non-traditional spiritual practice

[Hopalong]

Hi all,
As some of you know I'm an agnostic. What that means to me is a position of openness, wonder, and hope. (It AIN'T atheist...but likewise, I am not a traditional Christian as I was raised to be. I draw inspiration from all over the map. Might be reasonable to call me a Cafeteritarian.)

Anyway, sometimes I really struggle with prayer, because I am obsessively honest, and sometimes trip over the G-word (though other times I use it without judging myself). To make this long story shorter, I have been searching inside myself for a prayer I could use that I could believe in. I've been wrestling with a good deal of depression and anxiety and fear of the future lately, so I wanted to find something I could say that would feel honest, true, and to the point. I have known for some time, as a result of deep participation in my (UU) church that I need a daily spiritual practice. But I'm too squirmy to meditate, didn't know how to resolve the To Whom It May Concern part of prayer, and didn't have the confidence to create my own special sacred space and/or ritual as many evolved people I know have done.

I just felt held back, but I guess you have to start where you are. So after a rough week battling my fears, this morning I think I found a very simple prayer that works for all the themes in my life. All I know is I prayed it and the day has been so much better. It's helped me break out of my depression and start taking effective action and I'm feeling more optimistic. It's just:

I pray for whatever will contribute to health, to abundance, and serve the greater good.

That's it. I skipped the salutation. But I felt a true lifting after saying it to myself, and I am thinking of trying to start every day with this prayer. "Health" reminds me to take better care of myself, "abundance" encourages me to aim for the best job I can get without the desperate 'I'll take anything even if it's downward" panic, and "serve the greater good" just reminds me to stay oriented with my deeper values as I go along.

I was wondering if anyone else who is not a believer in a traditional faith has evolved a personal spiritual practice --whatever it is--that you wouldn't mind sharing.

thanks,
Hops

[seasons]

Hi Hopalong,
I wanted to send you a belated hug...((((Hop))) I know you've had a tough week. I also know with your great spirit wonderful things will open up all around you.

I wonder about this, all these titles, names of building etc. I am of a certain faith, which is comforting. Yet I know deep down in my soul we are all, beautiful in the eyes of .....fill in the blank.......for me God.

I love your prayer. You are so calming to my spirit, my person, what ever I can think of calling your gift. You remind me of a flower in spring time. You are so graceful and your spirit shines through. Thank you Hops for being you! seasons

[Hopalong]

Seasons, I am ... speechless.

 

Thank you for your kindness.

Hops

[movinon]

Thank you so much for posting that Hops.

I LOVE these:

Cafeteritarian

- I think I'll use that!

AND

To Whom It May Concern part of prayer

I am right there with you.  I choose not to subscribe to the traditional "God" which is difficult in so many ways.  I feel like I am trying to change my skin color.  My higher power is feminine.  I don't know if I want to use the term goddess as that even has different meanings in this culture. 

I don't feel like I can go to churches b/c it's al He, He, He and things dealing with THE bible.  Just doesn't fit for me. 

People have told me that they see me as a very spiritual person, but where do I fit?  Is it necessary to fit? 

When I pray, I stop myself when it comes to "Lord", "God", "Jesus" etc. b/c they're all male (to my knowlege).

I get my spirituality from lots of places as well...native American/nature, Mother Earth, Goddesses, the Sufi, Budhism.

Hey,  let's start our own!!

Movinon

[pennyplant]

I pray for whatever will contribute to health, to abundance, and serve the greater good.

I try to pray several times a day and it often varies.  Often it is just what I want to talk about at that moment.  I just think it in my mind.  But when I'm feeling specific needs, my prayer is similar to yours.  I pray for the best possible outcome, I pray for strength to handle however things turn out, wisdom to learn what I am supposed to learn, strength and wisdom for whoever I am praying for if someone I know has a need at that time.

I do address my prayers to God.  Since I am able to "picture" a force at work all the time in every life, God doesn't seem to me to be a "guy" or even a form.  God seems to me to be an active force, and for me that particular name is suitable for what I'm trying to connect with.

The other half of prayer for me is to be observant about what is happening in life around me.  I look for patterns which may seem related to what I have prayed about or what seems like a lesson.  When I think I have seen this, I consider it an answer and I say thank you.  Sometimes with reluctance or disappointment.  But usually it is a relief to understand what I have needed to understand.

I've been doing this for something like six years now.  It seems like I'm making progress in my life and that the prayer and the willingness to accept the answers is what makes the difference for me.  Before I was just running in place.

No church, though.  Not so sure that will ever happen.  I wouldn't rule it out, but it would have to be something extraordinary.

PP

[moonlight52]

Hi      Prayers      So sweet     like rain in the dessert YES    For the native American its not so much a prayer for some thing as
like the asking is saying lack of  ........maybe   ..........its back to seeing the lovely lemons and lovelier lemonade ....................
A  rain dance just is. I have spent years studying many faiths. Its the wheel with many spokes with a center .The spokes radiate from the center whatever you call it .Thats what Joseph Campbell said .I just love Joseph Campbell .Anyone read "Power of the Myth"?
The wheel is a powerful symbol yet simple.   Prayer All is well with my soul
In the Light of the Radiant ONE
Moonlight

[Hopalong]

Penny, thanks...your way of experiencing god, and not being stopped by old images, is enviable to me. You are clearly in a state of openness and dialogue with what is good. I feel I'm at a much more primitive babystep in my spirituality, but yours encourages me.

Yours too, MO. It's a big wide cafeteria! (I tell everyone who seems interested that there IS a church for folks who draw from a variety of sources, as well as add their own. It's at www.uua.org if you want info.)

In this personal, tentative search for how to build my spirituality in private ways too...I am grateful to be heard so gently. Thanks guys.

I am not in a rebellion against traditions or vocabulary. I feel a reverence for the things I can no longer claim as mine and respect for the good souls who are walking the walks of their faith. I just have this weird insistence about language, and I truly can't say words (about spirit, anyway) that I can't put my whole heart into. I think one deep thing I carry (cherish) from my childhood understanding about religion is to be honest. I'm NO paragon of honesty, heckno, I just mean...I took love and integrity so to heart that I felt a kind of deep responsibility not to lie about it when the phrases of the faith felt too constraining when I got older. In a way I felt so inhabited by what I understood of christ as a little girl that I never felt I lost that. He just has company now, in the cafeteria line.

It was/is how to pray--how to create practice. As short as that little prayer was this morning, it felt like something happened. It's so primitive compared to the complex patterns of faith that many people I admire can follow and contemplate. For me, about 8 words is progress.  

PP, I could visualize your quiet, attentive spirit...as well as the love in you.

MO, I really really love my UU church community. Which means I can laugh at us. I dutifully took a feminist theology class (one of dozens of adult RE classes) and it was all about preChristian goddess worship and I thought if I saw ONE more slide of goddess pottery I would start howling hermaphrodite hymn lyrics. Me too, I have no interest in replacing male dominance with female.

Anyway, I would love to hear more about people's private ways of having spiritual practice.
It is so generous to share them with me. Such a gift...I can't express how much I appreciate it.

love,
Hops

[mum]

Moonlight: ah, yes, Joseph Campbell. I love the way he made it his life's work to look at the threads connecting us all in such a scholarly manner.

I, too, do not have a great "TITLE" for my prayers/meditation/higher thinking...heck, I can't even name that!!!

Maybe because there is no words that truly fit this being...this everything, this nothing. It defies explanation, though we spend all our days on this planet trying to find it, experience it, and share it, sometimes bringing us closer to it, and sometimes taking us further away.

Hops, loved the prayer. Concise, intention based. Full of love.
I find Wayne Dyer's writings of late very interesting in this area. And the old "standard" on creative visualization by Shakti Gawain.....And for those not so inclined to put it to words, the "words" about the spiritual path by Pema Chodron,

[Sugarbear]

I was raised by a Christian father and a non-practicing anything mother. (divorced, so my mother had no influence over my spiritual path). My father knows that I am not following his religion, and it saddens him, but he is not pushy and we generally don't discuss religion that much because of it.

I want to state up front that I do not normally tell people any of my religious beliefs, because I have absolutely no desire to debate them, and they are still evolving every day, so to me personally, I am not interested in anyone else's opinion on something that to me is deeply personal. That being said, I also would like to state that my opinions and beliefs are strictly my own, and I mean no offence to anyone. If you don't like what I have to say, I'm sorry, but I'm not getting into discussing it except for this instance.

I am not Christian. I believe that most organized religions are not healthy, nor do they follow the teachings as they were intended. Any religion that states there is only one magic key to get into eternal happiness is just plain silly IMO.

I believe that "heaven," for lack of a better term, is a bit like, oh say, Hawaii. I've never been to Hawaii, but I have heard it is really great, and someday I'd like to go there. Thing is, there are people telling me that the only way I will ever get to Hawaii is by buying a ticket with their special airline, and packing only these certain items (list provided) and if I'm not at the gate on this EXACT second (please see ticket) with the proper items, then I will never get to Hawaii.

I think to myself, well, Hawaii was around a whole lot longer than any of these people, or even since they formed their tour group and wrote up their travel guides, so maybe there used to be other ways of getting there, so I started doing a little research. I found other airlines and even boats, all with different routes, requirements and modes of transport. I start looking for what made since to me, and realized that there are many different ways to reach Hawaii.... and maybe Hawaii wasn't the only stop I'd like to make....

Which is a silly little story to show how I came up with my ideas. I am mostly interested in Daoism as a philosophical rather than religious journey,  but I believe bits and pieces of several other religions, so I guess I am also a bit of a "cafeteria"  type as well.

I meditate. I like doing it outside, but I have a peacful place where I can do it inside as well. I light candles and incense. I let things drift in and out of my conciousness and try to work through problems, release anger, and get in touch with myself. I am more of a karma-beliving nature worshipper, but I'm not a touchy-feely tree-hugging eat vegan kind of person. I have no grief with those that are (I have great admiration for those that can) but I eat meat, I consume more than I save, and I deal with it.

I read, I write, I draw and paint. I had gotten away from my art in the last several years, but I believe that was because my spirit had been so supressed I lost the joy of artistic expression. I do believe that doing these things are a way of "praying."

I see spiritual embodiments in everyday things, and am thankful of them,  I think the true "holy" spirit is in us, and in the simple things that are around us... the way a flock of birds take flight and soar above the trees (I call it the bird ballet), sunlight filtering through green leaves and dappling the ground in the spring, the poetry of a fish swimming through water. I hear the voice of the "higher power/God/Goddess" in all of those things and more.

[pennyplant]

Penny, thanks...your way of experiencing god, and not being stopped by old images, is enviable to me. You are clearly in a state of openness and dialogue with what is good. I feel I'm at a much more primitive babystep in my spirituality, but yours encourages me.

Hi Hops,

It is easier for me, I suppose, because church has never been a large part of my life.  My mother didn't want to do the forced attendance thing as she had to do as a child, but that meant we rarely attended.  My father didn't do church at all except for getting married, the occasional Easter service and funerals.  Yet, when I helped him plan his funeral a few weeks before he died, he went over what the activities would be that day and said, "then we will all go to the church."  I had to remind him that we don't have a church.  I think he was remembering his mother's funeral.  At least that told me he was interested in having God at his funeral, so I was able to have a minister give a very good service for him. 

Anyway, we tried church every so often, but it felt strange and awkward.  I remember not understanding the Sunday School lessons at all.  Some of the concepts, like eternal life, and Heaven, actually gave me the chills.  We didn't know very many of the people there and everything felt kind of stiff.

Anyway, as a result, I didn't have anything to unlearn.  I did always want to understand God, though.  So, I had a motivation in that direction.

My problem is with the people part.  Just the idea of walking into a church service and having to decide where to sit and what to do and who to look at and all that..... it wears me out.  I don't really trust people very well either, not right off anyway.  It took me a long, long time to get a handle on the people I work with everyday.  In church, for a couple hours once a week (well, I work every other Sunday) so a couple of hours twice a month... well, it's just not going to happen in this lifetime.  And I know that is my loss.  But I guess I can only learn so much in how ever many years I have alloted to me.  I'm happy for now that I finally figured out that God is at work in my life and that I can see it and learn some stuff that way.

But what you have with your church is a very good thing, Hops.  It is something that I admire.

Pennyplant

[mum]

Sugarbear....what a lovely response to this thread. Thank you for sharing that.  And I like the Hawaii bit....

[Hopalong]

Sugarbear,
My thanks too, this is very beautiful and worshipful in the purest way:

I read, I write, I draw and paint. I had gotten away from my art in the last several years, but I believe that was because my spirit had been so supressed I lost the joy of artistic expression. I do believe that doing these things are a way of "praying."

I see spiritual embodiments in everyday things, and am thankful of them,  I think the true "holy" spirit is in us, and in the simple things that are around us... the way a flock of birds take flight and soar above the trees (I call it the bird ballet), sunlight filtering through green leaves and dappling the ground in the spring, the poetry of a fish swimming through water. I hear the voice of the "higher power/God/Goddess" in all of those things and more.

(In respect for my believing friends, I want to say I know there is just as deep worship and transcendent love happening in the hearts of most people who follow their faith in more traditional language and forms. I am not of the book, but I do not close the book on my neighbors who are.)

Penny, I don't know that you're missing anything. I think you've created your own church. I don't think anybody should feel their life is missing something if their own worship or sense of the holy is private. I'm one of those people who needs to be in community, that's all. (I'm one of the loud ones...meant to mention on that other thread that I know sometimes we yappy ones are just yapping because we don't have the courage of the quiet, to let stillness be. So I am thankful to learn about the good you find in your private sense of the sacred.) I mean, I can (and will, this summer) actually be one of the guest speakers and do a sermon without fear. But alone? I squeak out 8 words.

this everything, this nothing. It defies explanation, though we spend all our days on this planet trying to find it, experience it, and share it, sometimes bringing us closer to it, and sometimes taking us further away.

Aww, Mum. You get me closer to it.

Thanks, everybody.

Hops (who feels like...oh, let's be wild...lighting a candle or something)

[Hopalong]

Well yours is wonderful too, Bean.
I notice you're praying for everyone else.

Hops

[Brigid]

Sugarbear,
I loved what you wrote.  Even though I became a practicing Catholic about 10 years ago, I did not grow up with much religious exposure (my parents dropped me off at Sunday School and picked me up an hour later until I was about 13), so your explanation would have suited me for most of my life.  I found I leaned on my faith quite a lot during my dark days after the separation and found comfort there.  I admit to not being so good about it lately and even though I am not a "cradle Catholic", find myself feeling guilty about that.

I too am searching for a new place or way to be nourished spiritually.  I don't believe the Catholic church can be my spiritual home anymore, but I am feeling a void that needs to be filled.  I am also appreciating the responses being given here.

Brigid

[mum]

find myself feeling guilty about that.

hi, Brigid...the above statement is pretty much why I am not a Catholic anymore (don't think I ever was, really, just "born" into it)...the whole hair shirt thing, well, I just wore it a little too well.
We probably had much different Catholic experiences, though, and I know many people who find solace in the church...I am happy for them.

There is a song by the band "Death Cab for Cutie"  ("I will follow you into the dark")
with this line:
"In Catholic school as vicious as Roman rule
I got my knuckles bruised by a lady in black
And I held my tongue as she told me, 'Son,
Fear is the heart of love,' so I never went back."


That's pretty much my experience so I, also, never went back.  
It just goes to show how experience, history, personal interpretations give all of us soooo many ways to grow in this life.
 Kind of wonderful, I think, that "church" is such a large umbrella term with such variety of experiences under it.

There is also an interesting thought that wishing and hoping for "rescue" of some sort (like through a church, a deity, a person, an object, whatever) is just an avoidance of the truth....that there is no rescue...there is no saving...and there is nothing to be saved from, except in our own minds.  If we realize that there is no solid ground under our feet, no one coming to save us and give us that solidity, that we can then accept the total lack of control that we experience in this world, and finally find peace of mind and happiness.. . without the expectation that life will always be a certain way...

How does it go? "Before enlightenment: chopping wood and carrying water. After enlightenment: chopping wood and carrying water." Accepting what IS, and that it will change, always....and that we will still be human and nothing will really save us from that (and those "failures" we humans tend to make)

Anyway, there are always lots of ideas to toss around, hope y'all don't mind....