16 Ways To Tell If You Are An Old Soul

How can you tell if you are an old soul? Are there differences in traits or behaviors? What signs can I look for that can help me differentiate the difference?

Generally speaking, we are all old souls, but some of us have been here longer than others.

The word “old” is only relative to time. Because time is linear and our souls are eternal, 10,000 years would be the blink of an eye.

Dolores Cannon believes that we need to incarnate many, many times to learn all of the lessons we came here for.

1. You Understand Many Of Life’s Deeper Lessons.

For some people, it is hard to fathom that the soul of a child may be much older than the soul of his or her parents. For these particular people, this is a sign that their soul might be younger than yours. When you begin to understand why you keep incarnating to this 3rd dimensional reality, it becomes similar to the movie, Groundhog Day, where Phil wakes up each day to find out that it’s still February 2nd until he learns how to remove his ego and starts doing kind deeds for others.

Once you realize that time, space, energy and matter are 3rd dimensional products, the theory of time becomes irrelevant, thus the theory of how old your soul is also becomes irrelevant.

But for the sake of understanding how old your soul may be, we’ll continue!

2. You Are In Touch With Your Natural Abilities Or Have An Extreme Interest In These Abilities.

Some people are born with innate gifts, such as special healing abilities or psychic abilities. The truth is that we all possess these abilities, but an older soul is more in tune with how to access and implement these abilities in the name of humanity. If you don’t have any particular ability, but have a strong interest in them, this is simply your soul trying to recall these abilities that you may have had in a previous lifetime.

3. You Become Spiritually Aware.

Everyone is pure consciousness, but many people have a difficult time understanding what this means. Your soul is pure consciousness and love. It has a unique understanding of how the matrix is being played on this planet and understands that everything we do as a collective will help to facilitate the awakening of others.

4. You Understand The Importance Of Forgiveness.

Some people are old souls who still have much to learn because they are trapped inside the box with their ideologies, they are stubborn, or they have not learned the importance of forgiveness. By forgiving yourself and others, we can release any karma between these people.

5. You’re Able To Transcend Ego.

It’s nearly impossible for anyone to completely transcend ego 100% of the time but simply being aware of our ego and how it plays against unity consciousness is a definite sign of an old soul. On the other side, there is no ego. During your life review, you will re-live your ego and will see how it affected others, as well as yourself. At this point in “time”, you will probably make a soul contract with the hopes of overcoming ego and atoning for whatever ego issues you had in your previous incarnation.

6. You’re Able To Transcend Materialism.

Money and materialism are products of this 3rd dimensional reality and it’s easy to succumb to materialism, especially when it’s in your face through advertising, programming and peer pressure. An older soul realizes that money is non-existent on the other side and it generally takes away from who we truly are as spiritual beings.

Those who are older souls will generally use money as a tool to either help facilitate their spiritual progression through spiritual retreats or by possibly creating a lavish feng shui home decorated with spiritual meaning versus the most luxurious furnishings. They may also use their money to help others who are less fortunate.

7. You Are Able To Understand The Concept That Your Body Is A Shell For Your Soul.

Before you were born, you not only chose your parents, you also chose your life situations and challenges that would help to facilitate your spiritual growth while atoning for any previous karma. The body that you are currently in is simply a vessel for your soul.

Your name is what your soul currently refers itself as, but in previous lifetimes, you had many different names and you have lived many previous lives as either a male or a female. Your name and title are both associated with ego because ultimately, you are infinite consciousness and we are all on the same team.

8. You Seem To Have A Special Connection To Eras Long Before You Were Born.

Did you ever watch an old movie or see some artwork from a specific era in time and have a connection to that era? Chances are, you lived a previous life during that time period and this is your cellular memory letting you know!

9. You Have An Understanding Of What You Need To Do To Complete Your Spiritual Progression.

Just by making it this far, you are more awakened than most people on this planet. You have an understanding of Universal laws and what is left to do on your soul contract. Even if you are not specifically sure of either, your higher self and spirit guides will continue to lead you in the right direction.

10. You Have A Strong Feeling That Home Isn’t Earth.

Did you ever look at a random area of the sky and stare at an unknown star for no particular reason? Do you have a special connection with specific star systems such as the Pleiades or Orion’s Belt? Do wars and corruption make you feel uneasy, as if they didn’t exist where you originally came from? Are you one of the souls who volunteered to come here at this specific point in time to help with the Earth’s ascension? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then chances are, Earth is not your home planet.

11. You Tend To Be A Loner.

The stigma on the word loner is often condescending, but those who are old souls are merely looking for other fragments of themselves and will often distance themselves from younger souls who need more incarnations into a 3rd dimensional planet. Older souls will seek out other like-minded people because there’s a comfort and familiarity with these types of people who will help to facilitate each others spiritual progression.

12. You Have A Rebellious Nature.

Whether you rebel from religion, laws or anything else, this is a sign that your soul knows the only true laws… the Laws of the Universe. While you respect the reasoning and intention behind laws and religion, you might not be compelled to use these as absolute laws when you know there are a set of higher laws that are intended to facilitate our spiritual progressions.

13. You Have A Burning Desire To Attain Truth And Inner Wisdom.

Many older souls can easily see through the lies we’ve been taught through religion, politics and through our educational facilities. While they realize they are all one with the universe, they also want the truth exposed to help other people’s awakening process. They also continue to seek knowledge in the spiritual, metaphysical and esoteric fields and will absorb this information much easier than anything they were taught in school.

14. You Are Not Controlling Of Others.

Older souls are more accepting, not just of other people, but of circumstances as well. For example, while you don’t approve of the corruption within politics, you understand how the corruption will help to awaken other people to the truth. You respect the free will of others and are more likely to use tact than verbal demands of others. You tend to be more of a team player than anything else.

15. You Sense A Separation Between Yourself And The “Real World”.

As you transcend ego and materialism, you find yourself living a different lifestyle. While this lifestyle is unique to your current incarnation, there also seems to be a familiarity of the direction you’re heading.

16. You Are Curious Whether You’re An Old Soul Or Not.

Many young souls wouldn’t ask this question or much less be concerned about it. While many older souls aren’t concerned either, for different reasons, they simply “know” they’re old souls, but it’s nice to have affirmations that coincide with your spiritual progression.

There are many lessons we have learned throughout our lifetimes, all of which has culminated into this particular incarnation. All of your previous life incarnations are embedded into your cellular memory and can be recalled through past life regressions.

Most of the people on this planet are old souls, yet many remain unawakened and still have a lot more to learn and will need several more incarnations to a 3rd dimensional planet.

Many of those who are awakened will probably move on to their next level of spiritual progression. It’s important to remember that this is not a race because in the end, we all win. Enjoy every millisecond in this incarnation because this may be the last time you’ll ever experience a 3rd dimensional reality!

By Gregg Prescott, M.S., In5D.com

The 8 Key Elements of Resilience

Resilience is defined as the psychological capacity to adapt to stressful circumstances and to bounce back from adverse events. Resilience is considered a process to build resources toward searching for a better future after potentially traumatic events. Some of these resources come from our inherent potential and some from what we learn about how to endure hardship. The ability to bounce back requires being empowered to make decisions that promote personal well-being. And like sobriety, they must be frequently reconfirmed (Southwick & Charney, 2012).

1. Pursuing a meaningful goal. Resilient individuals find a calling and dedicate themselves to what gives life purpose. Pursuing a meaningful purpose may involve stress and pain in the short run but over the long run brings meaning (e.g., raising children, seeking personal growth, training for a marathon). People with a sense of purpose feel less anxiety and stress (Hagerty, 2016). As Nietzsche remarked, “He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.”

2. Challenge assumption. Resilience requires creativity and flexibility. Traditional beliefs should be examined in the light of new experiences and ideas. Creativity requires one to consider many perspectives to avoid being imprisoned by one’s habitual thoughts. In the aftermath of major life struggles, where fundamental assumptions are seriously confronted, it can lead to positive psychological change (Terdeschi and Calhoun, 2004). In a sense, change represents the death of who we once were. For example, psychologist Lyubomirsky (2013) notes that a rewarding life after divorce requires not only leaving your spouse but also leaving your past self behind.

3. Cognitive flexibility.  Resilient people tend to be flexible in their way of thinking and responding to stress. An important component of cognitive flexibility is accepting the reality of our situation, even if that situation is frightening or painful. Acceptance is a key ingredient in the ability to tolerate highly stressful situations. Avoidance and denial are the most common counterproductive coping strategies that can help people temporarily, but it ultimately stands in the way of growth.

4. Growth through suffering. Resilient people generally meet failure head-on and use it as an opportunity to learn and grow. Nietzsche famously remarked, ‘What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.’ In his book, Antifragile, Nassim Taleb (2012) writes, “Our antagonist is our helper (P39).” Thus, we can view any experience of emotional pain as an opportunity that will strengthen our ability to better deal with any future pain. However, when we medicate away our suffering we miss the opportunity to grow.

5. Acting despite the fear. Courage is an important aspect of positive psychology that allows one to overcome personal limitations and pursue a full life (Seligman, 2011). Courage is not a matter of feeling no fear. Courage is acting despite fear. Courage is the strength in facing one’s destructive habits. For example, the courage of an addict overcoming his or her addiction or the person abused as a child overcoming deep psychological traumas to become a loving and productive adult. Those who move forward in the face of adversity increase their inner strength.

6. Emotion regulation. A prominent view in psychology is that our emotional lives are shaped by our values and judgments (Solomon, 2007). It’s the basic premise of modern cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT). This is also one of the basic psychological principles of Stoicism (Robertson, 2019). Much, if not all, of our thinking, is up to us. We can liberate ourselves from destructive emotions such as anger and hatred by developing a capacity to choose how to interpret the situation. Our ability in managing the flow of thought and the capacity to visualize the future contribute to happiness.

7. The feeling of agency. Agency (the power of me) is an internal resource that often enables resilience. The sense of agency refers to the capacity of individuals to act independently and shape their life circumstances. By exerting free will, the person expands his options and freedom. When feeling free and self-determined, we generally flourish. Believing that things are beyond our control is a recipe for helplessness.

8. Social support. Resilient individuals draw strength from their social networks. They also provide social support to others. The availability of social support reduces anxiety and stress. After all, it feels easier to face adversity when you have a close friend that you can rely on. When you have strong social support, you don’t have to use as many of your own personal resources to cope with adversity. Those relationships give you a profound sense of emotional security and the feeling that someone has your back no matter what.

References

Hagerty BB (2016), Life Reimagined. Riverhead books.

Lyubomirsky, S. (2013).The myths of happiness: What should make you happy, but doesn’t, what shouldn’t make you happy, but does.New York: Penguin Press.

Robertson, Donald (2019), How to Think Like a Roman Emperor: The Stoic Philosophy of Marcus Aurelius, St. Martin’s Press.

Seligman, Martin E. P. (2011). Flourish: A Visionary New Understanding of Happiness and Well-being. New York: Free Press.

Solomon, Robert C. (2007). True to Our Feelings: What Our Emotions Are Really Telling Us. Oxford University Press, USA

Southwick, S. M., & Charney, D. S. (2018). Resilience: The science of mastering life’s greatest challenges. 2nd edition. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Taleb, NM (2012) Antifragile, New York: Random House.

Tedeschi RG, Calhoun LG (2004), Posttraumatic growth: conceptual foundations and empirical evidence. Psych Inquiry, 15(1-18).

Are You Interested in Ridding Yourself of All Resentment?

Someone treats you with disrespect and you feel resentful. Such an initial reaction is common and actually good because you are saying that you are a person who deserves respect. Yet, if the initial resentment lasts, and continues to last for years, it eventually can chip away at your happiness, at your self-esteem, and make you miserable. At that point, it is healthy to try to shed the resentment.

As another challenge, it is possible that you have a history of others treating you unfairly that could go back to your childhood, your adolescence, and into your adulthood. Sometimes we still have an unconscious resentment that is abiding from decades ago. These resentments can be part of our current psychology, shaping who we think we are and affecting our level of well-being. 

I have found that there is a particular psychological exercise in which you can engage:

1. Diagnose those people and incidences that have hurt you.
2. Assess your current level of resentment resulting from these.
3. Take scientifically-supported steps to rid yourself of these resentments, all of them that have occurred in your life. 

The exercise is the Forgiveness Landscape.  What is this and how does it work?  

The term Forgiveness Landscape is an expression first used in the book, The Forgiving Life (Enright, 2012), to refer to all of the people who ever have been seriously unjust to you. When people first construct their forgiveness landscape, they often are surprised at:

1. How many people are on the list.
2. The depth of the anger left over, even from decades ago.

When we are treated deeply unfairly by others, the anger is slow to leave. If we push that anger aside, simply thinking we have “moved on” or “forgotten all about it,” sometimes this is not the case. The anger can be in hiding, deep within the heart, and the only way to get rid of it is surgery of the heart—forgiveness.

Would you like to examine your own forgiveness landscape to see how many people in your life are still in need of your forgiveness? You might want to write down your answers to the following questions.

The first set of questions:

Think back to your childhood. Is there anyone who was very unfair to you and if so, what is your anger level now on a 1-to-5 scale, with 1 signifying no anger leftover and 5 signifying lots of anger when you reflect on this person and the actions toward you.

More specifically from your childhood, are there any incidents from your father that still make you angry? From your mother? A sibling?

What about from peers or teachers, is your anger still high when you recall the incidents?

The second set of questions:

Let us now focus on your adolescence. Follow the pattern from the first set of questions. Then let us add any coaches, employers or fellow employees, and romantic partners to the list. Are there people who still make you angry in the 4 or 5 range of our scale?

The third set of questions:

Who in your adult life has made you significantly angry, in the 4 to 5 range of anger? We can add a partner, any children, relatives, friends, and neighbors to the list.

Now please rank order all of the people from those who least offended you to those who most offended you. Now, look at that list to see your forgiveness landscape. There is your work, right there on the list. I recommend starting with people lower on the list. Forgive them first because they in all likelihood are the easiest to forgive because the anger is less. As you work up the list, you will gain in your expertise to forgive, which is good preparation for forgiving those on the top of the list—those who are the most challenging for you.

You can find more on this way of forgiving in the book, The Forgiving Life, which walks you systematically through this exercise. Enjoy the challenge. Enjoy the journey of forgiveness, which can set you free in so many ways.

References

Enright, R.D. (2012).  The forgiving life.  Washington, D.C.: APA Books.

Enright, R.D. & Fitzgibbons, R. (2015).  Forgiveness therapy: An empirical guide for resolving anger and restoring hope.  Washington, DC: APA Books.

Lee, Y-R & Enright, R.D. (2014) A forgiveness intervention for women with fibromyalgia who were abused in childhood: A pilot study. Spirituality in Clinical Practice, 1, 203-217.