Spirituality Definition
The Meaning of Spirituality in Life
Diverse Meanings of Spirituality
But even looking at its meaning in the dictionary we will find that there are three to four definitions, and one of them is a definition that seems to contradict its basic concept. It defines spirituality as church property which is something material, not spiritual.
And the dictionary lists 9 different contexts in which this word “spirituality” can be used.
Scientists in a certain workshop could not agree on the meaning of spirituality.
So, what really is the meaning of spirituality in life?
Difficulty in Getting the Meaning Without Experiencing It
A difficulty in getting at the meaning of spirituality in life is that we cannot know its meaning if we have not experienced it to a certain degree. And judging from our observation of the people around us they seem to be concerned only with the material things, like how to produce money for a living, how to spend it, how to hoard it. It seems that these people do not have any experience of spirituality at all.
But if it is true that the human being is composed of body, soul and spirit, then any human being has an experience of spirituality and therefore has a notion of its meaning.
Spirituality in life then is a way of living wherein the person gives proper emphasis to the spiritual part of his being.
The athlete, the body builder, the beautician, the gym owners give emphasis to the physical aspect of the person, the body.
The academician, the teacher in our schools, the educational institutions give emphasis to the mental aspect of the person, the soul.
The religious persons, the spiritual healers, the shamans give emphasis to the spiritual aspect of the person, the spirit.
Meaning of Spirituality in Life
Spirituality in life then is giving emphasis and priority to the spiritual aspect in our life, the things which endure, like faith or belief in the world of spirits and God, hope or desire for better things in life, and love or union with the spirits and with God.
When a person lives in such a way that he gives proper value to the spiritual dimension of his existence, then he has a mature spirituality. But if he does not live in such a way then he only has incipient or beginning spirituality.
Furthermore once a person lives a mature spiritual life, he gives primacy to the spiritual dimension of his life. He is no longer caught in the rat race. He has a calmness about him. He is no longer a slave of material things, like money, or of psychological rewards, like fame.
Spirituality in life enables us to live life to the full if we also take care of our physical and mental life. These three dimensions are all essential in life, but the primary one is spiritual, a dimension which most people seem to forget or relegate to the background of their life.
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Here are my other blogs which may be of help to you:
http://bit.ly/spiritdev for your spiritual growth
http://bit.ly/alterhealthcare for your health
http://bit.ly/novotrends for learning about the new trends around us
http://bit.ly/bepaidonline for earning some income from the Internet
Here are your links to download the e-books for FREE. To download a copy of A NEW CHRIST by Wallace D. Wattles click this website http://bit.ly/anewchrist. To download a free copy of A NEW EARTH by Eckhart Tolle click this website http://bit.ly/ebookanewearth. I hope that you enjoy reading these free e-books and profit much from them, as I have also profited greatly from them.
The Meaning of Genuine Spirituality in Life
This is now the second post on the article of Dr. Gianni ZappalĂ . Again the title of this article is “Spirituality is the new black …and it has social impact!” Its source URL is http://www.csi.edu.au/uploads/31642/ufiles/CSI%20Background%20Paper%20No%201%20-%20Spirituality%20is%20the%20new%20black%20-%20Part%20I.pdf
If you want to read the whole article, please click that URL.Again as in the previous post, the words written by Dr. Zappala are in italics. My reflection follows after the section in Dr. Zapalla’s article.
What is this thing called spirituality?
It may seem like a futile exercise to attempt to define something that is different and personal for everyone. The concept or definition of spirituality in part eludes many in the social sciences because of its ‘fuzzy’ nature and a lack of consensus on what it means. As with many such concepts, we often intuitively know what we mean by them even though we struggle with trying to logically define them. As David Hay observed of the experience he and his colleagues had on embarking on an empirical study of spirituality:
[T]he variety of opinions that emerged [among academics who were knowledgeable of the subject] simply increased our confusion, but something interesting did emerge from this apparent failure. Everybody agreed that whilst pinning spirituality down to an agreed definition seemed impossible, they were able to recognize it when they came face to face with it. 13
The following small selection of definitions of spirituality gives a flavor of how social scientists, many of whom are writing about spirituality and business and/or organizations and/or workplace understand the concept:
• Spirituality is ‘the careful and reflective art of developing a relationship with the sacred’. 14
• Spirituality is the ‘basic desire to find ultimate meaning and purpose in one’s life and to live an integrated life.’ 15
• Spirituality exists wherever we struggle with the issue of how our lives fit into the greater cosmic scheme of things…an idea or practice is “spiritual” when it reveals our personal desire to establish a felt-relationship with the deepest meanings or powers governing life..16
• Spirituality is a concern ‘with our deepest sense of meaning, purpose and interconnectedness with one another and the earth we live on.’17
• The spiritual in human beings makes us ask why we are doing what we are doing and makes us seek some fundamentally better way of doing it. It makes us want our lives and enterprises to make a difference. [emphasis in original]. 18
• ‘Spirituality has to do with the paths people take in their efforts to find, conserve, and transform the sacred in their lives.’ 19
13 Hay, op.cit. p.130
14 David Tacey, The Spirituality Revolution,Sydney: Harper Collins, 2003, p.28
15 II Mitroff & EA Denton, A spiritual audit of corporate America: A hard look at spirituality, religion and values in the workplace, San
Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1999, p.xiv
16 Robert C Fuller, Spiritual, but not Religious, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.
17 Tim Costello, „Spirituality and love at work. in C. Barker and A Payne (eds) love @ work, Qld: John Wiley & Sons/Australian
Institute of Management. 2006, p.212
18 Danah Zohar & Ian Marshall, Spiritual Capital – Wealth we can live by, London: Bloomsbury, 2004, p.29
19 Brian J Zinnbauer, Kenneth Pargament & Allie B Scott, „The emerging meanings of Religiousness and Spirituality: Problems
and prospects., Journal of Personality, 67(6), p.909
Here now is my own reflection on this section:
My first comment on this section of Dr. Zappala’s article is that I am happy that now social scientists are embarking on an “empirical study of spirituality.” This implies that social scientists now acknowledge that spirituality can be studied empirically, just like any other social phenomena. Because of this spirituality has a new meaning for all of us. Where before it was the area of theologians and mystics, now it is an area of sociologists. It has more than a theological meaning, spirituality now has a sociological meaning.
That is why “pinning spirituality down to an agreed definition seemed impossible”, as we read in the article. This is because it has become a very rich concept with its entrance into the social sciences. It has become like the elephant to the perception of 7 blind men: one thought it was a tree branch, another thought it was a hand fan, etc.
But despite their disagreement on its definition, the social scientists agree that they recognize what it is when they come face to face with it. In other words, the meaning of spirituality can be grasped intuitively, if not logically.
The elements in their definition are: art, relationship, sacred, ultimate meaning, integrated life, beyond our selves.
First, genuine spirituality is an art. It is not a science. It is something that we practice, not something that we read about and forget, like the characters in a book. It is something that cuts into our personality. It is something that we are supposed to foster every day, otherwise we lose it, like the skill of painting.
Secondly, genuine spirituality has to do with a relationship with others, beyond ourselves. It is not delving into ourselves and losing track of the time and place we are in. It is not thinking of the I, me and mine. Spirituality is a relating with others.
Thirdly, this relating is open to the sacred, that dimension of our life which is beyond our mundane world. Here we acknowledge that there is a reality other than that which is seen by our eyes and perceived by other senses and deduced to by our reason.
Fourthly, genuine spirituality has to do with the ultimate meaning of our life, not just with our present needs and desires. There is something more to than just eating, drinking, and enjoying the present turn of events. Life has a grander purpose than just the enjoyment of pleasure.
Fifthly, genuine spirituality integrates our life. It makes us whole. In other words, spirituality is a unifying factor in our life. It unifies the many elements of our life: the physical, the material, the mental, the psychic, the financial, the ups and downs of our life.
These are the elements of a genuine spirituality and this is from the viewpoint, not of priests, pastors, religious people and theologians, but from the viewpoint of social scientists.
My last comment is that now social scientists can spot spirituality when it appears and they can distinguish the genuine one from the fake. Hopefully the social scientist can spot the genuinely spiritual person from the fake one.
Click Here!
Here are my other blogs which may be of help to you:
http://bit.ly/spiritdev for your spiritual growth
http://bit.ly/alterhealthcare for your health
http://bit.ly/novotrends for learning about the new trends around us
http://bit.ly/bepaidonline for earning some income from the Internet
Here are your links to download the e-books for FREE. To download a copy of A NEW CHRIST by Wallace D. Wattles click this website http://bit.ly/anewchrist. To download a free copy of A NEW EARTH by Eckhart Tolle click this website http://bit.ly/ebookanewearth. I hope that you enjoy reading these free e-books and profit much from them, as I have also profited greatly from them.
Meaning of Spirituality
Diverse Meanings of Spirituality
If we search through the Internet today we discover that there are more than 5 million entries when we search for spirituality definition and more than 11 million entries when we search for spirituality meaning.
When we put the quotation marks in order to search for the exact terms, we discover that there are more than 15 thousand entries for “definition of spirituality” and more than 1.9 million entries for “meaning of spirituality.”
This just shows us even on a cursory level the diversity of definitions and meanings of the word “spirituality.”
Here are some examples from the Internet of the definitions of spirituality.
According to Dictionary.com with a site in http://dictionary.reference.com/ “spirituality” is 1. the quality or fact of being spiritual; 2. incorporeal or immaterial nature; 3. predominantly spiritual character as shown in thought, life, etc.; spiritual tendency or tone; 4. Often, spiritualities. property or revenue of the church or of an ecclesiastic in his or her official capacity.
From http://www.livingwordsofwisdom.com/definition-of-spirituality.html “The definition of spirituality is that which relates to or affects the human spirit or soul as opposed to material or physical things.”
From http://www.theorderoftime.com/spiritual/spiritualessence.html#The%20definition%20of%20spirituality we have this entry. “The definition of spirituality Many wonder what spirituality is. What is the definition? The dictionary (the Merriam Webster) will tell you that it is something deeply religious, something relating to the spirit and sacred matters.”
And finally, for our purpose here, from http://www.kriyayoga.com/english/encyclopedia/spirituality.htm the entry is “Spiritual Encyclopedia: Definition of ‘spirituality’ and ‘spiritual’ Spirituality often abused as word - the true and strict definition is a directly God related spiritual being or development of spiritual being.”
That is only for its definition. When we go to its meaning we find more diversity. We discover that there are different meanings for different classes of persons. In the web we find that there is a Meaning of Spirituality Among Nonreligious Persons at http://www.joinnursingcenter.com/prodev/ce_article.asp?tid=832639
There is a meaning of spirituality for individuals with disabilities at http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a727455890
And at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12175360
There is the meaning of spirituality relevant to health and nursing today.
And the wiki.answers at http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_te_meaning_of_spirituality has this about the meaning of spirituality: “The meaning of spirituality is the meaning of life. To be faced with good and evil, and evolve for good into a positive energy source willing to do good in such a corrupt and manipulated world.”
What is most obvious in the meaning of “spirituality” is that it comes from its root word, which is “spirit”. The suffix “-uality” qualifies the use of “spirit” in this instance.
So a basic definition of spirituality is the quality of one’s sensitivity to the things of the spirit. And what are these things of the spirit? These are those that cannot be directly perceived by our senses but whose effects can be deduced or inferred by our observations, like love, justice, peace, etc.
Basic to this understanding of spirituality is the premise that we regard the human being and/or the rest of creation as composed not only of matter, but of something immaterial, something invisible, something beyond our present knowledge. There is always more to what we can perceive with our senses and know with our reason.
So the basic meaning of spirituality is that it is a term which encompasses everything that we cannot see directly with our eyes, directly perceive by the other senses and know by our mere reason. That is spirituality in its basic meaning.
Click Here!
Here are my other blogs which may be of help to you:
http://bit.ly/spiritdev for your spiritual growth
http://bit.ly/alterhealthcare for your health
http://bit.ly/novotrends for learning about the new trends around us
http://bit.ly/bepaidonline for earning some income from the Internet
Here are your links to download the e-books for FREE. To download a copy of A NEW CHRIST by Wallace D. Wattles click this website http://bit.ly/anewchrist. To download a free copy of A NEW EARTH by Eckhart Tolle click this website http://bit.ly/ebookanewearth. I hope that you enjoy reading these free e-books and profit much from them, as I have also profited greatly from them.