Health and energy - demystifying Energy Work
Energy is the real substance behind the appearance of matter and forms - Randolph Stone D.O.
Photos credit: Anna C Myrup
Disclaimer: This blog reflects what I’ve come to understand so far of energy work through personal practice, study, and professional exploration. This blog is not meant to be a comprehensive scientific evaluation of the current state of the knowledge of energy and energy medicine. It focusses primarily on the perspective of the energy medicine practitioner. My understanding keeps evolving - as energy science and practice does. I share this here not as final truth, but as a living perspective, open to growth and refinement.
When I First Stepped Into Energy Work…
When I first entered the world of energy work and healing, it felt like stepping into a new dimension - and getting completely lost. There were so many practices, traditions, and terms: yoga, transcendental meditation, Reiki healing, breathwork, tai chi, qi gong, acupuncture, Ayurveda, Shamanic healing, 5Rhythms dance, sound healing, trauma release, meridians, chakras, the quantum field, the biofield…
It was beautiful - and I wanted to try it all out - but also overwhelming. Which one to choose? What does what? How does it work? What will work for me?
A Search for Vitality, Meaning & Connection
I came to energy work through both innate curiosity and the sense that there’s more to health and life than I had learned in medical school. And more recently - out of necessity. Navigating burn-out and midlife transition, I was looking for something beyond conventional approaches - something to reconnect me with myself, my body, my energy, and a deeper purpose. I wasn’t looking to treat a disease, but to support my wellbeing on all levels: physical, emotional, mental, and increasingly, what I now know to be energetic (and what some also may call spiritual).
From my perspective as a public health physician, energy work isn’t about magical thinking or bypassing medical care. It’s about cultivating a relationship with your energy systems so that they support your health and vitality. It’s about understanding how life energy shapes and influences our biochemical system - our body, mind, and emotions - and learning how to work with it, consciously and gently.
Photos credit: Pexels
One Energy, Many Names
The most important insight?
There is only one energy - what different traditions call life force, chi, prana, or Source. All energy practices work with this same force, but in a slightly different modality. As Donna Eden puts it, energy is “the unseen force that animates all life.” And as Einstein reminded us: “Everything is energy.”
What matters isn’t which modality is “right,” but which one resonates with you.
We Are Energy Beings - With an Energy Anatomy
In medical school, I was taught only about the body’s physical systems: cardiovascular, endocrine, immune. What I’ve since come to learn is: we also have an energy body - with its own structure and rules.
The body’s energy is often described in three main categories:
1. Electrical energy - the body’s internal communications system. It powers the nerves, brain, muscles, and heart, and can be measured with tools like EEGs, ECGs, and EMGs.
2. Electromagnetic energy - the field generated by the body’s electrical activity. The strongest field comes from the heart, followed by the brain. These fields extend around us and interact with our environment, and are measurable using tools like MEG, MCG, or SQUID devices.
3. Subtle energy - known as chi or prana in ancient traditions. Einstein acknowledged the existence of such energies - those "we know exist because of their effects," even if we cannot yet measure them directly.
According to Donna Eden, three primary energy systems influence our biochemistry:
· The biofield - the energy that surrounds the body (also called the aura)
· Localised energy centres - such as the chakras
· Energy pathways - like the meridians
These energetic systems may involve electrical, electromagnetic, or subtle energy in different combinations.
In total, Donna Eden identifies nine key energy systems that make up the human energy anatomy and we can actively enegage in. Some are more familiar, like the Aura, Chakras and Meridians, while the other maybe less so, including the Radiant Circuits, Celtic Weave, Triple Warmer, Five Rhythms, The Electrics, and the Basic Grid.
These energies shape our biochemistry - our health and wellbeing. This helped me understand that energy isn’t an “add-on” or something you choose to believe in - it’s foundational and key to prevention of disease and ill health, even if we do not fully understand it yet scientifically.
Photos credit: Pexels
How Energy Behaves: 10 Key Principles
From Donna Eden’s work, I also learned that bio-energy follows natural laws. These ten principles helped me make sense of how to view energy work:
1. Energy wants to move - Stagnation leads to physical symptoms and emotional stuckness.
2. Energy moves in specific patterns - Spirals, waves, figure-8s - found across traditions and practices.
3. Energy needs space to move - Muscle or mental tension, or toxins can block its flow.
4. Energy wants to cross over - Crossed-over energy supports vitality and cognitive clarity.
5. All energy is connected - Meridians, chakras, aura - everything interacts and communicates.
6. Energy is influenced by the environment - People, places, sounds - everything in our environment impacts our energy.
7. Energy prioritises survival - If we don’t feel safe, the system locks into protection mode (fight, flight, freeze).
8. Energy forms habits - Old patterns can become limiting over time.
9. Health reflects energetic state - Symptoms show up after imbalances begin in the energy body.
10. Energy can be re-patterned - With consistent practices, energy systems can be balanced and restored. This is the essence of trauma-informed energy work.
Photos credit: Unsplash
Five Ways to Repattern Energy
Across ancient and modern traditions, five core practices appear again and again for moving or restoring energy flow:
1. Touch - Stimulating points on the skin (e.g. tapping, acupressure, reflexology)
2. Tracing - Running hands along energy pathways (e.g. meridian tracing)
3. Movement - Intentional postures and flows (e.g. yoga, qigong, dance)
4. Focused Mind - Using breath, visualisation, meditation, intention, affirmations
5. Healing Environments - Sound, nature, ritual, human presence, hands-on healing
Many Modalities, Same Foundation
Most modalities combine several of these five practices:
· Meditation - breath and mental focus
· Yoga - movement, breath, posture, focused mind
· Sophrology - breath, movement, mental focus, sound
· Eden Energy Medicine - tapping, tracing, acupressure, intention
· Reiki - hands-on healing, and intention
Different paths. Same life force.
Photos credit: Pexels
Self-Practice vs. Practitioner Support
Energy work tends to fall into two categories:
· (Guided) Self-practices - such as yoga, qi gong, meditation, Sophrology
· Practitioner treatments - such as (hands-on) Reiki, reflexology, acupuncture, or energy medicine sessions
Many systems, including Reiki and Eden Energy Medicine, can be practiced both ways.
For me, having a regular self-practice has been essential. It keeps my energy flowing, clears daily stress, and helps me return to center. Practitioner sessions, on the other hand, have supported me through deeper layers of healing when I needed more insight or release.
What Is Coherence?
One of the goals of energy work is to restore optimal flow and re-pattern energy imbalances, and ultimately bring about coherence.
Coherence means that all the parts of your energy system begin to move in harmony. You experience more balance, emotional steadiness, and connection.
As Dr. Joe Dispenza teaches, coherence is not just internal. When we breathe, feel, and think in alignment, we entrain with the coherent field of life itself - also called the quantum field or unified field.
This is where deep healing happens - when your inner system resonates with the greater rhythms of nature and the universe. Being in nature itself often helps bring this harmony forward. The coherence of the natural world supports the coherence in our own system.
Energy Work and Manifestation
In this blog, I’ve focused primarily on energy work in the context of health and wellbeing. But it’s worth noting that energy work is also the foundation of manifestation practices.
Manifestation is simply another way of working with the same life energy- by directing our intention, thoughts, emotions, and vibrational state to shape the reality we want to experience. It’s not a separate thing - it’s part of the same field. In fact, manifestation is an element of Sophrology, where visualisation and future-facing exercises help anchor your energy in alignment with what you desire. But that’s a whole other conversation, for another time!
Photo credit: Anna C Myrup
What I Wish I Knew at the Start
Energy work is not something to analyse. It’s something to experience, because life itself is an experience.
While I still follow the science (and am excited to see how this field is evolving), what’s really changed me is regular practice and self-exploration. Over time, I’ve learned how to tune in to my own energy - how breath, posture, sound, emotion, and awareness shape my wellbeing. I am not perfect, but I certainly commit to myself more and more.
Sophrology in particular gave me an easy daily practice to develop this skill - by training my awareness in a way that’s simple, grounded, and accessible. And mastery of your awareness opens whole new ways of being.
As the Buddha said in the Kalama Sutta: “Don’t follow teachings blindly - not even mine. Experience them for yourself, and adopt what leads to truth and well-being.”
Healing isn’t about fixing something broken. It’s about becoming (energetically) whole, and living a better life from that wholeness.
It’s about restoring balance, flow, and coherence - both within yourself and with the greater energy of life you are part of.
Today, I work specifically with Sophrology, Reiki, and Eden Energy Medicine to keep my energies flowing on a daily basis - and I honestly wish I’d learned this much earlier. Preferably in medical school.
Health isn’t just physical or mental. It’s energetic. And all three are deeply connected.
Thanks for reading. And wherever you are on your path - keep going and evolving!
Energy is life. Life is energy. Enjoy it.
AnnA