Written by: Amie Dean, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Soul Qualities are essential and foundational aspects that describe your Soul Self. These foundational qualities are the pointers towards a more spiritually awakened life. To heal your inner child's wounds, it’s important to activate and cultivate these qualities in your everyday life- this will break down the barriers of your heart and help you lead as your Higher Self.
Courage
(to be vulnerable to be honest to take the next step without seeing the whole staircase, to reach out for help to not go it alone)
Power
(confidence + the ability to take empowered action to be persistent and persevering in a course of action, to not give up no matter the challenge)
Trust
(to trust in divine timing to accept what arises at the moment to surrender one's will to that of the Divine., patience in the process, confidence in the knowledge that all is well)
Love
(to be compassionate to lead as love to forgive grievances of the past)
Peace
(to move towards harmony to seek balance to choose calm over chaos, silent stillness)
Freedom
(For creative self-expression for adventure to be curious, to explore your inner and outer world)
Joy
(The joy of just being of feeling the oneness of all that is unlimited in its capacity)
The inner child wounds in your system will continue to activate your protective sub-personalities causing overworking, perfectionism, people-pleasing, emotional eating, burnout and so much more (see article to learn more about inner child wounds https://www.brainzmagazine.com/post/healing-your-inner-child-part-1) until cultivating these Soul Qualities become the focus of your life.
You need to cultivate every one of your Soul Qualities in order to heal your core wounds. It’s likely you tap into these qualities within yourself without realizing it, these are times when you are most aligned with your Soul. Our experiences matched with these qualities are often the most memorable and profound moments of our lives. Let’s explore these qualities together:
Courage
(to be vulnerable to be honest to take the next step without seeing the whole staircase, to reach out for help to not go it alone)
Your Soul is courageous. To be courageous on the spiritual journey means one of two things: first that you are willing to open to the knowledge that you are already on a spiritual journey regardless of your experience with spirituality before now. And second, to be courageous enough to look within. As we travel into the castle of your heart, there are dark passageways that you have avoided out of fear to face what feels unfaceable. While it may seem like courage is far off when we are faced with terrifying circumstances, in truth, because courage is a natural, innate quality, it is always here waiting for you to call on it.
To be courageous on this journey does not mean that you will never be faced with the desire to turn back in face of fear, because this is an imperfect awakening experience, perfection is not necessary, nor is it possible. In other words, there will be times when you will quiver in the darkness and be directed by the Guarding sub-personalities to keep your guard up. But these moments are important because they are just reminders of what it is to be human. These are opportunities to choose courage over fear, which is a choice that needs to be made in each moment of your life. This quality of courage will also be explored as it relates to vulnerability, honesty, and reaching out for help. Courage is not just our ability to take outer action, it guides us to speak our truth in less than ideal environments that could easily activate our shame, courage guides us to first be honest with ourselves about how we feel and our human shortcomings so we can reach out for help when needed. We are not meant to walk this path of awakening (which is this entire human life) alone.
Within the phases themselves, I will share practical ways to call this courage out of the cave of your heart so you can begin to make progress on healing these wounds and leading as your Soul Self.
Power
(confidence + the ability to take action to be persistent and persevering in a course of action, to not give up no matter the challenge)
Your Soul is pure, potential power at its core. Your Soul is vibrant, powerful, and all-encompassing. We are often so disconnected from our power, and if you have a core wound of “disempowerment” then the cultivation of this quality is especially important for you. To step into your power means to lead with confidence, to take action when intuitively prompted to, and to be persistent and persevering when it feels as if your energy and stamina are drained. We often give our power to other people, our current life situations, and to the past.
You will know if you are giving your power away because you no longer feel a backing of spiritual life force energy to continue the path you are on. When we are experiencing depression, burn out, grief, anger and other lower vubratory emotional energies, our human batteries have run out. We have to recharge with extra self care before we can activate the deeper power that lies within.
If you are currently visiting Phase 2: The Nightmare, it is likely you feel especially disconnected from this Soul Quality and while it’s a natural part of our awakening process to lose sight of our power and stamina to keep going despite seeing only obstacles ahead, we must ignite the fire deep within, even if you feel as if your sub-personalities are to afraid to let you step into your power, activation of this Soul Quality leads to resilience, know that in time and with patience, you will powerfully lead your inner world.
Trust
(Trust in divine timing to accept what arises at the moment to surrender one's will to that of the Divine- trust leads to patience in the process, confidence in the knowledge that all is well, and adaptability in the changing nature of life )
Your Soul is one with God, the Divine. From this higher place, there are no coincidences, no frayed threads of experiences. Instead, everything is interwoven into a beautiful tapestry of connection, of oneness. From the place of our ego-mind (Guarding sub-personalities) we see everything as separate, even time seems to show up as one moment after another yet, it is only one perspective and it is the limiting third-dimensional space of consciousness from which we live most of our lives. Interestingly, your Soul resides in the higher dimensions of consciousness and never struggles with trust, fear, or unease. This is true you, see the whole universe in its completion, even within the chaos. Your Guarding sub-personalities believe they are all alone to guard the castle of your heart, to keep you safe, and to lead your life. They can not understand the concept of trust as your Soul does, they can learn to trust your pure intention to guide them to the light of who you are, but they can never replace the deep, infinite trust your Soul knows to be true. Fear cannot exist in this dimension of awareness, and so it makes sense that our sub-personalities would not be so willing to let go of their protective shields just yet.
They have fought against fear for many years, and to tell them it has not existed in the way they thought, would not meet them where they are at. Instead, we must share in their pains, and their perspectives, so that over time they can trust you as your Soul Self enough to put down their weapons and armor. As trust is built within, it creates patience in the process, confidence in knowing all is well, and adaptability to the impermanent nature of life. There are practical tools I will share in later chapters to begin to rebuild the trust within, and it varies phase by phase. Know that whatever phase you are in, you are where you are meant to be and trust will become easier and easier.
Love
(to be compassionate to lead as love to forgive grievances of the past)
Your Soul is the essence of love. We have been weaving this throughout this journey as this is one of the most important qualities to understand. As children, we naturally share in love with all those around us, we smile, we laugh, we play, and we enjoy sharing in connection with others regardless of their differences. As very young children, we didn’t have labels that kept us from loving from our hearts. We shared in our stories, our pains, and our hopes. We showed kindness to others, without even knowing what the concept of kindness is. From the very beginning, we led as love.
We were praised for this of course and learned to be nice, and not to be naughty and thus guarding sub-personalities were born to direct our efforts in the right way. Many of us became people-pleasers, over givers, and helpers to our detriment, because we forgot that at our core we have always known how to love. It became work, a doing, an efforting experience instead. It was backed by fear, the fear of loss, the fear of pain, and the natural desire to rid the ones we love of the pain they endure. And of course, because our sub-personalities have taken over and choose when and how to run this program of love, we easily run out of love to give. We easily get hurt. We easily fall apart when it’s not reciprocated. From this place within, we don’t need a rulebook to love unconditionally.
It’s not our fault though, we needed to learn this so that we could unlearn this in adulthood. Our inner children needed the rulebook, they needed the structure, but most importantly they needed unconditional love to remind them of the love they are. It can’t be taught in words, but only from the Higher Self can you love this intensely without the fire burning out. And only from the scarred places in your heart can you know what it is to love, what it is to truly give of heart and Soul, without sacrificing anything. Compassion is an expression of the love that you are and to lead as love is to simply choose to express your love each and every day, with every person you meet.
There is no greater Soul's purpose than to spread love wherever you go. Forgiveness is the recognition that there is nothing to forgive. In truth, you can’t make forgiveness happen, it is not a doing. Forgiveness is a deep understanding that the person who hurt you is also hurting. It is the understanding that our unhealed wounds trigger the unhealed wounds in others. Forgiveness happens naturally when you recognize that their wounded-led behaviors that caused you so much pain were your gift. It pulled open the bandage of the wounds you did not want to see, it caused your wounds to become rawer and excruciatingly painful than they had ever been before. But because we hide behind our wounds, we often can’t see the healing we most need until someone shows us the pathway. We need to activate the qualities of courage, power, trust, and love in order to forgive. Once these are fully active within us, forgiveness is a given.
Everyone is your friend, no one is your enemy. We are all one in the journey of awakening, we are Soul friends helping to activate each other's wounds so we can remember to choose to heal and ultimately remember our wholeness. We forgive when we are ready to forgive, there is no need to push the process, it will only keep you stuck. Remember: love is who you are. Anything outside the realm of love is just your calling to love yourself more deeply.
Peace
(to move towards harmony to seek balance cto choose calm over chaos, silent stillness)
You are at peace. You are the calm, quiet stillness amidst all the noise, it is why you feel at home when you are in nature or large places that make you feel spacious. There is a wisdom that comes from this still place within, you know exactly what to do, how to do it and everything just makes sense. There is no rush and no hurry as everything is on time from this peaceful place of being. You might find time slows down, the clock ticks in the background but it is no longer the driver of your life. If you suffer from anxiety, I know this can feel like a far-off goal, but just like the other Soul Qualities, it is available to activate and cultivate within you. Most everyone has experienced peace, even if it was only for short moments at a time.
Maybe you heard the birdsong out your window, or on a walk felt peaceful as you mindfully felt the warmth of the sun on your skin, maybe you feel it when sitting in mindfulness meditation when you are watching your thoughts and allowing them to be. It’s common to believe that our environment and circumstances need to be peaceful before we can feel calm, have you ever said this to yourself “I’ll take care of all this on my to-do list then I’ll relax” But because peace is who you are, you don’t have to wait to experience it. First, of course, you must practice cultivating this peace when things are calmer in your life so you can practice this quality more deeply when things are chaotic. I’m a true believer that mindfulness practice is one of the most helpful ways to cultivate this quality within and I’ll be sharing practices to start or deepen this journey for yourself as we explore the phases in more depth. It’s also necessary to seek balance in our lives, to bring elements of just being and doing (taking action) together. I’ll be sharing more on this topic in further chapters.
Freedom
(For creative self-expression for adventure to be curious, to explore your inner and outer world)
Your Soul is free to create, free to express itself, is curious and open-minded, with a desire to explore your inner and outer world. Freedom is a value for many, but as you look deeper into your life, you might find that you are called to be free in all areas of your life. You likely want freedom in your work so you can allow creativity or innovative ideas to flow, and freedom to do what you love so you can honor your Soul's unique gifts. Your Soul is curious and adventurous, it wants to explore its inner world through books, music, and more, it wants to clear the clutter of the mind so there is more space inside for what matters to you. Your Soul wants to explore the outer world, whether it’s enjoying nature, visiting new places, or just mindfully experiencing the subtle changes in its environment.
You might notice that you resist confinement or anything that makes you feel smaller than you are. Any resistance of course is not resistance from your Soul, as your Soul is adaptable to any situation. Instead, your Guarding sub-personalities recognize this confinement and become angry, rebellious, depressed, and more. Because your Soul IS freedom, it only seeks to secondarily express itself in the world. Therefore you do not need to experience outer freedom to experience inner freedom. This is good news because we don’t always have control over the outer experiences of freedom, but we can cultivate a free and spacious mind from within and that is enough to feel this quality of your Soul. Freedom within the mind begins with nonresistance to the patterns present here, we experience true freedom when we can allow things to be as they are, only then will the storm clouds part to make room for the spaciousness that you are. True freedom is freedom from taking our thoughts at face value, instead, we tap into our innate curiosity to question what arises.
Joy
(The joy of just being of feeling the oneness of all that is unlimited in its capacity)
Your Soul is Joy. All paths lead us here, by activating any of these seven Soul Qualities, you make room for the quality of Joy to burst forth from your heart. In Buddhist teachings, joy arises naturally as we awaken. Soul Quality joy is very different from circumstantial happiness because we only experience this kind of happiness whenever things are going well for us. For example, when you get a job promotion, receive the good news that resolves a problem you had, go on a trip or vacation, or enjoy a delicious meal. The happiness you feel in any kind of circumstantial situation is minuscule compared to the immense joy that lives within you.
Our Guarding sub-personalities are trying so very hard to make sure we experience happiness and avoid unhappiness, however, these parts of us don’t understand that we do not need anything outside of us to be happy. We can easily fall into seeking mode whether it’s switching jobs over and over again because we want something better, or seeking a new partner in order to tap into that level of happiness felt earlier on in our relationships. We are simply searching for ourselves, we know we are joy deep within (even if it’s only subconscious) because we don’t know how to activate it from within. There is joy in just being, we will dive into how to activate and cultivate this in upcoming chapters.
You might wonder how much influence you have over your spiritual awakening journey, and from the perspective of these 6 phases, you do not need to wait for spiritual awakening to happen TO you. With that being said, you might think of this process as a co-creation with the Divine universe. The more we try to force the process, the more we stay stuck in our current phase or fall back into earlier
phases. As we open to the intelligence and grace of the Divine, we will more easily accept our experience and therefore will become more fluid to move upwards in the ascension process.
Journal To Activate Soul Qualities:
As you consider these Seven Soul Qualities, go through each one in a journal and note a positive or even profound experience you had. To retell the story of those experiences and truly feel them is a first step in activating these qualities within. Also, I encourage you to note which Soul Qualities you feel you are already cultivating and which ones you need to focus more on.
If you are interested in learning more about healing your core wounds and aligning as your Highest Self, I invite you to download your free Spiritual Awakening Guide Book to understand your spiritual journey, heal your core wounds and align as your Highest Self (includes a journal to track progress over time).
Amie Dean, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine Amie Dean is a certified clinical trauma counselor and an Ascension Coach. She helps driven, empathic women, struggling with self-criticism and not feeling good enough, heal their inner child wounds so they can live an authentic, spiritually awakened life true to their soul's mission. She is the founder of One Awakening, a transformational online community to heal core wounds together and awaken spiritually. In her signature Awakened Living Program, she is a guide for increased self-awareness and Higher Self realignment.
