World Class Hugs

By Rachel Puryear

In a fast-paced world filled with fleeting moments and soundbites, some individuals possess a timeless essence that sets them apart. Such folks might feel out of sync with their peers who are chasing the latest trends; instead preferring to reflect deeply on life’s mysteries, valuing deep conversations with friends over small chat, and trying to understand many different points of view.

If you’ve ever wondered if you, or someone you love, might be an old soul, here are some of the signs:

Emotional Depth and Heightened Empathy

An old soul will likely feel things deeply, and feel for others, as well. Having empathy is normal for humans (without certain personality disorders), but for old souls, it’s defining.

An old soul in a crowd may look at other individuals they don’t know, and genuinely wonder about those people’s lives, what’s going on with them, and who they really are – realizing that each person may only pass by them for a moment, but also has their own unique story and complex life that goes well beneath what’s on the surface.

Hearing stories about others’ troubles may affect old souls emotionally for a while, whereas for most other people it might quickly roll off their backs. Many old souls have to learn (and teach themselves) emotional grounding, in order to not be in a constant state of distress for all the incredible grief and awfulness in the world.

An old soul might readily help others in need, due to their high empathy. This could lead to burnout and being taken advantage of, especially during the younger years of their lives – although many old souls will also learn to set better boundaries and limits as they get older in life, remembering again that their survival and well-being is also important.

Old souls tend to be highly introspective, as well, and reflect on life’s mysteries and big questions a lot. Still waters run deep with them. They like to seek a deeper understanding of the world.

Whereas much of the world likes simple, black-and-white answers to things, old souls love to explore nuance, complexity, and shades of gray in their world view. They can appreciate multiple points of view about controversial matters, and both agree and disagree with a variety of viewpoints at the same time – and accept that there are just some tough questions in life that there won’t be widely accepted, and satisfying answers to.

Mature Life Perspective, Especially From Early Age

As children, old souls are often precocious. If you’ve ever met a child or teen who’s an old soul, you may have forgotten you were talking to someone so young, and had deeper conversations more easily with them than you’ve had with most adults. (I have known old souls as children, and it’s a pretty amazing phenomenon.)

Old souls often have an innate sense of fairness from a young age. Although often quiet and gentle, they can become surprisingly fierce in response to injustice (like bullying or discrimination, against themselves or others), and suddenly become outspoken for what’s right.

If an old soul comes from challenging childhood circumstances (such as poverty, abuse and neglect, troubled or absent parent figures), they may ultimately come to empathize with adults who let them down early in life, even if they ultimately decide to also set strict boundaries and even limit contact with those people – though that empathy for those who hurt them may come much later in life. It’s not that they’re okay with what happened, necessarily, but that they are likely willing to (eventually) try and put themselves in the shoes of those who raised them, and better understand where they were coming from. On the other hand, some of them may also come to forgive others in this way.

Sensitivity to the Greater World

Most people focus mainly on themselves, and their own lives, and shape their world views accordingly. Older souls, however, tend to be aware of greater societal and world issues, and value the greater good – recognizing the artificiality of the barriers people put up between themselves and others.

Older souls tend to think critically, and question what they are told, rather than accept everything at face value. They are also likely to try and contribute to positive change in the world, in a variety of ways big and small (depending a lot on their own resources and circumstances, of course).

Complex Spiritual Development

Older souls tend to give a lot of thought to spiritual matters, and for many of them, it’s a very important – and also deeply personal – subject. Rather than aligning their beliefs with traditional religious teachings, though, they tend to develop their own spiritual paths. They’re also generally not big on proselytizing – in fact, they tend to be quite private about their spiritual lives.

Many old souls will also be non-believers, atheists, and agnostics, or at least for parts of their lives – this can be especially so if they are disillusioned by the faiths they were brought up in, and feel alienated from religion by judgmental, authoritarian religious training in early life, or abusive religious authority figures and institutions.

However, at least at some point in their lives, they will feel drawn to life’s bigger questions, and the universe’s greater mysteries – and use their heightened intuition to navigate deeper truths. They realize that spirituality lies within themselves, and not just inside institutions. For some older souls, this may come a bit later in life.

They will likely feel a strong connection to the universe, and to the greater consciousness – often finding solace and greater insight out in nature, in genuinely mutually loving and caring relationships, and through meditation and reflection.

Some older souls may gravitate towards decidedly more open-minded and welcoming sects of major religions for community with others who understand, while others may join smaller spiritual communities where they feel welcome and accepted, and yet others may pursue their spiritual lives independently. Many will be interested in exploring different philosophies from multiple spiritual traditions, and may incorporate practices from a variety of different faiths into their own spiritual lives.

Whatever they choose, it’s important for them to feel a sense of belonging where they are, and will appreciate connecting with fellow kindred spirits.

For many older souls, they will feel a sense of responsibility to also uplift others spiritually – whether through teaching, counseling, offering healing practices, providing other kinds of support, or simply trying to be a living example of what they want to see more of in the world. This would come though, of course, in the form of helping those drawn to them, rather than through pressure or guilt.

Feeling Ahead of Your Time, and/or Drawn to Previous Ages

Old souls can be drawn to certain eras in the past. To clarify, that doesn’t mean they necessarily want to return to social mores of that era, especially if social standards have evolved a lot since then – but rather, they simply feel a special connection with that time period. They might also be history buffs.

Alternately, or even at the same time, old souls might feel ahead of their own time. They might hold unusually forward-thinking, or unconventional views compared with most of the rest of their peer group. They can feel like outsiders, feeling out of place, given the norms of the mainstream group.

Gravitation Towards Other Older Souls

Do a lot of these characteristics ring true not only for you, but for others near and dear to your heart, too? Older souls will tend to be drawn to one another, as there’s a mutual understanding and acceptance that’s difficult to find elsewhere – plus, you may be kindred spirits of one another, too.

Or, maybe you read this article with someone else in mind, admiring a loved one as an old soul. However, if you see and recognize them for who they are, there’s a good chance that you are also an older soul – and maybe you were too humble to think about it that way first, which is not unlikely.

Either way, older souls do tend to attract each other, and appreciate one another very deeply. So if many of those closest to you are older souls, and you love it that way, then you are also very likely an older soul, too.

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