L E T T E R – What Spirituality Means Part 2

Yesterday, I wrote in the Letter about re-framing spirituality and you can read it HERE. It’s a big topic and one that two Letters won’t do justice to but I really want to stimulate thought on this. I had some interesting responses, ranging from ‘my God I haven’t been enjoying a glass of wine with my partner because I am a yogi and I thought it was bad to do that’ through to ‘how dare you suggest someone eat chicken’. My point is – none of this is the point!!!

We get so utterly overwhelmed with our ideas of how we should be living ‘spiritually’ that we actually undermine our attempts to experience consciousness on a higher level. Our intention and how we go about life, is the key. I love Sri M’s teachings because he always points out that you can meditate on a mountain for years. But if you return to society and are mean and resentful, then the whole thing is a waste of time.

Meditation and yoga and learning are all excellent tools to living a more meaningful life. But not if we use them as stop-gap measures punctuating days filled with rage and frustration. Ticking a box is not the path.

The path is about understanding that this life is a gift and yes, it’s shitty and challenging at times, many times, and yet even in the midst of all this chaos, we can be kind, loving and creative. We expand beyond our ideas of what should be happening and work with what is happening. We need to find the source within us and be guided by that, not our ideas of what living spiritually means. Living authentically means living spiritually and being exactly where we are. 

One of the students here on our India Retreat said yesterday that he felt bad about not being a vegetarian. Feeling bad because we aren’t ready to do something is not expansion. We must go with what feels okay with us, and simultaneously explore better ways of living. Forcing something because we don’t want to at all, but think we should, doesn’t create lasting change.

One tool though is opening up and saying, ‘I’ll run this little experiment for a month and see how it goes’ is stop-gap and a way for us to learn. Collect the data, keep flipping it and changing it up and then make an educated decision. Now your soul, mind and body have had a chance to try it out, and not your intellect bullying you into something based on how others are doing it.

Sent with love,

Jac x