When Positivity Avoids Real Feelings

Spiritual bypassing is the use of spiritual ideas and practices to sidestep feelings that need feeling — grief relabeled as a lesson before it has been cried, anger meditated into silence instead of heard, everything happens for a reason offered where honest sadness belongs. The term sounds like an accusation, but it names something almost everyone with a practice has done, usually with good intentions. Practices are soothing, and it is natural to reach for soothing before we are done hurting; noticing the pattern is not a verdict, it is the door back to honesty.