Spirituality, and trying to figure out what I believe

[ironangel]

Figuring out my belief system has been a vague goal of mine for the last 15 years or so. Mind, I didn't work on it all 15 years; in fact, I probably work on it less (in the active sense) than anything else I've got going on. Part of this is because figuring out what I believe is hard, part is because of my self-esteem issue.

I suppose the best place to start is where I have felt most spiritually satisfied. These places include, in no particular order:

• at the beach, sitting quietly
  
• at (Catholic) church, on Christmas Eve
  
• at Gnostic Mass
  
• on Star Island, sitting on East Rock and watching the sun come up
  
• at the top of Mount Washington
  

So, let's see. We have nature, and ritual. Not a big surprise, really. None of that really touched on what I believe though. Let's see what we can do there:

• I believe that when in doubt, life wins.
  
• I believe in God; I believe that it's even possible for multiple Gods.
  
• I believe that every person has to find their own path to God, if they even desire one at all. Not everyone does.
  
• I believe that we are all responsible to live as good a life as possible, and that our actions have inescapable consequences.
  
• Bad things happen to good people, and good things happen to bad people. It's all about the choices we make, and how we deal with them.
  

OK, so, that's a start. Not sure where I'm going, but at least I basically know where I am.

Comments

[cellio]

This is a good start. No one ever figures this stuff out all at once.

Some questions to possibly cogitate on:

- What obligations do you believe you have to yourself? To your family? To your community? What bad things happen if you don't fulfill them?

- How do you attack morally-ambiguous problems? What factors make the biggest difference in how you act?

- For the rituals that work for you, what effects do they produce? How do they make you feel?

- Does having a scripture matter? How true does it need to be?