askchapo

I feel like I have a lot to say about this but this has always been a topic that has been hard for me to grasp. It seems that a lot of my feelings have been shared by others in this thread. Despite not having a fully fleshed and holistic understanding of what spiritually is and how I relate to it I'm gonna give describing one aspect of my current perspective a shot.

Love is something that describes our social relationships with others in society. To characterize love is to see it as a mixture of different qualities and actions we seek from ourselves and another person (such as care, affection, respect, communication etc). But to describe love in short, it is the willingness and action required for another person to grow, for you to grow alongside them, and for the relationship between you two to grow as well. So love describes the yearning for the internal relationship within you and another person to grow and develop as well as the external relationship between you two to grow and develop as well.

When I hear people talk about spirituality they're usually talking about their relationship to reality. I think one of the hallmarks of talking about spirituality is going beyond recognizing the external relationship between the individual and reality that often externalizes reality outside of ourselves and instead recognizing the subjective experience of being a part of reality in a way that sees our relationship with reality as an internal one. So to connect it with my previous paragraph about love, maybe spirituality describes my willingness and the actions taken for the internal relations within myself to grow and develop in addition to my external relationship with reality, that reality outside of society, to grow and develop as well. All the while, trying to internalize that I am the reality around me as much as the tree outside my window, an ant, or a rock in space.