Scott’s Thoughts-01-26-10

Here I am in my late 50’s…quickly approaching the big 60’s and still not knowing what I really want to do with my life. Some radical changes have happened to me in the last few years. I went from being an Evangelical Christian to a New Ager of sorts.

All my former ideas of things and how they work have been turned totally upside down to where it is hard to decipher what is real reality anymore. I know this sounds a little scitzo to me and perhaps others, but I really don’t know what I believe anymore.

I used to think that beliefs were real…now I realize they are all made up by us. They are merely our thoughts about the reality of things. My mind wonders…what if…what if not. I used to think more black and white. My thoughts seemed more rational. But are they the truth?

What is the truth really? I am finding out now in my insecure world of not knowing that the truth for me is changing. Kind of like the kid who used to believe in the tooth fairy and growing up to hear his friends chuckle about the idea that the tooth fairy was actually mom and dad. Devastating to a kid to think his parents were pulling one over on him/her.

Once, you realize though it was just a thought…that you believed in…you can analyze it later as an adult and let it go. It was just a gesture of fun and games played out by your parents.

The same thing holds true of religion for me. Something I held to tooth and nail. It was my security. This is what my church, my religious parents and leaders told me was the truth. But was it? Is it all the truth? I don’t know now, and neither do I care.

Does anyone purport to know the truth and nothing but the truth? Not now for me. Even my own reality is in question. Why am I here? What is life all about? A question I still find unraveling for me as a person…just as truth becomes clearer for me, and yet still muddy.

Am I just crazy? Some might think so. No, I am not crazy; I just don’t understand it all. Do I still believe in God…Yes…I do believe in a God…a masterful and loving creator. I hold to this one belief…and it is one of the few I feel I can hang my hat on.

Some might argue that I believe in fairy tales again. God…if God were God why would he create a world full of such sickness, pain and grief? Why would he create such a mess we call earth? Earthquakes, pestilence, floods and famine…WHY?

I don’t really know the answer to all of this. Yet…deep in my heart of hearts…I think most of what we call as a big mistake in living on this earth…might just be one of our greatest teachers in the evolution of the soul.

Pollyannaish, you say? Perhaps. I want to believe in a kind, loving God, who will always love us in spite of our criminal and animalistic ways. My heart, my soul longs for this kind of loving relationship with a God who believes in me.

Can I change the world? Probably not. Should I change the world? Probably not. Can I change myself? Possibly, but maybe not. What can I do then? Just be me. Maybe that is all that God wants from any of us. Does this mean in spite of all the messiness that this life gives us…we can make the mess into a masterpiece?

I would like to think so…What do you say Picasso? Shall we paint some more? Paint with forethought my son…paint me a wonderful masterpiece.

D. Scott Arant