Decode Your Deepest Desires by Learning the Language of the Soul

The purpose of the spiritual journey is to unlock the love and wisdom hidden within suffering, desire and aversion.

Photo by Egor Myznik on Unsplash

Desire is a guide to what the soul is saying silently. It is the purest desires, hidden deep within the heart, that point us toward “appointments” made for us by the soul long before we were born. We’re instinctively guided toward our destiny by what we want and what we do not want. Whenever we suppress desire or settle for what is undesired, we reject the soul’s organic impulse for exploration, expansion and joy. Whenever we stifle, override or shame desire, we effectively cut off our power source and disable our spiritual navigation system. 

I want and I need are survival mechanisms, communicated by an infant at birth, long before he acquires the language to ask for what he wants or needs. As we mature, we can develop the capacity to interpret raw desire through the contextualizing filters of reason, emotion and intuition, thereby helping us to act in right relationship to all that is. We become fluent in the poetic language of the soul when we observe meaningful signs, intuitive insights and unexplainable coincidences as mysterious puzzle pieces that somehow fit together and display a glorious picture of a better life along with the step-by-step directions on how to construct it.

What is planted in each person's soul will sprout. ~ Rumi

Heartfelt desires and the desire for change are the twin engines that propel us through life, but their raw expression can sometimes be confusing, taboo or difficult to decipher. Like conflicting communiques from an unexplored territory, the conflicting impulses of desire and aversion require skillful interpretation before their metaphoric meaning can be understood, grounded, and applied to beneficial practical effect in daily life. When people contact me for a consultation, it’s usually because they either lack what they desire deeply or they wish to eliminate an undesirable condition they’re currently experiencing.

Love is the bridge between you and everything. ~ Rumi

“Roberta” first consulted with me two years ago. Dejected after experiencing a series of unsatisfying romantic relationships, she desired partnership, closeness and a feeling of inclusion. At our first meeting, she revealed that she had a tendency to put up with inconsiderate behavior in her partner until it became intolerable, at which point she would abruptly “cut and run.” She was sad and frustrated by this repetitious pattern, but felt helpless to to change it. In addition, she desired an upgrade in both her living arrangement and her career.

Relationship. Home. Work. Overcoming difficulties in these three fundamental aspects of life is part of the great experiment of being alive. Each soul incarnates through a unique and distinct body-mind as a vehicle in which to interact with life for the purpose of  “road testing” the soul. Whenever we lack something we desire deeply or we experience something totally unwanted, we suffer. That friction is where the rubber meets the road and we experience an uncomfortable challenge. It helps to remember that friction has a silver lining; it also creates light (inspiration) and heat (motivation.) Any suffering or deprivation in personal power, self esteem or security is always an invitation: we can either expand or shrink in response. Whenever we make the choice to follow the path laid out by the soul, we’re led unfailingly to a grander self-expression where we can claim our highest good and live more fully into our vast potential. 

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“Roberta” chose to claim the expansion to which she was being invited by her soul. Woo Hoo! And today we celebrated her “graduation” from her three original challenges:

She’s enjoying a mutually-supportive, good-enough, still-a-work-in-progress romantic relationship. Check. She’s speaking from her new light-filled home office, steps from the Atlantic Ocean. Check. Today she begins her dream job after an extensive pre-employment process in which she experienced warmth and connection with members of the staff who felt like a work family. Check. 

Checking all the boxes on her wish list was a fantasy two years ago, but today it’s fact. We celebrated her well-deserved success by savoring each of her accomplishments. While Roberta’s goals seem concrete, sometimes the spiritual journey takes us through the terrain of grief, addiction or trauma and success feels more like an internal lightness than a visible outcome. Roberta’s process may be unique to her, but it provides a template for all of us who seek ongoing expansion into who we really are. When we have the courage to follow the soul’s promptings, step by step, here and now, we are predictably led to expand and incarnate as the highest, wisest and most loving version of ourselves.

Here’s how Roberta transformed three key aspects of life by decoding the messages from her soul:

• Show up for yourself: Roberta showed up for our weekly sessions consistently. Whether she felt she had the time, money or energy, she kept her commitment to herself by showing up to her sessions with me. Between sessions, she took the concrete steps we agreed were beneficial for her to take. Incrementally she created the changes within herself that were ultimately reflected back to her in the outer world as a harmonious relationship, a new home and a fantastic new career opportunity.

• Be willing: Roberta was open to receiving an alternate perspective, even when it challenged her current point of view. She humbly and courageously accepted that she was in some way contributing to her difficulties, but just didn’t understand how. Her openness to viewing conflicts from multiple perspectives allowed her to take in more relevant information about her role in troublesome situations and how she could transform the situation by transforming herself. As she felt empowered to make the desired changes, new solutions and attitudes emerged for her, one by one.

• Be patient: Roberta’s journey toward that which she desired unfolded over two years. Facing buried landmines of unprocessed emotions, accepting her responsibility for unconsciously creating hardship, and grieving life’s inevitable losses was an organic and necessary process and not one that can be rushed. Over an extended period of time she recognized, metabolized and integrated all that she was discovering about herself, collecting all the forgotten parts of herself into a cohesive and current whole. When nothing in her life seemed to be “working,” she still put in the effort necessary to replace her disempowering, erroneous beliefs with more uplifting, spiritually-aligned beliefs with persistent practice, practice, practice.

• Be faithful. When nothing seemed to be working in her favor, and disappointment piled on top of discouragement, Roberta held to her faith in the Universe’s exquisite timing and her own soul’s impulse to birth itself ever more fully through her. Even when she was faced with setbacks, disappointments and delays in her desired outcomes, she never gave up. She held a vision in her mind’s eye of the good that she trusted her soul kept in “escrow” for her and just kept putting one foot in front of the other. 

Although many times it was tough for Roberta to “keep the faith,” she persevered. She made use of every scrap of experience and adopted new and supportive beliefs to replace any self-sabotaging or limiting beliefs. She trusted the process and she trusted in me as her guide through some pretty treacherous inner terrain. It was by navigating her inner landscape that she learned to decode her soul’s messages and welcome the wisdom contained within suffering, desire and aversion. She took the incremental steps that knit together a jumble of bits and pieces into a solid, authentic self with the capacity to co-create more beneficial conditions in her life.

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