The Six Pillars of Soulful Living – Part II

Does the idea of soulful living, living from a calm, happy and empowered place appeal to you? If yes, find out more about how you can, by practicing the six pillars of soulful living. 

Before we go into the next three pillars of soulful living, here’s a quick recap of all the six pillars of soulful living:

1. Simple Living: Living a simple and content life. 
2. Slow Living: Living a slow and mindful life.
3. Peaceful Living: Living a calm and peaceful life.
4. Joyful Living: Living a happy and positive life.
5. Gentle Living: Living a kind and compassionate life.
6. Purposeful Living: Living an empowered and purposeful life.

And now that you have read about the first three pillars of soulful living, lets move to the next three pillars.

PILLAR #4: JOYFUL LIVING: Living a happy and positive life. 

To stay connected to our joy is the simplest purpose of our lives. To be in that state of joyful existence, childlike innocence, hope and excitement, that is the ultimate aim of soulful living. What makes this difficult is that we tend to connect our happiness with the fulfilment of our desires. So, when and only when our desires are fulfilled, do we allow ourselves to be happy. Else, we convince ourselves that we have lost our only ticket to happiness and being miserable is the only option left.

But we have a choice. The choice to be happy, to make the most of what we have. Or the choice to be miserable and hung up about what we didn’t get. When we deeply connect to our soul, we find that joy flows naturally in us. And even when life gets difficult and tumultuous or we experience irreparable losses and soul deep pain, we can still chose to stay positive. Joyful living is not about being ‘haha’ happy or pleasure seeking all the time. Nor is it about pretending to be ok when we are struggling within. Joyful living is about returning to a place, where despite the external conditions we stay open to learning from life, to pro-actively finding solutions and to dreaming again. To finding our joy in the simplest of things and in the grandest of our dreams.

How can we live more ‘Joyfully’?

BY REMEMBERING IT IS A CHOICE

Remember that happiness is our choice. In fact it is our very own innate soul nature to be in a state of peaceful, joyous existence. Yet we often allow so many things to steal our precious joy, from minor irritants to big life events.

• PRACTICAL EXERCISE = CHOOSE HAPPINESS AGAIN & AGAIN: A simple exercise to remember that we have the choice to be happy is to: write this sentence:

‘… and then I chose happiness.’ 

Fill the dots in this sentence with your story, your pain. All the things that you have experienced in life, from a small minor incident that irritated you to a traumatic life shaking event. Let it all out. And in the end, affirm to yourself, that you choose your happiness and smiles over pain and sadness. Let the end of your story be ‘your’ choice to be happy, positive and light. Give joy a chance in your life and consciously choose it again and again. No matter how many times you need to do it.

BY GIVING GENEROUSLY

Nothing brings the soul greater joy than giving to others. So give whatever you can. Give materially if you can. Give hope and kind words to those you find in distress and in pain. And if nothing else, simply give good wishes to anyone and everyone you come across.

• PRACTICAL EXERCISE = GIVE WHAT YOU WANT TO RECEIVE: Whatever it is in life that you wish to receive, that feel you lack and is the core reason for your unhappiness, begin there. Begin to consciously give that very thing to people around you or to someone particular in need. And the generous universe will respond by giving the very thing right back to you. Sheer magic!

BY CULTIVATING GRATITUDE

Every breath we take, every day of this life is a precious precious gift. Simply to be alive, to be able to feel joy and love is the greatest gift from life. Yet on a daily basis, we often chose to take our life for granted. We ignore all the goodness that we have in our lives, all the blessings, for the sake of maybe that one thing we don’t have. But the more we thank the universe and the more we thank life, the more it gives to us.

• PRACTICAL EXERCISE #1 = LIST DOWN YOUR BLESSINGS: Simply list down 5 to 10 things (on paper or mentally) that you are grateful for in the moment, or in your life. This is an easy tool to return to a state of appreciation and gratitude anytime you feel low.

• PRACTICAL EXERCISE #2 = FIND THE ‘GIFT’ IN YOUR HARDSHIPS: As we grow and evolve, we can start to become grateful not only for our blessings, but even for the difficult experiences of our lives. Find the lesson that life is trying to teach you through a difficult experience. And then use that wisdom to find your gift. And take your life in an even higher direction, by using that gift to serve others. That is always the universe’s ultimate plan for us.

PILLAR #5: GENTLE LIVING: Living a kind and loving life. 

Gentle living is about pouring our compassion, love and kindness into the world. Into the lives of those around us and those we meet. It is about treating each other with tenderness, generosity, respect and sensitivity.

How can we live more ‘Gently’?

THROUGH KINDNESS & COMPASSION TOWARDS OTHERS

Kindness is really the core of who we are as pure divine beings. And it is indeed the simplest form of spirituality. If there’s only one thing we can be in any moment, with anyone, then we must be kind. And if we cannot be kind and sensitive to one another’s circumstances and pain, then we are far from being aligned with our true soulful path. Being kind and understanding does not mean we approve of another’s poor actions, bad behaviour or dysfunction. Or that we allow ourselves to be disrespected or mistreated in the name of being kind. But simply that we understand them for a moment and try to understand where those actions or traits are coming from. Understanding means to not hold ‘them’ eternally responsible for our pain. To free ‘them’ and free ourselves. 

• PRACTICAL EXERCISE = IMAGINE THE ‘OTHER’ AS ‘SELF’: What prevents us most often from being kind and sensitive to another, is treating others as separate from us. Place yourself in another’s shoes and imagine what they must be feeling. Try to understand what pain, fear, hurt or anger they are carrying. And then imagine what if they were us. And kindness, understanding and compassion will naturally start to flow towards them.

BY BEING KIND, LOVING AND GENTLE WITH THE ‘SELF’

It is also extremely important to understand that we need to be kind, gentle and caring with ourselves first. And only then we can extend the same kindness and grace to others. We must be gentle with ourselves and honour the journey we have had. And we must be gentle with others and honour their journeys.

• PRACTICAL EXERCISE #1 = MAKE MISTAKES BUT TAKE RESPONSIBILITY: We are all trying to follow the soulful path, yet in our journeys we end up making mistakes, which is ok. We must allow ourself the freedom to make a mistake. But what we cannot allow ourself is to pass on the responsibility for that mistake to someone else as blame. We must own our mistakes, or at least our part in them. And then commit ourself to learning what we need to, so that we don’t repeat them. When we are able to allow our self, the room to mistakes without harsh judgement, guilt and self-blame, it gets easier to offer the same grace to others.

• PRACTICAL EXERCISE #2 =ACCEPT THE ‘WHOLE YOU’ = STRENGTHS + WEAKNESSES: Our strengths come through our weaknesses. Hence it is vital we accept and own not only our strengths but also our weaknesses. When we acknowledge and accept our weaknesses rather than judging them or going into guilt and self-blame, we are able to move on to the next step. To find a way to convert those weaknesses into strengths, slowly and steadily, step by step.  

THROUGH UNIVERSAL LOVE – THE WORLD IS MY FAMILY

When we live with the awareness that we are all universally connected, we are all God’s pure children, it makes everyone we meet and the whole world, really part of our family. If we can treat each soul we meet as our family, being kind, accepting and forgiving becomes easier.

PRACTICAL EXERCISE = WISH FOR OTHERS WHAT YOU WISH FOR YOURSELF: One of the simplest ways we can share our love with all, is by simply wishing for them all that we wish for ourselves. Wish everyone the same level of joy, health, love, success and abundance as you would wish for yourself. And feel your heart expand in joy with this simple, tender act of love. Purity in our intentions for others is a subtle, gentle, yet very powerful act of deep soul love for others.  

PILLAR #6: PURPOSEFUL LIVING: Living an empowered and purposeful life. 

And last, but perhaps the most important pillar of soulful living, is a deep commitment to a higher, grander and more noble purpose for our lives. A purpose that is higher and bigger than simply living for ourself and our joy. And the only way a purpose can be bigger than ourself is when it involves serving others, selflessly.

A life of purpose is a focussed, powerful life where we consciously use our energy in serving others in whatever way we can. We help others, love others and most importantly we empower others to live their best life.

A strong purpose in life is like an anchor. A constant that doesn’t sway up and down with the uncertainties of life and gives us the stability to carry on with our lives. And once we find our purpose, we have a crystal clear path for our life. A sacred path that leads us straight to God, to the Source, to the Divine Almighty, through loving and serving all others.

How can we live more ‘Purposefully’?

BY FINDING OUR HIGHER PURPOSE IN LIFE – A CAUSE THAT IS GREATER THAN ONESELF

There is nothing greater in life than living for a purpose higher than oneself. However we may not always be crystal clear about what our higher purpose is. In fact we may have no idea at all. Hence it is extremely important to be patient with ourselves. To allow ourselves to grow into a clear, strong, higher purpose, through our varied life experiences. Whether we are conscious of it or not, life is often leading us to our higher purpose. And if we pay attention to the signs, and become quick learners of life, we will find our purpose sooner than later.

• PRACTICAL EXERCISE = YOUR PURPOSE = SOUL JOY + SERVING OTHERS: But what do you do, if you have no clue as to what your higher purpose maybe? How do you find it? Two great questions to ask yourself are:

 Q1) What brings my soul the greatest joy? What is it that fills my days with joy and excitement and my soul with deep fulfilment at night?

Q2) How can I use this talent, this skill, this joy of my soul, to serve other souls? How can I use it to help, heal and empower other souls along the way?

When you combine the two, you will find your magic path.

BY COMMITTING TO LIVING WITH DIGNIFIED SOUL VALUES

Whether we are fortunate enough to live our purpose as our full-time worldly occupation or not, we can always commit to a higher spiritual value as our purpose and live our lives in accordance with it. We can identify any core spiritual value that we personally connect with, and we want to live by, as our higher purpose in life. It could be kindness, being kind to all. Or empowerment, empowering all those we meet in some way. It could also be joy, making the lives of others happy, joyful and full of laughter. Whatever we choose, we can live it as our higher purpose in life.

ULTIMATELY AND MOST SIMPLY: BY LOVING OTHERS

Our ultimate purpose and divine duty in this grand journey of life, is to love ourselves and others in whatever way we can. We may not have found our soul-joy purpose, which is alright. We may be struggling to commit to our soul-values and living with them, which is ok, at least we are trying. But what is always in our capacity as divine souls, is the ability to lend a helping hand to another in need. A kind word, a warm hug, a sweet smile, words of hope, our silent supportive presence and heartfelt good wishes. And that truly is, the grandest purpose of our lives, to love one another. And to keep expanding our soul’s capacity to love more and more.

We can commit to any or all of the above six pillars of a soulful life. Or we can even create our very own pillars to support us in in the path of soulful living. What is important is that we create and consistently follow a guiding map for our soul’s journey. And that we do not get caught in the never-ending worldly rush of external life and lose our very essence.

We can lean on these pillars, day after day, to create a simple, happy and content life. A sweetness and light filled life that we love living every day. A life for which we feel eternally grateful and blessed. 

Love & Power, Richa