Spirituality Is Not a Videogame
“Logain: “I can hear them when I channel. All of them. Whispers of a thousand Dragons, a thousand lives I’ve lead. They’re teaching me how to do better this time. Isn’t this why the Wheel turns our spirits out again and again — to learn?“
Moiraine: “The Wheel doesn’t want anything. It can’t. Anymore than the river, or rain can want something. It’s people who want.“
— The Wheel of Time TV series, Episode 4
There are some real clichés in spiritualism.
I read an article today by Kat Medium, who believes that the purpose of reincarnation is to “level up”. She said: “We’re here to learn, grow and improve as human beings. Once we grasp all those lessons and evolve enough, we get to skip the whole flesh-n-blood, ‘physical shell’ thing”.
In her view, physical existence, life itself, is a test. One that can be passed. Transcended. Moved beyond. One gets the impression, reading her article, that the purpose of life is to escape it.
This is an idea that comes up again and again in many spiritual practices and allegories. Ancient Egyptians saw their lives as brief auditions for eternal afterlife. Christians believe their physical state is “fallen” from the state of divine grace to which they may return after death. Many Hindus and Buddhists see the goal of spiritual enlightenment as finding a way to break free from samsara, the cycle of physical existence.
Even in modern movies and TV we see these ideas. “Escaping the Matrix” is a common metaphor used in spiritual circles today. In The Wheel of Time TV series characters debate why reincarnation takes place. Some believe there is a “purpose” to it all, some end goal in mind. Others believe that the only way to escape suffering is to “break the wheel” and end samsara for good.
Again and again we see the belief that in order to become enlightened, one must change something about themselves or about the world. And that doing so will allow them to “level up”, break free, ascend, or otherwise escape the mundane prison of life itself.
As Kat Medium said in her article:
“I was genuinely hoping I’d make the grade this time out. I really thought I might stand a chance of progressing to the next level, spiritually speaking… Doesn’t all that count for something? Shouldn’t that go towards bonus points or extra credit? Oy veh, what’s it going to take before I can count myself as being spiritually “evolved?””
But what if actually there was nothing to “win”? What if the point of spirituality was to realise that the present, the now, samsara — IS nirvana? That you can’t run from where you are? You will always be exactly here, now. Where ever now is (it’s always shifting).
This is not to say that changing is bad. The essence of life is change. You are always changing, from one moment to the next, and you can guide your own changes to a certain extent. But enlightenment is not something you unlock once you’ve progressed past a certain “level” in spirituality.
And yet this idea persists. Why?
“You see, because we are brought up in a social scheme whereby we have to deserve what we get and the price that one pays for all good things is suffering. And people love to boast about how much they’ve suffered…” — Alan Watts, The World as Self
According to Alan Watts, most people believe that in order to get something they want, they need to suffer for it sufficiently. This is where the “video game” idea of spiritual “levelling” comes in. It’s a subconscious postponement of enlightenment.
But why would someone postpone their own enlightenment? There are two main reasons:
- Firstly, because society has programmed us to believe that because hard work leads to success in capitalism, anything good needs to be “worked for” and the greater the good, the harder the work. This belief also been perpetuated by religious gatekeepers who have a vested interest in making laypeople believe spiritual authority is difficult to attain. After all, if everyone could be enlightened without going through long arduous processes, priests and gurus would no longer be special and command authority and privilege.
- Secondly, society has told us since birth that we shouldn’t have too great an opinion of ourselves. We should be humble. “The world doesn’t revolve around us”. And since the realisation of enlightenment is the fully embodied certainty that “I am God/Atman/the Universe” the mind often resists it due to the feeling that such a belief is “vain” or “narcissistic”.
“Supposing that I say to you: “each one of you is really the Great Self”.
And you say “well all you’ve said up to now makes me fairly sympathetic to this intellectually. But I don’t really feel it. What must I do to feel it really?”
My answer to you is this: “you ask me that question because you don’t want to feel it really. You’re frightened of it. And therefore what you’re going to do is you’re going to get a method of practice so that you can put it off. So that I can say well I can be a long time on the way to getting this thing. And then maybe I’ll be worthy of it, after I have suffered enough.”” — Alan Watts, The World As Self
You’re not alive to learn something SO THAT you can move to “the next level”. You’re alive as an expression of Existence Experiencing Itself. That’s all. That’s everything. You don’t have to run from it. It’s freeing. It’s beautiful. You are enough (and you always were, and always will be). You are everything. You are not just this life, or the lives you remember. You are ALL LIFE. You are existence itself. And how can you make “existence itself” more glorious and wondrous than it already is and already becoming? When it is Supreme Be-ing? And that’s you?
Reincarnation happens as the constant refreshing and renewing and changing of existence and experience. It’s not “for” anything. Is evolution of life “for” anything? Is the expansion of the universe “for” anything? No. It doesn’t have to be “for” anything. It IS. And that is freedom.
Enlightenment is not transcending the world, but realising that you ARE the world, the universe — you are seamless with the present moment.
“When this kind of experience happens you discover that what you are is no longer this sort of isolated centre of action and experience locked up in your skin. (…) And when you see clearly that it isn’t there, you have a new sense of identity. And you realize that what you are is as I said, the whole world of nature doing this.” — Alan Watts, Eco-Zen
