Thou Art That

[Guest Furball]

I think i need to pull up my diaper and evolve thicker skin before i put myself out there again sorry

[Joshpantera]

I'm agnostic about a higher power in general; so my panenthiesm may well be theistic--I don't know.

But I want to have the option of discussing things using theistic vocabulary without being jumped on, which is why I like the protected status of this forum. I see God as a metaphor, but I don't want to have to explain that every five minutes.

 

I also agree that we are God, in the sense that the only thing we have is our consciousness, it's the only perception we have. I'd also rather not have to explain that every post either. So hurrah for this forum and the way it is.

 

CelingCat, if you think there is a high power, a soul, or reincarnation then there are people here who will listen to your ideas. Please don't stop posting.

I think that once you've established yourself as a naturalist, from then on atheists will generally get the drift of what you're saying or at least understand that your references are not supernatural claims. On any forum that I've visited I had to get the point across that I'm a naturalist at first, then everyone calms down if I speak about spirituality or something to that effect. 

 

But again, a higher power is a concept and you've stated that God is beyond concepts so by that measure you don't even need to be agnostic about a higher power. If there is a higher power, that's not God. God is beyond the concept of that higher power. That would be an alien or some consciousness but not the ultimate factor, which is the mystery beneath the existence of a higher power. You get the drift. Thou Art That. 

[Joshpantera]

“If you do follow your bliss you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living. Follow your bliss and don't be afraid, and doors will open where you didn't know they were going to be.” 
― Joseph Campbell

 

“Follow your bliss and the universe will open doors for you where there were only walls.” 
― Joseph Campbell

 

“The goal of life is to make your heartbeat match the beat of the universe to match your nature with Nature.” 
― Joseph Campbell

 

“Follow your bliss.
If you do follow your bliss,
you put yourself on a kind of track
that has been there all the while waiting for you,
and the life you ought to be living
is the one you are living.
When you can see that,
you begin to meet people
who are in the field of your bliss,
and they open the doors to you.
I say, follow your bliss and don't be afraid,
and doors will open
where you didn't know they were going to be.
If you follow your bliss,
doors will open for you that wouldn't have opened for anyone else.” 
― Joseph Campbell

 

“I don't have to have faith, I have experience.” 
― Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth

 

“God is the experience of looking at a tree and saying, 'Ah!” 

― Joseph Campbell

 

“The experience of eternity right here and now is the function of life. Heaven is not the place to have the experience; here is the place to have the experience.” 
― Joseph Campbell

 

“The agony of breaking through personal limitations is the agony of spiritual growth. Art, literature, myth and cult, philosophy, and ascetic disciplines are instruments to help the individual past his limiting horizons into spheres of ever-expanding realization. As he crosses threshold after threshold, conquering dragon after dragon, the stature of the divinity that he summons to his highest wish increases, until it subsumes the cosmos. Finally, the mind breaks the bounding sphere of the cosmos to a realization transcending all experiences of form - all symbolizations, all divinities: a realization of the ineluctable void.” 
― Joseph Campbell, The Hero With a Thousand Faces

 

“When you realize that eternity is right here now, that it is within your possibility to experience the eternity of your own truth and being, then you grasp the following: That which you are was never born and will never die. . . . (90)” 
― Joseph Campbell, Thou Art That: Transforming Religious Metaphor