever life patterns are playing out around us. Sometimes we’re moved to sequester ourselves, to sit before a fire in the hearth or candle flame to enter that marvelous state of trust we call wool gathering. Sometimes we’re called to pour our hearts into a journal, or to ask a confidante to help us orient ourselves in a more positive way as we move through our current life challenges. Whatever life affirming activities we are inspired to embrace after tapping on our sense of emptiness indicate the energy shifts that assure us we are indeed in the grips of renewing forces. Tapping a positive round, such as “thank you for this wondrous energy flow,” and “I am grateful for this growing time,” and “life is strong in me,” seals the bargain we have made with the renewing powers that govern our lives.
Saying yes to daily renewal is often the beginning of deepening joy. Tapping is, after all, also called Emotional Freedom Techniques. Tapping on our feelings of defeat, despair, and dread frees us to live under the influence of life supporting energies that quicken our sense of connection to life’s flow. These energies become apparent when we answer the evolutionary call to continue to grow into our wisest and most loving selves. Happily, this call to renewal persists, no matter our chronological age.
Until next week
Jane