Blurts & Spasms

In answer to Quora question: "Does everyone go through spiritual awakening, or is it only a select few?"

Thank you for the A2A Morgan. This is a difficult question, and I think it depends on what you mean by "spiritual awakening;" as you can see from the answers already offered that this means different things to different people. But, if we agree to define that awakening as an acute awareness of a spiritual dimension of Self, and its intimate connection to the Universe and the Divine, here are what I believe to be some strong possibilities:

1) For every conscious being, opportunities for this awakening occur repeatedly, becoming more and more insistent and intense - both in a given lifetime and over the course of many lifetimes.

2) It is possible for someone to willfully reject this awakening over and over again, though I think it becomes more difficult and more hazardous the longer this willful rejection is perpetuated.

3) It is possible for someone to lack the facility from birth to have a spiritual awakening in their lives, and also not be able to acquire or develop that facility. We might think of this as an "autism of the spirit," which might occur as frequently as other autism spectrum disorders.

4) It is possible for someone, as a result of their environment - and emotional injuries and traumas of childhood in particular - to have a crippled or muted facility for spiritual awakening, and that unless they act with awareness, discipline, patience and endurance to heal those injuries and traumas, they will continue to have a persisting deficit in that facility.

5) It is possible for some people to go through multiple "spiritual awakenings" without interpreting or appreciating them as especially significant, or adjusting their worldview, values or behavior in reaction to those awakenings. In fact, they may either forget about them entirely, or take them for granted, or consider them an ordinary part of life.

In the end, what do these possibilities indicate, in answer to your question? I think they indicate that, although everyone will have multiple opportunities to become more spiritually awake, it is in fact relatively few who will both fully engage that opportunity, and continually operationalize their awakenings in new modes of being. For waking from sleep in the morning does not constitute living - we must also rise from our bed and go out into the world to make our way; in the same way, spiritual awakening does not constitute a spiritual life - we must actively honor our new spiritual understanding and perception in all of our choices, relationships and interactions, moving ever forward to the next horizon of being. When we allow our spiritual dimension to inform who we are and how we live, the strength and depth of that dimension continues to grow.

My 2 cents.