What was the last juicy generalization from which you freed yourself? What caused your perspective to change?
…that subscribing to any religion means you’re either hopeless, an idiot, or schizophrenic.
I’ve been raised Catholic. By that standard and my current age, I should be a bible-beating, rosary-strangling nun. To the generalized horror of my conservative, Asian family, I’ve taken several liberties on our religion, defying pretty much all 7 of the sins at one point or another, a few of the Commandments, and choosing to support homosexuality, and even worse, not being against abortion [I sense my ancestors turning in their graves] among other constitutions of the Church.
To be fair, I realized very early on in my life that attending Sunday mass and praying, standing, and singing on cue wasn’t going to change much. If anything, I kind of hated it (What kid wants to get up before noon on the weekend?). As I got older, the belief in an omnipotent being who preached about brotherhood and kindness became harder to stick to when every other news channel and/or magazine consistently had a feature fully establishing the cruelty of all human beings. So by the time I got to middle and high school, “disillusioned” was a lovely understatement.
Then crap went down in college. Maybe it was being away from home. Maybe it was the year I spent walking the high wire between depression and rage. Maybe it was working in hospitals and seeing more people dying than actually living. Maybe it was a combination of all of them, but I walked away from college seriously re-thinking my own beliefs and faith.
Sure, I’m aware that my prayers may not actually reach a tangible being that could actively alter my reality now. But “speaking” to God brings me more comfort than hope, which I make a fine distinction of. Hope, by definition, is the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best. When I pray, I don’t hope. I say “Thank you for what you’ve given me, please give me strength to endure what comes.” I don’t hope, I ask. Someone else decides whether or not to give it to me.
Like Santa Claus.
You ask for something you’d like from someone you’ve only seen in books and TV screens. But unlike children, you learn with age that if you don’t get it, it’s ok. The world keeps on turning and it’s not Santa’s, God’s, Vishnu’s, or Buddha’s fault. I guess what I’m trying to say is, “Shit happens.” No matter what, bad things happen every day; sometimes it’s to faceless people in a third-world country across an ocean, and sometimes it’s to the person you share a home with.
Shit happens.
Faith, spirituality, religion, whatever you call it, it gets you through it.
At least it did for me when my vision got a little dark. Compared to my 2008-2009, the next 13 months are a Miami summer day in the shade.
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