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Daily Question, August 30

What are some experiences that have shaped my spiritual life?

  • KC

    Lots of setbacks and loss – work, loved ones, friends, aging. These experiences have led me to a contemplative spiritual community and practices, both formal and informal. Meditation, yoga, walking, reading, drawing, writing, solitude, retreat, connecting with nature, friends and a faith community have all shaped my spiritual life.

  • JoeytheHoff

    I was raised in the Catholic Church and grew through and out of that institution. I support the merits of the varying religions of the people I know. But, I am most drawn to meditation. The experiences I have had while looking inward have led my spirituality to exist fluidly and out of the confines of structured religion.

  • Paul Y

    My experiences in my life was when I became catholic 35 years ago and now I have a very close friend who will be going on that spiritual journey to receive the sacraments. I’m very happy to go on that ride with her and in fact feel honored to go with her and to be her sponsor.

  • Loving_Kindness

    After not having been a regular church goer for most of my adult life, about 5 years ago, a dear friend invited me to a Christain men’s boot camp. This experience reintroduced me to God. Since then, I have become a regular Catholic church goer .

    About 2 months ago I was drawn to going to 630am mass everyday during the week. I do so as a means of giving thanks and praying for on a daily basis the strength to be loving and kind regardless of whatever challenges I face.

  • Anna

    Surely it is really bizarre that a lot of friends here - and me among them - started their spiritual journeys when they found themselves on the edge of a crack, separating them from their past spirituality. So we all have to trust and jump in a new era! Grown in a catholic tradition and for a lot of reasons, at a certain point I would have liked to change ... then I found wonderful people, writers, this site, a website of an ecumenical monastery, Pope Francis, and I started a new journey, holdin...

    Surely it is really bizarre that a lot of friends here – and me among them – started their spiritual journeys when they found themselves on the edge of a crack, separating them from their past spirituality. So we all have to trust and jump in a new era! Grown in a catholic tradition and for a lot of reasons, at a certain point I would have liked to change … then I found wonderful people, writers, this site, a website of an ecumenical monastery, Pope Francis, and I started a new journey, holding the best part of my previous tradition, but transforming it into a more true Faith. I mean: the firm belief that there is a Transcendence and that God is Mercy is at the basis of my spirituality. I know a dear priest who says that this is my “awakening”, my spiritual rebirth.

    Read More
    • Aine

      Amen, Anna. There is a saying, though, that cracks “are how the light gets in.” It seems the most efficient way to learn our true worth to God is to become a bit banged up. Perhaps we must come to a place of feeling cracked and broken before our misunderstanding of who God is and how much we are the Beloved can be swept away and replaced with that transcendence and mercy of which you speak.

  • Hot Sauce

    My real spiritual journey started when I found the scary passages in Matthew 12, Mark 3, Luke 12, Acts 5, Acts 8, Hebrews 6, Hebrews 10, and 1 John 5 about unpardonable sins. At this point in my life, I felt that I was evil and, at some point, had to have committed at least one of these. I feared that God would condemn me to hell, and there was nothing I could do about it. I asked my pastor about these passages, and he gave me very inadequate, somewhat "wild" interpretations of these passages. F...

    My real spiritual journey started when I found the scary passages in Matthew 12, Mark 3, Luke 12, Acts 5, Acts 8, Hebrews 6, Hebrews 10, and 1 John 5 about unpardonable sins. At this point in my life, I felt that I was evil and, at some point, had to have committed at least one of these. I feared that God would condemn me to hell, and there was nothing I could do about it. I asked my pastor about these passages, and he gave me very inadequate, somewhat “wild” interpretations of these passages. From this point, I began to realize that just because the church or an authority figure interprets something a certain way, that does not mean it is correct. At this point, I began questioning many of the church’s interpretations of the Bible, still fearing for my salvation and that of others, while simultaneously coming to understand deeper and deeper insights about the Bible (though I even questioned the canonicity of certain books within it as well). As my journey continued, I came to the conclusion that the Bible is not infallible but is shaped by its context and the ideas of humans, though it is also a sacred and valid path to God. As I continued questioning, I wondered whether religion was valid or whether God existed at all. As I continued investigating, I questioned the validity of my quest for knowledge. Is knowledge really even worth seeking, or am I wasting my time, when I could be doing something more beneficial with my life? Seeking answers to this question, I went on a quest for ethical wisdom and moral values. Struggling with what my dharma was, the time came for me to go to college. As I learned about various religions and spiritual teachings, I learned about many practices that can help an individual discern the dharma and ethical values. From here, I began practicing some of these, though some of them did not seem to lead me anywhere far, while others did. I am now investigating the ones that have not led me very far to see if there is a way to practice them more authentically and so gain spiritual insight from them. This is my journey in a nutshell.

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    • Aine

      Sounds like we might have been raised in similar denominations, Bleach. One of my turning points came when I was at a youth conference as a leader. We were in the leaders' sessions, and one of the folks in there asked, "How can I learn how to be a better leader for the kids I work with?" The guy giving the seminar replied, "Read the Gospels. See how Jesus taught, how He treated people, and then do that."

      Well, that sounded logical to me, so I started reading. What I found changed my life. Ins...

      Sounds like we might have been raised in similar denominations, Bleach. One of my turning points came when I was at a youth conference as a leader. We were in the leaders’ sessions, and one of the folks in there asked, “How can I learn how to be a better leader for the kids I work with?” The guy giving the seminar replied, “Read the Gospels. See how Jesus taught, how He treated people, and then do that.”

      Well, that sounded logical to me, so I started reading. What I found changed my life. Instead of the God that had been portrayed to me, I found a God I could connect with, one who treated others with love, kindness, respect, and who always had time for even the least of the least. When I dared contrast that example with what I had experienced in that church, my eyes were opened in new ways, and I could no longer stay there.

      Leaving started me on a journey of an ever widening experience of God, inside another church for awhile, and then outside it, though one day I hope to find a community of like-minded folks. And the more I learned how much God loves me, the more I learned how much we are all loved, regardless of what name we use for God.

      It also led me to the knowledge that God is bigger, WAY bigger, than any human conception could possibly contain. We haven’t scratched the surface yet!

      Read More
      • Hot Sauce

        Yeah. Fundamentalism definitely tends to put Source into a box. The church I go to now is United Church of Christ, and the one I go to when I’m at college is Episcopalian. I also really like the Unity church, which is a blending of Christianity and New Thought. I feel like these maintain traditional Christian rituals and terminology while still offering room for freedom of thought and ability to understand Jesus in one’s own way.

  • Aine

    Maybe, um, everything? Our lives are spiritual paths, so nothing that has happened is wasted, extraneous, or without meaning to the whole.

    I love to experience the ups, but I treasure how God has been there for me in the depths. I learned this year that the original form of "worship" was worth-ship, meaning that it was a method through which we could recognize the worth of God. In the Exodus story, Moses is told to tell Pharoah to let His people go into the wilderness so they may worship Him. ...

    Maybe, um, everything? Our lives are spiritual paths, so nothing that has happened is wasted, extraneous, or without meaning to the whole.

    I love to experience the ups, but I treasure how God has been there for me in the depths. I learned this year that the original form of “worship” was worth-ship, meaning that it was a method through which we could recognize the worth of God. In the Exodus story, Moses is told to tell Pharoah to let His people go into the wilderness so they may worship Him. Thus, when the Children of Israel were called to wander in the wilderness for forty years, they were really called to learn the worth of God during their time of struggle, to see the provision of water, manna, and quail, the leading, the guiding, the protection, and to learn to trust even when the end is not in sight.

    To me, that is the path of life, in many ways, and thus the spiritual path that shapes me.

    Read More
    • grateful sea

      Yes, everything. Thank you for saying so. Maybe this is why I felt overwhelmed by the question and could only approach it from very early memory.

  • Kit

    the sickness followed by the loss of loved ones. the pregnancies lost before birth. the smile of my firstborn. my inner strength of faith and unending love and grace of God. the silence is not
    empty for me- it is full of answers. Just because you can not see the air, does not mean you stop breathing, and just because you can not see God, does not mean you stop believing. To me, my spiritual life is a private source of support, love and comfort. I can draw on this side of myself easily as...

    the sickness followed by the loss of loved ones. the pregnancies lost before birth. the smile of my firstborn. my inner strength of faith and unending love and grace of God. the silence is not
    empty for me- it is full of answers. Just because you can not see the air, does not mean you stop breathing, and just because you can not see God, does not mean you stop believing. To me, my spiritual life is a private source of support, love and comfort. I can draw on this side of myself easily as closing my eyes. I keep it full and alive with prayers and thankfulness to God.

    Read More
  • Francine Marie Tolf

    I have read all the below responses and just want to say thank you, all, for your beautiful and profound words. Your experiences and feelings renew my faith in human beings.

  • Lunamagicae

    The deaths of both my father and my step father. I hold both experiences very close and dear to me. As painful as each event was to me, it has shaped the person I am today, for better. And the time my boyfriend of four years betrayed me with my best friend of 8 years. I have always been spiritual but after this betrayal, I was forced to turn to spirituality more than I ever had before – there was nothing else that I could have done and I wouldn’t change that happening to me for the world.. 🙂

    • Aine

      One of the best gifts I ever got was being dumped by someone I thought I wanted. No, I would not change that for the world either! 🙂

  • SeeAreLow

    The challenges of life. When I had no other choice but to either die or fight .. those times are when I felt the power of prayer.

    • KC

      Thanks SeeAreLow. Your reflection really resonates for me 🙂

  • grateful sea

    Singing, with my mother and sister. Especially rounds (one of my favorites was Dona Nobis Pacem). Some of my earliest memories.

    • Anna

      May I ask the author of Dona Nobis Pacem? Perhaps this is a song that I know, my choir sang Mendelsshon.
      Wonderful, yet not easy!

      • grateful sea

        Dear Anna, thank you for asking. I guess I never thought about its origin. I only knew what my mother told me, which is that it meant “give us peace” in Latin. I learned lots just now from Wikipedia — that the words come from the Latin Mass and that the simple three-part melody we sang was a ‘canon.’ Beautiful harmonies. The origin of this melody is unknown, usually listed in most hymnals as “traditional.”

        • Anna

          And thank you for your answer dear grateful sea!

  • Susan

    When I stopped being a ‘church goer’ and stopped going to church and turned inwards towards God. I learned about Centering Prayer and Mindfulness Meditation and just spending quiet times with God.

    I now attend a small, country church for fellowship, to pray for others and volunteer but it is the quiet, solitary moments that really shape and inspire my spiritual life.

    • Aine

      I, too, had to step away from church to find out how dearly I was loved by God. While we have not yet found the place for fellowship and community, that is one of the things on my To Come list. Have you heard of the Ignatian Prayer format? A friend introduced me to that. It is very moving.

      • Susan

        Thank you for sharing about Ignatian Prayer. Yes indeed, my husband and I are on an 8 week adventure - An Ignatian Prayer Adventure. It is very spiritually profound. You have helped me realize that we are not alone in learning about Ignatian Spirituality.

        I do realize there is no perfect church nor is there a church that lines up perfectly with where I am spiritually. So, I am learning not to let the 'church things' nor the 'theology' bother me. And what I have found is that deep down, many p...

        Thank you for sharing about Ignatian Prayer. Yes indeed, my husband and I are on an 8 week adventure – An Ignatian Prayer Adventure. It is very spiritually profound. You have helped me realize that we are not alone in learning about Ignatian Spirituality.

        I do realize there is no perfect church nor is there a church that lines up perfectly with where I am spiritually. So, I am learning not to let the ‘church things’ nor the ‘theology’ bother me. And what I have found is that deep down, many people are spiritually seeking and do want to have a deep and personal relationship with God. And that is where I try (not always easy) to stay focused and centered.

        Read More
  • kathleen

    Any heartache and there have been lots brought me to seek meaning, to question and seek solace. Experiences of awe like birth increase my sense of higher power. Going to different christian churches throughout my life introduced me to different approaches to relationship with self, Universe and others. Authors, teachers and guides also inspire and support me to keep believing. Finally the Buddhist tradition has offered me more insight into moment to moment experience of spirituality.

  • Pilgrim

    As a child, I always went to the woods for solace and the feeling of home. I am still more drawn to woods and forests than I can even articulate. I can breathe there, and sense the explicit nearness of the Divine. Oceans and our Great Lakes invite me similarly, but in a grander and less intimate way.

    As a kid I used to go to mass twice sometimes, just to hear the ancient music. Music continues to be a lifeline for me.

    Being a mother, and later working with children and families - especiall...

    As a child, I always went to the woods for solace and the feeling of home. I am still more drawn to woods and forests than I can even articulate. I can breathe there, and sense the explicit nearness of the Divine. Oceans and our Great Lakes invite me similarly, but in a grander and less intimate way.

    As a kid I used to go to mass twice sometimes, just to hear the ancient music. Music continues to be a lifeline for me.

    Being a mother, and later working with children and families – especially those judged or marginalized by church – pure, messy and chaotic grace.

    When my dad was dying (too young!) in hospice of pancreatic cancer, I one day sat at his bedside, lifted my face upward, and said maybe the first real and rawest prayer of my life: “Enough!” He died peacefully in the night. That might have been the day I learned what prayer really is. I know it was the experience in which I knew I was heard.

    Additionally, being infused with courage when it has been most needed, and being companioned by the people I most needed (including poets and writers) at life’s most difficult times.

    Read More
    • Aine

      You know, Pilgrim, although I think that pastor has to be one of the hardest callings in the world, somehow I think you were probably much more essential in that capacity than you might realize this side of heaven.

  • Michael

    for me it was breaking away from organized, ritualized religion (initially Lutheran but also other “flavors” of Christianity). in no way am I disparaging it, but for me it was dampening my spirit instead of lifting. I found my spirituality when I was shown liberation theology, dove into the Bible, and learned tenets of the other paths to spirituality the world has to offer.

    • Aine

      Me, too. I think that when we break away but take our faith with us, God is able to speak over the din of issues that plague so many churches and thus reach our hearts in new and unexpected ways.

  • Ed Schulte

    What are some experiences that have shaped my spiritual life?

    Direct experiences, starting from early age, with the self eliminated pure white light of Spirit. And also, further into adulthood, the non-reflected Golden light of Christ – Logos. These experiences were prof positive that the Soul is always in a state of worship and reverence…no matter how distracted the temporary personality becomes within its own attempts at self survival.

    It is as Meister Eckhart has said, “God is no...

    What are some experiences that have shaped my spiritual life?

    Direct experiences, starting from early age, with the self eliminated pure white light of Spirit. And also, further into adulthood, the non-reflected Golden light of Christ – Logos. These experiences were prof positive that the Soul is always in a state of worship and reverence…no matter how distracted the temporary personality becomes within its own attempts at self survival.

    It is as Meister Eckhart has said, “God is not found in the Soul by adding anything but [rather] by a process of subtraction,”

    Read More
  • Stephen Holder

    By chance alone in the first 20 years of my life I experienced multiple near-death experiences, some related to sailing with my parents, some because I worked in a ship yard and others just because. The first time was actually an illness I had when I was young, it was scary, I was in hospital and surrounded by strangers, all talking in their Dr language, with severe faces, yet despite this I felt a sense of trust, that things would be ok. The times I was sailing, some very frightening instances ...

    By chance alone in the first 20 years of my life I experienced multiple near-death experiences, some related to sailing with my parents, some because I worked in a ship yard and others just because. The first time was actually an illness I had when I was young, it was scary, I was in hospital and surrounded by strangers, all talking in their Dr language, with severe faces, yet despite this I felt a sense of trust, that things would be ok. The times I was sailing, some very frightening instances occurred, and one of them was a prolonged sailing from France to UK, over 17 hours in the worst kind of storm one could conjure up, yet during this time, considering the possibilities I found stillness, despite 10 meter waves rising, cresting and falling over our boat, I felt that whatever happens, if we made it home in one piece, that would be great, or if not? then hey, I enjoyed the ride. I’m in my 40’s now and that sense of trust, and acceptance has really formed who I am, how I respond to things. I put this down to something my mum always said to me, (and still does) “no matter how hard it seems right now, or how sad you might feel, everything works out for the best, everything”. I have found this to be true, and I have explored this principle in-depth over the years, finding connections in Taoism, Buddhism, and even quantum physics, but the biggest insight I received upon reflection is that, despite events in our lives being on occasion utterly out of our control, our experience of life is entirely based on how we choose to relate to it, how we choose to react to it, and how we frame the experience. I personally talk to what I believe to be the universe each morning and throughout the day, always as friend would talk, and often in a playful manner, which in my experience reflects back to me the same, almost always.

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    • Aine

      I am working on developing that trust. I’m not sure I want to nearly drown to accelerate the process, though come to think of it, I did that once, too.

      Hmmmm. Your words give me food for thought concerning new ways to frame my own bevy of near death experiences. I am copying what you said to mull over more. Thank you.

      • Stephen Holder

        Hi Aine, yes in hindsight my story has an edge of extreme to it, and as you said there are elements that speak to your experiences too, as I’m certain so to almost everyone in some way. This experience can just as easily be attributed to ‘small’ events too such as a forthcoming business meeting which is potentially scary, which afterwards doesn’t seem as bad as we predicted, if we approach these events in the same way, trusting the outcome to in some way, in even just a small way, add to...

        Hi Aine, yes in hindsight my story has an edge of extreme to it, and as you said there are elements that speak to your experiences too, as I’m certain so to almost everyone in some way. This experience can just as easily be attributed to ‘small’ events too such as a forthcoming business meeting which is potentially scary, which afterwards doesn’t seem as bad as we predicted, if we approach these events in the same way, trusting the outcome to in some way, in even just a small way, add to our experience positively no matter the outcome. We can actively seek out these events when we fully trust the moment, I do anyway. Thanks for your comment, and good luck.

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  • Kevin

    So many experiences, from subtle to profound, have shaped my spiritual life over the years that it’s hard to know where to begin. But here’s a worthy starter list:

    An experience of Christ (not the Church) at work in my life,
    followed by other powerful spiritual revelations of sources beyond the judeo-Christian traditions.
    Being a Quaker.
    Farming.
    Photography.
    Working with children.
    Witnessing the birth of a child.
    Having a family.
    The spirit of music.
    Being on and near the ocean....

    So many experiences, from subtle to profound, have shaped my spiritual life over the years that it’s hard to know where to begin. But here’s a worthy starter list:

    An experience of Christ (not the Church) at work in my life,
    followed by other powerful spiritual revelations of sources beyond the judeo-Christian traditions.
    Being a Quaker.
    Farming.
    Photography.
    Working with children.
    Witnessing the birth of a child.
    Having a family.
    The spirit of music.
    Being on and near the ocean.
    Receiving and sharing the gift of healing.
    – Kevin

    Read More
  • Always Learning

    Prayer ????
    Reading spiritual and personal growth literature, ????
    Participating in personal growth book study groups,
    Surrounding myself with positive, like-minded, curious people,
    Doing things just like this website ????

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