What is spirituality
October 27, 2011 11:43 AM   Subscribe

"Being spiritual" - what does it mean?

What does it mean to you when people talk of being "spiritual", or when Oprah, for example, talked of "remembering your spirit"? I'm thinking more of the Buddhist / Eastern / New Age concept of 'spirituality' rather than the Abrahamic-religion based idea of spirituality, and what this means.

Is there a consensus at all on this, or is it an individual thing?
posted by stenoboy to Religion & Philosophy (42 answers total) 6 users marked this as a favorite
 
Is there a consensus at all on this, or is it an individual thing?

It is completely individual.
posted by tylerkaraszewski at 11:50 AM on October 27, 2011 [3 favorites]


In my experience, people who describe themselves as being "spiritual" are people who were raised as [particular religion] and still, mostly, believe in [particular religion], but don't necessarily go to organized services for [particular religion], and want to sound worldly and "hip" while assuring you that they're not one of those [practitioners of particular religion].

For instance, someone who was raised Christian, is still a Christian, believes in the Christian god, goes through the motions of being Christian when they're back home with their families, but spent a week backpacking in Thailand during college and has a few gay friends.
posted by phunniemee at 11:51 AM on October 27, 2011 [12 favorites]


I usually take it to mean that the person who said it feels invested and interested in understanding and nourishing whatever they regard as the 'soul' component of their being. Further, I almost always take it to mean that they are not adherents of any particularly structured, orthodox, or organized religion, but rather regard themselves as curators of their own spirits.
posted by willpie at 11:54 AM on October 27, 2011 [7 favorites]


When I say I'm spiritual, it means "I don't want to get dragged into a Buddhism 101 conversation."
posted by desjardins at 11:58 AM on October 27, 2011 [3 favorites]


It's completely individual. When I used to be new-agey, I used "spiritual" to represent the fact that I believed in soul/greater being/etc but did not follow a strict dogma or attend church. I think a lot of people use it to indicate that they do not follow an organized religion, but still believe in god(s), goddess(es), angels, souls, etc.
posted by arcticwoman at 11:58 AM on October 27, 2011 [6 favorites]


When my mom uses it to refer to herself, she is indicating that she does not identify with an organized religion but instead believes in a lot of New Age-y stuff. However, I hear Christians use this sometimes to distinguish themselves from other Christians who aren't as involved in the the philosophical tenants of religion (i.e. they don't just go to church for a community, or because it's perfunctory; they think a lot about the soul, the afterlife, etc).

Then as an atheist who has no paranormal beliefs, I would never describe myself as spiritual because to me, it has paranormal connotations. But some atheists do describe themselves as "spiritual" as opposed to religious, and sometimes by this they mean that they are concerned with how people are connected, how we treat each other, aesthetic beauty that has that otherworldly feel, etc. I have taken this to mean that they retain some of the loftier (no bad connotation here) religious *feeling* without the paranormal beliefs. An atheist who is into meditation, for example, might consider themself to be spiritual, or they might not. Buddhism is often considered a spiritual practice despite being associated with atheism.

The similarity between all these is sort of the focus on a transcendent emotional experience as distinct from external, mundane experiences. But in general I do not think there is one uncontroversial definition. If someone says they are "spiritual" it does not tell you much until they elaborate, except perhaps that they seek meaning beyond everyday life.
posted by Nattie at 11:59 AM on October 27, 2011 [6 favorites]


When someone says that they're spiritual, to me it sounds very wishy-washy. They're essentially uncomfortable making any assertions about their beliefs. They don't seem to strictly follow the dogma of any philosophy or religion, but they're also not fully comfortable with the notion that the supernatural does not exist.
posted by explosion at 12:00 PM on October 27, 2011 [6 favorites]


In my experience people who say they're "spiritual" either fit roughly into phunniemie's stereotype or they're atheists/agnostics who don't want to get into a potential argument about whether god is real.
posted by theodolite at 12:00 PM on October 27, 2011


I think the best general translation might be "I have some of the qualities you associate with religious people, but I don't fit the prototype in every way."

Because there are lots of different ways to deviate from the Religious Person prototype (atheism, non-dogmatic theism, solitary practice, apathy about "the rules," belonging to a non-majority religion, having beliefs that change or evolve frequently, etc...) there are lots of different kinds of people who can honestly call themselves "spiritual."

And because it's a vague term, there is sometimes a dude-I-don't-want-to-talk-about-this component to the way people use it. I mean, in general, being deliberately vague is a good way to send the signal "I don't like that question. Let's change the subject." But sometimes you'll also hear it used in a way where context makes it clear which sort of deviation from the prototype the speaker has in mind.
posted by nebulawindphone at 12:07 PM on October 27, 2011 [1 favorite]


Everyone who uses the term seems to mean something different. Sometimes it means "I'm not part of an organized religion." Sometimes it means "I understand things you don't." Sometimes it means "I think your aura needs dusting, here, have a crystal."

One definition I've heard that I like, if only because it is clear, is that religion is about talking to god(s), spirituality is about listening to god(s).
posted by QIbHom at 12:20 PM on October 27, 2011 [1 favorite]


Spirituality is religion without authoritarianism.
posted by goethean at 12:21 PM on October 27, 2011 [3 favorites]


Religion without dogma.
posted by Tom-B at 12:23 PM on October 27, 2011


Atheism for the lonely.
posted by supercres at 12:24 PM on October 27, 2011


It could mean a couple things.

1. Some people have religious beliefs that don't necessarily fit neatly into any one given faith path. So rather than trying to shoehorn themselves into any one path, they carve their own; it's sort of a D.I.Y. approach to religion.

2. The term "religious" has a certain connotation in this country, so some people could mean it like "I'm religious, but I'm not like that."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 12:30 PM on October 27, 2011


On a closer read, and answering a particular quesstion:

I think when Oprah talks about "remembering your spirit", in particular, she's making an effort to be all-inclusive -- you know, if she says "remembering God" she'll come across as strictly Judeo-Christian, and since she doesn't want to exclude non-Judeo-Christian people she speaks of "remembering your spirit" instead so as to allow the listener to define "spirit" however they choose.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 12:32 PM on October 27, 2011


I'm an agnostic animist with pantheistic tendencies who is sometimes entirely atheist. It's hard to explain and boring to talk about, so "spiritual" is good enough shorthand (though it has cultural connotations that I don't really fit with, but whatever). There's definitely no one-size-fits-all definition.
posted by rtha at 12:33 PM on October 27, 2011


It's kinda like saying your relationship status is "open".

Atheism for the lonely

I am going to use this.

Calling yourself "spiritual" has all sorts of wildly different meanings. At least in my world it could be...

1) I'm not open to discussing my beliefs, because trust me, this will be ugly.
2) I have some beliefs and I'm always collecting new ones here and there.
3) I'm an atheist/agnostic, but I can't quite accept it.
4) I'm making this up as I go along, but one thing is for sure, I reject the notion that science has *any* answers. Let me spout some crazy person stuff.

...and so many more.
posted by pjaust at 12:38 PM on October 27, 2011 [2 favorites]


People who assert their spirituality in contrast to religion are often talking about a sort of intangible feeling, belief and way of life that is heavily rooted in personal experience, not borrowed second-hand from people who strictly tell you what to believe and how to practice that belief. It's holistic, fluid and ineffable rather than dogmatic, endlessly discussed and narrowly prescribed. If that sounds "wishy-washy" it's because it's a difficult thing to pin down by definition, but that's a feature, not a bug. It's possible to be ardently, passionately spiritual and to have real and heavily personal ideas about it, yet be unable to articulate those beliefs in a sentence or two without getting into poetics or koans.
posted by naju at 12:58 PM on October 27, 2011 [5 favorites]


I like these answers. I like Tom-b's and goethean's answers for the best consice definition. Here is my personal take:

If someone were to ask me if I were "spiritual", I would say "yes", for these reasons:

I like the idea that there is something big out there that binds all of humanity together. Something big that all of humankind, as well as the rest of life and everything else, are a part of.

I just like to say for certain that, yes, every life is important and has intrinsic value.

I do think that it's an emotional hold-over from growing up in church. Sometimes I pray, just because I feel like it. I don't even think it's likely that someone is listening.

But I still feel free to pray, and still not quite know if anything is out there. It's not having faith in things you can't see. I don't pretend to know what's out there, and I can't help anyone else understand it. The most I feel I could do is help someone be OK with not knowing (which can be hard for people who grow up in a religious environment). Maybe at death we just stop existing, and that's ok.

I think it's boils down to a preference to understand the universe and humanity in terms of some kind of creator/supernatural myth. Even if you can't accept any tenets of a particular religion, you can still have this emotional pre-disposition.
posted by beau jackson at 1:02 PM on October 27, 2011 [1 favorite]


I think when people self-describe as "spiritual but not religious", it's a fairly free-form identifier, ranging from the more traditionally religious who nonetheless don't want to be lumped in the crazies, to those who basically believe in a God but don't attend organized services, to more New Age beliefs, to a way to shut down discussion on the topic because being questioned about religious belief is rather intrusive.

Although it's sort of the reverse of what you're asking, a tangentially related Facebook group is too amusing not to be mentioned in this thread. It was called "I am Religious but not Spiritual", with the tagline running something along the lines of "The most important thing in life is to have an institutional relationship with God". Alas, no link as it seems to be archived/dead.
posted by UniversityNomad at 1:04 PM on October 27, 2011


If someone says "I'm spiritual but not religious", this tells you nothing. I've known people who have told me this who turned out later to have been fundamentalist Christians (they have a spiritual relationship with Jesus, not a religion) and I've known people who've turned out to be essentially atheists who've told me this. So, the word means what the speaker means it to mean, no more no less, which means it is meaningless.

I've stricken the word spiritual from my vocabulary, and from my concept of what constitutes the English language. The word "Spiritual" is dead to me, a mere animal utterance conveying less meaning than the bark of a dog or the honk of a goose.
posted by smcameron at 1:15 PM on October 27, 2011 [5 favorites]


I disagree with the sentiment that it is completely individual. I think there are universal elements to spirituality. These would include compassion, empathy, and filial love - to name a few elements.

(That said, individuals can use (and mis-use) the term spirituality in all sorts of ways).

Spirituality is meta-physical - and like any metaphysical thing, it defies definition. It is like asking, what is love? However, we would not conclude that love is purely an individualistic concept just because we can not define it.

I could rattle of tons of books to read on this subject, but above all, I would recommend Living Buddha, Living Christ.
posted by Flood at 1:19 PM on October 27, 2011


I also believe that it is completely individual and potentially encompasses any of the examples that have been described. I think for some people it's also a short-hand for where they see themselves on the spectrum between "extremely-devout-follower-of-a-particular-religion" to atheist. Agnostic doesn't really capture the notion that one believes in some sort of greater power but does not adhere to a specific religious dogma or that one picks and chooses various tenets or practices from a wide variety of religions.
posted by kaybdc at 1:25 PM on October 27, 2011


To me, being spiritual means that I see myself as part of a larger picture, something larger than just myself. I have a set of guiding principals by which I try to live my life. They help me navigate my way through my life and help me define my place and my role in the larger world. I'm not a member of an organized religion but many of my beliefs are common to several organized religions. For me, saying "I am a spirtual person" is a short form for saying these things.
posted by ThatCanadianGirl at 1:26 PM on October 27, 2011 [1 favorite]


It means whatever you want to mean. I've been accused of being spiritual by people who don't realize that I'm an atheist with an entirely mechanistic view of the universe. When they find out, I become a pariah! As far as I can tell, spiritual is a label people use when human is too commonplace; a means to elevate their entirely mundane reality above everyone else's.

You don't have to believe in anything supernatural to feel moved by or connected to events, people or places. It's just the experience of being an emotional being in a complicated world. I've never felt the need to ascribe it to an external force or consciousness, but some people obviously do.
posted by klanawa at 1:27 PM on October 27, 2011


a means to elevate their entirely mundane reality above everyone else's.

That's certainly not what I mean when I say it. Although that reaction might be the reason that I hardly ever say it out loud.
posted by ThatCanadianGirl at 1:33 PM on October 27, 2011


In my experience, people who describe themselves as being "spiritual" are people who were raised as [particular religion] and still, mostly, believe in [particular religion],

Interesting. In my experience, "spiritual" has always seemed like code for "I was raised in a conventional religion and rejected it some time ago, but still have either 1) vague feelings about higher powers and the afterlife that I don't really do much about on a day-to-day basis; or 2) a vague interest in Eastern religions that I don't really do much about on a day-to-day basis."
posted by aught at 2:02 PM on October 27, 2011 [1 favorite]


To me being spiritual is seeking spirituality. Seeking, because there is only the quest. If you think you have found it then you have not. Spirituality itself defies easy definition. It is something beyond self. It is not found in possession or even in the quest to better self. It seems to be found in best in helping others. Everything came from unity at the start of what we would call time and the quest for that unity seems to bring spirituality. While it is beyond self its quest must include honesty with self about self, and of course love of others as you would love yourself, or perhaps greater than you would love yourself. I can't define it, I can't claim to even know really what it is, but I have some ideas about how to get closer to it. If only I had better perseverance to them.
posted by caddis at 2:30 PM on October 27, 2011


For me, it means that someone is just religious enough to be accepted but not religious enough to be considered an annoyance by most social groups.
posted by DisreputableDog at 2:44 PM on October 27, 2011 [2 favorites]


There are some good thoughts at the beginning of Eugene Peterson's Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places (yes, a Christian book, but he's addressing a larger phenomenon.) Large quotes can be found here:

“The meteoric ascendancy of interest in spirituality in recent decades is largely fuelled by a profound dissatisfaction with approaches to life that are either aridly rationalistic, consisting of definitions, explanations, diagrams, and instructions (whether by psychologists, pastors, theologians, or strategic planners), or impersonally functional, consisting of slogans, goals, incentives, and programs (whether by advertisers, coaches, motivational consultants, church leaders, or evangelists). There comes a time for most of us when we discover a deep desire within us to live from the heart what we already know in our heads and do with our hands. But “to whom shall we go?” Our educational institutions have only marginal interest in dealing with our desire — they give us books to read and exams to pass but pay little attention to us otherwise. In our workplaces we quickly find that we are valued primarily, if not exclusively, in terms of our usefulness and profitability — they reward us when we do our jobs well and dismiss us when we don’t. Meanwhile our religious institutions, in previous and other cultures the obvious places to go in matters of God and the soul, prove disappointing to more and more people who find themselves zealously cultivated as consumers in a God-product marketplace or treated as exasperatingly slow students preparing for final exams on the “furniture of heaven and the temperature of hell.” (Peterson, p.4).

The upshot of this institutional failure, observes Peterson, is that spirituality has become ‘free-floating’ leading to do-it-yourself constructions that are ill-formed, and conditioned ultimately by the dysfunctional cultural context that is our contemporary lot:

“Because of this spiritual poverty all around, this lack of interest in dealing with what matters most to us — a lack encountered in our schools, our jobs and vocations, and our places of worship alike — “spirituality,” to use the generic term for it, has escaped institutional structures and is now more or less free-floating. Spirituality is “in the air.” The good thing in all this is that the deepest and most characteristic aspects of life are now common concerns; hunger and thirst for what is lasting and eternal is widely acknowledged and openly expressed; refusal to be reduced to our job descriptions and test results is pervasive and determined. The difficulty, though, is that everyone is more or less invited to make up a spirituality that suits herself or himself. Out of the grab bag of celebrity anecdotes, media gurus, fragments of ecstasy, and personal fantasies, far too many of us, with the best intentions in the world, because we have been left to do it “on our own,” assemble spiritual identities and ways of life that are conspicuously prone to addictions, broken relationships, isolation, and violence. There is no question but that there is widespread interest in living beyond the roles and functions handed to us by the culture. But much of it ends up as a spirituality that is shaped by terms handed out by the same culture.” (Peterson, p.4)
posted by Pater Aletheias at 2:46 PM on October 27, 2011 [2 favorites]


It's usually to claim one is more serious about the True Essence of a religion/all religions without possessing any of the flaws of stereotypical practitioners of that religion/any religion. This forms a new category of people from which one must again exempt oneself, but I digress.
posted by michaelh at 2:52 PM on October 27, 2011


If you want to pursue this question further, and want to read something academic, you might be interested in Robert Wuthnow's After Heaven: Spirituality in America since the 1950s. In this, he looks at the way that American religion has changed since roughly the immediate postwar period - most dramatically in the shift from "dwelling-oriented" to "seeker-oriented" spiritualities, as he characterizes it. (If this whets your appetite, you could also look at his Restructuring of American Religion, which is focused on religious institutions since the 1950s [versus "After Heaven, which is focused on the same time period but on personal spirituality]).
posted by UniversityNomad at 3:01 PM on October 27, 2011


Honestly, for most people it means that they can say or do anything they want, as long as they think they have good motives, and as a result God is ok with their thoughts and actions.
posted by brownrd at 3:58 PM on October 27, 2011


The symptom of a finite creature trying to reconcile the transcendental with the immanent.
posted by yoyoceramic at 4:07 PM on October 27, 2011 [1 favorite]


I always assume it means "I believe in God but don't want to be in a specific religion."
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:51 PM on October 27, 2011


I always assume it means "I believe in God but don't want to be in a specific religion."

Exactly. This is what it means for me- though I wouldn't describe myself as "spiritual" as it sounds too much like a cliche or joke at this point.
posted by bearette at 7:18 PM on October 27, 2011


Concern with that beyond the immediate, everyday, material world.
posted by 5Q7 at 7:36 PM on October 27, 2011


I'll take a go at this. i have a plan for my improving my life. It's based on internal systems of belief, emotional repatterning, methodologies and has at its core the idea of changing my relationship to the world around me. It's not based on achieving spiritual wellness through external events, money, status, power, or other ways of measuring my value to the world based on social factors and consensus.
That's my spiritual life, changing from my current reality to my idealized self based on my values, methods and inner relationship to my life. Perhaps that's an explanation or perhaps it's just semantics. Still, that's what I come up with.
posted by diode at 9:38 PM on October 27, 2011


The word is a pet hate of mine, because to me it smacks of a sort of wilful, wishy-washy evasiveness about feelings and beliefs. Whenever I've tried to pin someone down on precisely what they mean when they describe themselves in this way they tend to either go along the "religious but don't like organised religion" route or else they just waffle vaguely about feelings of awe, transcendence, elevated states of consciousness, and similar tenuous inarticulacies.

I don't think there's any sort of consensus about the definition, and this is largely because of the very insubstantiality of the word.
posted by Decani at 1:53 AM on October 28, 2011


wishy-washy evasiveness

I'm not being evasive when I use the word. I'm just not articulate enough to describe what I mean by "spiritual" in a way that can allow others to fully understand what the word means to me. Which is fine, because I have no pressing need for others to fully understand what I mean when I talk about my own guiding beliefs.
posted by ThatCanadianGirl at 6:09 AM on October 28, 2011 [2 favorites]


As I said in this thread about "spiritual" atheists (which may be of further interest to you), there are at least two distinct uses of the word. It is used in relation to the supernatural (as an individualistic descriptor for everything from crystals to touch healing, pantheism to deism, religious Buddhism to a pantheon of self-invented god(s), etc), and it is also used in relation to feelings of wonder, awe, joy, and self-actualization which have nothing to do with the supernatural, but are commonly associated with it.

Personally, I think we could use a new word for non-supernatural "spirituality", but until we have one this confusion will always persist. To make things even more confusing, what the supernatural type of "spiritual" means to most people depends on location and culture -- in Santa Fe it's usually a shorthand for New Age with some Buddhism sprinkled in (or vice versa), but when you hear it in the Midwest it's more likely to mean I-was-raised-Christian-and-believe-in-God-but-I-don't-go-to-church. The meaning of the word depends on the individual, though, so you can't simply assume these meanings even if they're the most prevalent where you are... which introduces the third distinct use of the word, the "evasion" mentioned above. Some people are being deliberately evasive when they use this word -- because it doesn't "mean" anything certain in and of itself, it can serve as a way to suggest "I would rather not talk about this in detail right now" without saying so outright, just as "oh, I'm not very religious" can.
posted by vorfeed at 10:39 AM on October 28, 2011


Thank you vorfeed,
Knowing that I am very out as an atheist, both my theist wife and her Catholic nun friend have spoken of me as "spiritual", leaving me completely nonplused and without any response but thank you. With your explanation I think that now I have some understanding of their intent. I am indeed filled with wonder, awe and joy in the real and (mostly) rational world we live in. I know that they both view me as ethical, compassionate, generous and benevolent. I think that maybe they just couldn't think of other terms to use in place of spiritual.
posted by X4ster at 3:27 PM on October 28, 2011


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