Just like you want your cell phone to have all its bars before you make a call, you want your body/mind/ spirit energy triad to have all its bars before you perform.

Donna Eden, a fabulous energy medicine practitioner and teacher, has the capacity literally to SEE people’s energy. She knows what goes wrong with many people’s energy – and she sees exactly how to fix it. It’s been my good fortune to study with Donna and her designated teachers.

But long before I studied with Donna, back when I was a full-time performer, I used her Five Minute Energy Balance routine before I went on stage. When I didn’t, I could tell the difference. Though they didn’t know why, so could my fellow performers!

Here is a shorter version of Donna’s routine. Some of the exercise names are changed to help you remember them.

THE THREE THUMPS

Begin standing or sitting; it doesn’t matter.

Using the first two or three fingers of each hand, thump the collar bone spots – HARD! Thump 10-20 times. Find them just below and to the outside of your collar bone – you will see them in the diagram at “1.”

Now thump the thymus area, in the center of the chest. You’ll find it at “2” on the diagram. For men, this is about where your third button goes. Women will sometime have necklaces that hang there. Wham it HARD, 10-20 times.

Finally, thump the side of your ribs, right in the notch where the pad of your forefinger can fit. If you find a tender area, you are right on it.  You’ll see this at “3” in the diagram. Again, thump HARD, 10-20 times.

If you do only ONE of these exercises before you start, this is the one to do!

If you find yourself tired or unable to focus,  wham the collar bone spots  HARD, 15-20 times.

Diagram 1.

LITTLE KID CLASP

Begin standing or sitting; it doesn’t matter.

Put your left and right arms out straight in front of you, so the backs of your hands are touching. Palms are out. Now take your right hand and cross it over the left, and clasp your hands together. Your fingers will be interlaced.

Lower your hands to the floor and bring them up through your arms to rest against your chest

(you’ve seen little kids do this a million times – you almost certainly did it yourself as a kid).

Now cross your left ankle over your right. Take in a deep breath, and when you do, put your tongue on the roof of your mouth. Breathe out like you are blowing out a birthday candle. Repeat two times more.

Now reverse the pattern (left arm over right, right ankle over left) for extra credit and better balancing.

If you find yourself feeling confused or unable to follow directions or conversation, this is an instant fix.

It’s also fairly unobtrusive, so you can do it in public.

If you start to research this work, you will also see this referred to by its more formal name, the modified Wayne Cook pose.

CROWN PULL

Begin standing or sitting; it doesn’t matter.

Take the fingers of both hands, and put them, back to back, in the center of your forehead. Dig the fingers in and drag them apart, like you are prying open your skull from the forehead.

Now put your fingers up higher on your skull, just above where you pulled apart your forehead. Pull apart that area, too.

Keep working your way around the skull until you reach the back of your neck. Once you finish dragging your fingers across your neck, do the same thing for your shoulders – only rest there a minute, before you drag your fingers down.

Shake out your hands. Now tug your hair by the roots (unless messing it up would be a disaster for your performance). It will feel better than you imagine!

SO good for getting your brain to stop thinking” so you can get out of your   own way!

CROSS CRAWL

Lift the right knee to meet the right wrist or elbow. Put it down. Lift the left knee to meet the left knee or elbow. Put it down. That’s one rep. Do seven more reps like that.

Now cross over, so the right knee meets the left elbow or wrist. Then the left knee meets the right elbow or wrist. Make the arm find the knee – no fair hanging out and bring the knee to meet the waiting arm. The balancing happens in the two limbs finding each other. That’s one rep – do seven more.

Harness the Energy Around You!

You are done when you have finished three sets.

For most of you, this is worth doing several times a day. After about three weeks, you can graduate to the alternate leg-arm sets and skip the same leg-arm sets.

You can do this in meetings, quietly, under the table. No one will spot you.

If you find yourself stuttering or stumbling over words, this is how you instantly fix it.

HOOK UP

Middle finger in your navel.  Middle finger in the notch at the back of the skull. Press them in, and pull them up. Take a deep breath, and then blow it out.

Repeat at least three times. In the beginning, you might want to do this even as much as ten times – but three breaths at least! If you can take the time to just hold here, you will start to notice that you yawn, or take a deep sigh. In that moment, you have “hooked up” and you are good to go to the final step.

If you feel disconnected from yourself, do this and find yourself again.

ZIP UP

Draw an imaginary line from your pubic bone up to your bottom teeth. Now draw an imaginary line from your tail bone up your back, over your head and down to the top teeth. Repeat the front zip – pubic bone to bottom teeth. Turn the imaginary key and toss it away.

This is so fast and easy to do – don’t miss doing it!

NEXT MONTH: A fabulous exercise for all performers that helps you stay centered, focused and calm. It has an added bonus: for many people, it knocks off pounds, without even trying.

And it will make you a better performer, too. So what’s not to try?