Click for audio: What Child is This?
Historically, Christmas is the celebration of the birth of Jesus. Spiritually, we recognize it as the emergence into our awareness that spiritual dimension biblically called the Christ, or the soul. While most people are likely to carry some notion that they have a soul, in many cases, this deeper essence that is our spiritual core is often shrouded in ambiguity.
When we think of birth, we think of something beginning, something new coming forth that has had no previous existence. The biblical account of the birth of Jesus as Savior certainly makes this assumption. Humanity needs redemption and a Savior, who was not present before, is born into the world to set people free from the bondage of sin.
In our case, the soul is not brought into existence but has always existed. Our becoming aware it as the living foundation of our being is a perceptual shift that we make. Where before we thought we were the sum of our body, history, education, culture, etc., we begin to understand that we are much more. We are spiritual beings expressing through a human experience.
Why would we consider the soul our personal savior, and what is it that we need to be saved from? The soul is our bedrock identity. Most of our unhappiness is the result of either trying to be or thinking we should be something other than we are. We have developed a self-image that feels incomplete and will not be complete until we achieve or otherwise acquire something we do not now have. Turning attention to the soul, we invite into our awareness a level of spiritual strength that empowers us to see the conditions and events in our life from a higher vantage point. Living from a center of strength rather than reacting from the perception of weakness saves us much strain and heartache. The outlook of the eternal being you are is one of creative optimism. Your life becomes what you instinctively know it can be.