I. Overview

Balance the four domains—physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual energy

We are like a house with four rooms—physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. If we don’t make time to care for them, they can become dusty with neglect. During transitions in your day, as you move from one activity to another, take a few moments to discern which room or rooms need your attention.

You can also practice and play with this reminder when you are feeling drained or if you’ve been devoting an excessive amount of time in a particular room, like training for a marathon or working tirelessly to meet a publisher’s deadline for your book project.

In today's exploration, you will examine what nurtures you and what depletes you in the four domains of energy: mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual. It's important to know that in mindfulness, the spiritual domain is not concerned with religion or higher powers, but rather with the things that give your life meaning and purpose.

After your meditation (Return), remember to take a few minutes to reflect and discover insights (Listen). Then, choose one action to commit to for today (Begin).

II. Dedicated Practice

Return

Energy Meditation

Before meditation, check in with your energy levels - how energized are you feeling right now?

During this meditation, you will be asked to notice your body sensations, thoughts, feelings, and sense of spirituality (meaning and purpose), and how the level of energy you feel in each of these domains affect your overall energy levels. This can be an elusive and subtle concept for a lot of people, so just do your best to notice your experience and energy levels during the practice. This will become more clear to you the more you do it, and the Disrupt Your Defaults and Take Action prompts will help you see how these ideas can become more concrete when applied to everyday life.

Listen

What did you discover about your energy patterns in today’s meditation?

Did you see how your overall energy is affected by your mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual energy? Again, spirituality here means the things that make you feel most alive and give your life a greater sense of meaning and purpose.

Begin

Open Your Energy Matrix file below (the Word document is attached) and make a note of the following:

Which room do you spend most of your time in?

What is nurturing and what is depleting?

Look for nurturing activities that are overlapping across rooms. How can you make the overlapping activities a priority in your life?

What are the common challenges that keep you from engaging in the nurturing activities?

What commitment(s) can you make based on your observations of what is most important for you to enjoy a fulfilling life?

III. Daily Reminder to Integrate Energy in Your Day

Return to the mantra—Visit the Four Rooms—throughout the day.

Real-World Triggers to Practice and Play with the Mantra

You can use one or more of the following everyday cues to return to the mantra:

• Feeling out of balance
• Overwhelmed
• Depressed
• Anxious
• Seeking clarity about purpose
• Spiritually disconnected
• During transitions between activities in your day

Practice and Play with the Mantra: Visit the Four Rooms

Listen to the 3-5 minute audio guidance to return to mindfulnes in your day with this reminder.