In the 6 years that I was a teacher there wasn’t a day that I wasn’t plagued with anxiety. Anxiety was my norm - it was my home frequency at all times. My anxiety levels were the highest in the moments when my “most misbehaved” students were acting up, throwing tantrums, or literally physically fighting with other students. Sometimes it seemed like my students could tell how anxious I was and they fed off my fear. Back then I had no awareness of energy dynamics - I didn’t know how to settle and maintain my energy hygiene let alone a classroom full of 20-30 tiny human bodies struggling with trauma lingering in their energy fields.
In the 2 years since I’ve left the classroom I learned so much about energy dynamics in general and what it feels like to embody my own energy hygiene practices. And I’ve realized that all of this healing and clarity around my energy field and how to upkeep my energy hygiene would’ve helped me be a stronger, clearer, and more joyful classroom educator.
So today I’ll be sharing some practices that could help classroom educators who especially struggle with their own anxiety, who struggle with “classroom management” and any educators who identify as Highly Sensitive People and/or Empaths. These practices may also support and apply to any service workers who engage with lots of people on a daily basis - i.e. nurses, social workers, lawyers, doctors, service workers etc.
Ok, so first and foremost we ALL have repressed emotions, repressed traumatic memories, energetic junk that actually belongs to others floating in our energy fields. Many of us - especially if we’re HSPs or empaths may also have thinner energetic membranes around our energy fields that allow others’ energy into our fields - we may also have tears and holes in our energy fields. And we - including our students and coworkers - are coming into school with dense energy whether we’re aware of it or not. So WTF is dense energy? I’m talking about dense emotions - remember, emotions are energy-in-motion. So folks are coming into school and classrooms with anxiety, depression, anger, rage, resentment, sorrow, grief, jealousy, envy, etc. This is especially true for our students who live in households where abuse and neglect is the norm. And we can see this low vibrational energy manifest when students come in with stanky attitudes, low energy, and are ready to pick fights first thing in the morning.
Before I was aware that I was an HSP/empath, I thought that the anxiety I woke up with everyday was solely mine - now I realize I was actually picking up on my students’ low vibrational energies even before we all arrived at school. And this anxiety only intensified once we were all in the same room. I know most, if not all, teachers have some sort of morning routines to check in with their students and “set the tone for the day.” I know I tried morning meetings, community circles, mindfulness rituals and yet none of these routines seemed to be enough to quell the low vibrational - even violent - energies with which some of my students arrived.
What I’ve learned in my time away from the classroom is the importance of intimately knowing my own energy - what are my own emotions, how to clear low vibrational energy/emotions from my field, how to cultivate a high vibrational energy field for myself, and how to create and set energetic shields and boundaries. I wish I had known how to tune my own energy field so that I could be a strong, magnetic high vibrational force that could be the tuning fork that helps clear and regulate my students’ low vibrational energy fields.
Daily meditation is one practice that’s helped me grow my awareness on what emotions and thoughts that I’m carrying are truly mine. Noticing and observing the emotions and thoughts present within me and my energy field then allowed me to clear and release them. Oftentimes the most accessible way for me to clear and release that energy was through crying and/or journaling.
There are many tools and practices one could use to clear low vibrational energy stuck in our classrooms - but they may not feel very effective until we learn and intimately get to know our personal energy fields - what we’re carrying that is ours or that belongs to others, how to shield our fields, how to increase our vibrations, and how to keep and maintain a high vibration and our energetic sovereignty.
A lot of what I’m sharing I’ve learned through Maryam Hasnaa’s work in the New Earth Mystery School. And I’m applying these energy concepts to the work of classroom educators because I see how necessary these energy concepts, tools, and practices are to facilitate more harmonious and high vibrational classroom experiences for all folks involved.
The first energy hygiene practice I’d recommend for educators is a daily check in on your energetic internal landscape. You can do this through a meditation practice. Whether we got a good night’s sleep or not, we all can wake up feeling funky for a variety of reasons. So once you cleanse and nourish your physical body for the day, it’s important to check in with, cleanse, and nourish your emotional, mental, and spiritual bodies as well. What’s the mental/emotional weather like within your spirit that morning? If it’s feeling low vibrational energy like anxiety, depression, sorrow, or anger it’s your responsibility to clear that energy. You can move and clear that energy with movement, release through tears, humming, EFT tapping, journaling/writing, verbal affirmations, prayer, and even visualizations. In this practice it’s helpful if you have Higher Beings that you pray to or work with in your spiritual faith - you can call on Them to support you in clearing your energy field.
Once you clear your energy field you can fill up your energy field with whatever you need - be it faith, courage, strength, vitality, creativity, cheer, joy, love, patience, or compassion - there are visualizations you can do to fill yourself up with that high vibrational energy. Some folks like to visualize a golden light coming down from the sky into their crown and filling up every cell within their being with all that high vibrational energy to fuel and nourish their energy field for the day.
Next, you can create/visualize a shield enveloping your energy field - there are many ways to build your energy shield and it’s important to let your intuition lead you in visualizing what your personal shield looks/feels like. Now that you’ve cleansed and cleared and shielded your body, mind, spirit - your whole energy field - you’ve set a high vibration within your home frequency - you carry that energetic signature with you throughout your day.
Next, once you get to school/work, it’s important to cleanse, clear, and set a high vibrational frequency in your classroom/work space. First, clear away any clutter or physical trash. Then, you can use medicinal herbs, scents and aromas to clear any stagnant energy lingering from the day before. A lot of folks turn to sage or palo santo - but if these herbal medicines are not native to your ancestors or the land you live on or your spiritual tradition - then I suggest you use other herbs. Burning dried rosemary, mugwort, cedar, or other herbs are great medicines to clear energy in a space. You may also then want to diffuse essential oils to set a high vibration to the space - think lavender, lemongrass, peppermint, etc.
Words and intentions are the most powerful - so you can also literally say, “I cast out any low vibrational/negative energies stuck in this space. I only invite energies of peace, love, joy, fun, and healing into this space.” Or whatever your heart comes up with works just as well. This is another practice where it’s great to ask your Higher Beings to help remove/invite certain energies into the space.
Sound/music is another tool you can use to set a high vibration in your classroom because sound is literal vibration - it's important to choose music that is at a high Hz frequency. There’s tons of meditation music out there on Youtube or Spotify. You can search for playlists that have songs set at 396 Hz - that’s the root chakra frequency. This chakra has to do with safety, security, stability, survival, and basic needs - this is where a lot of trauma or discomforts in the body originates and gets stuck. So it might be helpful to play music set at the Root chakra frequency to help soothe and settle your students’ (or your own) root chakra imbalances upon entering your classroom and starting your day.
Physical movement is another powerful way to clear and release stagnant energy. So incorporating some type of movement in your morning routine may help soothe your students’ ( and your own) nervous systems and help raise their vibrations. You can teach your students how to tap and hum along to some music or shake and jiggle/wiggle energy out of their bodies along to some music. Saying affirmations out loud while tapping on their bodies is another exercise to clear energy and raise your students’ vibrations.
If someone would’ve shared all this information with me even just 3 years ago while I was in the thick of my anxiety and resentment for school systems, I would’ve rolled my eyes and felt overwhelmed at having to add more shit in to my morning routines because I barely had the time or capacity to just roll out of bed and make breakfast - not to mention the morning rush of needing to make copies and posters and set objectives on the whiteboard!
And back then I did try some of those practices within my classroom but it still felt like that shit didn’t or couldn’t work for me or my students/classroom. What I’ve learned though is that I was trying to impose tools/practices on my students as a band aid solution and in an attempt to control and prevent their low vibe energy from erupting - and I didn’t use or practice or embody those tools and practices myself. I wasn’t prioritizing or working on raising my own vibration. What I know now is that whatever frequency my body/mind/spirit - my energy field is vibrating at - be it anxiety, anger, resentment, fear, overwhelm - that’s the vibration at which I was tuning and inviting my students to resonate at - and it was all happening unconsciously.
The way I used to approach classroom management was all about trying to control and prevent shit from popping off. I wish I would’ve approached “classroom management” from an energetic understanding. I wish I would’ve had the knowledge, tools, techniques and practices to be able to flow with whatever energy was present among my students and the classroom. I wish I could’ve assisted my students in cleansing, clearing, settling, and tuning their own energy fields to more peaceful and harmonious frequencies. But the truth is I wouldn’t have been able to do all that back then because I didn’t know how to do all that for my damn self!
Internalizing and embodying these energy hygiene tools, techniques, and practices for yourself is the first step to support yourself in having a more peaceful, harmonious, and joyful teaching experience. As within, so without!