Robert Heinlin, (sp?) wrote a book called Stranger in a Strange land. Fantastic read, I recommend it to everyone, especially if you like sci-fi with a philosophical edge. In this book, he introduces a word, Grok. It is now a part of the english language, and means, "to understand intuitively or by empathy; to establish rapport with" in it's transitive verb context.

I have been trying for some time to figure out why exactly we don't have a specific word for the the sensory function of that sense related to energetic awareness. We say that we 'See' energy, and people all over have various experiences 'hearing' or 'smelling' energy, but I think that this is just a means of using some familiar sense habit to interpret one that we are not taught to pay as much attention to. Or, perhaps our predecessors really were largely 'energy blind' and incapable of truly granting it a place on the table of senses by virtue of their literally lacking that sense function. Who knows. But, I don't know of any word akin to 'See' or 'Hear' which specifically labels the action of Sensing energy. We often just say, Sensing energy, which is like saying that we Sense Color rather than just see it.

I have been working for a long, long time to divorce my energetic sensory from my five senses. It is incomprehensibly difficult to literally fill in the blanks between my senses to identify solidly a sixth sensory function. But, I have come to the conclusion from ten years of development that it is in point of fact it's own separate sense, having a difference from the other senses in a similar way that the other senses differ from one another.

Now, I have Seen energy as colors, and I have heard energy as sounds, and smelled it as subtle scent. I perceive it to have texture and temperature and sometimes, rarely, even a taste. But, rather than accept that energy occurs to me in these fashions, and agreeing that that is simply how one perceives energy, I have instead tried to pay enough attention to catch the moment before I interpret it into those other sensory lanes. What I have found is that Sensing energy is an instinctual action much like seeing light or hearing sound. But, there is no way to describe it, because we haven't taken the time to build a vocabulary suited for talking about it.

It may be only a local lexicon, but I'd like to work on building up a vocabulary that will allow us to discuss energy directly, rather than by allegory. The Omnimancers have a similar sort of tradition to this, but they are tight lipped about it for fear of spreading around dangerous knowledge. Whatevah.

Grok seems to be an appropriate word. For me, the point at which I perceive energy directly is a moment of instinctual knowing in which I identify the energy with some phenomenon in myself or that I have experienced before. By and By, I have stopped comparing energy to other phenomenon, and it has added some indescribable extra layer to my experience of reality, from conversation to watching TV. No one seems to have a standard use for the word Grok, and I like it's philosophical connotation in the way that Sight implies clarity and understanding, Grok implies union and deep awareness of significance.

Thus,

Grok - v; to perceive energy; to grasp the energetic significance of a phenomenon through instinct.

Why not Intuit? Because intuit already has a definition and common usage, and is not really the same thing. You don't intuit energy, your intuition rather helps you reason abstractly based on unconscious observations and past experience.

More, more!

peace