7 Spiritual Lessons To Take Into 2024, According To Experts

The new year is upon us, and during this time of reflection and rest, we're thinking back to all the tidbits of wisdom we heard throughout the past year.

"Empathy allows you to connect with others on an emotional level and recognize their perspectives, [such as] a parent feeling the disappointment or sadness of their child losing a game or struggling with a challenge. Compassion is characterized by a genuine sense of care, kindness, and a willingness to take action to help others in need. While empathy and compassion are closely related and can work in tandem when it comes to understanding and relating to the emotions and experiences of others, empathy focuses on understanding and sharing those emotions, while compassion extends sympathy by adding a proactive and caring response to suffering."

"Stepping away from the past is often more of a process of moving through rather than letting go. We can't just let go and forget, but rather we often need to sit with the feelings, process them, and move through them to states where we feel more calm, centered, and empowered rather than feeling triggered by a past event. My all-time favorite and go-to mantra is, That was then, this is now. I use this frequently with survivors of trauma as a daily reminder that they are safe now and that they are here now. Helping people ground in the present moment helps them separate the past from present and settle more firmly into what is actually happening in this moment, not what happened in the past."

"We live in a society where we are constantly being told who we are and how we should act. Finding yourself can also mean filtering through this noise and [finding] an inner dialogue that is kind, compassionate, and in resonance with how you would like to be, and not what you think others want you to be. Finding yourself improves your life's satisfaction. It helps you get in touch with your wants, needs, desires, and joys. Doing this helps us live in alignment with what is true for us. Cultivate a sense of curiosity that if something doesn't work, then maybe the next thing might, and keep going with this train of thought. It is all a process of learning and relearning, so instead of focusing on a timeline—focus on what's working and not working, and just keep building on that knowledge."

"There's this constant tendency to think we have to be perfect. It's a self-protective mechanism because when we're not perfect, there are consequences, and that's a scary thing. When you foster your ability to recognize and accept your imperfection, however, that is literally one of the greatest skills of life. And a side benefit of that is when we learn to do it for ourselves, we learn how to forgive other people too. So it's figuring out, How can I create hope out of pain? How can I create evolution out of what feels like a failure? It's like a living, swirling matrix of woundedness, brokenness, beauty, potential, and strength, so we need to actually shift our whole paradigm to move away from that polarity into a richer understanding."

"While most people aren't huge snake fans, a snake's regular shedding of its skin can remind us that we all go through times when something, someone, someplace—or a way of being with ourselves—leaves our life. Hard times are always painful, uncomfortable, and vulnerable, yet they also open the door to healing transformation. In what ways is a new layer of you, or a new layer of potential and possibility regarding an area of your life, revealing itself? Focus on the healing new habits, people, opportunities, experiences, attitudes, thought patterns, or resources that are appearing in your world as you navigate this hard time. Just like the snake shedding its skin, hard times have an awkward, in-between-worlds quality to them, but we can often already see evidence of something positive being born in our lives, even if it's very new and fragile."

"The concept of acceptance—a willingness to hold the fact that we can't necessarily plan for everything or anticipate everything or control everything [goes a long way with worrying]. Even if the worst-case scenario were to happen (which it probably won't), have that reassurance to remind yourself, I have always gotten through things. I trust myself to handle this and figure this out when the time comes."

"The state between being and becoming can be a very unhappy state because all you're focused on is the fact that you're not yet what you want to be. Striving for a state that you're not in without having any or much focus on what you do have in your life to be grateful for will create a state of lack in your brain. Within reality, there's a level of choice of how you're perceiving the situation you're in. And if you can regulate that, in a way that's happiness."