How to Feel Energy With Your Hands

In my last post, "How to Talk to a Tree," I mentioned that one of the things you should try to do when you approach a tree is to feel the tree's energy field with your hands. A large, wise or older tree typically projects its field several feet out from its trunk, although you'll feel more if you hover your hands a few inches over the bark.

A while ago, when I was helping a couple of friends get into tree communication, I put together a set of instructions for learning to feel energy with your hands. If you've never worked with energy, or you don't know what your own energy field feels like, this is a good starting place. The exercises I mention are based on  the Chinese discipline of qigong, which I write about more extensively on Tai Chi With Melissa.

I hope you have fun using these exercises. Enjoy!

In western culture many people are not used to the idea of the auric field or “chi bubble” or energy body, although the presence of this energy field is considered to be as plain as the nose on your face in many eastern cultures, and is common knowledge in alternative healing circles. One straightforward way to think of this energy is as the electromagnetic field generated by your cells. All living systems generate this field. The goal of this exercise is to begin to feel it with your hands.

WARM UP
If you are able to stand, that’s preferable, but you could do this exercise while sitting in a chair. If you do wish to sit, use a hard chair (kitchen / dining room chair) and sit toward the front of the chair with your feet flat on the floor. If you’re standing, stand with your feet shoulder width apart.

Bring your hands together, palms almost touching and fingers pointing away from your chest, in front of you. Your arms should be straight out from the centre of your chest. If your shoulders bother you, you can do this with your hands at belly level.

Slowly open your arms until they are stretched out to either side of your body, like you’re opening them to hug someone. As you open your arms out, try to make the movement come right up from the ground, pushing your feet into the floor to make yourself bigger. Do this whether you’re in a chair or standing. Try to feel that the movement of your whole body, as you make yourself taller by pushing into the floor, pushes your arms out to the side.

Bring your hands back together in front of you. Repeat the opening and closing movement, pushing into the floor to get taller and spread your arms wide, and relaxing down into the floor to bring the arms back together in front of you.

As you move, try to keep your shoulders relaxed and down. Don’t stop at the extremes of the movement – just keep moving gently. Try to relax as much as possible. You want to move softly and smoothly, not stiffly. A good image to use is that you’re pushing through water, moving the hands out to the side and then gathering the water in front of you.

When you’ve done that a few times (eight to ten repetitions), change your hands so that you’re pushing the water out in front of you, palms away from you. If you’re using the water imagery, you’re trying to splash someone – but slowly and gently. Then pull the water in toward you, palms facing you. As you push away, you want to push your feet into the floor to get as tall as you possibly can. As you pull in, relax back into the floor. Do this eight to ten times.

SENSING YOUR OWN FIELD
After you’ve warmed up, you’re ready to play with your energy. Bring your hands in front of you at or just under chest height, elbows bent so your hands are a few inches away from your body, fingers pointing away from your chest, so that your wrists sit at a comfortable angle. Imagine you’ve got a small ball of dough (about the size of a tennis ball) between your palms. Roll the imaginary ball of dough between your hands, first moving the hands in a circular motion toward you. Again, you want to make the movements slow and gentle - don't attack the imaginary dough like you are trying to punish it!  After a few moments, switch the direction of the rolling, moving the hands away from you, still keeping the imaginary dough between your palms. Keep your hands relaxed as you do this, fingers straight and gently spread.

After you’ve played with the rolling movement for a little while, try pulling your palms apart six to ten inches and then pressing them back together, keeping a couple of inches between them. As with the rolling motions, keep your hands relaxed, relax your whole body, and focus your attention on the palms of your hands. Play with these movements, alternating between the rolling and the stretching motions.

What you are looking for is any sensation you feel in the palms of your hands as you practice the rolling and stretching movements. If you feel something, just take note of it and continue the movement.

Common sensations are heat or tingling. Some people feel that there is a magnet repelling their hands from each other as they press them together. A feeling of fluffiness or something jello-like between the hands is also common. You might feel like there is something warm swirling around the hands, on the palms, on the backs, or both.

If you feel any of these sensations (and there are no doubt others you can feel), congratulations! You’re feeling your chi!

The reason why the sensations happen is that when you do this exercise, you are making the electromagnetic fields around the hands interact with each other. The hands are polarized differently, so the fields “buzz” a little as they encounter each other. Feeling your own chi is a preliminary step to getting a sense of what it feels like when your field interacts with someone else’s field, or a tree’s.

If you don’t feel anything the first time, please don’t be discouraged! Try again when you’re feeling relaxed and calm. Just sink into the movement, try to focus your mind on what you’re doing, and note any little sensation.

You can do this exercise “cold”, but it’s even better if you’ve recently been physically active in some way. Stretch a little, go for a walk, hit the gym, or even do some deep belly breathing. While you’re still feeling the buzz, go through the warmup and then try rolling and stretching the palms.

So – play with it, have fun, and if you do try the exercise, please let me know how it goes! I am very happy to answer any questions you might have.