Energy Flows Where Attention Goes

The third principle of the Kahili shamanic tradition explains just about everything that happens to you, ever.

Energy Flows Where Attention Goes

So in the traditional Kahili shamanic worldview, there is such a thing as energy- you can probably feel it tingling if you like to meditate, or listen to really good music, or are in a place where everyone is happy and relaxed, and even though, you feel like the place is bursting with energy.

It is also what you notice when you see someone and think that person has a lot of energy, and then you might be strongly drawn or strongly repulsed based on that person's ideas, but you're not usually unmoved. Or you can see that someone is doing really well at something, like sports, or art, and you are moved somehow, by witnessing it.

Or you can experience a place with not so much energy that can have an eery feel, like a room where people are feeling a little awkward, or an abandoned building, or someone having a hard time for whom the simplest daily tasks are obviously very difficult, like getting up a short flight of stairs or getting their wallet out of their pocket. Or people who are just being slow, and you can just tell that person just isn't likely to be doing a lot of things today. People say it casually, there isn't a lot of energy in that room, or they're worried about Joe, he's been low energy lately.

So there is such a thing as energy, and it matters a lot to everyone's life. That's great! But now what?

The great, practical secret of this principle is that your energy follows your attention.

That's big. Why? Because your attention is, and is probably the only thing that is, totally under your control.

It's kind of fashionable these days, depending on which circle you hang out in, to throw out the idea that we all create our own reality, and maybe even that we have a choice about everything, and that everything happens to us because of our energy. Okay, fine! But now I just still want things to be different, and I still don't know how to do anything about it.

The idea that your energy follows your attention changes this situation. Your attention is the specific mechanism that you can use- no matter where you are, where you stand, and how things are for you at the time- in order to make changes to your life.

This is pretty broad statement. It should be- it's a principle! But if it's that broad, a few specific examples make it easier to grasp.

The most obvious one is choosing a perspective. Let's say you're standing in a room. There's really nice picture on one end of the wall and on the other there's a picture you don't like at all. So you could look at the picture you don't like and notice all kinds of terrible details, likely feeling worse and worse. You could look over to the picture you do like, and notice more and more cool details about, and feel better and better. Or, you could look at the picture you don't like, and focus on things that you do like about it on purpose. Or you could take it off the wall, or get a sharpie and draw a moustache on it. Or, you could close your eyes or stare at the blank wall and think of something completely different, that you do like.

In the first instance, you are using your attention to guide your attention towards something that you're not particularly in harmony with, which can give you a messy, conflicting feel. In order to solve that, you can just distract yourself and look at something nice. Works great! If you're up for a challenge, you can direct your attention towards something that doesn't feel that great to you, and shift your attention to different aspects of it. This is where interpretation comes in- what is happening right now is really as many different things as meanings you assign to it. All the meanings are there- which one you experiences is a matter of which one you guide your energy to with your attention. Finally, you can just change something about it, which could be practical, or it might not be, depending in this case on how friendly you are with everyone else in the room and what their expectations are. Or, you can withdraw your attention from your environment and turn your energy to something imaginary- which is made of the same stuff as your environment, but it's a lot less structured, eventually drawing it into your environment because your energy is there.

All spiritual techniques use this idea, Huna or not. There are so many ways to fine tune your attention, it boggles the mind. ESP, "manifesting", shamanic journeying, reframing, working with one's past or future, autosuggestion, all of the ultimately are based on the idea of attention, and the effect it has through energy.

To get started in a simple way, put your attention on your body. Then on your immediate environment, then to the town or village you live in or near, then the country, continent, the world, the solar system, the galaxy, galaxy cluster, and finally, everything. If you followed along you should be pretty spaced out now, because you expanded your consciousness so much.

You can experience something very similar by just going for your immediate environment and noticing detail. The colors, the shapes, the meanings, the touch, the vibe. Guide your attention to various parts and areas and aspects.

What you may also notice by doing these things you start getting a feel for how these aspects you placed your attention on vibe. You kind of get them. That's because you are there- your energy is there when you place your attention on them. When you place your attention on a person, you are there- and if you do it a lot, that person will start getting a feel for you too, because your energy is there. And when your energy is there, you can feel it. This is ESP, right there- it's just a special case of putting your energy somewhere and feeling it, and maybe asking questions when you have a rapport. ESP is in fact 100% accurate all the time- you are always in contact with where your energy is. But the catch is you might not be in contact with what you think you're in contact with. If you guide your imagination to, say, "a man in the room next door", there could be many men there, or next door isn't particularly well defined either. Or your energy might have come into contact with something really intense nearby and gotten distracted from what you originally wanted to pick up. That's why ESP can seem so hit or miss- when you remove your focus from your immediate environment, that's a lot of complex reality to zoom through to get where you want to go. Which is why we have your physical life in the first place, to have a little structure, something to experience in a more orderly, detailed way than the bouncing around you can get when you're not so used to putting your attention to strange, nonphysical places.

You might notice also that if something already has a lot of energy, that makes you want to place your attention on it, as well. That's where certain breakthrough events can come from- you can put your energy on something that was nothing more than an idea, and when it gets enough energy from you, it can come into physical reality, and if you keep going, other people might put their energy on it as well because your energy excites them. This is basically how anything comes around to physicality in the first place. But if you know this, you can do it on purpose by being aware where your energy is going at any time.

What's important to know is that, in addition to your conscious focusing, there is also a great deal of energy focus that you do out of habit. In Huna, this is called your subconscious mind doing things. A really great thing to do is to use your energy shifts specifically to affect your own subconscoius mind. All spiritual techniques mentioned above do that. There are many more, and it's great to keep an eye open for learning new ones and exploring them, but even the few mentioned here should be enough to completely turn everything about your life around, simply by becoming more aware of and changing the way you use your attention to direct the most personal aspect of you- your energy.