What is Spirituality?
Written by takuin on Thursday, April 17, 2008 – 10:58 pmOver at Tom Stine’s website there have been several recent articles on various aspects of spirituality, and his post, “So What is Spirituality? Really,” gave rise to this one.
If you have a look at his article, it goes into fine detail on the various definitions used for that word and how it is generally looked upon. It is a great piece and well worth the time to read. (In fact, if you have not been to his site before, there is plenty of fine material to pore over. So check it out.)
I rarely ever use the word spirituality. In any form. Why? Because it has far too many definitions based on opinion, and seems to be rendered useless by the sheer amount of choice one has. But I will use the word in a different context.
What is Spirit?
If we look into the etymology of the word, it comes from the Latin, Spiritus. This word simply means, Breath (from Spirare, which means to blow, or breathe).
I am not at all sure of the reason, but somewhere along the line someone must have thought about the “breath of life,” as the indescribable thing that gives us animation; the thing that gives us breath.
(Not that it is all important to look into the word origins to live a better life, but you would be amazed at how clear things can become, at least on an intellectual level.)
Well, What is Spirituality? Am I spiritual?
To answer the question is quite simple:
Are you breathing? Yes? Then you are spiritual.
It doesn’t require any affiliation to any special club, and you don’t have to go anywhere to get it. Hopefully this can clear out some confusion, because if someone claims they can make you more spiritual, you’ll now know they are full of it. 
Look into the wholeness of your life. It is complete in every possible way already. You may think, “No it isn’t,” but what you think about this is irrelevant. Your idea of what you need keeps you from seeing that you already are.
Every animal, every plant, and each of us has this spirit. It is inseparable from daily life because it is daily life.
Rejecting the Obvious
You can try to reject the obvious; that you are already whole and complete, a perfect spiritual being; but where will that leave you? The sun will rise tomorrow, a beautiful sphere of fire, the mother of life on this earth. Reject it all you want, but it will be there for you tomorrow. It will always love you, even if you hate it, loathe it, or completely ignore it.
Don’t let yourself get in the way of the obvious. It is all so beautiful.
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Posted in Posts, Question of the Week |
April 18th, 2008 at 1:28 am
Bravo! I couldn’t have said it better. Well, I tried to say it better, but….
Yes, everyone, everything is already as spiritual as they come. From a rock to Krishna, from stripper to Jesus, all are already all. You hit the nail on the head, Takuin, we are already whole and complete and that is the truth. All of “spirituality” is merely a backwards journey to realizing what is already true.
I still use the term because it conveys some sort of meaning to so many people. If we were to classify your blog, or hit the thumbs up on StumbleUpon, we were need a category for it. I will stumble it, and I will choose “spirituality” so that baseball fans will know that it isn’t about the New York Yankees. Just words, just a label to help minds out. Nothing more or less.
Again, wonderful post.
April 18th, 2008 at 1:12 pm
Beautifully put.
Why does spirit refer to breath? Because spirit can only be experienced when it moves. And the most intimate way it moves is in animating us to life. We might say life is kinetic spirit. Simply being we cannot experience. We can only be being. This is the reason for all expression. For unmanifest being to know itself, it needs to move and express. Without the flow, nothing is known.
Looks like a great blog. Will have to explore more. I think I’ll blog about this blogging too (laughs)
April 18th, 2008 at 1:24 pm
[...] 2008 Here is the flow. Tom Stine asked What is Spirituality, Really?. Takuin Minamoto then asked the same question from another angle. 2 sides to the same coin. In one case, it is concluded that Spirituality is [...]
April 20th, 2008 at 11:39 am
Thanks Tom. When one uses that word, it is more or less easy to figure out what they mean. But I usually I ask one to elaborate, more times than not.
There is already far too much nebulous language being thrown around in spiritual work anyway, and it is always good to get to the point.
You made a great remark about the classification of things. That sort of external classification is necessary for clarity in various ways. The problem, of course, is when a human being internalizes the same mechanism in order to view its surroundings. “White people are like this, Black people are like this, Catholics are all like this, Mexicans do this,” etc.
Thanks, Tom.
April 20th, 2008 at 11:43 am
Thanks Davidya. Great comment.
I’ve seen you over at Tom’s blog quite a bit, and its nice to have you here. Feel free to chime in as much as you like.