Are Spirtual Practice and Healing Practice the Same?

[Group Manager]

Posted by Group Owner
Via Group Manager


“Are Spiritual Practice and Healing Practice the Same ?”

“Spirituality can refer to an ultimate or an alleged immaterial
reality; an inner path enabling a person to discover the essence of
his/her being; or the “deepest values and meanings by which people
live.” Spiritual practices, including meditation, prayer and
contemplation, are intended to develop an individual's inner life.”

“Spirituality is often experienced as a source of inspiration or
orientation in life. In a wide variety of traditions, spirituality is
seen as a path toward one or more of the following: a higher state of
awareness, perfection of one's own being, wisdom, or communion with
God or with creation. The Vedas and Upanishads also describe such a
path as one of transformation. Spirituality aims both at inner growth
and outward manifestations of this growth. Love and/or compassion
are often described as the mainstay of spiritual development.” From
‘Wikipedia.org’

Now I thought, that spiritual practice and healing practice were the
same; but what I have seen is, that healing practice incudes spiritual
practice, the cultivation of ‘a higher state of awareness,’ but
focuses on the only thing that is etched in stone which will
ultimately allow healing to occur.....complete and unconditional self
acceptance.

I went into spiritual practice nearly 40 years ago with a deep desire,
and an unquenched longing, to bring peace to my troubled life.
Spiritual practice, meditation / prayer, undoubtedly helped me touch
that place of peace within me, and definitely had a ‘healing effect’
in my life.....and for awhile it was my ‘answer.’ However, after
years of dedicated and invaluable practice in Zen I noticed, because
of the ‘higher state of awareness’ I was cultivating through
meditation, that the ‘troubles‘, those wounds, and hurt aspects in me,
the ones I went into spiritual practice to ‘heal’ were still there. I
was still ‘troubled’ by my depression, my anger, my shame, my
fear...not to mention that in the midst of passionately seeking to
realize the Truth, I was still afraid and unable to speak my truth.
Afraid not to say ‘yes’ when my truth was ‘no.’

Seeing that I was not ‘getting’ what I thought spiritual practice
would bring to me triggered an old and well worn program.......self
criticism.....which of course, brought right along with it the most
troubling feeling...the one that seemed to haunt me most of my
life....the sense that I am ‘not good enough’, and like a lightening
flash I would disconnect / flee from the feeling it, by another old
and well worn belief / program.......the one that says, ”if I’m not
getting what I want, it means I’m not working hard enough.” And that
belief was confirmed by the the fact that those ‘troubles’ were
clearly still there. This translated into, ‘you are failing at
spiritual practice.’ I was disappointed in myself and began to become
worried and concerned. I thought that spiritual practice was the
answer and would heal those troubled waters. So at that time, as one
who put all my eggs in the ‘spiritual practice basket’, I believed the
answer was to meditate more. I was wrong.

Now, to look at this from the healing practice perspective, which
includes spiritual practice, and focus’s on complete and unconditional
self-acceptance. I have come to understand that in the silence and
stillness of meditation the aspects of me that needed to be healed
were allowed to come to the surface, to be seen even more clearly, so
they could be paid attention to.... not to be pushed away or
judged.....not to be bypassed or avoided through spiritual practice.
I was resisting them, not allowing myself to feel those ‘troubled
parts’ of me, not wanting to be present with them. So, in the midst
of a spiritual practice that I wanted to bring peace to my life, I was
waging war on those ‘troubled’ parts of me. They were my inner
‘terrorists’ and I wanted to kill them. I realized what I saw in
myself was exactly what we have being seeing in the world for
thousands of years...practicing war in the name of peace.

The spiritual experiences we have will, and do, change our lives.
However, it is our conscious (or unconscious) choices that creates
our lives. I experience self healing through the conscious choice
for complete and unconditional self acceptance. By consciously
choosing to allow my Self to first be present with those troubled
parts of me...then to embrace them.....and then to extend to them that
light, love and compassion, which “are often described as the mainstay
of spiritual development.” Developing the Light of Consciousness
through spiritual practice and choosing to bring it to the parts of me
that live in the shadows is what heals my troubled mind and nourishes
my soul.

For me wholeness is the absence of exclusion. If I desire peace and I
am at war with any part of me I am creating and living in
conflict.....I will be fighting for my life in my very own private
war.



For a complimentary consultation and introduction to Parallel
Realities Practice...via phone, skype, or in person please call or
write..


Coly Vulpiani

303.476.8402

700 E. Ninth Ave., Suite 9 , Denver , CO 80203