What is a spiritual bypass?

What is a spiritual bypass?

this term describes the tendency to use them spiritual explanations, to avoid complicated psychological problems. The term was first introduced in the early 1980s by the psychotherapist John Wellwood in his book Towards a Psychology of Awakening. According to Wellwood, spiritual bypassing can be defined as "the tendency to use spiritual ideas and practices to bypass or avoid facing unresolved emotional issues, psychological wounds, and unfinished developmental tasks."

As a therapist and Buddhist teacher, Wellwood began to notice that people (including himself) often used spirituality as a shield or a type of defense mechanism. Instead of working through difficult emotions or confronting unresolved issues, people would simply dismiss them with spiritual explanations.

While it may be a way to protect oneself from harm or promote harmony between people, it doesn't actually solve the problem. Instead, it just glosses over the problem, letting it fester without a real solution.

Signs of spiritual bypass

Spiritual circumvention is a way of hiding behind spirituality or spiritual practices. It prevents people from admitting what they feel and distances them from both themselves and others. Some examples of spiritual bypass include:

Avoiding feelings of anger

Believing in your own spiritual superiority as a way to hide from insecurity

Belief that traumatic events should serve as "learning experiences"

Believing that spiritual practices such as prayer are always positive

Extremely high, often unattainable idealism

Feeling detached

Focusing only on spirituality and ignoring the present

Just focusing on the positive or being overly optimistic

Projecting your own negative feelings onto others

Pretending things are fine when they clearly aren't

Thinking that people can overcome their problems through positive thinking

Thinking you have to "rise" above your emotions

Use of defense mechanisms such as denial and repression

Spiritual bypassing is a superficial way of covering up problems in a way that may make us feel better in the short term, but ultimately solves nothing and just perpetuates the problem.

Examples

Spiritual bypassing can sometimes be hard to spot because it is often very subtle. However, looking at examples makes this phenomenon more apparent:

After the death of a loved one, people tell surviving relatives that the deceased is "in a better place" and that "it was all part of God's plan."

The woman is angry and upset about something someone else did. When she tries to share her feelings, her friends tell her to stop being so negative.

A relative regularly crosses boundaries and behaves in ways that harm other family members. Instead of confronting this behavior, those who have been hurt feel they must suppress their anger and remain tolerant.

Spiritual bypassing is also often used to dismiss the real concerns of people dealing with problems. People facing discrimination are often advised to simply be "nice" or "patient" when dealing with outright mistreatment. This suggests that people can rely on individual positive thinking for overcoming complex social problems.

Recognizing a spiritual bypass

If you are saying these things, you may be in a spiritual bypass:

"Everything happens for a reason."

"It was for the best."

"It was a blessing in disguise."

"Only good emotions!"

"Thoughts and prayers!"

Ask yourself who these comments are really helping. Do they really give someone comfort or insight, or are they just a way out of a difficult situation with the idea of feeling better?

Impacts

Spiritual bypassing is not always a bad thing. During times of severe distress, it can be a way to temporarily relieve frustration or anxiety. However, researchers suggest that it can be harmful when used as a long-term strategy to suppress problems

Spiritual bypassing can have a number of negative effects. This can affect individual well-being as well as relationships with others. Some of the potential negative consequences include:

Anxiety

Blind loyalty to leaders

Codependency

Control problems

Neglect of personal responsibility

Emotional confusion

Excessive tolerance of unacceptable or inappropriate behavior

A feeling of shame

Spiritual narcissism

Tips and tricks

Spiritual bypassing may act as a way to protect ourselves from things we find threatening, but it ignores an important truth. We cannot choose which emotions to feel. Life cannot be all good thoughts, feelings and emotions. To experience the highs, we must endure the lows.

Some things you can do to try to resist the tendency to spiritual bypass include:

Avoid labeling emotions as good or bad. Although some emotions may be negative or unpleasant, they have a purpose. Emotional experiences are not wrong or taboo, and feeling these emotions does not make you a bad person. Try to view your emotions with acceptance and remember that all emotional states are only temporary.

Remember that negative thoughts and feelings have a purpose. The purpose of life is not to avoid such thoughts, but to use those thoughts to drive positive action. Simply putting on rose-colored sunglasses and ignoring a problem does not solve it.

Remember that uncomfortable feelings are often a sign that there is something wrong and something needed to change. If you always try to reduce the discomfort by simply avoiding it, the situations that cause you distress will remain the same. Look at these uncomfortable emotions as an opportunity for transformation rather than a burden to avoid.

Don't blame yourself for the mistakes you made. Spiritual practices can help us avoid distraction and live harmoniously. We all tend to fall back into old habits when faced with something difficult, but spirituality is an excellent stress management tool that allows you to focus on your spiritual growth instead of being distracted by daily events or negative thoughts . By actively avoiding these distracting forces in our lives, we are able to transform the way we view ourselves spiritually, which will then enhance the way you are satisfied and happy with who you are as a person, as it is almost impossible not to grow from this process mentally physically emotionally etc.

Here is a wonderful video by Milena Goleva that gives us a lot of food for thought about excuses: