Turn up your inner light

I want to share a visualization technique I've been using and recommending more and more lately. It's particularly useful for when you need to summon your own inner power and presence, for example when preparing for a challenging situation or an encounter with a difficult person or group, or just when you're feeling depleted and low and need to call up your best self. I think of it as "turning up my volume" or “filling myself up with myself.”

Turn It Up

First, place your palms on your thighs with feet on the ground and take a few deep breaths with eyes closed. Then imagine that there's a lightbulb inside your chest. Take a moment to notice its qualities -- is it on or off? Dim or bright? Old-timey or modern?

Next imagine that there's a dimmer knob sticking out of the center of your chest. Grasp the knob and begin to slowly turn it to the left, or clockwise as if you have a clock on your chest facing out. (I actually use my fingers to turn an imaginary knob, but you can also just visualize it.)

As you slowly turn the knob imagine the bulb becoming brighter and brighter, radiating through your chest, torso, and eventually filling your whole body with bright light. Allow a smile to come to your lips. Imagine this light is your deepest, truest, highest essence, and when it fills you up you become buoyant, brilliant, and impenetrable.

You can keep going to extend the light as far outside of your body as you want, creating an aura of protection and strength, expanding to share your light with anyone else who needs it. Then go about your day as your shiniest, brightest, most fulfilled and centered self.

Give it a try and let me know how it feels. I hope it brings some radiance to your day.