I found this list online and thought it was interesting, and a good way to begin to frame the conversation - a way to shed light on the differences between the two ways of thought.
Written by Sanjeev Patra
A learned man was once asked to explain the difference between Religion and Spirituality. His response was profound:
▪ Religion is not just one, there are many.
▪ Spirituality is one.
▪ Religion is for those who sleep.
▪ Spirituality is for those who are awake.
▪ Religion is for those who need someone to tell them what to do and want to be guided.
▪ Spirituality is for those who pay attention to their inner voice.
▪ Religion has a set of dogmatic rules.
▪ Spirituality invites us to explore within and get attuned to the Universal Rules.
▪ Religion threatens and frightens.
▪ Spirituality gives inner peace.
▪ Religion speaks of sin and guilt.
▪ Spirituality leads us on the path of emancipation!
▪ Religion represses everything which it considers false.
▪ Spirituality transcends everything, it brings us closer to our Truth!
▪ Religion invents.
▪Spirituality helps us to discover.
▪ Religion does not tolerate any question.
▪Spirituality encourages searching questions.
▪ Religion is human. It is an organization with rules made by men.
▪ Spirituality is Divine, without human rules....leads us to the Causeless Cause!
▪ Religion divides between us and them.
▪Spirituality unites.
▪ Religion follows the concepts of a sacred book.
▪ Spirituality seeks the sacred in all books.
▪ Religion feeds on fear.
▪ Spirituality feeds on trust and faith.
▪ Religion makes us to live in External Reality.
▪ Spirituality lives in Inner Consciousness.
▪ Religion deals with performing rituals.
▪ Spirituality has to do with the Inner Self.
▪ Religion feeds on internal ego.
▪ Spirituality drives to transcend beyond self.
▪ Religion makes us renounce the world to follow a God.
▪ Spirituality makes us live in God, without renouncing our existing lives.
▪ Religion is a cult.
▪ Spirituality is inner meditation.
▪ Religion fills us with dreams of glory in paradise.
▪ Spirituality makes us live the glory and paradise on earth.
▪ Religion lives in the past and in the future.
▪ Spirituality lives in the present.
▪ Religion creates cloisters in our memory.
▪ Spirituality liberates our Consciousness.
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So what is Spirituality to me?
It is the belief that we are directly responsible for the outcomes that present themselves to us during our conscious, waking moments; basically, the thoughts that we have create the reality we experience.
From the moment I can remember having my own thinking mind, where I was rationally considering what I was experiencing, I began questioning the Religious Belief System that I was indoctrinated into. I am not saying this to disrespect the ancestors who have passed this tradition down through the family, or my parents who just did what their parents did or told them to do - I am simply saying, that without choice I was told to put something, some body, a story in a book, in front of my conscious mind, my own spirit, and believe that it was the way - I was indoctrinated into a belief system that did not resonate with 100% of my being based on the thoughts of prior incarnations of beings in my vibrational family. Some people need the structure of a Religious Belief System, and again, I mean no disrespect to anyone who subscribes, resonates or tunes into, those vibrational frequencies.
Thoughts are thoughts - they come and they go all day like cars passing you on the highway going the opposite direction - some thoughts stay because they resonate with your vibrational frequency and they trigger an emotion - both good and bad - and some pass right through because they are just a passing thought and have no true purpose, like “that peanut butter and butter hardroll from Stewart’s was delicious” or “can cats really see our auras?” or “if I farted in the forest and nobody was there to appreciate it, was it really a fart at all?”, basically void of any teachings to render into the records of the collective consciousness. When you continue to think the same thought over and over, it becomes a belief - and thats where things began to shift for me. The more I thought about an invisible man judging my every move, and watching my actions, recording them into his records so that at some point down the road he can tell me whether I am worthy of joining him forever in a place that was better then where I already was, but I had to die to get there, and there was no proof heaven even existed, or hell for that matter - the more I began to back away, because it felt like fear whenever I considered the possibility that maybe I wasn’t going to be good enough, or that I’d never do enough good to earn my place wherever they say I’m going for eternity after my physical time inside this skin suit expires; that’s when I started shifting my focus to making my own observations about how life worked and doing that based on how it felt, how it resonated within my own container, what emotion(s) it triggered. For a long time I felt like I was too scared (indoctrinated fear) to find the key to the doorway to step outside of the Religious box I was put in - and I did my Self, my Spirit, zero favors in trying to get there - but when I finally made the commitment to find my own Spirit and live my Truth, through cleansing myself of all other spirits that did not serve my highest vibrational self or resonate with the natural vibration of life, I felt as though the weight of 1000 horses was lifted off my back, and that I was free to enjoy what Spirit had to offer. You can frame that from your own personal universal experience and take from it what you will - for me, from the time I was 20 until the age of 46 the thoughts I had were coming from a place of catching up - where my bodies energy field, the subtle body, was being dragged behind me by my physical self/body, because my Spirit was so heavy with all the work it was doing to try to match the vibration of the pure positive consciousness that surrounds us. It, as a part of me, was always trying to play catch up, always running never resting, always tired, always behind and always in doubt of everything. When I decided to allow myself to feel for the first time in decades, and I took control of my own thinking, I felt an energy that I thought I had lost, or that I’d never be able to connect with again. I’d filled the correct container with Spirit, and it was with my own source of divine light energy, I was finally home.
I hope some of this resonates with you, and that you know that you are loved, beyond any reasonable doubt, there is love for you in the universe.
Until next time - be well, think good thoughts, and always keep it pointed at infinity.
-H Tim