Sacred, Struggling, and Still Not Real: …Waking Up From Spiritual Bypassing

There’s a subtle kind of distortion that can creep into even the most sincere spiritual path. It looks like purity - flowing linen, tye-dye, soft eyes, unconditional love on our lips, medicine ceremonies on weekends, blessed spring water in our flasks.

But beneath the beauty and intention? Sometimes, something else is operating.

Judgment. Avoidance. Performance. A bypass so clean it almost sparkles.

I’m not writing this from a pedestal. I am calling out my own bullshit too.

I have found myself doing the obscure diets and detoxes, dressing in a way that I felt expressed in the “right”, my beliefs, finding identity in being the one who left the UK behind, in being vegan, in van life, in off-grid community living, in the spiritual scene. I genuinely believed I was further ahead than the people I left behind.

But lately, I’ve been asking: Who am I outside all of that? When it’s just me. And God.

And the deep, aching loneliness that comes with stepping away from all these things and performances that once gave me belonging.

Because that’s the thing with spiritual bypassing - it doesn’t always look like avoidance. Sometimes, it looks like devotion. Like discipline. Like a “high-vibe” life. But underneath, it can be a way to avoid the raw, unfiltered truth of who we are without all the labels.

These are a few I've been considering:

Marginalising of the masculine

In many spiritual and conscious circles, we’ve elevated the feminine to near-divine status -intuition and emotion replacing rather than complimenting, the masculine emotional structure (not only the motherly allowing of the emotions but the father's clear 'this is enough now') the discipline, facts, structure, clarity and boundaries (for ourselves but also with animals and children perhaps). Without reverence for the masculine container  - all that beauty spills into chaos.

I write more about this here: Without Feminine Containment, Emotion Becomes Chaos - Not Authenticity

There’s also this popular belief that there are no absolute truths - that every perspective is equally valid. But if everything is true… then nothing is clear. Discernment is also important.

And in the same spirit, many spiritual communities reject hierarchy altogether - often as a reaction to the dominance and abuse seen in traditional structures. Every voice is treated as equal, and so we deliberate decisions for hours, unable to move forward because no one wants to take the lead.

But there is such a thing as natural hierarchy and order to things - born not from ego or control, but from wisdom, clarity and expertise. Without it, we risk valuing inclusion over integrity - and stagnation over leadership.

Addicted to Ascension: The High of Spiritual Bypassing

Some bypass looks like enlightenment - floating above the mess of life, claiming to have transcended it all. Rudolf Steiner called this the Luciferic pull: escaping into ideals, detached from the body and the world.

But what if we’re not here to leave the 3D - but to live it?

To bridge soul and skin. To stop chasing peak states and start showing up in the ordinary sacred.

Many of us move from one workshop to the next, one retreat to another, the next energy healing, plant medicine (because there are some drugs that are the 'better' and more 'acceptable' right?) - desperately trying to feel healed. But what would it look like to just tell ourselves 'you're good!'?

Elected poverty

There’s another layer to all this - the aesthetic of simplicity.The barefoot living. No makeup, no mirror, disconnected to 'society', in the middle of f*ing nowhere rejecting wealth, rejecting comfort, (showers included?). I’ve lived it. To the extreme (as I do with many things). With a donkey named Robbie. And then on land that I bought:

A Donkey Travel Adventure Trading Four Wheels for Four Hooves

From Dream to Reality: The Harsh Truth About Off-Grid Community Life

It was a beautiful and growthful part of my life and I wouldn't change it for the world. But I clearly see now that I was trying to prove something. To myself, to the world. It was a rebellion. A search for identity. I wanted so much to be away from society that I mostly just did exactly the opposite of it. And was therefore still controlled by it. I wasn't comfortable, I was struggling. It was hard work.

The Rise of Spiritual Narcissism

In my simple (basic) living, there was a belief I had that my life was somehow more 'sacred' and 'spiritual' because of the struggle and simplicity.

The sneaky belief - so common in New Age spaces - that I'm better than others because I'm ‘on the path’.

Eating cleaner, understand my nervous system better, burning sage, connecting with the universe, speaking in I-statements and politely, with control expressing myself (even through there's a lot more that wants to be said and it is not the full truth).

And sure -that’s all beautiful. But it becomes dangerous when it feeds the very separation spirituality is meant to dissolve. And living simply doesn't make us more holy (just ask Osho) - just as living luxuriously doesn’t make us less.

Are you silently judging others (as I have) for their parenting, diets, medicine choices, jobs - all while preaching non-judgment and unity?

The truth is… it’s not about the lifestyle. It’s about the why. Why are we doing it? What are we proving? And to whom? Are we covering up a dark ugly need to repent somehow?

Is it superiority in disguise? Another ego trap?

What If Spirituality Isn’t the Destination?

Here’s what I'm discovering is true for me:

Spirituality is a phase. One that needs to be lived fully, but then integrated. Like adolescence. Like heartbreak. Like anything that cracks us open but isn’t meant to define us forever.

I like Dolly Parton's take on this:

Conclusion: Leaving the Costume Behind

I wrote this not because I’m free of it all - but because I feel that I’m waking up inside of it. Because the very things I once clung to for safety - now feel like costumes I can’t wear anymore.

This isn’t a call to abandon the sacred. It’s a call to question where we’ve confused sacred with better. Where we’ve made pain into virtue, performance into authenticity, or emotional chaos into feminine power.

I’m not interested in being seen as wise, or evolved, or holy. I’m interested in being honest. In being seen, loved and accepted in who I actually am. And that, I'm still discovering.

With love and honesty,

Laura

If you're peeling back the layers of performance - in your spirituality, your relationships, or your self-expression - and you're ready to live, love, and lead from something deeper... Let’s talk.

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