The Spirituality Industry is a Scam

Break Free from the Dream State Series #2

The spirituality industry hasn’t developed out of the blue; it’s risen from the dysfunctional and self-centered culture we’re all swimming in. Poverty, environmental degradation, racism, sexism, ableism, war, how we treat animals, pesticides, herbicides, less than 1% of people owning over 50% of wealth, on, on, on, on and on. One has to see that all this dysfunction is rooted in the same soil before one can move beyond it. Here’s the underlying truth: The root cause of all the dysfunction in the global culture and, therefore, in the spirituality industry, is because we’re told there is a personalized, individual* you separate from everything else. The industry claims it’s honorable and good to aim for things like a higher self, a better self, an elevated consciousness, or good vibrations. Do any of those goals make sense without a personalized, separate self, an I? No. They absolutely do not.

The original spirituality quest, the true hero’s journey, is about living every moment knowing there is no personal self. It’s not about an experience, an insight, or a cool mind trick you can do. Truth-realization, buddha nature, wholeness, enlightenment, awake, Tao, etc., is all about seeing clearly, always, that all are involved, interconnected, and as it has to be. One can never get to this way if there is a belief in a personalized self.

Are you still with me? I know conceptualizing there’s no you can be tricky. I’m not saying your body isn’t real or you’re in some alternate reality; I’m saying that the voice in your head that you call you, is not real. I’m saying that the personality that you hold on to so tightly is not you. For example: Are you introverted or do you have social anxiety? What happens if you have a baby, will you become more nurturing? What happens if you have minimal resources, will you become greedy? Which of these labels, traits, and personality characteristics are actually you?? And that voice in your head, who is doing that?? The adventure is psychological, subtle, and intimate.

The I, or this personalized self, is full of contradiction and fragmentation; therefore, the teachings and preachings within the spirituality industry are stuck in capitalism, hierarchy, and personal motivations. The teachings are confusing, misguided, and promise empty objectives. Sure, there are a few, very few, speaking from a truth-realized lens, but unfortunately, they are overshadowed or misunderstood with all the inaccurate noise; 99.9% of the industry is a scam.

Manifestation, choice, karma, intention, ego, the moon and astrology are misunderstood.

For example, let’s break down the term manifesting. There is a common belief that one can manifest, or make things happen for themselves if grounded enough, open enough, and in-tuned enough with the universe. One might feel they are an all-powerful God (in the Judaic Christian sense of God- “I can control all.”). In one sense, we are all God, but in another, we have no control over the universe at all. If we forget the second part, that we have no control at all, there is a good chance we’ll get narcissistic, self-centered, and entitled. We start to think the universe revolves around us, and we matter A LOT. This God Complex is a big problem. Instead, if one can stop trying to control* everything and understand that everything is exactly how it has to be, happenings will feel like miracles and manifestations.

If one can get outside of personalized thinking, then yes, it will seem like things are manifesting for them. But it’s a waste of time to desire manifestation because if you truly live without personalized thinking, you won’t care if you manifest stuff. You might think, “Narly! I thought that book looked good and my friend just got it for me! Life is so neato.” Then it will end there. No special meaning added. No drama. You might tell a friend, but you won’t be telling them from a place of self-importance or meaning.

Stick with me around manifesting, but let’s bring karma in. If I kill my uncle, my aunt will probably get pissed and try to kill me or put me in prison. Karma. Cause and effect. On a grander scale, if my culture is hierarchical and there are just a select few individuals that get most of the resources, there will be a majority of people without resources. Karma. Cause and effect. Now, in every thought, on a super micro scale, if I have jealousy in my being, I’ll act out of that jealousy and distrust my partner. My partner will respond to that action in their own way, continuing the conflict, and on and on the dance will go. Karma. Cause and effect. Karma exists because the universe works in a yin-yang fashion of opposites and interconnection. There cannot be up without down, nor can there be this table without space. Whenever we get caught in the manifesting game, we must think about its effect. There are currently over 8 billion people on this planet; if they are all manifesting a car, well, um, how is the earth going to even provide that? On a basic level, thought alone can prove that new-aged manifesting doesn’t make sense.

Same with astrology. The moon. Tarot cards. Rationally, if considering the yin-yang of the universe, it doesn’t make much sense, but go a little further anyway… Why do we think we humans matter so much? If the moon is affecting us, then it’s affecting every species out there. Yes, the moon is cool. It might affect us a bit because of its gravitational pull, but if we’re thinking statements like, “Omg, I was so grumpy yesterday, now I feel alive and amazing! It must be because of the full moon.”… Probably not, unless every species on earth was grumpy yesterday??

I have to give a shout-out alert to the term choice. We think we have choice because of the whole God Complex thing and the individualistic culture we’re swimming in. We struggle to understand how we can simultaneously be God and not have any control or choice. Bring no self in. If there is no self, who is doing the choosing??

We could blame all this inaccurate thinking on Adam and Eve mythology*, but even before that, it’s that darn self, personalizing it all again. There may be some cool coincidences with the stars, our birthdays, and those fun tarot cards, but it’s just because we want to see it and we want to create meaning in our lives. Humans are not more important. We are not more intelligent than anything else. We just are magically, beautifully here like everything else. Neat! Wow! It’s fun, so keep it light. Once we start calling beliefs truths, we get all serious and righteous and call it religion. The spirituality industry is a religion. A very wealthy religion. The yoga industry alone is worth billions and billions of dollars*. When did spirituality and money coalesce? Why?

Maybe think of it this way: If you have a desire, an intention*, then your ego*, no, no, let’s say self instead, is just messing around in the yin-yang-ness of life and not guided by truth at all, because who is doing the wanting? Get it? Coincidence, intention, karma, and manifesting mingle in the same dissection. Just take the self out, and you’ll find it has to do with us only because we’re here, part of the grand dance, nothing more.

Evolution and consciousness are being misused.

Being truth-realized, enlightened, knowing truth, etc., has nothing to do with evolution. Wikipedia defines evolution as; the change in heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. When people in the spirituality industry speak of evolution, they seem to be using the label to describe a more conscientious way of living, better than one’s past way of living and good for humankind.

I can see some similarities between the definitions; both have to do with change. The wrongness comes in because truth doesn’t have to do with change at all. Look at the spiritual evolution label against the reality that there is no self — Whose past are we talking about? Who’s defining better? If a judgment or measurement is being made, we fall into the trap again of personalized thinking. (The Paradox Trickster may have come up for you here. I am saying that all the measuring and judging you do is because of your belief in the self, and I’m also implying you can still function in this world and be a thoughtful, kind, compassionate person. The difference lies between listening to your mind/body navigational system* or using thought.)

There is no self to evolve. We are all it already. We all have mind/body navigational systems that guide us if we let them; therefore, there is no where to get or evolve to. We seem to be using this term to describe someone who is perhaps self-actualized, not truth-realized. A self-actualized person may have a looser grip on their egos, but they still very much exist in the enculturated sphere of cares and believe their ego (self!) is real.

Similarly, there is no sense of higher consciousness or lower consciousness when it comes to truth. Who knows how we’re defining consciousness these days, but what I sense is that we’re not defining it as aware-ing. If we define it as aware-ing, full presence, silence, meditation, flow, be-ing, etc., then that’s something interesting and worth exploring in the search for truth. But it seems it’s used in the spirituality industry as another place to “get to”.

If you can conceptualize that everything is included in the yin-yang, how can higher be better than lower? Don’t they need each other and exist only because of each other? You don’t need to care too much about being conscious or discovering what consciousness is. Just like everything else- consciousness, unconsciousness, evolution, stars, moon, your neighbor, your guilt, shame, happiness, coffee, sickness, pain; all are included and part of the dance of reality, what is. When it comes to truth, none of these things have priority over another. None of these admired ways of being are special; if they feel special, breathe and get out of the self again. Sure, dissect, talk, explore, wonder… but if you think you are getting closer to knowing something, start over. Get back into the unknown.

“You’re truth”, is not the truth I’m talking about.

If you have been on a long, strenuous, personal journey and came out on top, you have awoken to a new you, or, a new way to behave and think. You’ve discovered a deeper level of awareness around who you are, and you have personal truths under your belt. You’ve probably heard, “It’s my truth”. This is awesome, but this is not awake in the sense I’m talking about.

I’m talking about an awake that means truth-realized, which means one lives every moment in knowing the truth that underlies everything and everyone and is beyond dualistic thinking. You’re not observing the observer anymore and wondering about your programs, you’re just be-ing, aware-ing- you’re not doing anything, and everything is getting done. You know what’s behind the curtain; you know the eternal place that this ever-changing world is stemmed from. You are back to nature, and you can’t get away from it or need to remember anything about it, you are it.

In summary: you might want to play elsewhere.

Importantly and confusingly, we believe this self has somewhere to get to and something important to be. We are told we need to work on the individual, grow!, and this self needs to survive and thrive. In this culture, we seem to hold a strong belief that our individuality is important and worthy of praise and exploration. Thoughts about how to be better, more successful, healthier, prettier, the best possible human EVER engulf us. Yes, we care for others, but even that is often seen through the lens of the self. (“I am a good person. See?”). The belief that I, the self, is separate from everything else is powerful and reinforced in this culture, therefore, the spirituality industry. We usually won’t slow down enough to see it.

I think many people are seeking in the wrong genre. If you want to figure out how to live in this society in a healthy way and find happiness through ignorance, I think you mean to be in the health and wellness genre. If you want to figure out how to question this society, everything, and swim through depression and anger and look at all the muck in you and around you, and then maybe figure out what reality is, then the actual spirituality genre is right for you (like this blog ;)!).

Do you want to swim through the muck?! Here are my tips…

1) Slow things waaaay down.

2) Realize there’s another way, and the reality you perceive is very limited.

3) Keep wondering without concluding about your thoughts, actions, and beliefs. Listen-in with kindness.

4) Don’t leave. Don’t escape. Keep coming back to it. Further. Don’t give up!

Thanks for reading! Reach out with any thoughts or questions, April

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*Individual original meaning: Early 15c., "one and indivisible, inseparable" (with reference to the Trinity), from Medieval Latin individualis, from Latin individuus "indivisible," from in- "not, opposite of" (see in- (1)) + dividuus "divisible," from dividere "divide" (see divide (v.)). Original sense now obsolete; the word was not common before c. 1600 and the 15c.

”Stop trying to control.” I’m not saying we should sit around and do nothing about all the problems we face and be completely passive because nothing matters. I’m saying that when we surrender, let go and trust that our mind/body navigation system* will take care of things, we are in flow, and right action will come from that.

•Adam and Eve mythology. When people started to believe the Bible was true, the myth of Adam and Eve seeped into our worldview. The myth claims that Adam and Eve brought sin to us all; therefore, humans are born with sin and error. The belief that something is inherently wrong with us is causing huge negative consequences and leading us away from the truth that we are whole and perfect.

*There are many statistics on how much money the yoga industry is worth, and almost all of them quoted numbers in the billions, so I went with that.

*The term intention is another term the spirituality industry butchers. If we have a goal or desire to get something or to get somewhere, we’re trying to control again and not trusting our mind/body navigational system. I think intentions are only useful when held lightly, with wonder.

*Ego: Misguided concept because who is me to have an ego? It stinks how much we use this term. It’s really hard to write without using it because it’s so mainstream. Garin and I have wondered about this term a lot, and we’re quite certain it’s adding to mass confusion. It seems like self would be the more accurate term, and talking more about the mind/body navigational systems* is more useful.

*Garin coined the mind/body navigational system to describe the mechanism that helps us survive and thrive, both individually and collectively. Inherently, there is nothing wrong with the mechanism, but when it has to adapt to a dysfunctional system, it becomes dysfunctional itself.

Here are some quotes I think get to the point. Enjoy!

When you sit quietly and watch yourself, all kinds of things may come to the surface. Do nothing about them, don’t react to them; as they have come, so will they go, by themselves. All that matters is mindfulness, total awareness of oneself, or rather, of one’s mind. - Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

The real is as it is always. We are not creating anything new or achieving something which we did not have before. - Ramana Maharshi

Hope and fear are both phantoms that arise from thinking of the self. When we don't see the self as self, what do we have to fear? - Lao Tzu

Here’s the most directly I am able to say this: The one and only truth of any person lies like a black hole at their very core, and everything else—everything else—is just the rubbish and debris that covers the hole. Of course, to someone who is just going about their normal human existence undistracted by the larger questions, that rubbish and debris is everything that makes them who they are. But to someone who wants to get to the truth, who they are is what’s in the way. - Jed McKenna

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it. -Rumi

Silence is difficult and arduous; it is not to be played with. It isn’t something that you can experience by reading a book, or by listening to a talk, or by sitting together, or by retiring into a wood or a monastery. I am afraid none of these things will bring about this silence. This silence demands intense psychological work. You have to be burningly aware- aware of your speech, aware of your snobbishness, aware of your fears, your anxieties, your sense of guilt. And when you die to all that, then out of that dying comes the beauty of silence. - Jiddu Krishnamurti