If you want the best from Life, you should become the master of your physical senses and be able to engage your spiritual senses with great faith. Many Sufis, monks and religious figures have experienced this and all religious books have described it. Thus it shows that there are spiritual senses along with our physical ones. You can only make your spiritual senses grow by putting faith in God, because it is only through faith that you can believe in the unseen deities like God. This is only possible through your inner spiritual eye, a great spiritual sense that everyone has but only a few can put to use. When your spiritual senses are awakened, only then you can let go of the fear of negative forces and embrace positive ones. A prophet once became afraid in war after seeing the enemy’s army but his spiritual eye made him see chariots instead of the huge army and all his fear went away. So it is true to say that physical senses arouse great fear while spiritual senses give us faith and strength over it.
In Jeremiah 1:11, it is said “The word of the Lord came to me saying, ‘Jeremiah, what do you see?’ And I said, ‘I see a branch of an almond tree.’ And the Lord said to me, ‘You have seen well, for I am ready to perform my word.'”
*The Many Spiritual Senses:
So there are total 5 senses in our body along with the sense of mind and heart. Together they make 7 senses, each having their own characteristic. Each of the 7 senses has inward (self) and outward (outer world) types. This multiplies them into 14 spiritual senses. Together the senses are 14, but if divided it shows that the man lives with 7 physical and 7 spiritual senses.
1. Spiritual eyes of self
2. Spiritual ears of self
3. Spiritual taste of self
4. Spiritual touch of self
5. Spiritual smell of self
6. Spiritual conscience.
7. Spiritual divinity.
*Exercises for Increasing Spiritual Senses:
There are many exercises that even a common man can do for increasing his/her spiritual senses and achieving complete faith in God. Spiritual senses are only developed when you take control of your physical senses completely. The following exercises can help you in developing your inner spiritual senses.
*Exercise 1:
During daily prayer and meditation take time out to think about your life’s purpose. Answer yourself that why this life and world was created? Why were you created? This will make you realize your true self, your reason for being who you are. And only through this realization can you step forward to achieve higher spiritual goals. This exercise will show you the importance of increasing your spiritual senses.
*Exercise 2:
There is always a spiritual being inside everything whether it is material or living. Your inner spiritual eye can only help you see through that. To activate your spiritual eye, find 2 places within your home or outside that you think that one has a good and the other has a bad aura. Sit at both places at different times and try to gather up their spiritual atmosphere. Try to recognize what makes both these places bad and good. When you do it more often, you will feel innately that there is a big difference between their spiritual atmospheres but you will not be aware of it.
This is what happens to us in normal routine as well; we see the good and bad in front of us but we are not able to discern why. But if you keep going to both the places, you will literally see and feel the difference that makes them good and bad. But this can only be achieved through continuous tries and practice. You can even contemplate various things of daily living, like when you receive a letter try to look at it spiritually and discern whether it holds good or evil news.
*Exercise 3:
To activate your inner spiritual sense of hearing, you need to hear the spiritual and emotional meaning behind each sound. Through this, you can achieve the sense of realizing the moods of the people around you. When you hear your father coming into the home and closing the door, try to see through the sounds what his mood is. When you listen to a song, try to hear through the music what the composer felt. You can even contemplate nature through this exercise, with enough practice; you will be able to find out the harshness or softness of nature through a blowing wind.
*Exercise 4:
Once you have moved up the ladder of your spiritual senses, it is also time for you to eat spiritually healthy food. It does not mean to eat food that is of good taste or high quality. Rather, eat food that you can sense is spiritually healthy and positive. This will develop your inner spiritual sense of taste. Do a simple exercise, take a bread piece, put it in a plastic bag and then in the street for an hour. Now taste it a little and you will find it tastes spiritually tasteless. Simply like this, eat foods that you find spiritually positive. Go out and eat junk food to taste their spiritual negativity. This sense needs practice to develop but it helps you in staying and living healthy.
*Exercise 5:
Increasing your sense of spiritual touch, requires the same practice as other spiritual senses. Try to feel the difference between contacts that you find positive and contacts that you find negative like touching your mother or touching your enemy. You will find the spiritual negativity and positivity lurking right underneath them. Try to see the negativity and positivity within yourself, by touching your own skin. The second part needs mastery over spiritual senses but it can be achieved nonetheless.
Same goes for the exercises regarding spiritual sense of smell. You can smell the favorable or negative environment of a room through practice and higher faith. All these exercises require great faith in God for finding the truth. The exercises will start with your question of the purpose of these exercises and with faith you will find these answers along with increasing your spiritual senses. But only these exercises cannot turn you into a spiritual person. Leading an honest life, having faith in God and keeping the people around you positive is the only way through which you can understand your own spiritual senses and awaken them.