I’ve always been a spiritual person in that I’ve always believed in God. I didn’t always like him, mind you. I was angry for awhile. Regardless of my emotions, I always believed in something more. But exactly what that something more was, wasn’t always clear.
So much gets hammered into your brain when you’re a kid. So many rules and beliefs that you take for face value because that’s what you’ve been taught. You don’t think that you have a choice to believe in whatever the hell you want because the alternatives are wrong. It’s either this way, or the highway (to hell).
Raised Catholic, Not a Catholic
I was baptized Catholic, had my First Holy Communion, and was pretty much raised in the Catholic church until I moved in with my aunt and uncle when I was 8.
Growing up, my family never really talked about God that I recall, except to say how sin is bad. I knew who Jesus was and why he was important, of course. But, church was boring and I always felt talked at instead of talked to.
I never felt good after leaving church. I felt bad, unworthy, and really freaking tired. All the guilt that surrounds this religion is heart crushing for me. All the rules. Why do you HAVE to be in a building to talk to God? Why do I have to eat fish on Fridays? Why do we sit, stand, sit, kneel like a game of Simon Says?
What I do know now is that I’m not Catholic. The major turning point for me was when we had Gianna. We went to get her baptized and the priest refused. Why? Because me and Vince weren’t married and it was against their rules. WTF?
Sorry, Father. I don’t think God agrees with this rationale. If you believe that unbaptized babies go to limbo if they die, how can you refuse to pour water on my child’s head because I had sex out of marriage? How is that good? I was livid.
That rejection stayed in my heart. I honestly only had Gianna make her First Holy Communion because I loved Vince’s Gram so much and wanted to make her happy. She was really big on this stuff. So it was Gram-guilt not God-guilt that made me do it.
As an aside, the fact that we dress them up like little brides and grooms for their Holy Communion was always disturbing to me.
The God I Know
The God I know wouldn’t want me to feel rejected. The God I know is love, kindness, and acceptance, despite your mistakes. It’s exactly like the love parents have for their children. You can fuck up over and over again, but in the end, all God has is love.
If you haven’t read the book “The Shack” or watched the movie, I highly, highly recommend it. It helped me understand how God can accept and love those people that do horrible things. Things that are outside of my understanding of being OK.
There’s So Much More Out There
Ultimately, I find other religions fascinating and can’t believe that one religion is 100% right. Buddhism is freaking cool and the basis of Islam seems so on-point to me. I totally get Wicca’s appreciation and respect for nature.
I don’t want to shake any feathers or piss off all my Catholic family and friends. If your religion makes you feel good, then that’s wonderful. Keep with it! For me, I felt like a whore for the longest time because I wasn’t married and just unworthy. None of that is good. None of that is God, in my opinion.
Mix It Up and Eat It Raw
I don’t remember much about my childhood and nothing really good about my mother. But I do remember her making salisbury steak. She didn’t measure anything and just threw a bunch of seemingly random ingredients into a bowl and mixed it with her hands. No measuring….this may be why I’m an awful cook. She would let me help and eat the raw mix before forming the patties and cooking them.
Ah, those were the days before you knew to worry about E. coli.
So for me, religion or spirituality is like a salisbury steak mixture. I throw in a bunch of unmeasured, different religions’ ideas, and mix with my hands.
The thing is, I think I am on the right track. Because, now and then, I will get these chills up and down my back. They will run from the base of my neck and up into my head. Sometimes it will spread into my heart. I never had an explanation for it. The feeling of peace and love. Does anyone else get that?
It wasn’t until I read/listened to Napoleon Hill’s “Outwitting the Devil” that I was able to give it a better name. According to the book, which is AMAZING, the chills are my brainwaves tapping into that vat of positive energy that exists in our world. The energy we can’t see, like gravity, radio waves, and magnetism -it’s there. Our thoughts are electromagnetic. Seriously, google it. Magnets attract stuff. So if we have positive electromagnetic thoughts, we can attract POSITIVE things.
Your thoughts become things. Your thoughts affect your entire life.
Really, our brains are amazing.
Being Spiritual, Not Religious
The me two years ago would have rolled my eyes at these ideas. Older, grayer, and somewhat wiser in my years, I’ve finally learned the importance of positivity. The importance of rejecting rules and beliefs that make me feel awful. Being in a place of love and knowing God is there with me. It doesn’t matter if I am sitting, kneeling, sitting, or standing in that place.
As long as I am there.
Omg! This is ME!! While I was reading this I felt like I was reading something I wrote! No one else has ever understood my thoughts about this so I gave up discussing. And the CHILLS..I get them too & have just started realizing what it was. I have now went down the rabbit hole as I call it of researching everything I can about all different religions & ways of life. I’ve now become Alice in wonderland with wanting to drink a little of this and eat a little of that..not literally but you know what I mean lol.… Read more »
Love listening to this type of meditative music before bed as well. There is scientific study about what music in different frequencies does for you while in the different phases of sleep. The brain is SUPER fascinating and reprogrammible through neuroplasticity. I’m gonna look into that book also. Thanks for sharing