h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

This post maybe a bit long..but shorter than it could be.


Hi Z. Good question, except it doesn't really fit my sort of conception of the 'spiritual'. Trig made a good point on another thread that it can be confusing because people often mean different things by the term. I agree.

Yeah 'journey' is quite a good metaphor..but like all metaphors will have its limitations. Hmm... 'ride'? like a train journey? or a funfair ride?..or a surfing buzz? A bit of all of them?. I'm not so keen on the big stations that don't connect..a bit like the 'labels' one moves from station to station until one reaches the end and finds the 'truth'? (As the Fundies always say, 'The truth will set you free' )

I'm more a staring out the window at the landscape getting all manner of different glimpses..in a bit of a reverie..sort of like my spiritual friend, 'Remembrance of things Past'.

But yeah stations are also fun and useful. One of mine was the biology degree I did. And you didn't get a 2 (i) from London University in 1980 by being a hippy dippy type. I take the stations with me to give a freshness to the reverie. Back to the window as it were.

The poets have been really important for me...Rhymn of the Ancient Mariner was an interesting station. Relationships with people and Nature are good little stations

You used the past tense in the question...so have you arrived?

I can't imagine arriving for myself and I would be being disingenuous to say otherwise...except the big ocean we all arrive at after our roughly 3 score and ten..give or take..The river does always disappear into that.

I'm very happy that Guys seems to get my kind of spirituality. Today at Chemo I was immensly cheered by the fascinating art project that was funded by their charity involving a poet, artist, photographer and staff and patients...that explores the journey ofa person after a cancer diagnosis. A nurse gave me the book they made. I loved it and felt right at home.

It's a bloody relief when your kind of spirituality and language is GOT, *plus* the superb science based stuff that saves lives. People need both.

That silly pretentious 'Shard' building is right next door; the tallest in Europe..waiting to be filled with rich people's appartments for entertaining to impress, shops and shops and hotels and hotels. The dagger into the sky, at London Bridge the ancient crossing place on the river that is London's spiritual historical heart. And the present day station is the most *connected* in London. A hub. The locals in Bermondsey hate the thing. But as if anyone cares what they think.

Anyway it seemed to me that Guys quite dwarfs it spiritually.

Off for a cuppa now I think.

I've seen these spiritual journeys advertised, but the operators are disreputable. Spiritual journeys are like cheap airlines, who say they fly to big cities, but actually land nowhere near them.

You will not arrive in heaven.

And while your emotional baggage may disappear to Mumbai, it will eventually all return in an even worse state than before.

Don't forget your passport to a better life

The only kind of spiritual journey I have ever done is that to the nearest off licence to buy some whisky, or vodka. oh, that's a spirits journey I guess...

I was (I think) Christened in a church when I was young, can't remember, but never err... wahtever the word is... confirmed. Asides which never had any involvement with organised religion cept for funerals and weddings and Christnings etc.. So, asides nighthooverism and zen baguetteism, which, are, lettuce face it somewhat tongue in cheek, I've managed to avoid anything remotely spiritual or religious in my life thus far, and don't see that changing anytime Different pokes for differnt folks I guess, some people seem to need, or want spiritual things in their life, or just end up with them, by chance, some don't..

Went to a C of E school as it was the closest one in town, and went to scouts as it was fun, and in both got some half hearted christianity. Never baptised or anything like that.

Never believed a word of the mystical stuff, and most of the moral stuff I remember was broadly appropriate, I have to say.

Now fairly anti-clerical, but still recognise that there are some very decent religious people within very warped structures and beliefs.

sprout