Inside Out

The spiritual journey is an inside out journey. What is on the inside (the interior dimension) determines what is on the outside (relationships and behavior). 

This truth is central in Jesus' teachings. Jesus challenged his religious culture's focus on the exterior, i.e., right behavior. He rejected their behavior-based distinctions between clean-unclean. Instead, he focused on the interior dimension of life, what he called the heart. "It is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come ... (they) come from within" Mark 7:21, 23. He taught us to be aware of and to deal with this interior realm. "Why do you see the speck in your neighbor's eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? First take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor's eye," Matthew 7:3, 5. When we are blind to what is in our hearts, we are critical and judgmental of others, Matthew 7:1. Facing and dealing with our own issues frees us to be compassionate with others. Inside out: what is in our heart governs how we view and treat others.

Following Jesus, walking the spiritual journey leads us to growing awareness of the inner realms of our life. We learn to recognize our attitudes, our emotional reactions to others and to life's events, the spirit out of which we live, our moods, our needs and desires, our longings and fantasies. This awareness positions us to deal honestly with what is in our heart. It becomes the invitation to open ourselves to the Spirit's transforming work. Self-understanding and self-awareness lie at the core of the spiritual journey. They are the path that leads to spiritual growth.

This kind of self-awareness has to be cultivated. The demands and responsibilities of family and career easily distract us. We get caught up in providing for material needs, dealing with schedules, pursuing career advancement, accumulating wealth, coping with all that life throws at us, and just surviving. Any and all of these realities invite us to cultivate self-awareness, but we are generally too busy (or exhausted) to do the self-reflection that is needed. Instead, we cope by seeking comfort, escape, control.

When we neglect the interior focus of the spiritual journey, we generally substitute a different focus in our religious life. We focus on what to believe (right and wrong) and on what to do or not do (behavior, morals). We focus on beliefs and behavior because they can be measured and evaluated. We use them to reassure ourselves that we are "right" and "good." We buy into the faulty thinking that Jesus challenged: a focus on externals. A focus on externals (right beliefs, behavior, ritual) emphasizes obedience. It produces conformity. But the focus on externals can only produce surface appearances or pretense. It cannot produce the kind of spiritual growth that leads to the transformation of the heart.

It strikes me how little the interior journey is a part of popular religious life. Yet, the spiritual journey is an inside out journey. Its focus is on what's on the inside ... in the heart. The spiritual journey is about the transformation of the heart and mind through the work of the Spirit in our lives.

May it be so for us!