Spirituality 101: My Spiritual Journey
I've had a lot questions about the journey to where I am today in regards to my spirituality and "witchiness" so I wanted to share how I got started, the beginning of my awakening, and some tips for those who want to deepen their faith and connection to the Universe.
To be honest, I've never really sat down and reflected on my awakening or how I began to develop my spirituality. It's been a slow progression over the past 3 years that have felt more like a slow burn than an instant spark that started it all. As I was sitting down to write this blog post, I consoled my old journals to get an idea of what really got me started on this path.
I want to preface this by saying that everyone's spiritual journey is different and happens at different times in their life. I hope that by sharing my journey, I can encourage you on yours and give you tools to begin developing your connection to self.
The Story Begins...
I have always been an introspective soul. I've journaled for many years and have always yearned for something greater than myself. While I'd say my first awakening happened the summer of 2017, after my first year in college, there are definitely things that happened before that. But for the purpose of this blog post, we'll stick to the summer of 2017.
From high school on, I have had a rocky relationship with my hometown of Louisville, KY. I always felt suffocated, misunderstood, and like I could never fully be myself. I dealt with bouts of depression throughout high school and disordered eating and anxiety through the beginning of college. When I returned home after my freshman year, I wasn't in a good mental state but I was determined to get out of it. I began developing a blog called Naturally Nicoletta as a place to share my journey with others in hopes to connect to someone because I felt so out of place in this world for my whole life.
Looking back, I can see that my spiritual journey began as a survival mechanism to get back into connection with my body and myself. Before this summer, I had very little self worth and looked for validation everywhere except for within myself.
The beginning of my journey starts with the self...
I realized that I was the only person who could save me from feeling this looming sense of disconnection from the world. At this time, I was in the midst of disordered eating but as I was exploring podcasts and diving deep into following wellness bloggers I found a thing called intuitive eating. Hearing other people's perspectives and stories brought me comfort and that gave me the foundation to begin exploring this concept of trusting myself.
On August 3, 2017, I write in my journal: I have been listening to a lot of podcasts lately. On embracing the unknown, intuitive eating, doing things in your life not to accomplish something but to learn something about yourself from it." This is the beginning of my awakening.
Riding The Wave
Moving to my sophomore year of college, I began to more consciously explore my spirituality. I even set an intention to "explore my spirituality" during my second year. I began reading books (suggestions down below!), listening to more podcasts, and following spiritual teachers on social media. I started to ride the wave and open my mind to new ways of thinking.
In the beginning, cultivating deep self-love, respect, and appreciation was definitely the foundation to get me to where I am today. I spent all of my sophomore year continuing to work on my relationship with myself, getting to truly know myself. I journaled a lot. I spent time alone. I began writing intentions, affirmations, changing my negative self-talk. I spent over a year in this space. Things didn't click overnight and quite honestly, it took a lot of time and real effort to begin truly truly loving myself.
As I reflect back on my journal, I see a shift in myself overtime. I continued (and still do) repeat phrases like "I am so proud of myself" "I trust the Universe" "I am so grateful for..." "Surrender" – This was the year that I really began to look at myself: my past, my triggers, my shadows, etc. Through reflection, I became aware. And in result, I was able to shift my awareness into being more conscious.
I began to trust myself which helped me to find faith in some higher power.
I began to explore things like being in the present moment, vulnerability, authenticity, what it means to love, who i really am and how i want to show up in the world. Once i was grounded in my being and who I am, I was able to explore extensions of that – things that sort of validated all of the things that I found out about myself. Cultivating a deep love, respect, and appreciation for myself built the structure to explore my spirituality fully. It gave me space to explore my place in this world and my going inward, I developed trust and faith to explore outward.
Following Curiosities
I won't go into all of the details of the past 3 years because I have at least 4 journals worth of valuable information and if I wrote about all of that...you'd be reading a book, not a blog post. Fast forward to my junior year, which I spent abroad, this was the year that allowed me to begin exploring my spirituality. I had the deep love for myself and awareness of the world around me and while I was abroad, I was able to start following my curiosities and test what life would be like if I began living it the way I wanted to.
I began expanding my social circle to include people that aligned with me on a deeper level, I continued to share the things I was going through on this blog and my Instagram and I had a lot of downtime to figure out how I wanted to live my life. I continued to read a lot of books about spirituality, Buddhism, personal development and I journaled a lot.
2019 was the year that I started my meditation practice. It was also the year that I got really acquainted with the present moment. Before then, I feel like I was watching life pass me by, but my meditation practice gave me a tool to really live. I'm grateful for that because it has made life so much more vibrant.
Here We Are
I'm fast forwarding to now because we are here...now. In the present moment. Senior year has been interesting. In some respects, it has been extremely difficult. For the majority of the year, I have felt lost between two versions of myself: the version I had been for 21 years and the person that aligns with my highest self. I constantly felt torn between the two…the comfort of the old, unawakened self and feeling like my current reality didn't match with the life I envision myself living.
On the other hand, the end of 2019 and early 2020 has been a beautiful practice in trusting my intuition. It has been a slow progression of fully accepting myself as I am and taking the step to live that life. For me, this looked like continuing my meditation practice, entering spaces where I could build community (ex. cacao ceremonies, moon circles, etc.). And in November, I began saying no to alcohol. This is not the beginning of my sober curiosity journey (full story on that later) but for me, choosing to abstain from alcohol was one of the final pieces into stepping fully into my worth and in alignment with my highest self.
This journey continues to circle back to connecting with myself. If I think about it, spirituality is such a deeply personal journey and the whole point is to connect back with your highest self. Sure, things like astrology and tarot and reiki and cacao ceremonies and spells and herbalism are interesting and fun to learn about and a big part of spirituality. But they are all just tools to get you back home to yourself.
Initially, I was having trouble writing this blog post because I didn't know where to start or what to include. People have been curious about how I've gotten into spirituality and my witchy side and I was trying to focus on those tools. But that's just it! They are tools! It's about so much more.
The spiritual journey is a journey back to self.
It can include all of the woo-woo things I mentioned earlier but you can find also spirituality through religion, which is how many people think of it. The details may be different but, in my opinion, the overall result is very similar. A deep trust, understanding, and connection with your highest self (note: this highest self can be whatever you resonate with – God, the Universe, source, etc.) and this personal journey is about finding that peace within you. It's all inside of us. It always has been.
As you walk on this journey, I encourage you to give yourself grace. This is a lifelong journey. There are lessons that you will learn over the course of your entire life. There's no one way and there's no right way. Our journey unfolds as it is supposed to–do not rush or fear that you are behind. You are exactly where you are supposed to be.
I am so honored to share my journey with you. It's been a beautiful 3 years and as I am coming up on my 22nd year, I realize how beautiful this whole life has been. And more importantly, how every experience, person, and lesson has prepared me for the exact moment I am in right now. What a beautiful feeling.
Some of my favorite books/podcasts/people to follow:
BOOKS: The Alchemist, The Four Agreements, The Power of Now, The Universe Has Your Back, Material Girl, Mystical World, Daring Greatly, The Untethered Soul, Rising Strong, You are Here
PODCASTS: The Balanced Blonde Soul on Fire, Almost 30, Ancient Wisdom Today
PEOPLE: Sah D'Simone, Moun D'Simone, Hitomi Mochizuki, Lalah Delia, Morgan Harper Nichols, The Auric Life, Spirit Daughter, To Be Magnetic
I'd love to support you in whatever way I can. Comment down below or send me a message with your thoughts on this blog post. Let me know how I can help you! I'm grateful for you.