Spirituality and God: It’s About Being Open.
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We are spiritual beings, and spirituality is a personal quest that enables us to make sense of our experience, seek refuge in hard times, and feel connected to something greater that ourselves… it humbles us.
I was raised Catholic in an all-girls school following the long tradition in my family, which probably started with my great grandmother, but expanded to my grandma being raised in a boarding school with nuns, and landed on my mother who also attended my school. By the time I went there, some nuns remained at the top of the hierarchy, but there were also male teachers and a male priest.
We had mass every Wednesday and learned all the church anthems, leading to our first communion at the age of 8, where we all involuntarily made a vow to a Catholic doctrine.
As I reached the age 13, I had my first menstrual period, and after my parents’ divorce that year, I began to question a lot of things, including expectations around being a young woman at the tender age of 13. I still wanted to go trick-or-treating and play with my dolls, and was somewhat puzzled about all the things that were expected from me now.
My first interests towards spirituality manifested around those years too. I was very drawn to the fairy realm by the movie Thumbelina at the age of 8, and was also curious about astrology.
As I turned 18, when I was expected to confirm to the Catholic faith, I found myself undecided about wanting to befriend a punishing God whose main scriptures diminished and scrutinized women up to the point of calling the prophetess Mary Magdalene a prostitute. The idea of inherited sin didn’t resonate with me, as with my parents’ fallout, I began to question divine justice altogether.
I didn’t confirm, and instead, I went on a quest unknowingly where I would eventually find the type of spirituality that worked for me.
During high school, I found myself fascinated by ancient cultures and rites, but it was philosophy and Greek mythology that really dug a greater depth into my yearnings, finding connection through embracing multiple deities, each one with a specific function, very much like the angels of God.
A few years later, I found myself enthralled by concepts of a metaphysical nature, inclined to learn more about paganism and living in harmony with oneself, the earth, and everything that surrounds us. Shortly after, I crafted my blog at the time — Between the goddess and the demoness — the struggle I felt between two opposing forces inside of me: one that fought for love and the other one who fought for truth.
Years later, it became clear to me that that struggle was none other than my masculine energy within battling with my feminine energy within, which both held different proportions, but that made me whole, one led me to surrender and the other one to action (Divine Feminine and Sacred Masculine).
As I learned about yoga and meditation, I also took on inspiration from Ganesha, Lakshmi and my deity Saraswati (the Indian goddess of wisdom and the arts), grasping better the polar (whole nature) of each devi like Kali (the goddess of destruction) and validating what I had written in the preceding years.
Once again, I understood that balance meant understanding the polarity and then striving for the middle ground, and just like the mightiest angel (Archangel Michael) holds a sword, different divine forces adopt certain traits for different scenarios. Spirituality is not just peace, love and positivity, it is also justice, service, integrity, compassion and truth.
And truth, well, it has many layers and forms, and there is a truth for every level of consciousness, which is why sometimes when you hear something you know nothing about, a light flickers inside of you because it resonates — it’s a code rather, and it becomes active then to your conscious awareness of something you knew but forgot when you landed here on Earth.
Nowadays, my spirituality looks like a miscellany of all of my experiences. I still create my sacred space wherever I live with whatever I have: deities, pictures, candles, incense, crystals, amulets, whatever is more appropriate for the time, and it has become less elaborate and more intentional than in my earlier years of spiritual seeking.
I embrace the healing power of essential oils, I spend time in nature and with animals, napping, and my main incentive is service and kindness. I don’t believe in becoming hardened after your battles, and healing is more about becoming childlike and less conditioned by your adult self’s past failures and fears.
I also enjoy sharing with different cultures as well as strengthening the rites with those who are similar to me, and ultimately, spirituality is about being open. I find many modalities start losing effect after a while because we become active in our own gifts and no longer need the amulet and the code to tap into God or Source, nor the church, nor the elaborate sacrificial creed.
We go with the flow, and if it doesn’t feel right, we don’t embrace it. That doesn’t mean we go around killing people’s God for them, doesn’t matter if they believe in a Zeus-like God or in a lizard.
It’s important to understand that deep down, spirituality is not a one-size shoe that fits everyone the same. What’s a positive trait for one religion becomes evil in another, and so forth. We carry on with outdated conditioning that is not tailored to our unique selves, rather it is a channel that allows us to establish life as sacred with little special routines.
We have since ancient times been seeking an understanding of our human existence, and with that, we have tapped into the universe via religion, nature, community and physical practices like fasting, meditation, prayer, etc. There are guidelines from our ancestors to help us tap into the stream of life around us called God.
However, with these practices, we are simply seeking connection, and that is why, above all, spirituality has to be personal, handcrafted and revisited when some aspects feel outgrown or irrelevant.
And as we each embrace our individual journeys, we may just get to the code of unconditional love that animals portray so effortlessly and be able to care for our world with gratitude and see God in each other’s eyes, no longer believing but knowing that (S)he, Source, God, Goddess is here manifest all around, in the birds and the trees, and in each other.
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Laura Piquero is the Queen of Duality, a writer, artist, creative coach and wellness advocate with an emphasis on self-healing and self-transformation, through the process of awakening and honoring our deepest emotions (both light and shadow aspects). You could follow her on Instagram, and find her book, Starseed Recall on Being Human (on accelerated spiritual awakening), on Amazon.
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