Spiritual Development

What is it? Well it's not 'one size fits all' that's for sure. Everyone has their own Life Journey and people often choose to start their search for personal or spiritual development either during or after a crisis point such as the death of a loved one or a major illness. Another trigger is often that feeling of 'there must be more to life than this..' in the everyday routine.

Some people go to see a Medium, a Psychic or a Tarot reader hoping for everything to be 'fixed' for them. It doesn't work that way.
A reading or a sitting with a spiritual guide is only a step towards what you can do for yourself in relation to the messages that you are given. What you are receiving is information, options and possibilities - you need to take responsibility for what you do with them. Personal Responsibility is the key to any search for spiritual knowledge because it's your life and you choose how you live it and how you respond to situations that arise within it.
 Certain subjects will resonate with you and others won't and there are many ways to approach a search for spirituality in your life but the most effective first step that I know is through meditation. This is how you learn to step back from your physical and logical self and move towards a different, metaphysical experience of 'being'.
I've had wonderful experiences of other 'dimensions' whilst meditating; the most amazing of all was a feeling of being up in the stars, totally enveloped in love and light and 'hearing' a voice tell me that I was safe now. This had huge meaning for me at that point in my development and it gave me the courage to change my outlook in my physical life from fearful to fearless .

So try meditation as a first step - even ten to fifteen minutes a day helps to put things in perspective. It's not easy to learn to do it alone so you may need to search out a good teacher - meditation and mindfullness are popular courses and you'll find the one that's right for you, trust yourself!

Resistance to Success

Why do we resist success? There are many reasons but for me it comes down to fear. Fear of success and not being able to keep 'coming up with the goods', fear of trying  something new (like setting up a website and blogging) and not being a success. Fear of putting myself and my ideas out into the ether for others to see and judge.
 What I keep forgetting is that I need to be able to try new ideas and allow myself to 'fail' or 'succeed' in order to develop as a human being and learn more about my reason for being here on the earth in a physical body.
Failure and success are, after all, a very personal idea based on our individual values. One person's measure of success may be to have all the things money can buy while someone else may see success as having the respect of their peers. Everyone's idea of success and failure is different because each one of us is unique.
So this morning I decided to stop the fear by checking in with my body and concentrating on the physical aspect rather than the mental torture I was inflicting on myself. I went for a swim and an hour later I was able to put things a little more in perspective: I might succeed or fail but I'm having fun just trying something new that I'm passionate and good at. What about you?