Spiritual awakening is an experience in which an individual's ego transcends their ordinary, finite sense of self to encompass a wider, infinite sense of truth and reality they find themselves in. Such experiences are often perceived as a direct connection, communion, or non-dual merging with an unlimited and universal consciousness, the divine or God in perceived oneness.
Experiences of spiritual awakening, whether gradual or sudden, intentionally induced or spontaneous, evoke a sense of deep inner knowing, understanding, remembering, or unveiling of one's true nature, while simultaneously experiencing more peace, bliss, aliveness, feelings of awe, sacredness, gratitude and my favourite kind of experience abundant, unconditional love.
Spiritual awakenings can be spontaneous or triggered by major life changes or traumas such as life-threatening illnesses, car accidents, divorces, war, pandemics, midlife crises, mental health crises such as clinical depression or anxiety, or even a near-death experience.
One of the first signs of awakening is ‘noticing’. You may be going through life on autopilot without giving much thought to who you are, what you want, and why you are here in one moment and the next moment you are becoming the observer of your life, watching your thoughts, feelings and behaviour. Then you continue to observe only to ‘notice’ that you are becoming the observer of the observer. And from hereon in, there’s no turning back.
You can’t unseen what you’ve seen. You can’t unfeel what you’ve felt. You can’t unknow what you’ve come to know. And you certainly can’t unexperience this profound spiritual awakening experience.
The beauty of spiritual awakening or the expansion of your consciousness is that it starts an internal process which will have you stop ‘doing’ and 'forcing' things your way. It will have you stop pushing sh*t uphill and surrender to a higher power. This process will have you face your ego and shadow side full on and guide you to practise love and compassion toward yourself. It will have you comfort yourself when your inner child is hurting and it will teach you to stand by you unconditionally. It will introduce a softness within you that has you speaking lovingly to yourself and taking the time to understand the causes of your pain. And each time you do so, you grow a little bit more and your inner being shines a little bit brighter each time too.
And then this ‘emergence’ happens where you find yourself on the other side of reality. The old ways no longer work and the old laws no longer apply. Everything seems upside down and inside out. Life now becomes one BIG PARADOX.
You find yourself contemplating on how chaotic and complicated your life has gotten, yet you are feeling as calm and free within yourself as ever.
You have become more compassionate but less tolerant.
You have become more fierce, yet more loving toward yourself and others.
You have become more outspoken but feel silence inside.
You have surrendered but are more in control.
You have set strict boundaries but are more open.
The rules of creating things in your life change. Instead of forcing, directing or manipulating a certain desired outcome to manifest, you go the opposite way and surrender to the desired outcome and allow the higher power to orchestrate all variables for you instead.
You have total trust and faith that ‘the universe has your back’ and all that is required of you now is your willingness to experience the total opposite of what you previously thought you needed to do.
Saving money will have you feeling broke while it's making you rich.
Setting boundaries will have you feeling alone while you're creating new healthy relationships in your life.
Digging up your trauma will have you feeling broken while it's actually healing you.
Working out will have you feeling weak while it's actually making you strong.
Learning something new will have you feeling dumb, while it’s making you more intelligent.
Making yourself a priority will have you feeling you’re letting others down while you’re generating more capacity to support others.
Cultivating peace within yourself will have you feeling the chaos while the focus shifts.
Cultivating loving thoughts, will have you thinking hateful thoughts while it’s adjusting to new ways of thinking.
The quieter your inner being, the louder your presence.
Your ability to create the reality that you want is directly determined by your willingness to experience it's opposite.
Such is the wonder of the world of paradoxes.
What paradoxes have you come across in your spiritual awakening? Please let me know in the comments.
Love always,
Virginie