My spirituality has been growing a lot lately. Not in a way that feels rigid or narrow, but in a way that feels more open, more observant, and more full of light. I feel more peace, more encouraged, more love – towards myself and others as well.
I have been thinking about the difference between religion and spirituality. I inherited a religion that didn’t always feel right to me and left me with many unanswered questions. I struggled feeling spiritual even when living within the lines of religion.
To me, religion often feels like a pathway that has already been designed. It can offer structure, language, tradition, community, ritual, and shared belief. For many people, that path is beautiful and meaningful. It gives them direction. It gives them belonging. It gives them a way to understand God, goodness, purpose, suffering, and hope.
Spirituality feels different to me.
Spirituality feels more personal. More intimate. More revealed through human experience and therefore, to me, more inclusive.
It is not always found in a building, a doctrine, a sermon, or a set of rules. Sometimes it is found in grief. Sometimes in forgiveness. Sometimes in motherhood. Sometimes in heartbreak. Sometimes in music. Sometimes in nature. Sometimes in the quiet moment when something inside you finally opens up and you feel something that you may not even have words for. Sometimes it is found when you realize you are still being led, even if the path looks different than the one you once expected.
I have found myself embracing the many pathways I get to witness my friends and family on. Different lives. Different beliefs. Different lessons. Different struggles. Different ways of seeking truth, healing, peace, and meaning.
And somehow, I keep seeing the same thing.
Each pathway, in its own way, seems to lead toward light overtaking darkness.
That does not mean the darkness was not real.
It does not mean pain disappears because we learn something from it.
It does not mean every path looks the same or every person grows at the same pace.
But I am beginning to believe there is something sacred in watching people come along.
Watching a child mature.
Watching a friend heal.
Watching someone soften.
Watching someone begin again.
Watching someone find language for something they could not explain before.
Watching someone choose peace.
Watching someone choose themselves.
Watching someone choose light.
Maybe that is part of the Beautiful too.
Not needing every path to look like mine in order to recognize the light in it.
Not needing every person to believe exactly what I believe in order to honor the goodness growing in them.
Not needing spirituality to be confined to one expression, one tradition, one timeline, or one way of becoming.
Maybe spiritual growth is not always about certainty.
Maybe sometimes it is about openness.
It is about learning to see God, light, truth, love, grace, healing, or goodness moving through lives that look different from our own.
It is about recognizing that darkness can be overtaken in many ways.
Through repentance.
Through therapy.
Through forgiveness.
Through boundaries.
Through recovery.
Through honesty.
Through love.
Through starting over.
Through finally telling the truth.
Through becoming softer and stronger at the same time.
I still believe in God.
Maybe more than ever.
But I am learning that God does not always arrive in the same form. Sometimes God is revealed through religion. Sometimes through spirituality. Sometimes through people. Sometimes through pain. Sometimes through the quiet realization that we are being invited to grow beyond the version of faith we inherited and into the version of faith we have actually lived.
And that feels Beautiful to me.
The many pathways.
The different ways people heal.
The way truth can find us.
The way darkness does not get the final word.
The way light keeps showing up, even when it does not look exactly how we expected.
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