Scientist and Agnostic... and They Tell Me I'm Experiencing a Spiritual Awakening

"I’m not religious," I replied.

Life smiled at me—half with false tenderness, half with shameless arrogance—and opened the door for me to step outside and play.

If you’ve never heard of a spiritual awakening, don’t worry—I hadn’t either. I only learned the meaning of the term less than ten years ago, and I learned it the hard way. To me, spirituality was something reserved for Catholic Argentines, the religious of the world, and my grandfather. My grandfather was a meditator.

A few years ago, exhausted from stress, anxiety, and physical fatigue, a friend suggested we take a meditation course. I agreed immediately—after all, my grandfather, the least anxious person I knew, had always seemed unshakable to me. One plus one is two.

But my friend never showed up. She got the wrong address, missed the first class, and gave up right then and there. Not me. I’m structured. When I start something, I have to finish it—otherwise, I imagine it ruins the aesthetics of my life, like a half-eaten slice of pizza left on the coffee table.

And so, I completed a six-week Vipassana meditation course—six classes, each three hours long—a journey that turned out to be a one-way ticket to the unknown. Meditation schools should put warning signs at the entrance: "Embarking on the path of spirituality is no joke. Think twice." I’m convinced the Buddha statue at the door was smiling because he knew we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into.

Meditation isn’t just sitting in silence and chanting "ohm". Meditation is an invitation into the unknown. It’s stepping onto a path of self-transformation. It’s learning to do magic. And whoever learns to meditate becomes a magician.

When I realized I was becoming spiritual, I felt uneasy. I didn’t like it. I didn’t recognize myself. I had always assumed spirituality and religion were one and the same. I was completely lost. I had spent my entire life resisting religion because I believed in science. I was a scientist, I am a scientist, I was sceptical.

But spirituality, just as serene and disciplined as my meditation practice, continued to weave its way into my life. It didn’t ask for permission. It didn’t ask to be excused.

It took me a while, but eventually, I saw it. And when I did, my ego—newly initiated in its process of deconstruction—relaxed: spirituality and religion are not the same thing.

I had always thought spirituality was just an aspect of religion. But while religion can, in some cases, foster a spiritual path, spirituality is infinitely greater than any belief system humanity has created.

Spirituality needs no dogmas, no intermediaries, no sacred texts. It’s a journey inward—toward something that has always been there, waiting patiently to be discovered. It’s the connection with a presence that arises when body and mind are set aside—one that is everything and nothing at the same time. It is you, but in an intangible state. It is the essence that remains when we strip away everything.

Robbie Williams still had a few layers to peel off in Rock DJ, and dare I say—if he had, he would have reached that essence and charmed the girl. Because at that level, there is no difference between self and other, here and there, now and later. There is only the whole, in a state of absolute fusion.

When I touched that whole, I understood. I was everyone. I was me. I was God. And it all happened at once.

"I don’t know what’s happening to me," I said.
"You’re having a spiritual awakening," I was told.

And the door remained open for me to step outside and play once more.
The light outside flickered differently though—same world, different eyes.