Spirituality has to go

[Brian]

 

I explained already about how for an individual it's spirituality and for many people it's a religion yada yada come on already

 

 

Do I really have explain what Zen is to someone who doesn't understand what spirituality means. The definition of spirituality cannot be whatever you want it to be. If spirituality is actually so shallow as it can be whatever you want it to be, then I don't need to explain why it's so useless. It's self-defeating, and silly.

Actually, Allan Watts should be on my list, too. Oh wait.

It's a new type of vicious cycle, not Zen at all. Instead of worrying about something then worrying about worrying and then worrying about worrying, in spiritual vicious cycle you wonder about how spiritual a sandwich is then wonder about wondering and wonder on wonder with wonder.

Sorry, Infinity lol

We can't just BE we have so see spirituality in everything, with a trained enough mind, spirituality is the same as someone who is stuck in worrying loop, but it's not because they don't want to but because it's like drugs. The effects wear off and you are left with nothing, but you want more. Spiritual pursuits are like a hunt for more and more wonder, but it's all an illusion. Just be, that's Zen.

I'd rather you try to explain what reality is, what science is, and what technology is. You at least think you understand and respect those terms while you openly don't really understand religion or spirituality (yet you hold them in contempt regardless).

[Bearded Dragon]

Dualism is the bane of true freedom. So much of that going on here.

 

Should do this, shouldn't do that. How can one be free?

[Silent Answers]

Well that escalated quickly. Lots of different views but this is actually a cool thread.

 

Remember science was born out of religion. The two are both seeking truth of something greater. They just take different approaches... If you only use one method, there's no contrast. That's why this thread has created a decent discussion, there's plenty of contrast.

[Nungali]

I'd rather you try to explain what reality is, what science is, and what technology is. You at least think you understand and respect those terms while you openly don't really understand religion or spirituality (yet you hold them in contempt regardless).

 

 

[Brian]

 

 

 

I'd encourage you to have a go at those five terms and the relationships between them, too.

 

If anyone expresses interest, I'll share my thoughts on them later, when I am using a full-size keyboard rather than a phone.

[steve]

Protector said:

"Strange, haven't heard of any new spiritual advancements, especially ones that could fix global warming.

http://sutura.io

Science can loose all the grips it wants, I can't imagine anything replacing it."

 

Science hasn't fixed global warming yet. In fact, science caused global warming.

 

I'm not at all anti-science, nothing likely to replace it, and by it's very nature it is always striving to refine it's view and methods - so is authentic and skillfully applied spirituality. It's not about science or spirituality, it's about what people do with it.

[Protector]

Science can break it, science can potentially fix it

Spirituality... can't really do much outside of the human condition... but then there are meditating cats... science can take away mystery our of meditation... it can take away lots of things spirituality has until only the wonder of the real world is left

 

I am among those who think that science has great beauty. A scientist in his laboratory is not only a technician: he is also a child placed before natural phenomena which impress him like a fairy tale. We should not allow it to be believed that all scientific progress can be reduced to mechanisms, machines, gearings, even though such machinery also has its beauty.

Neither do I believe that the spirit of adventure runs any risk of disappearing in our world. If I see anything vital around me, it is precisely that spirit of adventure, which seems indestructible and is akin to curiosity.

 

-Marie Curie

[C T]

What science cannot take away....

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_utzLojCIE

[dust]

science can take away mystery our of meditation... it can take away lots of things spirituality has until only the wonder of the real world is left

 

Well...my spirituality (so-called) is the wonder of the real world. Science is part of it, no doubt. I think science can be great.

 

But many people, including scientists, don't feel that wonder. They go through life like software. I'd say that they lack a spiritual side.

 

From the very beginning here, I would like to point out, I have agreed with you, to an extent, that religion (and spirituality, to the extent that it can be defined as religious or theistic) is unnecessary, and that the world might be a better place without it (though probably not, because people are largely not very nice either way). I just don't think you can define spirituality in purely religious or theistic or magical terms. It can be as simple as finding beauty in the taste of a (stale?) sandwich.

 

Perhaps I should find another name for my spirituality, and avoid further arguments like this. But for now I'll continue to call it spirituality, because my current mental health is as good as it is right now partially because of what I've learnt from Daoism and Buddhism.

Edited October 11, 2014 by dustybeijing

[iain]

Hello Protector,

Have you considered the implications of relativity in terms of spirituality; If we were to suppose that our experiences of life and indeed reality are very different, what term then best we apply to that which differs; Is it not the spiritual component of our mutual experience of life on earth, which differs?
If so, then it would not be foolish to disregard it ...

Kind regards.

[Protector]

Traditionally spirituality has been defined as a process of personal transformation in accordance with religious ideals. Since the 19th century spirituality is often separated from religion, and has become more oriented on subjective experience and psychological growth. It may refer to almost any kind of meaningful activity or blissful experience, but without a single, widely-agreed definition

 

Spiritual wonder

What is life? What am I? I want to know and I must search for the answer. It's calling for me to know myself. I want meaning

 

I get it! I give myself meaning! Life is a journey and I can go anywhere!

I have this strength in me to be whatever I want to be... and I always had it... I didn't know how to use it... or did I?

Did I need to learn to meditate to know my own mind? Is it really as important as I've been told? As I've told myself?

What did that give me? I can do anything and my potential is infinite, but didn't my journey use some of my potential?

I need time to meditate. I need time to read books. I need time to learn.

Things that told me about myself, things that were always true

Things that brought me back where I started

Now I have power, but it took so much time to finally start... but I want to keep going

I want to know more about the world and myself. I like the journey and life is a journey, I can reflect on that but, have I actually lived, yet?

Of course I have, and I will live more. I've learned about my spirit and I will learn about other spirits, about magic, about astrology, there's qi gong to do, there's yoga, there's meditation. So much work to understand the supernatural and finally reach enlightenment.

 

Very familiar, and naive

 

 

Scientific wonder

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1k8AbL28uoQ

 

 

Spiritual people like to think that they have answers to things that science doesn't. One day science will understand something we do and they don't. But these things are based in faith and not evidence.

Spiritual people like to think that the Earth cares for them. Scientists can see that it plainly doesn't. Nothing on Earth is made for us, we evolved through billions of years for Earth. There are a few places where we can live safely and eat nonpoisonous food. We didn't evolve for the bottom of the ocean or space. And the space is larger then we can imagine, we don't even register in it as a speck, but we like to think it matters.

Spiritual people find so much comfort out of the Earth caring for them, that if that belief shattered, they wouldn't know where to go. If they knew from the start, they could have adapted and seen beauty in things they couldn't imagine existed without science.

A spiritual person could see the beauty of nature in a forest, but a scientist can see beauty in tiny cells each tree is made of and actually see the cells, while the spiritual people guess about the existence of the Spirit of the Trees and try to convince themselves that they can see/feel these spirits, some like to think there is a spirit just because it makes them feel better. Not many can see/feel tree spirits but the spiritual persons can convince themselves that the spirit exists without truly examining the source of the feeling that tells them there's a spirit in that tree.

Many would say, "I've seen the tree spirit, that's enough proof for me and I know someone else who've seen a tree spirit. It can't be just a coincidence. We must have discovered the tree spirits before science has."

A religious person would use the same reasoning to prove that they've met Jesus. There could be insane amount of evidence that there were no angels pulling you out of a car crash, even though you think you saw them and thought they were real. Must mean there are angels.

Spiritual world used to be a lot bigger. There were faeries, dragons, spirits, other things. Science came and cameras were invented. Spiritual world became smaller and smaller. So many don't believe in god but believe in some other spiritual possibility. Science keeps cutting things off, no more magic, no more faeries. Yet the spiritual people expect science to one day prove that magic exists and that there are faeries.

 

If you fail to present evidence, there will be no new discoveries. What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. The onus is on you to say why, the onus is not on the rest of us to say why not.

[dust]

OK, man, I officially give up. As far as my own place in this conversation, you're not responding to anything that I'm actually saying to you. You persist in identifying this thing (spirituality) as something that nearly all of us have told you it's not.

 

You're going against your own supposed dedication to reason by being entirely unreasonable -- that is, not using reason to argue, but instead ill-informed preconceived notions about the world outside of a laboratory, continuing to claim that we all believe in faeries and deities and magic.

 

We do not. I do not.

 

Please, go and troll somewhere else.

[Marblehead]

OK, man, I officially give up.

I finally decided to look at this thread. So I look at the last post first and see the above.

 

I will leave now.

[beyonder]

Spiritual wonder

What is life? What am I? I want to know and I must search for the answer. It's calling for me to know myself. I want meaning

 

I get it! I give myself meaning! Life is a journey and I can go anywhere!

I have this strength in me to be whatever I want to be... and I always had it... I didn't know how to use it... or did I?

Did I need to learn to meditate to know my own mind? Is it really as important as I've been told? As I've told myself?

What did that give me? I can do anything and my potential is infinite, but didn't my journey use some of my potential?

I need time to meditate. I need time to read books. I need time to learn.

Things that told me about myself, things that were always true

Things that brought me back where I started

Now I have power, but it took so much time to finally start... but I want to keep going

I want to know more about the world and myself. I like the journey and life is a journey, I can reflect on that but, have I actually lived, yet?

Of course I have, and I will live more. I've learned about my spirit and I will learn about other spirits, about magic, about astrology, there's qi gong to do, there's yoga, there's meditation. So much work to understand the supernatural and finally reach enlightenment.

 

Very familiar, and naive

 

 

Scientific wonder

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1k8AbL28uoQ

 

 

Spiritual people like to think that they have answers to things that science doesn't. One day science will understand something we do and they don't. But these things are based in faith and not evidence.

Spiritual people like to think that the Earth cares for them. Scientists can see that it plainly doesn't. Nothing on Earth is made for us, we evolved through billions of years for Earth. There are a few places where we can live safely and eat nonpoisonous food. We didn't evolve for the bottom of the ocean or space. And the space is larger then we can imagine, we don't even register in it as a speck, but we like to think it matters.

Spiritual people find so much comfort out of the Earth caring for them, that if that belief shattered, they wouldn't know where to go. If they knew from the start, they could have adapted and seen beauty in things they couldn't imagine existed without science.

A spiritual person could see the beauty of nature in a forest, but a scientist can see beauty in tiny cells each tree is made of and actually see the cells, while the spiritual people guess about the existence of the Spirit of the Trees and try to convince themselves that they can see/feel these spirits, some like to think there is a spirit just because it makes them feel better. Not many can see/feel tree spirits but the spiritual persons can convince themselves that the spirit exists without truly examining the source of the feeling that tells them there's a spirit in that tree.

Many would say, "I've seen the tree spirit, that's enough proof for me and I know someone else who've seen a tree spirit. It can't be just a coincidence. We must have discovered the tree spirits before science has."

A religious person would use the same reasoning to prove that they've met Jesus. There could be insane amount of evidence that there were no angels pulling you out of a car crash, even though you think you saw them and thought they were real. Must mean there are angels.

Spiritual world used to be a lot bigger. There were faeries, dragons, spirits, other things. Science came and cameras were invented. Spiritual world became smaller and smaller. So many don't believe in god but believe in some other spiritual possibility. Science keeps cutting things off, no more magic, no more faeries. Yet the spiritual people expect science to one day prove that magic exists and that there are faeries.

 

If you fail to present evidence, there will be no new discoveries. What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. The onus is on you to say why, the onus is not on the rest of us to say why not.

Wow. That was alot of text devoted to a straw man. Also kind of funny how you mention the burden of proof, yet make alot of empty claims yourself. I'll let Jung explain my view, regarding the topic of wu wei, though:

 

"I treat satori first of all as a psychological problem. For anyone who does not share or understand this point of view, the "explanation" will consist of nothing but words which have no tangible meaning for him. He is not then able to make of these abstractions a bridge to the facts related; in other words, he cannot understand how the perfume of the blossoming laurel (p. 90-1) or the tweaked nose (p. 87) should effect such a considerable change of consciousness. The simplest thing would be, of course, to relegate all these anecdotes to the realm of amusing fairy stories, or at least, if one accepts the facts as they are, to dispose of them as instances of self-deception. (One would also willingly use here the expression "auto-suggestion", that pathetic white elephant from the store of spiritual inade-quacies!) A serious and responsible examination of the strange phenomena cannot lightly pass over these facts. We can of course never decide definitely whether a person is really "enlightened" or "redeemed", or whether he merely imagines it. We have no criteria for this. Moreover, we know well enough that an imaginary pain is often far more painful than a so-called real one, in that it is accompanied by a subtle moral suffering caused by the gloomy feeling of secret self-accusation. It is not, therefore, a question of "actual fact" but of spiritual reality; that is to say, the psychic occurrence of the happening known as satori.

Every spiritual happening is a picture and an imagination; were this not so, there could be no consciousness and no phenomenality of the occurrence. The imagination itself is a psychic occurrence, and therefore whether an "enlightenment" is called "real" or "imaginary" is quite immaterial. The man who has enlightenment, or alleges that he has it, thinks in any case that he is enlightened. What others think about it can determine nothing whatever for him with regard to his experience. Even if he were to lie, his lie would be a spiritual fact. Yes, even if all religious reports were nothing but conscious inventions and falsifications, a very interesting psychological treatise could still be written on the fact of such lies, with the same scientific treatment witth which the psychopathology of delusions is presented. The fact that there is a religious movement upon which many briliant minds have worked over a period of many centuries is sufficient reason for venturing at least upon a serious attempt to bring such happenings within the realm of scientific understanding."

-CG Jung, introduction to Suzuki's "Introduction to Zen Buddhism" (Grove Press, New York, 1964), p.15, 16

Edited October 11, 2014 by beyonder

[iain]

Hello Protector,

How would do you prove to a spiritually limited being that a rose smells nice, or even that a rose has any smell at all?

[Marblehead]

Hello Protector,

 

How would do you prove to a spiritually limited being that a rose smells nice, or even that a rose has any smell at all?

I heard something last night I hope I can repeat properly.

 

The guy was eating something he had never eaten before and said, "It tastes like the smell of Christmas."

[iain]

I heard something last night I hope I can repeat properly.

 

The guy was eating something he had never eaten before and said, "It tastes like the smell of Christmas."

Now that conjures up a kind of fruity nutty spicy taste for me; quite an incantation.

[Protector]

OK, man, I officially give up. As far as my own place in this conversation, you're not responding to anything that I'm actually saying to you. You persist in identifying this thing (spirituality) as something that nearly all of us have told you it's not.

 

You're going against your own supposed dedication to reason by being entirely unreasonable -- that is, not using reason to argue, but instead ill-informed preconceived notions about the world outside of a laboratory, continuing to claim that we all believe in faeries and deities and magic.

 

We do not. I do not.

 

Please, go and troll somewhere else.

 

Brace yourselves, incoming links

 

http://thetaobums.com/forum/223-esoteric-and-occult-discussion/

http://thetaobums.com/forum/99-healing-circle/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/36578-is-celibacy-for-10-years-realistic/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/36585-regarding-shen-and-its-natural-properties-to-restore-essence-why-would-one-work-so-long-on-the-lower-regions/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/36572-what-is-the-force-that-keeps-us-unconscious/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/36598-can-an-8-month-old-infant-master-tai-chi/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/35896-astrological-musings/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/36533-christian-qi-gong-masters/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/36568-cultivation-in-the-heart-want-to-feel-what-happens-with-your-energy-when-you-think-less-almost-nothing-during-the-day-an-example/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/36553-why-are-so-many-individuals-involved-into-spirituality-with-third-eye-open-or-not-countering-all-negativity/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/36558-what-is-the-ideal-thing-that-can-happen-to-you-in-meditation-no-thing-nothing-happens-why-and-how-to-attainembody-god/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/36549-independent-news-paper-uk-life-after-death/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/16504-internal-vision-and-remote-viewing/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/36469-will-meditation-alone-achieve-special-effects/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/26533-great-spiritual-physical-mental-benefits-from-semen-retention-celibacy-and-mental-emptiness-my-experience-and-thoughts/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/6911-nine-steps-to-spiritual-immortal/

http://thetaobums.com/topic/36468-what-the-hell-is-all-this-complex-stuff/

 

You persist in identifying this thing (spirituality) as something that nearly all of us have told you it's not.

 

Speak for yourself

 

Also, I'm the one who feels trolled. I keep going on and on about how crazy this place is and then you tell me that this whole time you were trying to prove that spirituality is thinking that life is wonderful or that roses smells nice.

This is not a site about rainbows or roses or wonderment or spirituality giving life meaning. This is a farmhouse where everyone thinks they have psychic powers and that's wonderful.

[C T]

Speak for yourself

 

Also, I'm the one who feels trolled. I keep going on and on about how crazy this place is and then you tell me that this whole time you were trying to prove that spirituality is thinking that life is wonderful or that roses smells nice.

This is not a site about rainbows or roses or wonderment or spirituality giving life meaning. This is a farmhouse where everyone thinks they have psychic powers and that's wonderful.

To a large extent, i am very much in tune with what Dustybeijing and a few other bums have said, and is continuing to say (well, maybe not anymore, seeing the exasperating nature of this discussion thus far).

 

From your quote above, its clear there is something missing in your understanding of what constitutes a spiritual life. I mean, you do not even seem to be able to differentiate psychic powers and spiritual expansion. Yet, it makes one wonder though, if you have such a low opinion of this (imo) dedicated forum... enough to label it a farmhouse, why do you even persist with your presence here?

Edited October 11, 2014 by C T

[bax44]

I'm here and I've never claimed to have psychic powers. In fact I've rarely seen that topic even broached on this forum apart from as an aside occasionally in threads on other topics. Of course I've only been here about a year so maybe before that? Either way it feels like the op is insisting that we all fall into his definition of spirituality just because we post and read here. At this point I'm not even sure what his argument is, as it feels like it's changed quite a bit.

[Jetsun]

Being absorbed in science can be just as much an avoidance of reality as being absorbed in spirituality, I know plenty of academic scientists and many of them are basically out of their bodies and completely cerebral beings, you ask them how they feel about something and you might get an answer a few hours later if your lucky. Take the anti religion pin up boy Richard Dawkins as an example, he has admitted that he was sexually abused as a child but he says it didn't affect him at all, in other words he is completely dissociated from his body and genuine feelings, which occasionally comes out in projected vehemence against the religious, its not hard to see what's really going on with him. Being absorbed in the intellectual can be a defence against discovering the deeper depths of your own being, which is what spirituality can help guide people towards, science won't help with that aspect of life very much i'm afraid.

[Marblehead]

Just to add in this thread (but not in the Atheist thread), I do consider myself a soulful and spiritual person even though I don't talk about it much.

[C T]

Speaking of anti-religion pin-up boys, Chris Hitchens comes to mind. Poor chap, one of the brightest minds around, but died an early death from over-drinking and excessive smoking. Some of his reflections on life and the human condition were exquisitely observed, and in my view, stemmed from a place of great spiritual thirst. An example...

 

"The only position that leaves me with no cognitive dissonance is atheism. It is not a creed. Death is certain, replacing both the siren-song of Paradise and the dread of Hell. Life on this earth, with all its mystery and beauty and pain, is then to be lived far more intensely: we stumble and get up, we are sad, confident, insecure, feel loneliness and joy and love. There is nothing more; but I want nothing more."

Edited October 11, 2014 by C T

[Protector]

I don't think spirituality encompasses only the powers. The super power people get top billing on my list of spiritual nuttiness, the second place would be the lifestyle and world view. That's the thing that promotes the acceptance of psychics and such around here. That's what I've been trying to talk about but the topic kept shifting on how the spiritual is the enjoyment of wonderful or something.

[Marblehead]

Yes, spirituality is is a different concept that is super powers. The super powers would be talked about by the alchemists. Spirituality is a much broader, and perhaps much vaguer, concept.