The Law of Conservation of Energy states that energy cannot be created or destroyed, just transferred and transformed.

This means many things, not the least of which is that energy itself, across the entirety of the universe, is finite. There’s only so much that can exist. There’s only so much capacity.

Energy comes in many forms in this universe, just as it does in the universe of your mind and body. We live lives in denial of this inconvenient truth on virtually every scale of human existence. We burn through resources in all their iterations with little thought for what is lost.

But the truth is, it wasn’t lost at all.

It was given away.

A choice was made.

Each of us has the power within ourselves to choose how we transfer and transform our own energy. We each have a finite capacity for Mental-Emotional Energy, yet we give it away as if it flows from a river without headwaters.

When a large enough star has burned through its fuel, it collapses in on itself into an infinitely dense, infinitely small singularity that warps the very fabric of space-time itself. Yet despite this infinite smallness, its effect ranges far beyond itself, reaching out in all directions within a gravitational aura so strong that not even light itself can escape.

Time itself slows to a near stop.

The star isn’t the only thing that was affected by the burnout and subsequent collapse either. Every celestial body within arms reach, or that dares tread too near, suffers the same fall from cosmic grace.

Burn through your fuel, give too much of your energy away, and you too risk an inward collapse and darkness that impacts not just you, but everyone around you.

A star exists through a balance of inward gravitational pull and the outward propulsion of matter through thermonuclear fusion. In other words, it takes a certain balance for a star to burn brightly. Your light to depends on balance.

Be mindful of how you transfer your energy, or to what you allow it to transform. It’s too easy in this world to let your fire die for the wrong reasons. It’s too easy to transfer what limited energy you have to receptacles undeserving.

Focus on the things that matter most.

The things that make you happy.

The things that would make 8-year-old AND 80-year-old you proud.

And always remember, you choose how you transfer and transform your energy.