Quotes About Spirituality

To accept yourself wherever. you are.... And don't think in terms of competition! You need not be anywhere else. Wherever you are, if you can be happy there, you have become religious, you have become spiritual. Spirituality knows no competition, spirituality knows no greed, spirituality knows no ambition - because spirituality means desirelessness.

There is one thing that all true spirituality has in common, whether that spirituality is derived from faith, from science, from nature or from the arts - a sense of wonder.

Be radical! The reason you feel so miserable is because you put spirituality in a form. You boxed it, franchised it. You decided spirituality was a certain way but then you got stuck in the way.

I have always been resistant to doctrine, and any spirituality I had experienced thus far in my life had been much more abstract and not aligned with any recognized religion. For me, the most trustworthy vehicle for spirituality had always proven to be music. It cannot be manipulated, or politicized, and when it is, that becomes immediately obvious.

I'm asked that a lot: 'James, is there really a continuing spiritual renaissance occurring on this planet? Look at all the conflict, look at the wars.' And I believe, yes, we're still moving toward a deeper spirituality. It's personal. It's grassroots. It's everybody trying to get their own connection made, and from there it grows out.

A revolution is to bring on change and we're spiritual people trying to bring on spiritual change. It might sound like I'm a dreamer, but economic models have reached their height of evolution. Technology has evolved. What hasn't evolved is mankind's spirituality; everything is from 3,000 years ago.

We often confuse spiritual knowledge with spiritual attainment. Spirituality is not a matter of knowing scriptures and engaging in philosophical discussions. It is a matter of heart culture, of unmeasurable strength.

What I would argue is that real spirituality is the ability to keep encountering two opposite thoughts at the same time and still maintain some kind of morality and perspective in the world. It is not the elimination of one side of the equation or the elimination of what you don't like; it is the investigation of everything.

What is material and what is not? When the world is the end and God is the means to attain that end, that is material. When God is the end and the world is only the means to attain that end, spirituality has begun.

I was unwilling to - without getting too philosophical about it - I was unwilling to structure my spirituality in the way that the church wanted me to structure it.

In Radical Optimism, Beatrice Bruteau sets forth a deep and shining vision of spirituality, one that guides the reader into the contemplative life and the very root of our being. Dr. Bruteau is a philosopher of great measure whose work should be required reading for all who seek the deepest truth about themselves.

There is no need to make spirituality a part of education. If you make education non-imposing and non-suppressive, people are naturally spiritual.

I actually feel that personal matters, like religion and spirituality, are things that I really discuss only with intimates. I think it's, in a way, like sexuality, something where it touches upon something very private.

Emptiness is that which frees us from religiosity and leads us to true spirituality.

Spirituality really lost its way when it became a stick to beat people with: ‘Do this or you’ll burn in hell.

There are many concepts of spirituality, among them, various notions of divinity developed in the Judaeo-Christian-Islamic religions. Within these the concepts vary greatly.

I think the spirit survives when we die, and nothing is wasted in nature and just as our material body disintegrates and becomes something else in the soil. The spirit becomes something else, reunites with a spiritual force that is out there in the universe. Not as individuals but as part of this spirituality.

Religion should unite all hearts and cause wars and disputes to vanish from the face of the earth; it should give birth to spirituality, and bring light and life to every soul. If religion becomes a cause of dislike, hatred and division, it would be better to be without it... Any religion which is not a cause of love and unity is no religion.

A lot of my songs deal with spirituality and God, and I guess if you're in tune with that, you'll read into it.

I've always been very spiritual, since I was a very, very young child. The older I get, I'm reading more, I'm experiencing more, and so that's all reflected in all of my music. All of my fans are pretty familiar with me and my beliefs. It's all about connecting to yourself and sticking to your own spirituality.

A lot of people talk about the spirituality of Buddhism, and it is a spiritual discipline. But in Shambhala there also is a notion that you have to be synchronized with both heaven and earth.

An authentic spirituality does not cater to culture; it calls culture to accountability.

Religion is believing someone else's experience, spirituality is having your own experience.

I've always hated the word spirituality, but now I accept the word, and I think it's a useful term. It just means so many things. And actually, most of the things it does connote are beautiful things.

Do unto others…’ is a good rule of thumb. I live by that. Forgiveness is probably the greatest virtue there is. But that’s exactly what it is - a virtue. Not just a Christian virtue. No one owns being good. I’m good. I just don’t believe I’ll be rewarded for it in heaven. My reward is here and now. It’s knowing that I try to do the right thing. That I lived a good life. And that’s where spirituality really lost its way. When it became a stick to beat people with. ‘Do this or you’ll burn in hell.’ You won’t burn in hell. But be nice anyway.

We're a little lazy about spirituality in this country.

I'm not sure about anything as far as religion and spirituality go.

Nowhere does one become more convinced of the strong hold which Freemasonry takes upon the minds and lives of those aging workers in the Craft who have attained its highest honors and of their firm belief in the power of its teachings to purify the soul of men and raise them to a new dignity and to greater heights of spirituality and practical morality.

The contemporary form of true greatness lies in a civilization founded upon the spirituality of work.

Religion is not something I like to talk about publicly. One reason is the politics, but also I think spirituality is deeply personal.

The spirituality that we need to develop for social change is one that mobilizes us for social change.

"Moksha" is really a satire of myself. I've always been interested in Eastern spirituality. I'm particularly interested in enlightenment and the spiritual pursuit to liberate ourselves (I'm a Buddhist at heart). During my teenage years, I imagined I'd end up going to India to become a yogi; study with the last living saints in a cave; give up all my worldly possessions; learn to levitate. And there's still part of me that can see myself "disappearing" for some years at an ashram somewhere.

Nothing of spiritual significance comes without sacrifice. Your spirituality will always be measured by the size of your sacrifice.

A dreaded society is not a civilized society. The most progressive and powerful society in the civilized sense, is a society which has recognized its ethos, and come to terms with the past and the present, with religion and science. With modernism and mysticism, with materialism and spirituality; a society free of tension, a society rich in culture. Such a society cannot come with hocus-pocus formulas and with fraud. It has to flow from the depth of a divine search.

In every aspect of life, purity and holiness, cleanliness and refinement, exalt the human condition . . . Even in the physical realm, cleanliness will conduce to spirituality.

If God does exist, it's in music and in art, I think there's more spiritually in what I do than in a lot of religious groups judging, especially in the way they've treated me in the past couple of years. I've grown tired of talking about religion. It's time for me to move on. I'm trying to redefine the idea of spirituality and make it now such a bad word for myself, because I find that I sound really stupid saying it sometimes

Two attempts have been made in the world to found social life: the one was upon religion, and the other was upon social necessity. The one was founded upon spirituality, the other upon materialism; the one upon transcendentalism, the other upon realism.

Psychological wealth includes life satisfaction, the feeling that life is full of meaning, a sense of engagement in interesting activities, the pursuit of important goals, the experience of positive emotional feelings, and a sense of spirituality that connects people to things larger than themselves.

Every characteristic absence of spirituality, every piece of common vulgarity, is due to an inability to resist a stimulus - you have to react, you follow every impulse.

I'm touched by the idea that when we do things that are useful and helpful - collecting these shards of spirituality - that we may be helping to bring about a healing.

The idea that each of us can be directly spiritual is radical. Most religions are based not on teaching adherents to be directly spiritual, but in persuading them to trust in the intercession of ministers or priests. The problem with this approach is that we cannot gain access to spirituality except through the medium of a fallible human being. If we want to see Tao, we need only open our eyes and trust what we see.

Spirituality tells the seeker not to live in the hoary past, not to live in the remote future, but to live in the immediacy of today, in the eternal Now.

Spirituality has to play an important role, particularly in resistance movements. The institutions we are fighting against - corporations and governments - use alienation as one of their primary weapons. A big part of their messaging is intended to make people feel separated from each other, which disempowers them, which makes them ever easier to exploit. This is really a spiritual weapon they are using. It isolates people and breaks their spirit.

Spirituality as a science, as a study, is the greatest and healthiest exercise that the human mind can have.

I grew up in a very artistic, cultured home, but without any kind of spirituality. My parents were secular materialists, so I saw art as having an alternate value.

Spirituality is not about what you know. It is about growing, deepening, evolving and becoming a living reflection of your spiritual identity.

Most importantly, the meaning of spirituality lays the seeds for our destiny and the path we must follow.

I feel like some of my baby fat is going away, and that’s not just physically, it’s psychologically. I think that your body is in tune with your mind and your spirituality and your heart. If things are going better, I just think you look better.