I've been thinking...

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I've considered myself an atheist for quite some time, but, admittedly, I feel that life has a certain emptiness to it, and it often causes me great sadness. I feel like I might be in a situation where I'd rather be happy than right, and so I'm wondering if I should adopt some sort of faith. I don't want to live my life unaccomplished, always dreading the end - I want some sort of goal that will bring me happiness.

Read the Tao. There's a thread right outside below this one.

i feel the same way. i think its because i want to make shure im doing the right thing

In your position I would probably investigate Christianity. It is at least a pragmatic choice to look into due to its high levels of cultural acceptance. I dunno, if you are dealing with some emptiness, then perhaps you might look into Francis Schaeffer(if his writings aren't too scarce) as even though he doesn't prove Christianity, he does in some of his writings(those on philosophy such as "The God Who Is There", "Escape from Reason", "He Is There and He Is Not Silent", and "Back to Freedom and Dignity") make a case for it as being a solution to emptiness, which in your situation might help you, at least if you like looking at things sort of from an odd philosophical perspective. Well, I guess those writings sort of relate to me more than many others.

Last edited by Awesomelyglorious on 28 Nov 2007, 12:42 am, edited 1 time in total.

If there's a family background in a faith, it can be easier to just stick with that. Just do some reading...see what rings true for you.

It seems a bit impossible, knowingly to adopt a faith that you do not find intellectually compelling, in order to have the solace that a believer would have. I managed to become a Christian at a time in my life when I desperately needed justification in order to make it through another day, but it involved a great deal of unwitting/unconscious self-deception. Had I been aware of not "really" believing, I could not have pretended. Could anyone?

I stayed that way for a good two or three years and it truly was comforting, believing in an afterlife and a great cosmic reason for making sacrifices and doing the right thing. You're right. In some ways it is a happier existence to believe in some sort of religion. This past summer the spell was broken. I thought it would kill me, quite literally. I remember telling that to my friend at the time, that if he kept trying to pry that illusion from me, I might die of despair. But I didn't.

Life is scarier with our outlook, DejaQ. Or so I see it. Everything good seems more precarious, death a bit nearer and not so friendly. Nobody's keeping tally of our good deeds done in secret.

But what we do have is a good, long, hard look at the human condition. We're fully immersed in it. The only real beauty in agnositicism is found in prizing truth and quality over beauty. Whatever "truth" is.

If they have any integrity people who indulge in self deception are bound, at end, to realize that life is essentially dangerous and insecure and unpredictable and the only way to provide any self protection is to acknowledge the dangers and devise practical measures to account for this.

I like not having to make individual moral judgements over everything and everyone, it's too exhausting mentally. There's some great minds gone into thinking out the various creeds. Apart from that, I have had (and still do have) bizarre supernatural phenomena in my life (witnessed, I'm not imagining it), so I need something that accounts for that stuff. If it wasn't for the supernatural stuff, I'm not sure I would have adopted a faith. It's like a 'thorn in my side' that keeps me a believer. I think it could be easy to drift away back to the worldly world with out it.

Have you ever taken time to write down what things are really important to you? Things like honesty, family, whatever... I grew up in a family that actively discouraged religious activity of any kind but had occasional contacts with friends, teachers and colleagues who would, from time to time, share their beliefs. Most of the time I would brush them off until I came across some ideas and beliefs that just 'felt right' to me. I wasn't actively seeking but I had taken the time to think about what was important to me and was ready when the opportunity arose. I believe that faith is a great gift along with integrity and honesty and I value and respect people of faith whatever their affiliation.

I can't remember the author but someone once said 'When the student is ready, the teacher will appear'

Having never had a supernatural experience I cannot comment.

Richard Dawkins covered this very well in his final chapter of "The God Delusion", in which he referenced one of my favourite quotes from Bertrand Russell:

"I believe that when I die I shall rot, and nothing of my ego will survive. I am not young and I love life. But I should scorn to shiver with terror at the thought of annihilation. Happiness is nonetheless true happiness because it must come to an end, nor do thought and love lose their value because they are not everlasting. Many a man has borne himself proudly on the scaffold; surely the same pride should teach us to think truly about man's place in the world. Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cosy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigour, and the great spaces have a splendour of their own."

To me, living your life about what might happen afterwards is really just a waste, and couldn't really be called living. In terms of adopting faith for your own happiness, if it's not something you truly believe you're just kidding yourself anyway. Overall I think you'll wind up being far happier in the long run just being true to yourself

sand you rule

I've been in this situation before, but I can't make myself believe something I know isn't true though.

good point. and thats why i constintly go back to being an atheist vses religious

i had a bash at this. I decided a few years ago that atheism was being a bit of a dead end for me, that it was not leading me to any new perspectives etc, so i decided to try believing in god.
What i did was to say to myself " i believe in god", which provoked an internal roar of laughter and mockery; "yeah sure" i said to myself.
I said it again; " i believe in god" and i was again full of scorn. Anyway i kept going, repeating " i believe in god", and at some point, the sixth or seventh time, on insisting, the laughter stopped. And the belief held, fragile, still conscious of itself, but there. And it felt as if there was suddenly twice as much space in my head ( as if a belief in god needed lots of room, or created it ! !) , and i felt like a six year old, as if i believed in fairies, and naughty, in the most wonderfully "light" way, jubilatory.
I didn't ever try to tell myself that god existed though, that is a whole different headspace, just that i believed in god.
If i forgot about the conscious decision to believe, if i began to take the belief for granted then the wonderful naughty light spatial feeling disappeared. As if i was believing in something "real"; easy and obvious. Whereas so long as reminded myself that i was choosing to believe in something unreal it was really exhilarating.
At least it was until god took on a life of his own and became terribly demanding and authoritarian, about how i should behave etc, ( too much like hard work and personal sacrifice for me!!) so his company became distinctly unpleasant at which point i got scared and stopped.

Last edited by ouinon on 28 Nov 2007, 2:12 pm, edited 5 times in total.

All I can really recommend is checking into a lot of faiths: Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Wicca?
And hey, if you convert to Islam, you can go to Mecca! They have a KFC, even.