Care of the Soul
In Sufism we understand the human being to be composed of
three aspects; self, heart, and spirit. Self is the experience of our personal
identity, including our thoughts and emotions. Heart is something deeper,
experienced through an inner knowing, often with a quality of compassion,
conscience, and love. It can ultimately lead to the recognition of the deepest
part of ourselves – our innermost consciousness, or Spirit, the reflection of
God within us.
If we simply say that soul is our inner being, then the
quality of our inner being, or soul, is the result of the relationship between
self and our innermost consciousness, Spirit. The self without the presence of
spirit is merely ego, the false mask, which is governed by self-centered
thoughts and emotions.
The more the self becomes infused with spirit, the more
“soulful” it becomes. We use the words presence
and remembrance to describe the
conscious connection between self and Spirit. The more we live mindfully with
presence, the more we remember God, and the more soulful we are, the more we
drop the mask.
Care of the soul, then, is always the cultivation of
presence and remembrance. Presence includes all the ways we mindfully attend to
our lives
Soul is the child of the union of self and spirit. When this
union has matured, the soul acquires substance and structure. That is why it is
said in some teachings that we do not automatically have a soul; we must
acquire one through our spiritual work.
Living Presence
Kabir Helminski
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