A better try at exploring the intangible
We took a walk in the neighborhood, acting like the lovebirds we are. The breeze wafted across our faces carrying January’s heat off the tarmac. Two cones of icecream hovered in the horizon, promising sweetness and delight. Vanilla snow draped in chocolate invited the finesse of teeth and tongue, avoiding brain freeze while seeking out the perfect bite. Two laughing women broke me out of my reverie. Were they laughing at me? So what if they were? My gait shifted, an algorithm struggling to anticipate a future without adequate data. I’m 16 again. No, I’m 26. I’m here now and there in the pounding of my anxious heart.
I recently told someone that I felt like I only just stopped feeling like a teenager last year more than halfway through my 20s. It felt wild to confess but, in the spirit of honesty, many of the things which used to bother me about being alive and being in relationship with myself, others, the seen and unseen world have only just ceased to be as painful. Watching a parenting seminar by Marcela Collier, she said something that shifted my perspective: “When we begin a statement with the words, ‘I feel like…,’ we aren’t describing emotions; we’re describing beliefs.” As I thought about it more, I began to wonder at the intertwining of our spirituality ( as in our belief systems as informed by our sacred experiences) and our emotional experiences. Because emotional maturity is a huge beacon of life for me currently, the question came up: If the emotional is spiritual, then is emotional maturity spiritual maturity?
When you grow up in an environment where dogma and religious doctrine take precedence over critical thought, it never really occurs to you to ask what even is spirituality? The way I think of it now, without looking it up, is that spirituality is the framework through which people engage with the unseen world and how this engagement informs the way they interact with the material world and other people. A spiritual framework includes spiritual ideology, spiritual community and spiritual practice; I grew up with Christianity, church, communion, baptism, praying and fasting, as well as mission work and outreach. It grew and enhanced my writing and musical talents. But I also embraced homophobia, purity culture, hypocrisy and deep self-hatred, which overflowed into my interaction with others. This dynamic could be primarily subconscious, but it happens nonetheless, even with people who don’t hold a spirituality affiliated with any organized religion or occult lineage. It is fascinating to me how spirituality isn’t exclusively spiritual, but intertwined with other aspects of being and being with one another. It feels like spirituality is about being a person in the world with other people, and the different frameworks are informed by different sacred (or special) experiences that inform our own.
So that’s what I think spirituality is, but what is emotional maturity? It must be said that emotional maturity is not emotional indifference. I am compelled to think about emotional maturity and love (as defined by M. Scott Peck and brought back to my attention by bell hooks) as near synonymous: “Love is the will to extend one’s self for the purpose of nurturing one’s own or another’s spiritual growth.” If love is the will or the choice or the intention, then I believe emotional maturity to be the capacity or the agency to actually extend oneself. Love is “I want to,” and emotional maturity is “And so I did.” When we experience emotions, we have a mental reaction accompanied by physiological responses. Sustained emotional experiences, metabolized (made conscious) or not, form beliefs. Emotional maturity is the ability one has to be present with their beliefs and emotions such that the resulting behavior is intended for the nurturance of self and/or others.
Love can be present at every level of emotional maturity, but without emotional maturity, love remains a theoretical exercise, I think. In this way, emotional maturity is required for spiritual growth. I could want very badly to practice nonjudgmental listening when a friend shares about a messy romantic situation (love), but I could also struggle with puritanical beliefs about their behavior and patriarchal tendencies. Even noticing this would be emotional maturity; shifting my behavior would be greater emotional maturity. I have begun to feel my spiritual compass turning away from the doctrine I grew up with and reorienting towards Life as a guiding spiritual principle and Love as its origin and ultimate purpose. So, if asked, I would probably say I believe in Life because I have experienced it. And I believe Life exists so we can continually grow as beings of Love from the origin of Love itself. This framework is still in its infancy as I have only a bare ideology without practices and community incorporated, but I’m excited to see how we two mature.
If emotional maturity is the capacity required to nurture spiritual growth, I imagine that emotional maturity is not exactly 1:1 equal with spiritual maturity. But, they depend on one another and inform one another’s progress. Without the space to understand why I behave the way I behave, to practice being my own compassionate witness, and change or remain the same, the presence of will to nurture myself or someone else doesn’t impact my situation. But when I can take a step back to be with myself, it enhances the way I will be able to show up for someone else. So I’m appearing as someone different, having laid my teenagehood to rest, now experiencing an initiation into a new way of being. What is that going to look like? How will it feel? What new things will I grow to believe? I wander. I wonder.
Your support is emotionally and spiritually nourishing! Please share this with a friend. And if you’re feeling generous, and resourced — buy me a very small car.
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