Of balance and imbalance

When you ask for help from the spirit world, when you channel the energy from the source, when you pray to god for whatever it is you need, what do you offer in return?
For some this question may seem surprising - for after all guides and angels ask for no recompense, the energy is free and unlimited, and god usually is not demanding of repayment. Yet this is not how it works, for nothing is the only thing that comes for nothing.
In our daily lives we happily accept that there is nothing that is for free. Favours asked from friends are paid back, or perhaps paid forward, energy used is paid for, even collecting solar energy extracts a price of sorts, if sunbathing we need energy to repair the cells that are killed, and if it is for solar heat or electricity we have to invest in the equipment, but even then the act of collecting it changes the local ecosystem, warming it or perhaps just cooling another area from the shade. We do not always think of it like that, but we accept that it is the case when we do.
Equally we extract, whether we mean to or not, the cost of help we give from those who we help, or from elsewhere at some stage or other, we may deny this but if we look closely deep within we find it is true.
We live in a closed system, energy moved from one place to another changes the balance, and just as the weather functions with the energy created between pressure gradients, the energy we move can create calm or storm, gentleness or destructiveness, love or anger.
Individually we are very small, so the changes we make seem very small, so small in fact that we frequently, and mistakenly assume that they will have no effect, but have an effect they do, and in the process we are changed.
Some will think that when we die the changes, the imbalance we create is wiped clean, it disappears, but how can this be in a closed system? The changes we make, and those that are made round us persist, and if they are to be rebalanced at some stage, we need to make those rebalancing actions, or accept that someone or perhaps the system will.
So when you ask for help from a spirit guide or healer, when you move energy to help someone heal, when you receive help from another, an imbalance is created, and it will have to, at some stage be redressed. Nothing is free, anything else has a cost.
Equally when you bring calm and gentleness to a situation, you are assisting in redressing existing imbalances, whether it is a stormy relationship, or healing past wounds. Only through love and compassion, through a fearless examination of oneself, through honest truth and dispassionate evaluation can we truly bring the calm and peace that will heal, these are the processes that allow us to reconcile issues and bring grace.
This is not just supposition, it is visible to those who look, the flows of energy, the different levels and colours of the energy, the connectedness of all things and the way in which they interact - when one takes this all in it is like 'being in the moment', a breath-taking expansion of one's awareness, the play and interplay of all the energy is visible for anyone to see. Those who assume that things are free will see only what they want to see, their desires and self will hide the reality of the energy, they absorb and consume as if they are starving with no thought for the consequences, they are blind, they confuse happiness with grace and in doing so will not be able to find grace for the fear of the truth constrains them.
Some will say that the 'whole' is the 'whole' and that we are all 'the whole', this kind of overview denies the truth that we are each a part of the whole, we each have our own identity just as organs in the body are separate but still part of the body. Each one of us has our own energy needs just as some organs in the body need more or less energy than the others, or perhaps different kinds of energy from one to the other. We are individuals, we remain individuals even though we are all part of something larger, and because we are individuals we must take responsibility for our individual activities, our energy needs and uses, and how we interact with the other parts, the constituents of the 'whole'.
This is not a burden, it is a joy, we give and we receive, we get back what we give and we have reflected back to us the love and compassion that we radiate, this makes living a joy, of being part of it all fulfilling, this is the blessing we are offered, it is up to us to ensure we make the most of it.

love
chris