Undoing Internalized Self-Seriousness In Spiritual Pursuits

My earliest childhood memories of religion were in attending synagogue service. I can easily recall the smooth wood of the pews we sat in, which faced the bima and the service room's stained glass windows. The congregation intoned hymns along the playing of an organ, which I loved so deeply that a decade later I insisted it should be present at my Bat Mitzvah.

A lot of people probably have fairly similar memories even if they are not Jewish. My particular denomination was born surrounded by German Lutheran churches in the 19th century. Two of my exes were former Lutherans and at the time of our relationships, we shared the sentiment that religious services should have a certain sacredness to them.

But what happens when your religion doesn't only or primarily happen in an organized location within a larger community? What if you pursue a very individual spiritual path that cannot be fulfilled by other people's, even wise and experienced religious leaders', prescriptions? What if you were part of the occult community for awhile and never really liked Aleister Crowley, but decide to go to a Thelemic Black Mass just to try something new only to leave like, 'Jesus fucking Christ, it's like he wanted to host a bad theater play in a church'?

What I have found, talking to spirits every day, is that it is highly unlikely to impossible to have profound, life-changing, and undeniable experiences regularly. The fact is, you are an embodied being due to have a material life of ups and downs. Not every day is going to have something mindblowingly important conveyed to you. Nor are you going to be able to avoid the more uncomfortable and challenging parts of existence. At best, those ongoing connections with spirit allies can help you realize the beauty and magnitude of the smallest, most taken-for-granted bits about being alive. If properly implemented, they should also help you reduce your suffering and bring you to a place of higher consciousness, which always includes a "mundane" expression as well as any other realities or states in which you may find yourself.

But also... Sometimes a mundane-seeming message is often is as important and no different than an overtly spiritual one. For instance, Lucifer recently conveyed something to me through a friend. The message was, "Stop focusing on (a specific goal of) building your future; go get laid and have fun." I felt disappointment at this at first because I still desperately want what he was referring to. To me, it's of Ultimate Importance. Maybe even one of the Meanings of My Life. Although I have other information on how I am eventually going to get to it (knock on wood), it seemed discouraging that my guardian would go out of his way to not aid me in taking steps that I thought were essential to achieving this goal.

Then, of course, I thought about it a lot more. More significantly, despite pre-existing beliefs about myself and my presumed demisexual orientation, I took the next steps of fulfilling Lucifer's instruction. Practicing instead of studying works wonders in all areas; doing so in this case was so exciting and successful that it literally helped me realize I have capabilities that had been denied for maybe a decade. Unlocking them immediately improved my self-esteem and opened up an entire new world of possibilities. Along the lines of the proverb "this, too, is Zen,": this, too, is spiritual.

(Especially if you're a transgender or other type of queer adult person who only fully came out 3 years ago.)

If I want to be trite, journey > destination. Or as Astaroth said while holding my hand over chai, "What is the point in working so hard to liberate yourself and others and not experience any joy? Don't we liberate others because we want them to feel more goodness in the world? If you do not allow yourself to experience the sweeter parts of life, there will be nothing to pull you through being mired in the struggle. Seek balance in what you do and value your happiness."

So in this next year (my birthday was two days ago!), I will seek to lay down my seriousness. I will work to more highly treasure my joy. I will unboundingly embrace all parts of existence and find that growth comes through leisure as well as work.