Spirtuality???

What is spirituality? What is atheism? What is theism? Who am I? Am I a “spiritual” person?

• Look at the matrimonial profiles in India.
• Most of them would boast of being a spiritual person with spiritual ideals and spiritual inclination. (A spiritual person would never call himself a “spiritual person”.)
• Some would call themselves to be spiritually inclined as well as broad minded. (So, is being spiritual not being broad minded?)
• Some say, “we are spiritual, but not so involved in traditions.” (So, does “being spiritual” indicate “being traditional”?)
• Some say, “we are atheists and modern.” (So, are atheism and modernity devils in spirituality?)

What is spirituality and who is a spiritual person?

Spirituality is to know the actual nature of the spirit and a spiritual person is the one who realizes the oneness of all spirits, all souls, all individuals.

Hence, tradition and customs are not related to spirituality at all. Associating them would be like associating jazz with Carnatic music. The underlying music is same, but they are completely different genres. So, traditions have been set up to set up a disciplined format of living. Spirituality is to disciplining oneself. The root “discipline” may be the same, but “being traditional” cannot be correlated with “being spiritual.”

In terms of modernity, I think we must revisit the definition of “being modern.” Modernity should not be related to wearing the so-called “new generation clothes.” Being modern is to adapt to the changes in the world and yet remain the same. It again leads to spirituality, that is, understanding oneself, understanding others as well as their needs.

The newspaper article (The Speaking Tree from The Times of India) attached herewith talks about “being a spiritual atheist.” We have seen innumerable people who have proclaimed themselves as atheists, but have taken immense effort to develop the society. If they were never spiritual, they wouldn’t have done this for others’ happiness.

So, what is spirituality?

Spirit-all-unity, to realize the unity in all spirits…

Think over this…you may probably get several answers.

This post is part of the IBMC (https://itsphblog.wordpress.com/ibmc/ibmc-07-the-news-and-paper-challenge/).

Regards

Lalitha. V