Hello everyone!
Collectively, we are a widely spread out group. Kellen is usually on the east coast, I’m usually in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, and everyone else is somewhere in between. (At least until we get some international peeps).
Everyone has different lives, responsibilities, and goals that all require differing amounts of time, effort, and energy.
Amidst all that, if you are up to date with these weekly readings, you will have read roughly one hour’s worth of material. One hour can be hard to find, but ten minutes over the course of six weeks? Sneakily, more manageable.
Beyond that measure though,
Thank you to everyone for your time and your thoughts. The current evolution of this project is only possible because of your participation and it is immensely appreciated.
And with that . . .
Here is the formerly [SECRET] Finale of the first Season of Wednesday Balms -
You.
Today’s Lineup:
Introduction
Side A - Grounding
Side B - Gravity
Side C - Alignment
Side D - You
Experiment
Notification
Introduction
Kellen: The intention of this week is to summarize and clarify the previous weeks’ Balms into a concept that grounds us.
Myka: Effectively, this article is a distillation and examination of everything we covered thus far. The motion will be going from an extremely wide angle lens and then pulling it in to a single point. And from that point, hopefully allowing you to build back outwards.
Where Wisdom falls short, Peace provides solace. Where Peace is too still, Love energizes action. Where Love needs direction, Freedom allows space. Where Freedom inhibits navigation, Wisdom gives guidance. And then the cycle continues all over again.
As the efficiency of time spent in one domain begins to diminish, movement into the next provides a refreshing opportunity for both challenge and growth. Seemingly, this is everything right?
But with Wednesday Balms . . . the hope and the goal is to balm your mind.
What isn’t Wisdom - is Peace.
What isn’t Wisdom and Peace - is Love.
What isn’t Wisdom, Peace, and Love - is Freedom.
If you take ALL of that away - Wisdom, Peace, Love, and Freedom, what could possibly be left?
In my mind, the answer is Gravity, something that seemingly connects all these disparate things. It is the center upon which your sense of Wisdom, Peace, Love, and Freedom all adhere on. It is the core.
And beneath that, at the very center of it all is - you.
The object and subject of self development.
Side A - What is Grounding?
Myka: Wisdom, Peace, Love, Freedom, Earned, Unearned, Value, Objective, Subjective.
Because these concepts are abstract things that don’t have a definitive appearance, the utilization of personal story telling, figurative metaphors, and visual graphics is essential.
These tools provide grounding for those concepts. They help pull those ideas down from the realm of abstraction and tether them to something more solid and relatable.
This is a strong reason why the previous balms all had some element of personal story telling to provide a reference. A metaphor can be hard to imagine, but thinking about that one time Kellen or Myka did a thing? That’s easier.
Grounding is the foundation that provides stability and support.
Side B - What is Gravity?
Myka: Proper organization and clarity of thought reinforces that foundation and creates a sturdier structure. However, the very concept of “grounding” is only possible because there’s a force beneath it. Gravity.
One interpretation I had for this project was that everyone has a singular possession of each of these concepts. Meaning, we all have one Wisdom, one Peace, one Love, and one Freedom. Kind of like four separate balls of clay.
Wisdom is the easiest to visualize this with. Imagine, I have my Wisdom-Clay-Ball and as I learn things I add more and more clay. As I carve away at the Unearned, the quality and value of my Wisdom-Clay-Ball increases. The stuff that works is the stuff that sticks.
The idea of Gravity is that it is force that allows certain things to revolve and orbit around other things. It is mutually attractive force that allows mass to connect to mass. It is also the unseen thing in the center that exists when I put together each piece of Wisdom, Peace, Love, and Freedom.
Where “grounding” helps pull these concepts down, Gravity is what holds them together.
Kellen: Gravity is something that we cannot see, but feel.
It unites us - it’s an equalizer that we all have to answer to. At the same time, we often take it for granted because it is constantly present.
We use these concepts as a road map, a reference point to evaluate who we are and how we live. It is a form of gravity - we all have this sense in us, that we are constantly swimming in it (fish don’t see water). When we become more aware that this is something that is always there, our own inner sense and gravity, equipped with the evaluating of the unearned, we can live more conscious and aligned lives.
When I think of what has resonated for me during the writing process, I reflect on how these Balms have brought me into contact with unconscious parts of my life.
They have done this by encouraging a sense of alignment.
This alignment manifests from the awareness that some of the things I have done and am doing exist in a realm of unconsciousness where I am making unwanted sacrifices (the unearned).
Side C - Alignment
Myka: If Gravity represents the objective force that pulls certain things together, alignment is the subjective orientation of those things.
Kellen: This is the organization process. It is cleaning out the apartment, letting go of what only clutters our space, and holding onto what we believe to be most relevant.
Gravity acts a reference point to whether or not we are in alignment.
When we stack our spine into alignment and are in proper position we feel this sense of weightlessness, that our muscles have to do less work and our joints and bones begin to rest on top of each other. There is a tension between effort and effortlessness, a balance.
I also think about therapy, and the speaking out and metabolizing of emotion and thought that eventually fosters a sense of alignment and weightlessness through the chimney sweeping process.
Freud believed that the ideal state from therapy was to feel simply okay.
To exist in a state of ambivalence and neutrality. By sharing the swings of our emotions and thoughts and stretching to the ends of the spectrum on either side we will eventually find more or less a center.
Side D - You
Myka: As you are reading this, your understanding, your acceptance, your reactivity, and your experience of the material are all forms of grounding.
Our senses of Wisdom, Peace, Love, and Freedom are all things we tend to rely on and seek out because they provide stability.
The Unearned is useful, but not always helpful or reliable. The Earned is more useful, helpful, and reliable. Based on that, it is always valuable and more stable to have more of the Earned.
What works and what doesn’t work varies from person to person. In this way, one person’s Earned Wisdom may differ than another’s person. The reason for that is each of us has within us a sense, a feeling, or a force - a sort of gravity that allows some things to stick while other things don’t.
The dangers of the unearned are often felt in unintentional and unconscious bargains where we try to get more by giving less, and then ultimately get dealt less by giving more.
The more we are attuned to the reality of everything around us, the more we are able to have “fair” or “okay” deals, getting what is right. Initially, this process of “earning” involves greater intention and greater consciousness. A lot of thinking, a lot of learning, a lot of practicing. Hard stuff.
However, as time goes on and as these things become more integrated within us, we begin to have more unconscious, unintentional, yet ultimately beneficial occurrences. It’s not really getting more for doing less, it’s more being naturally in tune with what’s right. Not over working, not over thinking, just being.
That is alignment.
But within all of that . . . despite everything, it is still you.
The sender, the receiver, the witness, the participant, the family, the friend, the individual, the group member, all of it is just you.
I’ll probably need to edit this a few more times, but -
tl;dr You are great and everyone you know benefits from your presence. When you get better and become more aligned, everyone you know benefits from that increased resonance of your presence. And in turn, the more everyone else tries to get better as well, the more your own experience will improve too. It is a collective endeavor that is pragmatically effective when we all agree we’re here to help each other.
Experiment - Track Thank You’s
Myka: One way to experience “alignment” is through the sensation of gratitude.
“Thank you” has become a trite phrase these days as a partner in crime to “please” and an arch-nemesis to “sorry.”
We request with, “please.”
We receive with, “thank you.”
And if there’s rejection on either side . . . “sorry.”
This is the conscious communication of thankfulness and it is recognizable as manners or etiquette. However, over time it has become automatic and lost some meaning.
If something happens that is out of our control - that is, if there is something we didn’t request that we’ve been gifted, that declaration of “thank you” is more aligned with gratitude.
Seemingly, there’s an unearned component here because things happened that you didn’t ask for. But actually, if you have alignment - your earned gravity - that’s unconscious and earned.
One way to hone and observe alignment is to observe how many times you want to give unprovoked thanks during the day.
If you really wanna dig in . . . find some time, sit down, and think about all the things that you are thankful for.
Notification
Next week! We will be taking a break in order to properly prepare for the Season of Wisdom.
Next next week! We will be returning to the concept of Wisdom for 4-6 weeks.
On that pass through, we will be going slower and being more interactive with the idea-balms.
See you then \m/