Yes, praying and posing can bring joy – but true spirituality demands something more of us | Jackie Bailey

Mmindfulness, spirituality, well-being – these words are treated as interchangeable in the global wellness market. But spirituality is not the same as being happy. Spirituality, according to almost one of the world’s great wisdom traditions, requires work, service, and sacrifice.

The dominant world religions – Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam – all encourage practices such as yoga, mindfulness meditation, chanting, prayer, group singing and dancing. They have long been effective tools for giving followers an experience of deep connection, sometimes accompanied by feelings of awe, ecstasy, and transcendence—feelings that encourage them to return.

But feeling joy or connectedness is not an end in itself. These feelings are the emotional motivators of ethical action. Every religion lays down rules for proper behavior – consider Buddhism’s Eightfold Path, Judaism’s 10 Commandments, or Vedic Hinduism’s restrictions and observances. Indigenous traditions transcend these religions, including humans and non-humans (or “more than humans,” as Potawatomi botanist and author Robin Wall Kimmerer describes our partners in the natural world) in the circle of those to whom we owe service.

Yet today’s global wellness industry makes us think that spirituality is just another dimension of feeling good. The Buddhist practitioner Miles Neal coined the term “McMindfulness” to describe the Western tendency to extract practices from ancient religious traditions and turn them into “colorfully packaged nuggets for … mass consumption.” The A $1.5 trillion wellness market seeks to sell the health benefits of spirituality divorced from the ethical frameworks within which these practices have developed.

Religious ethical frameworks are extremely harmful when used to maintain power inequalities in the areas of gender, class, race, and sexual identity. But the use of spiritual practices, in the absence of any ethical requirements, can also be harmful. For example, scientific studies have shown that yoga and meditation can actually increase people’s sense of “spiritual superiority” and focus on the self instead of soothing the ego and promoting charitable acts of service.

Evangelical Christian megachurches have grown, well, “mega” through the use of age-old practices such as group singing, music, and spectacle. They create experiences of “collective effervescence,” as identified by sociologist Emile Durkheim in 1912 as the basis of religion. An old problem arises when churches associate such spiritual emotions not with ethical action but with intolerance, selfishness or greed.

As early as the 14th century, Christianity took advantage of people’s spiritual feelings to make money, selling “indulgences” for the benefit of souls in purgatory (God’s hypothetical waiting room). Martin Luther opposed this practice as it took away people’s ability to give to the poor. In one of the great ironies of religious history, Luther’s theology of a personal relationship with God would eventually provide the basis for the prosperity gospel of some of today’s megachurches.

Leading a spiritual life does not mean rigid adherence to church dogma. Nor is it about engaging in practices like meditation in the absence of a larger context. Indeed, yoga means “yoke,” and the type of yoga popular in the West is only one way to unite with a greater consciousness, something greater than yourself. Other yogas of the Hindu tradition include work, philosophy, learning, and acts of service.

I don’t want to be “McMindful”. I don’t want to extract practices from religious traditions to commodify them and feel good about myself. Well, I probably want to feel good about myself. But well-being practices begin and end there, while spiritual practices should extend beyond my self, encouraging me to contribute to the well-being of all beings.

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I want a spirituality that draws on the wisdom and practices of thousands of years and puts that knowledge into a modern ethical framework that I believe in. If I’m going to spend 20 minutes a day sitting on my bum cultivating compassion for others, I’m also going to get up and act on that feeling, donate, volunteer, or just be nice to someone I really don’t like. If I’m gonna sing about how God/Des loves us all every Sunday, I will also take that love and turn it into charitable, non-judgmental acts of kindness every other day of the week.

I can meditate and do yoga (actually yoga sucks) or raise my hands in group worship. But I cannot treat these activities and the feelings they create as ends in themselves. These practices are tools that help me stay focused, cultivating the attitudes and emotions that sustain me as I try to live an ethical life. To live spiritually is to be connected in a deep and meaningful way to the mystery of life – and to behave accordingly.

• Jackie Bailey is the author of The Eulogy, winner of the NSW Premier’s Literary Multicultural Award 2023. When not writing, Jackie spends her time helping families cope with death and dying. She is an ordained interfaith minister with a master’s degree in theology, and this article includes excerpts from her forthcoming non-fiction book on spirituality in a post-religious world