Spirit vs. soul…
What’s the difference? (Is there a difference?!) Can we use these two words interchangeably?
I want to begin by talking about our Heart because I believe it’s where;
spirit vs. soul
becomes
spirit and soul.
There are many traditions that suggest our Heart is where The Divine and our humanity come together. (Yes, some traditions say that The Divine comes in through the crown, but they also say the Heart is where spirit and body unite.) But what is your Heart anyways (beyond that beating, life holding organ inside your chest…)?
your Heart is the centre of you.
It’s your personality and where your deep knowing is. Your Heart holds your feelings, your Truth and the last thing I want anyone to do is ascend those precious, oh-so-sacred things… (although ascending into your feelings, your Truth and your Heart is a Divine Feminine experience that is often overlooked by many spiritual traditions).
*** A pause for clarity: when I say feminine, I don’t mean gender. Masculine does not equate with male nor does feminine equate with female… although it can, it doesn’t have to. ***
Our Western, patriarchal culture has overlooked the power of the Divine Feminine in many ways and this has created an immense imbalance in the way our world is functioning (errr… not functioning might be more like it). This imbalance also shows up in the way we hide our ‘dark and messy’ selves (think Instagram pics vs. real life), the way our human desires can be referred to as “sins”, the way some spiritual traditions suggest we need to ascend the human experience (emotions, feelings and thoughts), and even in the way we have disconnected from the Earth herself (pollution, over consumerism, general disrespect). To summarize, overlooking the Divine Feminine shows up everywhere - even in the way we connect with The Divine.
(For the record, God is not ‘male’ and one expression of gender, is not more god-like than another.)
Our deepest drives are distorted by an internal censor. Whether this is a bearded man on a cloud or a vague sense of guilt will depend on your individual programming. Face up to it. Even if you are enlightened enough to be nodding along with what I am saying, you still have fetters on your freedom that have not yet been struck.
- Peter Grey, The Red Goddess
Of course we feel these effects. We are living and breathing them.
Just as the quote above suggests, these beliefs, whether quiet or loud, has most of us trying to ascend into ‘higher realms’ (ex: looking to ‘heaven’ or not feeling our feelings instead of diving deep within ourselves).
As long as we grab at our divinity and push away our humanity we aren’t free. If you want to be free, you can’t push away anything. You have to embrace it all. It’s all God.
- Ram Dass
This is often referred to as spiritual bypassing, which is when only ‘the good’ and ‘the light’ are acknowledged and everything else is skimmed over by saying things like “it’s all love man!”
The tricky part is that it is all love, but this process of by-passing the dark, doesn’t exactly bring someone into a state of Love… and that’s the sweet spot.
The problem is too many people in our culture try to skip over this step [incarnating the soul] and go straight up to spirit. Overspiritualization is a real danger.”
- Marion Woodman
Spiritual bypassing has us ignoring half of our feelings, and in turn, ignoring the Truth that is hidden within them. Spiritual bypassing has most of us ignoring the divinely feminine way which isn’t about ascending this human experience, it’s about connecting.
Connecting.
Ahhh… now that’s where I can exhale.
The feminine principle attempts to relate. Instead of breaking things off into parts, it says, Where are we alike? How can we connect? Where is the love?”
- Marion Woodman
So… spirit vs. soul - what gives?
For me, and as it turns out a few others too, the word soul feels like spirituality embodied - like a human experience.
And spirit feels like enlightenment - a practice of transcending earthliness.
Soul feels like wild-hair-in-the-wind feminine and spirit feels more like non-attached, yet chiseled, masculine.
Soul, to me, means “embodied essence,” when we experience ourselves and others in full humanity - part animal, part divine. Healing comes through embodiment of the soul. The soul in matter is what I think the feminine side of God is all about . . . The feminine soul is what grounds us; it loves and accepts us in our totality.
- Marion Woodman
When I use the term feminine soul, I’m referring to a woman’s inner repository of the Divine Feminine, her deep source, her natural instinct, guiding wisdom, and power. It is everything that keeps a woman powerful and grounded in herself, complete in herself, belonging to herself, and yet connected to all that is. Connection to this inner reality is a woman’s most priceless experience.
- Sue Monk Kidd, Dance of the Dissident Daughter
I like to use the word ‘soul’ most often in this work for a reason! You see, the misbalance of Divine Masculine and Divine Feminine in our culture has most of us leaning towards hiding half of ourselves - the half that regenerates in the soil and in the dark. The side of us that can’t be contained by rules or traditions or ‘should’s’. There’s something much more wild and free within us that feels the way forward and speaks our Truth. This side can’t be denied any longer as much as the Earth herself can’t be ignored any longer.
I like to think of this process like a bouncy ball. You know those superb bouncy balls that fit in the palm of a child’s hand? Those. They actively bounce up and down repeatedly… until they land.
D
O
W
N
on the Earth.
I believe that’s exactly what we’re here to do: to experience the lightness of spirit, and then dive into the depths of our soul. The dive has an impact. It’s enough to propel us upwards again until the space between is less and less… and we land in a place where we learn to balance both spirit and soul, Heaven and Earth.