Make Your Spirituality A Priority

Make Your Spirituality a Priority By Dr. Wayne W. Dyer I know you have many significant and important relationships; certainly the ones you enjoy with your children, parents, spouse/lover/significant other, co-workers and best friends rate very high in your life. However, I ask you to place your relationship to your "Source" of being at the very top of this list. When this becomes your reality, you intuitively go to the silence within and remember to send your ego to a place where it doesn't interfere with your deliberations. Make your relationship to the Source your priority, even if you declare yourself an atheist. When you go to this place within yourself, you don't need any religious orientation or belief in the supernatural. Rather, I ask you to think of God—or the Tao, Divine mind, Krishna, Source or any of the thousand names for God—as love. There's a loving energy in the universe that allows for the creation of all beings. It is a nonbeing without form or boundaries, and it does nothing while leaving nothing undone! Make this energy your primary relationship, above all others in your life, consulting it before anyone else. Retreat there in silence, and listen and know that this force is outside of you and within you. By all means, love your family (and everyone else on this planet). Treasure all your relationships, but first and foremost make your relationship to your highest self your priority. When you see God simply as love, there will be no room left for excuses and bad habits. You will only be able to give away the love that is your creative essence. How to Be Spiritual Every Day By Dr. Wayne W. Dyer While it's good to have strong relationships with the people in your life, it's important to put your relationship with your "Source" at the top of your priority list, spiritual teacher Dr. Wayne Dyer says. Your Source can be God, the Tao, Divine mind, Krishna or whatever else you call your higher power—the key is that you make this bond your number one. Dr. Dyer shares five practices to help you become more spiritual every day. Get Quiet Decide to reduce the noise level in your life. Learn to take time each and every day for quiet contemplation. For example, when you're driving alone, turn off the constant chatter bombarding your inner world. Try to make meditation a daily practice, even if it's only a few minutes each day. As Swami Sivananda reminded his students, "Silence is the language of the gods." Ask in silence, listen in silence, and let silence be the jumping-off point for becoming one with the creative force of the universe. Reenergize Your Surroundings The Power of Intention works when you surround yourself with people who are on the same spiritual path as you. Remember that like attracts like, so you attract Source energy to you by being like it. Similarly, when you're continually in the company of lowenergy, angry, depressed, shaming, hateful people, you'll probably find life a little more challenging. Choose to be in the company of those who hold a space for you to achieve the joy of maximizing, rather then minimizing, your highest human potential. Make your surroundings a temple of love and kindness. Pay attention to the music you listen to, the art you view, even the arrangement of your furniture and flowers—all of it!

Get Back to Nature One of the most spiritual things you can do in your life is spend time in nature. When I am in nature, it feels like God has entered my consciousness, and a rapturous feeling of contentment overwhelms me. A setting that showcases nature's beauty is pure God in action: unspoiled, untended, alive in stillness and teeming with life. When you're there, you'll begin to see the miraculousness of every cubic inch of space. You'll feel the presence of an energy that you may have lost touch with in your daily life, and that energy is in you. Practice Yoga The meaning of the word yoga translates to "union." The ancient rishis who gave us yoga considered stretching, balancing and flexible exercise an opportunity to experience union with God. Such a union with the Source of being wasn't a painful experience, since God was viewed as natural, peaceful and gentle. Even as you stay in a space the size of a small mat, you attain the same kind of benefit as other, more punishing exercise regiments but without the pain or exertion. Yoga is a great workout for the entire body— particularly the joints, muscles and even internal organs—but especially for the mind. Practice Mindfulness Truly experience all things you do during the day. Try to escape the habitual feelings and thoughts you experience and stay in the present moment. Enjoy each of your actions fully. I wish for you to come to know the heavenly pleasure of living each and every day aligned with your Source. Dr. Wayne W. Dyer is an internationally renowned author and speaker in the field of self-development. He's the author of more than 30 books, including the current New York Times best-seller Excuses Begone! How to Change Lifelong, Self-Defeating Thinking Habits.

To begin a spiritual journey, it's important to first understand what spirituality means. Spiritual leaders from around the world want to help you start your journey by explaining what spirituality means to them. Eckhart Tolle, author of A New Earth, says to be spiritual is to live in a state of openness. "With that openness, a far greater power comes into your life," he says. "So to be spiritual is to be in touch, connected with that dimension of depth in yourself." Eckhart says you need to become more aware of the aliveness of this moment. "The aliveness that is all around you no matter where you are. And to become aware of that, you need to become a little bit more alert than you usually are," Eckhart says. "Increasingly, you become rooted in the aliveness and the fullness of the present moment. That's to lead a spiritual life." Spiritual author and lecturer Marianne Williamson says spirituality wakens when you become still and humble. "There are forces inside you—forces of fear and limitation and chaos—and they live inside us saying, 'You can't do that,'" she says. "Spirituality is where you lay claim to a ground of being within yourself where you say, 'I want to be that. I really do. I want to be that person that I'm capable of being.'" Marianne says people aren't happy because of what they aren't giving. "The most important thing is that we learn how to forgive each other and that we learn how to love each other. How to live in the spirit of blessing and not blame," Marianne says. "The spiritual path doesn't mean always an easier path, but it means a choice. A choice that we're making to try our best to be as loving as we can be."

Rabbi Irwin Kula, president of the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership, says the key to being a spiritual person is understanding that it takes practice. "You have to practice becoming alert, becoming more conscious, becoming aware," he says. "And you have to practice becoming kinder, more compassionate and more caring." Rabbi Kula has a rule that will help you practice your spirituality. "You have to develop your head, your heart, and your hands," he says. In order to develop your head, Rabbi Kula says you need to learn something new about yourself, someone else or an opinion you strongly disagree with, because doing so will help you become more conscious, aware and alert. When you are grateful for things, Rabbi Kula says you develop your heart. He suggests that at the end of the day you think of 10 things that you're grateful for. The idea of developing your hands means to perform an act of kindness every day. "Here's the key: [perform the act of kindess for] someone more vulnerable than you," Rabbi Kula says. "And it's like anything else. The more we practice, the better we become." The Rev. Ed Bacon says that like law and medicine, spirituality is a practice. "Spiritual practitioners must practice spirituality where we stop, take a breath, become still inside— that's the act of meditation and contemplation," he says. "It is the same in all of the religions." The Rev. Bacon's advice for people seeking a spiritual journey is threefold. "That is to be in nature, to connect with the arts and to connect with ritual," he says. "It is in moments of serenity, stillness, that we experience something much larger, transcendent, cosmic than we are." Michael Bernard Beckwith says everyone is spiritual, though not everyone realizes it. Spirituality, he says, is the awakening to a dimension of the being or soul. "When one begins to really feel into the spiritual dimension of their beings, they bump into love. They bump into compassion. They bump into beauty," he says. When you begin to notice the things in your life you are grateful for, Michael says you will stop seeing obstacles or hindrances. "You see potential. You see possibilities," he says. "Then you become an open vehicle for more inspiration, more wisdom, more guidance coming from the spiritual part of your being."