Basically, it starts by getting ourselves into alignment. This is what it says about the Emerald Alignment on the website at Rainbow Light Foundation, where you will find  visual diagrams and an audio to take you through it.

“When we align the physical, mental and emotional bodies of the energy field, we are bringing the misaligned atoms and molecules of the lower body into line with a higher vibratory rate, i.e., the governing consciousness… All healing is light transmission. The Emerald Alignment is a simple, safe and effective method of releasing anxiety and aligning the subtle energy of the body through the emerald ray.”

Now, what does being in alignment have to do with art? Everything, it turns out. Alignment and art go together naturally, no matter what art form you’re thinking of. When we look at dancers or skaters or athletes, or any kind of physical movement, we see right away how their bodies are aligned with their thoughts. If you have ever tried to spin or twirl you know how dizzy you can become if you aren’t focused and coming from your center, which is all about being in alignment.

In music of whatever kind, we hear it in the harmonics and feel it and see it with the way the musician is one with the instrument. One of the members of Rainbow Light Foundation is the harpist, Rebecca Penkitt, and she plays very slowly, which I have found calming, especially when I’m stressed and need to slow down and tune into my breathing. You can hear her on You Tube at Harp Connections.

Self-Portrait 1980

Sometimes we have to find a still, quiet space in order to write or draw or create something. But there are also times when I’ve been in a state of excitement and have wanted to put it on canvas. My mind feels chaotic and overwhelmed with emotion, but instead of screaming or throwing something or dissolving into tears, I’ve trained myself to set out the colors on my palette. I was taught to line them up in a particular order. First white, then black, then the cool greens and blues, then the warmer reds and yellows. This is a form of alignment that is outside of me, but just by laying out the colors I start to focus. My thoughts start to order themselves without consciously trying. That predictable alignment of colors brings me back to my center, and I am able to let go. And lose myself in the act of creating something outside of me.

Art is very personal, and it boils down to what moves you and how you express your feelings about it. In works of Van Gogh we see how he made all those little lines, the brush strokes that followed the energy of a billowing wheat field. The separate strokes delineating a sky swirling with stars or the leaves of a tree swirling with feeling. We like it, even though we might not know why we like it, because he is expressing what he feels so that we can feel it too. It’s very healing to feel beauty, which is why his prints are popular in hospitals.

Art, when we give ourselves over to it, has the power to bring us into alignment with our spirit or soul. I can give you a perfect example of this from my own experience.

When I was old enough to go downtown by myself to the library at Lincoln Center and borrow records, I used to come home with recordings of the legendary violinist Yehudi Menuhin, who said,

“The violin, through the serene clarity of its song, helps to keep our bearings in the storm, as a light in the night, a compass in the tempest, it shows us a way to a haven of sincerity and respect.”

I loved hearing him play. I thought he was Russian. I had no idea he was actually born in New York. But I knew he was Jewish. Maybe I thought he was Russian because I listened to him playing Tchaikovsky. When he played the violin I felt it in my bones. What was strange was that no one else in my large family had any feeling about him at all. I was also drawn to gypsy violins and music from Eastern Europe, none of which resonated with the rest of my family and did not seem to fit in with my Anglo-Irish background.

It was a mystery to me until I was nineteen and my mother told me that my biological father was actually Jewish and his mother, my grandmother, was from Russia. From Rostov, just south of where Yehudi Menuhin’s parents were from, in what is now Belarus. The news of my background was startling, but it was also a relief to know that there was both a physical reason and a psychic one, why I resonated with a particular kind of sound or vibration. And for all I know, I also resonated with the sound of his name, Yehudi, which I have since learned is a Hebrew word which actually means Jew. But it goes to show that if you’re carrying around a vibration and it’s part of you, part of your cellular memory, and you don’t hear anything like it in your environment, you will go looking for it. It’s like something is echoing within you, and you have to find where the echo is coming from.

Nowadays, I melt when I listen to Schindler’s List. The violin strings are almost too full of resonance. It’s sad, but the sadness is also beautiful. It’s the feeling of an intersection between something that is too sad to bear, while at the same time the music takes you to a place which is almost too beautiful to bear. To me, it feels like the intersection between Heaven and Earth, where life can seem so tragic, yet at the same time—so beautiful!

It’s important to notice what music you feel drawn to, and ask yourself why—not just because you like it—but why do you like it? There’s always a reason why, because our soul calls to us in different ways and on different levels. And if we listen, it will always tell us what we are aligned with…

And finally, I would like to add this quote from Abraham-Hicks:

Take the time to line up the Energy first, and action becomes inconsequential. If you don’t take the time to line up the Energy, if you don’t find the feeling place of what you’re looking for, not enough action in the world will make any difference. ~ Abraham-Hicks