Stuck In Limbo

[Galien]

 

Galien, I hope I don't offend you if I say i give the same advice to you. You have me worried  about you.   bill

I'm alright mate, I have had all the therapy I can really. I have suffered from severe depression most of my life and it is what it is. I also have pretty bad post traumatic stress disorder from things that have happened. I have a lot of other stress triggers in my life at the moment, so I'm not doing too well. I have become estranged from my youngest daughter and it is tearing me apart. Often I just cannot see a reason to stay alive at all. Thanks for your kindness.

[Guest r3alchild]

 

 

 

I did open my heart to many christians and I was treated like a leper. If jesus said " wisdom is proven by what results from it" then by looking at the whole of christianity could one say, jesus must not have been very wise. Or does that verse not count against the great and powerful OZ.

Christians started detroying me when I was about 12. I allowed them to continue until I was 45. I was a fool to trust them. I will never really trust anyone again. Not that I believe in miracles but it is a bloody miracle I am still alive, although some days I still wish I weren't.

You can trust whats real, true and honest. Anything else you must disregard. Why do I say that, because what you said to me I trust with my whole heart and I, you should not be afraid.

[RipVanWinkle]

Well, hang in there. I wish I could suggest something more than I have, but I have my own intellectual limitations. Dog did not see fit to make me any smarter than I am. But, Good Luck.    bill

[Blue elephant]

I don't think most religions force you to make up your mind - except for Christianity and Islam. As for the other religions / philosophies, you are free to try on as much or as little as makes sense to you.

 

For me, the de-conversion from Christian belief involved exploring whether I thought Jesus was who he was portrayed to be in the Bible. I was influenced by the "jesus never existed"sites and I now believe that Jesus did not exist. So the rest of what is in the Bible is pure rubbish as far as I'm concerned.

 

Another powerful factor in my journey away from Christian belief was making a list of the attributes of the Christian god.They included:

-all powerful

-all knowing

-compassionate

-a few others?

 

They could not exist simultaneously with all the stories in the Bible. Therefore, it is bullshit! For about six months after I made these decisions, I felt intermittent worries about being sent to hell. But I reminded myself about these logical impossibilities and I kept company with friends and groups that were not infested with god-botherers (greenies are good for that!).

 

I had the impression from one of your other posts that you come from Melbourne. If you need to find people and groups that are not religiously obsessed, check out environmentalist groups and folk music. There are also some exciting things happening in homelessness services in Melbourne as well. While some of the homelessness services are nominally Christian such as Vinnies and the Salvos), it does not seem to affect their day-to-day homelessness services. Homeground in Collingwood has some interesting posts on Facebook.

 

btw, I was able to identify the Indian meditation group with the guru in one of your other posts. This group is all right as long as you take them with a "grain of salt".

 

Hope these words help.

[RipVanWinkle]

The required of belief as in Xtianity is absolutely cruel. It is a dirty control technique. bill

[Deva]

Christianity promises a lot and delivers nothing.  You have to tie your brain in knots to believe the stuff, must have constant reinforcement, and have a lot of fear of hell mixed in, or it would be impossible to remain in it for a moment.

[Akheia]

CS, nobody says you have to make a decision now about what you're going to do or believe. Christianity makes people feel like it's NOW OR NEVER, and that's not true at all. When I deconverted, I felt like a ship adrift for the longest time because I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do with this great spiritual truth I'd discovered about Christianity being patently false. It sounds like you're there now.

 

Christianity also makes people feel like it's either Christianity or nothing at all, and that, too, is a harmful myth. I got into Zen Buddhism for a while after leaving Christianity and it helped a lot to center me and calm me down. Meditation can be such a balm for the spirits after the storm of guilt, shame, judgement, and anger that encapsulates most churches. Some people here get into paganism, some into UU, some into atheism; post-Christianity, one size doesn't fit all. It's okay if you take a while to rest, and then maybe a bit longer to explore your options. You figured out that Christianity is fake, but now that you're feeling adrift, the only option you see is going back to that dog's vomit (to use the Biblical phrase). There is a huge middle ground, and there's no time limit on how long you can hang out there before doing something else. You're in the ice-cream shop and thinking there are only three flavors--why not sample the other flavors? Or just crack open a book and read in the shop a while before leaving?

 

You don't have to label yourself anything for right now. You don't have to declare your major anytime soon. You can just rest. If I had any suggestions for you, I'd suggest continuing to educate yourself to catch up on the stuff you denied before. The more you know, the less likely you'll be tempted to return to a system you know is false and harmful to you. And don't worry about tying yourself to anything right now. Chances are you're going to grow a lot over the next few years; whatever you think works for you spiritually now might look radically different next spring. And that's okay.

 

PS: Galien, thanks for opening up about what's going on right now for you. It helps a lot. You've been so over the top with the aggression and judgment lately that it's got me concerned too. FWIW, best wishes.

[Wings]

Hi CS, I just want to give you a big hug and welcome and thank you for sharing your story.

I echo what everyone else has said-- you don't have to choose one religion/philosophy or another or apply a label to yourself. Also, it is important to just 'get out there' and see what else there is. I'm not meaning to downplay your pain or experiences, but if you think about it, you've been told for so long that you can't trust yourself, only god, that it's not only about building relatioships with the spiritual and/or other people, you also have to rebuild the relationship with yourself.

 

Be gentle on  and kind to yourself-- it takes time. I went through a pretty messy deconversion and church discipline process and have now been out for a year. I was a WRECK for a while and really thought I'd never make it. Somehow, one day at a time, I just got stronger and better and I'm happy without any religion now. The biggest thing was learning how to trust my own decisions to do the right thing and to accept and forgive myself when things didn't go as planned. In addition to all the rest of the comments above, I'd say just love yourself and give yourself permission to feel the full range of motions and take the time that it takes to heal.

 

Galien, I also want to send you a big hug!! I hope things get better for you soon, but thinking of you and wishing you warm thoughts only.

[Guest r3alchild]

CS, nobody says you have to make a decision now about what you're going to do or believe. Christianity makes people feel like it's NOW OR NEVER, and that's not true at all. When I deconverted, I felt like a ship adrift for the longest time because I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do with this great spiritual truth I'd discovered about Christianity being patently false. It sounds like you're there now.

 

Christianity also makes people feel like it's either Christianity or nothing at all, and that, too, is a harmful myth. I got into Zen Buddhism for a while after leaving Christianity and it helped a lot to center me and calm me down. Meditation can be such a balm for the spirits after the storm of guilt, shame, judgement, and anger that encapsulates most churches. Some people here get into paganism, some into UU, some into atheism; post-Christianity, one size doesn't fit all. It's okay if you take a while to rest, and then maybe a bit longer to explore your options. You figured out that Christianity is fake, but now that you're feeling adrift, the only option you see is going back to that dog's vomit (to use the Biblical phrase). There is a huge middle ground, and there's no time limit on how long you can hang out there before doing something else. You're in the ice-cream shop and thinking there are only three flavors--why not sample the other flavors? Or just crack open a book and read in the shop a while before leaving?

 

You don't have to label yourself anything for right now. You don't have to declare your major anytime soon. You can just rest. If I had any suggestions for you, I'd suggest continuing to educate yourself to catch up on the stuff you denied before. The more you know, the less likely you'll be tempted to return to a system you know is false and harmful to you. And don't worry about tying yourself to anything right now. Chances are you're going to grow a lot over the next few years; whatever you think works for you spiritually now might look radically different next spring. And that's okay.

 

PS: Galien, thanks for opening up about what's going on right now for you. It helps a lot. You've been so over the top with the aggression and judgment lately that it's got me concerned too. FWIW, best wishes.

To talk about the ending comment you said, I grew up with two very judgmental and angry parents. I learned to be like that at a young age, it did cause me a few problems in my life, I never got any help untill I started looking at christianity, but that ended up twisting and corupting me further. In the end I ended up with a mutant judgmental and anger complex. But I am ready to face myself now and do something about it without using a faith based system.