Spirituality is not all mystical shenanigans. In fact, studies show that no amount of crystals, spirit guides, or dream catchers can guarantee you live a spiritual life.
At its core, spirituality is about living a life of meaning. And while your beliefs in mercury’s retrograde may persuade you to make more intentional decisions, they are merely branches to the root.
What separates a spiritual person from the crowd is how they align themselves with the world. A spiritual person seeks people, places, and pursuits that help them grow, and cut’s off all of that which doesn’t.
I want to make it very clear that spirituality and religion are not one and the same. Religion follows a systemic agreement of faith towards a particular God or divine power; spirituality is about recognizing this power within ourselves.
If you possess some of these 7 traits, you may be a spiritual person without even realizing it. And you don’t have to buy tarot cards, either.
1) You enjoy taking care of yourself
Self-love is the first-order priority for any spiritual person. If you do not love yourself, you can never respect yourself.
You have likely struggled with loving yourself in the past, and may have even experienced a trauma of some sort. Eventually you hit a wall, and decided you have had enough of feeling like crap.
So you made the decision – once and for all – that you were going to take better care of yourself. You began to eat the right foods, exercised frequently, and stood up to people that disrespected you.
You enjoy taking care of yourself because it reinforces traits of strength, love, and respect – all of which you once lacked. It gives you a feeling of empowerment.
“Respect yourself and others will respect you” – Confucius
2) You have an evolving purpose or mission
You may not know exactly what you want to do with the rest of your life. And even if you do know, your purpose is likely to change and evolve over time.
But what’s important is that you are actively searching for it. You avidly try new things and explore new adventures, sculpting your identity day by day.
A spiritual person aligns their identity with their purpose. Who you are, how you think about yourself, and the way in which you are viewed by the world all connects through your life’s work.
Your purpose is your center. It is something you can fall back on when all else fails, keeping you grounded through thick and thin. It is your comfort in discomfort, and order in disorder.
“He who has a why to live can bear almost any how” – Friedrich Nietzsche
3) You have a strong set of values
While spiritual people do not necessarily conform to all the same beliefs, values and principles are held important regardless of what they are.
You hold your values close to your heart. They are engrained into your identity like the color of your skin or the iris of your eye. You use them as a compass, gently navigating your purpose through the muddy waters of life.
Your life journey is like a sailboat at sea. Without a strong set of principles, the currents of life will tip you over and sway you from your direction. You need strong values to weather the storm.
“Don’t let your special character and values, the secret that you know and no one else does, the truth – don’t let that get swallowed up by the great chewing complacency” – Aesop
4) You relish time alone
Sometimes, you just need to take a break from the world.
Regardless of introversion or extraversion, a spiritual person needs time alone to reflect on personal affairs. Periods of solitude are important to you.
You are enamored with introspection, and harbor an endless curiosity about yourself and the world. You have an extremely vivid imagination, and being alone helps to feed it.
This is another reason why you frequent journaling, fitness, meditation, or yoga – it’s a place where you can connect with yourself without any outward explanation.
“Nowhere can man find a quieter or more untroubled retreat than in his own soul” – Marcus Aurelius
5) You have high degrees of self-awareness
You are aware of your strengths, but more importantly, you are hyper-conscious of your weaknesses. You exude a humble confidence in your abilities.
This pushes you to seek out challenges and opportunities that are difficult – not just because you think you can attain them, but because you like to test your boundaries. You are not afraid of rejection because that is where growth lies.
Likewise, you take feedback and criticism well. Even though you are sensitive, you strive to seek truth no matter how difficult it is to hear.
“Being self-aware is not the absence of mistakes, but the ability to learn and correct them” – Daniel Chidiac
6) You do not deny the metaphysical
You don’t have to believe in astrology or numerology to be spiritual. But, a spiritual person understands that there are some things in the universe we simply cannot comprehend.
Those haphazard coincidences that just “happen” at precisely the right moment. Or those failures and heartaches that actually led you to something greater…
You often think that maybe there is something out there – a universal life force. It can see but cannot be seen; it can hear but cannot be heard. This greater force does not have to be defined, but it must be recognized.
Life is too coincidental to be meaningless.
“Coincidences are spiritual puns” – G.K. Chesterton
7) You are open-minded and optimistic
Spirituality by nature is an open-minded community. It welcomes faiths and religions of all kinds, because there is a little truth in every one of them. All rivers lead to the ocean.
You are very empathetic, and often the one people go to when they want to vent or discuss personal issues. You believe everybody deserves a chance to be heard.
The downfall to this is that you are also very naïve, and have likely had people take advantage of you in the past. You can put yourself in anyone’s shoes, sometimes even before your own.
But no matter how many times you fall, you always find a way to get back up and learn. Your deep-rooted optimism inspires you to look at the positives, and you are perpetually convinced that everything will unfold as it’s supposed to.
“Everything will be okay in the end. If it’s not okay, it’s not the end” – John Lennon