Recently I’ve become aware of themes, or patterns, that show up in my daily life revolving around sharing my experience and ideas. A journey is something to be cherished. People often only see success and never get a glimpse of obstacles overcome and lessons learned along the way. My intention with this blog is always to document for myself, my journey, and to let you in on that experience so that you can add to your own!
And with that I’ve typed out some meditations on the ABC’s of spirituality. I’ll explore what that means to me, and I’d love to hear what it means to you.
A is for Awareness
What is awareness? The simplest explanation is to perceive, or be conscious of, something.
As humans, what distinguishes us from other species, is our awareness of self. We are able to be conscious of our perceptions of ourselves, as well as the world around us.
To me, this is the basis of spirituality. We are the observer and the observed. The universe, experiencing the infinite expression of itself.
To be aware of yourself is to be human, but to be aware of your individual journey as a human, is spirituality.
We all start at different places along the life path. Awareness of that path is the beginning of your spiritual journey.
Things you can bring your awareness to:
Your breath.
You may have heard of mindfulness meditation. The idea is to focus on your breathing and only that. Letting go of everything that is on your mind and focusing on the simplicity of inhaling and exhaling.
Doing this will allow your mind and body to relax. Breathing feels good, it makes space in your body, and it’s necessary to live. You usually don’t have to think about breathing. It is an automatic function and often gets taken for granted.
When you realize that the most important thing for life is breath, and you can have that unconditionally, your mind and body relax into the present moment. You’re able to express gratitude for a thoughtless bodily function. You’re able to practice awareness.
You stop worrying about your worries because the only thing you have to worry about is something you don’t actually have to worry about.
Your attitude.
How to do feel right now? How are you expressing the way you feel with your actions? Are you feeling defeated and kicking up dirt around you? Or are you feeling empowered to learn from your mistakes?
Bringing awareness to your attitude allows you to question why you’re feeling the way you do. Maybe things haven’t been going your way for awhile. Think about how you’ve been acting lately… has your attitude matched your expectations? Being aware of your attitude gives you the opportunity to evaluate it. If you’re attitude hasn’t been helping you get to your goals, make an adjustment.
Your mindset
Attitude is a reflection of your mindset, which determines how much responsibility you take for your life.
If your mindset is fixed, you feel like you aren’t in control of your life. Everything feels predetermined and your abilities are limited.
Having a growth mindset means taking responsibility for the direction of your life. Understanding that you have control over yourself and YOU are your only limitation.
Your Choice.
Think of all the times you’ve said that you didn’t have a choice.
Now think about how untrue that was.
Remember when you were young and you tried to blame doing that bad thing on your friend?
“Mom, I had no choice! They made me do it!” Remember your mom saying, “If your friend told you to jump off a bridge would you do it? No? Then you had a choice.”
Same concept. Everything is a choice. And once you’re aware of that, you can start taking responsibility for it. Own up to your decisions. They got you here. And here is right where you needed to be.
Once you bring your awareness to these aspects of your life, you’ll start to see a shift in patterns. You’ll notice that you are noticing more. You’ll feel more in control of your life, because you ARE in control of your life. You will start to find synchronicities in everyday life that remind you of your spiritual journey.
Without awareness we are animals. It’s not a bad thing to be an animal but we have, and continue, to evolve past that. We have a responsibility to ourselves and our collective conscious to become more aware.
The beauty of awareness is that it’s a gift. For ourselves and for others. As things come into our awareness, we are able to interpret and share that information with others. We get to make someone else aware. And in turn, we all get to learn and grow!
I’ve been aware of my spiritual journey for several years now. I’ve accepted that sharing parts of my spiritual journey is a part of my spiritual journey.
Bringing awareness to my breath reminded me that I have everything I need. Being aware of my attitude taught me that my emotions are powerful tools in expressing myself and understanding those expressions. Bringing awareness to my mindset allowed me to evaluate my approach to life and adopt a mindset of growth and abundance.
I’d like to know what you’ve been aware of lately. Leave me a comment or feel free to share with me your experience with awareness.
This is a 3 part series so stay tuned for the rest of the ABC’s of spirituality.
Kaleah Callaway 