Walking the Spiritual Path: Keep going through the tough times

The secret to change is to focus all your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new. Socrates

Let the light of your heart lift you, let your soul carry you. This is not a burden you are meant to hold onto, but rather let go of as you become who you are truly meant to be. Unknown

Making progress along the spiritual path can be hard sometimes. The old ways of doing things hold on tight. With the best of intentions, we fall back into old patterns. We lose track of where we are and what we are doing. The old familiar ways seem comforting and easier.

This is the illusion of the ego and conscious mind. Remember this — the ego — is the part of you that never wanted to walk the spiritual path to begin with and is looking for any opportunity to bail. It’s an energy that kicks you when you are down and says it’s too hard, and really you should just stop now.

That’s like saying that you should stay in the house you’ve always lived in. Yes, it’s next to the city dump. It smells so bad on a hot day it makes you gag, and you are pretty sure the water is poisoning you. But, hey…. Your stuff is unpacked and it would take so much energy to move. It will be hard, and expensive and blah, blah, blah. The excuses go on and on.

When the old pulls us back into what we don’t want, the easy excuses are always there. The easy excuses are always wrong. At the end of the day, the spiritual path is all we have. The journey inward is the only one worth following. On the hard days, sometimes we just need to remember that.

“It always seems impossible until it’s done.” Nelson Mandela