A tale of soul vs ego

I’m sure you’ve heard it before: being aligned is the answer to finding happiness in your work, and ultimately leads to business success… but what does being in Alignment actually mean? Were you ever that wonky to begin with? And how does alignment really impact the work you do, and how you serve others?

I’ve been on a mission to figure out why this new-age lingo is so crucial to my business mojo… And what better place to do it than the spiritual center of Eat, Pray, Love: Ubud.

I am about to wrap up my 6 month adventure in Bali – the place where I have learned the most about myself. This has been an epic, ugly and transformative time for me. I removed myself from all that is known and familiar, extradited myself from the loving safety net of my people, taken away all my comfort, routine and habits. By choosing to do this, I consciously stripped myself bare of the things that form my external identity: who I am in relation to people, things and my environment. Without the things that we have based our identity on, who are we? Is it possible to expose ourselves down to the basics of our being, analyze this raw state and rebuild ourselves anew?

Well, I’m still figuring it out, I’ll keep you posted. But what I have learned is that to be truly aligned in business, we have to find out who we truly are; discover the essence of our being and build that into your unique offering.

And to do that, we have to break through our ego:

EGO

Ego is linked to our focus on survival: it’s our preoccupation with the outside world. It’s how we define ourselves in the physical realm, with our focus on our bodies, time and our environment. It’s how we want people to perceive us, and how we perceive them. It’s our judgement and comparison, it’s the places we have to go, the car we choose to drive, the things we surround ourselves with, our concern with time. It’s hard work, because we’re constantly trying to control or force an outcome.

Living with our Ego selves is like swimming endlessly upstream while trying to control the source of the river. It’s living in stress, imbalance, fear, anger, sadness. It’s focusing on our own survival above anyone else’s which makes us selfish, separate and limited. The fact that we’re only trying to survive, by default means that our bodies are always stressed, always in flight or fight mode.

In short: not only is it exhausting, but it’s slowly killing us.

SOUL

Find what sets your soul on fire: Go do that

You know this one. You may have ignored it for some time, but deep down you know it. Your soul is your inner being, that burning feeling in your chest when you do something you love, something that makes you feel free. It’s what you feel when you close your eyes, turn off your mind and dance chaotically to your favorite music, letting the beat drive your body. It’s what you feel when you’re fully in the flow of creating something magical, be it art, music, writing, baking. It’s what I feel when I touch down in a new destination and I’m forced to navigate by instinct alone. It’s what I feel when I get into a rhythm of a good run, when my feet pound the road and take my body to unknown places. It’s what I AM when I’m writing or drawing.

Your soul whispers to you all day if you let it. It’s the one who nudges you to talk to a stranger on the bus who ends up becoming a life-long friend. It works as your conscience when you’ve done something that doesn’t feel right. It has an intelligence that far outweighs your own, and you should let it drive the bus, always.

Your soul the unsung hero of your story: but she’s been silenced by Ego and left to hide in a dark corner.

You’ll know when you’re listening to your soul; life suddenly becomes a whole lot easier. You spend less time swimming upstream, and more time going with the flow – trusting that wherever you end up will be right. You’ll naturally be full of compassion: for yourself & for others. You’ll be guided to do the work you love, spend time with people who actually fill your cup, listen to your body and make healthier choices. You’ll want to feed yourself better food, you’ll want to move and shake and play with your kids. You’ll be less selfish and be more focussed on helping others find their bliss. You’ll start realizing that happiness is just a daily choice, that with enough practice it can become entwined in your bones, in your being.

ENERGY

If you’ve ever studied the realm of quantum physics, you’ll understand that everything is made up from energy: you, me, the chair you’re sitting in. Our energy is everything, and it connects us to everything else in this quantum field. We are all broadcasting a distinct energy pattern: our thoughts, emotions and actions have a ripple effect across the universe that we can barely comprehend. We also know that the primary rule of physics means that energy cannot be created, it can only be transferred or transformed.

So this begs the question: once you are no longer spending so much time, effort and energy on maintaining your ego, where does that energy go?

Well, simply put: it moves from the stress points in the body, back up to your brain via the heart.

The heart: home of your soul. When you stop spending so much time pretending, you will have more time to just BE. And when you BE, you BECOME: the truest, happiest and most fulfilled version of yourself. A self born of love.

When your heart and your mind are working in unison, you are aligned, suddenly things start to open up: new possibilities will start presenting themselves. Because you’re sending thoughts that are coherent with your feelings into the quantum field, the energy is powerful: things can’t help but change. There is no other way, it’s quantum law. 

This shift in energy will show up in the work you do, the clients you serve. They will feel the shift, they will match your energy and they will be drawn to you. THIS is when your work stops feeling like work and starts feeling like your calling, because it flows to you and through you in creative waves: Your soul has awoken.

CHOOSE LOVE. REPEAT DAILY

When you are aligned, you can’t help but make choices through love, not fear.

You realize that being ‘happy’ isn’t so much a pursuit, as a choice. It has little influence from exterior environments: some of the happiest people on earth have very little. It’s the decision to live in gratitude, for appreciating the small things. It’s choosing to see setbacks and hardships as the lessons they really are. It’s choosing growth and trusting that everything will be alright in the end, because who’s to say that there even is an end?

It’s choosing to root yourself so deeply in your truth that no storm can move you. Change is the only constant in life, yet once you find the solidarity of your soul in the outer environments, change doesn’t effect you as much. Your authenticity can shine through in the face of adversity, and that truth, that connection to your soul is the only beacon you need. It creates a magnetic field for trust, joy, human kindness, miracles, and love.

BACK TO BUSINESS

As a business owner, you will know how much energy is required of you on a daily basis. When you are doing work that you love, that is aligned with your soul, you’ll realize that energy isn’t spent – it’s transferred through you to those you serve.

So my question(s) to you is this: how are you spending your energy?

Who or what have you bound yourself energetically to that no longer serves you?
What truths are you hiding from the outside world, what things are you using to create your persona?
How can following your bliss set you free, both mentally and financially?
How will you choose to focus your new energy? How can you use this energy to put into others, to serve and inspire?

How can you choose love over fear?