What is a 'spiritual path'?

mossieh

This term was mentioned in a post in Paranormal by Thaedydal and I'm curious as to it's meaning. It sounds on the surface like a precise definition, but I've been hearing the following phrase a lot lately: 'I'm not into organised religion but I am a very spiritual person' and I wonder; What exactly does this mean?

Can you define it?. What does it mean to you? I'm not interested in dictionary definitions, I'd like to hear about some real, strong beliefs.

Also, I'd like to reserve the right to (gently) question these beliefs, as I said to Thaedydal, a strong belief system should bear up to some questioning.

Any takers?

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

when someone says they are spiritual it means they take pride in the fact that they believe things without proper grounds for believing these things.

Sapien

What people generally mean by a "spiritual path" that is not part of an organised religion is a philosophical, metaphysical framework for considering spiritual ideas, often influenced primarily by one tradition or a cognate group of traditions.

Nevyn

Mordeth take the time to read the charter for this forum disparaging people's beliefs will get you banned.

Nevyn

I would say that a spiritual path is one of learning and seeking understanding both of oneslef and of the universe.
It is never ending and requires tought, research and reflection.

mossieh

Mordeth wrote:

when someone says they are spiritual it means they take pride in the fact that they believe things without proper grounds for believing these things.

That's a direct answer. No spiritual path for you then Mordeth?

mossieh

Sapien wrote:

What people generally mean by a "spiritual path" that is not part of an organised religion is a philosophical, metaphysical framework for considering spiritual ideas, often influenced primarily by one tradition or a cognate group of traditions.

But what do YOU think Sapien? Do you have a spiritual path?

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

it's an observation, one that I believe is protected by the charter of this forum.

mossieh

Thaedydal wrote:

I would say that a spiritual path is one of learning and seeking understanding both of oneslef and of the universe.
It is never ending and requires tought, research and reflection.

I can see how learning and seeking understanding (even for someone who has no interest in scientific findings, as you said) would be a worthwhile path to follow, but what makes it a 'spiritual' path?

Thought, research and reflection sound like scientific methods to me to be honest.

Sapien

mossieh wrote:

But what do YOU think Sapien? Do you have a spiritual path?

I was answering your first question.

I am influenced by many spiritual traditions. Do you have any more specific questions?

Nevyn

mossieh wrote:

I can see how learning and seeking understanding (even for someone who has no interest in scientific findings, as you said) would be a worthwhile path to follow, but what makes it a 'spiritual' path?

Thought, research and reflection sound like scientific methods to me to be honest.

Even when they are personal subjective spiritual experiences ?

mossieh

Sapien wrote:

I was answering your first question.

I am influenced by many spiritual traditions. Do you have any more specific questions?

I'm just trying to get a sense of what this phrase means to you personally. Can you outline some of the core beliefs from these traditions that have influenced you? The phrase 'spiritual path' is rather nebulous to me, I'd like some specific examples of what it means to you. What spiritual traditions have influenced you? how do they affect the way you live your life? Where do you see your spiritual path leading? How would you live your life in it's absence?

Trinity

Be gentle, new to this forum and no facts to back up my statements

I've yet to find my 'spiritual path' but whatever it is it wont be out of a book or what someone else tells me. I was brought up a catholic i've had enough of that

It will be one that i find from within. My personal beliefs will be all that matters. How i feel about myself. I like to think i am a (fairly) good person. Kind, caring, compassionate (open to debate!!). I dont steal or hurt people not intentionally anyway.

But they are traits that are already there within me and whatever path i take it wont change that. As long as i do no harm to anyone else and try to find inner peace and happiness and try to be a good person, thats all that matters to me.

Sapien

mossieh wrote:

I'm just trying to get a sense of what this phrase means to you personally... The phrase 'spiritual path' is rather nebulous to me...

I told you what it means - whether to me personally or to anyone else. It is a matter of definition, not personal experience. If you want to know what my own spiritual path is - that is an impossibly broad question, and you will need to be more specific.

mossieh wrote:

What spiritual traditions have influenced you? how do they affect the way you live your life? Where do you see your spiritual path leading? How would you live your life in it's absence?

I have been influenced, in one way or another, by every spiritual tradition to which I have been exposed, I'm sure. The traditions into which I have done most study are generally those that make up the Western Esoteric Tradition - Hermetica, Qabalah, Alchemy, Theurgy and Goetia, Gnosticism, Classical, Middle Eastern and Egyptian theogony. Chaos Magick is my major occupation of late. It is impossible to gauge how my spirituality affects my life and my attitudes - it's not as though I have any kind of empirical control. My spiritual interest is not a moral one, if that is what you mean.

Many of the spiritual paradigms I use involve the idea of a developmental path leading to an ultimate transition to a different state of consciousness. I do not, at present, aspire to follow any of these with any kind of exclusivity, though all offer unique and interesting techniques, many of which do I use.

I don't know how I might experience an "absence" of my spirituality.

mossieh

mossieh wrote:

I can see how learning and seeking understanding (even for someone who has no interest in scientific findings, as you said) would be a worthwhile path to follow, but what makes it a 'spiritual' path?

Thought, research and reflection sound like scientific methods to me to be honest.

Thaedydal wrote:

Even when they are personal subjective spiritual experiences ?

We're going around in circles here Thaedydal. My question was, what makes them spiritual experiences, as opposed to physical or emotional?

mossieh

Sapien wrote:

I told you what it means - whether to me personally or to anyone else. It is a matter of definition, not personal experience. If you want to know what my own spiritual path is - that is an impossibly broad question, and you will need to be more specific.


I have been influenced, in one way or another, by every spiritual tradition to which I have been exposed, I'm sure. The traditions into which I have done most study are generally those that make up the Western Esoteric Tradition - Hermetica, Qabalah, Alchemy, Theurgy and Goetia, Gnosticism, Classical, Middle Eastern and Egyptian theogony. Chaos Magick is my major occupation of late. It is impossible to gauge how my spirituality affects my life and my attitudes - it's not as though I have any kind of empirical control. My spiritual interest is not a moral one, if that is what you mean.

Many of the spiritual paradigms I use involve the idea of a developmental path leading to an ultimate transition to a different state of consciousness. I do not, at present, aspire to follow any of these with any kind of exclusivity, though all offer unique and interesting techniques, many of which do I use.

I don't know how I might experience an "absence" of my spirituality.

Thank you for such a detailed and eloquent response, if the imprecision of my questions is annoying i apologise, this is somewhat new ground for me. I found this part of your answer particularly interesting: 'Many of the spiritual paradigms I use involve the idea of a developmental path leading to an ultimate transition to a different state of consciousness.' This is somewhat of a unifying theme in many of the major belief systems is it not? Do you feel you have had any experiences, however limited, of this different state of conciousness?
As for an absence of spirituality, obviously this for you would be a hypothetical situation, but can you not imagine how a different life might be, where you rarely devoted serious thought to these matters? A world that most people (myself included) inhabit?

mossieh

Trinity1 wrote:

Be gentle, new to this forum and no facts to back up my statements

I've yet to find my 'spiritual path' but whatever it is it wont be out of a book or what someone else tells me. I was brought up a catholic i've had enough of that

It will be one that i find from within. My personal beliefs will be all that matters. How i feel about myself. I like to think i am a (fairly) good person. Kind, caring, compassionate (open to debate!!). I dont steal or hurt people not intentionally anyway.

But they are traits that are already there within me and whatever path i take it wont change that. As long as i do no harm to anyone else and try to find inner peace and happiness and try to be a good person, thats all that matters to me.

Thank you Trinity1, I must say, your personal beliefs sound pretty close to my own. I like to keep things fairly simple, for me: Physical happiness + Emotional happiness = Happiness. Is this spiritual? Does it need to be? I don't feel spiritual, I just feel like me and I like it.

Sapien

mossieh wrote:

I found this part of your answer particularly interesting: 'Many of the spiritual paradigms I use involve the idea of a developmental path leading to an ultimate transition to a different state of consciousness.' This is somewhat of a unifying theme in many of the major belief systems is it not?

What in particular are you thinking of?

mossieh wrote:

Do you feel you have had any experiences, however limited, of this different state of conciousness?

Which different state of consciousness?

mossieh wrote:

As for an absence of spirituality, obviously this for you would be a hypothetical situation, but can you not imagine how a different life might be, where you rarely devoted serious thought to these matters?

Can I imagine what life would be like as a different person? Sure, I suppose so. I don't know what insights such an exercise might offer though.

mossieh

Sapien wrote:

What in particular are you thinking of?

off the top of my head, the buddhist state of zen, the christian state of grace, the transcendent state of TM, there seems to be a common aspiration to an elevated state of conciousness.

Sapien wrote:

Which different state of consciousness?

Any of the above, or their equivalents in the belief systems you've mentioned. It would seem like a difficult task to follow any path towards an ultimate goal without having experienced even a small foretaste of that goal.

Sapien wrote:

Can I imagine what life would be like as a different person? Sure, I suppose so. I don't know what insights such an exercise might offer though.

Surely the ability to view a situation from anothers perspective is an aid to communication and understanding? Is it not possible to learn in this way? Any time we try to understand anothers point of view is that not what we have to do, to briefly imagine ourselves as that person?

Nevyn

mossieh wrote:

We're going around in circles here Thaedydal. My question was, what makes them spiritual experiences, as opposed to physical or emotional?

That is what makes them subjective.

The exact same event occuring to a range of people maybe seen as
coincdence, normal, odd, or a message from the universe/diety/spirits/guides/saints/angel ect ect depending on them and
they are at in thier lives and on thier life journeys and spiritual path.

Sapien

mossieh wrote:

off the top of my head, the buddhist state of zen, the christian state of grace, the transcendent state of TM, there seems to be a common aspiration to an elevated state of conciousness.

Well, things do have to have a point.

mossieh wrote:

Any of the above, or their equivalents in the belief systems you've mentioned. It would seem like a difficult task to follow any path towards an ultimate goal without having experienced even a small foretaste of that goal.

As I have said, I do not aspire to attain the spiritual transformation of any particular system. I do not believe in an ultimate goal. It would be more useful to think of me as a collector of belief systems, in the centuries old tradition of European esoterica.

mossieh wrote:

Surely the ability to view a situation from anothers perspective is an aid to communication and understanding? Is it not possible to learn in this way? Any time we try to understand anothers point of view is that not what we have to do, to briefly imagine ourselves as that person?

Of course. What is your question?

mossieh

Sapien wrote:

Can I imagine what life would be like as a different person? Sure, I suppose so. I don't know what insights such an exercise might offer though.

Mossieh wrote:

Surely the ability to view a situation from anothers perspective is an aid to communication and understanding? Is it not possible to learn in this way? Any time we try to understand anothers point of view is that not what we have to do, to briefly imagine ourselves as that person?

Sapien wrote:

Of course. What is your question?

So do you agree or disagree? Answering questions with questions is a politicians trick and is at best, evasive. I'm starting to see a pattern here.

mossieh

Thaedydal wrote:

That is what makes them subjective.

The exact same event occuring to a range of people maybe seen as
coincdence, normal, odd, or a message from the universe/diety/spirits/guides/saints/angel ect ect depending on them and
they are at in thier lives and on thier life journeys and spiritual path.

I understand what subjective means. I also know that it has no bearing on the question I asked. These generalised and vague answers are precisely what I was trying to get past. To be honest, having come to this forum with some preconceptions of what I would find, my suspicions have been entirely confirmed, which is simultaneously disappointing and reassuring. Other than Trinity1's rather refreshing reply and what seems like an increasingly astute observation from Mordeth, all I've seen here is evasion and cloud-talk. Does anyone here have something of substance to add to the debate?

Nevyn

A person's spiritual path can be made up of various experiences and often they can be very emotional and private.

From my point of view mossieh I have answered and you don't get it or else you want me to lay out on line to a stranger and the entire internet some of my most personal moments and lay bare for you my relationship with my Gods.

Firstly a lot of them would not make sense to you as you would not have the context for them and to give you that context would mean pretty much telling you chunks of my life story.

Secondly a lot of them are as interpted by me and how I view the universe and clearly you view it in a differnt way.

Thirdly you don't know the way in which I walk my path and the knowlege that I have learned and I would not have the time to teach you as you may never get it and you would have your own to find.

I will give you one example:

The crows that hang around my house I see as being there watching over me sent by my patron diety. I feed them and offer them libations on the behalf of my Goddess and make an offering of liver at least once a month.
This is part of my spiritial path and my devotions to my Gods.

Someone else might say that the crows hang around only cos they get feed
and that them turning up in the first place was random.

Trinity

mossieh wrote:

Thank you Trinity1, I must say, your personal beliefs sound pretty close to my own. I like to keep things fairly simple, for me: Physical happiness + Emotional happiness = Happiness. Is this spiritual? Does it need to be? I don't feel spiritual, I just feel like me and I like it.

I havent read books and i dont have a great knowledge like the others.

But I believe in my heart that emotional happiness you talk about, where you find it, is your own personal 'spiritual path'. What makes you happy? What beliefs do you hold that give you the emotional comfort that contributes to this happiness.

It can be hard to label spirituality. My own definition of it is just being in touch with yourself, your inner self and the world around you. Its also the knowledge that its not just the physical happiness that matters.

The others who have studied i have great respect for them. and accept that i am possibly talking ****e :-)

Nevyn

No your are not all all trinity1 it could be that you are not as screwed up or a complicated as others and have had an easier time connecting to what works for you.

If what you belief meets your needs and gives you that inner peace and happiness why would you need to search on.

mossieh

Thaedydal wrote:

I will give you one example:

The crows that hang around my house I see as being there watching over me sent by my patron diety. I feed them and offer them libations on the behalf of my Goddess and make an offering of liver at least once a month.
This is part of my spiritial path and my devotions to my Gods.

Someone else might say that the crows hang around only cos they get feed
and that them turning up in the first place was random.

Thank you Thaedydal, this is exactly the kind of reply I was looking for. a concrete example of how you follow your path. Why liver might I ask? Does it have a cultural significance?

Nevyn

mossieh wrote:

Thank you Thaedydal, this is exactly the kind of reply I was looking for. a concrete example of how you follow your path. Why liver might I ask? Does it have a cultural significance?

Crows and other member of the Crovis family in Ireland are for the most part
the main carrion eaters, which is part of thier assocation with my patron diety.
The liver is what I was told would be an appropiate offering and it is the closest way to an offer of carrion and blood in a modren context.

Sapien

mossieh wrote:

So do you agree or disagree? Answering questions with questions is a politicians trick and is at best, evasive. I'm starting to see a pattern here.

Allow me to rearrange those quotations so that you might have some idea why I continiue to have questions:

I don't know what insights such an exercise might offer... What is your question?

mossieh wrote:

I'm starting to see a pattern here.

Perhaps you should resist that temptation until you have managed to ask me a question that I can answer substantively.

mossieh

Sapien wrote:

Perhaps you should resist that temptation until you have managed to ask me a question that I can answer substantively.

Hmmm... a yoda-like response if ever I heard one. 'You may have an answer, if you ask the right question.' I think I've asked reasonably straightforward questions here but it seems to take several attempts to get a 'substantive' answer. Smoke and mirrors come to mind, or possibly a failure to understand relatively simple questions is indicative of something else, who knows? Anyway, I've kept you from your esoteric studies long enough, I'll reverse my puny logic-based intellect out of here.

Politeness 0, Condesencion 1.

Nevyn

I don't see how asking someone who has a spiritual dimension to thier life about living thier life with out one would be able to explain that spiritual dimension.

I would say that the difference between having a spiritual dimension and walking a spiritual path is that walking a spiritual path is working towards what ever spiritual goals you set for yourself and those can vary, so can the journey and how long it takes.

mossieh

Ok, against my better judgement I'll respond once more.

Thaedydal wrote:

I don't see how asking someone who has a spiritual dimension to thier life about living thier life with out one would be able to explain that spiritual dimension.

I don't claim it would explain it, but it might help to clarify how it is you actually benefit from having this 'spiritual dimension'. By imagining your life without it, maybe it would be easier to see what it gives you. I don't think this is a particularly challenging concept. I may be wrong.

Thaedydal wrote:

I would say that the difference between having a spiritual dimension and walking a spiritual path is that walking a spiritual path is working towards what ever spiritual goals you set for yourself and those can vary, so can the journey and how long it takes.

I've read this sentence several times now. I understand each of the words. I am failing completely to detect it's overall meaning. My lack of a spiritual dimension or path is seeming more like a blessing(steady) each time I read it.

Thank you for replying to my questions anyway, it has in it's own way, been a very educational experience.

Nevyn

mossieh wrote:

Ok, against my better judgement I'll respond once more.

I don't claim it would explain it, but it might help to clarify how it is you actually benefit from having this 'spiritual dimension'. By imagining your life without it, maybe it would be easier to see what it gives you. I don't think this is a particularly challenging concept. I may be wrong.

It makes my life and my interaction with the universe make sense to me.

mossieh wrote:

I've read this sentence several times now. I understand each of the words. I am failing completely to detect it's overall meaning. My lack of a spiritual dimension or path is seeming more like a blessing(steady) each time I read it.

Oh well, the debate about a having or not a spiritual life and wether it is a blessing or a curse is one people having been having long before the internet.

We all interpt the universe and life trough our senses and brain and each is differnt and so it subjective.

Sapien

mossieh wrote:

Hmmm... a yoda-like response if ever I heard one. 'You may have an answer, if you ask the right question.' I think I've asked reasonably straightforward questions here but it seems to take several attempts to get a 'substantive' answer. Smoke and mirrors come to mind, or possibly a failure to understand relatively simple questions is indicative of something else, who knows? Anyway, I've kept you from your esoteric studies long enough, I'll reverse my puny logic-based intellect out of here.

Politeness 0, Condesencion 1.

I really would be quite happy to answer reasonably well-defined questions. Did you perhaps consider that you might have been asking too much of people with these hypothetical questions? How much introspection do you really believe your curiosity warrants?

I do not, however, respond well to snide ridicule or accusations of low intelligence. It is clear what you want from this dialogue - at least give yourself a chance to earn it.

Nevyn

Nah he asks flakey questions which don't have precise answers to that he can infer that we are flakes.
Just as long as I am a dark chocolate flake and not a lepers leavings I can live with it

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

he said I was right, so back off the guy.. he clearly knows what he's talking about

Marksie

Trinity1 wrote:

It can be hard to label spirituality. My own definition of it is just being in touch with yourself, your inner self and the world around you. Its also the knowledge that its not just the physical happiness that matters.

The others who have studied i have great respect for them. and accept that i am possibly talking ****e :-)

No trinity1. Your definition is one that works for you. Mine is intensely personal to me and hard to explain. What i do to develop that again is drawn from several sources and does involve major aspects of what you have posted.

The best way i can explain about the whole spiritual path idea is what a dear friend said to me.

"there are many paths to the top of the mountain, but they all lead to the same place".

How you choose to develop and express is therefore entirely personal based on the Your essential self.

Is a spiritual dimension therefore the connectedness i feel to life around me, and the nature and the world and beyond?

I haven't had to try and express this before as i hadn't really thought of the two as separate, in that my beliefs and my inner self tend to compliment each other.

SkepticOne

A more common word for what people are talking about here would be superstition.

Nevyn

I find that term in the context of this forum to be offensvie.

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

from dictionary.com

1. a belief or notion, not based on reason or knowledge, in or of the ominous significance of a particular thing, circumstance, occurrence, proceeding, or the like.

2. a system or collection of such beliefs.
3. a custom or act based on such a belief.
4. irrational fear of what is unknown or mysterious, esp. in connection with religion.
5. any blindly accepted belief or notion.

seems pretty reasonable to me
what was it you found offensive?

Nevyn

No one would get away with saying that on any of the other forums in this catagory.
It is not an acceptible comment.
Same as going into any sports forum and wholesale trashing the sport.

Sapien

Mordeth wrote:

from dictionary.com

1. a belief or notion, not based on reason or knowledge, in or of the ominous significance of a particular thing, circumstance, occurrence, proceeding, or the like.

2. a system or collection of such beliefs.
3. a custom or act based on such a belief.
4. irrational fear of what is unknown or mysterious, esp. in connection with religion.
5. any blindly accepted belief or notion.

seems pretty reasonable to me
what was it you found offensive?

I don't understand. Why are spiritual beliefs necessarily superstitious? To my mind nobody on this thread has yet sufficiently defined what spirituality is, so to proffer superstition as a simple synonym seems to beg the question in a rather assinine way.

As I have said before, the skeptic tendency to immediately reject any concept that is perceived to be of a spiritual bent, without any real knowledge of that concept or its context, without any articulated reason, is as clear a manifestation of superstition as any I know.

Mordeth, if it satisfies your intellectual standards to cut and paste your argument from online dictionaries, then you should know that dictionary.com offers this rather diffuse set of definitions for "spiritual";

1. of, pertaining to, or consisting of spirit; incorporeal.
2. of or pertaining to the spirit or soul, as distinguished from the physical nature: a spiritual approach to life.
3. closely akin in interests, attitude, outlook, etc.: the professor's spiritual heir in linguistics.
4. of or pertaining to spirits or to spiritualists; supernatural or spiritualistic.
5. characterized by or suggesting predominance of the spirit; ethereal or delicately refined: She is more of a spiritual type than her rowdy brother.
6. of or pertaining to the spirit as the seat of the moral or religious nature.
7. of or pertaining to sacred things or matters; religious; devotional; sacred.
8. of or belonging to the church; ecclesiastical: lords spiritual and temporal.
9. of or relating to the mind or intellect.
–noun
10. a spiritual or religious song: authentic folk spirituals.
11. spirituals, affairs of the church.
12. a spiritual thing or matter.

Your argument doesn't really amount to much.

SkepticOne

Although the word superstition may be used in an offensive way that is not the intention here. I think it reasonably accurately describes a lot of what is being said in this thread. I agree with Sapien that it does not reflect every aspect of what we might call the spiritual but rather a subset.

knird evol

Mordeth wrote:

when someone says they are spiritual it means they take pride in the fact that they believe things without proper grounds for believing these things.

The only thing you have proper grounds for believing in is your own spirit which you are presently experiencing the existence of - direct experience - and the unified cosmic conciousness that each is a part of and all of - which you can also experience perhaps if you follow a Path in that direction.

Other things, a glass on the bar in front of you, mordeth or an lcd screen are external objects. These may or may not exist, as you only experience them as secondary phenomina. Essentially signals that pass on neural pathways from your sense organs through sight, sound, touch to your brain and can be duplicated in dreams or under hallucinagenic drugs and in other ways.

You should read Wittgensteins explanations on the relativity of language to avoid making mistakes like quoting 'dictionary.com' 'definitions'

knird evol

Mordeth wrote:

when someone says they are spiritual it means they take pride in the fact that they believe things without proper grounds for believing these things.

The only thing you have proper grounds for believing in is your own spirit which you are presently experiencing the existence of - direct experience - and the unified cosmic conciousness that each is a part of and all of - which you can also experience perhaps if you follow a Path in that direction.

Other things, a glass on the bar in front of you, mordeth or an lcd screen are external objects. These may or may not exist, as you only experience them as secondary phenomina. Essentially signals that pass on neural pathways from your sense organs through sight, sound, touch to your brain and can be duplicated in dreams or under hallucinagenic drugs and in other ways.

You should read Wittgensteins explanations on the relativity of language to avoid making mistakes like quoting 'dictionary.com' 'definitions'