Video Summary:

Warrior energy is pure dynamic energy. It is active, yang energy. Sometimes it may be referred to as pure masculine energy which works if it describes the energy independent of the male gender.

Warrior energy was developed in tribal cultures such as the Samurai and the Native American cultures. It typically served as strong energy and practices to keep people safe so cultures could flourish. In our individualistic contemporary society, it is often directed to make things happen in your life.

When I was in my early twenties and studying with my spiritual teacher, he pointed out to me that my childhood had left me somewhat passive in that I wasn’t taking charge of my life. I allowed other people and situations to determine my life.

During that time there was real value in learning how to make things happen and create my own life. It was a powerful time. I started a business, bought my first house, and got stronger in my relationships. I was doing ceremony and vision quests. Warrior energy took me a long way with these things.

Then about ten years later, my teacher sat me down and said something like, “Okay, you got that down. You know how to create things. You created your business and created your life. Now I want to teach you a new way to create things.” He was referring to what I now call collaborative creation.

Collaborative creation involves putting an intention out and inviting spirit, life, or the universe to create these things collaboratively with you. So you're not forcing a specific outcome into existence. For a while, as I was learning this new way of creating, I associated warrior energy with forcing things to happen.

So using warrior energy to make things happen became something that I consciously tried to not do. As it turns out I threw the baby out with the bath water because it wasn't the warrior energy that was the problem. It was the way I was directing it. It was the intention of the energy.

And so somewhere along the way, I started learning to redirect my warrior energy. When creating things, I stopped directing it to force and push a static outcome to happen. Rather, I learned I can take that same warrior energy and direct it into an intention to initiate the collaborative creation process.

I've also found warrior energy to be very useful on a spiritual path where you're challenging fear, going into the unknown, and changing your belief systems and reality. This takes some serious strength and tenacity. So we can direct this warrior energy internally to challenge our fear and comfort zones.

I've been using warrior energy now that I'm in a new town and don't know many people. I'm doing new things that I'm not necessarily very good at with people I don’t know. These experiences are way out of my comfort zone. So I channel my warrior energy into showing up and challenging these experiences.

Our spiritual path can be very challenging. Some days the dragon wins. We may fail, not get the outcome that we want, and get discouraged. We can use warrior energy to brush ourselves off and get back up to fight another day.

The I Ching speaks of “marshaling your armies against yourself”. I see this as marshaling your warrior energy in towards yourself rather than directing it outside to force things to happen. I can marshal my armies (warrior energy) into myself to challenge my fear, inhibition, and old belief systems.

So when you’re reinventing your life, you can rely on that energy. The energy is the same, but you’re directing it in a new way.

You can start a spiritual inquiry by asking yourself how you can direct your warrior energy that’s less towards forcing things to happen and more towards challenging yourself to create the life you would have for yourself.