The simplest way for me to describe the difference between religion and spirituality is that religion is man-made, while spirituality is self-made.
When we begin our spiritual journey, it always starts with going within ourselves, understanding why we are the way we are. The further we explore our own hearts, the closer we come to the truth. We learn that we, as individuals, are love. We gain an understanding that there are no limits to the universe and that we are just one living being consisting of a body and a spirit. Our spirit, or soul, is here to have an experience based on free will, emotions, and soul development. We acknowledge that we stand in our own power to create the life we want to experience for ourselves, without judgment or punishment.
There are many different religions in the world today, each with its own doctrine and set of belief systems. These belief systems are conditions and rules that run parallel with judgment and punishment. Typically, most religions believe that their specific belief system and conditions are the only way to enter the kingdom of heaven. Religion, like many other societal conditions, is taught.
Spirituality, on the other hand, is not taught; it is already within us. When we are willing to question the beliefs and conditions in which we were raised, whether religious or non-religious, we choose to walk the brave and courageous path of self-awareness and discover that a whole universe — God, love, and the answer to the meaning of life — resides within us all. To arrive at these answers for ourselves, we must consciously activate our reprogramming, a process that unfolds over time and requires daily effort. This is one reason humans fear spirituality; they are unwilling to walk the path to freedom because it demands stepping outside their comfort zone to learn about themselves.
Spirituality is the understanding that we are loved unconditionally, not judged for our life lessons and choices. We know this is true because we come to understand that we ourselves are love and that the god of our own heart is love.
When we begin to walk the path of self-awareness, we learn that there are no conditions for love and acceptance, no punishment for mistakes, and no judgments for the choices we make, we start to experience personal freedom from the constraints of our own preconditioned mind.
As young children we quickly learn that religion is based on a set of rules with conditions and punishments. If we abide by them, we will be loved and accepted. As adults, we can also learn that spirituality is the inner wisdom to understand that natural consequences will happen as we go through life, making the choices that we make on this journey, and that we are given the freedom to do so. That is true love, the love given to us by God.
I was raised Catholic, attended a non-denominational Christian school run by Baptists, and married a man who converted to Islam. After practicing these three different religions, I learned that religion, no matter which one we choose to practice and believe in, is a set of belief systems based on someone else’s interpretation of history. It reminds me of the telephone game: one person tells another something, and it is interpreted differently by the receiver, who then tells another, and so on, until the end message is so distorted that no one actually knows what the original message was.
With spirituality, we come to understand that the original message was love — self-love and love for all.
When society calls me “woowoo,” it is such a compliment. Thank you; I’m so grateful that I am “woowoo” and that I have awakened to the dream of the planet. The dream of the planet is love. I believe that religion came from the message of love, and through centuries of the telephone game, it has become something that we now must heal ourselves from.
It is because of this centuries-old telephone game that I believe the difference between religion and spirituality is that religion is man-made while spirituality is self-made.
