Spirituality is an Emotion

Ben Andrews

A problem I have wrestled with for years is my feeling that the meaning of the word “spiritual” as is it is used generally, does not make sense. In the middle of a discussion with a good friend, as I was trying to explain my discomfort about why I feel it often does not fit, it suddenly hit me.

When people say they are not religious but spiritual, they make an illogical comparison. Religion is a thing, a belief, but being spiritual is a feeling, an emotion, not a thing! One can be full of spirit or spiritless depending on the input of your senses or thoughts, and thus it varies over time and affects your emotions, while religion is not an emotion but an indoctrinated belief. So the statement does not make sense.

One can be in good or bad spirit while religion is a permanent condition. On top of that is the fact that “spirits“ and “souls” are man-made concepts derived from “breath” and the fact that it can be affected by emotion. We can be ”breathless” when we emotionally react to the input of our senses or thoughts and be put in a great spirit or a bad one. To me, it was an insight that finally explained so much about the fact that “spirit“ is not a “thing” but an emotion similar to “love,” triggered by the input of your senses or thoughts. 

Then there is also the confusion of the belief in spirits, ghosts, or souls, which have nothing to do with emotions but are man-made concepts just like religions. If you have to be indoctrinated by a human in concepts such as religion, gods, spirits, souls, ghosts, Hell, Heaven, etc., they are obviously man-made. You are not born with such concepts; however, you have inherited the genes which create emotions.

This sudden insight, that spirituality is an emotion, triggered through the people I talk to or correspond with over the years, has put me in a great spirit. I hope it does for you.