Privilege, Perspective, and the Misapplication of Spiritual Tools
When we're blinded by our privilege, the way we use powerful spiritual tools and practices becomes stunted and harmful.
We know in the US there has been a massive influx of interest in things like “diversity, equity, and inclusion” work since all the upheaval of 2020. As a trans and nonbinary person, I watched this unfold with cautious optimism. There were glimmers of hope that real change could be made, and it was finally going to happen. But fast-forward four and a half years and things don’t look or feel all that different.
I watched the contemplative Christian space struggle to make themselves attractive to more Queer and BIPOC people. I was a big part of the Enneagram community calling for a more black, brown, and queer voices to be heard. I was even personally swept up in how the cycling industry was responding to the need to diversify their athlete rosters and advertising campaigns. But as soon as the dust of 2020 settled (or at least cleared enough for people to be forced back to work) it seemed these efforts fell on their faces.
For those in the advocacy and activist world, this isn’t surprising. And for me, it wasn’t so much surprising as it was disappointing. I knew from my experience of these powerful tools (and I’m including bikes in here as well) that if there was any group of people who could truly make a radical and lasting change in our broken systems, it would be the people who used these tools. The people who had literally had their lives completely transformed because of centering prayer, or the Enneagram, or bikes, or any other tool in a long list of spiritual tools—these are the people who should be leading the charge, leading the change! But time and time again, I have watched these people and these communities do little to change societal structures of oppression and harm, and instead just make themselves more comfortable.
I remember a conversation with a colleague a couple years ago where I was just starting to gain insight into this problem. He was excited to be working in a contemplative space and deeply wanted to see, and hear from, and be in community with a much more diverse group of people. On the surface, I was excited by this. It can feel refreshing to see someone with such privilege truly have a deep wish to see things change. Under the surface, though, something didn’t feel right. As I rode away from that meeting (yes, on my bike), I couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling. “Are black and brown communities asking for this? Are queer communities asking for contemplative tools? Is this really what they want or need right now? Is this what I, as a trans person, need?” The more I sat with the questions, the more the answer to all these questions came back a resounding,
“No.”
And this isn’t to say I think that tools like meditation and the Enneagram (or even bikes for that matter) don’t have a place in queer, trans, or BIPOC communities, because clearly they all do. But that’s not what these communities need from affluent, cishetero, white folks. For some reason, though, offering these spiritual tools to these marginalized communities seems to be the only thing those folks can think to do in light of their latest spiritual revelation.
And I get it. I know what that’s like, I’ve fallen victim to it myself, and have even advocated for it in the various spiritual communities I’ve been a part of. I don’t want to excuse myself from this problem, because I have it, too. But I believe now, after many years of self-study as well as studying psychology, economics, critical race theory, spirituality and religion, queer theory, and living as a trans person in an increasingly hostile state, that I actually understand the problem much better, and I may even have a solution.
So, let’s first understand the problem:
The first thing I want to make explicit here, if it weren’t clear to readers thus far, is that all of the spiritual tools I’ve mentioned thus far, and many, many, more (like transcendental meditation, yoga, reiki, tarot, etc.), regardless of their origins, have been appropriated and dominated by white, capitalistic, patriarchal culture, at least here in the West.
Now, it is not bad, in and of itself, to be white or straight or cisgender and use any of these tools. But like most things, it’s not what but how that tends to cause the issues, and this is where we get to the heart of problem. Of course there are the issues around appropriation and the fact that we need to practice these tools while honoring their cultural roots, and while that certainly plays into what I have come to understand as the heart of the problem, I’m not writing this to unpack all the ways these spiritual tools have been culturally appropriated.
Instead, I want to focus on what I see happening in these dominantly cishet, white, middle-upper class spiritual communities. I also want to say that this is happening not just in the slightly woo-woo communities around the Enneagram or meditation. It’s also happening in every Christian denomination, mainline or otherwise, and has been for nearly two thousand years (but especially since Constantine).
I believe wholeheartedly that these tools have brought about a spiritual transformation for many people in these communities, and I think most of us reading this can relate to how excited we are when things like this happen, and how much we want to share it when they do. It feel natural, almost imperative that we share this new joy with others. Oh, goodness, am I guilty of this one. I have deconstructed my evangelical faith, but I have not yet found a way to stop being an evangelist for whatever amazing thing I’m currently into. And I think this is a big part of the problem ( and maybe it’s the fact that I’ve had so much experience with this feeling over the course of my life that has lead me to this deeper understanding).
What I’ve come to understand is that this initial excitement about whatever personal or spiritual transformation is taking place is only the beginning of what’s happening. While it may not feel this way in the moment, it is only surface level. But we’re so excited about it, we have to go tell everyone now! And in the telling, the actual transformation loses its momentum, it stays at the surface level, or is otherwise arrested before it gets to the deepest parts of us. In most of the communities, with most of these tools, I have watched as the transformation stops (or is stopped consciously or unconsciously) just short of waking us up to the truly radical truths of our position and complicity in the systems of oppression in which we live.
It would be as if a bunch of fish were meditating to become happier instead of to become aware of how polluted their water was. The first makes the fish happier, makes life somewhat easier mentally or emotionally, but the latter is more challenging, and has deeper, messier, and more confronting implications. In the first, we have nothing more to do but keep doing what we’re doing, and of course, telling others about it. But the second requires something more from us, it would require us to drastically change the way we live and directly challenge the systems of oppression that have benefitted us greatly and kept us so profoundly comfortable.
When we can see the problem this clearly, the solution is already within our grasp.
Again, I find myself easily frustrated with these communities, especially contemplative Christian ones, when this key element of spiritual transformation is missed (even though I have also missed it plenty). We can’t keep the institutions of capitalism, white supremacy, and patriarchy operating while offering marginalized communities contemplative practices and spiritual tools and expect that to be enough.
Jesus didn’t maintain his privilege in society or even as the Son of God (if that’s how you roll theologically) in his time on earth. He broke every cultural barrier not to just offer charity, but to truly live in solidarity with the marginalized of his time. And he explicitly commanded his followers to do the same.
The Enneagram offers us an incredible tool for understanding ourselves and others on a profound level, but if we’re only able to see how our type structure is affecting us, and not how our enculturation into gender roles, class systems, and racialized thinking are unconsciously guiding us, we’re missing out on the greatest and most life-affirming transformation the Enneagram offers.
So, as we look at the issues of DEI in our spiritual and personal development communities, it becomes clear that simply sharing these tools with the marginalized does nothing address the real problem, and shows the limits of where we’ve allowed our tools and practices to change us. Again, marginalized communities are not asking cishet white folks to give us tools, we’re asking them to address the wrongs they’ve committed and are complicit in. If we, however, allow these beautiful and powerful tools to guide us into the painful and challenging reality of our true place in the world, we will be empowered to take true contemplative action that will lead us into solidarity, and eventually the deep transformation of not just ourselves, but our society—the very water we swim in.
I don’t want to suggest that this deeper transformation of self and society is a cakewalk, an easy outpouring simply stemming from our own spirituality. It is not. We cannot simply meditate our way into a utopia. Once our practices open us to this deeper way of seeing, we must take decisive action. Our practices support us in this contemplative action, but there must be action. We must become active politically, we must shift our lifestyles, we must do everything we can to divest from the oppressive systems that threaten the lives of our neighbors, and build new societies based on cooperation, connection, and mutual aid. Without this new awareness and these actions our practices and tools will be left to do nothing but coddle us and keep us blind to reality.
But ultimately, the choice is ours. Do we want to allow our practices and spiritual journey to take us into the deeper reality, one that calls us into action to heal the wounds we’ve caused? Or do we want to stay put with the feel-good spirituality that has been dubbed the opiate of the masses and ignore the ways in which we live harm our neighbors and destroy our environment?
I want more. I want to go deeper, I want to take action, I want to change. I want the way my spiritual journey has changed me to be obvious, visible by anyone who sees me. I want to be at odds with a system that privileges a few while the masses are exploited. I want to help lay the bricks that build a better world. This is what our practices offer us, an opportunity to be part of building and maintaining a society as transformed as our inner lives. I want that, and I hope you want it to. If so, let’s work on it together.
Bingo!