"How is your spiritual life?"

A good friend asked me this question in a recent email. I reckon that the question and its response are relevant to our mission here on wanderingstu.com, so i am presenting some of my answer here for all of you all. It's a bit raw, but it's my thoughts, so hey. Hope all is well. Shabbat Shalom:


so i see these guys who are so friggin on fire with God, all whirling around and sighing and psshhh-ing and moaning---

but that ain't me (usually)-- i've been trying to pray 3 times a day, use the liturgy, and also talk to God in my own words in a form of intimate meditative prayer used by Rebbe Nachman of Breslov.

some days are good and others aren't. also been reading these little booklets based on Rebbe Nachman's teachings that promote joy and no despair-

so i sometimes see my thoughts turning in the right direction rather than the wrong, and perhaps these things are helping----

but i feel soulless (as always) without love and without some sort of creative outlet. i live with an accomplished musician- in fact most, of the guys in this Religious-Americans-turned-Israeli crowd with which i hang seem to be musicians. and that gives my spirit a friggen slap in the head, for not practicing, for not taking steps to better myself.

i think the most powerful spiritual idea (for me at least) is humility, real crushing of the ego-- it might help me to have a true love and to play sizzling guitar (or at least to be able to sing some plaintive neil young tunes), but really, the way to be satisfied is to want Nothing. especially since i ain't no impoverished asian monk with a terrible skin condition,,, shit! i have 2 platinum credit cards....

so if i can subdue the ego, that wants to be loved, wants to feel important, skilled, etc, then the world, rather than an endless challenge and frustration, becomes a source of ample blessings and adventures, which is how most people see my life from the outside anyhow.

So i have been trying to cultivate that as well.

But then the next minute, some beautiful woman walks by, or you see some family who "have it all" and you start wanting wanting wanting again..............

So then you breathe again, slowly, deeply, think of that monk with the skin condition, lissen to some more Wilco and Billy Bragg, and try to subdue it all for another hour....