Spirituality: The why and why not.

It is a common question online on forums like Reddit and a very common confusion among people in general: what is the spiritual path? Why must I walk it? And why is it that most people don’t want to? The confusion unfortunately stems from the same reason anyone is confused about anything these days: too much information. Wherever you look, whether on forums, Q&A sites, social media like YouTube or even Instagram and Vimeo, you will find oodles of information about what spirituality is, why one must walk it, what it involves, how to go about it, what happens along the way and what the end result is.

Even more confusing are the so-called “wisdom” and “inspirational” quotes that say stupid things like “you are the sky” or “God is love” or some such nonsense. Not only are most of these coming from unenlightened sources, many of them are taken out of context, or are, literally, obsolete.

“Yes, spiritual wisdom can become obsolete. This is why gurus keep coming down and restating wisdom in new ways, like Jesus did.”

When Jesus came down to Earth, He didn’t simply confirm the old laws. He, in fact, changed some of them. The most important ones are about “an eye for an eye”, which Jesus replaced with “turn the other cheek”, something Mahatma Gandhi demonstrated to devastating effect on the British East India Company. He also made marriage laws stricter. These are huge changes.

Every guru comes down to Earth not just to clarify the truth, but also to restate wisdom in new language, change what is expected and set out new rules or new standards of behavior. Why? Because the world changes, and practical wisdom always must be relevant to the world.

“The world changes. Therefore, spiritual wisdom must be constantly updated, as I am doing now.”

Why walk the spiritual path?

Spirituality means that you identify with the spirit. What does identifying with the spirit mean? It means that you don’t identify with the body, or your feelings or your emotions, or even with your soul! All of these are subject to destruction at some point or another. Yes, even your so-called “soul” can be dissolved by the power of love.

“Your “soul” isn’t permanent. It is dissolved by the power of love when creation ends.”

So you are not even the soul. In fact, your true nature is far beyond what you can experience in normal life. It is for this reason that people walk the spiritual path: to discover the truth of who you really are, not intellectually, but by “being it”, so to speak. Along the way, you may gain some powers (and lose them) and you may have some interesting experiences, but none of those things are of any consequence. The only good reason to walk the spiritual path is to discover the truth.

“The only good reason to walk the spiritual path is to discover the truth.”

So what happens when you discover the truth? Nothing. You don’t gain any advantages, nor do you become super-powerful or something like that. You continue to live life, but you live it better than anyone else. This doesn’t mean that you change who you are, either. In fact, you become yourself more than ever. So discovering the truth confers no advantages, unless you believe living really authentically is some kind of advantage. In fact, you do gain some disadvantages. You become unable to lie, cheat, steal, etc. Money becomes a tool, not something you want. Wealth is shunned, actively. Poverty is embraced. You see?

So spirituality confers no advantages as far as the world is concerned.

Should everyone walk the spiritual path?

No, absolutely not!

We don’t need every single human being on this planet to become enlightened tonight! Yes, most of us should become enlightened in this lifetime, but you don’t have to hanker for it unless you are dying to learn the truth. If your hankering for truth is so extreme that you literally don’t think about anything but the truth, then yes, the spiritual path is for you and you will surely become enlightened quickly. However, most people don’t want this.

What most people want, are things that everyone assumes is only possible by walking the spiritual path: peace, joy, happiness, comfort, etc. This is not true. In fact, you are better off not walking the spiritual path if all you want are those things.

“If all you want is peace, joy, happiness, etc., you don’t need to walk the spiritual path.”

There is a good reason I am offering to be your friend for life: it will take time for us to really understand what is best for you! You will have to listen to me talk for a long time. You will have to ponder, wonder and ask me questions. You will have to live life, have normal life experiences and ask questions about spirituality, peace, joy, happiness, love, etc., in the context of those events. And of course, you may want me by your side if you’re facing difficult circumstances, like the death of a loved one. Understand?

The point of coming to me isn’t simply about getting initiated, getting on the spiritual path, and becoming enlightened. It is about understanding yourself, what you want out of life, how to go about your life, etc. This is about you living a beautiful life, not necessarily becoming a spiritual master. Let me give you an example.

Let’s say you were stupid and decided to read a spiritual book, in the false hope of walking the spiritual path all by yourself. You start reading and things are confusing, so you come to me and start discussing things. Along the way, you realize all you need is to love human beings. Well, there’s many ways to love human beings. But first, you must have love in your heart. That’s going to require you to walk the spiritual path, no doubt. But then you talk to me more and realize it isn’t love you want to share, but happiness. Aha! That’s a lot easier. See, you can share happiness much more easily: by working at a food bank, for example!

But, you say: I want to be a comedian and make people laugh. Isn’t that sharing “happiness”? No! Absolutely not. Entertainment has nothing to do with sharing happiness. The type of laughter that is heard in comedy clubs isn’t a happy laugh—it’s a judgmental laugh for the most part, even if one is only judging oneself. It’s an idiotic laughter, one that wants to brush under the carpet the pain of the world and wants to make light of it. It is a sad laughter, because every one of those people is choosing to comfort and entertain themselves, rather than pay attention to their own pain and do something worthwhile about it. It is no different than having a drink of alcohol.

This is the kind of clarity you need. If you really want to entertain, you are not a candidate for spirituality at all! But if you want to share happiness, yes, you may continue to do that for a while, and see if your needs become deeper, so to speak.

This is the reason that you must not walk the spiritual path by yourself, or by reading a book or using an app. You must not take up a powerful technology like yoga (which is what all of this is), without guidance.

“*Never* walk the spiritual path without a guru’s guidance. You will fall into a ditch.”

Why the spiritual path is difficult

So if the spiritual path really offers truth and authentic living, why don’t most people walk it? One word: pain.

“The reason most people don’t want to walk the spiritual path is because it is painful.”

Here’s what happens on the spiritual path, regardless of the “tradition” being followed. First, you are made to open yourself up. When you do so, the first thing you experience isn’t love, or happiness, or even joy, never mind bliss, ecstasy, etc. The first thing you experience, is the pain of the world around you. The pain of the world isn’t just a concept, or a feeling: it is energy and it will rush in as soon as you open yourself up. It is something you do feel, but most of you try to distract yourself or mask the pain using drugs, alcohol, sex, entertainment, etc. So opening up your energy system causes you to experience the pain of the world in a very real way. Then, it gets worse.

Now you may think, “Ah! I am going to experience love now!”. And you would be right, except love isn’t pleasant in the beginning. When love comes rushing in, it dissolves all the places in your body where garbage used to reside. All the stuff that was influencing you, all your beliefs, all those bad memories, not just from this life, but from prior lives as animal or tree or whatever, all those things are causing you to behave in ways unnatural to your true nature, your true nature being light. You know, like Jesus said, “I am the light”. Well, so are you!

That dissolution of garbage in your system will leave holes. And that’s painful. It’s like being torn apart, see? So now, your pain gets worse. Then, and only then, will Grace come into your life and heal all your pain, by filling those holes and restoring you. This will take a long time—I mean years. And during those years, you will be no good. Like a recovering patient, you will have little energy, nothing you can really accomplish, feel weak and useless, etc. So that’s difficult as well.

Once healed, now you have to re-learn how to live in the world, which is again challenging. Like a child learning to walk once again, you will stumble, hurt yourself, get up and ultimately figure it out. But inside, you will remain child-like, innocent and pure. You know, like Jesus said “Be ye like little children?” Or like Nisargadatta said “I feel clearly that in spite of all the changes I am a child.” Like that. And being like a child in this cruel world of ours is hard. But you’ll gain wisdom and skill and learn to survive.

And then you’ll be ok. I am not even saying you’ll learn in the way you’re learning today, like an egoistical being, but as a piece of life, devoid of all identities. You cannot imagine what that’s like. You have to be there to know.

This is why walking the spiritual path is difficult and why most people don’t want to choose it. But it is stupider to want to walk the spiritual path without a guru’s guidance.

Why walk the spiritual path anyway?

So why do I keep asking people to commit to the path anyway? Because only when you finish your spiritual journey will you be a full-fledged human being. You cannot live authentically if you don’t finish. You cannot understand what the world really needs unless you see the light. You will make mistakes along the way if you are not fully enlightened. You will have happiness, but not the unshakeable true happiness that comes from being dissolved to the extent possible on Earth. You cannot be one with God if you’re not fully enlightened. And most spiritual insights and experiences, which are rich and make life really amazing, you will miss.

Most importantly, you will fail to be able to teach the next generation what it is that really matters. Sure, you can convey some philosophies or a bit of wisdom or maybe share quotes from a master, but you will not have real wisdom of your own to share, except for worldly wisdom, such as how to save money better or something like that.

Even more importantly, and this is no longer just an Earthly concern, you will not be able to change the world. Changing the world requires spiritual power and that power will not flow through you unless you are beyond surrender. You have to be one with the light for the power of love to work through you. And when that power flows through you, you will impact the world in ways others cannot. And that is what our world really needs: powerful entities that can shape life on this Earth.

So I urge you to consider walking the spiritual path if you really wish to serve humanity. But if not, that’s ok—you must serve in some way. I am asking everyone who reads this to help make my project a success. I wish to leave behind an ashram that will enlighten people for as long as it is around, with or without me in it. And I wish to create a race of gurunis, i.e. female gurus who will continue to change the world long after I am dead.