Welcome to my blog fair readers. This is an exploration into my experience of looking back into an old experience from the eyes of a new perspective. A picture of the earth from the moon if you will. An exploration of a man who lost his belief and observes it from the eyes of a new philosophy as he continues supporting his family through participation.
This is not an angry blog, I fortunately have moved past that stage. It is also not a blog about discussing all the shortcomings of Mormonism. I firmly believe everyone needs to eat their own apples, so you must walk your own path there my friend, some embark on it well prepared, and some are thrown into it by jarring occurrences that strike them to the very core of their existence. I am a victim of the latter, or am I a receiver of a great gift or insight? I suppose that all remains to be seen.
So through a life of trying to understand God and ultimately failing or succeeding (depending on your perspective), I arrive at the philosophy of "is". Things are what they are. The universe continues on it's way and we are just pieces of it having very little control over it or our very lives. No hard statistics to show that believers get any more perks or health than others, outside of the benefits of socializing with like minded people.
I find myself with a very Buddhist philosophy these days. A Secular Buddhist philosophy. I don't believe in the metaphysical or non-provable items. I do practice mindfulness meditation and the tricky art of letting go. The four noble truths and the eight fold path make a lot of sense to me and the belief in "impermanence" and "all phenomena are empty" is something I have had since my teens.
I write this so the reader understands the lens through which I am observing things now. I look back at the items that reduced me to what I was at my darkest hour and I understand how they accomplished that by examining them with my new glasses. I don't mean to say one system is better than the other, I should mention here. I only find I am more healthy taking in some of the Buddhist philosophies.
So much in life is centered on desire. We desire our families to come to our part of heaven. We are expected to desire our inactive home teaching families to come to church. We are expected to desire to have missionary experiences. We desire people we know to join our church. We desire people we don't know to join our church. We desire our sons to get the Priesthood and serve missions. We desire our daughters to marry in the temple (sons too). We desire to be better when we are told it isn't good enough. We desire peace when we are constantly attending meetings, indexing, home teaching an ever increasing pool of families, taking kids to mutual (youth activities), we desire healing balm for our mental wounds and rejuvenation each week, we desire meaningful answers to priesthood blessings without having to make up some excuse as to why it didn't turn out as expected, we desire a lot of things us Mormons.
I come to understand a bit why I was suffering. Life is suffering, desire causes suffering, we can overcome desire/subdue it. I let it go. I am learning to say no. I am learning I can't control whether other people suffer or not, they do that through their desires. I can help where I can to ease discomfort, but I am not responsible for other's desire's for me.
So today I sit, finding my mind and body through releasing judgement for a space and observing what is there. I sit in church and observe the people who run around in constant motion running their individual pieces of the kingdom of God and holding comforting thoughts of a better life after death. Some of them are compatible with the demands and find joy and fulfillment in their efforts to affect other's lives willing or not, and some plod along, executing endless actions commanded of them but not getting as much out of it, betting it will be better in the next life. So I observe, and hopefully without too much judgement.
This is not an angry blog, I fortunately have moved past that stage. It is also not a blog about discussing all the shortcomings of Mormonism. I firmly believe everyone needs to eat their own apples, so you must walk your own path there my friend, some embark on it well prepared, and some are thrown into it by jarring occurrences that strike them to the very core of their existence. I am a victim of the latter, or am I a receiver of a great gift or insight? I suppose that all remains to be seen.
So through a life of trying to understand God and ultimately failing or succeeding (depending on your perspective), I arrive at the philosophy of "is". Things are what they are. The universe continues on it's way and we are just pieces of it having very little control over it or our very lives. No hard statistics to show that believers get any more perks or health than others, outside of the benefits of socializing with like minded people.
I find myself with a very Buddhist philosophy these days. A Secular Buddhist philosophy. I don't believe in the metaphysical or non-provable items. I do practice mindfulness meditation and the tricky art of letting go. The four noble truths and the eight fold path make a lot of sense to me and the belief in "impermanence" and "all phenomena are empty" is something I have had since my teens.
I write this so the reader understands the lens through which I am observing things now. I look back at the items that reduced me to what I was at my darkest hour and I understand how they accomplished that by examining them with my new glasses. I don't mean to say one system is better than the other, I should mention here. I only find I am more healthy taking in some of the Buddhist philosophies.
So much in life is centered on desire. We desire our families to come to our part of heaven. We are expected to desire our inactive home teaching families to come to church. We are expected to desire to have missionary experiences. We desire people we know to join our church. We desire people we don't know to join our church. We desire our sons to get the Priesthood and serve missions. We desire our daughters to marry in the temple (sons too). We desire to be better when we are told it isn't good enough. We desire peace when we are constantly attending meetings, indexing, home teaching an ever increasing pool of families, taking kids to mutual (youth activities), we desire healing balm for our mental wounds and rejuvenation each week, we desire meaningful answers to priesthood blessings without having to make up some excuse as to why it didn't turn out as expected, we desire a lot of things us Mormons.
I come to understand a bit why I was suffering. Life is suffering, desire causes suffering, we can overcome desire/subdue it. I let it go. I am learning to say no. I am learning I can't control whether other people suffer or not, they do that through their desires. I can help where I can to ease discomfort, but I am not responsible for other's desire's for me.
So today I sit, finding my mind and body through releasing judgement for a space and observing what is there. I sit in church and observe the people who run around in constant motion running their individual pieces of the kingdom of God and holding comforting thoughts of a better life after death. Some of them are compatible with the demands and find joy and fulfillment in their efforts to affect other's lives willing or not, and some plod along, executing endless actions commanded of them but not getting as much out of it, betting it will be better in the next life. So I observe, and hopefully without too much judgement.
No comments:
Post a Comment