How To Access Soul Power: 5 Surprising Ways!
Do you have times in your life when you question your power?
You know on one level that you have talents, skills, agency… and yet, you feel this underlying question mark?
As a soul coach with 25 years of experience, and the author of The Butterfly Silhouette: 12 Principles for Following Your Soul, winner of the San Francisco Book Festival in both Spirituality and Poetry, I have a perspective about personal power and the soul that I want to share with you.
Your innate power comes from the fact that everything you need to evolve and grow in this life is already within you, within the soul.
In this article, you’ll learn:
- Why longing for “something more” is your soul speaking to you
- How emptiness becomes power
- What it means to live close to your heart
- How to relax in the middle of fear and pain
- Why caring for your soul is more useful than fixing yourself
- The role of imagination in accessing soul power
If accessing your soul’s power is something you’re actively working toward, The Sunday Scroll is where I write each week about soul-centered spirituality for spiritually hungry seekers. Sign up here.
Each of us has a soul
“The final mystery is oneself. When one has weighed the sun in the balance, and measured the steps of the moon, and mapped out the seven heavens star by star, there still remains oneself. Who can calculate the orbit of his own soul?” ~ Oscar Wilde
I love this quote because it opens me up. In my challenging moments it tells me I’m bigger than my fear, anger, and negativity.
Each of us has a soul. Each of us has a purpose. Each of us is eternally connected to the light. Bringing this light to earth is part of our purpose.
Everything you need to evolve and grow in this life is already within you.
What is soul power?
Soul power is the innate power that lives within you. It’s the power you’re given at birth to fulfill your soul’s purposes.
Here’s an example:
Thirty plus years ago I started a journey that changed me forever.
I left my IBM sales job and started work as an executive coach. However, something about this kind of work, focusing on goals, plans and outward success, wasn’t satisfying to me.
How to describe gnawing thoughts of: This isn’t me. I feel there’s something else.
My longing was about something bigger. It was my soul saying: You’re not doing your thing. You’re not caring for your deeper needs. You’re disconnected from your True Self.
My soul’s power was starting to show itself in my life. It had been speaking to me for a long time, but I had turned a deaf ear. Now I was listening. It was time to go to the dark and light aspects of my soul. First, for myself; and second, because you can’t take others where you haven’t been.
Here is some of what I learned…
Soul Power 1: Allow Emptiness
Allow the emptiness to become fullness.
I have heard over and over and in various forms that you have to be empty before you can be full. Thomas Moore quotes in Care of the Soul from the Tao Te Ching (ch.22)…
“When twisted you’ll be upright; when hollowed out, you’ll be full.”
I began recognizing in myself a profound longing, a spiritual hunger. I felt guilty for admitting to such a feeling in the face of a life filled with love, family, and good fortune.
As I got closer to my own soul, I saw this yearning differently. The texture and feel of it changed. Instead of filling it prematurely, I learned to pause and ask…
What is my soul telling me? What parts of me have I neglected?
Thomas Moore tells us…
“It is this ‘pregnant emptiness’ that enables us to access the soul’s power. When we fill the soul with what it needs, the soul calls forth an innate power that is stronger than any ego driven power.”
His words were music to my ears. I wanted more.
“When we fill the soul with what it needs, the soul calls forth an innate power that is stronger than any ego driven power.”
Soul Power 2: Live close to your heart
Let your feelings guide you.
While working for IBM in my 20’s, I got my executive coaching certification at night.
A teacher in my executive coaching program told us…
“The journey in life is the 18” one from here to here.” He touched his head, then his heart. Someone in the class pointed out that a child’s heart is about 8 inches from her head.
Living close to your heart means noticing how you feel and allowing yourself to feel it, even when emotions feel illogical.
Emotions aren’t logical, they just are.
When emotions are too much to handle, I recommend emotional release work. Here’s my article with over 50 emotional release methods you can try. Choose what works best for you.
If you’ve read this far, your soul is right here with you. The next sections walk through how to live close to your heart, relax with what is, and care for your soul like you would a child.
Soul Power 3: Relax with what is
Accept what you cannot control.
The Buddhist religion teaches great lessons about relaxing in the middle of fear and pain. It teaches facing our demons in life.
In her beautiful book, When Things Fall Apart, Buddhist nun Pema Chodron writes…
“The point is to lean toward the discomfort of life and see it clearly rather than to protect ourselves from it.”
She adds, “When we reach our limit, if we aspire to know that place fully – which is to say that we aspire to neither indulge or repress – a hardness in us will dissolve. We will be softened by the sheer force of whatever energy arises. The energy of anger, the energy of fear. When it is not solidified in one direction or another, that very energy pierces us to the heart, and it opens us.”
The first time I read that I was blown away. And honestly, I didn’t understand what she was talking about! Now I do…
Soul Power 4: Love your soul by caring for it
Self-care is showing love to yourself.
I like to think of the soul as a child. If we are wise, we don’t try to fix or solve our children. What we do is care for them. We pay attention, we love them, we watch them. This is what our soul wants: To be loved and given attention, not fixed.
As we tend to our souls, we exhibit our love. And like a child, our soul responds. It responds with a deepened love of self.
Soul Power 5: Use Imagination
Open up to what you can see for yourself.
I wrote earlier about opening my heart wider and wider. Sometimes this takes imagination. I wrote about conversations with my soul. This too takes imagination. Stopping, pausing, and reflecting, this may require imagination.
If we can’t see the value in our own lives, if we can’t envision the unlimited possibilities that exist for each of us, then we are slowly dying. Imagination helps us see. Imagination gives us vision.
Practical Steps for Accessing Soul Power
Remember, everything you need to evolve and grow in this life is already within you, within the soul. Here are practical steps so you can apply the ideas above to your life.
1. Connect with your soul daily
Daily connection with your soul doesn’t have to be elaborate. It can be five minutes in the morning, sitting quietly before the day takes over. It can be a walk where you put the phone away and let your mind settle. It can be journaling, meditation, prayer, or simply sitting with a cup of coffee and noticing what’s true for you that day.
The soul is always there. The question is… are you? Daily connection is how you show up for yourself.
2. Practice regular self-care that is actually soul care
Self-care is one of the most important habits you can build. Real soul care is the way you tend to your inner world so that you can show up for yourself and others.
This includes rest when you are tired, food that nourishes you, time alone when you need it, and time with people who fill you up.
It includes saying no to what drains you and yes to what brings you back to center. When you make it clear that you want to strengthen your connection to higher knowing, even simple self-care becomes sacred.
3. Check in with your feelings
Your feelings are your compass. They are not the problem. Feelings tell you what is going on with you, they are never “wrong”, they just are.
Sit with what comes up. Sadness, anger, fear, longing, joy. Don’t rush to fix any of it. Don’t push it away or perform a more acceptable version of what you actually feel.
As we feel, we transform the energy. And, it takes time. The key here is to not hold on with our thinking. To not tell ourselves we are deficient, not enough, or our feelings are too much or simply wrong. None of this is true. Instead, stick with the body, with the energy of the emotion.
4. Pause and ask the question
When something feels off, when you are restless, when you are confused, pause. Don’t reach for a distraction or fill the space with noise.
Instead, ask: What is my soul asking of me? Is there any part of me that I’ve neglected?
You don’t need to know the answer right away. The asking itself is a practice. The answer arrives in its own time, often when you least expect it. A line in a book, a passing thought in the shower, something a friend says that lands in a way you didn’t see coming.
5. Use imagination as a tool
Imagination is one of the most useful gifts you have. The soul speaks through what you can picture, dream, and envision for your life.
Imagine yourself doing the thing you have been afraid to do. Imagine yourself living the life that feels just out of reach. Imagine your soul speaking to you and listen for what it says. If you can’t see possibility, you can’t move toward it.
Imagination gives you eyes for the life your soul came here to live.
Final thoughts
The soul wants us to honestly express who we are, be present in the moment, share our gifts, cooperate with other souls to heal the planet, and grow in light and love.
When you access your soul power, the way you move through your days begins to change. You feel less driven by fear and more guided by knowing. You stop pushing for the life you think you should have, and you start trusting the life your soul came here to live. This is what it means to be true to your soul, this eternal part of you that is connected always.
For my complete guide to following the soul including what is the soul, scientific views, world views, soul awakening, soul guidance, soulful living, and much more, read: How To Know and Follow Your Soul.
