How do you sense “energy”?
February 18, 2007
It no longer makes any sense to me to ask “do you sense energy”. It seems quite clear to me that everyone senses energy — everyone has “subtle sense perception”. Our daily exchanges with others don’t just occur through the spoken word and gestures, but are also “energetic” exchanges. We are simply not trained to recognize, ackowledge and name this in our (Western) culture.
I recently had a phone call from a woman who sees that people are somehow affected by her hands as she works as a hairdresser. Her perception that something is happening on the level of energy has become undeniable and she felt prompted to explore this experience. At the same time, she was apprehensive about it. There is a reluctance to acknowledge this experience and even more reluctance to share it with others. If we acknowledge it to ourselves, we are opening up to a whole new way of perceiving life, to a whole new understanding of what “reality” is. If we share our perceptions, we run the risk of being considered crazy or flakey. And yet opening up to the existence of that which lies beyond the reach of the five senses gives us not only a greatly enriched experience of life and living, but can provide us with useful information and abilities.
How many people can honestly say they’ve never felt someone staring at them from across the room? How many can say they haven’t felt someone approaching them from behind even though they don’t hear them? We feel these things but we ignore the implications of these perceptions. How would you explain them? What actually is happening?
The tendency to ignore what we actually perceive is what causes us to take so long to embrace the latest understandings of physics, as well as the value of many alternative healing approaches such as energy healing. It’s what causes us to ignore one of the most valuable resources we have — our own intuition.
As I explore the field of energy healing more and more, including developing more of my own subtle sense perception, I realize that what I now experience with such clarity and certainty is something I had always experienced. It had always been there in the background, but I had learned to ignore it. When I’ve taught inroductory energy healing classes, it was never a matter of teaching anyone how to do anything. It was always about holding a space for them to acknowledge and own what they were already experiencing.
So, how do you sense energy? Do you see it, hear it, feel it? Is it simply a “knowingness”? Do you have a sense of what others are feeling or thinking? Energy can be experienced in so many different ways. The skeptical part of you that asks “am I making this up?” is useful in keeping an overactive imagination in check, but it’s usually working overtime. My rule of thumb in my classes is “if you sense something, it’s real”. Then the task is to understand what it is and how it can be useful.
Comments
16 Responses to “How do you sense “energy”?”
Share your ideas or ask questions!
(Your email will not be used by us or shared with a third party.)
Everything is energy. As our own creators and creations of life we have the choice how we not only perceive our own energy but how we are created by it. The more we can let go of the old reality that we are separate from the whole the more we find peace inside of our mind and this is then manifested in the flesh as our new reality. Eventually we become pure love unaware of any of the ‘darker’ energies of life and bring only love to others we choose to be with. Thank you
Thanks for commenting, Julie-Ann!
hi there ….
as you say i would say too – sensing energy is common sense. you can kinda “smell” if the air in a room is thick. e.g. yesterday i entered my boss’ office and i could sense it’s stinky in there …
on the other hand when I go down to the bar to have a cappuccino I can “sense” if the people there are in a talkative mood or want to be left alone.
it’s SO much common sense, it’s so natural that it’s hard to “see” it.
On the other hand, e.g. when I look at a Feldenkreis lesson, I can see what will happen next. I guess this is a different kind of sensing, but nevertheless visual. It’s not TV out here, so I cannot compare it to computer or camera effects. But it’s kind of an overlay of the next picture on the one that is on right now.
Hi psychicdrawings!
Thanks for sharing your experience. I really like your point that it’s hard to see because it’s so natural and so common sense. It’s kind of under the radar most of the time but definitely going on.
The way you describe seeing what will happen next reminded me of how I see things (when I do see things, since I mostly “feel” energy or have a kind of “knowingness” about it). I love your phrase “It’s not TV out there”. I have seen some things superimposed on the physical world things I am seeing, but mostly when I see things it’s a kind of “inside” experience. I’ll see something in my “inner eye”, and sometimes that has appeared as an overlay. (But it hasn’t happened in terms of what will happen next as it does in your case.)
My sense is that since we’re sensing subtle energies that aren’t seen/felt/heard with our five senses, our minds may create visuals to represent what we are sensing. We really have so much to learn about “subtle sense perception”, but I do feel it helps me to recognize mine when others share their experiences.
Love your Post and a worthy question to ask.
And may I add this to the discussion:
I was about to write that I sense Energy from other people as emotions. But I deleted all that — needed to write about this instead:
And may I add this to the discussion:
- Everything in the world is composed of energy.
- Our Bodies are made up of 70% + Water
- Everything sends out a different energy wave (pattern)
And Guess what? Water is a very good receiver for energy waves.
Take some or leave some it is up to you what you do with it.
have a wonderful day
Marcel
Thanks for commenting, Marcel. I hadn’t really thought about the fact that our bodies are mostly water and how that relates to energy healing. Lots to think about!
2 Acadian:
héhé finding commonalities is always a good thing – not only to explain the science of energy transmission but also in human communication (and gaming up girls) 
btw, I just had a deep look at how we (humans) learn and I noticed: a key element in learning is to find differences
2 heartofhealing: “I see things it’s a kind of “inside” experience” that’s intriguing! when I first heard about auras’n’stuff I was trying to see them outside too. Well didn’t work out toooooooooo good and I forgot about that. But then I was staying for a couple of months in Sedona / Arizona and woops there they were
but kinda too late … I was already happy with the “inside” experience.
Then there are a lot of different qualities to “inside” experiences as well. They come in a couple of different formats. Anyways that’s a too big story for a comment I guess. I just wanted to say that I totally agree with you
plus I have to make a side note: all this energy sensing is not different to normal sensing, it’s just like it. example: when driving a vehicle most times you see the traffic signs, but sometimes you don’t (and sometimes that gets you a ticket)
Beautiful — what a great exercise! It seems so important for all of us as we explore ourselves (and the world) as energy to be able to acknowledge our perceptions even when we can’t explain them. That exercise alone with your students can open a whole world of knowing for them.
I feel the field of energy medicine is really in its infancy. On the one hand, sensing energy is a natural human ability, as is using it to facilitate healing, and yet we understand so little about it. I think part of the difficulty is that we take recourse to three dimensional, “material” models to explain what we sense. It’s like trying to understand electrons as little balls orbiting a nucleus. It doesn’t really work.
One of my favorite resources is Alice Bailey’s Esoteric Healing. In it, she states that medicine will not really be complete until it incorporates the understanding of the energetic levels of our being. I agree. Hopefully your students will start to ask questions and help bring that about.
There’s something else interesting about energy. I often try this out with medical students when I’m teaching. I ask them first to rate on a scale from 1 – 10 with 1 being the worst they can imagine and 10 being the best they can imagine, what their energy level is right now. Then I ask them to repeat the exercise rating their “mental energy”, and finally, a third time, their “emotional energy”. And you know what? They all manage to come up with ratings. Every time! So I ask them, how did you do that? How did you assess your energy levels – your global, mental and emotional energy levels? Of course, none of them know. Well, that’s because nobody knows. What are we detecting? What are we measuring?
And as psychicdrawings points out we can even detect the energy levels of other people when we walk into a room or sit in a cafe.
Sorry, I’m not providing any answers here but I do think its an amazing natural ability we all have and its a great way to get medical students to start thinking more holistically and less materially.
I agree about the “material” models. Think you’re spot on about that. I think the emerging model of “Complex Adaptive Systems” is looking much more useful. I think there’s some connection between our idea of “energy”, the idea of “flow” and the old idea of a “vital force”. If you’re interested to explore a bit more about the complexity model come over a have a peek at my blog heroesnotzombies.wordpress.com where I’ve written about this.
Thanks for the Alice Bailey mention. I feel a little Amazon shopping coming on
Bob
Hi Mary,
Thanks for your lovely site. Looking forward to seeing more posts in the future. I have a question: you mention that you are “developing more of my own subtle sense perception”. How are you going about doing this? Is it just something that you do during everyday life, or do you do a specific exercise? I am trying to attune myself to seeing auras (see my blog – look under aura category) and I am doing a specific exercise for that. I have also tried meditation; calling a mantra, but I find that this somehow deadens my access to my subtle senses, as I feel as if through meditation I am blocking out my feelings. How do you feel about this?
thanks.
Hi Beatrix,
This is a great question and has made me think about how I have been developing my ability to sense energy. I don’t do formal exercises to do that — I never really have. I think it’s been more a matter of becoming aware of the energetic impressions that I am receiving all of the time. It’s been of journey of acknowledging what I perceive, recognizing it and stopping ignoring it. It’s natural to perceive energy. We all do it, but we don’t recognize it.
There are so ways of sensing energy and of subtle sense perception. People become especially fascinated with “seeing auras”, but there are many other ways of sensing energy. I did check out your blog post on perceiving auras. You mention wanting to know if your partner is angry and not showing it. There are lots of ways to access that information without seeing it in the aura. I feel it’s important for people to know that they don’t have to be able to “read the aura” to get the intuitive information they want. You may already be sensing when your partner is anger, but doubting what you are feeling or not recognizing it.
As for meditation, there are so many different ways to meditate. Some forms of meditation would help you to develop intuitive abilities. The type of meditation I favor does not block out feelings. (You can read more about my take on meditation on my Meditation Oasis blog (www.meditationoasis.wordpress.com.)
I’ve been getting so many questions lately on how I sense energy and my journey with it, that I’ll soon write some more posts on this subject!
Hi There
The “How” for me is :
I presuppose energy is vibration. I them presuppose that I can sense that energy and interpret it through my inner and outer ears, eyes, feelings, smells, touch, taste. If I am trying to sense something I can’t see, I use my hands but with imaginary eyes in them to pick up images/feelings…mmm and I wonder how it would be with ears in my hands? If I am “feeling” into another, I extend imagination energy as a hand image, “feel” into the energy which I then get images/feelings for.
X
What an interesting description, K! Thanks for taking the time to share your experience. I feel we all learn and become clearer in our sensing of energy as we listen to each other.
Hey Mary,
I really like energy and talking about it. In Japan ( my country) we call it “ki” and there are some legends about it as well. I really like your post but can you make this energy visible by , perhaps, by practicing on it? I have practised and I have felt my hands pushing away from each other and sometimes trembling too. Can you please tell me whether its possible to make it visible?
Hi Rasuke,
There are lots of different ways of sensing energy. You are feeling it with your hands. Some people sense it most easily this way, others by seeing. I do think it’s possible to develop all the ways of sensing energy if you practice. As you sense the energy with your hands, let your gaze “soften”. Don’t focus sharply, just let your vision be very relaxed and perhaps you will start to notice some subtle impressions. With practice you can sense it through vision, but it may take time.