WALKING ON THE PATH OF SPIRITUALITY

In today's "Blessed" blog post, I would like to share with you some of the things that I've learned and encountered throughout the first month of my stay-cation. In my very first blog post, I discussed how we were going to look at many different aspects of religion and spirituality. I said:

"Here in the Phorbe community we will talk about God’s love, affirmations, the law of attraction, chakras, alignment, meditation, being centered, all of it and more. We will call on experts and interview people with firsthand experience. We will learn together, and I hope throughout it all you will keep and open mind and learn something that will help you towards a better life and take you one step closer to reaching your goals and dreams".

So far, I've been pretty timid in my approach to "BLESSED" blogging as I didn't want to rock the boat. However, as I've said before, I have reached a new understanding of my spirituality and I would like to share this with the Phorbe community in hopes that it will helps some of you too. Many of the topics discussed below are topics that require an open mind. So, if you are not ready to be fee and open with your interpretation of what you read, I suggest you skip this blog post and come back to it when you're ready.

Without further ado, here are five things I've learned and encountered on my stay-cation so far:

1. Higher Self vs. Lower Self

The very first thing I learned, that started my journey, was the concept of the higher and the lower self. I was asking myself the question: why is it that I am always so gung-ho to help other people and organizations (jobs) reach their goals and dreams, yet when it comes to my goals and dreams I hit a wall. Don't get me wrong, I have seen a lot of my dreams become reality. However, my deepest darkness dreams have yet to make any traction. In fact, the only one of the goals that I have accomplished is Phorbe. I started doing some research and came upon this concept.

The way I understand it is, every person on this earth has an aura. Your aura is made up of your thoughts and feelings. This aura or form is a spiritual reflection of your thoughts, feelings, and physical body that emanates and vibrates your ideas, sensory images, and even information about your physical body in the spirit world. Negative thoughts and emotions vibrate on a low and slow spectrum. Positive thoughts and feelings vibrate higher and faster.

Each of us has a higher self. This higher part of our spirit, our aura is us at our best. We vibrate at a higher frequency because we are connected with our spirituality and we are one with our purpose in life. This is how God intended for us to function. However throughout time and over history, humans have developed a multitude of layers that have overshadowed and buried our higher selves. All of those layers together create your lower self. That part of yourself that gives into temptations, jealousy, and all of the negative traits that each of us deal with in our own way.

The lower self is also called the Ego. Each layer of the lower self represents one of our weaknesses. All of these layers are covering our higher self and prevent us from vibrating at a higher frequency. Even worse, some of us are so ashamed of or embarrassed by our lower - self that we have put up a mask to cover that lower self. This is done subconsciously, most of the time you don't know you've put up a mask until the mask starts to break. The mask helps protect us from unwanted scrutiny and humiliation, but in the end it's only a band aid. It can't fix the problem just cover it up.

The goal of the spiritual journey is to remove the layers of the ego to reveal the higher self, the enlightened self. This means removing your mask and facing each layer head on. Think of your higher self as a source of light covered by soil ( your ego). In some places where the soil isn't so thick, light shines through. These are the areas of our life where we have already reached our higher selves. The goal is to dig through and remove all of the soil so that we can let our higher selves free.

It was in learning and accepting this concept, plus seeking council from my mentor Lisa, where I discovered some things about myself. While I may have thought that I was over the trauma of growing up homeless and all that comes with it, I am not. My ego consists of many layers of brokenness, anger, frustration, and sadness from all that trauma mixed with other emotions of not feeling worthy or deserving of having my dreams come true. Trust and believe, I know that I can do anything I put my mind to. Yet, at the same time, I am terrified that once I put in the work, once I achieve all of my goals, people will realize who Jasmine really is and take everything, I worked so hard to accomplish, away from me. I've been wearing a mask ever since I moved into the dorms of Chapman University...that's seven years. I've been hiding all of this mess from the world and myself.

It's time to face this trauma, let go of it, and break free.

For more on the higher self vs. the lower self check out this link!

2. The Trifecta of Spirituality

Once I decided that it was time to break free of my mask and face my ego, I began researching how to start your spiritual journey. In all the research that I found, every source listed three things to do to gain a deeper connection with your higher self and start breaking through the layers of your ego. If you don't do anything at all, at least do these three things: meditate, pray, & journal.

The good news is, in an effort to help all of you, Phorbe Queens, realize your Summer Goals, I have already began working on these things. My goal now, was to implement them into my life as daily practices.

Praying

If you missed it, I did a whole blog post on how to pray back in May, check that out here!

In my daily practicing, I began praying, first thing, every morning when I woke up and last thing every night before I go to bed. I am trying to get back into the habit of praying over my meals. I also want to build a relationship with god where we become so close that I feel comfortable talking to him out loud at any time, as I explained in my very first "Blessed" blog post here.

In an effort to reconnect with God, I have signed up for some small groups at Church and have started re-reading the Purpose Driven Life. The goal is not just to pray to God, but to spend time with him every day reading the bible and getting to know him and his goals and purpose for me.

Meditating

I've tried and failed so many times at meditating consistently, but now I have found the holy grail: guided meditations on Youtube. This is that fire. Now, I absolutely love meditating and I feel that if I miss a day, my whole day is jacked. Meditation really allows you to let your physical form rest while you consult and spend time with your spiritual self, your true self. This is all you boo, there's no masks in here because there's no one to hide from.

I use guided meditations with the goals of releasing negative emotions and thoughts, letting go of anxiety and fear, and unearthing suppressed emotions. I used flvto.com, to download the audio from each of my favorite meditations to my phone. So now, no matter where I am I can meditate.

In this blog post, I talked about how much easier meditating is with consistency and help from guided meditations. I also spoke about the joy and lessons learned from being consistent in writing in my journal every morning and evening.

3. Morning and Evening Routines

I briefly touched on my new morning and evening spiritual routines in my last blog post. I came across Kendra Justine from Pretty Boss TV in my research and Thank God I did. This Queen is well versed in all things Spiritual. I've been binge watching her videos to absorb all the knowledge she drops on a daily.

I found #PrettyBossTV on the first day of my spiritual journey. I found her morning and evening routines a couple of hours later. The goals of these routines is to help you be proactive in your spiritual work and allow you to tap into your higher self right at the beginning of your day. The best part, each of these includes an element from the Spiritual Trifecta. So you'll be well on your way towards reaching your higher self. Instead of explaining them further, I will just leave these here:

Night Routine

This one is still a bit difficult for me to do because I am so used to falling asleep to the sounds of my favorite shows Bobs Burgers or Family Guy. So, I can't say that I follow this ritual every night, but when I do, I definitely notice a difference in my quality of sleep and my mood and energy the next day.

Morning Routine

I have only missed this routine three times since I started my spiritual journey and as I said with meditating, each of those three days were horrible days where I let my ego self get the best of me. But when I do this routine and then add on my daily reading and my coursework for the book The Artist's Way, I wake up on a mission with a positive heart and mind ready to conquer the world. I use photos of my siblings to open my eyes to and I pray to God.

4. The Power in Listening

There's so much power in being still and just listening to your soul or listening to God speak. The spiritual trifecta has definitely helped me appreciate this a lot more. It was hard at first, as I am so used to being on the go, go, go and being quiet is not my forte. But, since I have become more consistence in my practice and more proactive in my spiritual healing, the epiphanies have been monumental, the realizations profound, and the creative ideas have been genius.

I have gained deeper access to myself. I found Jasmine again and in finding her I've started to get to know her again. I've learned that there is just as much good as there is mess in my life. My purpose is meant for me and is not something I just made up. My career plans have become more focused and a lot more terrifying; which is good.

At times it's a bit much. I'm not basic by any means. There are many dreams floating around inside me and sometimes they're all overwhelming. This is where those three days of just saying fuck it have come in to play. I've found that being on a spiritual journey and committing yourself to your purpose is a decision you have to make over and over again every day almost every hour. Okay, I just finished the third thing on my to-do list for the day. I have one more thing to do, but I'm tired and want to go to bed. Right there, I have to make the decision. Which is more important. Am I willing to sacrifice an hour of sleep to get this last thing done.

The goal is not to be hard on yourself and remember each new day is an opportunity to do better, be better, and work harder than yesterday. Retraining your mind, falling in love with yourself, and working on your goals all of this takes time. It won't happen over night. That's why it's called a spiritual JOURNEY.

5. My Spirit Guide

Her name is Amy she has bright red hair and bright blue eyes. She is charming, witty, and exactly who my spirit guide needs to be. She tells it to me straight but is also compassionate. I love her already.

We met two weeks ago. I found a guided meditation on encountering your spirit guide. The first time, I did this meditation she was there and I cried. She told me to get ready because this next year, everything that I've been trying so hard to get going the past 7 years will finally be put into practice. The life I've been asking for, praying for, and working for will be mine and things will start falling into place like the most epic game of tetris. She told me that my real goal for my stay-cation is to re-train my mind and let go of the negative thoughts and emotions that are holding me back.

Since that first encounter, I have met with her in that same guided meditation three more times. She even shows up in my other meditations. She gives me new ideas and helps me answer questions that are heavy on my heart. I should say, the whole creative plan for Phorbe and the Queen Maree brand has changed from what it was a month ago. It's now more daring, more scary, but more thrilling at the same time. The timeline has shifted and although that was annoying at first, I am learning to trust the process.

Everything Amy tells me she tells me straight from God. It's like she is the one way messenger. It's....wild. But I always feel safe when I encounter her and I always feel like what she says is truth.

If you think you're ready to encounter your spirit guide, check out this guided meditation that helped me meet Amy:

Woo, that was a lot. I told you, this stay-cation hasn't been all fun and games. I've been putting in work!

What do you think Queens? Is there anything that stands out to you? Something you want to learn more about? My goal is to start inviting some guest bloggers into the community to begin touching on each of these concepts a little more deeply. Which expert do you think I should bring in first? Let me know in the comment section below!

It's a beautiful day to conquer the world. So go forth and slay!

-Queen Maree

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED SEPTEMBER 12, 2018