Learning to be human in chaos

When I first started getting interested in wholism I used to think it only belonged to those who sat around on big colourful cushions with pinched fingers chanting Om!
I thought that being 'holistic' meant that one had to reach a certain level of spiritual bliss or omnipresence to be truly at one with the universe. Life has a way of bringing one back to reality when one's ego starts to get away on them! A lot of learning was done in my little crystal shop, The Seventh Ray, a name that was mindfully chosen for its spiritual meaning. I soon discovered that wholism was much more than crystals and meditation and it required being very connected to the daily things and people that were very much tangible. Although seeking something higher than ourselves, I believe, is an integral part of living holistically, what also needs to be kept in perspective is the need for being 'human'.
What do I mean by that?
In a nutshell I believe that we are spiritual beings having a human experience and not the other way around. I met so many people (and I was one of them) that wanted to escape reality by seeking something perceived as being 'better' than what was being currently experienced. Perhaps that's why there is an attraction to drugs and substances for the same reasons? I believed that the answers to life lay in another realm, and to get 'there' (wherever that was) would bring me Nirvana, and be the missing link. I spent years involved in the world of chakra balancing, aura cleansing, meditations, healing and so on. I now abhor the term 'healing' because it implies that there is something wrong with us! How dare we assume such a thing about ourselves or another. However, I don't regret this chapter in my life one bit, and I learnt a lot. While I found a healthy pathway to little windows or pockets of peace, and it awakened much in me. I never seemed to quite find the fulfillment that I was seeking. There was always something missing. I started settling down in myself once I realised I had to blend all my 'worlds'. In other words how to stay connected to whatever 'it' is that exists which is much bigger than me, yet I belong to, but at the same time accept and fully embrace my physical experiences which are all relative. I started to understand that my reality was largely up to me in that no matter what happened to me, the spiritual 'gift' was in each moment of how I responded to things. This gift is available and increases every time I step into that no man's land space of not knowing what's going to happen next. However, the trick is whether I step in there with faith or fear! And I've come to learn it needs to be with faith and conviction.
Life for me now is simply learning via the people I meet and the things that happen. I still believe in other realms, but my feet are now firmly planted on the ground. I also believe that we are far more capable and whole than we have been lead to believe. We have to almost unlearn things we have been taught to truly access our authentic and god-given selves and we have to some how find this part of ourselves through the chaos that life can bring, and maybe that's the whole point.