Spirituality Without Religion: What Grounds Me Now

If you had told younger‑me that one day I’d be writing about “spirituality without religion,” I would’ve laughed, clutched my KJV, and asked if you needed prayer. Back then, I thought religion had all the answers because that's the way I was raised. It felt like a map someone else had already drawn for me — clear, tidy, and laminated for durability.

But somewhere along the way, the map started to feel more like a brochure. Beautiful, yes. Helpful, sometimes. But not the whole story.

These days, my spiritual life looks less like a sanctuary with pews and more like a patchwork quilt stitched together from experience, grief, nature, music, and the occasional bottle of wine I swear I didn’t mean to finish.

So here’s what grounds me now.

Nature Has Become My Sanctuary

Moving to Aberdeen has been like enrolling in a spiritual masterclass taught by trees. The moss, the rain, the quiet — they all have something to say if I slow down long enough to listen. The forest doesn’t care what I believe. It doesn’t ask me to sign a statement of faith. It just stands there, ancient and patient, whispering, “Relax, sweetheart. You’re part of something bigger.” Even Lucy seems to get it. She loves exploring and sniffing the acreage here like she's checking for messages. She feels the presence of the deer and coyotes. She's making the connections.

I Still Love the Methodist Church… But I Don’t Live There Exclusively Anymore

Here’s the thing: I genuinely love the Methodist church. I love that it values conversation, honors disagreement, and doesn’t panic when someone asks a hard question. It’s one of the few places where doubt isn’t treated like a moral failure. A far cry from my evangelical roots. And I still attend regularly.

But I also feel just as “at home” in a Pagan/Wiccan ceremony or a Buddhist Puja. There’s something beautiful about traditions that invite you to experience the sacred rather than define it. Something freeing about stepping into a space where mystery is allowed to be mysterious.

I guess you could say I’m spiritually bilingual now. Maybe even trilingual on a good day. I am a member of the United Methodist Church and I'm even going through their Lay Servant Ministries program; but that doesn't mean I'm in a monogamous relationship with it.

Humor Is Part of My Spiritual Practice

I’ve tried meditation. Truly. But sometimes my brain treats silence like an invitation to think about snacks, laundry, and whether Paul Rudd is aging or just evolving.  Self‑hypnosis works better — sometimes. Other times I just fall asleep and wake up feeling spiritually refreshed but physically confused.

And yes, I once drank an entire bottle of wine during a mediocre movie and called it “a reflective evening.” Spirituality is a journey.

Grief Walks With Me, Not Behind Me

I’ve lost a lot of people — friends to AIDs in the 80s/90s, my brother, my mother and father, grandparents, Willow and Norbu. Grief has become a quiet companion, not an intruder. It doesn’t ask permission. It just sits beside me, reminding me that love leaves marks.

Grief has softened me. It’s rearranged my priorities. It’s clarified what matters and what absolutely does not. It’s taught me that presence is sacred, and that the people we love never really leave — they just change the way they show up.

Music Is Still My Prayer

If I have a religion now, it’s music. Singing and piano have always been the way I connect to something bigger — call it God, Spirit, the Universe, or the collective sigh of everyone who’s ever lived.  Music is the one place where all my worlds meet — the hymns, the Pagan chants, the Buddhist bells, the Broadway scores. It’s all sacred to me.

Small Rituals Keep Me Grounded

• Morning coffee while the rain preaches its own sermon

• Cooking plant‑forward meals that make my body feel like it’s on speaking terms with my soul

• Caring for my Lucy like she's a furry human

• Practicing self‑hypnosis to quiet the noise

• Choosing kindness over cynicism, even when cynicism is louder

These aren’t religious rituals. They’re human ones. And they’re enough.

Love Is the Center of Everything

James grounds me more than any doctrine ever could. Our life together — the laughter, the challenges, the shared dreams — is its own spiritual practice. Love, partnership, chosen family… these are the things that keep me steady.

And honestly, the fact that we can legally be married still feels like a miracle. A hard‑won one. And the truth is: the hard-right is still trying to take that away from us. The battle is not over.

I’m Learning to Trust the Mystery

I don’t need all the answers anymore. I don’t need certainty. I don’t need a map.

What I need — and what I have — is a sense of connection. To nature. To memory. To music. To the people I love. To the people I’ve lost. To the quiet voice inside that says, “Keep going. You’re doing fine.”

Spirituality without religion isn’t emptiness. It’s spaciousness. It’s freedom. It’s the permission to build a life that feels honest, grounded, and deeply human.

And that, for now, is more than enough.

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Remembering Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. today.

On one of my last trips to Atlanta, I visited the King Center, and the experience has stayed with me. Walking through that space—seeing the history, the courage, and the cost of the movement up close—was a sobering reminder of where we’ve been as a nation. It’s one thing to learn about the Civil Rights era; it’s another to stand in the place where so much of that struggle was lived.

I’m old enough to remember the day Dr. King was assassinated. I’m also old enough to remember the painful things some adults in my sphere said in the aftermath—words that I was not intended to hear as a child—meant to diminish a man whose life was devoted to justice, compassion, and the belief that love could transform even the hardest hearts. Those memories don’t fade. They shape how I understand progress, and how fragile it can be.

And yet, visiting the King Center also stirred something hopeful in me. His voice still echoes. His dream still challenges us. His call to build a more just and compassionate world is not a relic of the past—it’s a living invitation to keep moving forward.

Today, I honor his legacy with gratitude, humility, and a renewed commitment to the work he began. May we continue to walk toward the world he imagined, not just in remembrance, but in the way we live, speak, and act.

Grief, Aging, and the Strange Tenderness of Starting Over

 

I’ve been thinking a lot about how grief doesn’t stay behind when life moves forward. It packs itself neatly into the corners of every new chapter, like a familiar shadow that refuses to be left at the old house. When we moved to Aberdeen, I thought I was leaving certain things behind—old routines, old streets, old versions of myself. But grief, as it turns out, is a loyal traveler.

I feel it most when I think about Willow and Norbu. Losing them in the span of a few years carved out a quiet space inside me that I’m still learning how to live with. They were part of the rhythm of my days, the background music of home. Even now, in this new place with its towering trees and endless rain, I catch myself expecting to hear their paws on the floor or see them curled up in their favorite spots. Grief has a way of reminding you that love doesn’t disappear—it just changes shape.

And then there’s Lucy. Sweet, stubborn, 15‑year‑old Lucy, who has somehow become the anchor in all this shifting. She trots around our new yard like she’s giving us a tour of her property, and in her quiet, steady way, she reminds me that continuity is possible. That even when life rearranges itself, some threads remain unbroken.

Grief Has Been With Me Longer Than I Realized

The truth is, grief didn’t start with the dogs. It’s been with me since the 1980s, when I lost so many friends to AIDS that I stopped trying to count. Entire constellations of people—bright, funny, complicated souls—gone before they ever had the chance to grow old. I was in my twenties then, and I didn’t understand how those losses would echo through the decades. But they do. They always do.

And then I lost my dad and my grandparents, and in more recent years, I lost my brother. I lost my mother. Each loss reshaped me in ways I didn’t see coming. Grief softens you, whether you want it to or not. It rearranges your priorities. It clarifies what matters and what absolutely does not. It teaches you to hold people a little closer, even if only in memory.

Turning 65 in a World That Looks Different Than I Expected

Reaching 65 has been its own strange experience. There’s a tenderness to it that I didn’t anticipate. A kind of quiet astonishment. I’ve lived long enough to see my beard gray, my priorities shift, my life reinvent itself more than once. And yet, so many of the people I loved never got the chance to stand where I’m standing now.

There’s gratitude in that. And there’s guilt, too. Survivor’s guilt is a real thing, even decades later. Sometimes I look around at this new life—this house in the woods, this quiet town, this unexpected chapter—and I think, Why me? Why am I still here when so many aren’t?

I don’t have an answer. But I’m learning to let the question soften me rather than haunt me.

Claiming My Life, One Note at a Time

When I turned 65 at the end of November, I didn’t know how to mark the moment. It felt too big, too strange, too full of ghosts and gratitude. So I did the only thing that felt honest: I sang.

I recorded a one‑hour virtual concert—not because I thought the world needed it, but because I needed it. I needed to claim my voice, my presence, my aliveness. I needed to say, in my own way, “I’m still here.” Music has always been my way of praying, even when I’m not sure who or what I’m praying to.

When I was younger, I really believed religion held all the answers. It felt solid, certain, like a map someone else had already drawn for me. But the older I get, the more I see how human it all is—how many hands have shaped it, how many versions exist, each claiming to be the “right” one. There are over thirty thousand Christian denominations, and somehow every single one is convinced they’ve cracked the code. Somewhere along the way, the word Christian stopped feeling like something I could claim. In this age of polarization, it’s become so tangled and heavy that I don’t recognize myself in it anymore.

Grief as a Companion, Not an Enemy

What I’m learning—slowly, imperfectly—is that grief isn’t something to overcome. It’s something to walk with. It’s the reminder that I’ve loved deeply, that I’ve lived - not as fully as I wish because I always put limitations and criticisms on myself that I didn't deserve - but I’ve survived things I once thought would break me.

And maybe that’s the quiet gift of this season of life: realizing that grief and gratitude can sit at the same table. That aging is both a privilege and a reckoning. That starting over at 65 isn’t about erasing the past—it’s about carrying it with you in a way that honors what was and makes room for what’s still possible.

I’m still learning. I’m still becoming. And if you’re walking through your own season of change, I hope you know you’re not alone. Grief may travel with us, but so does love. So does memory. So does hope.

Starting Over at 65: What I’m Learning About Change

If you had asked me twenty years ago what life would look like at 65, I probably would’ve said something about stability. Predictability. A tidy little routine. Isn’t that the script we’re handed? By this age, we’re supposed to be “settled”—whatever that means. Settled in our homes, settled in our beliefs, settled in our communities, settled in our identities.

Instead, I’m out here at 65 doing the emotional equivalent of unpacking boxes labeled “Fragile: Handle With Care,” except half of them are mislabeled and the other half contain things I don’t remember owning.

Last fall, James and I packed up our life in West Sacramento and moved to Aberdeen, Washington. New state. New home. New community. New spiritual landscape. Nothing about this season feels “settled” in the traditional sense. It feels more like God picked up the snow globe of my life, gave it a good shake, and said, “Let’s see what happens.”

Why We Really Moved

There was also a quieter, heavier reason behind the move—one that sat in the background like a low hum. We could feel the country shifting in ways that made both of us uneasy. Not in a dramatic, end‑of‑the‑world way, but in a very practical, “we need to be safe… or at least safer” kind of way. I knew my job could disappear with one corporate reorganization, and the idea of being financially exposed in California felt like standing on a cliff edge during an earthquake.

So we made a choice. We looked at the map, took a deep breath, and said, “Let’s find somewhere quieter. Somewhere we can breathe. Somewhere we can hide if we need to.” Not hide in a bunker—just hide from the noise, the pressure, the feeling that the ground was shifting under our feet.

Aberdeen became our safety valve. Our quiet corner. Our “if everything goes sideways, at least we have trees” plan. And honestly, there’s something unintentionally funny about two middle‑aged men fleeing to the woods like we’re starring in a very gentle, very gay reboot of Little House on the Prairie, minus the covered wagons...plus a senior pittie who absolutely hates to walk in the rain.

The Myth of Settling Down

The funny thing is, I thought I was settled. I had routines. I had a church community that held me for 13 years. I had favorite grocery stores (God, I miss Nugget Market) and familiar back roads and a sense of who I was in that place.

Then suddenly I was standing on a Washington hillside, staring at a mid‑century house surrounded by trees so tall they looked like they were judging me. And I remember thinking, “I’m too old to be introducing myself to new neighbors. I barely like introducing myself to myself.”

But maybe that’s the point. Maybe “settling down” isn’t about staying put. Maybe it’s about settling into yourself—into your truth, your values, your voice. Maybe the place matters less than the person you’re becoming.

A Move That Became a Pilgrimage

I thought the move would be a logistical project: boxes, movers, address changes, the usual chaos. But it turned out to be something deeper. A kind of pilgrimage. Not the kind with maps and guidebooks, but the kind where you realize halfway through that you’re not just changing your surroundings—you’re changing your life.

There was excitement, of course. There was also grief. Leaving behind friends, routines, and the familiar ache of a place that had shaped me. And there was disorientation—the kind where you walk into your new grocery store and can’t find the peanut butter, and suddenly you’re questioning every decision you’ve ever made.

And then there was the stretch I jokingly call our “boutique homelessness phase.” We sold our house in West Sacramento before we had anything lined up in Washington, which meant we spent weeks living out of Airbnbs while we hunted for a place to land. It was equal parts adventure and exhaustion. One week we were in a cozy lake house with only one bathroom and ceilings I kept bumping my head on, and the next we were in a rental where the décor looked like my grandmother decorated it in 1955. Still, we were lucky. We found these genuinely lovely spots along the way—little pockets of calm while we tried to figure out where, exactly, our new life was supposed to begin.

But there was possibility, too. A quiet whisper that said, “You’re not done becoming.”

Lessons From the Land

What I didn’t expect was how much the environment here would become a teacher. The trees here are ancient and patient. They don’t rush. They don’t apologize. They just stand there, rooted and unapologetically themselves. I’m trying to learn from that.

The rain falls with a kind of steady insistence, like it’s reminding me that growth often happens in the quiet, unseen places. And the stillness—something I used to resist—has started to feel like an invitation.

One morning, I stepped outside and realized I could hear… nothing. No traffic. No leaf blowers. No neighbors arguing about recycling bins. Just quiet. An occasional crow called out breaking the silence. It was beautiful and unsettling, like the universe had muted itself so I could hear my own thoughts. I’m still deciding whether that was a blessing or a curse.

Becoming at Any Age

So here I am, learning to start over. Learning that change doesn’t stop just because you hit a certain birthday. Learning that “settling down” might actually mean settling into a deeper version of yourself. Learning that moving across states can be a spiritual practice if you let it be.

And maybe that’s the real gift of this season: realizing that it’s never too late to begin again, to reimagine your life, to follow the pull of something new—even when it surprises you.

If you’re in a season of change—whether chosen or forced—I hope you know this: you’re not behind. You’re not late. You’re not off‑script. You’re simply becoming, just like the rest of us.