New Order Spirituality

This is for encouragement, ideas, and support for people going through a faith transition no matter where you hope to end up. This is also the place to laugh, cry, and love together.
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Angel
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New Order Spirituality

Post by Angel » Sun Feb 26, 2023 3:11 pm

What is everyone settling on for their new belief system?

I've happily settled into "Spiritual but not affiliated", leaning towards our own interconnectedness as the divine force or energy (rather than higher power). I've traded what I now see as an unhealthy co-dependent community for exploring and nurturing inner spirituality and connection to a bigger picture - nature, humanism, enjoying the multi-cultural diversity of all the traditions without the need to adhere to the tenets of any particular religion or faith tradition. Simply put, I've fallen in love with not-affiliated, with the free nomadic life.


I needed to put a word to it - what was wrong with religious communities in general. I think I found the word.
That word, is codependent. That community they are always bragging about? it isn't healthy.

Codependency is a term used to describe a pattern of behavior in which a person puts the needs of others before their own to an extent that it becomes unhealthy and dysfunctional. Codependent individuals tend to rely on others for their sense of self-worth, validation, and identity, often to the point of neglecting their own needs and desires.

Codependency can manifest in a variety of ways, but some common traits include:
  • An excessive need to please others
    Difficulty setting boundaries and saying "no"
    Feeling responsible for others' emotions and well-being
    Low self-esteem and self-worth
    Difficulty expressing one's own needs and desires
    Difficulty with intimacy and forming healthy relationships
    A tendency to become enmeshed in other people's problems and dramas

Codependency often develops in response to growing up in an environment where a person's emotional needs were not met, such as in a family with addiction, abuse, or neglect. Therapy and support groups can help individuals with codependency learn how to develop healthy boundaries, improve self-esteem, and form more balanced relationships.


The opposite of codependent - a community where members are able to find themselves.
  • Equity - not male hierarchy
    Diverse, inclusive, dare I say "woke".
    respect, healthy boundaries
    support, honest communication, listen to one another (not listen to book or manual)
    collaboration (not servant/master - mutual 2-way collaboration between equals, no one-way preaching)
    inner spirituality - authenticity - defining one's own values. generating harmony and peace from within (not dependent on others for peace). personal Meaning, Purpose. Empowered. Self-reliant. Resilient.
    Ownership - "I" am the Creator of my own life.
I think there are different stages - the Fowler stages as an example (there are other models) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_W._Fowler
They say people at different stages hate one another, but I am learning a mindset of just rationalizing it as - they are at a different stage. I don't get angry at someone with dementia, or get angry at someone who is Catholic/JW/Muslim/Jew - or even Mormon, they are all starting to blur together for me now... and I am seeing, the others - the other non-affiliated. I saw them in the grocery store today (shopping on Sunday), I see them on the trails, I see them at school - these beautiful, often quiet, peace-filled, non-affiliated, no-agendas, independent down-to-earth people and I am doing what I can to become one of them.

Happy Sunday NOMies.
“You have learned something...That always feels at first as if you have lost something.” George Bernard Shaw
When it is dark enough, you can see the stars. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

dogbite
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by dogbite » Mon Feb 27, 2023 11:42 am

Spiritually, I pursue nothing.

I am refreshed from time in nature, which one might construe as spiritual. I do not but wouldn't dispute those who do.

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Angel
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by Angel » Mon Feb 27, 2023 12:00 pm

dogbite wrote:
Mon Feb 27, 2023 11:42 am
Spiritually, I pursue nothing.

I am refreshed from time in nature, which one might construe as spiritual. I do not but wouldn't dispute those who do.
In my family any hint of being an "athiest" (or even agnostic) would be extra hand-wringing, so I've kept the word "spiritual" to make mom&dad less upset.
“You have learned something...That always feels at first as if you have lost something.” George Bernard Shaw
When it is dark enough, you can see the stars. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Linked
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by Linked » Mon Feb 27, 2023 1:17 pm

I haven't yet found anything convincingly supernatural or divine post mormonism. I'm fine with the universe just being what it appears to be. There's plenty of interesting and wonderful things to explore and morality exists outside of religion.

I appreciate your discussion of codependency. Boundaries are something that I struggled with and I suspect my mormon upbringing caused the difficulty or made it worse. It's been really hard to feel emotionally fulfilled without a codependent community.
"I would write about life. Every person would be exactly as important as any other. All facts would also be given equal weightiness. Nothing would be left out. Let others bring order to chaos. I would bring chaos to order" - Kurt Vonnegut

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græy
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by græy » Tue Feb 28, 2023 10:23 am

Linked wrote:
Mon Feb 27, 2023 1:17 pm
I haven't yet found anything convincingly supernatural or divine post mormonism. I'm fine with the universe just being what it appears to be. There's plenty of interesting and wonderful things to explore and morality exists outside of religion.
I feel this. I have told trusted friends that I'm leaning agnostic. In public I preset and believing agnostic, but in reality I'm completely comfortable with the idea of there being no God or divinity. My logical brain is very ready to admit the world and the universe makes sense without any Creator force beyond physics. While there are mysteries we still don't know, we are learning so much all the time and to this point in history, not one single iota of evidence has led to a definitive claim of "God did this and there is no room for any other explanation." On the other hand, we're constantly finding better naturalistic explanations for our observations.

I find there is meaning in my own happiness and well being and that of my loved friends and family. I find joy in experiencing new things, sharing those experiences, and seeing others find wonder in discovering the mysteries we're still exploring. I know that I feel better trying to hold integrity and honesty for myself, being kind to others. I find that to be enough, regardless of what I do or don't believe, or what is or isn't true.
Well, I'm better than dirt! Ah, well... most kinds of dirt; not that fancy store-bought dirt; that stuff is loaded with nutrients. I can't compete with that stuff. -Moe Sizlack

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alas
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by alas » Tue Feb 28, 2023 10:37 am

I still believe in something, some power “out there” that can communicate with us, some intelligence. But I don’t pretend to be able to explain it. I have just experienced it, but I also don’t try to explain that. I was told stuff. I have been outside of my body. I can’t explain any more than that. And none of the “scientific” explanations fit what I experienced. So, nobody has been able to say that “it was just in my head” cause that doesn’t work. So, yeah, I believe in something or somebody. But it also doesn’t fit any known religion, well, maybe closest to some modern Hawaiian songs I have heard, at least those speak to me. But I have to read the translation cause my Hawaiian doesn’t go that far.

But mostly, being out in nature, worshipping under the Cathedral of the great blue dome, with red sandstone pews or pine trees and a turquoise lake, cactus, wild flowers, rocks, wind, rain, snow, that is my spirituality.

The other stuff, you can plan it or cause it or control it in any way. It is totally wild and untamed, which is why lots of people don’t believe it. It isn’t “replicable” as in, it cannot be controlled in a lab, so it doesn’t exist. That is like saying you can’t train and control a sea urchin, so they don’t exist. But, I need spirituality and the only thing I can control is being out in nature, because when nature is totally untamed and uncontrolled, it is closest to the other stuff.

And sorry if I am not making much sense.

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Angel
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by Angel » Tue Feb 28, 2023 2:11 pm

alas wrote:
Tue Feb 28, 2023 10:37 am
I still believe in something, some power “out there” that can communicate with us, some intelligence. But I don’t pretend to be able to explain it. I have just experienced it, but I also don’t try to explain that. I was told stuff. I have been outside of my body. I can’t explain any more than that. And none of the “scientific” explanations fit what I experienced. So, nobody has been able to say that “it was just in my head” cause that doesn’t work. So, yeah, I believe in something or somebody. But it also doesn’t fit any known religion, well, maybe closest to some modern Hawaiian songs I have heard, at least those speak to me. But I have to read the translation cause my Hawaiian doesn’t go that far.

But mostly, being out in nature, worshipping under the Cathedral of the great blue dome, with red sandstone pews or pine trees and a turquoise lake, cactus, wild flowers, rocks, wind, rain, snow, that is my spirituality.

The other stuff, you can plan it or cause it or control it in any way. It is totally wild and untamed, which is why lots of people don’t believe it. It isn’t “replicable” as in, it cannot be controlled in a lab, so it doesn’t exist. That is like saying you can’t train and control a sea urchin, so they don’t exist. But, I need spirituality and the only thing I can control is being out in nature, because when nature is totally untamed and uncontrolled, it is closest to the other stuff.

And sorry if I am not making much sense.
I do think there is a power out there, I just do not see it as an old white guy in the sky - not "higher" power, just power,, some force here, on the same plane of existence as us. I feel it as interconnectedness, inter-being, a network, web - any group, from concerts to political rallies, or just on a subway, waiting at airport - you can feel the energy from different airplanes, different places.

Animals - how do birds know migration routes, fish returning to where they were hatched, ants and bees coordinating efforts - humans have this too - feeling connected. Warm fuzziness, elevation - just connection. I don't think it's God anymore, I think it's us - I think it is feeling one another. No higher power, no one ruling over the rest, but a substance like energy - the new age people call it energy, might be a good name for it, shared energy.
“You have learned something...That always feels at first as if you have lost something.” George Bernard Shaw
When it is dark enough, you can see the stars. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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alas
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by alas » Wed Mar 01, 2023 12:54 am

Angel wrote:
Tue Feb 28, 2023 2:11 pm
alas wrote:
Tue Feb 28, 2023 10:37 am
I still believe in something, some power “out there” that can communicate with us, some intelligence. But I don’t pretend to be able to explain it. I have just experienced it, but I also don’t try to explain that. I was told stuff. I have been outside of my body. I can’t explain any more than that. And none of the “scientific” explanations fit what I experienced. So, nobody has been able to say that “it was just in my head” cause that doesn’t work. So, yeah, I believe in something or somebody. But it also doesn’t fit any known religion, well, maybe closest to some modern Hawaiian songs I have heard, at least those speak to me. But I have to read the translation cause my Hawaiian doesn’t go that far.

But mostly, being out in nature, worshipping under the Cathedral of the great blue dome, with red sandstone pews or pine trees and a turquoise lake, cactus, wild flowers, rocks, wind, rain, snow, that is my spirituality.

The other stuff, you can plan it or cause it or control it in any way. It is totally wild and untamed, which is why lots of people don’t believe it. It isn’t “replicable” as in, it cannot be controlled in a lab, so it doesn’t exist. That is like saying you can’t train and control a sea urchin, so they don’t exist. But, I need spirituality and the only thing I can control is being out in nature, because when nature is totally untamed and uncontrolled, it is closest to the other stuff.

And sorry if I am not making much sense.
I do think there is a power out there, I just do not see it as an old white guy in the sky - not "higher" power, just power,, some force here, on the same plane of existence as us. I feel it as interconnectedness, inter-being, a network, web - any group, from concerts to political rallies, or just on a subway, waiting at airport - you can feel the energy from different airplanes, different places.

Animals - how do birds know migration routes, fish returning to where they were hatched, ants and bees coordinating efforts - humans have this too - feeling connected. Warm fuzziness, elevation - just connection. I don't think it's God anymore, I think it's us - I think it is feeling one another. No higher power, no one ruling over the rest, but a substance like energy - the new age people call it energy, might be a good name for it, shared energy.
I agree it isn’t a higher power, but there is intelligence there too. Like you said, how do turtles return to the same beach where they hatched? So, more than just energy. But no old white guy at all. I don’t understand how collective energy might work, but I don’t see electricity or light as having intelligence, and so energy seems like the wrong concept, although there is energy. Or maybe it is like computers use energy to create something like intelligence, only this is intelligence. I don’t know, and my brain can’t figure it out because there are multiple concepts, sort of how light is both wave and particle. Or possible a particle moving in a wave.

I don’t usually try to figure out what “it” is because no need, except when I try to explain and put into words, god but not God, and maybe not singular. The idea of guardian angels has worked to explain because what can “talk” to us is like us in ways, but not like us in having physical limits. And not above us, except that it knows things. Maybe more powerful, but still has limits.

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Angel
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by Angel » Fri Mar 03, 2023 1:17 pm

alas wrote:
Wed Mar 01, 2023 12:54 am
Angel wrote:
Tue Feb 28, 2023 2:11 pm
alas wrote:
Tue Feb 28, 2023 10:37 am
I still believe in something, some power “out there” that can communicate with us, some intelligence. But I don’t pretend to be able to explain it. I have just experienced it, but I also don’t try to explain that. I was told stuff. I have been outside of my body. I can’t explain any more than that. And none of the “scientific” explanations fit what I experienced. So, nobody has been able to say that “it was just in my head” cause that doesn’t work. So, yeah, I believe in something or somebody. But it also doesn’t fit any known religion, well, maybe closest to some modern Hawaiian songs I have heard, at least those speak to me. But I have to read the translation cause my Hawaiian doesn’t go that far.

But mostly, being out in nature, worshipping under the Cathedral of the great blue dome, with red sandstone pews or pine trees and a turquoise lake, cactus, wild flowers, rocks, wind, rain, snow, that is my spirituality.

The other stuff, you can plan it or cause it or control it in any way. It is totally wild and untamed, which is why lots of people don’t believe it. It isn’t “replicable” as in, it cannot be controlled in a lab, so it doesn’t exist. That is like saying you can’t train and control a sea urchin, so they don’t exist. But, I need spirituality and the only thing I can control is being out in nature, because when nature is totally untamed and uncontrolled, it is closest to the other stuff.

And sorry if I am not making much sense.
I do think there is a power out there, I just do not see it as an old white guy in the sky - not "higher" power, just power,, some force here, on the same plane of existence as us. I feel it as interconnectedness, inter-being, a network, web - any group, from concerts to political rallies, or just on a subway, waiting at airport - you can feel the energy from different airplanes, different places.

Animals - how do birds know migration routes, fish returning to where they were hatched, ants and bees coordinating efforts - humans have this too - feeling connected. Warm fuzziness, elevation - just connection. I don't think it's God anymore, I think it's us - I think it is feeling one another. No higher power, no one ruling over the rest, but a substance like energy - the new age people call it energy, might be a good name for it, shared energy.
I agree it isn’t a higher power, but there is intelligence there too. Like you said, how do turtles return to the same beach where they hatched? So, more than just energy. But no old white guy at all. I don’t understand how collective energy might work, but I don’t see electricity or light as having intelligence, and so energy seems like the wrong concept, although there is energy. Or maybe it is like computers use energy to create something like intelligence, only this is intelligence. I don’t know, and my brain can’t figure it out because there are multiple concepts, sort of how light is both wave and particle. Or possible a particle moving in a wave.

I don’t usually try to figure out what “it” is because no need, except when I try to explain and put into words, god but not God, and maybe not singular. The idea of guardian angels has worked to explain because what can “talk” to us is like us in ways, but not like us in having physical limits. And not above us, except that it knows things. Maybe more powerful, but still has limits.

Just yesterday I was thinking about a past student, they just randomly popped into my mind, then a couple hours later - there they were, coming back to campus to visit. Coincidence that I had just been thinking about them? It's not "true", it's not divine - no more than any person is divine - energy, conscience - it is like gravity, caused by distortion in the fabric of spacetime - some fabric/web/connection under it all.

One day we will find the unifying theory - show it is all different manifestations of a single underlying force, it's all connected somehow.

Interconnectedness - not above/below - we're all part of it drops of water in the ocean :)
“You have learned something...That always feels at first as if you have lost something.” George Bernard Shaw
When it is dark enough, you can see the stars. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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LSOF
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by LSOF » Sat Mar 04, 2023 4:14 pm

I don't believe in anything spiritual, whatever that even means. Everything is matter and energy. As a Mormon, I always had trouble distinguishing the "promptings of the Holy Ghost" from my own thoughts. As a naturalist atheist, I know there is no difference.
"I appreciate your flesh needs to martyr me." Parture

"There is no contradiction between faith and science --- true science." Dr Zaius

Pastor, Lunar Society of Friends; CEO, Faithful Origins and Ontology League

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Angel
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by Angel » Sun Mar 05, 2023 6:32 am

LSOF wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 4:14 pm
I don't believe in anything spiritual, whatever that even means. Everything is matter and energy. As a Mormon, I always had trouble distinguishing the "promptings of the Holy Ghost" from my own thoughts. As a naturalist atheist, I know there is no difference.

I certainly don't believe in God- way too much evil in the world for that. Spiritual - it is difficult to find any word without baggage attached to it - spirits is used for everything from alcohol to mood "high spirits", team spirit - I like the definition "an animating or vital principle held to give life to physical organisms.", so "qi", chi - life force, vitality, willpower, breath - mind, charisma, l'chaim - to life :)

I do appreciate the SBNR crowd. Not codependent, not relying on any community, but instead inner self-reliance, peace within, free from dogmas, freedom of thought and mind, and yes - appreciation of nature, and just enjoyment of being alive.

Happy Sunshine day everyone!
“You have learned something...That always feels at first as if you have lost something.” George Bernard Shaw
When it is dark enough, you can see the stars. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Hagoth
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by Hagoth » Sun Mar 05, 2023 9:15 am

alas wrote:
Wed Mar 01, 2023 12:54 am
I agree it isn’t a higher power, but there is intelligence there too...
I don't think of it as intelligence so much as consciousness, a property of everything in the universe that adds up at the cosmic level, but I don't imagine it as a mind that's thinking about me. More like a state of being that is pure experience, and I am part of it, and that I can dip into. I have read the descriptions of mystics from all kinds of traditions. I have had mystical experiences myself. All of these people seem to be having the same experience, once you strip away specific religious context. These experiences are observable as brain states are visible via neuroimaging, and there is something real going on here. Personally, I think it indicates a human capacity to connect to the bigger reality that is beyond our five senses. Call it God, Tau, The Ground of Being or whatever, but at its core it is pure experience. I like to say God is a verb. Humans invent religion in an attempt to make sense of it, even though it is an experience that is wholly ineffable.

Ha. We're effing with something that is ineffable, and that often results in things being effed up.
“The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also.” -Mark Twain

Jesus: "The Kingdom of God is within you." The Buddha: "Be your own light."

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alas
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by alas » Sun Mar 05, 2023 11:17 am

Hagoth wrote:
Sun Mar 05, 2023 9:15 am
Ha. We're effing with something that is ineffable, and that often results in things being effed up.
Yup. :lol: :lol: :lol:

Keewon
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Re: New Order Spirituality

Post by Keewon » Tue Apr 04, 2023 8:32 pm

This discussion puts me in mind of a quote by the Indian physicist Subrahmanijan Chandrasekhar:

“In my entire scientific life, extending over forty-five years, the most shattering experience has been the realization that an exact solution of Einstein's equations of general relativity, discovered by the New Zealand mathematician Roy Kerr, provides the absolute exact representation of untold numbers of massive black holes that populate the universe. This "shuddering before the beautiful," this incredible fact that a discovery motivated by a search after the beautiful in mathematics should find its exact replica in Nature, persuades me to say that beauty is that to which the human mind responds at its deepest and most profound level.”

"Shudder before the beautiful"- that phrase has been around for centuries, but I can't think of a more apt description. However one may characterize spirituality, for me it's not to be found in any description that doesn't include, explicitly or implicitly, the concept of beauty.

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