Tag Archives: life
How long will we allow Religion to Rape our Spirituality…
The exploitation of spirituality by religions across the world…
Spirituality and religion are two realms that can be mutually exclusive but happen to coincide more often than necessary. If I dare use this comparison: I view Spirituality as the victim of a psychologically abusive abductor in the form of Religion. This may be quite a sensitive subject because, as Stockholm syndrome would dictate, we have fallen in love with our capturer. We are under the illusion, a comfortable subjective truth, that Religion is dogma—that religion is absolute truth, that religion is our savior. Since our capturer has provided all of our spiritual pfood, shelter, comfort, and fulfillment—it must certainly be the complete gamma of what spirituality has to offer. We have identified with our capturer so much so that some of us have laid down our lives in the name of our religion. Some of us have murdered in the name of our religion. Some of us have stolen innocence and destroyed entire cultures in the name of our religion. Some have sacrificed our first born in the name of our religion. So, what is this phenomenon known as religion and why is it distinguishable from spirituality?
Is there more to a spirit than what the constraints of language, imagery, expectation, and imagination can conceive?
I consider Religion a parasite. A contrived parasite that has latched on to something very real that is spirituality– a living breathing entity that is constantly evolving. As per my philosophy we (at least a fair portion of us) are light or spirit beings having a human experience. However one may choose to articulate the matter: whether we be vibrational beings, energy beings, or light beings to me it is all leading to the same source. One’s spirituality can not be denied or hidden. Most have an innate sense that we’re here for a “greater purpose”. Most have an unquenchable thirst to know “why” they are “here”. The seed has been sown in all of us. Now this journey to the source isn’t necessary easy or necessarily our purpose. But religion has provided a gross over-simplification of a complex issue.
Religion has taken the concept of spirituality and held it hostage. What is meant to be a means of freedom, a means of open communication of information, a medium of exchange, a medium of healing, a medium of empowerment has been replaced. It has been replaced with strict dogmas that reduce everything to the black and white. It has been replaced with spiritual atrophy. Man is convinced to disempower themselves and allow for their savior or external source to dictate the fates of their lives.
Many of the underdeveloped gifts that spirituality has bestowed upon us bleed through the oppression of religion. There are revelatory gifts that some encompass in which religion cannot quiet. There are untapped resources of physical self-healing that exist despite being taught otherwise. They call it the placebo effect—but it’s nothing more than the nescient or nascent ability of the mind to heal using our spiritual strengths. Some of us have the ability to manifest our own futures by “speaking things into existence” and others have the ability of foresight (to know what is to come of us). Ever been thinking of something and the person next to you seemingly reads your mind—and verbalizes what you were thinking? Perhaps this was preverbal spiritual truth—how we as beings communicated before our de-evolution into our current state.
I do not know all of the gifts that our spirits have to offer but I am aware enough to know that they exist and have courage enough not to deny their presence. But this is not an exposition of man’s gifts. This is an exposition of how the regulation of these gifts has been used to victimize us. How these gifts have been stifled and replaced with a rudimentary quality of life and existence. Some of the most powerful beings on this planet have the slightest idea of their potential. Brilliant minds and brilliant souls are falling to the wayside. –And in the name of what?
Now I don’t want to completely condemn religion because it does have its place. It can be the building block of something special. It teaches discipline and can provide a launching off point of where spirituality can take us. We all have various levels of intelligence and discernment and maybe religion can be something great for a portion of society. But to deem it the end all be all is tragic– fatal. And it keeps the gifted among us from being valued, from elevating our species, and helping to repair our collective consciousness.
How do we break the chains of our oppressor? How do we leave our oppressor if we love our oppressor? Is being in captivity so bad if I’m being taken care of?
When one manipulates the possibilities of the inevitable it impedes growth. When you start people off and dictate the end result of their life before they are even born there is no room for growth. Their whole life is oriented towards achieving one destination or avoiding the other. Spirits are meant to grow, expand, engage, create, and so forth. None of this is possible when the possibilities don’t exist in the mind…If the possibilities can’t even be fathomed.. The existence can’t even begin to be manifested…
Before Infinity and Beyond (A poem by Jack)
If I look back I see infinity… A lil further back I recognize pyramids…in aww at the wonders they’ve allowed me to explore… I look a lil further back and dragons.. I see myself encased in androgyny…
I gather a whiff… Engrossed is the spilled blood of my ancestors…
But the flame from the beast’s nostrils… Awakens me and draws us back to the present…
The flesh of my flesh witnesses it all… Has witnessed it all… And will continue to witness it all…From amulets… To chains… To marches.. To boycotts… To content.. To regression.. To invisible chains around the neck of a beast restrained…
Devoid of all distinguishable features…made less daunting… Stripped of noble stature…
Transformation of a lion to a common alley cat…
Yet the future is beyond the horizon… Not as close as some would like… But not as far as others should fear… A future that underlines the beginning… For all things lead back into themselves… Such is the nature of the Infinite…
Gifts of the Universe….(Unto those that Hear shall more be given…)
The Universe brings us knowledge in an array of ways. It is the obligation of the observer to discern the lessons bestowed upon her or him. In my own life, I’ve noticed much of the knowledge and wisdom that I have been granted has been in the form of stories and dreams. And my reflections upon these stories and dreams dictates the lesson learned. I’ve noticed some of the best stories come from the many random encounters that seem to inevitably run into me. And usually these encounters aren’t ones that I would typically welcome but instead of approaching with fear and defense I simply approach with a willingness to listen. For instance, I’ve had hour long conversations with the homeless, with teen runways, with ex-drug dealers who were fortunate enough to get out the game. Each one has a commonality to them and each one has a unique perspective. Each conversation was as random as the next and each one held an earnest level of sincerity. You see when someone is poignant and honest with you…I’ve noticed that there is always a lesson to be learned.
The other lessons I receive are from dreams. Now these lessons are of a different nature, they usually give insight about my own life and hints as to what paths I should take and my place among the order of things. Usually the dreams that provide the most insight are the dreams in which I am most fearful but manage to conquer my fears and intake the lesson. Random, but in dreams I’ve been inundated with the fear of being ripped apart by wild beast only to have those same beast impart words of wisdom. I’ve had dreams where I’ve been lead to a holding cell for various demons only to have knowledge bestowed to me. I digress; I say all this to say that knowledge doesn’t always come as you would like it to.
Who are you to judge in what form your lesson is to be presented to you?
Most of these lessons and occurrences are quite organic. For you to dictate on your terms when insight is to come seems rather insolent—timing is everything. For you to dictate or be dictated to isn’t a communal experience. It is outside the natural order of things. An organic course of action is usually triangular– two starting points converge at a mutual time and/or space. It is a give and take on one level or another.