What Does Spiritual Bypassing Mean

Spiritual bypassing is a technique for concealing one's identity behind spirituality or spiritual pursuits. It inhibits people from expressing their emotions and isolates them from both themselves and others. Following are some examples of spiritual bypassing:

• To conceal from insecurities, you can believe in your own spiritual superiority.
• Believing that tragic occurrences must serve as “learning experiences” or that every negative experience has a silver lining
• Believing that spiritual practices like meditation and prayer are always beneficial.

Spiritual bypassing is a flimsy means of avoiding problems, which may make us feel better in the short term but ultimately solves nothing and leaves the situation unsolved.

How do you know if you are spiritual bypassing?

I've learned the significance of compassion for myself as well as those that present themselves as problems after visiting multiple spiritual retreats and meeting many leaders in the industry. “You never know how others feel unless you walk in their shoes,” my father used to say, and his old-fashioned wisdom still rings true three decades later.

• Not paying attention to the present moment; spending a lot of time in a spiritual dimension.

What is emotional bypassing?

“Positive vibrations alone,” “Your thoughts generate your sorrow,” and “Let go of feelings that do not serve you” are examples of this.

These “keep positive” messages became suffocating rather than uplifting as I grew more involved in the wellness community. When I shared my issue or found myself feeling guilty or ashamed about experiencing bad feelings, I began to feel rejected. As a result, I began to disregard myself and the messages my emotions were sending me.

I began to accept the idea that some feelings, such as joy, compassion, happiness, and thankfulness, should be encouraged and nurtured, while others, such as anger, grief, jealously, or sadness, should be ignored, “transmuted” into positive emotions, or rejected outright.

Since “your thoughts generate your suffering,” it's safe to assume that thinking about, acknowledging, or exploring these difficult feelings will only make your anguish worse.

While observing and then replacing negative, critical, or unrealistic thoughts can be extremely beneficial (and is, in fact, the foundation of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy), it must be done after fully processing the emotions associated with those negative thoughts, as well as practicing radical self-acceptance and compassion.

All emotions are simply data indicating that there is a problem that needs to be addressed. We miss out on a wealth of opportunities for increased self-awareness when we ignore, avoid, or try to “fix” our more unpleasant feelings.

Encouragement to avoid uncomfortable emotions in the goal of perpetual happiness is not only unachievable, but it can also be harmful. We can delve into our full humanity when we allow space for processing and sitting with weight.

Who coined the phrase spiritual bypassing?

Spiritual bypassing is a term coined by clinical psychologist John Welwood in the early 1980s to describe the process of avoiding serious psychological concerns by utilizing explanations of enlightenment or catchall sentiments. “It's a tendency to exploit spiritual concepts and practices to avoid confronting unresolved emotional issues, psychological traumas, and unfinished developmental responsibilities,” Welwood writes in Toward a Psychology of Awakening, published in 2000. “Essentially, it's denying or suppressing one's basic wants or feelings, which may be painful, and finding meaning via spirituality,” says therapist and mental health advocate Liz Beecroft.

What is toxic spirituality?

The solution is far more straightforward than you might think. You are practicing toxic spirituality if you believe that you must always be positive and that anything negative is wrong.

What makes this notion so dangerous is that it prevents us from learning and growing by suppressing positive emotions.

Each of our feelings has information. This information is neither good nor bad; it is simply that.

Emotions Inform Us

When you have anxiety, for example, you are not a bad person or doing something wrong. Anxiety is trying to tell you something.

It could be a sign that you need to leave the house a few minutes earlier than usual since you dislike traffic. You escape traffic and, as a result, are less likely to develop road rage if you leave the house a few minutes early.

And no amount of meditation or prayer will alleviate the stress. It will almost certainly stay until you have learned the lesson and have left a few minutes early.

When you ignore or fail to gain information from your emotions because you've suppressed them for the sake of being “positive,” you'll either be stuck in your current circumstance or, worse, start self-medicating.

This belief that you must be positive at all times is harmful to your spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical well-being.

How do you know if you are a spiritual person?

The first evidence of a spiritual person is their lack of fear. When you have a fear or a chronic worry, that fear takes over your life and you are unable to be in the present moment. Fear of public speaking, fear of heights, and fear of bugs are the three most common fears among Americans. Many people, however, are terrified of death, rejection, loneliness, failure, illness, or making poor judgments. Spiritual people understand how to yield to forces beyond their control. In this way, they are similar to children in that they know how to ignore their minds and live fearlessly.

What is spiritual trauma?

Spiritual trauma is the result of a person's reaction to a belief system that dismisses and degrades them on behalf of a deity or a set of deities. More information can be found here. Christians are frequently encouraged to recruit for their religion, and losing a Christian friend or family member can be devastating.

Unfortunately, the desire to “reach” to the “lost” and the desperate need to reclaim lost territory with the emergence of the “nones” sometimes lead well-intentioned Christians to say hurtful things to those who have already been terribly hurt by the tradition. Words are important to someone who is just beginning to break free from destructive thinking habits. Here are some of my thoughts.

Is spirituality a defense mechanism?

There are so many claims out there that this route or that practice will allow you to live in a state of eternal pleasure while accomplishing all of your goals and becoming wealthy and slim in the process. Who wouldn't want that?

Over the years, I've become fascinated by how we try to feel wonderful all of the time. We've gotten better at using alternative means to alter our awareness, such as self-help literature, meditation, yoga, prayer, and special diets, rather than using drugs or alcohol. We are now spiritually distracting ourselves from our sentiments in certain respects, but we believe we are on a healthy spiritual road.

This is referred to as spiritual bypass. A protective mechanism is spiritual bypass. The defense is more attractive than other defenses, yet it fulfills the same goal. Spiritual bypass protects us from the reality, separates us from our emotions, and allows us to avoid seeing the big picture. It's more about checking out than checking in, and the distinction is so subtle that we often don't realize we're doing it.

Grasping rather than thankfulness, arriving rather than being, avoiding rather than receiving are all shorthand for spiritual bypass. It's spiritual practice used to suppress feelings, mainly because we can't stand how we're feeling or believe we shouldn't be feeling how we're feeling.

Almost every good activity we can do for ourselves, including spiritual practice, has a negative side. In a “willful” fashion, any spiritual or psychological instrument can be applied. Self-care, for example, can sometimes be about taking care of ourselves: unplugging from too much work and reconnecting with more balance and harmony. But, sometimes, we're just checking out under the pretext of self-care, rejecting what's going on and how frightening it is to show up for life.

What is spiritual bypassing in yoga?

This is referred to as “spiritual bypassing” by woke people. When we employ metaphysical conceptions like God or universal awareness to avoid dealing with difficult real-world concerns or unpleasant emotions, we are engaging in spiritual bypassing. Of course, activities that keep the body and mind healthy are more vital than ever right now, but they should be used to help us cope with reality rather than pretending that we are all one type of divine creature capable of magically transcending the realities of racism. What matters most right now is having the bravery and determination to make a difference in the world. Yoga can help, but only if you're devoted to something bigger than yourself.

Yoga and meditation can help you relax, which can help you become more resilient as an activist. However, these practices cannot replace taking decisive action for social change, and I feel it is every yoga teacher's dharma, or duty, to remind their students of this. Why? Because the wellness business is frighteningly white-dominated, and many white people are currently straddling the perilous line between realizing they are racists and becoming antiracists. Who else is going to do it if a revered teacher doesn't lovingly ask them to lean into their discomfort?