Mindful Moment #10 - Wasting Wishes? Make More!

Making Wishes

I’ve spent a lot of years wishing. On birthday cake candles, when I see a shooting star, or when the clock hits midnight on New Year’s Eve. I wish for something better or more or different than what I have. It’s usually a small, personal desire, but lately I think I might have been wasting my wishes. Maybe it comes with age or just a pandemic perspective, I don’t know, but maybe my wishes are being wasted on things that are limited to my little sliver of consciousness. Maybe I’m meting out wishes like Aladdin’s genie: you only get three and they come with conditions. But listen, if it’s called “making” a wish, we can just make more, right?

I’ve been thinking, what if I can have as many wishes as I want? And what if I extend my wishes beyond myself to reach as far as my mind can conceive? Would those be wasted wishes? Or would that intention be able to do more work than I can even begin to know? What if I can add my most positive of ideals to the sum total? I bet it doesn’t have to wait on a special occasion or rare event. I bet I can send as many wishes as I’d like to out into the world just whenever, all willy-nilly like. To serve what end, though?

Right now, I want to wish for peace. For the unity of humankind. For a general sense of calm to replace that nagging worry that feels lodged under my skin like tiny cactus spines. For more joy for all of us. For resources that can be extended to all humans and creatures that need them and managed with intentional renewal. For harmony to be our default setting, rather than (seemingly) conflict. For a salve that cools our sunburned souls. For more love, more understanding, more cooperation.

Last summer, I took a little solo vacation a few hours away to the coast. I spent long afternoons just standing shoulder-deep in the water, letting the waves pick me up and set me down. The ocean and I talked for hours, the sky chiming in at sunrise and sunset. They let me know it’s all going to be alright. By the end of my sojourn, I had been given this mantra, “I am you. You are me. We are energy.”

I say this now to myself when I am reminded that we are, whether we like it or not, in *this* together. If we could just synergize our intention toward a common concept of healing and peace, we could lift all of our spirits quite literally toward something more purposefully positive for the whole. I could be mistaken, but I think we’d be better off if we could just see each other—truly see each other as more alike than different. Not to diminish our individual experiences and unique gifts, but to recognize the basic truths that exist within all of us.

If you want to play along with this wishing experiment, try this:

Sit down. Drop your shoulders. Relax your jaw. Take some deep breaths. Close your eyes.

Imagine this positive intent around yourself like an aura. This intent is without condition. Think about good things: contentedness, a sense of community, an attitude of peacefulness, the experience of joy, the bliss of love. Imagine the aura growing into a glowing white light, a misty halo around you. With deep, centering breaths, breathe the aura larger until it is a full globe of light.

Make your wishes and send them into the globe of light around you. Hint: Frame the wishes in positives, asking for what you do want (as opposed to what you don’t want).

When you are ready, imagine the globe slowly rising, disengaging from each of your chakras, and leaving your own body’s aura behind. It’s going to rise like a mist away into the sky. In the sky, the globe will slowly dissipate into the atmosphere, its light and hope and wishes melting into particles, now carried on the wind. Wherever the particles go, so also will go the positive energy.

Note: After you do this exercise, you may want to do some grounding. Standing barefoot on the ground outside for a few minutes usually does the trick for me.

Hopefully this exercise will at least allow you to imagine something a little brighter, something a little happier. I hope it will be like a balmy breeze of change that allows us all to create an existence that is a little more connected to each other and the Earth, by way of peace, hope, and (dare I say it?) love.

Give it a try.

Namaste, friends.

-Amy

INSPIRATIONS THIS WEEK

We’re feeling inspired by these incredible and thought provoking pieces:

Climate Crisis and Cannabis Converge for Historical ‘420PPM on 4/20’As Earth’s carbon dioxide concentration reaches 420 PPM, concerned climate activists, journalists, and weed farmers come together to talk solutions.
Dictionary.com’s latest update addresses social justice issues, accessibility tech, and the global climate crisisThousands of edits address the changing nature of language and digital culture.
I’m A Sleep Psychologist: Are You Making This Innocent Bedtime Mistake?This one’s for all the pre-bed meditators out there.

That’s all for today, y’all – remember, taking time to focus on you is an act of love.

We hope you found this helpful – don’t hesitate to reply with any feedback on how we can improve future Mindful Moments! We can’t wait to hear from you.