Being Unserious about Spirituality

If spiritual life requires denying all that makes us wonderfully human, and taking life so seriously as to sap away even simple pleasures — we don’t need that kind of spirituality.

Spiritual seekers are sometimes influenced to believe that in order to achieve lasting happiness and transcendence, they are better off rejecting the world and its mundane trifles. The very same world that nurtures and shapes us through gritty experience; the one that teaches us to love through pain, not bypassing; the one that offers a sensory stage to act out our dreams. There isn’t anything wrong with this approach, but it does feel wrong to insist that it’s necessary or suggest that it’s superior. Such a bias creates a false dichotomy between spirit and matter which only serves to fuel ignorance. This type of rigidity can feed feelings of shame, guilt and unworthiness among good people who are trying their best.

I don’t believe in a Divinity that condemns us for living naturally: for trying and falling short, for having normal human emotions to work through, and for desiring that which we are all entitled to — joy and fulfilment. It is true, however, that we may face endless disappointment by mistaking the transient things of life for the eternal treasures they point towards. When we enjoy anything material, such as delicious food, a beautiful sunrise or an uplifting song, we know that the experience is fleeting. But if we can hold our minds to be completely present in that moment, we may pierce through to a core where we find a wellspring of joy rising spontaneously. This joy has no cause, no limit, no rhyme or reason. It just is the nature of life.

In fact, if we forge a truly intimate friendship with life, it may reveal itself to be quite the trickster, using playful misdirection and a little madness to shake us awake when we least expect it. Veil after veil of conditioning falls away until we find ourselves inside the joke, laughing along with the trickster rather than being laughed at.

We may appear the same; our outer circumstances may appear the same — but we are unequivocally reborn within. Without ever retreating to a cave, forest or mountain, we are transformed.

We hear music where others may hear only noise, we see beauty where others may only see ugliness, we sense an underlying peace beneath all the chaos, and feel love hidden behind every fear. And we can’t help but share these findings with others, because that’s often how love moves us.

These are some of the hallmarks of a spiritual life, calling us to embrace and cherish our humanity — light and shadow both.

Kiruthika Rajeswaran