I’m sure I’ve written about this before, because I find myself completely captivated when I look up at the sky and clouds are moving rapidly across my visual field. The other day, walking across Central Park, I found myself stopped in my tracks when I looked up and saw cloud-like airplane contrails moving so rapidly overhead that it felt as though the entire sky were rotating like the dome of a ceiling in an observatory. The lines of thin clouds went off in several directions at once, with all of them moving at exactly the same speed and in the same direction, some moving sideways, some straight ahead, some at other angles. It was both disorienting and fascinating to watch the sky seemingly move overhead as if it were this single, large, rotating ceiling.

As I realized more consciously that the contrail clouds were responding to strong wind currents overhead, I remembered the power of all the invisible currents that move through the sky. That awareness got me to thinking about the invisible currents that move through our lives – unseen, but affecting us deeply. Some of these currents are individual, personal to us – beliefs, past experiences, expectations, and wishes, and some are collective – circumstances and demands that affect us on a world scale or within our various communities.

Then, I began to think about how my experience shifted once I was able to notice that the contrails overhead were responding as one to the powerful wind currents blowing across the sky at that moment. In the same way, the quality of our experience shifts from being moved this way and that by invisible currents when we become conscious of their presence. This can mean becoming conscious of subtle political, religious, family, peer group, or other community pressure or persuasion. It can mean becoming more aware of our internal process – the ongoing dialogue we have with ourselves, the nature of our fears, the quality of our desires – that moves us into this emotional response or that action.

All of this also brought to mind an article I read a while back about becoming a more informed consumer of the media. In the article, the authors talked about how advertising, as well as news media, can move us this way or that with subtle, hidden messages and persuasions if we aren’t aware of them – another kind of invisible current constantly moving through our lives.

While we can’t avoid these invisible currents, and can’t always choose whether we will be moved by them, we *can* bring them into awareness so that we are more conscious of when and how we move along with them – or what we need to support us if we choose not to do so. For this week’s experiment, I invite you to wonder about the up-till-now invisible currents that move through your life, and move you along with them. And, as you become more conscious of the influence and impact of invisible currents – be they your beliefs, cultural norms, news reports that convey frightening possibilities that you might not have questioned – what choices might become available to you?

As with all the experiments, this one is an invitation to play with awareness, to notice what it’s like to focus your attention on something and see what comes.