ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the energetic qualities of people's lives and the way that these are affected by emotional and physical circumstances, looking at how spiritual practice generates and contains energy. It explores energetic cycles which occur in nature through solar and lunar influences and through hormonal fluctuations, particularly in women's menstrual cycles. The chapter explores the ninth element in the Ten Directions model, vibrancy, which is concerned with energy and aliveness. Vibrancy is about challenging ourselves physically, but staying safe in the process. People's energy levels are deeply interlinked with their emotional lives in other ways. Excessive consumption supports identity creation and craving, as well as causing moral harm through the effects of the food industry on animal, plants and humans. Psychological and spiritual growth involves liberating energy tied up in defending the psyche. People manage anxiety by separating the world into polarities. They feel psychologically in control of their surroundings by categorising their experience of them.
