Spirituality: Beginning at the Beginning

Spirituality: where do we begin?  It’s an important question for those who are starting to explore what spirituality means in their lives.  But it’s also important for those who have been at it for some time. After all, no matter where you are, when it comes to spirituality, we all begin anew each day.

The following is a text version of this posting.

I recently participated in an online discussion.  The discussion began with someone presenting this question.  “I’m new to this spirituality stuff.  I’m not sure what to make of it all.  Where should I begin?”

Where should any of us begin with spirituality?  I want to be clear:  this isn’t just a question for beginners.  Instead, it’s important to remember that no matter how advanced we may think we are on this spiritual journey, all of us begin anew each day.  It’s important for us to always begin at the beginning.  After all, in The Sound of Music, Julie Andrews reminded us that the beginning is a very good place to start!

As I read over the comments in the online discussion on where to begin with spirituality, the variety of opinions expressed was confusing and overwhelming.  One recommended guided meditation, another suggested a book, someone else said to embrace “your shadow,” and still another recommended making a novena. There were over twenty responses in less than a day and no two people made the same recommendation.  If the person who made the initial posting was confused about spirituality when asking the question, I suspect that the person was mired down even more deeply after receiving all of this exceedingly different advice.

Of course, I had a different perspective. In my opinion, if you want to understand spirituality in your life, you won’t gain that understanding by starting with someone else’s path or looking for something outside of yourself.  There will be time later to learn from the spiritual experiences of others.  Instead, the starting point for spirituality in your life is you and your life.  This is true for all of us.

We need to identify the times in our own lives that we consider spiritual.  It doesn’t matter if anyone else thinks of them in that way.  Instead, what were some of the moments or events in your life that you consider to be spiritual?  If the word, “spiritual,” is confusing, don’t use it.  Instead, think of this from other perspectives.

• When did you experience a sense of peace or pervasive calm in your life?
• When were you in awe of something?  Perhaps it was something beautiful in nature, or music, or art.
• Consider times when you encountered something beautiful or perhaps a sense of inspiration.
• What was it like to be aware that you were loved by someone?
• When times get tough in life, what do you hold onto?

It’s these kinds of questions that bring us to the beginning of spirituality in our lives.  Once we gain insight as to how we’ve already experienced something of spirituality, or wholeness, or hope, or awe and inspiration, then we can nurture those things and attend to them in ways that enable us to grow.

What about those who have been on a spiritual path for some time?  Yes, all of us need to go back and begin at the beginning.  It’s not just that we’re all beginners.  We are all beginners.  We begin anew each day.  However, people who have been on a spiritual path for some time often confuse the path for actual spiritual experience.  I’ve worked with several people in spiritual direction for whom this was true.  They could explain various forms of meditation or other spiritual practices, delve deeper into various texts and quote them, and they knew all the steps and formulations to follow.  But ultimately, they were so focused on the path that they didn’t experience the journey.  The descriptions of the path had become an artificial substitute for actual spiritual experience. 

This doesn’t mean that learning about your spiritual path or spiritual practices is wrong.  Instead, it means that we all need to return to the beginning and do that regularly.  We need to remind ourselves of those times when we experience the spiritual dimension of life most fully and nurture those experiences.  That leads us to greater depth and personal transformation.

Julie Andrews was right.  Start from the very beginning.  It’s a very good place to start.  The starting point for spirituality is your life and your experiences.