Everyday Spirituality

Spiritual beings are what we are naturally. Being spiritual is not specifically about being good or bad, greedy or generous, religious or agnostic. It’s about being all that stuff. We are being ourselves in spirit simply by our existence. I have said in the past, that I am not very spiritual, that is an incorrect statement, there is no other way that I can be.

   A rapist, a murderer, or arsonist, are just a spiritual as I am, or a priest, a good Samaritan, an baby or yourself. There are not even higher or lower states of spirituality. There is only spirituality. There are different levels of awareness of one’s spirituality, therein lies the difference. You can not be spiritual, you already are. The spirit manifests in the physical world through you, to experience itself with the 5 physical senses. Your relationship with your spirit and your environment is what you call spirituality. Whatever activity the spirit is involved with, through you is being spiritual, regardless of whether you consider it good or bad.

   Each of us is here with purpose, and that is to serve the spirit, so that it may know itself experientially through you. Your body is the vehicle of the spirit. As we are all interconnected, we collectively experience the physical world in all its aspects in more than 5.6 billion ways (earth’s population), in a relative arena of good and evil, happy and sad, feast and famine, wealth and poverty and in infinite pairs of opposites.

   How we are effected by the relationships between how we see ourselves and others is dependent on our individual thoughts about it. If we see only violence, hunger and disaster, then me may experience our life as a living hell and that will be our experience. If on the other hand, we see nothing but angels, in love, joy and happiness, our earthly experience, may be that of heaven, and we will have very little notice of the other, and virtually unaffected by it. As our awareness grows, we begin to understand the differences and their importance, we can see the appropriateness of the actions of others and accept that they are acting in a way that is consistent with what their spirit wishes to experience at the time. Therefore it would be inappropriate to judge another, because we are not aware of their spiritual purpose, and what the spirit wants to experience. Given the model of the world that each of us holds, there are no actions that are inappropriate, except in the "judgement of man."

   You may ask, how can we ignore what’s going on around us. Quit simple, what is going on around us is not the same as what is going around you. Our worlds could never be the same, because we are not the same, are perspectives and thoughts are not the same. Our interpretations are different.

   One person interprets a half bottle of water as half full, while the other sees it has half empty, and still another sees only the left over food in the refrigerator beside it, because he is hungry, not thirsty. All are correct in their judgments, but each of their judgments are effected by different thought processes.

   The beloved wife and family of a serial killer, would look differently at him, than that of his victims. This is the man that brings love and support into the family. They have a different perspective, and from that perspective, they would accurately describe the man, in their terms. The other side of his experience, does not exist for those that see him in loving eyes.

   I am reminded here of a short story I read some time ago.

   A man was following behind a slow driver in his car, and he was becoming very annoyed. There was nothing he could do to speed up the driver in front of him, who seemed to be oblivious to the traffic that has backed up behind him. He began to think of all kinds of names for him, and was looking for the zap button on the dash to make him disappear. The parade went on for several blocks before the man in the lead car finally turn off into a side street, and that took a long time as well. The man following also turned off and as he went finally managed to pass the car, he turned briefly to glare at the slow driver. As he did so, he noticed that the old guy in the car was one of his neighbours that lived several doors down from him. He was a nice old man and had not been seen in the neighbourhood for some time. He had worried that something might have happened to him, and was relieved to see that he was still alive and mobile. The man forgot all about the slow driving and smiled at the old guy and gave him a hearty wave. As he drove along, he felt good that he had seen him and was able to get his attention. Any thoughts about his driving had been forgotten. His new thought was for the old man’s welfare and that brought relief when he seen that his was ok.

   The event had not changed, but the sponsoring thought behind the man’s impatience had. Emotions always follow thought. Not the other way around as many suspect. The impatient driver observed a slow driver in front of him that surely must be a "jerk," and he became angry. Jerk equals angry. He then observed a good respected neighbor, that he had been concerned about, his emotion turned to relief and happiness. Not because the event didn’t happen, but because he managed to change his thought about it. It became a non issue.

  Thought, emotion and judgment. Slow driver, impatience, jerk! Control your thoughts and you control your emotion and judgments.