By Kara-Leah Grant
Can we, like, ban the word spirituality already? And spiritual.
Like, if someone says, I’m actually quite a spiritual guy, I just want to gag.
What the hell does that mean anyway?
What does spiritual and spirituality mean?
I turned to that font of all modern knowledge to find out. Wikipedia.
The term spirituality lacks a definitive definition, although social scientists have defined spirituality as the search for “the sacred,” where “the sacred” is broadly defined as that which is set apart from the ordinary and worthy of veneration.
Oh. Baby. The term spirituality lacks a definitive definition.
There’s nothing definitive about it. It’s not defining. So if it doesn’t define anything, it’s totally pointless to use it to define something.
A spiritual guy, a spiritual moment, a spiritual book… you can’t use the word to define a guy a moment or a book because it doesn’t define anything.
Oh wait.
Social scientists have defined it – got around in a big old pow wow and decided to ascribe it with meaning – as the search for the sacred.
So a spiritual guy is someone who’s searching for the sacred.
I’ve lost my sacred, seen it anywhere? Sacred, sacred, sacred… where’s my sacred?
Which brings us to sacred.
What’s that then? That which is set apart from the ordinary and worthy of veneration.
Set apart from the ordinary.
Set apart.
Apart.
A part.
The sacred is a part of the ordinary?
That’s why you’ve lost it! You’re confused… you’re right there living your ordinary life and you’ve forgotten that’s where the sacred lives, right in the middle of it all, as a part of the ordinary.
So you’re searching.
Because you’ve forgotten to venerate. You’ve forgotten to treat your ordinary life with reverence and respect.
That’s it.
Thats why before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.
You forgot to respect and revere your life.
In the forgetting, you knew you’d lost something, so you went searching, and heard about this spirituality gig, so now you thought you knew what you were searching for.
You kept searching, reading this teacher and that book and watching that person on YouTube and going along to that Satsang… Now you’re a spiritual person. You’re a seeker. But you’ve got so hung up on all the trappings of seeking that you’ve forgotten what you’re looking for.
Remember.
Let go all of the teachers and teachings and trappings and ideas and thoughts.
Look at your life.
See your life.
Ain’t it amazing? Ain’t it wonderful? Omigod, you’re like, alive. Wow! So cool… respect and revere that.
Now forget spirituality.
You’ve found what you were looking for.
Now, you’re just a guy.
And it’s just life.
No more spirituality, ok?
You’ve got it.
Quote of the day:
“If you seek some special life outside of daily activities, that is like brushing aside waves to look for water.” – Wu-Chun
Best wishes
Doug
Thanks Doug 🙂
Is that the sound of frustration clapping?
Brilliant! Give me a month or two to meditate on that & I’ll get back to you.
I do agree that it is much nicer to see the person naked, rather than cloaked in costume.
That’s it exactly. Spirituality becomes another cloaking device of the ego, hiding the actual person underneath. Show me your raw truth. Leave your costume at the door.
Where I went: http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=581996 now to light the fire, and cook tea.
Very grateful for the ordinary, and reminder, KaraLeah!
Aside from defining ourselves undefinitively from a dictionary – there is also a group/common meaning to the word spiritual. Some people ‘find’ their A-Part-ness by gardening, surfing, hiking, some by sharing food, writing, most by music. Ordinary spirit-ful-filling activities. Others find it by …lol…searching for it. Nothing wrong with that is there? Actually I would class you and I loosely in that group that has found meaning and a sense of deep sacredness in the overt search for meaning and deep sacredness. And I would culturally recognise others who have fun in the same way as ‘spiritual’ people who might like to get together and chant and smudge one another with sage and discuss their latest insights as they relate to a changing reality-scape…… If someone told me they were a ‘spiritual guy’, I wouldn’t gag, . I would assume, based on the culture I’m part of, that this person spends a bit of time meditating or doing a specific ‘create a sacred space ‘practice’ to get closer to their juiciness. Does the word need banning? Or do we need to look deeper into the way we humans tend to assume that one way is THE way? Which means that anyone not using that way is a moron?
Just some thoughts! Love to you, lit up sister xx
Wicked Emma, thank you! Feels like you’ve closed the loop beautifully on this one! Love your work.
KLx
This article does not even make sence.
Good article , I love Emmas affirming take on it too, that speaks to me.