Navigating the Storm: Decoding the Difficulties of Spiritual Growth

I wish joy and enlightenment were easy, but they aren’t. Not for us, and neither for Jesus, Buddha, or many of the great teachers and masters that have passed on this Earth. 

Luckily, living our purpose in joy, in full connection to who we truly are, is such a good thing that makes all this hard work worth it! 

I received a question from a reader wondering why has the majority of humanity failed to evolve into happy, joyous, and enlightened lives, like Buddha and Jesus.

Why Is That?

First of all, because it is not easy. We are here to expand, to live, to grow. Yet we are divine souls in a human body, which create our own inner struggles. The human condition, the part of us that is bound to the animal kingdom wants to let things be cozy and play safe. Yes, always go with the flow. “If you don’t feel like doing it today — then don’t do it”. 

We do our best to do the least amount of effort. Excessive energy waste is only for when absolutely crucial for our survival. 

Yet our eternal soul knows that it can keep expanding and going much beyond — towards infinity! The soul is filled with willpower.

To expand and grow spiritually, even to heal, we need to be able to access that willpower. Truly, we all have an incredible amount of power within us, and we can all unlock it. 

Unfortunately, the more we over-identify ourselves with our earthly bound side, the harder it is for us to access that fire. 

We want to grow. We want to expand and be free, and be joyful, to know the truth of who we are and live our purpose — and yet it is so easy and cozy not to.

 It is so easy for us to stay where we are. Despite the repeated patterns, despite the frustrations, despite the pains. Just like that, we do our best to shut down that inner whisper saying “there’s more to life”. 

There’s More to You

 Comfort zones are great nests for stagnation and depression, and that is because comfort zones aren’t the nature of your soul. 

The story goes that it took Buddha seven weeks of uninterrupted meditation under the bodhi tree for enlightenment. Now that’s right. Day and night outside under a tree.

This after years of pilgrimage, looking for his answers. On top of that, he didn’t know it was going to take him seven weeks. He just knew he needed to do it. And so, he sat there for as long as it took. All he knew was that he had to do it, and he gave it all. his totality. 

This is a story of tremendous willpower.

Now, on top of that, before all this journey, Buddha was a prince. He lived in a castle full of luxuries, pleasure, and power. Whew. His path required him to sacrifice everything. 

How many of us on this path are willing to commit to anything to that level and to access that level of willpower? 

This is not only about enlightenment or spirituality. 

It is about following our dreams, giving our best, and living in totality, which is what our souls want. How committed and willing are to ourselves — can we surrender to our hearts and souls? 

It is not easy. We keep holding ourselves back. Yet, we all want to be more joyful and free.

We don’t expand simply because we want it 

Uh, we don’t get anything just because we want it. Otherwise, we would all be rich, happy, having amazing sexual lives, eating all we want without getting fat, and so on and so forth. 

Wanting something is nothing but the fuel to be used by showing up and committing to what we want. 

To the habits, the conducts, the behaviors, the ways of thinking and seeing the world, and of treating others. 

Spiritual growth is not the path of least resistance, quite the opposite. 

Spiritual growth is not cozy. Cozy is wellness, and wellbeing. Spiritual growth is another thing. 

Spiritual growth is the path of facing fears, outgrowing shame and discomfort, and letting go of identities and attachments to dissolve the ego and raise consciousness.

 It would be so easy if only we were not so attached to these things. What this attachment means is that we overidentify ourselves with illusions, and because of that, it feels like letting them go means a type of psychological suicide. However, it is quite the opposite: it is this dissolution that allows the real divine us to emerge. 

Spiritual growth brings joy by dissolving illusions – not by coping with them.

Growth requires a level of discomfort

If we’re too comfortable, we are not growing, for we are moving within our comfort zone. Discomfort is the challenge to be faced, so you can heal it, and outgrow it. 

Signing up for spiritual growth or any type of growth for that matter is going against our so-called human condition, that animal inside of us that wants to save energy, to keep safe, to not do more than is required. That part of us doesn’t like work. 

Your soul, on the other hand, doesn’t see “work”, but an energy exchange required for the transmutation and transformation at hand. 

For this path to work, we strive to reconnect to our souls that have that willpower, and its nature of expansion, of infinity.

Frustration Is a Great Ally

Here is a major insight: Staying too much in our comfort zones causes frustration. It makes us feel trapped. Limited stagnated. 

That is because safety is not our true nature.

Even though the animal aspect of us loves it, our soul gets so uncomfortable when kept in the comfort zone, that frustration rises. 

Frustration is a call of the soul, asking you to reconnect with it, and return to your own path. 

As we have disconnected from our hearts and our souls, it has become much harder for us to connect to that fire in our hearts and that spark of the soul, that willingness to expand, that lust for life. 

Spiritual growth is a path that reawakens that flame of the heart and that spark of the soul. 

What Is Spiritual Growth?

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