10 things spirituality taught me

We often talk about mind, body, and spirit, but the latter usually makes us highly uncomfortable talking. It's taken me all of a year to find the courage to go against the grain and talk about something seldomly discussed on LinkedIn. I wanted to share some of the things I've learned about this period of spiritual experimentation and adventure. I wish I'd known some of the things before starting my exploration, and some of the things that I found were most of the value. I'm sure I'll keep adding to the list, but in the meantime, these are my thoughts… 

1. Spirituality is VERY polarizing

Ok, now let's start with the elephant in the room. My god! I have been branded a 'witch' by my mother, and not in a funny way. I had had some heated debates with people close to me. On the other hand, I've had clients love that I use tarot in my work now, and friends praise me for embracing my interests publicly despite knowing it's not a lot of people's come of tea. I realized that people don't like things they don't understand or don't know much about, and at times that makes them afraid of it. I get it, but to anyone, regardless of the subject or experience, I would keep an open mind and don't knock it till you try it. 

2. Spirituality is a magnet for like-minded people

I've mentioned before my motivation for moving to Berlin being more opportunities to learn and explore spirituality. I wasn't wrong! What was surprising was the average age of those people. When I went to personal development events in London, I was always the youngest by a long way, but in every event I attended, all people of my age were refreshing. It's not that I mind older people; in fact, 90% of my friends are 10-20 years older than me, but I think that's mainly due to not coming across many people doing the things that I was enjoying doing.

3. Spirituality is personal development but on steroids

I have been into personal development for the past five years, but nothing has accelerated my growth and presence quite like spiritual development. This period has hands down been my most significant transformation to date. For me, it's the part that I see missing in a lot of personal or professional development offerings. We are constantly focused on the mind, especially in the business world, and I think slowly we're starting to understand the importance of body but soul work, which seems far behind in terms of being mainstream. Without soul work, you miss out on the holistic approach of the whole self. 

4. Spirituality is a waste of money

Every single penny I spent on my spiritual quest has been entirely worth but here's the thing, did I learn anything I didn't know? What I mean by that is when I learned about my soul purpose being a healer and a messenger, that my ideal career, according to my birth chart, is to be a guide, teacher, and influencer, were these things I didn't know, the answer is no. However, where the things I truly believed in, no. So while I learned nothing groundbreakingly new about myself, I learned to believe and trust my path and myself a lot more.

5. Spirituality is already present in your life

This was something that caught me by surprise. When I looked back at some of the experiences I'd had in life, I realised how much spirituality and magic were already in my life. How much I was already unconsciously working with the universe to achieve the things I wanted to. I know that I have had an unusually successful early career both in the corporate world and running my own business. Now I'm not trying to downplay my hard work, and I'm not justifying luck, but it turns out I'm very, very good at manifesting my goals and being in tune with synchronicity. 

6. Spirituality does things therapy can't do

This may be a bit controversial, especially as I know many of the subscribers of this newsletter are therapists but hear me out. A lot of traditional therapy is very 'mind' focused. So I found that spiritual practices sometimes went a lot deeper because they work with the soul. I would also say that some of the more recent work I've done with a consciousness coach has made me realise that some of the choices based on the work I did in therapy would have been different now that I have the knowledge that I have and the transformation I've been through. 

7. Spirituality needs space to breathe

When I was leaving, my partner and I explained that I was leaving because I needed space and time to be on my own. I could tell this was something I needed to do on my own. It was the best and most challenging thing I did last year, but it was the right thing for me to transform. That's not to say become a hermit, but I listened to what I needed at that moment, honoured it, and gave myself space and time to go on the journey and integrate my experiences. 

8. Spirituality is great to find your purpose

I am all for finding your purpose; it's something I am hugely passionate about; however, the way you find your purpose is something I'm not tied to. I think that finding your purpose is something you can do in many different ways. What I didn't expect was that spirituality was an avenue to being able to find your purpose. While I wasn't surprised to discover my soul purpose of being on this planet to raise consciousness and show people how to transform their darkness into light, it took my purpose to a whole new level, so much so it's now influenced my work and business. 

9. Spirituality is difficult to explain

I've found writing this series particularly challenging. I've felt that it's been tough to convey what I've felt and the level of transformation I've been through. On this occasion, words don't quite seem to do it; maybe that's my assumption you can tell me. I find that there have been moments that have been just so indescribable or mind-blowing to experience personally. I've often found that if you're talking to people that don't have any spiritual knowledge, I've often thought, "Oh my god, when I explain this to people, I'm going to sound crazy."

10. Spirituality restored my faith

I talked in my first article of this series about my religious beliefs, and after I renounced my Catholicism, something else took its place very naturally. I swapped praying for a God to praying to the universe. The more I worked with spirituality, learning more about it, the more I experienced the magic of it in my everyday life and the more of a relationship I built with it. I soon realised I had renewed my faith, but this time, I was choosing what I wanted to believe in for myself and something that I wholeheartedly believed in.

I also want to say my intention isn't to make you convert to spirituality, far from it. My purpose with this newsletter is to share what is working for me in my healing process. As I've said previously, each person's journey looks different. When I started this newsletter, I never in a million years thought I'd write this four-part series, but here we are! I hope you've enjoyed reading it as much as I've enjoyed writing it. Next week we'll be back to the therapy, psychology, and mental health blogs.

I would love to know if you enjoyed this spiritual series?

With love and care,

Alex

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Hi there, I'm Alex. If we haven't met before, nice to meet you, and thank you for taking the time out to read my newsletter. If you enjoyed it, you could hit subscribe to be notified and if you liked it, feel free to like, share or add a comment. I'm running a workshop on finding you voice at the end of the month, if you're interested you can sign up here. If you want to connect with me in other ways, you can find me on Instagram here, or you can also sign up for my Authentic Alex newsletter that covers topics such as creativity, purpose, presence, leadership, and storytelling.

About Alex: At the age of 24 Alex found herself employed as the Head of Training and Development for a Foreign Exchange Company in The City. After experiencing her very own quarter-life crisis, she decided to leave the corporate world and create her own definition of success. On the day she left that job she wrote a post that went viral on LinkedIn.

Since then she’s been named LinkedIn Top Voice UK twice for her mental health and personal growth content and has become an official LinkedIn Learning Instructor. She's also the co-founder of #LinkedInLocal, a global movement creating communities in over 100 countries and 1,000 cities.

She’s best known for blogging under the hashtag #AuhtenticAlex where she smashes one stigma at a time and writes about her therapy journey with the aim of inspiring others to transform their traumas into triumphs.

She now helps individuals and businesses grow their presence on LinkedIn, find their sense of purpose, awaken their creativity and tell their stories. You can find out more about her and the brand here: www.fromtraumatotriumph.co.