EveryDay spiritual

By Annie Banks

Ordinary people as monks and mystics…

I picked up a  book with this title, sometime in the early 2000’s. I was just barely 20, and struggling to find meaning in my college student existence. Struggling to “fit in” which is really the struggle to accept one’s self. In my early teens, I had an awakening of my spiritual self, and wanted only to live for that… More meaning, more God, more  Soul, more magic, more awareness, more sensory perception… I thought that was how it worked, just a nice linear progression straight to Source!  

Only, I had skipped a few steps. I didn’t know that at the time, but I had not yet developed my emotional or social intelligence. And I certainly had not processed my childhood, parental influences and energetic inheritance. I did not yet know, that we all have a subconscious shadow, and inner child and parent aspects, and that we become adults who play out conditioned patterns. So, I certainly didn’t know what to do with the illogical behaviors I was experiencing, and the self sabotaging patterns that were becoming dominant over my life, nor did I know that what I was experiencing was a form of depression. 

What I write today isn’t about that part of the story.

It is about the moment I am in now, at 38 years old, a mother of a 6 year old girl, wife of 11 years, straddling a transition from personal trainer, to massage therapist, to virtual health coach, to life coach … when the global  event of our time occurs. 

In the very short time of a few weeks turned into months, the reality of human life on this planet has changed. And while there is a physical component of this, I believe that it is minuscule compared to the psychological and Spiritual.  I will not even try to include all 7 billion perspectives, so bare with me, I know I am only speaking from my 1. Yet, from my one little mind, I sense a deep pull back into alignment with my Soul. And I sense, I am not the only one. 

I never abandoned this calling. My focus has just been on other things, with “spirituality” as a background belief. Much of my focus has been on healing through my body, and learning to navigate my emotional self.  For the last 3 years, this has been changing. My spirituality has become once again my top priority. And I’ve been learning how to live accordingly. I am still learning. And I am bringing with me, 20 years of life experience, of learning about how the human psyche, brain and body work. While those things are in and of themselves, worthy of a lifetime of learning, my heart has called me back to this primary curiosity. What is my Soul? What is this concept we call so many things including, God? And How do I live a life of Spiritual purpose? 

What is it to live a mystical life as an ordinary everyday person?

Perhaps it just means, we live with enough curiosity to ask these kinds of questions, and enough presence to listen for the quiet answers within.  

Perhaps it’s not as out there as it sounds, but simply allowing the esoteric or metaphysical, and certainly the religious, to become the Everyday Spiritual.

- Insights -

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