Awakening to Your Soul

Awakening to Your Soul: The Sacred Practice of Returning

There are so many things competing for our attention.

Our work. Our families. Our phones. Our responsibilities. The roles we play and the expectations we carry.

It can become difficult to distinguish between the person the world expects us to be and the person we know ourselves to be deep within.

October's theme, Awakening to Your Soul, is an invitation to quiet some of that external noise and return home to yourself.

Yom Kippur and the Practice of Alignment

As I reflect on Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, I have been thinking about its deeper spiritual meaning.

At its most mystical level, Yom Kippur is a day of alignment.

The everyday physical world begins to fade into the background, creating space for us to examine ourselves honestly. We acknowledge where we have missed the mark, reconnect with our values and consider how we want to show up moving forward.

For me, there is a beautiful parallel between this practice and yoga.

It is one of the reasons I come to my mat every day.

Not to perfect a pose.

Not to achieve something.

But to come back into alignment with myself and my soul.

To become the best version of myself I can be that day.

And when I miss the mark?

I get to try again.

Pratyahara: Turning Inward

Yoga philosophy gives us a beautiful practice for this inward journey called pratyahara.

Pratyahara is the practice of withdrawing our attention from external distractions and drawing our senses inward.

We close our eyes.

We breathe.

The noise around us begins to soften.

For a moment, we aren't responding to emails, caring for someone else, completing a task or performing one of the many identities we've collected throughout our lives.

We simply are.

This isn't about rejecting the physical world or punishing the body.

It's about temporarily releasing ourselves from external demands so we can hear what's happening within us.

As those distractions begin to fall away, we can start stripping away some of the armor we've accumulated.

We become observers of our thoughts.

We notice sensations within our bodies.

We reconnect with the quiet awareness underneath everything else.

Teshuvah: The Art of Returning

At the heart of Yom Kippur is the practice of teshuvah.

Although it is commonly translated as “repentance,” its literal meaning is to return.

I love this interpretation because returning is also at the heart of yoga and meditation.

Think about what happens when you meditate.

You focus on your breath.

Your mind wanders.

You notice.

And you return.

A few moments later, it wanders again.

And again, you return.

There is no failure in the wandering.

The return is the practice.

Each time we come back, we become a little more familiar with ourselves.

Our thoughts.

Our patterns.

Our bodies.

Our inner world.

Life works much the same way.

We become distracted. We fall into old habits. We make choices that don't feel aligned. We allow the expectations and opinions of others to become louder than our own inner knowing.

And then something reminds us.

Come back.

Returning to Who You Were Before the World Told You Who to Be

What if awakening to your soul isn't about finding something that is missing?

What if your soul has been there all along?

Underneath the expectations.

Underneath the titles.

Underneath the accomplishments.

Underneath the mistakes.

Underneath all the stories you've collected about who you're supposed to be.

There you are.

Yom Kippur reminds us that even when we miss the mark, our core essence remains intact.

Yoga offers us the same invitation.

Return.

Again and again.

Return to your breath.

Return to your body.

Return to your values.

Return to the quiet voice underneath all the noise.

Return to yourself.

Standing at a Sacred Threshold

The final hour of Yom Kippur is called Neilah, traditionally understood as the closing of the gates.

I think of it as a sacred threshold.

A moment of complete presence and intimacy with the Divine.

When we become deeply still, the separation between our thinking mind and the divine spark within us can begin to soften.

You might call that connection God.

Source.

Spirit.

The Universe.

Pure awareness.

The name matters less than the experience of remembering that there is something deeper than the noise of our everyday lives.

Something within us that knows how to come home.

Awakening to Your Soul

You don't need to travel somewhere sacred to reconnect with your soul.

You can return home to yourself wherever you are.

On your yoga mat.

Sitting quietly in meditation.

Walking outside.

Sharing a meal around a table.

Gathering in community.

Traveling on retreat.

Or simply closing your eyes for a moment and taking one conscious breath.

This month, consider asking yourself:

Where have I become disconnected from myself?

What external noise am I ready to quiet?

Who am I underneath the roles I play?

What feels deeply true to me right now?

What is my soul asking me to return to?

Don't rush to answer.

Awakening to your soul isn't necessarily about searching harder.

Sometimes it's about becoming quiet enough to remember what has been there all along.

Return to your breath.

Return to your body.

Return to your truth.

Return home to yourself.

With love,
Melanee