Table of Contents
“We want spiritual principles to be more than beautiful abstractions; we want them to actually transform our lives.” — Marianne Williamson
When we talk about spiritual growth, most of us think of deliberately carving out time to practice meditation, yoga, self-inquiry, or other spiritual practices.
And although having a specific time in the day to practice is beneficial, for many of us this becomes a separate part of our life. Like a separate “spiritual identity.”
To embody spirituality, start implementing spiritual principles into your life.
You can see spiritual principles as tools. Essentially, these are simple tools that, when applied consistently, will lead to the revelation of spiritual truths.
These are truths you won’t acquire intellectually. Rather, through applying spiritual principles, they will present themselves with great clarity.
The truths will be self-evident when circumstances are suitable (which can be at any time).
The benefit is that you have not acquired them through the mind. Hence, they won’t end up with spiritual pride or arrogance.
The following spiritual principles have been tried and tested over the centuries. So there is no doubt that they lead to transformation.
But don’t feel pressured to implement them all at once. Otherwise, your good intention might backfire and you end up with a lopsided personality.
Instead of spiritual growth, you might end up with spiritual bypassing where you suppress all the “negative” aspects you don’t like about yourself. Instead of liberation, you’ll end up with a sophisticated spiritual neurosis.
The most important aspect in all spiritual practice, including living by spiritual principles, is awareness.
If you do everything with awareness, all your behavior will be fresh and beautiful. Habits are beneficial as long as they don’t become automated unconscious behaviors.
If you have resistance toward a principle or if it feels like effort, then don’t do it. You don’t want to do things just to avoid feeling bad. This won’t get you anywhere.
Instead, ask yourself why you are feeling resistance and then allow yourself to feel it. And if it still doesn’t feel right, then skip it for now.
One principle might serve your spiritual journey now and another one at a later time.
Always start from where you are.
Acting like you are somewhere where you are not will not shorten the path but prolong it. Living by spiritual principles is only effective if you live them from the place you are at right now.
So to avoid falling into the spiritual traps mentioned above, choose what feels right. Go through this list and feel which of the spiritual principles resonates with you the most.
Your intuition knows which one will serve you the most from where you are right now.
After you have chosen one, implement it and observe how it affects your life and well-being.
Kindness
The first principle is to be kind to everything and everyone, all the time, with no exception.
This doesn’t just include other people and other lifeforms but yourself as well. And by yourself, I mean everything about yourself. Be kind to your thoughts, beliefs, emotions, feelings, body, mind, soul, etc.
This is one of the most obvious spiritual principles. But it can be tricky to implement because forced kindness is perceived as smugness and provocation.
So keep in mind that kindness doesn’t mean to be overly sweet all the time. You can be serious and stern and kind at the same time.
Unconditional kindness means that you are not putting anyone down. Your words and actions are deliberate and sensible, and you always have the best for every party in mind.
If, for instance, an alcoholic wants you to give him more to drink, “no” can be the kindest action. Similarly, if you want to go working out because you know it’s healthy, but your body is telling you it needs a rest, being kind can mean skipping this workout.
Kindness is context-dependent and takes you discernment.
But as you progress on your journey, kindness will be like breathing. You’ll be kind without having to think about what is kind and what is not.
Admire All Life
Admire all of life in all its expression, no matter what, even if you don’t understand it.
Now, what does that mean on a practical level?
It means to respect and cherish life wherever you see it. This means avoiding unnecessary acts of violence against other creatures including plants.
We often squash bugs without thinking about it. Even though this might not be news to you, but bugs = life.
But honestly, isn’t life the most extraordinary thing?
You don’t need to be a religious fanatic to revere life. Quite to contrary. You’re not raising any form of life above anything else.
You acknowledge the multifaceted nature of life and you find it genuinely admirable. That’s all.
Rest in Not-Knowing
Many of us are thirsty for knowledge. We want to know things so bad, we go to pretty wild extremes to acquire knowledge.
How about instead of frantically trying to accumulate facts, we would embrace not-knowing?
This spiritual principle asks of you to presume no actual reliable knowledge of anything at all. Ask the Universe, Nature, Life, God, Infinite Intelligence, whatever you want to call it to reveal its meaning.
You see, almost everything in our universe is uncertain.
Yet so many of us struggle with feelings of uncertainty. Instead of doing something about it, we can start being comfortable with uncertainty and not-knowing.
Intend to See Beauty Everywhere
Intend to see the hidden beauty of all that exists – it then reveals itself.
Mystics, saints, and sages of all times have a tendency to see beauty everywhere. And if we open our minds and eyes to it, we can see the beauty too.
Words struggle to convey spiritual wisdom.
That’s why a lot of poetry and art aim to offer glimpses into spiritual realms. Images and visions often point towards something beyond words.
If you follow this spiritual principle, you’ll notice that you naturally focus on the beauty in all things.
Where others will see a depressing rainy alley, you will see each raindrop as a crystal from which infinity is reflected into every corner of this alley, illuminating it with divine light.
Very poetic, I know. I think you get the gist.
Forgive Everything and Everyone
Forgive everything and everyone, including yourself. Forgive everything you witness and experience, no matter what.
Resentment and guilt tear us apart and are among the most destructive emotions we can hold on to. Resentment and guilt imply punishment. And subconsciously that’s exactly what we’ll do, punish ourselves.
Do not be mistaken resenting someone else will not punish them, you’ll be the one suffering.
When you pick up hot coals with the intention to throw them at others, you’ll just burn yourself.
Remember Christ, Buddha, and Krishna all said that all mistakes are due to ignorance. And if you really think about it, most of us don’t go around with the intention to hurt others.
We all choose only what we believe to be good.
So do yourself a favor, drop the resentment and guilt. And if you can’t do it for others, do it for yourself. Forgiving others is the most selfish thing you can do and it’s beautiful.
Approach Life with Humility and Surrender
Many of us are in constant mental arguments with ourselves.
We create imaginary dialogues where we come out on top and feel really good about being right. We are immersed in mental theaters just to give ourselves some emotional gain.
If you don’t do that, well, good for you. I really mean it. If, however, you are creating this mental melodrama, ask yourself how it makes you feel.
Do you feel good creating it?
If not, you may want to commit to this spiritual principle. Approach all life with humility and be willing to surrender all positionalities and mental/emotional arguments or gain.
This means no longer trying to be right, no longer justifying yourself, no longer defending your position, no longer putting others down, no longer trying to win at someone else’s expense, and no longer engaging in senseless discussions.
This is pretty radical, I know. But if you commit yourself to this, you’ll see all the melodrama in your life vanish into thin air.
Implementing this seems like a lot of work, but all you need is awareness. Just be aware any time you’re creating melodrama, and tell yourself that it’s ok.
It’s not complicated. You are not changing your behavior. By increasing your awareness your behavior is being changed through you.
It sounds like wishful thinking, but that is really how it works. Try it and you’ll be surprised.
Be of Service to Life
Be willing to forgo all perceptions of gain, desire, or profit.
This means, be willing to be of “selfless” service to life in all its expressions. I put selfless in quotation marks because most of us cannot act from real selflessness.
When you do something for others and it gives you a good feeling you’re not selfless. But don’t worry about this. There is nothing wrong with it.
If you are selfish and at the same time help someone else, that’s great, that’s a win-win.
Embrace selfishness. It’s liberating. Definitely better than claiming you’re selfless, but really acting on a more nuanced form of selfishness.
Anyway, being of service to life doesn’t mean that you’ll no longer get or achieve things.
Quite the opposite.
You’ll see that when you no longer try to gain at the expense of others, that everyone’s desires will be fulfilled.
Here is the simplest way I can explain it. Adopt a win-win-win mindset. Good for you, good for others, good for the earth/environment.
When you live that way, you’ll help fulfill the goals of others and as a result, your desires will be fulfilled as well.
Try not to adopt this principle with the motive to get something from it. That would be self-defeating. Nonetheless, this is like telling you don’t think of a pink elephant.
So if you have ulterior motives, that is ok. Simply recognize and accept them. Don’t deny that they’re there, that won’t make them go away. On the contrary, that will just increase their power over your life.
After you have acknowledged any other motive, try this principle out of curiosity.
Do it because you’re curious to see how your life and the life of everyone around you might change.
Make Your Life a Living Prayer
Make your life a living prayer by intention, alignment, humility, and surrender.
Implementing this spiritual principle is not as difficult as it sounds. Although in the beginning, you might feel a little weird.
Essentially, you start by setting intentions before you do anything.
You are about to go on a walk? Set the intention to have a joyful and invigorating walk. You are about to have dinner with friends? Set the intention to have a good time and laugh your ass off.
The next step is aligning with your intention.
You do this by walking into your experience as if you know your intention is being fulfilled for sure. Be the person who would have the experience you intend to have. Honestly, try this and you’ll be surprised.
You’ll start to feel like a magician as one intention after the other is fulfilled perfectly. And this is where humility comes into play.
Don’t get too full of yourself, otherwise balancing forces might put you on your ass to humble you. Be lowkey about it and smile to yourself in appreciation.
The last aspect is surrender.
Surrender means not trying to force your intention into being. Your work is done by setting the intention. The rest is up to the universe. Relax and let life take over the steering wheel.
Approach each situation with an attitude of trust that life knows what it’s doing. Life has been here way before any of us, so relax.
Don’t effort, don’t control, instead, flow with life.
It takes courage to live like this, but it sure is more fun than the effortful approach we’ve been taught growing up.
When you follow this spiritual principle, you’ll discover that true spiritual reality is a way of being in the world.
Align Yourself with Authentic Spiritual Teaching
Many people, especially the younger generation, contract when they hear the word religion or “follow someone else.”
And it’s true, essentially you don’t need a teacher or guru. Your inner being is the perfect teacher.
Nonetheless, at the start of your journey, having someone to point you in the right direction can save you a lot of poking around in the dark.
Don’t worry, you don’t need to follow any religion or belief system.
If you come across a teacher or teaching that resonates with you, allow yourself to explore this direction.
Again, you don’t have to become a devotee. Trust your intuition to guide you to the right teachings.
See beyond the facade of all teachers, teachings, spiritual groups, and literature with which you intend to be aligned or a student.
It’s not a secret that there are quite a few con artists and narcissists in spiritual communities. If a “guru” wants you to leave your own discernment and critical thinking at the door then you should consider choosing another door.
Accept and Let Go in Every Moment
Accepting is often misunderstood as allowing yourself to be pushed around by everyone and everything.
But that is not what is meant by acceptance. Acceptance means accepting whatever emotion, mood, feeling, and sensation is presenting itself to you in every moment.
Accepting is not a passive state, it’s a state full of power.
By accepting your inner experience, you are integrating and transcending any limiting beliefs and destructive emotional patterns.
This works because you’re aware of all the mental garbage. And when you are aware of it you are no longer it. You have disidentified from it.
Shadow work, trauma work, and other psychological and spiritual healing modalities are in vogue, and they do work.
But at some point we might start to wonder, “When will my healing journey be done?”
Well, as long as we’ve identified with the part of ourselves that beliefs it’s defective and needs healing, never. And that is the trap many of us fall into on our inner “healing” journeys.
There will always be more shadow work and trauma work to be done, so don’t get hung up on it.
Instead, start observing the part that believes it needs healing. What if you were no longer identified with that part? Who would be there to heal?
What I’m suggesting here is not suppression, it’s increasing your awareness.
When you’re aware of everything that’s happening inside you, you’re severing the link between you and what you believe needs to be healed. And this is how the healing happens.
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Again, you don’t need to implement every one of these spiritual principles.
Even picking one and committing to it, can initiate a transformation. It’s like pulling on the end of one thread. Eventually, you’ll unravel the whole sweater.
And as soon as you have momentum going, you’ll see that you automatically start implementing many of the spiritual principles in this list.
Oh and please don’t take this all too seriously. Life is supposed to be fun.
Luka
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I loved reading your spiritual principles, Luka. I particularly resonated with Acceptance and liked the way you described it as full of power – to choose to be aware and to identify what is going on with our inner experience. The way this starts the process of disidentifying with our limiting beliefs and then we are no longer our ‘mental garbage’ and that precious space between our awareness and our thoughts has been created. Your words convey simplicity, lightness and humour which make all the principles seem accessible which is encouraging!
Thank you for your kind words, Harriet! I’m glad it resonates with you.