Positive psychology may appear to be a new set of ideas or concepts that are ground breaking and new.  The honest truth is that it’s been around for the entire documented history of mankind.  It has its roots in Eastern Philosophy and early paganistic methods.   Eastern philosophy promotes the idea of meditation, and paganism promotes the concept of ritual.

Ask and you shall receive.

While these paths may appear initially to be esoteric in origins, there is a long standing accompaniment of this way of thinking that is growing more popular even today.  These beliefs have been formulated into “laws” that appear to work all of the time, every time.

The framework for these laws is that the universe, in its entirety, is made up of the same stuff.  Modern day science affirms these beliefs in that we theorize that the universe is made up of the same basic elements that are listed in the periodic table of elements.  If we dig deeper down into each individual element, we discover that every element is made of the same basic parts– electrons, neutrons, and protons.  The difference between the elements is that every individual elemental atom varies in its number of these same basic parts.   Elements can work together to form bigger molecules, and those molecules work together to form the organs of our cells, which work together to form our bodies, yet the basic atomic parts tend to remain the same.

If you look deeper into the basic parts– the electrons, neutrons, and protons, we’ve theorized that what they’re made out of is quarks.  And quarks are essentially made up of energy.

One of the basic Laws of Thermodynamics is that energy cannot be destroyed or created.  Instead, it takes on various forms and moves in various directions.  This energy, is the essential movement, or life, that creates the universe.

We can see examples of this posited energy in action by simply observing the life cycle as it appears here on earth.   We see that the sun burns off energy and that energy hits our planet in the form of sunshine.  The sunshine is absorbed as heat in the non-living things, while our bodies absorb it to make Vitamin D and plants absorb it to make food.   In turn, the heat from the ground to keep our planet warm enough us to survive, and we consume the plants for energy.  If we eat meat, then the animals that consume plants, are also consuming the energy from the plants, and then we eat the animals.

The cycle of energy doesn’t stop with us, however.  We expel energy in the form of waste,activity, and emotion.  If we were to utilize the waste as a form of energy, we would be more efficient.  Instead, we tend to consume and use our energy in ways that give us more of what we want.  In the Western society, much of the energy is expelled as work.

Often we forget about the energy once we have expelled it.  However, everything that we do creates a ripple effect of energy throughout the world in which we behave.

We may not be able to choose how much energy the sun sends to our planet, but we do have a plethora of options on how we choose to expend our energy.

Because those of us in the Western world have tended to place such a high expectation on money and its pertinence to our survival, we seem to view the preferred place to appropriate our energy as the ones in which we receive compensation for our time.  Compensation is wonderful, as it begets us the material things we hold so near our hearts.

However… there are other ways for us to spend our energy, and there are a plethora of opportunities that we are given to acquire those things that we desire without the middle step of “work.”  In fact, work, in itself, does not have to be defined as something we have to do, nor is it something that has to be boring, tedious, or grueling.

The beautiful art of changing the ways we spend our energy has much to do with how we look at what we have to do with our time.  Our attitude makes every bit of difference in how we expend our energy, because with an open mind, there comes a number of ideas that will set your path outside of the box in which we’ve confined ourselves.

It’s easy to become entangled inside our box.  Much of what we’re taught from our culture is that we HAVE to work, we HAVE to use credit to make large purchases, and we HAVE to reach certain milestones as we grow into productive members of the society.  I’m not entirely advocating that you quit all of this, leaving behind the things that you’ve worked so hard for, but I am saying that it is important to evaluate where you’re at, consider where you’re going, and approach new ideas and opportunities with an open mind.  Realize that the sky is the limit, and only you can establish the boundaries for what you’ll do with your time and energy.