Don’t forget Rip Van Winkle? These of us in the American English speaking part of the world who passed our high school years in the 1950s to 1970s do don’t forget him. He was the man who slept for 20 years in a hollow in New York. We knew him in our English Literature class.
For the younger generation who know absolutely nothing about Rip Van Winkle, here is a really short summary. He was the principal character in Washington Irving’s story “Rip Van Winkle.” He was a Dutch American who did not want to perform for a fee. He just wanted to play. A single day he was lost in the mountains of New York as it was then ahead of the American Revolution and got into the company of the ghosts of Henry Hudson and his crew. He drank their drink and fell asleep. He woke up only soon after 20 years, with a extended beard and an aged man. He goes back to his village only to discover it was no longer the very same as he left it. America was now independent from Good Britain. Right after energy healing browsing he found his loved ones.
The explanation why I started with the story of Rip Van Winkle is due to the fact he illustrates the person who sleeps for many years, who is awakened only right after sleeping these numerous years, that is, in his body, the physical life.
In the spiritual life, like Rip Van Winkle most persons are asleep and unless somebody wakes them up they will continue on sleeping spiritually, maybe for the rest of their life. Some of them will wake up only in eternity.
Here are three methods to know you’ve had a spiritual awakening. If you have not gone via these three approaches, this implies that you are still asleep, that is, spiritually, like Rip Van Winkle physically, and it really is time for you to wake up.
And that is the difference amongst spiritual awakening and physical awakening. You cannot know that you are physically awake if you are asleep. You can not know that you are awake even though you are still sleeping. But you can know that you have not yet awakened spiritually. How? By reflecting on your life, regardless of whether any of these techniques are present in your life. If they are not however present, then it signifies that you have not but awakened spiritually. Realizing this you can now wish to awaken spiritually. And desiring to awaken spiritually is the step before really awakening spiritually.
Luckily, the methods to know we’ve had a spiritual awakening are equivalent to the approaches to know we’ve had a physical awakening.
The first way to know that you are physically awake is by being conscious of your surrounding, at 1st indistinctly, then little by small, far more distinctly.
Even prior to you open your eyes you can know that you are already awake, that you are nevertheless in bed, that it is late in the evening or early in the morning, and so on.
Even so in spiritual awakening you are conscious of the spiritual realities around you. You are conscious that you are in a planet of spiritual as effectively as physical realities. Once again, as in physical awakening, this awareness is at initial indistinct, but as time goes on and as you proceed in our spiritual journey this awareness becomes clearer and clearer.
This awareness of spiritual realities around you could result as a consequence of a dissatisfaction with your present job, of a failure in company, of a loss of a loved one, of a joyful encounter with a beloved. Whatever it is that triggers this awareness, you are created conscious that not only physical, visible items surround you but also spiritual, non-visible issues, like love or worry, inner peace or turmoil, joy or confusion.
Have you had this experience? If you have, then you have begun to awaken spiritually.
In physical awakening, right after getting conscious of your surrounding the all-natural thing to do is to open your eyes and you see items around: the fading darkness or the onrush of sunlight, the furniture around the area, the light switch, the door, and so on.
So also in spiritual awakening you open your spiritual eyes and perceive the spiritual realities around you: the strivings of human beings to increase their lives and seek ultimate happiness, the crimes committed in the search for some kind of satisfaction, the exultation and joys of these who succeed in their endeavors, the struggle amongst great and evil occurring prior to your really eyes.
Do you perceive these spiritual realities around you? Beneath the stories of sordid crimes and wars, of natural and man-created calamities, do you see the mighty spiritual forces claiming for your attention? Do you see the ever escalating hordes of human beings who are digging deeper into poverty and homelessness? Do you see the few elite masters of this planet earth who continue to obtain sources beyond their consumption and just waste them away? And do you see these events as element of a spiritual battle amongst the invisible excellent and evil forces of the universe, beyond psychological, sociological, economic and political factors? Do you see the forces behind our planet leaders which push them to dominate peoples and exploit them? If you do, you have had a spiritual awakening.
Thirdly, in physical awakening just after you are aware of your surrounding and following you open your eyes, you act. You get out of bed, go to the wash area, and so forth., preparing yourself for the perform of the day.
So also in spiritual awakening, after you are conscious of your spiritual surrounding and following you see what is taking place spiritually around you and all over the world, you act. You prepare for the spiritual operate ahead of you. You do not sink into hopeless resignation, thinking you can do absolutely nothing due to the fact of the enormity of the spiritual forces about you. You act simply because you are convinced that the Spirit in you is mightier than the thousands of problems around you.
You act but you do not do so rashly. You do not go into battle unprepared. So also in spiritual warfare you place on the shield and weapons of a spiritual nature, entirely prepared to vanquish the enemies.
Are you struggling with spirit power to make this world a much better location for you to live in, even just in your corner of the world? If you say, Yes, then you are acting and you are spiritually awake.
The 3 strategies to know no matter whether you’ve had a spiritual awakening is by 1) becoming conscious of the spiritual realities about you 2) opening your spiritual eyes to the events of spiritual forces about you three) acting spiritually in your corner of the globe to make it a better place to live in. If this has occurred to you, you know that you are spiritually awake and you can now assist other folks to wake up spiritually.