The Problem with ‘Religion’

I have been studying and practicing many different kinds of religion and spiritual practices for some years now, and I recently discovered there is a big scam going on. I saw it in many people, in how they behaved, talked and walked, but I mostly saw it in my own approach to spiritual practice.

What does religion really teach?

The thing is, what often happens when people turn to a certain religion or practice – whether it be radical Islamism or seemly harmless meditation practice – is they think they have found ‘The Way’. They think their old ways were wrong and that they have to change and become a different person. They might even start proselytizing feverously – much to the annoyance of others – or – in the worst case scenario – become violent or aggressive towards people who think differently. The primary violence however is in our own heads, the primary violence we direct towards ourselves.

You see, the moment people give themselves to a particular path, they go a bit crazy. Sometimes it is very obvious, sometimes very subtle, but it is almost inevitably there. It is as if they switch of a certain part of their brain, the part that used to be them, that used to talk, walk and behave like them, and now they start thinking, talking and walking in a different way, in the ‘right’ way. They sort of impose a new way of being on themselves, a way of being that comes not from the inside, but from outside of themselves. They – quite literally – ‘lose’ their minds, they ‘lose’ themselves. They lose their own minds and their own selves, and forcibly put on themselves another ‘mind’ or spirit, some sort of ideal that they have derived out of their religions and practices. They stop being themselves.

Why do they do this? What are they trying to prove? Who are they trying to prove themselves for? If there is anything as a God, I do not think He is like some school teacher grading us with a Big Red Marker. Rather, I would think He loves us for who we are. Why else did he create us as we are? And if there is no God, well than there is really no one to prove ourselves to. We are only trying to prove ourselves to… ourselves. Why? Because somehow we think we are not good enough, but we first have to prove or even punish ourselves in this or that way. We do not love ourselves, we do not accept ourselves.

Religion should not take away your freedom,
it should give you the freedom to be yourself

And this is the big scam. Religion makes us think there is something wrong with ourselves and that there is some high and lofty ideal we have to attain to, as if it were some test we have to pass. It makes us judge and criticize first ourselves and then others. The Gospel says: “Man was not made for Sabbath, Sabbath was made for man” (Mk 2:27). Religion is there not for us to conform to, to limit ourselves, but rather to help us in our quest to become our true selves. The message we should be getting out of it, is that –deep down – we are fine the way we are. We are all God’s children, we all possess Buddha nature, Allah is great and merciful, or whatever way you want to put it. God already loves us, why don’t we start loving ourselves?