O.C. RELIGION

For the spiritual seeker, dabbling in various practices can be a fun, educational and enlightening experience. By its very nature, it allows you to skim the surface of the spiritual life, to be curious and to taste what intrigues you without having to commit to a religious community or to a personal spiritual practice.

Unfortunately, many people believe that dabbling in faith is a spiritual practice, and become disillusioned and discouraged when they realize the superficiality and aimlessness of their explorations.

Dabbling in faith, however, can be wonderfully rewarding.

You can be exposed to many faith practices, and from exploring, your tolerance, appreciation and understanding of many religious organizations and practices can grow; you begin to see the universal values that are common to many traditions.

You can also start to study the belief systems, determining which faiths speak to you and are congruent with your values and beliefs.

You may also start to see whether you are attracted to large or small communities, contemporary or traditional practices, simple and austere practices or mysterious ritual. You can determine which personal practices best connect you with God or the universal, and whether silent practices or active practices move you most in that direction.

Even after finding our spiritual communities and personal practices, many of us still love to dabble. I enjoy occasionally following prayers from other traditions; I also have tried various types of meditations that are not traditionally within my faith. But I use this type of dabbling to enrich the faith practices to which I am committed; this dabbling is not the center of my spiritual life, but supportive of it.

Unfortunately, people can get stuck in the dabbling stage of spiritual development; they become enraptured by the diversity of practices and continue to move from one religious community to another, experimenting with various spiritual practices without integrating them into a dedicated personal spiritual life. They refuse, or are unable, to make a commitment to themselves and others to follow a congruent and meaningful path.

A significant limitation of dabbling is that you rarely get beyond the superficial. Your limited exposure may lead you to draw incorrect assumptions about various religious practices. You may find yourself following practices that primarily offer pleasure, spiritual highs and novelty. Once people in spiritual communities show an interest in helping you become more involved, you might find yourself creating excuses for leaving.

You might think that you can have a rich, disciplined, committed spiritual life on your own. But when you lose interest, you’ll probably assume that living a spiritual life has no meaning for you, rather than realizing you’re missing a depth of practice and the support of community. You become more of an observer on the spiritual path, rather than a practitioner. You’ll find yourself picking and choosing what you want to practice instead of realizing that a committed religious and spiritual life means embracing the demanding and difficult aspects of the spiritual life with the joyful and the mysterious. You may never get to the point where you understand, not just in your head but in your heart, that you are moved to pursue a life of spirit, not just for yourself, but for the chance to serve others.

You might believe that through dabbling you can develop your own spiritual life by creating an eclectic group of practices. There are people who are successful in following this path, but they are the rareexception.To develop a profoundly deep, congruent spiritual life requires first that the aspirant spend a great deal of time in study and preparation; second, that the practitioner put together a belief system of integrity and congruency; and third, that a person have an endless reservoir of discipline to continue to follow a spiritual practice, day in and day out, without the support of religious or spiritual community. Most of us don’t have the acumen, desire or discipline to do it all on our own.

Don’t get me wrong--dabbling is not wrong or bad; it’s just that it can seduce you into believing you’ve found a path when in reality you’ve settled for a superficial substitute.

You worry about how commitment will impose on your freedom: What will a community ask of you? Where will you find the time? What will you have to give up? Dabbling is like sticking your toe in the water at the beach and saying you’ve experienced what it means to swim in the ocean. You can never know what it means to ride the waves until you brave the frosty waters, you feel the waves thrash against your body, and the salt and sand tingle against your skin.

To lead a deeply spiritual life, you can’t just dabble. At some point, you must put aside your reluctance and your fear and jump in with your heart and soul.

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On Faith is a forum for Orange County clergy and others to offer their views on religious topics of general interest. Submissions, which will be published at the discretion of The Times and are subject to editing, should be delivered to Orange County religion page editor Jack Robinson.