Calling Out Spiritual Bypassing

When faith becomes an excuse, someone has to say “enough.” In this round-table discussion —recorded April 30, 2025—Malcolm Traverse sits with Greg, Devon, and Swag to pry open the glossy shell of “love-and-light” culture and ask the harder question: Is your spirituality actually helping you grow, or just hiding the mess?

Across laughter, side-eyes, and a few black-church memories, we wrestle with:

• what “spiritual bypassing” really means—and why “everything happens for a reason” can be a velvet-lined cop-out;
• using faith as a launchpad and a crutch: where’s the line?;
• the uneasy marriage of mental health, trauma, and Sunday-morning platitudes;
• comfort food, diabetes, and the spiritual excuses we make for skipped doctor visits;
• reclaiming accountability—whether it’s therapy, a gym membership, or finally checking your blood pressure.

Expect sharp humor, unapologetic sidebars, and a challenge to test every cherished belief for its real-world utility. If your practice doesn’t make you kinder, healthier, and more present, maybe it’s just costume jewelry for the soul.

Listen in, get uncomfortable, and—above all—keep it useful.

Transcript

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  📍  Hello, and welcome to the M three Bear Cast. My name is Malcolm Traverse. Male Media Mind is a grassroots organization dedicated to uplifting and unifying our community through dialogue, insight, creativity, and knowledge. And on the M three Bear Cast, I highlight topics that we also discuss on our M three livestream.

That's at youtube.com/mail. MediaMind two, we usually talk about things like relationships. Communication, mental health, spirituality. And in this episode we're talking about spiritual bypassing. Um, we play a video from a TikTok creator who explains the term, but it is one of those times where it is a criticism of the way that some people practice spirituality.

And I knew that when I brought up this topic. This was on April 30th, uh, 2025. I knew that it was gonna cause some issues with those who are religious or spiritual because it aims a, uh, accusatory picture at a lot of people who are performing spirituality or performing religion. Um, people who say that everything happens for a reason, or those religious people say that God works in mysterious ways, and it's just a way of dismissing someone's problems because everything can happen for a reason.

But if you can't accept those reasons, you're still in the place where you start off. And to me, I believe that a spiritual practice or religious belief should be useful. It should be a way of helping you process trauma, helping you get past the things that you can't accept to help you find community, to help you, um, deal with the hardships of life, even if they are stories, even if there are myths.

Um, the myths. It gave our ancestors comfort and I, I still find value in thinking about those myths, even if I don't believe them. And so I challenge my pe, I challenge my brothers who still believe to be a little bit more critical about their beliefs and to hold them to account to whether or not they're useful in their lives.

And I think the concept of spiritual bypassing is one of the best ways to do that. It's not saying that your beliefs are untrue. It's saying are they useful to you? Because the thing could be true and you can basically ignore it and move to some other spiritual practice within your religion or uh, spiritual framework that is more useful for you in your daily struggles.

In the arc of your life in helping you improve, helping you be a better friend, um, helping you be more loving and accepting of other people. Um, we all get to choose what we focus on, even if we don't get to choose what we believe in. So I hope that you enjoyed this conversation. It was on, uh, I was on with Greg Devon and Swag on Wednesday.

April 30th. Uh, it took me a while to get to this one because I didn't know if it was like argumentative. Uh, Greg basically got to vent a lot about a lot of the per,

I think in this clip you'll see that, um, Greg has a little bit of a journey from wanting to go in on the lady who was criticizing spiritual people. And I think he got to the, the concept that, um, spirituality needs to be useful. And I hope that other people kind of pick up on that same idea that even if you are a religious or spiritual person, that your friends who are not your, the same belief structure as you still want you to.

I still want you to be happy and wants you to be prosperous and to find comfort in your beliefs and not a, not necessarily trying to challenge them. All right. Here's our conversation on spiritual bypassing.

  

 I wanna start off with some like spiritual, the concept of spiritual bypassing. A couple weeks ago I had a topic about like beliefs, weird beliefs, and whether or not beliefs are useful or not is really the key to determining whether or not you should, question it or not.

Because I really feel like whether something is true or not, sometimes, especially when it comes to like spiritual beliefs is pointless. They're all based on faith, by definition. They're not gonna be proven or disproven. But a good question is whether or not they're useful or not. And one way of thinking about that is with this concept known as spiritual bypassing are, does your spiritual practice make you a better person or are you just ignoring your problems, let's play this for, so let's talk about something a lot of people avoid in the spiritual community, spiritual bypassing. That's when we use spiritual language practice to avoid doing the hard, messy emotional work. It sounds like this, everything happens for a reason.

Instead of holding space for real pain, love and light, instead of accountability, I'm protecting my peace. When really you are avoiding uncomfortable conversation. Here's the truth. You cannot meditate your way out of trauma. You are refusing to face. You can't stage your house and ignore the patterns still living in you.

You can burn all the sage in the world, but if your ego is still leading. That's not growth. That's toxic Spirituality, authentic spiritual growth. It looks like shadow work. It looks like apologizing. It looks like crying on your bedroom floor and choosing to rise anyway. It looks like forgiveness because it's not for them.

It's for you. Choosing love, not because it's easy, but because it's healing. If your spirituality doesn't make you kinder, less critical, more self-aware, more open-hearted, and then it might not be spirituality, it might be a performance. And here's the thing, no shape. We've all been there. This is about accountability, not shame.

We evolve when we choose honesty over image. My challenge for you this week, ask yourself, where am I using spiritual language to avoid emotional honesty? Now who is she? She's just someone on TikTok that I found. Do we have any, does she have any credentials? Because I'm gonna push back on everything that she said.

No, and how I'm going. Okay. So how I'm gonna push back is that is rich, that, because that is some people's coping mechanism. Everything. That's exactly what I was gonna say is that there's no true thing outside of any sort of context. There are certain contexts in which, spiritual bypassing is great.

I told you about one of the examples, like my grandmother, whenever she was in, like serious stress or something was really bothering her, was just start singing negro spirituals, and it was just a way of centering herself in that moment. But I'm thinking after a crisis has passed, are you still ignoring issues?

That's thing I was about to say that. Yeah. There. No, there is no truth. That's true in every context. That's the thing we all No, I agree. But it's the same thing as when one is in pain. We have had like white pain. Pain that was just so intense that you just, you're white knuckling it.

You're just sweating. Exactly. In my mind it's the same thing. So you kinda white knuckle through whatever the Absolutely. And then so I, so it depends on your spirituality and your spiritual training, if you will, how you and that may and God's will, like everything is God's will. Maybe somebody's spiritual forte.

Now that doesn't mean they don't go home and think about what has happened or try to work through what has happened. That's the part that I can't get with saying that those things aren't spiritual bypassing or avoidance to someone. No, I don't think they're saying that they are. It's asking yourself.

Are you avoiding? She just gave an example, so I'm just saying, so she put the list, but so if you have those questions for yourself, I think the more, I think the second question or the leading follow up questions should be, am I going back to deal with whatever that happened? You know what I'm saying?

Yeah. They, I don't want people to worry about thinking, oh, I cannot curb this thing, or I can, this is not the way that I can deal with, it's like death. You, it's not something that we necessarily understand, but it's a passing that we all have to go through and just that thing that, okay, so you, do we sit here and dwell on it, or do we feel, do we answer the question of death, but everybody has to go through it and, no I agree.

Because there are aspects thinking about death for instance, there are people who abso, who are absolutely terrified of death. And so the idea of the afterlife and the idea of the spirit that lingers beyond death is helpful for them to get through their day. Correct. That's, and that's what I'm saying.

At the end of the day, the question isn't whether or not your beliefs are true is whether or not they're useful. You get through the day. Yeah. I think her whole platform or what she was saying is very subjective and that, that's all I'm saying. I think it's, no, what I'm saying, that's what, by definition it's not gonna be yeah, and my opinion, long story short is if it works for you, do it.

I don't, I think that's very judgmental what she was saying. Thank you. Alright. All right. So here are some questions back after and that's what I'm saying it of course it is. One of the difficulties of talking about spirituality in general is that people do feel judged when you discuss it, but I think it is useful to challenge your beliefs.

Are they still serving you? Or is it just something that you have adopted from someone? These are just some questions that came up from, or discussion about this spiritual bypassing is just the idea that using spiritual talk to avoid deeper inner work shadow work is just dealing with the aspects of yourself, which you don't want to confront.

This is yeah, a very positive spiritual practice, which is difficult to do because by definition you're avoiding your shadow. Stress relief, obviously community. Those are also things that come from spiritual practices. I don't know. So I guess my question, to you is how have you evolved in your spiritual practice over time?

Have you, I don't know, adopted new practices that have helped you? Yeah, I think that I'm blessed that the Lord, as we see another year each year, and I think you, you learn what not to do. You know what I mean? Like the term faith without action is dead. That's the whole truth. We can sit here and pray or whatever your spiritual practice is Meditation.

Yeah. And, but if you don't take action, if you don't take the action that's based on the thing that you're worried about. So I, like I was telling a friend of mine, she's worried about money, honey, are you applying for a new job? That's the answer. Yeah. To, that's the having faith that God will send you more money, but to the action is you.

Assertively look for this thing. And yeah. And it's we often talk about dating, so it's oh God, send me a good man. Are you at a, are those places when. Be at, to get real black women. Yeah. Are are you doing or are you becoming the person that you want to attract?

Are you doing the, are you doing, and I think, think, I always, I guess thinking, oh, we're both from Virginia, so it's all black people. Virginia, we were raised the it's just like we grew up on East. That was Easter Monday. You know what I mean? That was Easter. And then church I didn't convert to Catholicism till I was older, till I was about 34 or 35, whatever it was.

But growing up in the Pentecostal and or the black church the, that's the thing that you're taught. Put it to the side. If you don't understand, put it to the side. Thank God, be your guy. Don't. And that's the whole thing about mental illness in the church. Oh no. If no. Take it. Jesus. A therapist.

You know what I mean? God knows he made, because that man is a saint. Yeah. And I question people that kinda leave it there. That's the problem I have. If you're just gonna leave it there. Or even if that's, if it just stops there, those things are helpful. Cope, coping mechanisms for sure.

Yeah. But if you just stop it there, or that is just your go to. I'm gonna stop right here. I'm put this, I'm gonna leave King Jesus black, say swag.

Some whatever they say. Yeah. It's like JJ Fad. Yeah, that's it. I'm sorry. It's just okay, but when are you going to, and then there's a part about when are you going to do the work? And then they like, okay, Lord Jesus. Oh man, Jesus gonna take this fat off my belly. Yeah. So will a Jim. Yeah.

I'm gonna say sometimes, sometimes, you know what, sometimes Greg is my spiritual animal. He really is. That's why we get a, that's why I like Greg, because sometimes he gets one out there just and when I made this post, somebody said, you're being wrong. I said, no, I'm not.

I'm here. But you did. Because I said, when people say, oh this is the body, the summer's gonna get yet to say your body, the winter and the fall got too. So we weren't expect anything different. We got That's what you gave us all seasons. All the seasons. And you did nothing but pulled up the Whataburger and pulled and got some fries.

Exactly. And sat on the couch. That's all you did. And and then and just, and the other thing is Mark, and it's, I love the fact when people are like, everything, the person's died. They got their, got the leg chopped off from diabetes. I love this one for black people.

Black. Listen to me. Let me tell you something. You can take your insulin. You better take goddamn metformin. You know what I'm saying? God didn't, God, it won't your tide. Everything happens in God's time. That was your lack of accountability to your health. You didn't sat around, took a toll and a toll won't enough.

They took the big toe, a little toe. I'm speaking from personal expression. It happened to my Yeah, that's definitely some spiritual bypassing. Yeah. Yeah. And right, they took my uncle the toes and then, Lord mama, every time they took a to at a different time, my mom run to the hospital, Lord. They didn't took Kurt pinky toe, Lord Ky toe, big toe.

And then finally I got the worst ass whooping of my life because I was like, now is he gonna, is he gonna stop eating hostess honey bun

swag? He all up to the hip. He ain't got number to you.

Now this, he ate himself into, lemme tell you something. I go to the doctor tell me I got sugar. As much as I love you, I hosted honey bun. I like on this side of the realm as long as I can. So I, things I'm going say the prayer would be God helped me control my love of sweetss. 'cause I will eat cookies until my fucking face is numb.

I know my sugar be, I ain't even got that. Yeah. Remember when the pandemic was here? Malcolm and I ate those blonde Oreos. Like nobody. Yeah. You talking about those go the no, the golden go. Oh, the golden. Oh yeah. Okay. Okay. I had I don't think I had 'em all under the bed. Oh my God.

And so I hated when they had them on sale. 'cause I do bother. Yeah. And I went to Doctor Greg. How did you become pre-diabetic? Bitch, it is them. Oreos. That's what it was. She was like, put them down. I was like, I ain't ready. She was like, gonna take that tote. And when she said it, like she didn't even know the story of my uncle Kurt, but when she said, yeah, they gonna take that motherfucking toe.

Yeah. All Oreos story short is I think that we, it's and I think that comes from slavery, that we just turn it over and black people are the kings and queens of moving on. We going to give the king Jesus and move on past it. And then next thing you know, we're like, er, about do at the bus stop.

Think we got too many bags. We got too many bags. Yeah. At some point they gotta unpack it. And actually we gotta get rid. We gotta get rid of the, and this is what I call one of the, one of the generational curses of how black people eat. And we understand where it comes from, but we gotta do better.

We got yeah. It does. And so it takes, and I fancy myself a good cook, but I cook like somebody grandma, so I stay my ass away from the stove because I cook with large, just shit that's gonna, I, so I have been, I'm ready, make my triumph. So I. I told myself, Greg, you gotta search for healthier recipe and it may not be as delicious as butter in your macaroni and cheese, but you don't want to kill your friends and family.

You love it. Yes. So you don't want commit murder through food, Greg. That's, and that's how you have to look at it. You know what I mean? Yeah. If you are serving somebody, like I love cabbage, I love fatback, you know what fatback is? Thank you. Grew up in Virginia. Except that my mother used to fry crackling in the morning with eggs and I used to go to school as a 12-year-old blood pressure high.

Like I was 60 years old. Oh God. Malcolm, you dizzy. You and Jim laugh like this, yo fuck is happening. The funny thing is like in that, I don't think there's any way to, really dampen the desire for the foods that make you feel comfortable and whole, especially if you're dealing with mental health issues.

On top of the fact that you're trying to lose weight, 'cause we use food to comfort ourselves. The truth is, for me, and this is just something you gotta find something healthy that is also a comfort food. There has to be something else that moves into space and it can't be, something that happens overnight.

It's not, and I'm gonna tell you that, do not fool yourself in ladies and gentlemen. Yeah. This thing that we're talking about, you gonna wake up, ta da. So my secret sauce is gone because I love sugar. And it's just, I need to get rid of that taste. So it's sugar for free. On my way to this week, I'm gonna buy me a tub of sugar free gum.

Yeah. I do the water additives. It works pretty well too. Like the, yeah, because you got to, but you got, and, but then, I have a therapist and just, I'm telling you all my business on my way. But just today I have decided I need. A psychiatrist And the re and there is a difference. One is a medical doctor that can give out medication.

And the reason I need one America is because I need, I am still afraid of the blood pressure cuff. I still freak out when I go to the doctor and my doctor just is nice and sweet and kind as you wanna be. He's Hey Greg, do you mind if I take your blood pressure? I'm like, yes. I'm mind nigga. I'm over here sweating and shit.

I'm over here about the hell goddamn meltdown. And, and his, he was like, Greg, you know I have to prescribe your blood pressure. I need to take your blood pressure. Yeah. And I'm like, doctor no, not today. I'm sweating,

doctored. I had when they were taking, I, I can tell this story too. So my brother died back in four years ago, and the day he died, I had a doctor's appointment. Now I'm like, oh, I'm okay. Fuck it, it's okay. I'm going on to the doctor. No, I'm not. Okay. I pulled up and I, my head started spinning immediately when I opened the door.

I was like, shit. And so my doctor was like, you wanna go home because Greg, you don't look well, you wanna go to the hospital because you don't look every time, as time went on. And so she snuck up and she took my blood pressure. She was like, oh my God, you gonna have a stroke? And so every time I go to the doctor, it's in that same building.

My mind is telling me, bitch, you going have a struggle. You gonna lose your life. You gonna lose your job. You. Yeah, I'm, that's the thing that, a phrase that makes me afraid. But I, you have to go to the doctor, you have to get this thing done. Yeah. When he gets the manual blood pressure machine, he kinda sneaks up behind me like a big game hunter.

And he just,

right, and he'll just behind me, he is like, gracious, I know it's gonna be high 'cause your heart is beating. He was like, I'm sorry man, I'm doing this outta love, I promise you. So I, to today I have decided that I'm going to go to a psychiatrist to talk about this one thing of Yeah. I'm holding onto it.

That is good. Yeah. And the irony is like going to that idea of spiritual practices, whatever it may be, that is something that would really help as well. I don't know which ones you do, but past that I've been trying, no, I'm saying whatever it is. 'cause there is like a point at which.

Whatever your psychiatrist tells you to do is gonna be some homework, right? It's, yeah. He's gonna ask you to do some things and at some point you're going to have to do them. And so whatever it is in your mind, in your tool set, you could call it spiritually, you can call it mental health, whatever.

You gotta get yourself to do it, whatever. So I'm gonna tell you my therapist that I see now, that's not a medical doctor. Yeah. We have done exposure therapy. I've bought blood pressure machines and conveniently lost them. I've done, I went to my priest, I went to the doctor with different people that try to make me comfortable.

I drug swag to the doctor one day. He live all the way to another. Aries Facts. Facts not work, yeah. I'm gonna try, I'm gonna try think next. I just feel are you free to

Now I went to my priest, I try to meditate. I've even taken like muscle relaxers. This, it's that core memory of my brother dying on that day and I'm, and I had a full meltdown. Yeah. So there is, I think what she's saying in the video and just to, not to belabor the point, but I think what you have to do work after you say, I'm gonna turn it over to God, everything happens for Yeah.

Those things because human okay, so God does everything for a reason. Does not. Yeah. I was gonna say for me, it's like everything happens for a reason now what. Because you still gotta move forward. I was about to say, so it's, God does everything for a reason, but pain and death and mourning and suffrage still hurts.

Yeah. It's the reasons that you may not be able to accept, and I'm tell you what, everything I tell people all the time what kind of universe do we live in? What kind of guard do we serve that will allow us to choose Donald Trump? Like we as a world and it, we're in a heap and shit of trouble.

And as much as I try to ignore the news, I can't, it keeps coming at me. It's sweeping under the door, it's coming on the phone. And they're like, you in danger, girl. They, it was like they popping up like cream. Girl. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Poland is getting ready, all these people are gearing up and.

And, I don't, for some reason, he just wants to turn over the keys to our country, to China and Russia, and I don't know why. And finally, and this is the tie in. And finally, white people are trying to solve that because it's their problem. If there's a World War and all this other stuff, you, this is the person that you chose.

You know what I mean? This is the person that you chose and we don't have enough juice to, to do that kind of choosing, and don't, so I told the white B-I-T-C-H online today. I said, listen honey, talk to your sisters. Talk to you, talk to your people because you, y'all chose him.

I ain't going nowhere. I'm not donating, I ain't doing nothing. I'm gonna take it to God. But the work on that level that I, 'cause I can't do anything about the politics. I think it's the hopelessness that you can feel when something that gigantic happens or something that you cannot control.

IE turn the pat, I'll tell you, I failed two years ago at this point, and then it's been a hard road back. So you ask yourself, God, why, Jesus, Lord, I already had some issues. Why? Why do I have to take on this? It becomes a part of the tapestry of your story, one, so you can, but you still with good reason.

You want an understanding and so telling my child this, some things in life you will never ever get the answer to. Damn and that's it. That's all. Yeah. It's true. It's true. And learning how to accept that is painful too. It's one of those things that spirituality is supposed to help you, accept the fact that certain things you will not know.

And the prayer says it all. God, accept the things I cannot change. Yeah exactly. And give yourself the ability to move forward if it, if faith is supposed to give you anything. It's the ability to act even when it doesn't seem like you know that it's rational to you. But boy, lemme tell you something.

Them people, they gonna have everybody jumping over in hill. And I'm not jumping intercostals, but if you don't believe that God made a therapist and you don't believe in the healing of mankind and the soul, we are in deep fucking dooo. Because we understand, and Malcolm, I, you actively dissuade people from, I'm be honest with you, for one, one Wednesday I finally understand your question.

Sometimes you leave me thinking and struggling, but this is the Wednesday that I get it. I understand your question. What's beyond, once you tell yourself I can handle it, or you put your big boy pants on and now what? What happens now? Now what? What do I do now? But I take Exactly, you keep that same pace.

It's hope and faith. Hope and faith thing that would get you across the bridge. Now is it real? That's up to you now. Yeah, sometimes you get, you can feel real go with it. That's what I'm saying, like if it's a, sometimes the light tunnel, a goddamn train and you about to get hit there, nothing that you can do about it.

Life. If you are a religious person, life has been predetermined by what deity that you. Worship. So if you believe in that thing, you just kinda gotta be, you have to live in your truth and be the best person in that thing that you can be. And that, my last point being is it doesn't make you a good or bad person, but we really should try to do better about a fellow man.

I, I used to be the king of mean. I'm the villain. In tons of people's stories. As I started to ask myself why, I'm like, Greg, look how you talk to that dude. Or look how you talk to that woman. You just totally dismissed this bitch. You told her to kick rocks and die, please and die. Got it.

And you sitting wondering why your back hurt, your neck hurt because it's reciprocal with the universe. So think about that when you're hollering in pain, Lord Jesus, Y Lord Jesus, Lord, my shoe. When you're thinking about those, you're thinking about those things and you're wondering why and why can't anything I touch, I can't be successful and.

Question myself. Am I a successful person in my personal life? Am I successful with my relationships with my loved ones? Does Thick know I'm playing when I say he got a big old country ass? And yes, I know. Okay. He knows I'm not. I'm telling the truth. But

thank you Malcolm, for the time.





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