A symphony of chaos, New York City buzzes and screeches around me in all directions. Bodies jockeying for space. The streets and air are stained with grunge. The buildings close out the sky. I walk through pockets of smells. One second, the rich heat of flat crust pizza. The next, the stinging sharpness of urine. New York is an assault on the senses. It overwhelms you. I have come here to gather people so as set off a ripple of consciousness within the unconsciousness.

This is not my first time to New York City. It has a way of staying the same. Of all the cities in America, doing an energetic diagnosis on New York makes me the most uncomfortable. It makes me uncomfortable because of just how identified New Yorkers are with New York. Indeed many of them cannot conceive in their hearts that anything exists West of the Hudson. The people, who love this city, LOVE this city and defend it with fervor. I’m used to people identifying with the location where they live to the degree that they feel personally offended by any critique of it. But knowing the NYC psyche, I fear an unusually high amount of backlash. But today, I’m going for it anyway...

The dominant negative vibration of New York City is: “Cut Throat”. This is the word, which best sums up the particular flavor of callous aggression that drags down the vibration here. It does not simply flavor the city. It owns the city. This is what gives New York its reputation for being the most unfriendly city in America. What is confusing about the average New Yorker is that this unfriendliness does not come in the form you would expect it. One would expect an unfriendly person to be aloof and to keep a distance between themselves and you. But New Yorkers do not do this. They are not aloof. To the contrary, they easily strike up conversation to the degree that one could say they even insert themselves in your space and business. They are outgoing but, at the turn of a dime, that outgoing energy can turn harsh and aggressive. Argument is an experience generally avoided amongst people. Conflict is uncomfortable. But New York is a city full of inflamed Egos. And Egos like to feel a sense of self. Egos feel this sense of self strongly when they are in opposition to something. And so, it seems like everywhere you go in New York is an argument or interpersonal conflict of some kind. Anger serves to suppress the fear that the people feel here.

I remember hearing once that though rats are generally peaceful, friendly creatures, if you put them in a cage that is too crowded; they start to eat each other. To the negative, New York is like a rat cage that is too small. The competition for space, resources, ruthless achievement and a sense of self within the world has made this city “Cut Throat”.

The dominant positive vibration of New York City is: “Vocation”. Vocation is a strong feeling of suitability for a specific occupation (most often it comes in the form of a career). Employment is usually the main occupation people have in life. And New York is ripe with people who regard their employment as being particularly worthy and of requiring great dedication. This dedication can be an inspirational thing. It fills the city with the feeling of being driven and it makes you want to get up and get moving.

In the spiritual world, we mostly teach people how to get beyond doing and just be. Being is therefore valued over doing. But the truth is that doing is a beautiful thing. Doing is a natural expression of being as long as it is not done to escape being. New York City is a place full of doing, which is why you can wake up at 3:00 am and walk out into a city that does not sleep. Sirens blaze all night with the rush of traffic and lights. People in New York have work to do. As a result, it feels like things are getting done and happening here. The relentless pace of life in New York can be its greatest downfall and its greatest gift. There is so much buzz to the city it would be very hard to get bored here. This buzz one feels on the New York Street feels like it’s own dimension. London is the city in the world that is the most similar vibrationally to New York. But in London there is an heir of “meandering or wandering” to the pedestrians on the streets. In New York, the heir is about purposefully charging forward. And if you walk out onto the street, you had better follow suit or you’ll be trampled to death. It’s like walking into a very fast moving current; it quickly teaches you to go with the flow.

After this weekend’s workshop, I have decided to take a look at changing the format of my synchronization workshops. I don’t know exactly how yet, but like any good event, they evolve over time. I’m going to allow this change to take place as they have a life of their own and I’m curious about what they want to become. It seems change is happening in all areas of life right now. Sometimes, we collectively go through this process. This year all areas of life are being forced to change form and function. We are in the instability of change so that we can find true stability. Think of it like a purification process. When we ask for the best possible version of life, our life has to mutate to become that. In the unstable transition from where we are to where we want to be, we step out into the unknown. Transition is not easy or comforting. As a result, the background noise in many of our lives right now is anxiety. It is tempting to think that anxiety means something is going wrong. But I assure you it is not. It is simply that we are being pushed WAY past our comfort zones into a new frontier. And when we confront the unknown, we project all the fears we have from past experiences into the unknown and in turn begin to fear it.

We need to own up to and face what we are really afraid of. We need to turn around and face the fears that we are projecting into the unknown. Because the unknown has become a scapegoat that keeps us locked in a vicious pattern of avoiding what we are really afraid of. So… What are you REALLY afraid of?