What is alignment?

Stuck is the signal

In years as an energy healer, seeing client after client, one reason shows up more than any other: feeling generally stuck, or blocked. Out of somewhere around a thousand people I've seen, that's the word for about nine hundred of them. Being stuck is a clear signal that you're out of alignment.

You are more than one part

Alignment is what happens when the majority of your energy, and the intentions underneath it, go in the same direction — your mind going the same way as your heart, going the same way as your gut. Energetically, we're really complex beings — we contain multitudes of different parts, different archetypes. Some are body parts: your brain and your heart are different parts. Some are roles: your inner rebel, your inner angel. Some are parts of your own history: your inner four-year-old, your inner teenager. Every part carries its own signature, its own information, and — most importantly — its own intentions, its own needs and wants. Saying we're complex doesn't even begin to cover it.

So when your head wants to pursue a career because it means stability, steady work, being well regarded — and your heart just wants to party all the time, connect with people, have a great time — those two are going to collide. Sit through a boring lecture while your heart wants to be out with people and your head wants you to stay, and that conflict is what blocks you. It's what keeps you stuck, keeps you stopped.

My own signal: shutting down

I'm someone who's quite prone to situational depression — getting overwhelmed, too many things going on at once, wanting to go in all these directions, and then my body just shuts down and says stop. It looks like watching Netflix for three days, or eating things that aren't good for me just to numb it all. It used to be more severe, though I was still functional. These days, if I'm shut down for around thirty hours, that's really my limit — and that's how I know: I'm out of alignment, different parts of me pulling in different directions.

How to find what's misaligned

The trick is to get really curious, observe, and ask: what are the different parts of me at play right now? Back to the actuarial-science example — if my mind wants stability and my heart wants connection, letting both of those come forward, with curiosity and gentleness and the understanding that every part of me is trying to help in some way, lets me ask what each one actually needs. The mind: security. The heart: connection. Once you can see both intentions clearly, you can get creative — is there a way to have both?

Every part of you is trying to help you in some way.

More often than not, it's a tweak, not an overhaul. Maybe you stay in the career path your mind wants, but you find a way to do it with more client-based, people-facing work — so your heart gets to come on board instead of putting the brakes on. That's what lets you move forward, aligned, instead of stuck between two parts of yourself pulling opposite ways.

Why bother realigning

When everything in you actually aligns, it can feel magical — things slip into place, because you're no longer fighting yourself, and life does get to get good like that. That's real, and meditation can get you there. But for most of us, most of the time, what actually gets you there is the drilling down. Which parts of me are at play here. What are they each needing. What direction is each one pulling. And how do I move them so they're finally going the same way.