>>6378
>as though energy is moving from my upper body down my legs into the ground
Yeah that's it and also it can change directions. The key to most psychic powers is find how the body makes "clean" or "true" energies and channel them. While the root chakra is supposed to be the "lowest" actually that is the "balanced start" it goes into the legs and the earth/underworld into even lower in the end because pic related.

>However, I've noticed negative effects occurring in my environment, which I recognize as externalizations of energy blockages that I had. I assume that this is simply an effect of passing them.
Yes that will happen quite a lot. I cannot do any meaningful energy work even passively without making things crack around me constantly. Even when I wake up from a turbulent dream which gave me an energetic realization I can hear things crack as I slowly open my eyes.
The everything is an "illusion" and how everything is "connected" shows in these situations. Our energies go through objects all the time and as object can accustom to the heat slowly sudden heat change makes the objects crack or deform in interesting ways. Our energies are the same sometimes.
>externalizations of energy blockages
There will be a point when you have to realize that external and internal exists as long as you do not understand the connection between them. The microcosm mirrors the macrocosm. What you consider "inner" and "outer" might be wrong because most of our inner issues come from outer interactions which means they are not truly inner and especially not inherent ergo that is not (You) and as the saying goes.
>We have to give back everything to earth that it gave us once we leave
Which includes our problems/attachments/blockages too. There are external "outlets" that are "thirsty" for these blockages within us. Like how CO2 is a waste for us while it is essential for plants. There are many hidden energetic relations like these. Depends on your environment and your connection with the hidden dimensions tho but these movements will affect the physical quite a lot.

And yes as I don't always know which tree will breath my CO2 and which plant will grow from my shit I don't always know how these energies move but they circulate so saying that the "ground" absorbed it is wrong it just goes through it then it returns to me in an another way and form. These layers can interact peculiarly and can move and appear many ways.