Are You Spiritual?

[Morchella]

I don't get this word "spiritual". Is there something that someone else can feel but not me? Perhaps cavemen might have an inclination for mysticism but now we know better I think. I think people who claim to be spiritual are frauds. They like to believe they are on some higher plane that the rest of us can't get to. What a bunch of pretentious liars. Spirituality is not reality but a pretext for making the rest of us feel incomplete so if we pay up we can get it too. Whenever I hear the word I feel the urge to gag. There is no such thing. Maybe I am too sensitive because I had a very nice girl once who dumped me because I wasn't spiritual enough.

 

[fishbait]

Spirituality is the last refuge of a failed human. A way of distracting yourself from who you really are.

 

[John Jones]

I don't get this word "spiritual". ....

Spiritual ~ superstitious.

 

[Lorentz]

I'll drink to that!

 

[kid meatball]

I'd take honesty over spirituality any day. Still, though, one can be spiritual and honest, so long as one is honest with oneself.

 

[Lanzy]

no

 

[zeggman]

I'm spiritual. I celebrate the human spirit, as expressed in art, music, literature, science, technology, mathematics, etc. etc.

 

[Navigator]

I'm spiritual. I celebrate the human spirit, as expressed in art, music, literature, science, technology, mathematics, etc. etc.

This is a very good all-round interpretation as to 'what is spiritual' I think.

Some who call themselves spiritual may not agree with some of the things included in your description, but no one personality or institution has the ownership on the meaning of the word.

On the other hand, if the word is broken down a bit, then the word 'spirit' is usually referenced to 'Ghosts' and all things to do with the mythology of afterlife...

But then again it is used also in reference to attitude.

 

[HansMustermann]

I see no need to call myself spiritual.

Yes, I can appreciate a sunset, or some good organ music, or most of the stuff included in the whole 'let's take "spiritual" back' stuff, but... why would I call it 'spiritual'? Even skipping the etymological connection to "spirit", i.e., soul, the fact is that it's not what the "spiritual" folks use it for anyway. Almost invariably it does seem connected to "spirit" de facto, via some woowoo or another. Or let's put it this way, they don't mean going to church just to be in awe of the acoustics of an organ concert.

So I seriously don't get this whole 'oh, I'm spiritual too, even if I have to redefine the word for that' meme.

Yes, there seems to be this 'oh, atheists are not spiritual' meme it answers to, and it's implied to be something bad or lacking, but... so what? No, seriously, why would I want to answer that by trying to fit in with the woowoo gang after all?

It's like being somewhere in the Eastern Bloc in the late 80's and countering the charge that there's something wrong with those who don't like communism (no, really, they even has it filed under a form of schizophrenia in the USSR), by pretending to be a communist too, just, err, in a different way. Why? The ones who actually made a difference were those who could say, "screw that. No, I'm not."

Well, that's not even an accurate analogy, because those at least pretended to be communists too to avoid some consequences that would be pretty brutal. Whereas the gang trying to fit in the 'spirituals' is apparently just in it for... fitting in with the 'spirituals'.

But anyway, screw that. No, I'm not.

Yes, I can appreciate an organ concert or the acoustics of a cathedral, but it's for just that, not because it makes me feel like there's some higher power watching over me. And I can appreciate the cathedral too, but not because it makes me feel closer to some woowoo deity, but even just because it's awe inspiring that they could even make buttresses that worked in an age where they didn't even have the vector notation we'd use nowadays to calculate that. And if I feel there is a greater power, a Logos of the universe as the Greeks used to call it, I'll just call it physics or social dynamics or whatever appropriate. And awe inspiring as it may be, I won't think it watches over me, nor think it's some kind of Santa that owes me something for appeasing it. And I might feel in awe about how we came to be or where we going, but not think there's some God that'll make everything right, and that we can crap all over the environment because, hey, he'll come back before we're done with that. Etc.

Am I spiritual? Not one bit. I can just have all the good parts without all the woowoo baggage.

 

[Loss Leader]

Not spiritual in any way at all. Never understood people who are. Seriously, when someone talks about the beautiful connectedness of whatever, it's like being blind and hearing someone describe a rainbow. I have no frame of reference.

 

[thaiboxerken]

I can be spiritual, as in full of spirit. Maker's Mark is my favorite.

 

[jasonpatterson]

This seems to be what people who are atheists but don't wish to call themselves atheist or agnostic call themselves.

The line, "I'm not religious, but I'm very spiritual," just drives me nuts.

 

[Frozenwolf150]

I'm spiritual. I celebrate the human spirit, as expressed in art, music, literature, science, technology, mathematics, etc. etc.

That pretty much describes the way I feel. Spirituality doesn't mean religious, and no religion has a monopoly on it.

 

[thaiboxerken]

This seems to be what people who are atheists but don't wish to call themselves atheist or agnostic call themselves.

The line, "I'm not religious, but I'm very spiritual," just drives me nuts.

I actually think it's a claim that people who believe in a god make but don't want to be tied to a specific religion or dogma. They just want their own custom god who lets them do whatever they want, but still get to go to heaven.

 

[aggle-rithm]

When my wife's grandfather died of cancer, he was in a hospice program that allowed him to die at home. There was a solemn vigil where he was surrounded by his loved ones in his last few hours. This struck me as a very spiritual experience, even though there was no religious or superstitious element to it. There was a kind of secular "holiness" and reverence in the air.

 

[aggle-rithm]

The line, "I'm not religious, but I'm very spiritual," just drives me nuts.

This usually means, "I believe a lot of crazy things, but nobody tells ME what crazy stuff to believe in!"

 

[zeggman]

Not spiritual in any way at all. Never understood people who are. Seriously, when someone talks about the beautiful connectedness of whatever, it's like being blind and hearing someone describe a rainbow. I have no frame of reference.

“The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.”
― Carl Sagan

“A book is made from a tree. It is an assemblage of flat, flexible parts (still called "leaves") imprinted with dark pigmented squiggles. One glance at it and you hear the voice of another person, perhaps someone dead for thousands of years. Across the millennia, the author is speaking, clearly and silently, inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people, citizens of distant epochs, who never knew one another. Books break the shackles of time ― proof that humans can work magic.”
― Carl Sagan

“Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.”
― Carl Sagan


“Science is not only compatible with spirituality; it is a profound source of spirituality.”
― Carl Sagan

 

[geni]

I don't get this word "spiritual". Is there something that someone else can feel but not me?

Loads of things. What of it?

Perhaps cavemen might have an inclination for mysticism but now we know better I think.

Define mysticism. Remeber we really doing know very much about religions pre sumer.

I think people who claim to be spiritual are frauds.

Fraud requires intent and that isn't what is going on.

They like to believe they are on some higher plane that the rest of us can't get to. What a bunch of pretentious liars. Spirituality is not reality but a pretext for making the rest of us feel incomplete so if we pay up we can get it too.

Doubtful. Most of the groups that would consider themselves spiritual don't get on very well with organised religion.

Whenever I hear the word I feel the urge to gag. There is no such thing. Maybe I am too sensitive because I had a very nice girl once who dumped me because I wasn't spiritual enough.

Probably. In practice spiritual means people who's religious position is too fluffy even for the CofE. Also this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Ndkz7HTjc8

 

[Loss Leader]

Define mysticism. Remeber we really doing know very much about religions pre sumer.

We may not know much but there's evidence of totemism and human burial going back 100,000 years. I think a burial ceremony indicates spiritualism.

Link to Wikipedia, but article written with good sources.

 

[zeggman]

I see no need to call myself spiritual.

Yes, I can appreciate a sunset, or some good organ music, or most of the stuff included in the whole 'let's take "spiritual" back' stuff, but... why would I call it 'spiritual'? Even skipping the etymological connection to "spirit", i.e., soul, the fact is that it's not what the "spiritual" folks use it for anyway.

The same etymological connection appears in "inspiration" (respiration, expiration, perspiration) though not in "exasperation". Do you ever feel the need to call yourself inspired?

I understand that some people who think they own the word do not use it as I use it. There are people who claim to own "patriotic" and other adjectives as well, who don't mean the same thing when they use it to describe themselves as I mean when I use it to describe myself. I see no need to invent a new word to describe the way I relate to the world.

So I seriously don't get this whole 'oh, I'm spiritual too, even if I have to redefine the word for that' meme.

I don't think it's a redefinition. I invoke the human spirit, and ground it in the here and now. I don't believe in an afterlife, spirit guides, karma, or "the secret".

And if I feel there is a greater power, a Logos of the universe as the Greeks used to call it, I'll just call it physics or social dynamics or whatever appropriate.

I don't believe in a Logos of the universe either.

Am I spiritual? Not one bit. I can just have all the good parts without all the woowoo baggage.

I don't accept the claim that spiritual implies woowoo baggage. There's team spirit, the "can-do" spirit, and the human spirit which I invoke. No baggage required.