The command of happiness over the tragic dimension of New Age healing rituals

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to present the relationship between healingand New Age Spirituality. Through the interpretation of certain rituals, the so-called workshops, I intend to develop the following argument: entertainmentand pain are constitutive elements of this spirituality, because they come about asefficient and causal conditions for the required spiritual transformation. Thus, Iintend to draw attention to two groups of ethical elements that emerge from therituals: a) those which indicate refusal of the logic of power through which therelationship between loss and gain, oppression and resistance is formed and b)those related to games and playing. Both groups arise from changeable situationsexperienced by the participants. They are creative-destructive situations, since theyoffer ritual means by which a person can perceive in his/her suffering, in pain orin decadent situations in his/her life, the opportunity to summon up control ofhis/her happiness again.