Spirituality is not an act, nor a belief, but a state of being
Leda Green
Spirituality is not an act, nor a belief, but a state of being. It is the condition in which the soul is aligned with itself, with nature, and with the present moment. To live spiritually is to exist in awareness, not as an escape from life, but as its fullest embrace.
Much confusion arises when altered states are mistaken for spiritual ones. Some argue that the use of drugs can open hidden doors to the spirit. Yet this is an illusion. Drugs alter the brain’s chemistry, cloud perception, and distance us from our essence. They silence consciousness rather than refine it.
It is true that in some cultures, such as among Native American chiefs and shamans, sacred plants were used in ritual contexts. But these were never employed for escape or entertainment. They were taken with reverence, under guidance, and within ceremony, as a means of deepening connection to the land, the ancestors, and the community.
The intention was integration, not diversion. Modern drug use, by contrast, isolates the individual, severs awareness, and often leaves the mind further from itself. Authentic spirituality does not depend on the numbing of the mind, but on its awakening.
The question is not about what is modern or ancient—it is about drugs. The ancients knew how to handle them. They worked with sacred substances through discipline, humility, and purpose. Today, even many who call themselves “certified guides” often lack the vision or the purity once required to enter those realms. The motivation has shifted from reverence to curiosity, from devotion to display.
These substances open gates that few truly see or understand, and in crossing them without clarity, people receive misinformation, become energetically drained, and are pulled into unseen dimensions they cannot navigate. What was once a sacred tool for communion has become a dangerous distraction from the true path of awakening.
As the Stoics reminded us, clarity is liberation; as the Buddha taught, right mindfulness is freedom. Both point to the same truth: spirituality is not a distortion of reality, but a deeper recognition of it.
Religion and spirituality are also often conflated, though they belong to different orders of experience. Religion is man-made: an edifice of laws, symbols, and institutions designed to organize faith. At best, it can provide guidance, discipline, and a shared sense of belonging.
Yet one may be religious without being spiritual, just as one may be deeply spiritual without any religion at all. Religion is the vessel; spirituality is the water that fills it. Spinoza understood this when he equated God with nature, removing the need for institutions in order to approach the divine.
Across cultures, spirituality has revealed itself in forms far older and purer than doctrine. The samurai of Japan sought not only martial skill but a way of being in which discipline and honor became paths to inner clarity. Tibetan monks, through meditation and silence, embody a spirituality of compassion and presence.
Shaolin masters in China unite body and spirit through movement, turning discipline into awakening. In the West, poets and philosophers reached the same essence when creation transcended ego and became an expression of truth. Rumi spoke of it as the annihilation of the self in love; Heidegger called it dwelling – being at home in the truth of existence.
At its heart, spirituality is the dialogue between mind and soul. Left unchecked, the mind constructs the ego: a fragile edifice of identity, desire, and fear. The ego hungers for permanence, validation, and control, yet it lives in illusion. The soul, by contrast, requires no construction. It simply is. Where the ego isolates, the soul connects. Where the ego clings to illusions of control, the soul rests in the reality of being.
To live spiritually is to bring the mind into service of the soul. When this harmony is achieved, consciousness sharpens, presence deepens, and life itself becomes the path. Spirituality reveals itself in art, in silence, in the movement of martial arts practice, in the compassion of prayer, in the stillness of nature, and even in the depths of suffering. For suffering, when faced with awareness, strips away the ego and leaves the soul bare to truth.
Spirituality is not about escaping life. It is about standing within it – fully awake, fully present, and wholly alive.
Leda Green is a healer, thinker, and advisor dedicated to restoring clarity, awareness, and authenticity in human life.
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