We go where the white goes when the snow melts away
As I said, obvilion would actually be easier, and frankly almost welcomed. At least it wouldn't hurt and to quote Daffy Duck: "I don't like pain. It hurts too much."
The only thing that exist before me at this point and time, is my being able to die a better death. I truly wish for " A Good Day To Die. "
I hear you prophecor. I'm not afraid of death, truly. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to shuffle off this mortal coil just yet, but I recognize that one day it will happen and this thread is my poor attempt to begin to understand where I fit in afterward. I've had 3 very poor examples in my life of people who were terrified of death and their last few months and years were a misery both to themselves and to those who cared for them. I think death is hardest on those who are left behind, and I cannot make my loved ones' lives more difficult. As Anthony Hopkins said in "A Lion in Winter" when asked what did it matter if he died a coward, his character said: "When all that's left is how you go out, it matters."
Get yourself some good weed and then get yourself a piece of AbraCaBubble candy/gum
Never tried it, but it's tempting.
We all play with the cards we are dealt
Yeah, and I'm honestly not trying to whine about what I've been dealt. But I do want to recognize that these experiences have influenced how I feel about the afterlife, an afterlife which might very include a Higher Power giving me The Look (among other things).
Frankly the only reason I believe in God is that I believe with all my heart that there is a Satan/Devil/Beelzebub/whatever. And if so, then there must be a counter-weight. Where there's a yin, there must be a yang. But my logic stops there and emotion takes over and I cannot conceive of any way possible for that Higher Power to even know I exist, must less give a tinkers dam. Which is okay in this life, playing the hand I'm dealt and all that, but what happens then when I die? If that Higher Power doesn't know or care am I screwed again? Don't much fancy that, which is why the atheist answer is more comforting than the religious answer. I'd like to believe the religious answers, but life experiences get in the way making belief nearly impossible.
I've already tried to believe something with all my heart because it was comforting. I won't do it again unless there is more proof than random platitudes written millenia ago by a bunch of backward shepherds. Those words might very well be true, but if so they apply to others and not me. I am convinced I am forgotten and ignored, or worse, cursed.
Know that you are always in my thoughts and prayers. Jeff S.
Thanks Jeff, that's very kind of you. I might just take you up on that after I reformat my computer (bloody trojan spyware!) before it crashes. But I must warn you, I know what the Bible says and reasoning from the scriptures doesn't mean much to me.
Does God care? Did Jesus care? Read the Gospel accounts and imagine you are there
I have read the Bible cover to cover 3 times. I've read separate translations from the New World JW garbage and I think it's a beautiful message that applies to everyone but me. Oh maybe not every single person, I don't claim to be so arrogant as to know how God feels towards others, but it bloody well doesn't mean me. Which, as I say, I can handle in the here and now. I've made my peace with it, and it's cool. Don't like it, but I can't change it.
Nowadays I find that listening out for silence helps me - it really does - at the very least it stops me thinking
Satanus recommended silence as well. Thanks for reinforcing the idea. The nice thing is I go in with no expectations so there will be no disappointment, you know?
Life sucks, but there can be some good moments
Of course! There have been many wonderful, fantastic moments in my life. I don't want my dark musings to led you to think otherwise. But really this thread, for me at least, is more about wonderings about the inevitable future.
on judgement day just ask, 'Was I really supposed to score top marks in that multiple choice about religion, life, morality etc. without ever knowing for sure the book I was reading was the one for the test I was being given? Would you do that to your own kid?
When I was in therapy, my last (and best) therapist told me that when a very small child first hears the concept of God they oftentimes will imagine their daddy floating in the clouds. And once we reach adulthood, very often we imput to God some (or even many) qualities/characteristics/personality traits our father has. This is one of the more subtle, and damaging, parts of child abuse. It wrecks incredible spiritual damage.
When I was very little (perhaps 3 or 4 years old) I used to stare up at the stars and try to imagine which one I came from. That was a period my daydreams were that my real (and loving) parents had visited this world and left but they forgot me and so I got stuck living with a couple of monsters. I used to tell myself that one day they'd remember me and come back for me.
Which is why I've mentioned some of what was done to me. I'm honestly not looking for pity, but I do recognize logically that those experiences have, in all likliehood, influenced me and my beliefs about God and therefore what happens after death. Therefore I thought it best if I could step outside my head and listen to "normal" people to see if it helped.
So until you are able to see this life, and yourself in a more positive (and deserving) manner, you will always struggle with this concept.
This is the conclusion I came to myself. And I am afraid the question this thread poses will continually be my albatross until I die and find out. I just hope whatever he does to me doesn't hurt. Just erasing me from existence really wouldn't be that bad.
I agree with Satan, learn to meditate. The simpler the meditation the better.
Thanks poppers. I will try what you suggest. Satanus is one of the most underrated posters this board has ever had, and someone I also read.
I don't believe that God would be so unjust as to ignore the struggles and confusions that people have here on this earth.
But he ignores pleas for help. He ignores children who are left with monsters. He ignores adults who fight and struggle just to survive only to get knocked down again and again. If he ignores me now, how can I come to believe he won't ignore me then? And if he does ignore me then, what happens? This ties in my idea that God is a corporate CEO. Do you think the CEO of IBM gives a shit about some spare in the mail room? My experience is the big do not know or care about the little. I'd like to think otherwise, but I have no reason to and I refuse to believe something just because it's comforting. I want to know what's real, not fantasy.
It is your perspective on God that will lead you to either dread or anticipate the future. The anger I have towards adults who spoil the young, I cannot tell you. They are interfering with a FUTURE gxxdmmit. And for very many, it is their parents who give them their first impressions of God. After all, if your own MOTHER found you unlovable, how could GOD?
But of course, Big Tex, you proved them all wrong. You are a wonderful, caring, whole human being. You are a good husband. You are good, good, and lovable.
I don't know why God allows bad things to happen. It's the first thing I intend to ask when I see Him face to face. Since I cannot reconcile an all-powerful God with an inactive one, I fear that God is NOT all-powerful. He has limits.
My perspective is that God IS intimate with all I do good and bad, but that His interest extends past that of an accountant. I am immersed in the thought that God loves me all-in-all, loves mankind, loves all little children. I console myself, as another poster has suggested, that God will give those evil people (the ones who are cruel to children) their just reward one day.
So you could say that I see the end of every man's earthly life to be the day of ultimate justice. But I am not afraid.
Janet your post really resonated with me. Thank you. I too have thought about your fear that God may not be all-powerful, which led me to my other belief/possibility about God: that he's a bean counter, an accountant or lawyer who miserly keeps track of errors. Personally I prefer thinking of God as a CEO, someone who can intervene but chooses not to. The idea that God doesn't intervene because he can't is my worst case scenario, and if true, I'm seriously screwed. My best hope then would be for complete erasure, but the meeting or judgment or whatever it would be called with the God accountant/lawyer would not be fun.
I wish I could believe that evil will dealt with, believe me I do, but I can't. It's not dealt with in this life, so why should it be in the next? God does not bring those people to task here, why should I believe he would then? My mother got away with it. My father got away with it. My grandfather got away with it. I've been set up twice at 2 different jobs and ended up taking the fall for others who skated free. Nothing happened to them. Jehovah's Witnesses across 3 towns and the City of Dallas villified me for 2 years for things my mother lied about.
I'm not looking for pity, I just mention this because I've never seen karma working in my life. I'd like to think the Buddhists have something there, and maybe karma works for others, but it damn sure don't here. And justice? Well that's the only thing I am afraid of. I truly, honestly, deep in my heart do not think there will be anything approaching justice, only that whatever happens (if there is someone judging me) will play out like the above.
The ONLY reason I believe in God is. from what I see -not man made but Creator made... Oceans,trees, babies,animals I could go on & on but you get the picture.
Grace you sound very much like my wife Nina. This is her philosophy as well.
Can I ask you something? I know you've had a rough life, and please believe me I know my life could have been much worse (I'm very lucky compared to so many others), so then how did you come to believe in a Higher Power that cares? Because it seems to me, at the end of the day when all is said and done, we just have to make a choice to believe a certain way. And honestly Grace, for me that's just not good enough. I've been fooled once -- twice actually because I foolishly made myself believe my mother and father really did love me but what happened was my fault.
So see, I don't want to get fooled again. You know, once burned twice shy and all that.
Geez I sound like Scooby Snax used to don't I?
(((codeblue))) Yeppers, I'll be there.
Chris
