True signs of spiritual maturity | Down-to-earth spirituality

It’s very easy for anyone to get lost in their search for spiritual truth. So many spiritual communities, Youtube channels, and other sources of information talk about the 5th dimension, energy activations, Mercury retrograde, and a whole lot of stuff that sounds beautiful and somehow makes you feel better for a while. But the truth is, most likely the people that talk about it don’t even have a clue about what spirituality is, and that it has absolutely nothing to do with all that esoteric hocus-pocus.

After a spiritual journey of more than 11 years, that led me through many different beliefs, I feel confident to have found some very tangible proof of what truly shows your spiritual growth. And it’s not what you believe it is.

10 Signs of spiritual maturity

Let’s get straight to the point. If you have been hopping from one spiritual trend or belief to another, and somehow you continue in that search, you might want to have a serious and honest look at your life and the world. Stop floating somewhere in a parallel universe, in a Buddhist temple, while trying to heal the 47th chakra that is blocking you from being happy and healthy right here, right now.

So, let’s get down to earth and speak about manifestations of spiritual growth. You will see they all have very similar energy and their characteristics are based on the same foundation. These are the 10 true signs of spiritual maturity.

1. Trust
2. Honesty
3. Tolerance
4. Gentleness
5. Joy
6. Defenselessness
7. Generosity
8. Patience
9. Faithfulness
10. Open-mindedness

They all have eternal peace and deep inner faith in who and what we are as the underlying reason for their appearance in the life of anyone who is approaching the culmination of their spiritual path. Let’s have a look at each of them and how you can recognize these traits in yourself.

Trust

Trust plays an incredibly important role in our lives. Often we’re not aware of it but that is exactly what trust is about. You trust in your body’s ability to keep your heart beating, your blood flowing, and your lungs breathing. So, the things you trust in are so deeply rooted in your consciousness that what you trust in is taken for granted. It’s a given fact.

But this type of trust is different. It’s based on a deep inner knowing of who you are. Which goes way deeper than your body, your personality, and the character you have adopted in that body. When you have reached spiritual maturity the search for who you are is over. Because you know who you are. It has become a given fact, through years and years, and most likely even decades of practice and perseverance to see yourself as Spirit. Because that’s the only thing spirituality is; the practice of recognizing Spirit in yourself, and everyone, and everything around you. Once you have established this truth as your reality you have built the foundation for the other characteristics all spiritually advanced people possess.

Honesty

The next sign of spiritual maturity is honesty. You might consider yourself to be honest. But to understand honesty in the context of spiritual growth you need to be willing to look a bit deeper within. Are your thoughts, beliefs, emotions, feelings, actions, and words always aligned? Or do you catch yourself being out of alignment? And are your words maybe only reflecting what you want to feel, but not what your true beliefs still show through your behavior? Is that trust in yourself still not rooted deep enough in your being to be fully aligned?

Only those who have been able to establish that trust in themselves will be honest, with the people around them. But above all, with themselves. You can be honest in a dualistic sense, but that will not stop you from seeing yourself as being dishonest. Honesty is not about the truth of your words in this world. It is a reflection of the belief in yourself as Spirit.

Tolerance

Being intolerant is to not recognize Spirit in that what you do not tolerate. Therefore, tolerance is the next sign of spiritual growth and maturity. That doesn’t mean you should let other people abuse you or treat you poorly. You being tolerant does not mean you do not stand up for yourself in this world. It’s about how you perceive those who treat you that way in your mind.

Do you judge and condemn them for it? Do you blame them for attacking you and your integrity as a human being? Or do you simply do what you need to do in this material world, but see them as Spirit in your mind? And let all judgment go? Tolerance is a consequence of being honest with yourself and the entire world. And accepting that, however things appear in this world, those who you previously did not tolerate are the same as you.

Gentleness

And when you have become tolerant you will be gentle with the world around you, as well as yourself. This shows gentleness is another sign of your spiritual growth. If you are honest and tolerant you cannot be but gentle because you understand that everyone, including yourself, is doing the best they can given their specific circumstances and experiences from the past that led them to the thoughts, beliefs, and actions they display right now.

Here again, this gentleness is not forced. But it’s something that will flow as a natural reaction to the events happening around you and within yourself.

I can’t say I’m gentle 100% of the time yet. I especially still need to learn to become more gentle with myself. And by understanding these principles of spiritual maturity, I now know that to be more gentle with myself I first need to be more honest and tolerant with myself. And, trust me, it’s quite a journey. But in moments that everything clicks I do see more and more often that gentleness is a very pleasant characteristic to have.

Joy

And what happens if you’re honest, tolerant, and gentle? Doesn’t a smile automatically appear on your face when you think about yourself being able to truly own those personality traits from within? For me it does. And that makes a lot of sense when you see that joy is the next sign of true spiritual maturity.

Life isn’t easy for any of us. We all have to deal with suffering from the moment we are born. Life for most of us usually is filled with more moments of suffering, pain, loss, and disappointment than it is with happiness, joy, and satisfaction.

But if you think about it, these are all things we experience within our minds. The situation that appears to have caused the suffering only triggered a reaction in your brain that caused the feeling of suffering. So, if you can change the way you perceive the situation, you can also change the way you feel about it. And joy becomes an option, even in circumstances that any other human being would expect you to crumble down in grief.

Defenselessness

The next sign that you are well on your way to becoming a spiritually mature being is defenselessness. In a world where everyone seems to be offended by even the smallest of things, this is often misunderstood. Companies are forcing their employees to stop using words that contain the word black. Men and women can now decide between countless types of genders and have them appear in their public profiles to showcase how they want to be addressed by others. While it doesn’t change what is in between their legs.

We live in a society that has cultivated individuality to a point that it is now generating endless conflicts and many can be triggered into a very aggressive defensive attitude by the slightest comment or action of others. The defense of human rights now promotes separation and division, instead of union and diversity.

But if you know who you are, would you truly be bothered and feel attacked? Defenselessness is not something to be mistaken for standing your ground in the world. It happens in your mind. It does not mean you should let yourself be beaten up physically or verbally. It simply means you know who you are, you tolerate others for where they are, you are gentle, and filled with joy.

Who needs defense when all you know is peace?

Generosity

This brings us to the 7th true sign of spiritual maturity and this is generosity. You need to understand that this should not be seen in the context of the material world. Being spiritually mature has nothing to do with how many things you give away to others. It’s about what perception you have of the world around you.

For example, someone has hurt you. Let’s say a colleague at work spread lies about you that almost made you lose your job. And let’s forget about how to react in the physical world and how to deal with it with your colleagues and manager because this is irrelevant to how you perceive it in your mind.

The question here is, what perception do you give to that person who spread the lies about you? Do you continue to see this person as an enemy and someone you need to defend yourself from? Or are you generous, and see this person as the same as you? And do you recognize Spirit in him or her?

That’s what generosity is about. Having the correct perception of the world is very generous because it spreads peace in and around you.

Patience

We’re now nearing the end of the list of 10 true signs of spiritual maturity. That brings us to patience, which is a very clear sign of spiritual growth. In today’s world where everything can be obtained at the click of a button and instant satisfaction has become the norm, patience is a virtue that not many possess.

To explain what patience means in the context of spiritual maturity I will quote a part of “A Course in Miracles”, which clearly defines these 10 signs as the main characteristics that all advanced teachers of God possess.

It says the following: “Those who are certain of the outcome can afford to wait, and wait without anxiety. Patience is natural to the teacher of God. All he sees is certain outcome, at a time perhaps unknown to him as yet, but not in doubt. The time will be as right as is the answer. And this is true for everything that happens now or in the future. Patience is natural to those who trust. Sure of the ultimate interpretation of all things in time, no outcome already seen or yet to come can cause them fear.”

So, it clearly states that patience is a consequence of trust. Just like all the other signs from the list. And to be able to work on these characteristics you first have to develop the trust necessary to reach any degree of spiritual maturity at all.

Faithfulness

Being certain of the outcome should help you to be true to your beliefs and the perception of the world you have obtained since you started your spiritual path. Being true to your beliefs is expressed in faithfulness, which is the next sign of spiritual maturity.

Do you let yourself be distracted and deviated in your behavior by the external circumstances of your life? Or are you faithful to the calm and peace that resides within yourself due to the trust in who you are?

Is the foundation you built within yourself strong enough to withstand the temptations of the world? Or will you continue to see it for what it is?

It doesn’t mean you should suppress those temptations. You simply need to understand them. And when you can see it for what it is, you can decide whether to fall into the temptation or not. Your faithfulness is not proven by acting out your hidden desires or not, it simply shows in the way you perceive them.

Open-mindedness

And faithfulness leads us to the final sign of spiritual maturity on our list, open-mindedness. To understand how open-mindedness relates to your spiritual growth you just need to see the link to judgment. Only those who do not judge are open-minded.

Every time you judge someone or something, you are closing a part of your mind. Because you determine that someone or something is worth it to be put in a box where your opinion is stronger than your trust in who you are.

The only judgment you will make once you’ve reached the stage of true spiritual maturity is one where you see Spirit in and all around you, and nothing else. I hope you can see that this is something most of us will not achieve in this lifetime. The world around us forces us to judge. And it takes massive determination, faith, and trust to continue to look at it from the perspective of the eternal and changeless Spirit you are.

So, this closes our list of 10 true signs of spiritual maturity. Down to earth, without all the fluff and esoteric ornaments. It’s something you can work with daily. Understand that if you want to grow spiritually, the only thing you need to do is recognize yourself, and the world around you as Spirit. And build your trust in that vision. Everything else will follow as a natural effect of that trust.

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