Sure...I realize that my path could be somewhat different than others.
Many years of religious searching has given me many questions. Being that my relationship between myself, others, God and nature seems to point towards my inner self, I keep attempting to stay there.
Experiencing my particular type of bipolar, my mind races constantly- I do not say this lightly. Sleep hardly brings me peace and days are frought with fear of everything, anxiety, sadness, and loneliness. Maybe this dissipates for me for a time- sometimes a morning or a day, but not more. If I am happy- it is a searing joy about something- I call it an exquisite experience of God- and that passes within a few hours at most- so quickly back to before. I feel like I somehow almost "pay for it". Though I know that's the bipolar talking.
I explain the above to illustrate the difficulty I have in maintaining a consistent pattern for a spiritual path.
Spirituality, for me, is a part of the mental gymnastics that I try, desperately, to make sense of for my own existence.
How do I access the spiritual part of me that in past years was very different than it is now?
I listen to the HEADSPACE app, and grudgingly let go, with the thoughts swirling in my head, and hold myself there for 10, 15, or maybe 20 minutes.
When I finish the meditative time, the process somewhat harnesses my thoughts and I become peaceful inside, appreciating my life, in all the colors it shows me. There, I find the spiritual gift I so long for.

When I first left my husband, we had a 9 room 2 story house in the woods. We'd been there for 30 years .... I never really missed it, or anything about it except for the screened porch in the back - I used to love to sit out there at night, listen to the birds "talk" while they went to bed, watch the bats come out, and hear our one lone owl begin his call. Otherwise, I left and never looked back. Then I lived in the upstairs of a girlfriends house for 2 years - same thing ... no connection. I think the reason this was so hard leaving and selling my condo was because it was the first place, ever in my life, that I felt safe, comfortable, taken care of because there were friends all around, and just the ability to decide things for myself. That was wonderful. I had been there for 12 years.
abby

4loss - your note reminded me of something I'd long forgotten. When I was young ... maybe 12 and under .... I would have these extremely brief periods of time when I would feel such joy I thought I'd burst. It only lasted maybe 10 sec. at the most and then it was gone. But it was wonderful. It makes me wonder why I no longer have them. Do I live "in my head" too much, do I have too much else to think about to be open to those light-hearted, joyous moments, or is it just the fact of maturation. Somehow I don't want to believe the latter .... I would dearly love to still be like that, but alas it seems to be gone.

The app sounds interesting. I'm going to check it out.

Jim