autumnal transitions and the law of correspondence - a video

"As is the microcosm, so is the macrocosm"

Many years ago, when I first started diving into the Holistic Health world and began to study the ancient teachings of the world's wisdom traditions (as well as the corresponding newest research from modern sciences), I came across the Law of Correspondence being described in a variety of ways. Depending on the teachings or research, the language would change, but the message would still be the same.

"As within, so without... As without, so within..."

What it means, because it isn't always clear to everyone right away, is, simply put, that what you do and how you are affects the world around you, and the world around you affects you.

The fact that we can hugely impact the environment (aka the world around us) is something we have been aware of for quite some time. At first, I can imagine, we probably were in awe of it and quick to impose whatever we pleased on the world.. In the beginning perhaps very benevolently, to simply make it work for us a bit better, later on also a little less kindly, as if to show the world who's the boss. Now that we've been finding out the consequences of many of our less-than-perfect actions (whether they've been reckless, purposely malicious or well-intended but we just simply didn't know better) we often start to think twice before we act, thank goodness, though collectively we still have a long way to go... I'm glad to see many people being able to realize this interconnectedness and act in a more intentional way. This, by the way, isn't only about our impact on the planet, which is probably the first thing that comes to mind when we say "the environment" but what is meant here is literally everything around you that isn't you, so it includes, for instance, other people as well.

Over the years, especially having been immersed in the world of the holistic approach to life, personal growth and the like, I've noticed that the impact the environment (the world around us) has on us is usually not something most people tend to think about. Yet, it's incredibly profound and, dare I say, in many ways, we're actually affected by it much more than the other way around. As much as we sometimes like to think so, we're not independent of what's going on around us. We, as humans, get affected by all kinds of things- from things like the state of the world, sunshine, the climate we live in, even the phases of the moon, all the way to the air we breathe, the food we eat, the people we surround ourselves with, the media we consume and so much more.

Interestingly, one could argue that as humans we'd first come to understand that- the way the world around us impacts us- way before we started discovering all the ways we are able to impact it. The sad thing about it is that we have forgotten it all..

Just like most of the things we usually talk about in regard to Holistic Health, they're nothing new really, we're only just coming around to remembering them and re-accepting them (largely thanks to all the contemporary scientific research coming out and supporting it all, bit by bit). These are things like our connection to nature, the importance and benefits of meditation, of proper nutrition and what that is, of sleep, of proper movement, the science of belief and epigenetics, what chronobiology is all about, how neuroplasticity works, and so on. I could talk about it for days... and I sometimes do, working as a holistic health and well-being guide.

But the same goes for Interior Design, actually. Which is why I like to connect my design services with my holistic health guidance, because despite it being an unlikely pairing perhaps, these two really do connect quite nicely.

"Outer order, inner calm"

"Outer order, inner calm" is a very wise and accurate saying that illustrates how the Law or Correspondence can be found in your home as well. The state of the space around you has a tremendous impact on your well-being. This doesn't mean that your home needs to be minimalistic or that it could never get messy. We're all different and while some of us naturally gravitate towards being more organized than others, we all benefit from our own kind of peace in our spaces. That peace usually comes from less clutter (visual clutter as well) and just a general order- either having everything neatly organized, or simply just knowing where things belong in your home and doing your best to keep them there.

Some of us are naturally minimalists, some are very organized, others tend to lean more into the “organized mess” sometimes called “artistic mess” category, yet others may be maximalists in their preferred decor style which usually introduces a lot more visual stimulation into one’s space. That's all okay, as long as our homes truly create a sense of safety and shelter for us and not just additional stressors. In other words, what "order" looks like to you may be different to what it looks like to me, but nevertheless, having your space in your kind of order will bring about more calmness into your mind and therefore your body as well, which is likely to have a positive impact on your productivity, focus, and even your social relationships.

It's important however to experiment a bit to see whether perhaps your sense of “order” has changed since the last time you checked. We are very changeable creatures, and as we grow and evolve so do our preferences.

On average, even if you're someone who claims that they don't mind working in a messy room, you're more likely to function better when it's tidy or at least when it's an "organized mess"- things may look a bit untidy to someone coming in from the outside, but you know exactly where everything is and everything has its place- it may look a bit messy, but there's an order to it nevertheless. I used to think I was like that until I realized that I actually feel much better when I tidy up even the "organized mess" around me. For me, especially as a Highly Sensitive, reducing the amount of visual clutter (even the organized one) has a deeply profound effects on my well-being. Beyond that, having unorganized things around is like having something always lingering on your mental to-do list- it's harder to relax knowing, even if it's somewhere in the back of your mind, that you probably should take care of that mess at some point in the future.

Feng Shui would also point to the negative effects of stagnant energy of messes, cluttered spaces and unorganized storage spaces around your home.

To stretch the Law of Correspondence even more, it can also relate to the people you surround yourself with.

"You're the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with" - Jim Rohn

While I can't agree with this quote completely, (because I believe that the number may vary depending on the individual, and it's also not only who you actually, physically surround yourself with, but also people (people, minds, energies) whose content you're consuming, be it in the news or on social media, or even in film or literature), I do acknowledge and appreciate what it's getting at and that is that the people you choose to surround yourself with will generally have a tremendous influence over you, whether you like it or not. The science backs it up by showing us that if most the people you surround yourself with are obese, you're more likely to also become overweight, if they're mostly fit, you're more likely to get fitter yourself and so on. On an energetic level, if most of the people you hang out with are quite positive, high vibration people, they will lift you up and build you up and if they're quite negative, just their presence in your life will mostly likely lower your own vibration.

Now, I realize that I just scratched the surface and all the various examples I mentioned are actually much deeper and broader topics. It sometimes takes one whole session if not several to get through just one of those aspects when working with clients, but this was just to give a general idea of how the Law of Correspondence is woven into various areas of our life, whether we are conscious of it or not.

Here, in my video, I've collected some moments from the fall of 2021 and noted some clear (to me) parallels between the outer world and my inner world, hence the title of this video.

I haven't listed all of them in the video, mostly because I didn't have the footage to accompany all the internal transformations I'd been going though at that time, so I chose not to go into that in much detail in this instance. But, as many of my friends and clients know, I happily share these things when asked because I do believe that the more people share their experiences, the more we normalize the fact that we're all different and there are many ways on the journey of personal growth. It all my look very different from one person to another and that is okay. It's also okay to know that what works for one person may not necessarily help someone else, even in a similar situation. But that's a whole other topic.

Also, this was my first voiceover, so apologies for the sound quality.. On the plus side, there's clearly so much wonderful room for future improvement🙃