You are Light, Even When You’re Grouchy

My college suitemates used to stand outside my dorm room in the morning, shove each other towards my door and say, “You wake her up.” They’d draw straws and the loser had to knock on my door. While a series of friends over the years have called me Sunshine, I’ve been called a variety of other names that aren’t quite so cheery.

And it’s true. I am not a walking advertisement for positive thinking. In fact, sometimes I find positive thinking is unrealistic and the responsibility of fighting the natural warning my brain offers depresses the heck out of me. I even wrote a HuffPost article about that topic. Life has dark days for a reason, and I don’t always whistle in the dark. Sometimes I run as fast as my rather large thighs will take me.

Yesterday I woke up with that sick feeling in the pit of my stomach as I remembered several shadows stalking me; my mom has recently had a stroke, my husband is going to start chemo for his cancer soon, and my dishwasher door is broken. While the dishwasher door doesn’t seem quite as relevant, I have a way of making all frustrations even-steven.

I spent the day consumed by these shadows until I went home exhausted and ended up sick all night. I am pretty sure my list of stressors did that, because I let them zap the photons right out of my DNA.

Here’s what I mean by the whole photons things . . .

Please don’t hold me to specifics on this, but I recently read that our DNA can absorb photons which are the quantum of light. There can be billions of these photons in us at one time, and we actually share them with others. Research shows that when one person transmits loving thoughts to another, the receiver’s photons increase. Photons can play a major role in physical healing. They are little energy particles.

Here’s another interesting fact – negative stories and negative people can reduce our number of photons. That’s right, they are the emotional vampires that can suck the light right out of us. Studies show that when people are watching negative stories or are around negative people, their photons decrease, their immune system goes down, and their energy is significantly reduced.

Always wanting a quick fix, I skipped ahead in this article to discover what builds our photons. Music is an amazing catalyst for light.

Remember the song “59th Street Bridge Song ( Feelin’ Groovy)”?

Yes, the one by Simon and Garfunkel. I love the lyric – Hello lamppost, what’cha knowin? I’ve come to watch your flowers growin’.” I loved that song as a kid. I’d put on my roller skates, go outside, and sing that song to the top of my lungs. In that moment, I WAS the lamppost. My photons were building to sunshine levels, and I felt it.

Today, I’m going to be careful about the stories of terror and sadness that I take in. I refuse to get into a political fight on Facebook. And I will dance with my husband at work. Because I have a spouse to whom I need to send lots of light over the next six weeks, and I need to be replete with energy.

And it amazes me that when I pray for strength and light, my body physically responds and delivers it to my DNA.

That’s just too cool for school.