Spirituality from the ground up

In my last post I spoke about words and ideas and how they point to the experience of life, rather than being the thing itself. I hope to expand on that, but I would like to first try and explain the way I approach these things.

Wearing different hats

Edward de Bono has a book entitled "Six Thinking Hats". The idea is that you put a different thinking hat on, and approach things in different ways. I find it really helpful not to commit myself to looking at things only one way, but try a number of approaches - looking at the same thing or subject matter from different angles. We can be so dogmatic about some things, and often all it takes is to look at it from a different angle and then we see it differently.

The thing to learn is that we don't need to commit ourselves to viewing things one way. For instance, in my last post I argued against a sort of platonic way of approaching various subjects. That doesn't mean that I need to identify myself with that argument, it is simply another way of looking at things that allows me to see the bigger picture better. It also gives me more freedom in writing my thoughts. I don't need to hold myself only to that which I've written and I have the freedom to contradict myself.

Starting with experience

Much of what we call 'beliefs' has a top down approach. What I mean by this is that we're taught something, or read something about God, or about life and we start with that idea. Ideas like fate, destiny, reincarnation, heaven, hell, spirit, angels, ghosts, demons, etc.
We then assimilate that idea into our belief system, and then, when challenged, we argue for its existence. We possibly then see that what we understood the idea to mean doesn't fit into our experience of living and so we reject the idea.

I came to a point in my life where I wasn't sure if I really believed all the stuff I claimed to believe. So, I made the decision to start from scratch and get rid of all my ideas and look at what I experience in life without being influenced by what I'm supposed to believe. (Now I know this is practically impossible - we always carry some beliefs with us, but I find that the exercise is very useful).
What I discovered doing this, was that there are experiences that do fit into some of the ideas and beliefs that I once held, but that the words used to describe the experience was never quite enough. It's the same as if we had to try and explain experiences like bungee jumping or making love to someone who hadn't had the experience. Words never fully capture the experience. To fully understand it, you need to experience it.

So - to summarize:

Spirituality, for me, is about living - experiencing life, and then finding ways to share that with others, as well as trying to understand what it is that others experience.

In the next few weeks I would like to look at a few of the things that didn't initially make sense to me from an idea point of view, but when I looked at them from an experience point of view I was able to make space for them in my mind.

Please feel free to comment ;)

More thoughts on belief

It's interesting that when I use the word 'belief', my immediate thought is about religious beliefs. While the whole idea of imagining I believe something different applies to religion, it also applies to other kinds of beliefs, for instance, what I believe about myself and what I believe I am able to do. I may believe that I'll never be a good writer. Now this may or may not be true, but unless I overcome that belief, I'll never know. So - how do I change that belief? One of the ways is to imagine that I can and then do what a good writer would do - namely write.
(This is one of the reasons I started doing this blogging thing)

Now there will always be some smart ass saying that if I pretend to believe I can fly and jump off a building - well you know how it goes.. hmm, but then again I will be in the air for the rest of my life..

Jokes aside, there are many beliefs I know I have that prevent me from 'reaching my full potential' (I hate that cliche, but i can't think of anything else right now). There are many patterns that have developed over the years, things that people that I respected have said, and the results that seem to prove these beliefs. While what I believe will most of the time be true for me, it doesn't mean it needs to be true. I can change.

That, by the way, is the lesson that bending a fork teaches me. Some things seem solid and unchangable. But if you look at it differently, they can be quite malleable and can quite easily change shape...

May the fork be with you ;)

Some more thoughts on words and communication

I'm not sure who originally said it - but I love the statement "words don't have meaning, meaning has words".I find this is so true in communication, especially when one moves into the realm of beliefs.
Someone asked me the other day what I believe in. I asked them what they meant by belief - it's a very loaded word. From their answer I learnt more about them. They asked me if I believed in a higher power. Now what does one mean by "higher" and "power"?
I think that when you move away from the "correct" answer to these questions and start looking deeper - honestly, you find "something" that is beyond words. The challenge is then to put "that" in words so that "it" can be communicated. But can it really be communicated, other than encouraging others to do the same, and to figure it out for themselves?