Spirituality- What is yours?

[samiam1611]

Everyone - what is spirituality to you? No quoting of dictionaries, Wikipedia, or the bible or anything like that. Just explain what it is to you. Well unless you absolutely “could not put it better” yourself.

To me, it comes from the fact that people desire explanations for certain things (especially our existence and how it came to be and the meaning of life); when these things cannot or have not been explained in other ways (such as scientifically), they cannot accept that the things are unexplainable, so they chalk it up to a higher power - a supernatural deity or deities. Spirituality is the resulting desire to become closer with this higher power.

I am not. Spirituality is a foreign concept to me. I do not understand it/do not have it. I have never had it. I’m pretty sure if I grew up on a desert island, isolated from civilization, it would never even occur to me that there was a supernatural explanation for things. I usually hate this saying, but every now and then, it is appropriate: “It is what it is”

Buddhists and all those other (mostly Eastern) religions I know hardly anything about - does your spirituality differ significantly from the Abrahamic religions (as you understand it), or is it just a different approach to the same thing?

 

[Michael_Francis]

Sticky: Banned Topics Notice

 

[samiam1611]

They unclosed my thread! Please read… I look forward to your responses. Thanks guys.

 

[Sufjon]

Buddhists and all those other (mostly Eastern) religions I know hardly anything about - does your spirituality differ significantly from the Abrahamic religions (as you understand it), or is it just a different approach to the same thing?

Hi SamIam: I suppose it depends on who you ask, and from what perspective you look at it. We would say that spirituality in and of itself is universal, because spirit is actually the true nature of things. The physical and causal worlds are only expressions of the spiritual, or that which is outside of the physical realm. Within the physical realm there appears to be separateness between this thing and that, but of course scientifically speaking, the universe is one big organism, with seemingly separate components. But what component exists independently of the other? If I take my ear and lay it on a table is that me? How about my finger? My foot? My brain? What part is me? All of them together? I am also made of countless billions of particles, each having more space between them than matter? Is that me? Where am I to be found? I am also the oxygen flowing through my blood, but that came from without, but apparently it is also a part of me, as is the sunlight and food that nourish me. Where do I begin and where do I end? The answer is that I am none of these, and yet I am everything, and everything considered, there is nothing that is not infused with the spiritual.

Cute dog by the way!

Your friend
Sufjon

 

[samiam1611]

Hi SamIam: I suppose it depends on who you ask, and from what perspective you look at it. We would say that spirituality in and of itself is universal, because spirit is actually the true nature of things. The physical and causal worlds are only expressions of the spiritual, or that which is outside of the physical realm. Within the physical realm there appears to be separateness between this thing and that, but of course scientifically speaking, the universe is one big organism, with seemingly separate components. But what component exists independently of the other? If I take my ear and lay it on a table is that me? How about my finger? My foot? My brain? What part is me? All of them together? I am also made of countless billions of particles, each having more space between them than matter? Is that me? Where am I to be found? I am also the oxygen flowing through my blood, but that came from without, but apparently it is also a part of me, as is the sunlight and food that nourish me. Where do I begin and where do I end? The answer is that I am none of these, and yet I am everything, and everything considered, there is nothing that is not infused with the spiritual.

Cute dog by the way!

Your friend
Sufjon

Toottaallly lost me, but thanks for answering anyway lol.
Thanks, she is cute, isn’t she? She died in September but I love her so much I can’t let go, I want to look at her all the time. I think if I believed in Heaven, I’d kill myself so we could be together again. But I don’t. So I won’t. sucks though.

 

[Xuan]

Everyone - what is spirituality to you? No quoting of dictionaries, Wikipedia, or the bible or anything like that. Just explain what it is to you. Well unless you absolutely “could not put it better” yourself.

To me, it comes from the fact that people desire explanations for certain things (especially our existence and how it came to be and the meaning of life); when these things cannot or have not been explained in other ways (such as scientifically), they cannot accept that the things are unexplainable, so they chalk it up to a higher power - a supernatural deity or deities. Spirituality is the resulting desire to become closer with this higher power.

Hi samiam1611,
I’ve never really tried to define spirituality before, but since you ask, I’ll give it a try.

God is everywhere. God is permeating the room you’re in. God is permeating everything in it. God is permeating you and me. God is good. Good includes love, humility, and all the other virtues. They are already permeating us, but we might not be aware of them. To me spirituality is trying to synchronize myself, my behavior, with the goodness, the virtue that’s already here… already permeating me.

Of course this is only my take on it. Other people might have other definitions or explanations. Anyway, I hope it helps.

Xuan

 

[samiam1611]

I just realized that when the mod edited my post, he cut out a part. I had another mini question so now my second >>> is an answer without a question preceding it! Oh well. The main question remains.

I think it was just like, are you spiritual?
Dunno why they cut that out.

You both answered it of course. Just pointing it out to anyone else reading this

 

[Publisher]

For me…living a “spiritual life”…“embracing spirituality” is to recognize the immanence and Presence of God in our world…to see the sacredness of ALL life around us…to see each act as a sacred act…each meal, a sacred meal…each gesture of kindness and mercy…sacred. Living “in the Spirit”…seeking to embrace this hallowed world of our…spirtuality for me is “having this mind in you which was in Christ Jesus”.

 

[Sufjon]

Toottaallly lost me, but thanks for answering anyway lol.
Thanks, she is cute, isn’t she? She died in September but I love her so much I can’t let go, I want to look at her all the time. I think if I believed in Heaven, I’d kill myself so we could be together again. But I don’t. So I won’t. sucks though.

Sorry to hear about the loss of your friend. She was indeed very cute.

Your friend,
Sufjon

 

[Bob_Crowley]

Everyone - what is spirituality to you? No quoting of dictionaries, Wikipedia, or the bible or anything like that. Just explain what it is to you. Well unless you absolutely “could not put it better” yourself.

To me, it comes from the fact that people desire explanations for certain things (especially our existence and how it came to be and the meaning of life); when these things cannot or have not been explained in other ways (such as scientifically), they cannot accept that the things are unexplainable, so they chalk it up to a higher power - a supernatural deity or deities. Spirituality is the resulting desire to become closer with this higher power.

Well, speaking from personal experience, and I’ve repeated this so many times I’m sick of it, my father appeared in my room the night he died. What did he look like?

Well, it was definitely him. But I could also choose to look through him if I chose to focus on the old wide double row book shelf I had at the time. I could see it through him.

Most of the time he was “standing” around the foot of the bed, but at one stage he was hovering directly over me, and saying “Don’t blame me for that! That was your decision!” This was in response to a certain accusation of mind, but I had not expressed verbally what I was really thinking. Yet somehow he knew and took offence at being blamed. This was the spookiest part of the event, apart from his final terrifying departing scream.

When he was hovering over the bed, I still remember looking into his eyes. They looked like deep black holes. Not very pleasant.

Now the point is that his body was dead, but he was here in my room, communicating. And obviously able to think.

So whatever spirit is, it can exist independently of the body. But at the same time I believe there is a spiritual world.

The other thing I’d like to know myself is whether there is a spiritual “environment”. For example for us to think, talk, and do things we need a physical environment around us, and in us. We need air to talk, electronic signals to communicate by email, physical objects to make other physical objects. Do angels need a spiritual environment to communicate with each other for example? Or do they literally operate in a vacuum?

Or if you like, what is heaven? Spiritual mansions as Christ promised? Or just the presence of God and nothing else?