Exploring your spirituality will help you to discover your real life purpose, to set up your long-term goals, to have better personal relationships and will also enhance stress management skills.

We are all aware of a series of tools that will reduce stress like exercising, eating healthy foods and having a good social life. But these days more and more people are embracing another way, just as beneficial, to achieve that stress reduction: embracing their spirituality.

Some people are quickly put off by the word spirituality because it is common to associate it with a certain kind of religion or belief system. Well, it does not have to be like that. Spirituality is related to our search for life meaning, our connection to others, and the development of our personal value system. This can be found in a religious practice, but many people these days are embracing their spirituality by meditation, different kinds of body work, art, dance, music or nature.

Spirituality can help you to be more centered and balance. By a process of self-discovering, we can realize what it is meaningful in our lives and therefore spend our energy in the right direction. This can eliminate all the stress associated with focusing in unimportant things.

It can also help you to release the need to be in control. Expanding your views, you can feel as a part of a whole and realize the impossibility of holding everything under your control. You can just let things happen and enjoy it.

Making space for spirituality in your life can also help your social life, as you can feel closer to different people that are in the same or similar paths. Spirituality can provide a better understanding of how personal relationships work as you can see things from a different perspective.

Spiritual people often make healthier life decisions, can cope better with stress and heal from illness faster.

Probably by this point you are asking how you can find your way towards spirituality. Everybody has a different way. You don't have to wear sandals and a tunic and spend the day chanting mantras. Just take some time to be alone, outside in the nature or in a quiet room. You can bring anything that has a meaning for you: incense, flowers, crystals, pictures... Some people like to hear some relaxing music, whilst others would rather have silence. Just dedicate this moment to be with you. At that point you might feel that all the things that were stressing you are not there in that moment. There will still have to go back and deal with them, but in that moment, they are not so important.

With time, maybe you feel you need to explore different ways of embracing your spirituality. Go on! There are very different ways of doing this. Some of the most popular include meditation, reiki, yoga, and being in contact with nature.

Photo: D Sharon Pruitt