Spiritual Growing Pains

Hello Fellow Travelers, 

Growing pains. I am sure you have heard the phrase before. Physical growing pains are crampy achy muscle pains that some preschoolers and teens experience as their bodies change and grow rapidly.  Growing pains is the phrase we give to the ups and downs that occur as an enterprise goes through early development.

Growing pains are also a common occurrence on our spiritual journey.

As we seek to BE rather than do, to awaken to our true self, discover and uncover our true nature, live as our higher self, choose love rather than fear, see with new eyes, focus on what works, disengage, be the observer, taste and then nurture ourselves with emotional freedom, live as the highest version of ourselves, calm the ego, feed the spirit, our lives CHANGE. We experience spiritual growing pains at times during this process because we are truly growing rapidly.

We are breaking free, testing new ground, and going into uncharted territory. We are like the young children who suddenly grow bigger, faster and stronger~overnight. We are like the new enterprise that suddenly has an abundance of work and may not have the ways and means to provide the services or product they promised~yet. We are the newly formed group or community who has added many members, yet has yet to find a place to meet or gather~yet.

Each and every one of us on the spiritual path has at one juncture or another experienced growing pains. 

They usually occur right after a major breakthrough and just when you've gotten almost too comfortable riding the wave of "I've got it now". That is usually the time when spiritual growing pains occur.

You will fall off the wave as your friend, sister, lover, child starts acting up or acting out. Or when you suddenly realize you have got to quit your job or leave a relationship, or you receive news of yet another crisis that is happening out in the world. You might, for just a moment, automatically revert back to old behavior, seemingly forgetting how far you've come or that you have a tool box full of helpful ways of dealing with "said problem." You might, for a moment, day or week start experiencing the pain of dealing with life without your spirit at the helm. It will feel as if you are being "tested". But you are not. You are simply experiencing "spiritual growing pains."

Once you have grown fuller, bigger and stronger by connecting with divine love, your essence, your inner wisdom, higher self and once you put this Self in charge of your lives and experiences, challenges will undoubtedly arise. They always do and always have.

Life is a series of events and circumstances. How you relate to events and circumstances is always your choice. When you choose to experience life as your higher self, rather than as a victim/martyr or any other way that dis empowers rather than empowers, you grow, stretch, open and expand. Your spirits are like a muscle, once you grow you ache a bit, until you adjust to being your spiritually strong Self. During this achy time, you might want to go at it harder by thinking you did something wrong, search for a way to fix the problem or blame the other person for forcing you to come down off your mountain of bliss to deal with them, but really the answer to your spirit's growing pains is the same as what you would do for a sore muscles.

Be kind and gentle with yourself. Talk to a trusted friend, counselor, receive gentle body work, write in your journal. Eat well, nourish your body, take Epsom salt baths, take a time out. Talk to your Spirit, and listen to your Spirit as well.

Get to really know the voice of your Spirit. It is not a quiet whisper. It is bold and strong and loud. Yet it is also extremely loving and sure. It sounds like a wise elder usually. Sometimes adding humor, yet always, always is the voice of clarity. 

And make sure that you stay in the place of love. Go back onto your mountain of bliss and get back into the frequency and vibration of joy/peace/freedom. Stay there and know that it is only a matter of time until the growing pains subside, the challenge resolves itself and you are feeling stronger and also more open than ever! 

Growing pains do sometimes follow spiritual growth. Stay in the growth part, and treat the pains with tender care.
Blessings, 

Mary