The Hawkins Scale
How To Navigate Emotional States
Introduction
David R. Hawkins is one of the most famous psychiatrists— and for good reason. In this post we’re going to discuss, explain, and take actionable advice from his famous emotional and consciousness scale. If absorbed, this will change the way you view and interact with your own states.
Pictured: David Hawkins.
“If you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration.” - Nikola Tesla
The Hawkins Scale
The fundamental premise of this scale is that everything “vibrates” at one level or another— stay with me. If this sounds too “woo woo” to you, I get it. However, I ask you to then take this as a fun thought experiment outside of your usual thinking.
Every thought, action, place, person, idea correlates with a certain vibration. At the low end of the spectrum, one can see this energy manifest and express itself as states associated with shame, lust, stress, apathy, etc. At the high end of the spectrum, you find drive, laughter, joy, serenity, visionaries, trailblazers, reason, love and the like. Different levels of energy correspond to each of these. What Hawkins did is create a map for us to use to navigate these states.
See map below:
Pictured: The Hawkins Scale.
You’re probably thinking “How is this useful?” or “How do I apply this in my own life?”— we will get to this soon. But first, let’s check out Frederick Dodson’s expansion and continuation of the scale.
Levels of Energy
Frederick Dodson, a famous researcher of consciousness and author, took this idea and ran with it. But instead of emotions, he writes from the perspective of energy— ones that I’ve found much more useful in my own experience. In his book Levels of Energy, Dodson lays out the scale again but with a focus on how to jump from one level to another.
For example, you can choose to lift yourself out of anger by reaching for pride, or come out of fear by using desire. I want to note here that mass media often keeps people in a state of fear and desire. What’s the latest international threat? The newest designer handbag? Are you keeping up with the Jonesses? How about protecting yourself from the latest biothreat? Protect yourself from this energetic drag down by removing any sort of media (article here) that suppresses your energy level. Back to my main point though, at different points of the scale you respond to different things. An apathetic person wouldn’t even engage in goal-setting, but they might be open to complaining about their situation. Someone at the point of desire might not accept their current situation for what it is, but they can get angry about their current situation and use that to fuel them.
Where This Scale Comes Into Use
We find ourselves at different points on this scale throughout our life. In fact, Dodson goes as far to argue that different energetic “pockets” exist where you hold on to energy from past experiences. For example, you could be ashamed of something that you did 5 years ago and still hold onto that shame. Or, you could have a strong desire to a certain outcome that holds you there. How to “ascend” up the scale is to go through and address all these different pockets of energy that you find yourself holding on to.
Analyze yourself with questions such as:
“What am I ashamed of?”
“What do I desire?”
“What resentment am I holding onto?”
“What are my greatest fears?”
“What do I not like about myself?”
and let that shit go.
You possess the capacity to completely control your emotional and energetic state. It is your decision if you want to experience a life filled with purpose, unrelenting motivation, beauty, and the work ethic of a human tank. Why settle for anything but that? You want a life of boundless energy.
Take this scale and analyze yourself, those around you, your dominant thoughts, the places you frequent, etc. In my personal experience, I’ve found “negative” or “low-vibrational” energy can manifest itself in a variety of thoughts. Often times we interpret this “negative energy” in a myriad of seemingly unrelated ways— it can produce a million thoughts that have nothing to do from where it initially came into your life. For example, think of one negative experience from childhood, one that you’ve held onto. How many negative thoughts has that caused you over the course of your lifetime? Probably thousands. We hold onto these things from our past and carry them with us into our future. Unless this energy is released or “transmuted” (turning it into something entirely new, using it to drive you), this energy will unnecessarily bog you down. It doesn’t have to.
I hope this article provides you with a new topic to study or even just a little bit of exposure outside of traditional thinking around emotions and energy. As always, please feel free to reach out to me with any questions on the topic or for further resources.
Cheers friend,
Chi