There is no such thing as Sin

...at least not in the way we were taught to believe.

I went to sit down and write my next deck review, but lately, I have been stuck on the Seven Deadly Sins.  I am not sure why, but it just keeps coming back into the forefront of my mind, so I know I need to get this out here for some reason.  Just not in the Christian sense, but more through a spiritual and psychological lens.  As a spiritual being, I can say from a non-dogmatic perspective that I fully believe that there is no such thing as sin.  Not in the eternal-condemnation-burning-in-a-lake-of-hellfire sense at least. 

It’s no secret that the Christian faith rules by fear - you must do as God says.  Why? Because the Church said so, that’s why.  But the Church can’t relay a command ‘from God’ and it have no consequence.  What would be the point of that? People might not listen.  So, they keep their devotees in line by threatening them with the threat of burning in damnation for eternity if they disobey. 

We aren’t born flawed; we aren’t going to some place below the surface of the Earth, tossed into a lake of fire and brimstone to be burned alive and tortured for eternity because you stole some eyeliner when you were 13 after your mum said she would not buy it for you.  It’s just not a reality.

When you look at what sin is from a non-religious perspective, it is essentially where the consequence of an action performed lands on a spectrum of moral and ethical reasoning.  What is sinful to one person is not even a blip on the radar to another due to context.  For instance, in conservative Islamic beliefs it is sinful for a woman to show her hair in public and must wear a hijab.  In Yemen and Saudi Arabia, it goes as far to be legally punishable!  But in the United States, women can wear bathing suits on the beach and have very little covered and that is normal.

We may not approve of everyone’s swimsuit choices, but none of us really see them as sinful… and a woman having her hair exposed is DEFINITELY not sinful in most other countries (and why only women and not men is for a different topic…).  It also shaped by intent.  Accidental harm is much different than deliberate cruelty.

Now that being said, we all do suffer from sin, on both personal and collective levels, but these are not things we cannot come back from, nor do they have to be long-term and especially not permanent marks on our life and soul.

A sinful action, when reframed from religious viewpoint and put into a more spiritual or psychological lens, is really an action that was influenced by a personal imbalance… stemming from a deep, unhealed wound.  Now understanding all of that, if we take a look at the Seven Deadly Sins through a non-Christian lens, we can apply that toward our own soul growth.  Let’s dive in…

The Seven Deadly Sins are: Pride • Envy • Wrath • Sloth • Greed • Gluttony • Lust.  These are cardinal offenses, considered to be the worst of the worst. Each of these sins all stem from a wound and have shadow traits but also have a counter virtue and an elevated form.  When we talk about shadow work and evolving spiritually, we do not want to pretend these things do not exist but find ways to learn from them, transmute them and integrate them.  To see them as teachable lessons, not enemy tactics to fear.

1. Pride: this is not being proud of a job well done or in regard to your personal growth and accomplishments.  You can be proud without being prideful.  This is pride in the belief that one is better than others.  An inflated sense of self-importance, of superiority… thinking you need to be celebrated, set on a pedestal, be given special privileges and others not included.

• The root of this is fear.  It’s typically a defense mechanism stemming from a fear of inadequacy, vulnerability or of being dominated.  The overbearing parents, the bullies at school, your ridiculously unfair skin conditions during puberty...

  
  

• It creates separation, disconnection and eventually isolation resulting in a breakdown of community.  That fear becomes so loud, pride grows an inability to learn from others, makes a person defensive, and they are unable to communicate in a healthy manner. 

  
  

• The opposing virtue of pride is humility, and the healed expression of this is Sacred Sovereignty. To stand in your own truth and power without the need to push it on other people. Understanding we can have a healthy respect for ourselves and others, accepting ourselves with all our self-perceived flaws.  When you are your most authentic self, you no longer worry about other people’s opinions about you.  The fear of being accepted by the masses and seeking external validation no longer impact you or rule your mindset and the pride just… disappears.  It results in a healthy knowing of self-worth without a need for comparison.

2. Envy: the green eyed monster we have all encountered at one point or another in our lives. It's the jealousy that we feel towards other people who seem to be more successful, wealthier, or happier than we are. And those people very well could be, but when we look at someone, there is a tendency to overlook what they had to get there in order to have all that they do. That could even be non-material things, like someone having a good deal of free time or just a very peaceful and carefree life. When your life is chaotic and you are feeling like everything is a battle, you can very easily slip into an envious state of mind toward a friend who isn't pulling that same struggle bus...

• The root of this is based in a disconnection from your true self and your path. Envious people typically have deep-seated issues that began during their formative childhood years. It's not just wanting what someone else has - it's the feeling of not being deserving of whatever it is, and feeling less than. These envious people were the kids who were constantly compared to other kids by their parents - or just completely overlooked by them. They were picked last for the team, perhaps grew up in poverty or were lower middle class, maybe they didn't get the best grades or were not considered the prettiest growing up... but those core wounds of not being good enough or pretty enough or smart enough stayed planted and then as they grew, envious tendancies flared up regularly.

  
  

• Envy sets an en energetic and spiritual tone that you do not believe you are ready for what you want. Your thoughts are extremely powerful. That thinking lowers the emotional and energetic vibration, and that in turn attracts more of the same. If you think you are not deserving, then the Universe will listen to you, and you will not receive anything.

  
  

• The opposing virtue to envy is gratitude, and the healed expression of envy is Inspired Alignment. No matter where you are in life, no matter what you have, it is important to always, always ALWAYS practice a mindset of gratitude. You can look at someone else's life and want the same thing. There is nothing wrong with that... but instead of using it to fuel your own crappy, self-depreciating mental spiral, use it to create Inspired Alignment. If you want to own a house on some land? Don't hate on the friend that has it - set a goal and start working towards it. Want a successful business? Then do the things. You can't complain about the results that you aren't getting from the work you are not doing. It's that simple. Celebrate other people's wins. The Universe has unlimited resources. Someone else doing well does not take away from you. There is enough for everyone.

3. Wrath: untethered, sometimes violent, bursts of pure rage... directed at someone (or something) when a person feels that they have suffered some sort of injustice. We see this on a daily basis both as individual and collective expressions of this emotion. We have become so accustomed to lashing out - or seeing people lash out - that it's not even something that gets paid any mind unless a person dies. We see it with school shootings, road rage incidents, fights on the playground, attacks at pubic speaking events, etc.

• Wrath is fuelled by an inability to control one's emotions. The amygdala is activated and our prefrontal cortex shuts down - that's the part that is responsible for logic, reason and impulse control. This typically is caused from a longer history where boundaries were not honoured and there were repeated instances of feeling stressed, trapped or betrayed. If there was no healthy way to let that stress out, eventually you may fly into a fit of rage, sometimes over a tiny thing.

  
  

• Wrath has many unintentional consequences. It can damage friendships, romantic relationships and how your children connect to you. But the feeling of raging out is also very addicting. It triggers a hormonal response (an adrenaline & noradrenaline spike) that actually feels good to your parasympathetic nervous system... almost like taking a drug, you get that dopamine release. It doesn't last long, but that release is intoxicating, and it takes bigger outbursts to get that feeling over time... and it easily becomes a habit, sometimes even an addiction. However, it is our job as people to learn how to regulate our emotions. You are free to lash out, sure. But the rest of us are free to say you are being a dick and keep you at a distance.

  
  

• The opposing virtue to this is patience and Boundaried Power leading to self-mastery. Anger is a sacred signal that something is not right. You can use that anger and transmute it into courage. Courage to set healthy boundaries and remove from your life what no longer serves you. Dismantle the systems in your mind repeating the narrative that you are powerless. In these situations, I tell my children that a ship doesn't sink because of the water around it, it sinks when the water gets inside. Do not let others violate your boundaries. If the water is choppy, navigate to some place out of the storm. By practicing boundaried power, you master self-control. THe actions of others no longer have any affect on you. You are using these healthy boundaries to reclaim the parts of you people used to walk on. It's honouring yourself and knowing your own worth, leading to better emotional and mental health... and eventually physical health.

4. Sloth: the act of laziness, or inaction. Not using your talents to live up to you fullest. most aligned potential. You are bloody miserable in your job. You are working a rotating shift, you are salary and your boss refuses to hire anyone else so you are working 60+ hours a week trying to keep things going. You know you need to apply for a new job... but when you get home you're tired. Instead of polishing up your resume and applying for a new job, you grab your phone, some potato chips and fall into the doomscroll loop for hours. Your mental health is becoming an issue... but you are not taking steps to change your situation. A new job is scary. Your ego is choosing that uncomfortable hell that is killing you instead of unknown heaven because it is afraid. You stay in your 'comfort zone'.

• The root of sloth is a confidence block. Fear of failure, feelings of overwhelm and a disconnection from what really makes you feel good and live a purposeful life are all things that keep your mind, body and spirit circling in this holding pattern of "not right now". This also happens on a spiritual level... when people get caught 'waiting for a sign'... really they are too afraid to make a decision and do not trust their intuition and instead want to shift responsibility for the decision onto their guides.

  
  

• The opposing virtue of sloth is diligence and determination. The elevated form would be Soul Stillness. Achieving that restful presence in your daily life. Stillness is not laziness, we need rest. But a soulful stillness will help one take true aligned action in their life. You are no longer waiting for the 'right time' because you understand that taking consistent steps toward a goal will be what makes the timing right in the end.

5. Greed: this on a collective scale has been the true root of all the world's problems. The excessive desire for material wealth and gain. Wanting more than your siblings, more then your neighbors... the "I'm gonna get mine no matter what it means to anyone else" attitude. Employers paying the absolute minimum to employees while taking billions in profits. People during the plandemic hoarding shopping carts full of toilet paper and not leaving any for other people.

• Greed stems from a fear of lack; a scarcity mindset. When you are dissatisfied with yourself you look for external validation to fill that empty hole... but that feeling of emptiness is insatiable. No matter what you are trying to compensate for, unless you address the root, the bandaids will never be enough. Your house will never be big enough, your bank account balance will never be high enough. Living inauthentically often means chasing external measures of worth (like money, possessions, status) instead of genuine fulfillment and it always leaves you wanting.

  
  

• The majority of the time, greed comes from people not being true to themselves, not being accountable with their choices and not living their true authentic selves. When we don't hold ourselves accountable it is much easier to take more than our fair share. Look at those CEOs. Without accountability, they can absolutely ignore the harm caused to every single person working for them - directly or indirectly - and environmental harm. That pursuit of excess and success without accountability puts up their blinders. (Now, you could be the true victim of ancestral or generational scarcity. You need to heal what was passed down to you... but that is for another post).

  
  

• The opposing virtue of greed is charity and gratitude and thankfully that is an easy one to overcome. The elevated form of this Radical Authentic Accountability. When you understand that your choices affect the whole, not just you, it is easier to see your role in life. Being authentic brings sufficiency to your day to day. When you have healed your wounds of growing up, you will able to authentically look at your life and say honestly that you have what you truly need because you are in alignment with your values.

  
  

  You can alchemize these things and transmute them into generosity, compassionate capitalism and a great number of "radical caring" mindsets that belive that there is truly enough to go around for everyone to live well. This is NOT a call for political communism, that also does not work - but communal in the true sense. We all do our part and be a part of the community - fairly compensated for the work we do and no one lives off the government or handouts.

  
  

• It's also good to remember that we do not need to view success in the way that society tells us to. Success does not have to mean 12 cars and a mansion and millions in the bank. 100 years ago, houses were much smaller and people worked the land they were on and they were grateful for the shelter and food the land provided. Now houses are huge, we have no land and we rely on other people to grow our food for us. We have very little gratitude and waste much. By slowing down, and being truly grateful for what you have now, you will find that you actually need less. We are an example of this. We are transitioning from a 3500 square foot home that we barely use and downsizing into a very comfortable sized travel trailer. Success to us is being able to go where ever we want, whenever we want not having a bunch of open space and things collecting dust tying us down.

6. Gluttony: compulsive consumption. food. alcohol. drugs. porn. sex. sugar. Gluttony dulls mental clarity, self-discipline and focus - both physical and spiritual. Gluttony almost always leads into poor health and wasted resources (money, energy, nourishment, etc). We also tend to neglect other responsibilities when gluttony takes over our way of operating.

• The root of this imbalance comes from a hunger that is not actually physical. It stems from a neglect of emotional and spiritual nourishment. A gift of pleasure or nourishment over time ends up controlling you instead of you mastering yourself and being able to moderate.

  
  

  This could sometimes be connected to scarcity trauma, especially those who lived in poverty who have never healed the mindset of 'I need to take as much as I can now, it won't be there later".

  
  

• The opposing virtue of gluttony is temperance; stepping into the shadow side of gluttony would be avoidance and that is not what this life is about.Pleasure is sacred and if there is something that you enjoy that does not being harm to yourself or others, treat yourself. The elevated form of this would be sacred nourishment through Mindful Indulgence for embodied pleasure.

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7. Lust: traditionally, it's about sexual desire. Sex is one of the most potent creative forces. It's why throughout history, sex magic lends power to so many spells and rituals. But it's also how we handle powerful life-force energy. Lust is any desire without intentional presence. Treating people or experiences as consumable energy rather than recognizing souls to connect with, regardless of the length of the connection. It places personal gratification above virtue, love and respect as it reduces a person to an object of physical pleasure than an expression of Divine connection through the soul.

• The emotional root to lust is seeking external validation, escape and control of a repressed need through sexual. Individuals controlled by lust suffer from a loss of discipline and misalignment with the Divine connection in the Universe.

• The opposing virtue of lust is not abstinence as the Church would have you believe. It is actually sexual connection infused with respectful intention. Passion that is infused with love and a spiritual connection. Understanding that the Divine creator is within each of us and our bodies are our temples. We should treat ourselves, each other and our bodies with reverence. We are not trash to toss in someone else's energy dumpster.

In closing, if you have read this far, I urge you to reconsider your lifestyle, your habits, your mindset... especially if you are a spiritual person. A lot of our issues stem from unhealed fear and scarcity mindsets imbedded in us during our youth. Scared people do crazy shit and fearfulness allows us to accept things that are way less than we deserve. We are amazing creations. We truly are of the heavens and the stars. We deserve everything that is meant for our highest and greatest good.... not slaving away at a job we hate with partners we loathe and children who are lost to the programming of technology.

Look at these Cardinal Sins. Really look at them and use them to begin the process of shadow work in your own life. No matter how far we've come, life will always be life. We get to experience a whole spectrum of good and not-so-good as we grow. If this resonated with you, leave a comment. Have something to add or have a question? I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Bright blessings,

Ehrin xx

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