You do not become spiritual. Spirituality is your natural condition. You already are, whether you like it or not, whether you’re religious or not, whether you’re inclined toward spiritual practices like meditation or contemplation or not, spiritual. It is a word that describes your inner self, your essence, that essential part of you that is deeper, deeper and more original than any other part of you. It is the closest of all to your source, the origins of your existence and the place from which life springs in you.
In order to understand life, the role of human beings and other forms of life, events and circumstances that we see in life, mankind has thought, represented, drawn and painted, and created rituals and ceremonies, sung, played and composed music and countless elaborations of movement since the beginning of recorded time. In fact, most or even all of the things we take for granted, such as music, movies, movement and dance, wine, food, arts and crafts, singing, festivals and ceremonies, rituals of initiation (such as baby naming, coming of age, weddings, and funerals) have their origins firmly in humanity’s primitive, pagan attempts to make sense of and honor life in a way that connects them with superhuman forces, such as the weather, the fruitfulness of crops, the success of hunting, the longevity of human life, the survival of the tribe, the bond of relationships and families in the tribe, the continued flourishing of life in the community: not much has changed, because today we mostly share the same kind of concerns.
Spirituality is all of this, plus possibly everything we do, say, discuss, and think. The ways in which we interact, love, fight, participate in our human roles, take care of ourselves and others, is at its core spiritual. It’s it is about us.
So becoming spiritual really means becoming who you are. This rather assumes that you are no longer who you are. And in a way it’s true. Not so much that you are not who you are, but that you are not yet everybody that is what you are. Life is an adventure of arriving or sometimes it is called growing up or maturing. We develop through stages of challenge, expectation, and personal growth to become, or finally arrive at, a true foundation based on reality, the truth about who we are.
An appropriate analogy is the flower. A flower begins as a seed that germinates in the ground. Reaching upward toward your intuition of the light source, the seed develops a stalk and finally penetrates and pushes through the surface of the earth. Once established above ground, the growing stem of the flower is totally dependent on nutrition, not only from its roots, but also from sunlight. Develop leaves and shoots. Over time, the bud breaks open and reveals the true flower.
Becoming spiritual, becoming who you are, is vitally important. For everyone. The differences between people are never clearer than those who take this seriously and those who don’t. Taking our essence, our spirituality, seriously means that we know that we do not have all the time in the world, we know that we are not omnipotent, that we will not always be here, that we are passing through and we know that we are here for a reason. Those who don’t take it seriously act as if they have all the time in the world, as if they will never die, as if they never have to face the important issues, predicaments and decisions of life; they are complacent and underneath that they are afraid.
Authentic spiritual life is the path beyond fear, because it is the path to truth and reality. It is the way to the eternal.
How do you become spiritual?
Start with a little discipline. Feel the world, cultivate awareness, keep your eyes wide open and your heart more open, let yourself be affected by the world, touched by people and events, be present and breathe: that’s a good start.