we. Faith and knowledge
- Interviews 2009-2010
- i. Background and relationships
- ii. Ideological residence and practice
- iii. Fate and laws of life
- iv. God or a larger, ordering entity
- v. Health, ill-health and care
- we. Faith and knowledge
- vii. Future visions and goals
- Summary i-vii
"I'm not a believer, you can't tell. But what am I?”
What the interviewees say about how they view natural science and the church. What the interviewees say about knowledge and belief. What the interviewees say about alternative paths to knowledge or certainty.
Science and academia
The older scientific paradigm is atheistic and materialistic. This is limited and needs to be expanded, rather than replaced, with the perspectives represented by the new spirituality.
Am I the result of activities in the brain as science claims. For me, it's… I can't accept that explanation. There is no basis for that explanation. There are no activities in the brain that create the self. But I see it the other way around, as the self... through the self is expressed... The self expresses itself through the activities in the brain.
Being a scientist does not have to be at odds with having a spiritual interest. And conversely: Atheism is in fact a dogma. The scientist Isaac Newton, for example, was open to the occult and deeply religious, while also being a scientist. In his time, the individual risked being burned at the stake if he did not believe in God, while today it is the opposite, metaphorically speaking, points out one respondent.
One of the interviewees says that Western philosophy does not have much to offer and that it even opposes the search for the answers to the really important questions: "Western philosophy always wants to pull down. It doesn't want to know the big questions... Prove that they are pointless or uninteresting, or misconceptions or something like that. That's what they've been doing since the Enlightenment roughly." At the same time, the new spirituality would also have something to gain from a meeting and collaboration:
Many in the new age, perhaps with good reasons, reject the academic world as a rather dead institution. They sit and carry on with their extremely advanced but lifeless teachings that say nothing about life, and have nothing to give to man in any deeper sense, but only carry on with their stubborn theories. But I still think that's the way we have to go. I don't want a saber... so, someone like this who says that no we shouldn't engage in critical thinking, but just blurt it out. But it has to go into... It's there, actually, I still think that the academic world is God's tool to clear thoughts from garbage. And it will take time. But it has to go in there. And it has to get out of there. I find it very difficult to accept those who seem to want to reject the academic. We must dare to put it to the test, and be prepared for it.
Respondents' interest in physics, astronomy, etc
The majority of respondents also touch on aspects of conventional natural science that interest them, such as physics and astronomy. Steven Hawkins is mentioned with appreciation, so is Albert Einstein. About Einstein, it is emphasized that he was a believer:
For example, this summer I read Stephen Hawkins. He has written one or two popular science books where he talks about the universe, and about black holes, and the stars and everything, in a very exciting way. And what repeats where repeats also in this spiritual reasoning, somehow. I feel like I'm finding evidence for that, so Einstein, for example, believed in God and the creator and stuff like that. Yes, it is very interesting indeed. A lot of this that people have denied... Or a lot, now it sounds like I know and know everything, but... There is probably a possibility, I think, that... Or at least there will be evidence for, or researched, on something way.
References to the vastness of space often appear in the interviewees' description of their spiritual interest and the understanding this has given them:
If you start thinking about our smallness, it's so breathtaking if you think about the universe and how pitiful... if the universe is 7,5 billion years old, and we live for 75 years, so it's like nothing, it's just so laughable , it's not even a drop in the ocean either.
One of the interviewees has recently seen a picture of the Crab Nebula on the internet. Reminders of the size of the universe make things like spiritual levels of development and forms of existence feel less improbable:
And I rolled up that picture and looked at it... So it's only a fraction fraction of the universe... Which is so unimaginably large and complex... So I thought, what the hell is all this for? Here we sit and think and so... It must be much more than we can even imagine. Then there must also be levels of development that are both lower than ours and higher than where.
This connection between the expansive perspective of the new spirituality and astronomy can also be dizzying in a painful way:
So, it depends on how seriously you place your worldview. Reincarnation and karma... if you really want to take it seriously, it turns the entire cosmos upside down... And it's quite a heavy piece, to work with purely mentally. Then what kind of world do I live in, including galaxies and stars and such.
Scientific terminology
Many words and concepts that appear in the interview responses have a rational or scientific sound: laws, principles (as in "the killing principle"), working hypothesis, frequencies, geometry, scales, systems, energies, light, perspective, atoms, conclusion, logic, synchronicity, talent cores, fractals, holograms, dimensions, chemistry ("chemistry of thoughts"), resonances, e.g. The fact that we revisit loved ones life after life works like a "radio transmitter and receiver". One respondent says, referring to a phenomenon that natural science has so far neglected, that "one must never despise empiricism". Talents and qualities we ourselves bring with us into the new life. This can be seen as our own "spiritual DNA": "It is something that you take with you. So it is… what should you call it… a kind of psychic DNA, or spiritual DNA, whatever you want to call it.” Past-life memories that are experienced as explaining problems in this life can also be "metaphors". The answers and explanations that come with the new spirituality can be used as a working hypothesis:
There's too much that just can't be ignored, I think. In any case, you can take it as a working hypothesis, if you are now working according to scientific research methods, then you can have it as a working hypothesis. It can explain a great deal of what otherwise cannot be explained.
However, such a spiritual working hypothesis can be difficult to abandon when deviant data become known, admits one of the respondents: "Every deviation from the first working hypothesis you adopt is very difficult to deal with."
Religion and the church
Even religion is an outdated paradigm. Christianity has had a mission to fulfill, during a period when people had no ability to absorb more advanced answers to the big questions. However, new discoveries, in e.g. quantum physics, have made old explanations insufficient and the questions call for other answers. The church and its representatives find it difficult to answer certain questions people bring up or to explain certain phenomena. They like to claim that God's ways are inscrutable, which is not correct from a neo-spiritual perspective.
All in all, the criticism against the church's teaching is that this teaching is simplified. Christianity feels too narrow and cramped. Starting to take an interest in the new spiritual worldview can be compared to "getting out of the box". Throughout history, religion has been the basis for many wars, dictatorships and other kinds of systems that oppressed people, which shows that religion is also a potentially very dangerous phenomenon.
An originally pure impulse may have become distorted over the years:
When a spiritual impulse like this comes and then eventually becomes a world religion, it is a person who presents his teachings to disciples or followers then in a rather pure way... and then gradually it becomes in history it becomes so to speak maybe a little watered down.
The church's rituals are described as outdated: "In general, I have a very hard time with this formalized, all these rituals. It feels very mossy and old-fashioned to me.” "For me, the church has been very marked by DEBT and... that boring piece of sin, very much like that." Priests can be too busy with what they want to say and insensitive to how churchgoers perceive it: “Skip this sin and forgiveness and trash, and then actually talk about life and love, and where we're going and what we're going to do think about."
One of the respondents describes how her image of Jesus has changed:
Yes, I have never had any relationship with Jesus, because I have thought that he... well, it was too painful, and too much sin and guilt, somehow, associated with it... But then... And then I felt so strongly that he was actually there nearby, he WAS there with me, in a way. And then I just felt so liberated by it.
One of the respondents describes herself as very religious, but says she has never felt at home in church. She grew up in a Christian family and during her upbringing was very involved in church activities. But eventually she got tired of the intrigues and, for example, of the resistance that existed against female priests. She perceived this as "insanely petty". The Church of Sweden's narrow view of homosexuality caused another of the interviewees to request withdrawal from it. This approach was perceived as such a big thinking error that the interviewee no longer wanted to be part of this or contribute with their tax money. The same respondent sees the fact that the Church of Sweden has now re-evaluated the view on homosexuality and allows same-sex marriage as a development in the right direction.
Several of the respondents highlight things they appreciate about the church, for example the music and the silence. The church room itself is described as an oasis, beautiful and peaceful. In a congregation you can also experience community. The church as an institution still has an important function to fulfill in society. An example of this is how it can gather people after a major accident or disaster. The church is a good forum, an institution that people need, after all. However, it is required that the priests update themselves, and acquire an understanding of the new spiritual perspectives. There are also good priests, who, for example, have begun to question the doctrine of sin. The church can function as an oasis, for example when there has been a disaster:
If there is an accident, a disaster, then you go to church. In a way, it gives the people security, in a way, and it's quiet, and it's nice, and it's beautiful, and peaceful. And I think we need an oasis like that somewhere. But it's clear then there shouldn't be a priest who stands and grinds like that.
The church has also changed over time. It has had to give up its absolute claims that the Bible is the word of God. This is to "join the intellectual game". Being able to live in a country that is as secular as Sweden is seen as something positive.
The Bible
The Bible has been corrupted throughout history. Above all, it is the Catholic Church that bears the responsibility for this. The church has edited what should be included in Jesus' teaching. The reason for this has been that they wanted to guard their own power, to reserve the right to issue letters of indulgence, etc. Another motive has been to perpetuate a patriarchal order. There are other gospels, including one written by a woman, which have been hidden. An important, alternative gospel is the Gospel of Thomas, which was found as early as the 1940s, but then hidden away by the Catholic Church for forty years. What is so uncomfortable about this particular gospel is that it says nothing about sin. In the Gospel of Thomas, the focus is instead on love. Sin is something that the men of the church invented to keep the people in check:
THAT has actually been researched, that there are other gospels that tell other things. Thomas, there is, of course, and then there is also a woman who has written in a different way. But the Catholic Church has wanted to keep this patriarchal way of thinking, where women were made invisible and full of sin /laughs/.
And it was only in the 80s that this was published, so for forty years the church kept them hidden, because they didn't want it to come out [Me: Why not then] No, it overturns the church's power [Me: In what way] Yes... the Bible has been rewritten many, many times by the church. Yes… there is no sin… for example. And the church lives on it quite well. And now it is time for the church to perhaps also move on. And the churches are empty. Why are they? Well, because they have nothing to give.
One respondent believes that what is written in the Bible may have been arranged or adapted right from the start: "Yes, and it has had its function. What would Jesus have done for the people of that time. They didn't have our concepts like we have today, so the religion has been adapted for those who embraced it."
But the Bible is or may have also been a source of inspiration for the respondents. Several of them tell us that for a period of time they read it carefully, especially the New Testament. One of the respondents was influenced during his confirmation above all by the Gospels. However, he thought even then that these were treated in a superficial way in the teaching. The Bible feels dead, states another interviewee, it does not speak to her at all.
Jesus, etc
The portal figures within the major world religions, Buddha, Moses, and especially Jesus, are mentioned in many places and with respect: "Yes, someone understood what this is all about." At the same time, Jesus was an ordinary person, parallel to the fact that he performed miracles, one of the respondents points out. This is presented convincingly in a book by the author Marianne Fredriksson:
Marianne Fredriksson has written an exciting book about Maria Magdalena. It is worth reading. It is about yes that Jesus actually yes that he was an ordinary man. He had a family and he was... He did all these fantastic things too, but... So the church, and yes the Catholic Church above all, has sort of chosen what should be in the Bible, and pretty much it according to their own, yes...
The image of Jesus has several facets:
He doesn't judge anyone. He cares, even if they are miserable and thieves and bandits, so he doesn't judge, but actually engages with everyone. Then he bangs his fist on the table. What was it... the moons in the temple, or what was it... wasn't it like... a trading post, or something like that huh. Then he got pissed off. So that he reacts and acts as well, when people don't do what they should do.
Religious terminology
The interviewees show a great interest in theological questions. Christianity is not infrequently attacked with rational arguments, for example the interpretation of Christ's death on the cross, or the perception of sin or guilt. There are many expressions from the Bible in the interview answers: To treat others as you yourself want to be treated; The Law of Sowing and Reaping; To turn the other cheek; It is in him that we move and have our being, as well as: He who has will have, and he who does not have must also get rid of what he does not have. Speaking of the personal relationship with God, an interviewee refers to "this Augustine matter", and in a discussion about esotericism and exotericism, it is mentioned that Paul should have made a difference between "giving milk and giving meat".
One of the respondents highlights the Christian expression "The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom", which he believes has a lot in it. However, he emphasizes that this is an odd opinion for someone who has an interest in new spirituality: "Yes, this that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom beginning, I'm low on that when I'm in new-age circles. It's the kind of thing that the new age wants... The first is that it belongs to the old, the old age."
A new paradigm
This spirituality that the interviewees embrace implies a new paradigm for how reality can be understood. This paradigm will gradually gain greater and greater influence and eventually replace the prevailing religious, scientific and, for example, psychological paradigms. The neo-spiritual worldview offers explanations for things that the older paradigms face without understanding, need to resort to more far-fetched hypotheses to explain, or for which they claim that there is not even an explanation for. New spirituality has great explanatory potential: "You see everything in a big process and you see a fairly clear map of how it works." However, not many are yet ready to embrace this new paradigm.
The transition to the new paradigm will take place on the day when natural science discovers and recognizes the existence of "higher types of matter", i.e. the spiritual aspect of existence, this which makes telepathy, etc., possible. Two hundred years ago, microorganisms were seen as "metaphysics", today this has become "mainstream". Normal science is about to make a similar discovery again. Natural science is not entirely wrong, it is more about the context in which its findings and observations are placed. Here the new spirituality can be helpful, a step on the way, to be able to see things in a new light. One of the respondents likens the new spirituality to a crutch, for the time being:
Yes, now if materialism is not true, then what is it that exists in the rest, is there beyond... I don't think we need to abandon any of the scientific... facts... but only the context in which we insert them, we have to expand. And then the question is just like, well okay then what is the bigger context, and that's like THE QUESTION. And these answer options that you can find in the new age, they are good because they help us... well, maybe it could be like this, yes, maybe I can hold on to this for a while, waiting for something better, or like... They give us a little support on the way, a crutch.
How conventional psychology views an individual's development is in principle correct. However, this needs to include past lives to understand the full background. New spirituality is also not in opposition to the usual theory of evolution. This is also true in principle. What eludes the usual theory of evolution, however, is that it is the same individuals who are born again and again, who make experiences and develop. Not only the individual develops, but all of humanity. Yes, in fact all life, even the plants, will evolve and eventually become humans. One of the respondents believes that it is possible to see "evolution itself as God's work... What is going on is a transformation... of us, from animals to humans".
The thoughts that exist within the new spirituality, about a collective unconscious, etc., may one day be supported by mainstream science as well:
But today... if you do as some new ageers do, they interpret, for example, quantum physics or things like this, or Jung for that matter, in... So there are a lot of opportunities to bring in things like this, like that consciousness maybe for example is collective, or there is a subconscious collective and things like that. So I think that the natural sciences will hopefully one day be able to study things like this in a more non-materialistic way, or that departs a little from the classical perspective, that you are just a biological apparatus.
The older paradigms live on in part because we got used to seeing the world in a certain way:
Because we always have these glasses on, and they are our... all our... Beliefs, huh... There is no good Swedish word. But it's as Set says... These beliefs are like molds that we create, and then we mold reality into that mold. So we don't really see what's here. Because really, this is just energy, everything, but we... You know how the brain interprets... and then we have all our learned... all our imprinting, culture, everything... After all, we are actually wearing enormous glasses.
There are researchers with a new spiritual understanding who will be able to make important contributions to conventional science, for example to physics. One of the respondents mentions a researcher with his own laboratory in the USA who will possibly succeed in formulating the "unity theory" that has eluded physicists for so long:
And there are those who believe that, yes, he is right, and then he can become the Einstein of the 2000st century. Because then he has continued... Because Einstein didn't quite finish. They haven't got it together... Einstein himself didn't believe in quantum physics. Because it does not go together with the theory of relativity. And yet it's the same world. Our little world, it is made of this big thing. All our atoms are in everything, right?
Absolute truths
Humanity needs to come back to the "absolute truths", says one respondent:
Basically, I don't think we'll get out of it. We must dare to look for absolute truths, in order to be able to have something to go on. All approaches are equally good, they say in postmodernism. Yes, except for the view that all views are equally good, because it is better. And you can't get out of knots like that until you dare to imagine absolute truths.
The major world religions have the same core, they all come from a kind of "primordial religion" that existed at an early stage. People who become "enlightened" get an insight into this core and what they write and say is therefore largely consistent, even if they formulate it in different ways. The neo-spiritual worldview is a representative of this original religion. In the future, all people will embrace this view of life. "Because some would say that, but you are comparing world religions that cannot be compared at all. There is nothing in common between Buddha and Christ, and then I mean it does.” However, starting to search for the absolute truths can be dangerous, or at least their application can be. Yet this is where humanity needs to go:
And have you once dared to get to the bottom of the fact that, okay, we're looking for something absolute, but we don't feel it... it's also a certain relaxation, as it were, in the soul. Then you can get out of this relative... Relative knowledge is a little convenient, but also always a little... yes, but then what is really true. If you then dare to rest in ignorance of the absolute, then you still have some kind of... Okay, I don't know what is absolutely true, but it has to be SOMETHING... That there are things we don't know, you should be able to live with that.
With postmodernism, the big ideas, the total ideologies, have perished. This is a sign of the times we live in right now. One respondent points out that he sees things like liberalism and pluralism positively, but that he nevertheless hopes and believes in a renaissance for a more coherent idea of life. These absolute truths are actually simple:
I think some of these truths are very simple. I think they exist today, but we have difficulty verbalizing them. I think there is something in that that it is better to forgive than to take revenge. We can't really… It has to be put into context, and do a lot of it, but some simple stuff I think we have… is on track, already there. I don't just think it's some distant mystery. And I think that a lot of it is part of general human knowledge in some way, but we have a very hard time putting it into good words.
The new spirituality's view of reality is very positive. This is described as "an unreserved positive perspective".
Faith and knowledge
Traditional religiosity or faith differs from new spirituality in several ways. Faith is associated with the fact that the person does not question, does not think for himself, but only accepts what authorities say, in contrast to those interested in the new spirituality who need logical reasoning to be able to accept a statement. The new spirituality can be rationally understood. Instead of just accepting certain dogmas, it is possible to examine for yourself what new spiritual writers and teachers claim to be true.
What can make someone become a believer is a lack of security: "You are insecure in yourself, and so you look for security in the outside... Many want fixed rules like this from the Bible, the Koran, or whatever you want... They NEED it. But I think it's because the internal structure is not that strong.”
Even if the religion teaches about certain supernatural things, the believer is often satisfied with these and considers other things, for example some that the new spirituality includes, as strange or improbable. This is because it is not mentioned in the Bible and cannot be "squeezed into this old thing". Examples of things that Christians tend not to believe in are "out-of-body" experiences. However, being so faithful to a limited system of thought can have a price for the believer, who runs the risk of becoming a divided person. The future may bring with it some new discoveries that the believer will then find difficult to integrate into his belief system. It will be most difficult for the most fanatical people who even deny evolution and believe, for example, that dinosaurs roamed this earth a few thousand years ago.
We say that you are then, for example, a Christian, and then it says there and there and there in the Bible that you can't do that... or that doesn't exist, or it's dangerous and so on, then you will start denying what you yourself have experienced. And then you get, like, a split person, it doesn't become a whole person, because then you have to be faithful to your old system. But you yourself have experienced something that goes outside the box, and you can't squeeze that into this old thing. And if you are then not prepared to give up your old structures, so to speak, but want to sit within that framework, then you are free, because all people should be free as well. But at the same time how can you grow, as men... in the soul then. Because then you will deny the experience you might have huh.
There are people with profound insights into life that they didn't get through studying, but through a kind of prophetic self-view. These people can speak with great authority on existential and metaphysical matters. They are not like the priests, who only reproduce what is written in the Bible or what they themselves believe and think. Those who, through their own experience, have gained an insight into the biggest perspectives know that it is in a certain way. When you feel confident that a teacher or writer has such profound insight, then you can conclude that what that person says or writes is probably true. This can then become a conviction which, although not based on one's own experiences, is nevertheless fundamentally different from religious faith:
You are religious and go to church and pray to God, and this whole choir, and join the choir and yes, everything they do in church. You live in your own little world, and you believe in God, you believe in Jesus, you believe in what is written in the Bible. But believe, then you just BELIEVE... Martinus for example, he KNOWS. So there is a difference. But I also think I know then, because I trust what Martinus writes. And everything I've read and everything I've done and everything I've experienced indicates more that Martinus is right than what people have in the church, with sin and things like that. So that I think I know, I don't think so, nah.
Since this is a belief that can be confirmed, you cannot doubt the neo-spiritual worldview either. By studying neo-spiritual literature, it is possible to get an experience of coherence, that the statements actually fit together. This is missing in Christian theology, which is perceived to have many "loose threads". The neo-spiritual worldview is perceived as more solid. However, some new spiritual teachings may be more coherent than others.
It also has to do with the fact that it is about FAITH, which is based on... which is based on an assumption with very loose foundations. And in my case, as far as the hylozoic is concerned, it is a belief that... a belief that is based on... that is, assumptions that are based on belief. That to me, this is completely logical. It fits into my worldview, it fits into the natural science education and schooling that I have. And there is really nothing that contradicts this belief, while the Christian faith hangs on incredibly loose threads. It goes against everything, both sense and reason, and science and everything, and then it's not so strange if you have doubts, huh? While here... I mean as I said, somewhere in the beginning, should it turn out that something contradicts these theses, well then I'm prepared to reconsider it of course.
Own experiences of the supernatural also allow the individual to claim that she or he knows, regardless of what others may think or think about this. However, it is understandable that others may doubt or be skeptical of what the individual claims to be true on self-perceived grounds, but this does not have to affect one's own conviction:
Because I have an understanding for people who don't believe in the spiritual and don't believe in spirits, or life before or after, like that... That you can talk to the dead and the spirits and so on... Although it's quite frustrating for me then, who KNOWS it is so.
An interviewee describes a third position, in relation to the neo-spiritual ideas, which is neither faith nor knowledge:
I kind of don't have that kind of FAITH, this is how it is and this is what I believe in at all costs... So that I really have nothing to doubt... If I was wrong, I was right. I'm not really in that kind of situation, but I look at it and it's there, but it's nothing like that vital... This is what I believe, if I was right, if I was wrong. Without that... No, it doesn't EXIST. On the other hand, I can feel... If you... I don't have any sort of addiction to it or what to say.
The search can also be something that the individual has been more or less forced into, via, for example, a life crisis: "I am not a natural searcher, but it was forced by circumstances. And as the circumstances fade, as I said, I have to constantly push myself to keep the search alive." A distinction can be made between being a finder and being a seeker and possibly there are degrees in between:
Although I would probably like to say that I am a seeker more than a finder. I don't have one... I don't want to claim that I HAVE a fixed outlook on life that I believe to be true. And before you might be able to land in some kind of... I haven't landed, I'm not looking for landing... but you might still be able to find some kind of stance in life so... Without having somehow landed that stable.
Skepsis
One of the respondents is interested in so-called conspiracy theories, but she points out that not all of them are to her liking. She distinguishes between those who seem sensible and others who don't: "And then you can always have the skeptic radar on, because I've always had that... so that you can filter out all the crap that, like..." One of the interviewees describes himself as skeptical and questioning and that this is an asset, for example, in socializing with the thoughts and experiences that belong to her spiritual beliefs:
I'm so skeptical. But I also think it's good to be. And I also think that I am because I also have a feeling that I will go quite far in this life. I've done it now, but I'll get even further as I work on it. And I will do it. So it is also good to be skeptical. And be able to question.
One of the respondents emphasizes that he needs his freedom of thought: "I think that has a little to do with my disposition. I want my freedom of thought, I want it, wherever it comes…” This thing about it being possible to channel sometimes comes up against criticism. An interviewee who is interested in one of these "channels" doesn't care much about how things really are: "Then there are theories that it's just her subconscious that's ghosting, and then that it really IS channeling. You can believe what you want about that, but it's interesting to read, it's really interesting isn't it.”
Alternative paths to knowledge or certainty
The interviewees mention several alternative paths to knowledge. For example, it is possible for a person, if the conditions are right, to gain deep insights into existence in a prophetic way. This path to direct knowledge, without going through study, research or experiment, is likened, as mentioned earlier, to that person becoming "enlightened". Such a special ability to perceive is also called "intuition". The knowledge obtained in this way is of a high, pure and complete character and these individuals are self-styled teachers in the spiritual realm because they can see and understand things that ordinary people cannot see or understand. These individuals experience the "result of existence" themselves.
The prerequisites required to become "enlightened" have to do with certain experiences that the person had in previous lives. It is a development issue. It is in the extension of everyone's development to experience this condition. People like Jesus and Buddha were both such "enlightened" people. The difference between this kind of understanding and when you are directed to speculate or research is like comparing human comprehension with that of an animal, or like instead of just being able to weigh and measure the properties of a book, actually being able to read it:
You can sort of analyze the paper, and count the letters, and weigh how much it weighs, and how long and big and all that sort of thing. And get to know a lot about this book, but nothing about what it IS ABOUT. And like this intuition then, it's like the ability to read the LANGUAGE of existence. And then we ourselves will be able to experience the eternal truths, so to speak.
The respondents give many examples of how they themselves were able to get the correctness of the neo-spiritual worldview confirmed for themselves. It is, for example, possible to test the principles that the new spirituality describes in everyday life. In this way, in some cases, a personal certainty is obtained that weighs more heavily than the common perception or what science thinks is possible or true. If, for example, the individual focuses his thought on something he wishes to obtain or achieve and this then materializes, it confirms that there are invisible ways of influencing the world. With the help of a so-called "medium" it is possible to get in touch with a relative who has died. One of the respondents has himself taken a course to develop such a medial ability and through this training received confirmation that the spirit world is real:
And then I trained on one of my student friends then and... It's a man and I think he has white pants, and so... don't know what I said, if I said suspenders or what I said, and I also thought that now I'm out on slippery ice, because one is so unsure of one's self... But whatever it is, she started to cry a lot. Then it's her father, she's absolutely sure it's her father.
It is possible to be invisibly enriched by another person's progress. One of the respondents describes how she captured what her mother went through in another place:
And I also feel that all the work she does generates positive things for me. Because it was like a weekend so... it was like on Sunday or Monday... then I just felt, damn it, something huge has released in me. Just like you can feel if you've been on a decent fucking course, or on a really good healing session, when it's really released stuff. Then you can feel this… really this difference. Aah, damn that's cool. I felt that. What the hell have I done? I haven't done anything, no. I haven't even meditated like, what is that... what is that something. And then the same day, or the day after, I talked to my mother. And then she tells us that she has done the damn thing on earth, and released a huge thing. I just, well, okay. And it's the first time I've really gotten it so really proven that it is. The work she does generates for me too.
Several respondents testify about how they can empathize with situations, and feel compassion for people who are experiencing something difficult, although the respondents themselves have evidently not been close to experiencing anything similar in this life. This is seen as a confirmation that we carry with us experiences from previous existences. One woman describes it this way:
Or like when you watch documentaries about things on TV. Sometimes you can feel... Ohh, I'm really getting started on this. It can be something you have experienced yourself, eh, quite simply. Or that people think, yes, I know that. Like when you visit a city you've already seen, you think. Or something like that. But also that, yes, that... You know how men feel in war. It goes without saying, how it feels to be in the trenches. I know what it's like to be a man and sit in jail and get fucking bullied for being skinny, like. I know all about this.
It is also possible to communicate with animals and to find out how they feel and how they feel about different situations. An interviewee consulted an "animal communicator" to find out why her dog was so anxious. The communicator had then spoken to the dog and was then able to reproduce important parts of the conversation:
Yes, she was alone with N then, in the kitchen at home, and then she wrote down what they talked about and then she read it to me later. I wasn't there then. It was really exciting... Well, anyway, then she told this animal communicator about it, that she didn't like being alone, that she didn't trust me to come back, well, I don't know everything she said. So it was great fun.
"Synchronicity" is meaningful coincidences that cannot be fully explained by probability calculations or common sense. Such coincidences testify that we are more connected to each other than it may seem or what mainstream science claims. Behind certain events, it is possible to sense an invisible planning. Some meetings can be perceived as being meant to happen:
Because I feel guided very much. You meet the people you are supposed to meet, you get the meetings you are supposed to have. It can be... Everything can come to you, for example a book, so that you get a greater understanding of something that you are in right now. All these synchronicities.
That trauma and the like in previous existences can cause symptoms and problems in this life, which can disappear by reliving the original experiences, is a confirmation that these memories and experiences are genuine and that we lived before. Several respondents mention that friends and relatives from previous lives can often be recognized by their eyes when the people meet in the next life. Although the appearance changes, there is something about the individual's gaze that is constant, which can give a strong certainty that it is not the first time you have met that person:
There is a difference when you look in the eyes of living life, than when you look at a photo, right? I had seen him in a photo. And I just said... You, Sune, so I think I know... Because he's into this too... It feels like we've known each other before, I said. Yes, he said. So just… yeah /laughs/ Shit fun. And then it was just like that…
One of the respondents feels lucky as she has already had experiences of things outside the ordinary since childhood:
And then this thing with spirit contact and things like this, I HAVE that in and of itself. So that I am one of the lucky ones here, I say, because my childhood WAS not fun, but on the other hand, my playmates were not the playmates of a human being, but these little people. In the forest or in the garden like I had. And I could even say to those classmates... to impress them then... I could say like this, that your room looks like this and that, even though I've never been there. And they thought it was scary, because I had never been there. I have things like that, so my intuition is very, very strong in this case.
For example, the fact that someone already as a child experienced a strong resistance to eating meat is seen as a sign that these are experiences, or habits, that he has with him from a previous life. This can be understood from the idea that everyone at some point in their development will develop such an aversion to eating meat:
I couldn't be in the kitchen if I saw raw meat, then I left. [Me: Yeah. What do you think about that then] I don't know. I believe I have been a vegetarian in a past life. [Me: Which explains why you] Yes, I have had... Actually, there are a few different things like this... Yes, partly the thing with meat, it was so incredibly clear. And then when I was sixteen, it was such a relief to become a vegetarian.
One respondent talks about near-death experiences she had during operations. For her, these have confirmed that there is an existence after death:
Then I went through operations myself and had experiences, and then it becomes even more noticeable, because then you have not only read about it, but now I have experienced it myself... What it is like to die, and enter a new world. And I did, I had two operations. And both times… As the staff said… we were losing you. And then I think like this, well then maybe that was the moment I disappeared into this other world... That it was a nice world.
Some reading experiences can be overwhelming. An interviewee tells us that many years ago he found a neo-spiritual book in a store, read a few pages and then laughed for a whole week. It was as if a weight had been lifted off his shoulders: “It was only the first page, huh. So it was like putting the key in the lock.” The author of the book is the one whom the respondent still, after several decades, thinks gives the best description of reality.
Criticism of the new spirituality
In the interview responses, there is also a lot of criticism of new spirituality and new age. Such spirituality can, for example, be perceived as too commercial, fuzzy, dogmatic or group-oriented. It is emphasized how a neo-spiritual fantasy world can sometimes lead to simplified thinking. Adherents have then gone too far in their interpretations or generalizations. These varieties are not something the respondents want to be associated with. One of the respondents is indeed interested in the "Law of Attraction" and the like, but she points out how certain literature she came across deals with these things in an overly banal way. That as soon as you think of something, a certain car for example, you should get it shortly: "Think of a car and it will be yours tomorrow!" Such literature is described as "borderline cases". One of the respondents had considered sending her children to the anthroposophists' Walldorf school, but changed her mind when she saw the information material the school sent out:
I thought there was an incredible amount of fear in that school. For example, they sent out a picture, a description of a child sitting on a rocking horse, a real toy horse like this and riding, and then there was a cross over it. It was wrong. Then there was a child sitting on a log. It was right, because then... And dolls shouldn't have faces either, because then... It was more right to sit on the log, because then the mind had to work, and you had to imagine it was a horse. So they promote the imagination. He who sat on the real horse did not have to imagine, therefore it was bad. But of course it doesn't work that way, that the imagination stops, but he who is sitting on that other horse, he continues to pretend that it is a real horse, or that he is out in some meadows or that he is in a situation ... If, on the other hand, he had a horse of flesh and blood, he would continue playing. The imagination doesn't stop with the objects, it's also an incredibly material view, I think.
When a certain ideology or certain ideas about right and wrong are overemphasized, it can be similar to brainwashing, even within the new spirituality:
But I like... I like people who you see flaws, and I like ABOUT... I like this crap, in both... everything possible like that, so that you see that it... That there is room to be human... And I don't like sitting like that... wet-in-wet in beautiful colors. And then it becomes really boring art. I think it will be like this brainwashing, that everyone should be the same. I want the individual to come forward and be allowed to do what he wants.
One of the interviewees is interested in the UFO question and considers it too likely that our planet is visited by extraterrestrial civilizations. However, she reserves herself against what she describes as "religious ufology":
There are many ufology societies that are very much into the divine... Yes, they are so divine and... Well, I don't believe... I believe in equals. So not this to look up to... Oh, they are gods. Then we end up in the same... Then we have a new Bible again, right?
A new spiritual teaching can be more or less systematic or elaborate. Some directions are content with "now we will worship the goddess again". A respondent, who reads a lot of different literature in the neo-spiritual area, states that there is "a lot of rubbish" as well and that it is important to be able to sleep. There are course farms where the goal is for the participants to develop spiritual abilities. This can be misguided and even dangerous. New spirituality is an industry with many fortune seekers. A lot is about making money. The fact that the supply is so "widespread", for example in bookstores that sell this kind of literature, is a sign of this, according to one respondent.
Personal problems can be understood too concretely, based on an imagined causality with causes in past lives. Reincarnation therapists tend to ignore that there may be a symbolic dimension to what their clients are telling. They take it too literally. If I'm afraid of water, it doesn't have to mean that I've drowned in a past life. This can also have a symbolic meaning, one respondent points out, that it rather says something about how I experience my life right now, that I may be "mentally drowning in my situation, from all the demands".
Sometimes causal reasoning based on the law of karma becomes downright cynical. If a three-year-old child is murdered, there are those who want to argue that then in a previous life that child should have himself killed a child who was three years old. This is certainly a possible cause, but it is unwise to lock yourself into this explanation. The law of karma teaches that man himself is responsible for how his life turns out. It is still possible to direct criticism against this notion, according to which each person is entirely themselves the cause of their fate. The objections are not that it could not be true in principle, but that it could lead to a bad attitude if this is emphasized too much. It then becomes too selfish. After all, life is a relationship with others.
The claim that everyone "creates their own reality" can lead to a lack of empathy. If someone has been in a car accident, then it is insensitive to ask that person why she drew on that particular experience:
And now it's become a lot like this, they say with new-age people... 'You create your own reality'... and it turns out like this... Well, someone has a car accident... Why did you create that for? So you have yourself to blame. I can't agree with THAT attitude... Well, some people think that, oh well, I don't need to care about anyone else, I only need to care about myself. Because I create my reality. It's my world anyway.
In the short term, we cannot bring about very big changes in our lives, says one respondent. The idea that "thought is creative" and the like is based on the assumption that existence is structured in an arbitrary way, which it is not. One of the respondents describes certain parts of the new spirituality as "a subjectivist quagmire" that he personally wants nothing to do with. When people remember past lives then it is often in the form of celebrities and great figures from world history, which indicates that there may be an element of self-deception in it all. The idea that you can attract or attract anything, just by focusing on it, is too simplistic:
The Secret is on to it, it's very popular like this in new spirituality, huh... And you can wish for exactly what you want, and you'll get it, because the universe is like a big candy factory, and then just wish... Only you wish enough, like this… because you create your reality. But I think that's only one half of the equation.
Eh, I'm a sucker for that, and they have themselves to blame. And it doesn't matter anyway, because everything is there and everything... and blah blah blah. If you use this philosophy LIKE THAT, then it becomes like a copout... You run away.
The interest in finding out who you were in a previous life is inherently suspicious and there is room for a lot of self-deception:
I would say that the interest in… this kind of romantic interest in past lives and so, uh, speculation about that, it's very much connected to this thing that I call new-spirituality-newage-fiction huh, like that. That it's these bored, middle-aged housewives who drink herbal tea and talk about how they've been princesses in ancient Egypt and stuff like that... Yes, I've been this and that... That it becomes some kind of, well, sentimental pastime, huh.
One interviewee questions the concept of "spiritual" itself. What exactly do we mean by that? She exemplifies with poetry and art:
The spiritual is not in the description, it is a very materialistic way of looking at it. Spirituality lies in how you build something. I mean, a poem doesn't become spiritual just because you write sky ten times, or... but it's what fits between the words and how you construct it.
And I get very tired of looking at descriptions like this that are supposed to be so-called fine art. I like much more this shitty art in some way, and that you feel that it is a person, and you feel the person's interior, and that it is someone who is searching, and that it can address terrible situations, but themselves like how... This intelligent way of manifesting it, and how a spirituality seeps through. But for example, like Edith Södergran, she can be very spiritual, I think, although she writes darkly, she writes that she is at the bottom of a dark well, for example. It's not heaven or anything, but there's as much longing and love as it can hold, and that's what I think spirituality is.