Why We Need More Spiritual Discrimination

Borrowed and adapted from Campus Ministry

Today, I could have benefited from a so-called "Integral Awakening Skype Session" to foster my "transformational process"... But I chose not to, just like I choose not to attend to the plethora of spiritual events available in the Bay Area, and here is why.

You would think that the Bay Area is the best place to nurture your spiritual side given the vivid subculture and the diversity of practices available. And yet I find myself rather closed to the spiritual market here, as if too much exposure to it had made me dull. Is it a personal disposition? Maybe, after all I grew up in a quite secular environment. But really, the red flag to me is the lack of discernment by spiritual teachers about spirituality itself.

Spirituality is an intimate relationship with reality, it requires observing and experiencing this relationship directly, exploring the territory by yourself before relying on maps others have drawn before you. So it produces an interesting paradox when you live in a culture imbued with spiritual concepts. You are called to encounter them in discussions and readings, and even though you're talking about existential and ultimate concerns, you end up sometimes using them more or less casually.

I don't know you, but I find it difficult to keep giving a special meaning to a spiritual concept like "awakening" or "epiphany" when I read about it in promotional emails.

The Dream Contract

Here is a hindu tale my teacher in World Religion shared it with us.

The Dream Contract

It was nine o'clock in the morning and Nasruddin was fast asleep. The sun had risen in the sky, the birds were singing in the trees, and Nasruddin's breakfast was getting cold. So his wife woke him up.

He woke up in rage. "Why did you wake me up just now?" he shouted. "The sun has risen in the sky," said his wife, "the birds are singing in the trees, and your breakfast is getting cold."

"Breakfast be damned," he said. "I was about to sign a contract worth a million grams of gold." With that he closed his eyes to recapture his shattered dream and those million grams of gold.

Now Nasruddin was cheating in that contract and his business partner was a tyrant. If, on recapturing his dream, Nasruddin gives up his cheating, he will become a saint. If he works strenuously to free the people from the oppression of the tyrant he will become a freedom fighter.

What kind of saint or freedom fighter are you if you are still asleep? If, in the midst of his dream, he suddenly realizes that he is dreaming, he will become awakened, enlightened.

(Picture under Creative Common licence, see terms of use.)