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It's
easy to get souls and spirits confused, although they do mean
different things. Both are a part of every individual, but they
also link us with the non-physical world, or the astral levels.
Spirit is the energy of all the Universe. You could think of
it as the spark of life. The soul is our intelligence
and brings us that spiritual energy. When you feel you know
something "deep down," it's probably your soul speaking.
Spiritual
Energy
Every single atom in the cosmos is made up of energy, including
our spirits. The energy is not good or bad, but neutral. Humans,
and other animals, have an individual essence that is made out
of this spirit. It helps form our character. We often refer
to someone as "spirited," meaning that he or she has
a strong energy for life. We have temporary highs and lows in
our energy levels, which we call being high-spirited or low-spirited,
and these can be linked to energy levels around us. On a cloudy,
dull day, when the whole World seems to be moving slowly, we
can feel sluggish and uninspired. But when we're with energetic,
lively people, or when the sun begins to shine, our tiredness
disappears and we feel spiritually uplifted.
The
Higher Self
Some
people call the soul "the higher self." Many people
believe that everything that lives has a soul, which creates
the patterns for our lives. The soul affects, and is affected
by, our feeling and our relationships with other people. The
soul remembers every life we've had, and every lesson that we've
learned, so we can develop different abilities in each lifetime.
Psychics
know the value of connecting with the higher-self for information
about themselves, others, and situations. Our higher-selves
our directly connected to the Universal Mind or Collective Consciouness,
which is where all information flows. By taping into that knowledge
we can make better choices and informed dicisions in our lives.
Transcendence
& Ascension
The
soul can help us overcome obstacles in our lives. By connecting
with the God within us, we can move into a higher state of awareness
and can deal better with problems. Transcendence happens when
we pass through one stage in our development and go onto the
next.
Ascension is the way to integrate all portions of yourself in
a conscious way. You are a multi-dimensional being who seeded
portions of itself into the physical density you may call "past-lives",
but that's a sequential and linear perception, you are more
than this, part of yourself may forgot this. The remembrance
is the integration of the splitting and seeding you have done,
the removal of the veil of time, identities and separateness
in yourself.
As well as having Guardian Angels, it's said that we all have
one or more spirit guides to help us. These are people or animals
who once lived on Earth and, in some cases, extraterrestrials
from other planets or beings from alternated dimensions. Spirit
guides never interfere in our lives because it's important for
us all to have free will. But it's said that they're waiting
to help us in any way they can. You just have to remember to
ask!
Unlike
Guardian Angels, most of us don't have the same spirit guides
throughout our lifetime. As we grow and expand our spiritual
selves, old guides leave and are replaced by new guides. For
example, an individual newly attuned to Reiki Healing will have
new spirit guides that aid in healing.
Those who are clairvoyant often have the ability to see their
own spirit guides as well as those of other people. It is also
possible to receive information from someone else's spirit guides
and this is often the way psychics perform their readings.
Ghosts
Almost
every culture seems to believe in ghosts, although explanations
for them differ. Ghosts are usually said to be the detached
spirit of someone who's died, and they may have good or bad
intentions. Some early cave people used to bury their dead under
stones and bind their hands and feet so that their ghosts couldn't
go on midnight walks.
Some
people, who don't believe that dis-embodied spirits can inhabit
the earth, say that ghosts are demons pretending to be the souls
of the dead. Whatever the truth, ghosts, hauntings, and other
phenomena that are difficult to explain, continue to fascinate
us as we try to discover more about them.
Perhaps
when we die our souls go onto the astral level as a kind of
stopping off point beforewereach our destinations. While in
the astral plane, these souls might reflect on the lives they
led, look over loved ones, receive divine guidance of some kind,
or prepare for their next life. Ghosts might be wandering souls
who, for some reason, haven't moved on properly from this world
to another. The Chinese believe there are two or three parts
to the soul, so the dead can seem to be in more than one place
at a time.
Some
ghosts may even be the spirits of people who don't even know
that they're dead. They might have been killed in an unexpected
way, such as in a car crash, and they find themselves wandering
around unaware that their physical body is dead.
People
also say that if we don't grieve properly for someone who has
died, they end up trapped between this world and the next. Apparently,
there's a simple way of moving a trapped sould on. You have
to tell it that it doesn't belong on Earth and it's time for
it to go on to the next place.
Some
information on this page is from The
Element Pocket Encyclopedia of Mind Body Spirit & Earth
by Joanna Crosse
For
more information on spirit and ghosts, check out these resources:
The Shadowlands - Ghosts & Hauntings
Ghosts Of The Prairie
T.A.P.S.
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