Spiritual Stress
Why You Feel Lost and How To Reconnect With Yourself
I first came across the term spiritual stress in the book ‘Unstressable’ by Mo Gawdat and Alice Law. As soon as I read about it, I had epiphany after epiphany.
We often speak of stress as: physical stress, or even emotional stress. Often the emphasis is placed on circumstances that are challenging, or how we cope with situations emotionally. Yet, underneath all the layers of stress, the root cause of strong stress is almost always spiritual stress.
Spiritual stress is when you no longer find meaning, purpose, and you are disconnected from life. This happens when the way you are living is not aligned with your soul’s path and journey. Often we feel this disconnect as a profound misalignment, a deep dissatisfaction, and feeling lost and confused.
This feeling doesn’t go away until we address the root cause, listen to ourselves deeply and take aligned action.
Spiritual Stress Symptoms
Spiritual stress express itself much like physical stress: you feel exhausted, drained, no energy, close to burn out, frustrated, lost, confused…
Where it differs from physical stress is that once the ‘stressors’ are removed, the feeling is still there. If you stop a stressful job, but you don’t reconnect with yourself, what’s truly important to you, you will still feel this inner gap, longing, and confusion.
On the surface, external stressors can be removed, and yet you still feel this disconnect and longing for purpose & meaning.
Spiritual stress can occur when you are going through a particularly challenging phase in your life, and hardship, but it can also take place when on the outside, everything looks ‘the same’. This means that a spiritual disconnect, feeling not connected with yourself, others, your work, has been building up over time, and now you suddenly feel this impact of it.
Spiritual Alignment
To reconnect spiritually:
Listen: we often ignore the inner wisdom and knowledge we have. We stop listening to our souls, to ourselves because we are afraid to truly acknowledge how disconnected we are. Instead, listen deeply. Raw honesty to yourself has amazing healing energy.
Time alone: carve out time alone for greater reflection, and inner listening so that you can tune in with yourself, uncover what truly matters to you, and reconnect. We can’t hear ourselves if we are always immersed in noise. We need space, time alone, to listen deeply.
Journal: putting words to paper help to see more clearly where the disconnect lies, and what has been feeling off. It’s a safe space where you can explore more deeply what has been affected you, and understand what lies behind this strong sense of lost and confusion.
Meditation: during a meditation practise, you see your thoughts and emotions more clearly. This helps you to identify where the feeling of lost & stuck is coming from, and to move past it.
Gratitude: as you disconnect from yourself, you focus mostly on what’s wrong, on everything you wish was different. This is a vicious spiral where the more you focus on what’s missing, or what’s upsetting the more you notice it, and the more stressed you feel. Yet, if you choose to pivot and focus on what you’re grateful for, you feel lighter, your perspective changes, and you begin to reconnect.
Aligned Actions: The spiritual stress is sending you a message that you are not aligned in your life, and work. That something isn’t quite right, and you want to lead your life differently. By taking aligned actions (actions that are aligned with your values, your purpose, and give meaning), you rebuild inner strength, and a feeling of inner peace & alignment.
Conscious Living
As a high achiever, you believe you need to be highly productive, performing and you focus on delivering results and outcomes.
The action part of life is fundamental, but it’s not the whole picture. If you don’t integrate the ‘being’, presence, slowing down, conscious living into your life, through your work, actions, and performance; then you will feel depleted and empty.
This explains why the world is going through a spiritual crisis: we are so disconnected from nature, and our own nature. We’ve forgotten what it’s like to fully connect with nature, ourselves and other people. When we tune in with ourselves, and reconnect spiritually, we find inner calm, and joy.
Spirituality is an anchor in times of crisis, and uncertainty, it keeps you grounded, connected to yourself, and to others.
Thank you for reading,
Enjoy the journey,
Katie