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Goodbye Jesus

Getting Used To There Not Going To Be An Afterlife


Chikirin

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Getting used to thinking of myself as mortal, and not having a soul or afterlife is the main difficulty I'm having.

 

There was a South Park where Mr. Hankey's son Cornelius becomes depressed after he realizes that he is just a piece of crap, that's kind of how it feels for me, too.

 

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You had to close this post with a picture of the Christmas poo? What is wronnnnng with you!? laugh.png

 

Well, Physics claims everything is energy that moves constantly and to a rhythm and as such, nothing ever really dies it's simply reformed.

And given the near death experiences that are related in books and on that cable show, perhaps it's all cerebral hypoxia that's causing those hallucinations, or perhaps not. Perhaps there is something else when near death is surpassed by all the way gone. We'll never know because, if someone did come back from that distance would we really pay that much attention given the smell?

 

And besides, why worry about what comes after you feel things in this life? You're going to be dead so all sensory receptors die too. If you bum about no after life take that as incentive to give it everything you've got in this life. Make it count. Feel it all. Enjoy every heartbeat as if tomorrow may be your last. Because it just may be and then what?

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And besides, why worry about what comes after you feel things in this life? You're going to be dead so all sensory receptors die too.

 

Well, besides the fact that we have a natural, instinctual desire to continue living, one might worry about what one will miss out on after death. I HATE that I'm going to die. It's not something I dwell on any more, but knowing that I would no longer continue to exist as a conscious being after death was really hard after my deconversion. Despite hating this fact, I fully accepted it as real when I realized there wasn't any god. It might help a bit to realize that time is just a spatial dimension that we simply perceive differently (or at least that seems to be the case). While your conscious existence doesn't span from your birth to infinity, it always has and always will occupy the space-time coordinates that it has occupied from your birth until your death. In any moment in time, your existence is limited in all three spatial dimensions. Maybe it's ok that it's limited in the time dimension as well.

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Getting used to thinking of myself as mortal, and not having a soul or afterlife is the main difficulty I'm having.

 

For me it mostly a relief. Billions of people are not going to tortured forever by some evil God tyrant with justice delusions. Not existing sounds wonderful to me. Let death be the end of all the struggles and pain of this life. Life has a lot of suffering. There doesn't have to be a paradise or heaven as long as there is no hell.

 

But once in a while I do miss the idea of heaven. It is a sweet dream.

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...It might help a bit to realize that time is just a spatial dimension that we simply perceive differently (or at least that seems to be the case). While your conscious existence doesn't span from your birth to infinity, it always has and always will occupy the space-time coordinates that it has occupied from your birth until your death. In any moment in time, your existence is limited in all three spatial dimensions.

 

And yet, that's theory, right?

 

And theories change, as is being found out by Physicists when they are stymied by black holes and realize, or even admit on those Discovery channel installments, that the laws of Physics, and even Einstein's theory of general relativity, no longer follows the rules.

 

So again, while it is a scary and emotional thing to realize one's own mortality, as I did once long ago when I focused for a moment on the fact I'm going to die, it's that one thing that everything alive holds in common. So why fight it? Why fear it? Why waste that time?

 

Instead of thinking about all those things you're going to miss when you're dead consider, all those things you're missing while you're alive. It's a big planet for one person amid a population of nearly 7 billion individuals. You're missing things right now. You're even putting off things that you think you'll have time for later. Why? Ego? Emotions? Pride? All the whys and the answers to, are just as alive as you are. For now.

 

And even so, when you were a believer in god and an afterlife, all that was faith. Which translates to hope that it's all true. Then you came to this conclusion that it wasn't.

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...

 

So again, while it is a scary and emotional thing to realize one's own mortality, as I did once long ago when I focused for a moment on the fact I'm going to die, it's that one thing that everything alive holds in common. So why fight it? Why fear it? Why waste that time?

 

...

 

The adjustment simply takes time, dude. That's all. I've adjusted very well, and I'm certainly using the time I have much more wisely than before. No sense making sacrifices in this life for an afterlife that will never happen.

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it is really unproven what happens after death so it is just as posible there is a after life but also just as posible there isnt one, simply undefined.

 

my advice is dont worry about it, anything can be posible after death but beating yourself up over it is a dead end.

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You had to close this post with a picture of the Christmas poo? What is wronnnnng with you!? laugh.png

 

Well, Physics claims everything is energy that moves constantly and to a rhythm and as such, nothing ever really dies it's simply reformed.

 

 

As Mr. Hankey explained to his son,

 

"Its the poo of the antelope, the poo of the giraffe

Which crawls up to the earth, and becomes the blades of grass

The grass is eaten by the cattle, which comes out the other end

To make poo for the humans, and start all over again."

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As a recent devonvert I've found it liberating. I'm no longer fretting about what to give up here to store up treasures there. Instead I'm focused on the only thing that is real - the present. Right this moment, how do I love, how do I give, how do I show kindness, gentleness, and compassion right now. I look in my wife's eyes (she made her deconversion several years before I did) and just cherish that moment, instead of worrying whether I'm loving her more than I am god, blah-blah-blah.

 

The concept of an eternal heaven and hell will drain the only life you have right out of you...

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Not existing for the billions of years up to the time I became conscious wasn't a huge problem and so returning to that state shouldn't be all that big of an issue either. When you think about it this brief blip of "existence" we call life, this precious few years out of billions, is the anomaly not the norm.

 

mwc

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When I'm asleep I don't miss being awake. When I'm awake I don't worry that I'll miss something while asleep.

 

If there is no consciousness after death (and science seems to indicate that is the case) then I shall be in no worse condition than I was last night while snoring at 3:00 a.m.

 

There is no way for anyone to prove any of the proposed scenarios, so my attention is on the only life I know exists.

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Yeah well maybe I'll get my mind around this eventually, its still early for me.

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Not existing for the billions of years up to the time I became conscious wasn't a huge problem and so returning to that state shouldn't be all that big of an issue either.

 

 

Time goes forward not backward, so its no the same thing.

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Time goes forward not backward, so its no the same thing.

So once you hold a conscious state you always must hold a conscious state?

 

All we are is our brains. We start as blank slates and when we, the brain, dies and the connections we've spent a lifetime creating go with it then we will return to that same nothing we once were. We are it. It is us. When it goes we too will go.

 

Time may move forward but this is all the same. No brain is no brain no matter how you wish to look at it. If, at some point, they create some "artificial brain" which allows one to transfer all brain function there, which would include consciousness, then I'll obviously reconsider this position but for now no brain means not existing.

 

mwc

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When I'm asleep I don't miss being awake. When I'm awake I don't worry that I'll miss something while asleep.

 

If there is no consciousness after death (and science seems to indicate that is the case) then I shall be in no worse condition than I was last night while snoring at 3:00 a.m.

 

There is no way for anyone to prove any of the proposed scenarios, so my attention is on the only life I know exists.

 

*****

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When I'm asleep I don't miss being awake. When I'm awake I don't worry that I'll miss something while asleep.

 

I actually do sometimes realize I'm asleep, and for whatever reason try desperately to wake up. I wish I could get myself to just try to control the dream when that happens.

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Time goes forward not backward, so its no the same thing.

So once you hold a conscious state you always must hold a conscious state?

 

All we are is our brains. We start as blank slates and when we, the brain, dies and the connections we've spent a lifetime creating go with it then we will return to that same nothing we once were. We are it. It is us. When it goes we too will go.

 

Time may move forward but this is all the same. No brain is no brain no matter how you wish to look at it. If, at some point, they create some "artificial brain" which allows one to transfer all brain function there, which would include consciousness, then I'll obviously reconsider this position but for now no brain means not existing.

 

mwc

 

I don't think time moves at all. Just like up and down doesn't move and forward and backwards don't move. It's just another dimension. We perceive a forward movement through time.

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I actually do sometimes realize I'm asleep, and for whatever reason try desperately to wake up. I wish I could get myself to just try to control the dream when that happens.

 

*heavy, labored breathing as Monkey begins to sweat and flail back and forth under the covers* "No...I forgot to carry the 1, and put in the minus sign....SHIT I need to add that to BOTH sides of the equation...OH NOOOOOOO I only got a 99% on my math test...AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHGGHH!"

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I actually do sometimes realize I'm asleep, and for whatever reason try desperately to wake up. I wish I could get myself to just try to control the dream when that happens.

 

*heavy, labored breathing as Monkey begins to sweat and flail back and forth under the covers* "No...I forgot to carry the 1, and put in the minus sign....SHIT I need to add that to BOTH sides of the equation...OH NOOOOOOO I only got a 99% on my math test...AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHGGHH!"

 

Hahahaha, I have had Calculus dreams! My biggest issue the last few semesters is forgetting to add the constant of integration when integrating (tacking on a " + C")

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I actually do sometimes realize I'm asleep, and for whatever reason try desperately to wake up. I wish I could get myself to just try to control the dream when that happens.

 

*heavy, labored breathing as Monkey begins to sweat and flail back and forth under the covers* "No...I forgot to carry the 1, and put in the minus sign....SHIT I need to add that to BOTH sides of the equation...OH NOOOOOOO I only got a 99% on my math test...AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHGGHH!"

 

Hahahaha, I have had Calculus dreams! My biggest issue the last few semesters is forgetting to add the constant of integration when integrating (tacking on a " + C")

Oh, I KNOW, right? I keep forgetting to ;lkhjpo the wpoijerh with the *&&^$%# as well. I understand...

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Sorry, Chikirin, I know I was getting ever so slightly off-topic. ;) Nice to "meet" you! Best of luck to you as you come to grips with this issue.

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And besides, why worry about what comes after you feel things in this life? You're going to be dead so all sensory receptors die too.

 

Well, besides the fact that we have a natural, instinctual desire to continue living, one might worry about what one will miss out on after death. I HATE that I'm going to die. It's not something I dwell on any more, but knowing that I would no longer continue to exist as a conscious being after death was really hard after my deconversion. Despite hating this fact, I fully accepted it as real when I realized there wasn't any god. It might help a bit to realize that time is just a spatial dimension that we simply perceive differently (or at least that seems to be the case). While your conscious existence doesn't span from your birth to infinity, it always has and always will occupy the space-time coordinates that it has occupied from your birth until your death. In any moment in time, your existence is limited in all three spatial dimensions. Maybe it's ok that it's limited in the time dimension as well.

 

That's beautiful, Monkey.

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And besides, why worry about what comes after you feel things in this life? You're going to be dead so all sensory receptors die too.

 

Well, besides the fact that we have a natural, instinctual desire to continue living, one might worry about what one will miss out on after death. I HATE that I'm going to die. It's not something I dwell on any more, but knowing that I would no longer continue to exist as a conscious being after death was really hard after my deconversion. Despite hating this fact, I fully accepted it as real when I realized there wasn't any god. It might help a bit to realize that time is just a spatial dimension that we simply perceive differently (or at least that seems to be the case). While your conscious existence doesn't span from your birth to infinity, it always has and always will occupy the space-time coordinates that it has occupied from your birth until your death. In any moment in time, your existence is limited in all three spatial dimensions. Maybe it's ok that it's limited in the time dimension as well.

 

That's beautiful, Monkey.

 

Thanks!

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I actually do sometimes realize I'm asleep, and for whatever reason try desperately to wake up. I wish I could get myself to just try to control the dream when that happens.

 

*heavy, labored breathing as Monkey begins to sweat and flail back and forth under the covers* "No...I forgot to carry the 1, and put in the minus sign....SHIT I need to add that to BOTH sides of the equation...OH NOOOOOOO I only got a 99% on my math test...AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHGGHH!"

 

Hahahaha, I have had Calculus dreams! My biggest issue the last few semesters is forgetting to add the constant of integration when integrating (tacking on a " + C")

Oh, I KNOW, right? I keep forgetting to ;lkhjpo the wpoijerh with the *&&^$%# as well. I understand...

 

Lucid dreaming about calculus? OK now I have heard it all. I have managed some lucid dreaming before about much more, ahem, interesting things, and it was off the effing chart.

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I actually do sometimes realize I'm asleep, and for whatever reason try desperately to wake up. I wish I could get myself to just try to control the dream when that happens.

 

*heavy, labored breathing as Monkey begins to sweat and flail back and forth under the covers* "No...I forgot to carry the 1, and put in the minus sign....SHIT I need to add that to BOTH sides of the equation...OH NOOOOOOO I only got a 99% on my math test...AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHGGHH!"

 

Hahahaha, I have had Calculus dreams! My biggest issue the last few semesters is forgetting to add the constant of integration when integrating (tacking on a " + C")

Oh, I KNOW, right? I keep forgetting to ;lkhjpo the wpoijerh with the *&&^$%# as well. I understand...

 

Lucid dreaming about calculus? OK now I have heard it all. I have managed some lucid dreaming before about much more, ahem, interesting things, and it was off the effing chart.

 

Heheheeh, well, I've never dreamt about calculus while having a lucid dream. And when I'm having a lucid dream, I'm not so lucid as to consider the possibilities. I just always want to wake up for some reason.

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