Modern Spirituality

When it comes to spirituality, each religion and culture have a uniqueness to offer. Some believe in reaching up to their spirit by dancing along with trance music, like in Islamic Sufism or by acts of self nullification like in strict catholic beliefs.

No one is born to believe in a particular religion. It is the way a child is brought up and then what he or she chooses to believe in that determines the religion he or she will follow. A very strong link of this determination is with the faith that a person has in him or her.

One aspect of this faith then is Mysticism. 

Mysticism or sometimes known as mystery religion is a conscious awareness of a superior and a definitive reality. This reality for many is closeness achieved through various means with God.

The concept of God is difficult for the human brain to accept given the scientific explanations that are present for each and every transaction that occurs in this world. It is strangely difficult to comprehend the power and existence of a being, stronger and more self sufficient than all other beings, which controls the processes occurring in this world.

This being, which cannot be heard, seen or touched, can only be experienced through the sense of feeling, which too is not physically explainable. What explains this feeling then is the concept of Mysticism.

In Mahayana Buddhism, Mysticism refers to the union of a human being, in a unique and deeply intrinsic connection, with a definitive reality. Followers of Buddhism, who are also the practitioners of Mysticism work towards the nurture and further establishment of these connection through various means.

These means can include meditation, dancing, performing standard rituals, singing, chanting along with various others.

What is interesting about this concept is that it does not bound people to a certain religion. Meaning to say that if a person is practicing Sufism for develop a connection with Allah, then, it in no way means that such a connection cannot be formed in Hinduism of Christianity. The fact of the matter is that not only are the roads towards attaining this connection very similar to each other, the destination of these roads in similar too and that is the development of a union with the ultimate truth, as has already been mentioned earlier.

According to the history of Mysticism, its roots are found in the sub continent, especially with Buddhism, Islam, Sikhism and Hinduism. However, researchers who work on this topic are of the view that mysticism is significantly different from any of the many stream religious practices and that the most important requirement of practicing this out of all is faith, determination and concentration. These are elements then, that have nothing or very little to do with the type of religion that a person is following. The only part that the respective religion of a person who chooses to practice mysticism play is determination of the type of practice that he or she does.

There is a part of today’s existence that not everybody is aware of. It is usual to see today, people fighting over religion, trying to prove that they are the ones on the right track of religion but it is unusual to find people who readily accept others of different religions into a movement, which helps survive the chaos that has now been created by the advent of the Age of Aquarius.

For those who believe and for those who look beyond the restrictive dogmas of this society, the New Age movement is a spiritual movement that incorporates the metaphysical and spiritual teachings in a combination from both the eastern and western traditions and religions.

As mentioned above, the new age movement does not differentiate people on the basis of their traditions or their religions and therefore, the view it presents to this world today is a holistic one incorporating again, both science and spirit.

The idea of this is to combine and utilize the knowledge and the traditions that are already helping a certain sect of people to provide peaceful help to the others too.