How to Nurture YourRelationship with Your Soul

In this opening session of a five-week series, wellness coach and self-love mentor Selena Lael invites participants into an exploration of the soul—not as an abstract theological concept, but as a felt, living presence that can be cultivated and nurtured in everyday life. The session, streamed live on Insight Timer, begins with a simple centering technique and opens into a teaching on what the soul is, how it relates to our human experience, and why developing a conscious relationship with it can bring alignment, compassion, and a sense of wholeness.

Lael emphasizes from the outset that participants are welcome regardless of their beliefs. Whether someone holds a deep spiritual worldview, identifies as atheist or agnostic, or is simply curious, the session is framed as an open exploration rather than a prescriptive doctrine. This inclusive tone runs throughout the teaching, acknowledging that the relationship with soul is personal and experiential, not something to be agreed upon intellectually.

What Is the Soul?

Lael describes the soul as "this aspect of you that has been with you lifetime after lifetime." She clarifies that this is her experience and the tradition she has learned from, which includes belief in reincarnation. The soul is understood as eternal, existing before the current body and continuing after it dissolves. It is not the personality, not the mind, not the emotions—but rather a constant, compassionate presence that underlies all of those shifting experiences.

She distinguishes between soul and Source (or God, Spirit, the Divine—language varies by tradition). In the teaching Lael shares, Source is the ultimate unity, the singular divine reality from which everything emerges. The soul is an individualized expression of that Source—like a ray of sunlight emanating from the sun. "We are all this one sun," she explains, using the metaphor to illustrate non-duality: there is no true separation between soul and Source, yet the soul carries a unique expression and journey.

This distinction helps clarify a common confusion in spiritual discourse: the soul is not separate from the divine, but it is also not the totality of it. It is both individual and universal, a paradox that can be felt more than understood. Lael invites participants to notice that the soul "has been with you lifetime after lifetime," carrying wisdom, themes, and a continuity that the personality does not.

How Does the Soul Relate to Daily Life?

One of the core questions Lael addresses is how the soul shows up—or often does not show up—in the texture of daily human life. She paints a vivid picture of the human condition: mental energy pulled in multiple directions, emotions scattered, physical pain or discomfort creating a sense of fragmentation. In this state, the soul can feel distant or inaccessible, like a quiet voice drowned out by the noise of survival, fear, anger, and distraction.

According to Lael, the soul does not judge these states. It does not see the human struggle as wrong or lacking. Instead, it waits "patiently, caringly," holding an endless well of compassion. The soul's presence is not conditional on our worthiness or our spiritual progress. It is always there, even in what Lael calls "the throes of despair" or "these dark places, these painful" moments. The soul does not leave us, even when we feel abandoned or lost.

She contrasts the soul's perspective with the "fearful mind of man," the survival-oriented, problem-solving aspect of consciousness that fixates on lack, comparison, and control. The mind asks: "How can I have enough money so that I…" or "If I just had a better job or a better…" The soul, by contrast, is not concerned with these conditional scenarios. It is not trying to fix or improve the human personality. It simply is—present, loving, and whole.

What Would It Feel Like for Your Soul to Fill You?

Midway through the session, Lael poses a question that serves as both a teaching and a meditation prompt: "What would it feel like for your soul to fill me with your love?" This question shifts the exploration from intellectual understanding to embodied experience. Rather than trying to define the soul or believe in it, participants are invited to sense it, to open to the possibility of its presence.

Lael suggests that when we turn our attention toward the soul, "there's an energy here in this space together. There's something that starts to wake up within us." This is not a metaphor—she describes a tangible shift in the quality of awareness, a softening, a spaciousness. The soul's energy is characterized by acceptance, non-judgment, and a deep "yes" to life as it is. There is no immediate need to fix, change, or transcend anything. The soul simply holds everything with love.

This teaching challenges the common spiritual impulse to escape or rise above the messy, painful parts of being human. Lael emphasizes that the soul does not require us to be bright, healed, or enlightened in order to connect with it. "I invite you to be here just as you are," she says, "whether you feel like you're as bright as the sun or in a dark hole right now." The soul's compassion is unconditional, and cultivating a relationship with it begins with allowing that compassion to touch us exactly where we are.

A Centering Practice: Aligning Body, Mind, and Spirit

Before diving into the teaching, Lael leads participants through a centering technique drawn from yoga. This practice is both simple and profound: it uses breath and movement to bring scattered energy back into alignment. Participants stand or sit, placing hands together at the heart. On an inhale, one arm reaches straight up while the other hand moves down by the navel, fingers pointing up. On a slow exhale, the hands return to the heart, moving "as slowly as you can, like you're moving through honey."

The technique is repeated three or four times, alternating arms. Lael explains that this practice can be done anytime throughout the day as a reset—whenever mental energy feels pulled in different directions, emotions feel chaotic, or physical discomfort creates a sense of being off-center. The slow, deliberate breath activates the parasympathetic nervous system, signaling the body to relax. The focused movement gives the mind something to anchor to, interrupting the loop of anxious or scattered thoughts.

But beyond its physiological benefits, the centering technique is also a symbolic gesture: it enacts the alignment that the soul offers. It brings everything back to the heart, the traditional seat of the soul in many wisdom traditions. By practicing this simple ritual, participants are not just calming the nervous system—they are training the whole being to return, again and again, to a place of inner coherence and presence.

Non-Duality and the Soul's Perspective

Lael touches on non-duality—the teaching that there is ultimately no separation between self and Source, between individual soul and the divine whole. "There is no…" she begins, describing the soul's reality as one of oneness. This can be a challenging concept to grasp intellectually, because it seems to contradict the lived experience of being a separate person with a distinct body, mind, and story.

Yet Lael is not asking participants to believe in non-duality or to transcend their sense of individuality. Instead, she offers it as a lens through which to view the soul's experience. From the soul's perspective, there is no fundamental separation. The dramas, anger, rage, and suffering that dominate the human experience are not ultimate realities—they are waves on the surface of a vast, still ocean. The soul sees through them, not by denying or dismissing them, but by holding a wider view.

This teaching has practical implications. If the soul does not identify with the personality's wounds and patterns, then connecting with the soul offers a way to access a part of ourselves that is not defined by those wounds. It does not mean the wounds disappear, but it does mean we are not only our wounds. There is something in us that is "beyond precious," as Lael puts it—something that cannot be damaged or diminished, no matter what we have experienced.

How to Begin: Turning Attention Toward the Soul

So how does one actually begin to cultivate this relationship with the soul? Lael's approach is both meditative and devotional. She suggests practices like softening the gaze, closing the eyes, and simply asking: "What is my experience of soul?" Rather than seeking a conceptual answer, the question invites a felt sense, an intuition, a quiet knowing that arises in the space of open attention.

She also emphasizes the importance of invitation. Throughout the session, Lael repeats phrases like "Fill me with your love" and "I invite you fully, wholly, just as you are." This language of invitation acknowledges that the soul cannot be commanded or grasped. It must be welcomed. The relationship is one of receptivity, not effort. It is less about doing and more about allowing—allowing the soul's presence to become conscious, to infuse the body, mind, and emotions with its spacious, loving awareness.

Lael notes that this retraining takes time. We are conditioned to live from the mind, from the personality, from the reactive patterns formed in childhood and reinforced over years. Turning toward the soul is a gentle, patient process. "This is how we retrain things," she says, encouraging participants to return to the practice again and again, without judgment or urgency.

The Soul's Compassion in the Dark Night

One of the most moving parts of the session is when Lael speaks to those who are in pain. She acknowledges that many people come to spiritual teachings from a place of suffering—"stuck in old wounds and patterns that seem to keep repeating," as she describes in her channel introduction. She does not offer platitudes or quick fixes. Instead, she offers the soul's perspective: it does not see you as broken. It does not need you to be different. It is "patiently waiting, caring," holding you in love even when you cannot feel it.

This teaching reframes the spiritual journey. It is not about becoming worthy of love or finally healing enough to deserve peace. The soul's love is already present. The work is simply to notice it, to let it in, to rest in the truth that "we are not separate from the soul." Even in the darkest moments, the soul has not abandoned us. It is closer than breath, quieter than thought, and infinitely patient.

Where to Go from Here

This session is the first in a five-week series, which suggests that the themes introduced here—what the soul is, how to sense its presence, how to align with its compassion—will be deepened and explored in subsequent teachings. Lael encourages participants to join the community on Insight Timer, to practice the centering technique daily, and to begin asking themselves: What would it feel like to live from the soul's perspective? What would change if you remembered, moment by moment, that you are not separate from this eternal, compassionate presence?

For those new to this kind of exploration, the invitation is to start simply. Close your eyes. Place your hands on your heart. Ask to feel your soul's presence. Notice what arises—whether it is a sense of warmth, spaciousness, peace, or simply a quiet curiosity. There is no right answer, no correct experience. The soul meets you exactly where you are. And in that meeting, something begins to shift—not because you are fixing or improving yourself, but because you are remembering what has always been true.