by Laura Castanza and Julia George

As we experience our human existence in physical form, there is a conscious and subconscious struggle with the duality of our earthly existence and its limitations beginning at birth and ending at death.  Without a map or clear direction of what is to come or how long we will remain on the planet, we can make great strides towards understanding our physical self in relation to our spiritual self.  This will inevitably bring balance to our finite existence in an infinite Universe.

If we believe our soul to be the great orchestrator of our journey, we make a conscious decision in the spiritual realm to incarnate as a human being in physical form.  The vessel we choose begins at conception including the circumstances that surround it, and develops in a meticulous and miraculous fashion.  Whether we are challenged with physical issues from the beginning, or develop them later, we are purposeful in this life in the context we’ve chosen (parents, culture, society).  Our form is a “base” energy, a sensory oriented body, navigating by instinct through our external existence, planet Earth.  It carries itself plus three other bodies: emotional, mental, and spiritual.

While the physical gives us mobility and outward presence to accomplish our purpose, it cannot do so independently.  To have sensory awareness of our environment, feeling is required. Feelings manifest from our brain and nervous system, but are expressed through our emotional body (our heart center) which processes stimuli.  When we experience being burned, our physical body will pull itself away to safety through instinct, and our emotional body will express the hurt/injury through verbal expression.  The emotional body is the “Expressor”, and we can gauge our own feelings and others through facial expressions: smiling, frowning, laughing, crying, etc.

Our mental body/mind relates all the experiences of our physical and emotional bodies through memory (our life to date).  The mind is mighty, constructing situations, absorbing information, and creating a personal reality around it.  It is a delicate tool, positively and negatively conditioned by everything we have been exposed to in our life.  If we consciously work to cultivate/train the mind, we’ll process situations through more reason and logic; if our mind is without discipline and we are functioning without awareness, we will suffer physically and emotionally from the mind’s perception of reality (our story).

Our spiritual body is our highest self, the whole core of our being.  This core consists of light, love, energy, essence, and is capable of transcending our Earth bound limitations through its ability to create our reality.  Our spirituality is the awakened soul; it knows we are part of the Universe and that everything is in order.  It oversees the health of our physical, emotional, and mental bodies through consciousness, and creates a balanced reality.  If we are less conscious and functioning predominantly at base levels, then the energy of our spiritual body diminishes, we become imbalanced, and we suffer through life.

Bridging the physical and the spiritual is the only solution to creating balance within every aspect of our being.  No one body can work independently of another as they have a healthy reliance (interdependence) upon each other.  Our level of consciousness dictates unity or conflict between our bodies and affects the quality of our life.

Resolution exists within our soul.  We have an innate drive beyond our physical world, calling our attention to something greater and more substantial, especially when things are amiss or troublesome in our life.  But we often miss the subtle indicators/warnings along the way, and sometimes experience a major accident or wake-up call to shake us out of our stupor.  We can avoid the latter through becoming more aware and dealing with our self entirely:  working with our body, cultivating emotional awareness, mental discipline, and spiritual practice.

Working with our body allows us better function in every way.  Our body is the vehicle of our soul.  It must be moderately and healthfully maintained for us to function at optimum levels; but how we feel inside ultimately decides how long or to what capacity our efforts last.  If we are to keep true to a physical program, we must integrate into our next important body, the emotional body.

The emotional body initiates the feeling to care for our body.  Fear based feelings, such as shame and insecurity, usually propel us to care for our self, or the opposite (physically deteriorate).  Unless we address these feelings, we never feel worthy of the work we are doing and will continuously sabotage our process until we get to the root of our issues that reside in the darkest parts of our psyche, our shadow.  When we face our emotional body and learn to become emotionally aware, our physical body becomes supported by emotional health…but not without mental discipline.

Mental discipline is the conscious monitoring our thought process.  Through awareness, we can learn to identify and objectify our internal language, self dialogue, and imagery within our mind that evokes emotion.  When we lack mental discipline, our emotional body is completely reactionary to every sensory experience it encounters; it’s wild and unpredictable.  If we become entirely scientific in our approach to mental discipline, we tend to disconnect from our emotional body, which leads us into the importance of our spiritual body.

Awareness and the cultivation of our spiritual body are crucial to integrating our physical, emotional, and mental bodies.  Our spiritual nature is just that, “nature”, directly linked to our planet Earth, a living breathing body.  In comparison, we are small like parasites.  When we are in harmony with nature, we nourish our self and support the health of the Earth; but if we are stomping around the planet trying to manipulate and own it, we are sucking the life out everything.

Spiritual practice is whatever we choose to do to harmonize and connect with the Earth, the Universe, God, Buddha, Jesus, Mohammad, etc…  Spiritual practice is often seen as a moment in our day when we honor the above; however, our spiritual body bridges all other bodies with the potential to create peace with every breath, within and without.  This does not mean that we walk around all day chanting mantras, kneeling at alters, etc.  It does mean that we maintain an open connection to the benevolent Universe.  It’s a dialogue of Prayer – when we speak to the Universe, and Meditation – when we listen.  Whatever our beliefs, this communication reveals our purpose, energetically through love.  To receive proper messaging, we must be open.  Messaging occurs through all our bodies as sensations and/or thoughts and possibilities, reinforcing only healthy options.

As we become more trusting of these messages through open heartedness, we reap the benefits we were born to receive for this very brief yet necessary lifetime we chose to be human.  Our soul evolves, and we transform.

For more information or to discuss this article one-on-one, contact Julia George/Aquarian Age @ 561.750.9292