| Complete and utter nonsense intermixed with normalcy. > This doesn't mean all experiences are pleasant. The worldly winds still blow harsh and cold. But secure attachment to reality means we can safely experience all of it. This is why challenging events often become crises of faith - they probe the very edges of our trust in existence itself. Only we by virtue of extreme privilege can deign to pretend that this is real and only when we are young at that. It's a crisis because we are asking people to simultaneously come to grips with a world where they are both a special spiritual being personally loved by the creator of the universe and a fragile existence that can be snuffed out for no reason by a misplaced step or a gust of wind. Since the reality of our mortality is impossible to ignore one logically must doubt how special we really are. > There is no prerequisite state we must achieve to earn the love of Reality/God. That love is already here, constantly available, needing only our remembrance. Not even sure what this even means. Our gods to the extent that they exist are constructs that didn't exist before we are born and will only outlive us save to the extent that we manage to communicate these ideas to others. To be loved by god is merely to be loved by yourself no different than imagining our dead loved ones would be proud of us by virtue of emulating them in our own head. Secure attachment to reality would be the erasure of these false idols. > Consider the common experience of feeling "abandoned by God" during difficult times This is simply understanding that we are in fact alone reliant upon ourselves and those who are close to us. > The difference between becoming bitter and deepening in faith during times of challenge lies in our capacity to include the breakdown into our relationship with reality - and through this inclusion, discover a more complete wholeness. Blaming yourself or blaming god are just two different ways to rationalize a delusion. If we continue to believe in god but simultaneously blame him this is obviously a more problematic path as we have no power to reform god. > This reveals a surprising truth about both spiritual development and psychological growth: what appears as falling apart might actually be falling together. What feels like losing our religion might be faith deepening its roots. What seems like a crisis of connection might be an invitation into more authentic relationship with reality itself. This sounds like Stockholm syndrome > When we grasp this truth, we can approach both our own development and that of others with deeper compassion and wisdom. We begin to understand that the path to greater spiritual security might lead us through periods of apparent insecurity When we believe in crazy baloney by definition no proof is ever given and many counterexamples are readily available so anyone with a functional brain will ultimately experience doubt. When we socially prove that doubt is normal and expected but not a reason for fundamental re-evaluation of norms by virtue of people both adjacent and above us in a social hierarchy "triumphing" over doubt we collectively grant permission to dismiss these troubling thoughts and continue believing in crazy. The entire piece could be profitably shortened to the sentence that intellectual, emotional, or spiritual growth requires one to be secure in one's self, and in the acceptance of one's self and support of peers and betters in order to move forward from the stable base of self. |