I lose count of the snide comments I read and hear from people in the spiritual world about “trash TV”, “wasting your time watching TV”, “rotting your brain with TV” blah, blah, blah!  What’s wrong with TV guys, just because you acknowledge your spiritual side doesn’t mean you get to bad mouth TV as a low energy, low vibration entity.

Now, I’m not advocating watching endless TV on autopilot all day, every day or putting the TV on just because you enter a room, but I do believe TV, like many other things cannot be labelled good or bad, it’s about what you bring to it and personally I love it! 

Don’t get me wrong, like many people in the world I used to be addicted to TV.  I would choose TV over reading a book any day and then when I started to awaken spiritually, I started to lose interest in it and get all judgemental to those who were still enslaved by it.  Now I like to think my relationship with TV is healthy, I’ve made peace with some of my old ways and can actually receive benefits from watching it. 

TV is very much a part of the physical world and since I am a spiritual being having a physical experience, I will fully enjoy my physical experience thank you very much including watching TV.  Like many other things, TV can be used as a way to nourish or deplete you, I prefer nourishment.

Here are 7 ways TV can serve your growth:

1.  Shadow work

What you cannot be with in others is what you cannot be with in yourself, your shadow.  Inversely, what you admire in others is a part of you that you may not be aware of.  Which celebs get on your last nerve and why?  Which soap character irritates the hell out of you?  Which public figure do you simply love and what is about them you love?

If you can’t stand someone in the public eye because they are desperate, where are you desperate and how can you accept or love your own desperation? If you feel someone is just plain dumb, when do you judge yourself as dumb and how can you love that part of you too?  What about the traits you admire in people, how can you bring these hidden traits with you?

TV can be great for helping you move away from liking some parts of you and not others.  Nothing is outside yourself, it’s all inside and reflecting back to you from the outside. TV can highlight the various opportunities for healing which will return you to wholeness and accepting all of you.

2. Nature programmes

If anyone wants proof there is a God or some form of higher power, watch a nature documentary.  Nature is a total vibration raiser and there’s nothing like watching an awesome nature programme on a big screen TV on HD (well apart from seeing it in real life!)

I often find answers to things that are lurking in the back of my mind while watching these programmes as they are filled with metaphors and a-ha moments for us spiritual seekers.  Nature offers us many lessons and TV gives us access to nature outside our garden, city or even country.

3. Send love during the news

The news particularly gets a bad rap because it is filled with negativity.  Negativity isn’t all bad and is a great motivator for positivity and change.  Live in this world not of it, you don’t have to watch news 3 times a day or even every day but switching it off because you fear negativity doesn’t sound empowered to me.

Negativity is the other side to positivity, it’s not good or bad, it’s just a thing. It’s the meaning you apply to it that gives it the label.  I am not asking you to wallow in negativity but I am concerned when people cannot be around it at all, “what you resist persists” after all.

Through choice and not fear, I don’t really watch the news but when I do, I use it as an opportunity to send love to countries or people around the world.  I also use it to remind myself how lucky and grateful I am for my life, no guilt involved, this is pure gratitude.

4. Practise compassion

In films, the news, TV programmes and soaps there are always goodies and baddies, someone is always right and wrong, a terrorist and hero etc. But this is always a matter of perspective and most things aren’t as black and white as that.

There are endless opportunities to practise compassion and acceptance.  Instead of constantly judging situations on how they should be, try flipping your point of view and seeing it from another side or simply accepting the situation for what it is without judgement. 

When we allow ourselves not to be carried away by our emotional response and turbulence we are in a much more powerful position to see what the situation really requires and to offer real help.  That’s real help, not help that satisfies our need to do something, anything in order to feel better about ourselves.

5. Just chill out

Sometimes we just need to chill out and let our hair down with our favourite programme or film and get lost in it.  One of my personal favourites is Charmed and recently after a particularly chilled out viewing of Charmed, I started receiving an avalanche of inspiration (3 pages to be exact) for some teleclasses I have been planning. 

Positive chilling is an act of being which raises your vibration and quiets the mind enough for valuable, maybe even life-changing information to be received.

6. Watch something inspirational

Personally, I find a lot of inspiration on the box.  Regular readers of my blog (www.lolafayemi.com) know I am an E! Entertainment girl and I just love a rag to riches tale.  Asides from the success stories, there is inspiration to be found on X Factor, American Idol, America’s Next Top Model and various other reality TV shows where get to see the journey of  people aspiring for more from life and chasing their dreams.

I also tend to attract inspirational films and some recent ones I have watched are The Great Debate with Denzel Washington, Freedom Writers with Hilary Swank and Goodbye Bafana/Color of Freedom with Joseph Fiennes.  All inspirational yet entertaining films that uplift you to soul level that I highly recommend.

7. Have a laugh

There’s nothing like a good belly laugh!  There are some funny shows on TV and thanks to repeats of Friends, Frasier, Simpsons, Family Guy etc there’s always something funny on.  People have cured cancer by laughing so lighten up and have a laugh, stop taking it all so seriously and enjoy the ride.  The energy of the creator is playful, so play!