Does Performance Lifestyle get into Spirituality?

The answer is yes and no.

First, let’s get clear on the terms. What is spirituality? (in practical terms)

Spirituality is not an area of your life or lifestyle, nor is it’s practice one of the 12 proficiencies you need to know to become a pro at living healthy and higher achievement; it is more than all of that. All Performance Lifestyle proficiencies are empowered greatly by a practical spiritual context and practice, including meditation.

Spirituality is the context from which you live your life.

It’s not religion or an “ism” of any kind, and it’s not escaping from your life to attain some kind of impractical enlightenment that may work for some very poor person with no attachments, or a rich person with the resources to quickly change or escape circumstances to do whatever she pleases; both of whom can more easily leave their life as they know it and sit on a rock with their legs crossed, transcending the real world in pure awareness.

Practical spirituality, does not require you to leave the life you live, although you will come to know your life from a whole new place.

It is, a context for who you really are, why and how to more fully engage with the world unencumbered and no longer at the mercy of the ego’s past.

We already speak of life at the next level as relative freedom from the hidden lifestyle challenges that hold you back. But is there something behind all the hidden challenges? Deeper than the alignment of how your life is structured, proficiency in the Lifestyle skills, and the direction and clarity of your goals?

Every aspect of a Performance Lifestyle is guided by your spiritual context. If you don’t have a practical spiritual context from which to live from you will be held back with the biggest challenge of all; not knowing who you are, why and how to fully more engage in the world.

When I first started teaching Performance Lifestyle I was on a quest to resolve many of my own hidden lifestyle challenges as I helped others resolve theirs. I was desperate for answers and I knew others were too; so what better way to get answers than lead the charge towards a better way of life.

What I never factored in, was an understanding of spiritual enlightenment and it’s practical purpose for living better.

Bringing Performance Lifestyle model together would take longer than I would have thought and mostly because of an unenlightened perspective and the encumbrances of my own ego. As I did, many people asked about spirituality, and if a Performance Lifestyle included spirituality in any way. The best answer I could deliver was “it’s all spiritual”.

Even early on, I knew that a practical spiritual context was the basis of the Lifestyle that would work for you, only I was unable to explain it in much depth and frankly wasn’t sure I quite embodied it yet.

I myself had big issues here, living out of ego riddled with distorted thinking; the whole concept of spirituality was confusing for me; a mix of religious dogma, flightiness and philosophy with no context that really made sense.

That’s why I co-authored the book. The Curse of the Capable, “change your story“, to help myself and others improve their psychological self identity (ego) from negative to positive and more supportive of what they want. In that book, we introduced a 4-stage process for changing any inaccurate or unsupportive story(s) you have about your life, to one (s) that supports you, what you want and how you want to feel. This opened up the door for more conscious creation as you move forward in life.

The book, ended with the concept of the spiritual learner who stays open-minded and learning from all relevant sources, so as not to get stuck again with stories (philosophies, rules, and values…) that just don’t work for you. But while the feeling of freedom and peace of mind increased substantially with greater resolution and evolution of the psychological self, the feeling of complete liberation was still hard to find. And that, is what I have learned is why you also want a practical spiritual context, so that liberation and complete freedom is attainable… even the middle of a busy day.

As my spiritual teacher Andrew Cohen states, “freedom has no history”.

I was able to succeed at making massive lifestyle improvements even without a truly enlightened spiritual context, particularly in the positive self psychology I created by changing so many of the unsupport5ive stories in my mind; but the ease at which such changes could be made and a true feeling of wellness did not kick in until a practical spiritual context was established; knowing where I was coming from, where I was headed and why.

Today, the clearer I now become on the spiritual context of my life, the easier life get’s, even amidst the incredible challenging times that everyone is experiencing.

Do you need to change your spiritual context to get your lifestyle working better for you?

No, but remember a practical spiritual context is not a new religion, or some impractical approach to enlightenment that only those with little to no worldly attachments or with enough resources to exit life can maintain; where the only answer is simply to meditate more.

Don’t get me wrong, meditation is very important in life, now matter what your lifestyle, but having a deeper spiritual context or framework within which to live, that explains nothing less than who you really are, why and how to fully engage in the world will drive you right. In a world where people drive themselves into the ground that’s a pretty welcome potential. Don’t you think?

You must admit, even if you don’t know what I’m saying 100%, if you were to know who you really are, why and how to engage fully in the world unencumbered by the negative influences of your ego, you would be much more inclined to improve your lifestyle, wouldn’t you?

Believe me, you would.

Filed Under: Performance Lifestyle

Tags: Andew Cohen, EnlightenNext, Evolutionary Enlightenment., Performance Lifestyle