Glowing up spiritually means embracing all of us and appreciating the heck out of it. Photo: Pexels
In today’s world we have become obsessed with being pretty, rich and “glow up”. This is not a bad concept itself, since being happy with what we look like sometimes really determines the way we feel about ourselves.
However, we should never neglect the spiritual part of our lives, as it determines how ‘beautiful’ our soul and heart are. These tips are supposed to help you find out where you’re lacking emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. When we glow up spiritually, our lives improve!
Map out where you’re lacking in life
Before we can start with trying to improve ourselves, we first have to know where improvement is necessary. Glowing up spiritually doesn’t mean become a saint and live the life of a monk. It means finding out where we’re lacking and what’s holding us back.
These can be physical aspects too, as our routines often determine how much we progress in life – in all areas. If you don’t feel good about your environment, your looks, your thoughts, your mental wellbeing, your career, your health, then start there.
If your messy room, a toxic relationship, low self-esteem, an unhealthy diet, emotional wounds – whatever it may be – make you feel bad day after day, you should be interested in changing those aspects. Only then can we properly take care of our inside!
So, write it all down, talk to people who can help you identify those aspects and observe yourself in your day-to-day life. When you got this far, you can start taking steps to bettering your life – inside and out.
Get rid of an environment that holds you back
If you now know what you don’t like about your life, try to take the steps towards changing them. If you need to be more confident, find people that you look up to and listen to their advice.
If you’re not as financially secure as you’d like to be, build a side hustle. Change your job if you don’t like your current one. Be open towards meeting new people, if the friends you currently have are toxic. Try to improve the relationship with your parents by communicating your needs and feelings. Consult a therapist if you want to get over unresolved trauma.
And so on. I know, this isn’t easy, but taking actions to changing your life will change your life. And it will definitely be worth it.
Get healthy
Try to live as healthy of a lifestyle as you can. A lot of today’s food is known to make us sick, or at least isn’t as good for us as natural foods are. There are foods that will give you a lot of energy, and are good for your body in all kinds of ways, including curing diseases and preventing them.
Some foods increase concentration, blood flow, make you sleep better, give you pretty hair, skin and nails, and slow down aging. Eat clean, cook your own meals, invest in high-quality food, go outside, take care of your hygiene, drink a lot of water and cut out the sodas. Move your body.
I always argue that you don’t have to go to the gym, if that’s not your thing. I find that today people think working out is the only way to be physically fit. It doesn’t have to be. Maybe you prefer running, dancing, swimming, climbing, yoga, skiing, tennis, whatever it may be. Take more walks too.
Improve your social life
A big part of being mentally healthy depends on the relationships you have with others. Humans are not supposed to stay alone and isolated. I noticed this when I had a bad phase in my life. I felt really lonely.
Maintaining good relationships with other people, with friends, with family and with lovers can really increase your life quality. That doesn’t mean your happiness should depend on them. We should thrive towards being happy in our own company too, but high quality relationships are important for our wellbeing.
Human touch can heal. And being able to talk about problems and emotions with people that are close to us is crucial in being happy in the long term.
Work on making an effort to seeing your friends more often. Communicate, share thoughts and stories, go out together, become more open-minded and social and be interested in getting to know new people as well. Don’t underestimate the power of connection and intimacy.
Journal
Journaling can drastically help with identifying what’s going on inside of us. It helps to get to know our shadow side, our inner child and the person we are supposed to become. Journaling is like talking to a close friend.
In your journal you can document your feelings, your goals, your progresses your set-backs, your wounds, what hurt you, what makes you happy, what character traits you love about yourself and which ones you’d like to work on and perhaps change.
Instead of letting resentment towards situations, other people or ourselves build up inside us, journaling is an excellent way of letting those things go and identifying them. You can also use your journal for your manifestations and write down your affirmations. Try it some time!
Find your character flaws and improve them
Now if have done the work I mentioned, it’s likely that you have found some flaws. Flaws are natural and nothing to be ashamed of. We can all improve, and we should – during our entire lifetimes.
Maybe you found out that you have the tendency to be jealous, to not be happy for other people’s success, maybe you’re vain, superficial, have low self-esteem, like to gossip, always blame your environment or other people when things go wrong, argue a lot with your parents, and so on.
Identifying those aspects is a big achievement already. But we should also try to overcome those negative character traits. Even if it takes a lifetime.
Again, actively watch and observe yourself in your everyday life. And when you catch yourself doing anything you don’t like (e.g. gossiping, being rude, talking down on yourself, being jealous), make an effort of fighting those tendencies.
Because most of the time such things are just habits. And we can totally change them! Also; a person who is truly happy and fulfilled with their life doesn’t feel the need to focus on others or be unkind to them. So, once you are able to ‘glow up’ in some areas of your life, those aspects might resolve themselves!
Heal emotional wounds
I have written about this topic before, because it’s huge and very important. Almost everybody has trauma or emotional wounds that cause them to act a certain way. Usually, they don’t do it out of malevolence but simply because that’s the way they learnt to protect themselves.
This goes hand in hand with the point I made just before. Once you can heal some of those wounds and can forgive others and yourself, you will be able to let go of resentment and will no longer feel the need to make others feel miserable.
Healing yourself is not only good for you in terms of not suffering from the trauma anymore. It will also stimulate character development. And that’s actually what ‘glowing up’ spiritually is all about.
Meditate
Meditating is a great way to calm down, release stress, increase concentration and helps us get to know ourselves on a deeper level. When sitting in silence we can watch our thoughts from a distance and truly get to know ourselves.
It has many health benefits too. I have read stories – one by Joe Dispenza of course – where people had visions about themselves, how they died, who they were in previous lives or past or future versions of themselves.
In his book ‘Becoming Supernatural‘ Dr. Joe Dispenza explains that with meditation we can control the energy flow in our body and can raise the frequencies we vibrate on – and with that, we can heal our body from illnesses for example.
Meditation has endless benefits. If you haven’t already, you should definitely try it out and do it on a regular basis. There are many guided meditations on Spotify or YouTube. In the beginning, it can only be five or ten minutes and you will already notice a difference.
But don’t get disheartened if you find it difficult or don’t see any changes right away. Meditation – like almost everything in life – is a skill and something we become better at when we practice it often.
Find a passion
This chapter is very important to me because I have only recently found out what difference it makes. A year ago, I had a bad phase where I felt very sad and unmotivated by my life. I also felt lonely and had gained weight.
Half a year later I discovered salsa dancing. Dancing now makes me so happy, that gradually I had to increase my dancing-intake 🙂 Now, I dance four times a week and additionally do ballet and standard and Latin-American dances. It gives me so much energy.
And listening to songs that I dance to automatically puts me in a good mood. I look forward to dance class every day and have never skipped one! I love the contact I have to other people and generally love the feeling of it. No way could I feel as bad about my life as I did last year!
I strongly encourage you to find something you’re really passionate about. It can be something creative, musical, athletic, anything. Painting, writing, dancing, reading, playing the piano, any project you can imagine, building a business, surfing, walking dogs from the shelter.
Find something, that makes you look forward to getting up in the morning. I promise, it will make your life better and it will make you happier. It will spark joy in you and it will make you want to achieve your goals. It will truly bring you forward in life. And it will raise your vibrations too!
Be grateful
Lastly, try to be as grateful for what you have as you can. Once we realize how lucky we are, how many things, how much love, privilege and opportunities we have, and once we start to be truly grateful for our lives, that’s when life gets much easier.
Gratitude is a spiritual practice that grounds us, and that puts us on high frequencies. We act differently when we see how lucky we really are and therefore walk differently through life as well. We can practice being grateful by listing a few things every day that we don’t take for granted (anymore).
And saying thank you to the people in our lives that mean something to us also makes a difference! Did I miss something? Let me know in the comments!
Love, Valentina <3
Written by Valentina – spiritual writer & founder of Valentina’s Diary
