Why do you feel you are spiritual or why you don't feel so?

I don't feel I'm spiritual because I feel that the very idea of "spirit" is incoherent, and I don't see the point of defining it in some incredibly vague way just to be able to apply the word to myself.

Re "meaning of life," there is no such thing beyond what individuals might choose to make up for themselves. There's nothing wrong with an individual making up some credo or overarching purpose or whatever for him/herself, but that's all it is.

"Soul" is an incoherent concept, too.

Re "true inner self," I'm all for existential authenticity, but that simply amounts to being honest with yourself, exploring how you really feel about things, what you really want to do, etc. I wouldn't say that it has anything to do with "spirit."

"Something above ourself" is ridiculously vague in my opinion. There are things you can't control, of course, like the "laws" of physics. (I don't believe they're literally laws, they're just brute facts of physical particulars.)

Hi, AJ, I was so hoping to find a youtube clip of Steve Martin as a fake faith healer, in a radio interview where he and the DJ talk about the importance of 'spirit' while taking drinks out of a flask. ;-)

All kidding aside, I don't think of myself as spiritual.  I try to be in tune with the natural world, if there is a label for that.  I live in a rural area and spend a lot of time out in nature, constantly aware of all the life forms around me, just being conscious of birds and bugs and plants and air and water and how it has all evolved.  Would that make me a naturalist?

I am emotionally conscious of the loss of my husband and my father, and wish that something of them still existed and could visit me, but I know that is wishful thinking.  What is left of them is what I remember of them.  I connect deeply to my pets, especially the tiny kittens I bottle-feed from time to time, when someone abandons a litter at my veterinarian's clinic, but the connection is purely on this level of existence, not something supernatural.

Maybe that is the defining word in this - supernatural.  I don't believe in anything supernatural, and my consciousness as a human is natural.  I suppose it could be described as my spirit.  But am I spiritual in the way society defines it at this time? No.

I occasionally engage in what might be called spiritual thinking, for example when fondly remembering a dead relative or friend. I even will engage in a imagining that is at odds with my rational viewpoint; that deceased family are able to see what I'm doing or look upon the world as it is now. But I realize that this is a fantasy, similar to other fantasies like imagining travelling and living in some far off land in the distant past.

I believe there are scientists that study the human brain/mind to try and understand our capacity for spirituality and faith, with some proposing that there are parts of the brain specialized for this. It makes sense, considering how many people seem to be spiritual and religious. It seems to me that this religious center in the brain is as non-specialized as our language center(s). We have great capacity for language and religion, but there is no specific tuning toward a particular religion or language other than what comes from learning. Identical twins separated at birth can end up being an Arab speaking Muslim and a Greek speaking Orthodox Christian.

    What I've noticed about people who are uncomfortable with spirituality is that they express a concern for facts. They don't think spiritual people have enough concern for facts. They think spirituality is antithetical to facts. If not that then they think spirituality is somewhat detrimental to the facts at least, even if only accidentally.
   The irony there is that for all their admiration and respect for science, they are terrible at it themselves. They contribute to widespread notions that are not science at all in the mistaken belief they're promoting science. It is disturbing how wrong they are about how very many things.
   What they believe is science is actually a lack of depth. You might have noticed that some movies have more "depth" than others. Some movies are more "pithy" than others. They engage your mind as well as your heart more than others. They often deal with things that are quite beyond "science" to manage them. Many people who think they're "scientific" aren't really, they're just shallow.
   They attribute the "spirituality" they see in other people to flaws or mistakes. They think spiritual people believe in life after death because of some emotional flaw clouding the reason. There are indeed a lot of flawed people on both sides. Just as not everyone who thinks they're scientific is, not everyone who thinks they're spiritual is. All that aside there really is no science that makes any strong case against an afterlife. People who believe in an afterlife are not really slighting any science and did not necessarily fail any science.
   One of the things that might "pass for" spirituality that is not really is the belief in doing what we are told. There usually are a lot of similarities in believing in doing what we are told and believing in a god, as well there should be. Not always is that true though. Sometimes large numbers of people fail to critically analyze things and a false narrative develops and they just keep following it.
   Many of the people promoting what they believe is science (and is not) are people who just like many others in the past actually believe in doing what they are told. But such people lately were told Darwin had answers the Bible did not. They were told religion usurps science. None of which on close inspection turns out to be true. They are however incapable of their own critical analysis and just go on believing what they are told. Many of those people are the same type people who believed in a "god" in the past.
   I have said here before and I will say here again, those people are not necessarily "evil." In fact in ordinary circumstances they are some of the better examples of human behavior and progress, decent and honest. But that depends on the narrative they follow being correct. Sometimes circumstances are not ordinary and the narrative is false.
   At the present time the widespread lack of critical thinking is obvious and every sort of mistaken idea appears widespread. I just finished arguing with people who actually believe frequent computer security "updates" make any sense. I doubt the people who argued against me could really be that stupid. They just never really critically analyzed the situation. They just followed the narrative, a false narrative.
   Just believing in doing what you are told can be very efficient. I said that before too. No one has time to analyze every point in the narrative to verify it. It saves time and resources when people just follow the narrative. Many of them are "good kids."  It might be what some people call "spiritual" too.

   Today that is not true. The narrative is so far wrong about so very many things. The blind are leading the blind and there are far too many of them.