How Spiritual Practices Contribute To Personal Growth
Spirituality is the science of the Spirit or the Soul. Spirituality is not about seeking something on the outside but a journey of discovering oneself by going onward, forward, upward, Godward and most importantly, inward. The journey of discovering oneself and the realization of the truth of self, life and God is what Spirituality is all about.
Spirituality involves an undying yearning to attain the Divine. The ultimate goal of Spirituality is also the ultimate purpose of life for which, one has to set the goal and go on a quest seeking the goal. Some people get confused when spiritual people say that their ultimate goal is to attain the Divine. They think that these are religious people but only when one sets his path in the spiritual journey, does he truly understand that seeking the Divine is nothing to do with what we call, God. In religion, God has a form, a name, a birthdate and even a date when he dies. In Spirituality, we believe that there exists a higher power that is the most powerful of all. It is a Supreme Power. This Power is formless, nameless, ageless, does not have a birth and does not undergo death. This Power is energy, it is Supreme and is immortal — a Supreme Immortal Power, SIP, that may be worshipped in different religions in different forms. The path of Spirituality also teaches that all living creatures, whether it is birds, animals, bees, insects or humans, have Soul in them. Soul is a Spark Of Unique Life. The Soul is life energy within each living creature which makes them breathe and makes their heart, beat. This life energy or Soul is like a wave that emerges from the ocean of the Supreme energy or SIP and after the death of the creature, merges back into SIP. Therefore, every living creature comes out of the Divine and merges back into the Divine. We are all manifestations of the Divine.
Various spiritual practices like meditation, being in Yoga, gaining knowledge, being in silence and service to humanity brings one closer to the Divine and thus, closer to oneself. These spiritual pursuits increase the self-awareness of an individual, which will ultimately lead to Self-Realization and Life-Realization. Spiritual practices lead to a greater knowledge and deep wisdom about life, birth, death and the concept of Karma. An individual who is spiritually inclined, who is on his spiritual journey and who has accumulated the wealth of knowledge understands and realizes that whatever is happening in life is due to Karma. Karma or the Universal Law of Action and Reaction is one of the basic tenets in Spirituality. So, when one accepts the Law of Karma, he stops being adversely emotionally impacted when something goes wrong in his life. He accepts the situation, his circumstances and maybe even rejoices in the misery, realizing that now he has reaped the fruits for his bad Karma and can do his best to do good Karma in life. The attitude of accepting every situation in life, good or bad, makes an individual emotionally resilient and strong. He will do his best and leave the rest to the Divine and Karma.
Thus, concluding this discussion, we can say that Spirituality is the science of the Spirit or the Soul, the very essence of life. Spiritual practices takes man towards the ultimate goal of realizing the purpose of life, realizing the self and realizing that the Divine is within each one of us, thereby, increasing self-awareness, leading to emotional and personal growth of a person and making him strong and resilient to face any situation in life.
