Your Soul: 5 Simple Soulful To-Dos When You’re Stuck

Your soul is on a path toward your destiny…  and doesn’t like being stuck.

Because the soul is longing to express itself in this life.

Do you know the movie Dirty Dancing and Patrick Swayze’s famous line, “Nobody puts baby in the corner”? That’s how the soul feels.

Don’t put your soul in the corner!

Sometimes we get stuck.

And so, the soul really hates feeling stuck.

It’s like you’re stuck in traffic when your child is at school waiting for you, or your dog is at home and needs to be let out. 

It makes you crazy. 

You want to break out!

You’re ready to drive on the shoulder, go down the center median, and you’re already preparing your story for the police officer who stops you. 

You have somewhere you have to be… and you don’t want to be stuck.

5 things you can do when you’re stuck.

1. Ask for guidance. This isn’t hocus-pocus. There’s an entire spirit team ready to help you. Rebecca Rosen talks about this in Spirited.
2. More quiet time and meditation to hear your guides and soul.
3. More emotional release because emotions are energy.
4. Read empowering material that reminds you of your soul and spiritual nature.
5. Remind yourself daily that your soul is here to learn and grow and it’s up to you to commit to that process. 

What you need to learn and grow is already within you. As you deepen your relationship with yourself and a higher power, the answers will unfold. You are a co-creator. 

Soul-searching is good.

So, how do you know what your soul’s path is?  How do you get unstuck?

You go soul-searching.  I certainly have.

That’s the nuts and bolts of a soulful life: Paying close attention to what you need… so your soul can soar in your life.

An example of the soul calling.

Out of college, I worked for IBM selling computers. Was this a good job for my soul’s path? 

Absolutely.  I learned so many things in that world that I needed to learn for what I would do later. It was a great stepping stone for my soul’s support.

However, there was zero self-expression in that job. Unfortunately, I was speaking a language I didn’t know or care to know. 

Yes, in that work, I was learning about myself.

However, after a time, the lack of expression, which my soul badly needed, forced me to quit that job. 

I needed to be doing something that would allow me to create something new. I was longing for soul sustenance and for me it was clear: I needed expression. 

And, my soul needed to be seen.

We’re each wired for the soul we have.

I’ve come to believe that we’re each wired differently. It really depends on what your soul needs.

So, I went looking for anything that would validate my deep desire to express myself. I was drawn to books, authors, people, and places that respected my unique and individual authentic expression. 

The way to know which way to go is to have a loving, soulful relationship with yourself… and trust where that takes you.

As I listened to the still, quiet voice within my soul, this became clear to me.

Symptoms of the unfed soul.

In Care of the Soul by Thomas Moore, he writes about how the soul gets restless when we don’t pay attention to it. Some symptoms of the ignored soul are that you…

Lose your joy. 

Are easily angry.

You feel blah and crappy.

Or, maybe you’re tired and depressed… to name a few ways that the soul tells us we need to make some changes.

Why do we stay stuck?

So, why do we stay stuck?

Is it a high tolerance for pain?  Or, is the fear just too much right now? 

Sometimes we’re not ready to unstick ourselves. We just aren’t there yet.

I look back on situations where I felt stuck (I’m referring to post-childhood because as children we’re dependent on adults to make good decisions for us.) and I see so clearly how stuck I was.

That’s OK.

I wasn’t ready. 

Forgive yourself for not being ready. 

Part of self-love is forgiving ourselves for being stuck, for not being ready to let go, to move on, to forgive, whatever it is. For a number of reasons, we may not be ready to make a change internally or externally. 

Internal changes

Often, when you’re not ready, it’s an internal job. You may need to see yourself clearly, see others more clearly, face fear, face the music, confront your insecurity, or learn to love yourself. Internal changes are good for the soul.

External changes

Sometimes when the soul is hungry, external changes need to me made. For example:

You may have to leave a relationship. Or, a job or career. Then again, you may have to move to a new place.

Or you may need to make changes to any of the above so that you are continuing to grow.

Overall, to connect with yourself, be soulful day-to-day.

The first 5 things to get to know your soul.

However, there are small baby steps you can do right now to begin to know your soul a bit better. 

1. Meditate each day. Focus on the breath, slowly and gently. Jon Kabat-Zinn has a great book to help you with this, Wherever You Go, There You Are. I know life is busy, but make this a priority. Go in your closet and take 5 minutes of focusing on the breath.  I did this when my sons were young.
2. Practice self-love affirmations. Self-love and self-acceptance are a part of learning and growth.
3. Feel what is true for you. Honor yourself and your soul by allowing yourself to feel without judgment. One way to do this is to notice the energy of the emotion and just notice it without analyzing it. Then, release the energy of the emotion.
4. Be patient with yourself. Everything you are is an accumulation of things that have happened already. It takes courage to be human, so be patient with yourself. 
5. Be excited. You are on a path to your destiny. You get to the job of helping your soul get there.  

What’s the difference between soul and spirit?

Many people confuse soul and spirit. These words appear similar and it depends on the context in which you’re using them.

Spirit

Our relationship to our spirit and soul is complementary and non-conflicting.

Spirituality encompasses our relationship to a higher power, God, Source, the universe, spirit guides, guardian angels, and a whole host of other quality ways that spirit manifests.

The soul holds the outline of your potential. So, your soul holds what’s possible for you. And, the soul is connected to the spiritual world.

At the top of this post, under What is the Soul, is more detail about what the soul is specifically.

Soul in American English

Since you might be curious about what the dictionary has to say about the soul, here’s what the dictionary says:

The principle of life, feeling, thought, and action in humans, regarded as a distinct entity separate from the body, and commonly held to be separable in existence from the body; the spiritual part of humans as distinct from the physical part.

Not bad, but this leaves me wanting more. You deserve a more specific, quality explanation of your soul, for this infinite and exciting aspect of you.

Summary

When you notice yourself being easily aggravated, overly aggressive, tired, or complacent, it’s often because your soul is not being expressed. You’re holding back. Or, there’s something you’re not saying or doing.

When this happens, the soul is longing for expression. Being true to yourself is music to the soul’s ears.

Because the soul exists to be itself.