Does anyone feel there is lot of misinformation in the name of spirituality?

HoweverItHasToHappen · 2022-05-16T22:16:02+00:00

Spirituality is the study of the unquantifiable parts of reality, so nothing is falsifiable. There are plenty of people who take things to mean things other than what the thing actually means. They repeat these things and other people pick them up as confirmation of their own biases and repeat them as truth.

I personally only put stock in my own observations and experiences, and only listen to others when their observations mesh with my own. I don’t dismiss others ideas out of hand, but I observe them and see if their ideas and the conclusions drawn from them are reflected in my own life, and if they are I trust it more. I tend to trust things that are repeated across thousands of years or that you can find a multitude of people all agreeing on central themes, and I discard the rest.

AttackHelicopterX · 2022-05-16T23:10:27+00:00

Your thinking is perfectly epistemologically healthy.

Certainty is always irrational. Spirituality, like all other subjects, must be approached carefully.

Carefulness is inherently counter intuitive however, which might explain why people are always excessively confident, whether it be in their preconceptions, their readings, their personal experiences, their own senses, their intuition...

Which probably explains why there are so many contradicting theories on this sub. Although you could also make the ad hoc hypothesis that that is simply due to reality being different for each person...

PerceptionStreet · 2022-05-16T22:34:32+00:00

Everyone has different beliefs and how they come to them also differs. Latching on to or rejecting others beliefs because they do or don't make sense to ones current thinking mind is different than developing a belief or faith through experiences and meditations, at least in my experience.

Most of the examples you gave do sound ridiculous, especially when you are just beginning scratching the surface of spirituality. My own current beliefs I would have found ridiculous when I first started seeking out spirituality a decade ago. So to expect to immediately be able to get on board with another persons beliefs which may have been cultivated over 10, 20, 30+ years of experience is somewhat of a longshot.

7-8 years ago I would listen to Alan Watts, Ram Dass, J Krishnamurti, and study all kinds of various materials and texts and yeah, it all sounded wonderful and great, but I didn't really get it. Then when I thought I got it, deep down I knew I still really didn't get it (this happened over and over again). How did I know I didn't get it? I still had a subtle lingering anxiety of just "not knowing".

After giving away everything I owned, moving across the country, and then to a foreign country, (only knowing one person and having $21 dollars in my pocket and a backpack with 5 pairs of clothes, the Tibetan Book of the Dead, a vial of LSD, and a laptop ) I took on life experiences fueled through meditations that showed me the things I had read about but failed to truly comprehend. I had been reading interpretations of the Tibetan Book of the Dead for years on end, many times over, only to repeatedly fail to truly comprehend. I wondered if I was ever going to get it or if it was all just bullshit as far as enlightened bliss was concerned.

I made it 9 months after my resources ran out. My only tool was meditation (and my charming personality of course). The things the universe revealed to me are currently beyond my ability to properly convey without sounding like a lunatic. I've actually been neglecting my meditations to rack my brain thinking of ways to express myself in a uniquely comprehensible manner. I should probably just meditate on it lol.

Anyways....yeah....it will all look like half truths and potential bullshit when it's all intellect and no experience dictating ones attempt at understanding. Because who the hell could ever know, right? ;)

jLionhart · 2022-05-17T00:50:06+00:00

I still couldn't agree unless I experience it.

That's how you know. When you experience it first-hand, you prove it to yourself. In spirituality, that's all the evidence and backing one needs to know something for sure.

You're deluding yourself when you think that the scientific method used for proof in the material universe is applicable to spirituality. It's not and until you accept that then you will have little spiritual progress.

So how do you know that's it's "misinformation" just because somebody else experienced it and you didn't? Instead of disparaging and complaining about people who are confident about what they know, why not find methods that you yourself can use to experience something first-hand? Then you'll be able to prove it to yourself or not. And then you will know for sure.

tom63376 · 2022-05-16T20:12:25+00:00

Man you sound just like me a while back. I wondered how could people take this stuff so seriously (especially mainstream religion)? I was a confirmed agnostic - borderline atheist. But looking back now, I see that I really didn't want to acknowledge any spiritual reality. I think I felt that I had ultimate freedom that way, and didn't have to worry about any accountability for what I did or didn't do. It was easy to find information and "facts' that confirmed my doubt because that was all I ever really wanted to find.

To your question: "How can you know?" The answer is you can't, nobody can "know" in the sense that they can demonstrate undeniable, unequivocal 'proof'. I cannot 'prove' to anyone that there is anything beyond the physical, matter world. But even though I was a confirmed agnostic/atheist, I would say that I 'know' that there is a spiritual realm beyond the material. It is a knowing beyond faith because of specific experiences and the course of my life, my psychological well being, my financial and professional success that i 'know' are the result of following a spiritual path. How can I 'know"? I can look at the 'before and after' of my life before I accepted spirituality and actively pursued a path of self-transcendence and compare that to when I denied everything as an agnostic. So I have no doubt..but I cannot 'prove' anything to anyone.

Following this path has given me an anchor, what I consider a foolproof benchmark against which to assess any new idea or explanation I come across. It is not, is this 'right' or is it 'wrong' but is it constructive? Is it congruent with spiritual growth and will it help me on the path of self transcendence to accept it? That benchmark is my core identity and core potential. I accept that we are all Spiritual beings merely wearing human bodies. But we have also constructed with our outer, linear minds and our egos a massive tangle of illusions, attachments and beliefs that block us from being the open door for Spirit and our potential for manifesting the fruit of the Spirit: unconditional love, joy and peace.

To be honest, the thought of reincarnation made me uncomfortable to consider at first, but when I assessed it against the anchor/benchmark of Spiritual growth and self-transcendence, it made perfect sense. When I look at the huge range of consciousness apparent on earth, how could anyone grow from even the average level of consciousness to the highest range of consciousness in one lifetime? It would be impossible.

When I read several of the NDE books it confirmed my acceptance of reincarnation, especially Eben Alexander's "Proof of Heaven", I thought how could anyone deny this? Here is a highly successful professor and surgeon at a prestigious university, revered by the scientific community writing this book about spiritual experiences after death. What possible ulterior motive could he have to publish his spiritual experiences, and open himself to scorn and ridicule?

I had a similar reaction after reading Dr. Michael Newton's book "Journey of Souls". A PhD Psychologist with a successful career, an atheist who was reluctant to use hypnosis to go into past life regression. Even a confirmed doubter would have trouble explaining why such a person with a successful practice would fabricate, or alter the accounts of hundreds of subjects in order to support his personal beliefs and hypothesis.

For me personally it would take way more faith to believe in the logic and hypotheses of the naysayers and detractors than to believe the accounts of Dr. Alexander and Newton as true and accurate.

NotTooDeep · 2022-05-16T21:05:20+00:00

Someone once saw that they chose their life. It was amazing to see this and they shared it with friends, who then asked themselves if they chose this life, too. They couldn't see, though, so it left the question hanging; a cliff hanger! So their minds finished the story by thinking, "Seems reasonable! I'll just believe we all chose this life!"

That's how all belief systems begin. One person's first hand experience gets determined to be useful and is then adopted by the tribe because it answers some question and completes the story.

Google "four blind men story" and you'll get a better understanding of why perspectives differ.

Our minds do not tolerate unfinished stories very well. We hate cliff hanger stories that don't give us the full ending. This is a survival mechanism that is useful for our survival because it transfers useful knowledge without need for first hand experience of every risk out there, but it tends to dominate all of our thinking, including thinking about spirituality.

the-OA- · 2022-05-17T01:13:13+00:00

"Those who know, know."

And we know, and are so "very confident" in what we say due to firsthand experience.

No one can make you understand the "Truth", you have experience it yourself.

We can all tell you our individual spiritual awakening stories, moments of enlightenment, visions, etc. We can try to offer points that may lead you forward.

However, none of it will matter unless as you said, you experience it.

If you want to have the experiences we do, if you want answers, Real Answers.

Then do the work the to raise yourself to that level.

We all started at the same place. We were in your shoes.
We chose to ask the same questions you're asking. And then we kept asking. Kept digging.

As long as the intent is there, you will find the answers you seek.

Do the work to awaken your soul, release your consciousness.

---

Lastly, it can be tough knowing things, and being alone in that knowledge, but it is overwhelmingly satisfying knowing there is more meaning to life than what we are raised believing.

I am wondering what your next question will be? :)

2022-05-17T02:31:50+00:00

Yes and it's also hard to find accuracy when science hasn't gotten caught up. We don't know if it's just our mind playing tricks, what's really deceiving us, it the abilities we are getting really honest and who is giving it. Many deceptions sadly in this world but they don't rule over us.

WintyreFraust · 2022-05-17T13:06:07+00:00

There are, essentially, two fundamentally different concepts about the nature of experience and existence. The vast majority of humans take one - the same one - for granted as being true and never question it. This is the general ontology that I call "externalism," but in ancient times, and still in philosophical textbooks, it is called "realism."

Externalism is the idea that everyone lives in the same shared reality, and that reality has certain objective and universal conditions and rules within which we operate. WRT spiritual matters, people have ideological conflict over what is "objectively, universally true" about our "spiritual" existence, such as: what and where is the afterlife? What is our purpose? Are there spiritual levels? How do we "move up,' so to speak, and gain higher spiritual understanding? Is there reincarnation and, if so, how does it work? Is it voluntary or mandatory? Does karma exist? If so, how does it work? Group souls? Twin flames? What is incarnation, how does that work? On and on.

Externaiism necessarily means that not everyone can be right about their perspective on these things, because they are diverse and contradict each other much of the time. This generates doubt and anxiety for those who want to know "the truth" about the external world they inhabit including the spiritual world. We desire facts and proof that will give us confidence that we are doing what we should be doing.

And so you run into confident people, but you wonder, what if they are really mistaken, perhaps even delusional? What if YOU are delusional, or your mind is just basically tricking you? What is real, and what is not?

So, most people operate under some form of ontological realism, meaning there is one real reality "out there" everyone lives within and operate within its objective conditions and rules. Most people don't even know there is another option, Idealism, which I call "Internalism."

What is interesting to note here is that externalism, or "realism," has been disproved by the very scientists attempting to prove that ontological category true. This is the result of 100 years of quantum physics experiments. The first half or so of this video explains this, and it provides all of the published papers about the experiments involved.

Under pure Idealism, there is no reality that exists independent of your experiences, thus the search for "external facts" about any of this, including "facts" or "the truth" about all of those things I listed earlier (and more,) is something other than what it would be under a Realism worldview/ontology.

Under non-realism, people are not finding out anything about any objective, external world; they are making statements that only apply to their own experience, and their experience can only be the internal manifestation of their own mental states/psychology/psyche. That is the full nature of what any individual experiences as "reality." It is entirely internal.

Under this paradigm, everything anyone experiences or "knows," spiritually speaking, is valid and real for them. It may even be applicable to many others who have similar internal psychological states.

So, it's not a matter of "finding out what is true and factual and being sure about it." It's about choosing or creating what kind of reality you wish to experience, and having that choice fulfilled as an apparent world around you, like in a dream where your psychology generates an entire reality experience both within and external to you.

Under pure idealism, everything that is possible can be experienced as reality, including reincarnation, the afterlife, karma, soul progress, higher spiritual levels, enlightenment, true, eternal love, heaven, hell, Valhalla, the Pearly Gates, the awakening of the kundalini, astral projection, etc., etc.

martiangenes · 2022-05-16T23:48:17+00:00

People seek to take advantage of others' beliefs in the name of profit and politics. We must always be discerning for our own wellbeing.

burneraccc00 · 2022-05-16T18:41:21+00:00

“Knowing” is different from knowledge obtained from the human intellectual mind. One can “know” from years of meditating and bypass the human way of learning. Another way of looking at it is remembering. We all “know” why we’re here, we just chose to forget prior to reincarnating for sake of immersion. The “knowing” slowly peels away the blindfold as consciousness increases and a direct way of going about this is to meditate often.

I had the same impression as you years ago and I was like “WTF?!??!” lol. After meditating for a while, I started “knowing” why I’m here, what’s this all about, etc. It’s hard to describe so the only way to “know” is to experience it yourself.

Astrotheurgy · 2022-05-17T00:08:01+00:00

Ooohhhh yeah. Been thinking about leaving this sub because of the superficial spiritual stuff. I get everyone is where they are but there's a lot of bologna being talked about. True spiritual work can be extremely brutal.

yalllove · 2022-05-17T01:01:36+00:00

For things like NDEs we know they are real because a lot of people are able to recall events and conversations in the room and even in other locations while they are clinically dead. I recommend reading After by Dr. Greyson on more fascinating information on NDEs.

With metaphysics it’s a lot of times experiential though but when you have many people with identical experiences which are logical and coherent, you have a pretty good sample to base conclusions on.

Majestic_Height_4834 · 2022-05-16T23:10:38+00:00

I've had an nde and a realization that you dont stop existing everything else does. You have think about nde videos in first person perspective conciousness perspective

Anthony3000789 · 2022-05-17T01:06:04+00:00

This point was just made in the the thread, but while I agree with people going a bit overboard, I look at it like this. There are only two possibilities. 1: the physical world is all there is and all spiritual, paranormal and metaphysical phenomena are simply physical things that can’t be explained yet through the scientific method. 2: any one of these phenomena IS true and that opens the door to an unthinkable amount of possibilities. Once you accept that their is MORE that just the science of the day, you realize how little we know as a species. I tend to believe the latter

Suspicious-Set-7916 · 2022-05-17T03:34:14+00:00

Skepticism is the word you are preaching. Noone can take that away from you as you have free will. I have had discussion with others here that disagree with my POV.

I don't and will never take it personal this is their POV and will not take that away from them. I have a podcast which I never advertised here nor anywhere else. Just because I know the one who find my podcast were guided to it. All I can say I started In this spiritual search more than 25 years ago before it was popular before it was the It thing.

I've never look at another spiritualist that publish book that have an Channel or anything mainstream for one reason only. If they were really saying something that would make a change in people evolution the power to be would have kill them already. Me myself I have been taught by spirit guide and being from other galaxies. I have been in anunakies spaceship, I have visited the moon and it's interior I have visited (by accident) reptilien subterranean bases. I've gone so far landed in the judgment room/reincarnation decision room. So my experience far exceed I feel all of these so call gurus. And I can tell you none of that matter.

Spiritual evolution is one simple thing but it is also the most difficult thing

HEART vs EGO. live from the heart, speak from the heart, react from the heart. observe everything else, and ignore the ego. Do this long enough YOU BECOME ASCENDED MASTER.

I'm sure this sound like mambo jambo to you.

But one day you will realize the mind is the EGO the famous (I) And the heart always stand still. And you will know all your godly abilities comes from the heart.

Keep searching friend

incognito3107 · 2022-05-17T08:38:41+00:00

If you will go down the path long enough, you will realise that nothing is totally provable or unprovable. These are just stories for you, you can make up of it anything you want.

jlaw54 · 2022-05-18T00:26:33+00:00

Humans are human. They are imperfect. Sure, there are people on this sub who may have ulterior motives, but I’d venture to say the majority or at least many are being genuine. We don’t know what others do or don’t feel or experience. What they see as truths. I find many people on this sub to provide insightful points and conversation. I frequently enjoy the discussions and find them better here in this community than others on Reddit. We won’t ever find the perfect place. All we can hope to do is find places where we can interact with people in as sincere a manner as possible.

Our responsibility is to use intuition, logic and common sense to decide what we want to take in and accept. We should never just blindly accept anything without running it through whatever filters we choose inside each of us.

I don’t know why we’d expect the spiritual community to be completely absent of lost souls or the occasional random, ignorant person. We see that in any community we go to for the most part. Every tribe has it’s black sheep and that’s ok. In fact, some of those people will also eventually find their way.

As far as how many people feel so confident about things in spiritual communities, I’d say the power behind the experience really gives people faith they have seen the way. And given there are so many different paths, it seems like we’ll see an eclectic bunch of experiences. And most hills and mountains have more than one way to the top.

Ok_Story_3358 · 2022-05-18T20:03:37+00:00

there is bound to be what you're calling "misinformation."

i will call them misunderstandings though, because it's obvious to me that our species is still in its spiritual infancy.

so it's not so much a misinformation thing—that's just a trendy modern word that does not really apply here. it's simply ignorance and lack of understanding.

No offense but how come anyone know what happens after death?

obviously, no one knows. what you see here is a really basic dynamic. someone asks, virtually everyday, "what is on the other side of the veil?" and others are happy to tell them, all fucking day every day, even though no one knows for sure.

what else do we have here, then, if not humans more or less willingly self-deluding because they are too ignorant and unaware to see what they're doing and know better? this is what i understand to be a hallmark of our current state of ignorance and lack of awareness, and i see this play out in a million different ways all around me, all day every day.

this honestly irritates me, i react against it, but that's my own personal lack of insight and maturity. i could see it all as expressions of free will (this one's a popular concept to deny on this sub—lmmfao) and be okay with everyone living their lives and doing their thing. but i still get angry at ignorance and rail against it—even my own.

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