Spiritual Awakening, is like waking up from a dream. When we live like we are sleeping, we are just numb to, consciousness. Spirituality, or “of the spirit” are our thoughts. The concept of spiritual awakening, is that life isn’t random, there is a pattern and purpose to every existence. Deepak Chopra calls this Synchro-destiny. Every moment is pre-destined, it is as it should be. The reason that challenges arise is simple are to make us more aware of our inner purpose and destiny.
Introduction to Spiritual Awakening
Why is life so difficult? It can be said that if you are not facing challenges, you are dead!
The bible says teaches “like fish caught in a net, problems show up unexpectedly.”
Somehow life manages to bring difficult problems, the causes of untold suffering and struggle. How you meet your challenges makes all the difference between the promise of success and, spiritual awakening, and the specter of failure. Successful people look at solutions while unsuccessful people only see the problem. Spiritual Awakening, can help solve internal struggles.
Eckhart Tolle says “we should live life accepting what comes our way; not being too happy when good things happen to us and not being too sad when bad things happen to us. Live in the now”.
When your, awareness, or, spirituality, expands events that seemed random begin to arrange themselves in a pattern; you become aware of a larger purpose and notice these events are actually related to the greater whole. Just as our bodies operate in a state of Homeostasis; in a similar way events and coincidences are all connected and are part of God's plan for your purpose. When you become, awakened, your purpose (which is unique for each person) you become like an architect who has been handed a blueprint of his or her, spirituality. Instead of laying bricks and fitting pipes at random, the architect can now proceed with confidence that he knows what the building should look like and how to construct it that's, spiritual awakening.
The first step in this process is recognizing what level of, awareness, you are working from right now. Every time a challenge comes your way, whether it is about relationships, work, personal transitions, or a crisis that demands action. It demands, spiritual awakening.
There are three levels of Spiritual Awakening.
Become aware of them, and you will take a huge step toward becoming a sorcerer and tapping into, spirituality.
Level 1: Contracted Awareness or no Spirituality
This is the level of the problem, and therefore it immediately grabs your attention. If all you see is the problem, then you need, spiritual awakening. Something has gone wrong. Expectations have turned sour. You face obstacles that don’t want to move. As resistance mounts, your situation still doesn’t improve because you are not tapping into your, spirituality. If you examine the level of the problem, the following elements are generally present:
Your desires are thwarted. Something you want is meeting with opposition. You feel as if every step forward is a battle.
You keep doing more of what never worked in the first place.
Your mind isn’t clear. There is confusion and inner conflict.
As frustration mounts, your energy is depleted. You feel more and more exhausted because you need to wake up, you need, spiritual awakening.
You can tell if you are stuck at the level of contracted, spiritual awakening, by one simple test:
Do you feel like the more you struggle to get free of the problem, the more you are trapped in it? In addition the law of attraction states that what you think about you bring about. The end result is that you get on the wave of negative thoughts , your, spirituality, that attract more of the same so not only does your problem not get resolved; but you attract more problems into your circumstance. Meditation, with positive thoughts, smiling, prayer, repeating positive mantras or scriptures are ways to create positive energies and break the negative cycle and start you, spiritual awakening.
Level 2: Expanded Awareness or Spiritual Awakening
This is the level where solutions begin to appear. Your vision extends beyond the conflict, giving you more clarity. You are becoming one with your, spirituality. For most people this level isn’t immediately available, because their first reaction to a crisis is to contract and feel the pain of the situation. They become defensive, wary, and fearful. But if you allow yourself to expand, you will find that the following elements enter your, awareness:
The need to struggle begins to diminish. You put the problem in God's hands.
You start to let go. You stand on the principle that all roads lead to your destination
More people connect with you. You get council
You approach decisions with confidence.
You meet fear realistically (fear is perceived) and it starts to lessen.
With clearer vision, you no longer feel confused and conflicted.
You can tell that you have reached this level of, awareness, when you no longer feel stuck; a process has begun. With greater expansion, unseen forces come to your aid. You move forward according to what you desire from your life, your, awareness, and, spirituality.
Level 3: Pure Spiritual Awakening or Enlightenment
Pure, spiritual awakening, is when no problems exist. You have transcended suffering as Buddha did. Every challenge is a creative opportunity. You feel completely aligned with the forces of nature. You have aligned with your, spiritual awakening, and your, spirituality. What makes this possible is that, awareness, can expand without limits. Although it may seem that it takes long time to have true mastery of your mind and get on the, spiritual awakening, path to reach pure, awareness; the truth is exactly the opposite. At every moment pure, awareness, is in contact with you, sending creative impulses. All that matters is how open you are to the answers being presented. When you are fully open, the following elements will be present: There is no struggle.
You are present in the now. Your mind is not busy with noise about the past or anticipating the future.
Desires reach fulfillment spontaneously.
The next thing you want is the best thing that could happen to you. You are a benefit to yourself and your surroundings.
The outer world reflects what is happening in your inner world.
You feel completely safe. You are at home in the Universe.
You view yourself and the world with compassion and understanding.
To be completely established in pure, awareness, of, spirituality, and, enlightenment, is the basis of, spirituality, a state of unity with everything in existence. Ultimately, every life is moving in that direction. Without attaining the final goal, you can tell that you are in contact with pure, awareness, if you feel truly yourself, in a state of peace and freedom.
Each of these levels brings its own kind of experience. This can be easily seen when there is a sharp contrast or a sudden change. Love at first sight takes a person without warning from contracted, awareness, to expanded, awareness, and is a, spiritual, experience. Instead of relating in the normal social way, suddenly you see immense appeal, even perfection, in one other person. In creative work there is the “Aha!” experience. Instead of wrestling with a blocked imagination, suddenly the answer presents itself, fresh and new! No one doubts that such epiphanies exist. They can be life changing, as in the so- called peak experience, when reality is flooded with light and a revelation dawns. What people don’t see is that expanded, awareness, should be our normal state, not a moment of extraordinary difference.
Problems with, Spirituality
Listening to people tell their stories of problems, obstacles, failure, and frustration (an existence trapped in contracted, awareness, and, spirituality, one sees that reaching a new vision is critical. It is all too easy to get lost in particulars. The difficulties of facing each challenge are often overwhelming. No matter how intensely you feel your situation, which has its own unique difficulties, if you look to the right and left, you will see others who are just as caught up in their situations. Strip away the details, and what remains is a general cause of suffering: lack of, awareness, that everything is impermanent. Unless you are shown how to expand your, awareness, you have no choice but to experience the state of contraction caused from pain and suffering.
Just as the body flinches when faced with physical pain, the mind has a reflex that makes it draw back when faced with mental pain. Tony Robbins says that “people move away from pain and towards pleasure” Here again, a moment of sudden contrast makes it easy to experience what contraction feels like. Imagine yourself in any of the following situations:
You are a young mother who has taken your child to the playground. You chat for a moment with another mother, and when you turn around, you can’t see your child.
At work you are sitting at your computer when someone casually mentions that there are going to be layoffs, and by the way, the boss wants to see you.
You open your mailbox and find a letter from the Internal Revenue Service and you remembered that you do not have your receipts.
While driving you approach an intersection when, out of the blue, a car behind you swerves past your car and runs a red light.
You walk into a restaurant and see your spouse sitting with an attractive companion. They are leaning in toward each other, holding hands and talking in low voices.
It doesn’t take much imagination to feel the sudden change of, awareness, that these situations provoke. Panic, anxiety, anger, and apprehension flood your mind; these are the result of brain changes as the lower brain takes precedent over the higher brain, triggering the release of adrenaline as part of an array of physical responses known as the stress response. Any feeling is both mental and physical. The brain gives a precise representation of what the mind is experiencing, drawing on infinite combinations of electro chemical signals coursing through one hundred billion neurons. A brain researcher can pinpoint with ever-increasing accuracy exactly those regions that produce such changes. What cannot be seen on an MRI is the mental event that incites all these changes, because the mind functions at the invisible level of awareness or consciousness. We can take these two terms as synonyms, but let’s explore them a little.
Business Problems created from lack of Spiritual Awakening
Spirituality, deals with your state of, awareness. It isn’t the same as medicine or psychotherapy. Medicine deals in the physical aspect where bodily changes occur. Psychotherapy deals with a specific difficulty, such as anxiety, depression, or actual mental illness. Spirituality, confronts, awareness, directly. It aims to produce higher consciousness. In our society this is seen as less real than the other ways of approaching problems. In times of trouble, people cope as best as they can with a swirling confusion of fear, anger, mood swings, and everyday struggle. It doesn’t even occur to them to pair the two words, spirituality, and solution in the same sentence; this points to a limited vision about what spirituality really is, and what it can do for you. We must incorporate our non-physical being with our physical body to solve everyday problems.
Anxiety, in teenagers and young adults is much more than a phase. It's a real condition that can interfere with daily life, lead to, depression, and suicidal thoughts.
In this interview, I am speaking with Megan Gallagher, mental health advocate and Tedx speaker.
While growing up, Megan experienced chronic, anxiety, and panic attacks, as well as body image issues. Inspired by the lack of honest conversations among her peers/teachers about “real life topics”. After therapy and healing, she dove headfirst into making that change in the public school system! Gallagher currently speaks at middle schools and high schools about, mental health, self-care, following your dreams & mindfulness. She has spoken at over 500 schools and been featured in major media outlets like Forbes Magazine, Entrepreneur Magazine, The Today Show, OK! Magazine, NBC news, FOX news and Yahoo!
Listen to the full interview here:
How did you traverse your painful childhood? What exactly caused your, anxiety, and how did you become an, anxiety, and, mental health advocate?
Growing up as a youth I can remember as early as elementary school, I have vivid memories of just sitting in class and noticing my stomach churning and getting really sweaty under my armpits. All these things would happen and I didn't really know what triggered these spiral of symptoms.
I would think I ate something weird at lunch or maybe something's not sitting right on my stomach or even that I had stomach flu.
My mom figured that I was more sensitive than my sister and needed more attention. I wanted just to be alone. Going to crowded public places really overwhelmed me. My parents would say Megan tends to freak before an event happens so they would try to find ways to calm me down.
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It wasn't until I was 13 years old in eighth grade about to graduate to go to high school, that I became aware of my emotions and become in tune with my body. These, anxiety attacks, were really scary and they came out of nowhere.
I would be sitting in a classroom and I felt like I was like coming out of my skin. Just wanting to get up and go the bathroom and just breathe. Freaking out, I like didn’t want to be around people, I just wanted to just have a moment for myself.
Myrna – Do you think you are in introvert? Did you put a label on it?
Megan – I’m actually the most social extroverted person ever. I thrive off of being around people and I love having a big friend group and I love hanging out with people, so I wouldn't say I'm an introvert, I would say I'm have high functioning, anxiety.
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Teenagers, can go one of two ways with Anxiety and Depression :
People who show their, depression, and, anxiety, through shutting down. They kind of isolate themselves.
I handled my, anxiety, and found comfort in talking about my feelings. I just love talking and being around people. I loved being around people hosting events and parties.
Now that I'm 24, I don't really get the, anxiety attacks, but I still have anxious moments.
I learned how to handle it though. I know how to stop the negative thoughts before they turn into a full-blown, anxiety attack.
My, anxiety, continued into high school. I remember so well gearing up during the summer and counting down the days until my first day of high school. I had the normal thoughts of you know, where's my locker. What if I get lost in this new school. The what if thoughts would fuel my, anxiety.
How to Control your Anxiety by being in the moment.
Now I know I should have stayed in the present moment, my mind was trying to anticipate what's gonna happen two months from now, one month, 3 weeks etc. But the truth of the matter is we can't control the future.
With, anxiety, you have such a fear of losing control. For people with, anxiety, being in control is what they want.
My, anxiety, has manifested itself in different ways throughout my life. When I was younger in high school, my, anxiety, manifested in an eating disorder. I was too anxious to eat in school, so I would starve myself all day and then binge at night.
My, anxiety, showed up where my mind would just black out. I would feel like I got shot off into space and then I would get hot and sweaty and see stars. It was so scary and so uncomfortable in public.
Anxiety, can mimic a heart attack or a stroke or it can mimic other life-threatening health conditions.
My freshman sophomore year of high school I was a mess, in constant, anxiety, mode. My mind would calculate that an episode happened at 9 00 a.m. in English class, so then the next day my body, that internal clock started saying it's 9 a.m. Yesterday I got an, anxiety attack, so I would have another, anxiety attack, thinking about the last, anxiety attack. It was a vicious cycle. I got so deep in the ditch I felt like a prisoner to my own mind.
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My, anxiety, had reached a point where I felt like I was being cornered in a wall, so I had to ask for help. I sat my parents down and told them what had been going on with me for years. They told me that, mental illness, and, anxiety, runs on my dad's side of the family and what I have it's called, anticipatory anxiety.
They scheduled me in therapy and told me your first session is next week.
Forms of Therapy for, Anxiety.
Talk therapy where it's just the typical talking while the Therapist takes notes.
Hypnotherapy where you lie on a couch and the Therapist puts you in a hypnotic state where you can reach your subconscious mind.
EFT Tapping for, anxiety, and fear. EFT is the abbreviation for Emotional Freedom Techniques, an effective self-help tool for calming anxiety and fear. EFT is like acupuncture for emotional healing, but you can do it for yourself and there are no needles, just tapping on a sequence of calming meridian points with your fingertips.
I am such an advocate for therapy. I think everyone who suffers from, anxiety, should do therapy because every single person on this planet has their own stuff. It doesn't have to have been something traumatic; but every person has baggage.
My therapist in high school told me “Megan everyone in life has baggage.” Just like people getting on a plane, some just have a little carry-on while some have like four suitcases. Some people have designer baggage, others have a trash bag; but everyone has something to bring on the plane.
What made you become a, Mental Health Advocate, talking in Middle and High Schools?
My therapist also taught me your mind is like a dog on a leash. When you walk your dog outside and you let the dog do its thing while on the leash. The dog just want to take off; but you have to maintain control of the dog on the leash. You mind is the same way, it wants to take off and anticipate everything and then get, anxiety attacks, but you have to reign it back in. You are still in control of the leash.
When I talk in schools, I try to teach teenagers that they are in control of their minds.
We're in a pandemic right now and people are getting, anxiety attacks, worrying about the future, worrying if they are going to find a job, it they are going to loose their homes.
Why do you think there is an epidemic of teenagers with, Anxiety, and Depression?
Teenagers were always having a problem with, depression, and, anxiety. A lot of people blame it on the social atmosphere, the social culture. The culture we live in today it's so different from the 80s or the 90s even the early 2000s. A huge switch happened when social media like Facebook and Myspace took off. Now there's Tumblr, there's Twitter, there's, Tic Tock, there’s Instagram. It's insane but it is important to remember social media does the same thing to human beings as, anxiety, it triggers the fear of missing out. Oh I didn't get invited to that party that I see on snap chat, oh my gosh what's going on with me, my friends are posing on a yacht with a celebrity, so their life must be better than mine.
Social media it really is a very negative thing and I think it's important to really be aware of how does it make you feel?Before you go on Instagram versus after you get off Instagram. If you are feeling, anxiety, or, depression, after you go on social media, you should cut back your time on it to like 20 minutes a day instead of scrolling for hours.
Here are some of the signs that your Teenager is Depressed
Since teenagers are often moody, it can be difficult to recognize when your son or daughter has become depressed, and might need help. The thing people tend to notice first is withdrawal, or when the teenager stops doing things she usually likes to do. There might be other changes in her mood, including sadness or irritability. Or in her behavior, including, appetite, energy level, sleep patterns and academic performance. If several of these symptoms are present, be vigilant about the possibility of teen, depression.
This is especially important because by the time family members and other people around a teenager note her lack of interest in most things. She’s usually been depressed for some time. Depression, is an internalizing disorder, i.e. one that disturbs a patient’s emotional life, rather than an externalizing one, which takes the form of disruptive or problematic behavior. As such, it takes a while not only for others to recognize it but often for the patient herself to realize that her thinking, and emotional responses, are disturbed.
What your main message for teenagers battling with, Anxiety?
My main message is follow your dreams in life. Once upon a time, it feels like a decade ago, when I went was allowed to speak at schools, I talked about, mental health, anxiety, and self-care. I touched on a lot subjects; but the main takeaway was follow your passions. First fill up your cup, take care of yourself and get to know your body.
Connect with Megan for speaking or to hear any of her work on Instagram @ meganwgallegher on Linkedin @ Megan Gallagher
