What do you spend your energy on?

Today I woke up with a question on my mind....."What is it that I put my energy into?"  During one of the classes for the advanced teacher training that I'm taking the instructor asked us to direct our attention to different parts of our body.  She explained that where we direct our attention, prana (vital energy) will go.  Back to my question......What is it that I put my energy into?  What is it that I focus on?

I would love to say that I always focus on the positive but I'd be lying.  I guess my mind just isn't wired that way.  A hundred good times can happen in a day and my mind will obsess over the 1 negative thing.  It's not a conscious choice.  It's just the way my crazy monkey mind works. 

I'm reminded of something that Eknath Easwaran says on one of his tapes on meditation.  He talks about  this tendency of seeing the glass half empty as being a mechanical problem.  He says that you just have to get under the hood and fix it.  (I love Easwaran!)   How do we fix it?  Meditation.

My energy has been very low.  I feel drained.  Again, the questions comes "What is it that I've been putting my energy into?"   Imagine for a moment that energy is like money.  If you have a lot of it you might spend it a little more freely.  When your money is in short supply you start to be more discriminative about how you spend it.  You'll think twice before spending your last few bucks on something frivolous. 

Why do we "spend" our energy more freely then we do our money?   When we notice that our money is running low we waste no time in acquiring more.  Yet, when our energy is running low we keep "spending" it.  We give it away as if it has no value. 

With this question on my mind  "What is it that I put my energy into?"  I also need to consider how do I build energy?  The practice for today is to give some thought to the things that drain your energy.  Consider each one carefully and decide if it were the last ounce of energy you had would you still engage in that activity? 

Once you have established the things in your life that you can let go of, then shift the focus to building energy.
Perhaps you need to ramp up your spiritual practice.  Maybe you need to feed your body with energy building foods.  Maybe you need to spend some time outside in the sunshine.   More likely, all of the above.

Remember that if your car had a mechanical problem you wouldn't kick it.  You would just get under the hood and fix it.   There's no need to kick yourself when your mind has a mechanical problem either.  Just get get under the hood and fix.   40 day Gayatri mantra sadhana anyone??