Courage and spirituality

By some interesting synchronicity, the word ‘courage’ has been given to me in 3 conversations relating to the path of my life at the moment. This has had me, in those moments my brain has space to think of anything but the puppy, realising in fact just how much fear I have been experiencing about the things I feel strongly about. What I mean is that I have been experiencing considerable self doubt. My deepest core self has a strong sense of what I believe to be important and meaningful in life. Yet when this starts to expose itself to the outer world, it cowers down for fear of ridicule and aggressive criticism. I’ve tried to approach this issue from an intellectual approach, to find rational and logical ways of describing what I believe. But that’s the problem really. I ‘know’ what I believe at an intuitive level and trying to intellectualise it only seems to turn it into some sort of detached, clinical object. This ‘knowing’ is instead at an embodied, deep gut feel level, one without words perhaps. But I’m going to to give it a go, to put it in into words that is.

The big question I have been pondering is what is spirituality for me. I ‘know’ I am spiritual. That ideas of soul and spirit are important for me but I am not religious. I don’t believe in there being gods or other lives or magic. What I do know is that there is something more than our day-to-day human existence. That we’re part of something greater, something interconnected. That there is mystery and vagueness. And that compassion and community are important parts of this spirituality. Maybe it is a feeling that there is a different way of being in the world that is about caring, not competition, conflict, or conquest. If we view ourselves as interconnected to everything else, we want to be a part of and to care for this wider community.

I don’t know, is that it? Does that describe my feeling, my knowing? I’m not sure and I’ve decided that’s ok.