Can anyone believe in anything anymore?

I currently hold the title of High Priest in a Hermetic Lodge know as the Arcanites, a group dedicated to the practice of magick and exploration of the unknown.

The title of Hight priest is a largely symbolic and honorary title. While I have practiced a great deal of magick in my life, I have no personal religious views. I am for all purposes an agnostic. I am not a believer, I neither believe nor disbelieve, my goal has always been to explore the possibilities rather than to adopt a line of personal beliefs.

Lately I have been moving away from Agnosticism to Atheism. This transition was mostly brought on by the rather strange circumstances of meeting my current girlfriend, which seemed very supernatural at the time.

I debated for a while as to whether I should post this in the religion forum or the relationship forum. but for me its not about the relationship. it's not a relationship problem. I love my girl and she loves me, that was never in doubt.

For me the debate is whether or not there is anything supernatural in the Universe and if anything can be believed in. Thus, I posted my thread here for a philisophical discussion.

At this point it seems like all magick has failed and fate has betrayed me.
I met someone who seemed the perfect girl, and the signs seemed to indicate that she was just what I needed at the time. I genuine gift from the heavens.

Then I find out the signs were wrong, and we are from different worlds. Don’t get me wrong, I love her very much, but I feel like she was presented to me as something completly different than what she actually was. If fate is responsible, if any supernatural entity or intelligence is responsible, then they have betrayed me.

I cannot believe that any sentient entity is that cruel, and I have to believe that everything in the universe is random. The meeting of my beloved queen could not have been written in the stars. We were just two random people who happened to bump into each other online.

It just that when I met her it seemed very much like she was from my world, now it seems like we are from different cultures; different, backgrounds; different planets.

Whether our meeting was random, instead of fated and meant to be, or whether the Fates have betryed me, the end result is the same - disillusionment. How can I ever believe in anything ever again? Furthermore, how can I be a High Priest without believing in the supernatural?

I hope things work out with my beloved, I love her and she loves me. However, whether we stay together forever or our relationship ends in the next 30 seconds, the one thing I will take away from the experience is that I can never believe in anything ever again.

For me it is now a proven fact that there is nothing supernatural in the universe. There are no gods, no angels, no spirits guiding mankind. The universe is random and belief is simply a dependency on myth and fantasy.

I love my girl, but I’m very deeply hurt by several things that have come up concerning these issues. It’s painful to find a kindred spirit and then find that we are from different worlds.

It’s painful, and I can’t believe in a fate that would betray me. I will not declare my allegience to a cruel god or to cruel fates. The only alternative is to believe in total randomness, and with that a life time of beliefs go out the window. It’s painful either way. I can’t believe our relationship was fated. We wouldn’t be so different if it was. But if it was just a random meeting then I can’t believe in anything. How could we seem so similar at first, then turn out to be so different. the early similarities were too coincidental to be mere coincidence.

I can’t believe in anything anymore. At this point I don’t see how anybody else can either. People cling to their myths and their magick because they have no reason not to. They haven’t been disillusioned they I have.

It hurts very deeply. Whether or not she is my soul mate doesn’t seem to matter anymore. I never had a seroius relationship before her, and one way or the other she is my last. I’ll either spend my life with her, or we will eventually split. In the latter case, I can’t go through such heavy emotional truamas again. If I loose her, I can never love another. This is why fate is so cruel. In a random Universe, randomness is equally cruel.

I cannot believe anymore. I no longer have the emotional stamina for belief.

 

I have been there too. This is just how love works. This is posted from an article about love and brain chemistry:

This phase doesn't last forever, and eventually you regain the ability to think straight and see that your lover isn't all she first appeared to be.

 

You're just very hurt, man. It'll pass. No need for a crisis of faith because of it, but that's just me. I can't tell you how to feel or think, but maybe your sadness is misguiding you? Maybe there is a point to what you experienced, something to learn and grow from, and that may have been the real reason for the relationship.

Viktor Frankl lived in Aushwitz, lost his family, friends, and wife and came out of it a stronger individual. Not that he NEEDED that experience to become stronger, but you can choose the meaning behind it. Not that you need any of this, but pain is inevitable, and there will be days that suck. You can choose the attitude that you have and move on from it. You can choose to suffer or choose not to.

I have read "Man's Search for Meaning", and found that it touches up a lot on this and it could be helpful, if interested. I really recommend a read. It may be helpful.

 

I've never heard of that one but it sounds interesting. I'll take a look at it.

 

Thats very interesting. I have Obessive-Compulsive Disorder. I often wonder if how I feel on these issues are related to the OCD, but I never really thought the deeper philosophical issues of were related to the nuerosis.

If normal people obsess over relationships, then I wonder if the OCD is making me obsess over the circumstances surrounding the relationship.

For me its not even about the relationship anymore. Its about belief. It just seemed like we were put together by super natural circumstances at first, like some divine entity gave me a little peace after everything I've been through in my life, and I've been through a lot.

Certain circumstances led me to believe that we shared some similar experiences and it was like she was sent to me to be a kindred spirit.

But then I find out that those circumstances were coincedental at best, the work of a fiendish force at worst, like I was led to believe and untruth.

If it was coincidence then the world is random and meaningless. If it was supernatural then it was a cruel exercise in misguidance.

Either way is hard to take. Perhaps I misplaced my faith. Perhaps I read too much into little coincedences. Or maybe I just think too much and over analyze.

The whole thing is confusing.

 

This girl not being what I thought she was isn't the source of my emotional pain. The underlying problem is that I feel like I am completly alone. I'm closer to her than anybody and if she isn't a kindred spirit then how can anybody else ever be?

My best friend in the world recently got married. She found a guy who was from her own world, her own social class, had a similar background, etc.

I don't have that because I'm not like anybody else. It's like I had a bunch of problems and personal experiences that nobaody else ever experieced. I'm from a different world than everybody else. And I feel like I will always be alone. I have no kindred because there are no kindred. I am alone. Not only nuerotic but in many ways a relic from a bygone era.

I had hoped, and originally believed, that my gf was sent to me more or less to prove that I wasn't alone. Finding out I misread the situation only seemed to confirm my outcast status. And thats hard to deal with.

I hate being the lone specimen in a species of one.

Maybe that gives an idea of why this situation has evolved into an internal debate on the existence of the supernatural, maybe it doesn't. But from my point of view, one leads into natural questions concerning the other.

 

http://litsum.com/mans-search-for-meaning/

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O87-hyperreflection.html

Might be helpful to have a read.

I hope I am not coming off as preachy, but I found that his writings has deeply impacted my life in a positive way.

 

Philosophy is entirely within the human mind. If you take humanity out of the equation (and indeed 99.more-9s-than-you'd-ever-want-to-imagine% of the universe is devoid of humanity or other intelligent life) there is no such thing as philosophy. So conditions in your brain will directly affect your outlook on life and philosophy.

Quite possibly. BTW, there are medicines that can help you manage your OCD.

The other side of the high and complete bliss you feel from dopamine in a relationship is withdrawal. When the relationship falls apart your levels of dopamine drop and it's going to make you feel depressed or even as though life isn't worth living. I went through this as well with my last relationship a couple of years ago. I couldn't function. I just kept going over the circumstances of the break up over and over in my head. It caused me to rethink my life. But I was in deep misery. I found the only thing that helped was to write down my thoughts, just so I could end the thought cycle in my head and get it out. I wrote down about 4000 lines of text by the time I came to terms with it LOL (and NO ONE is ever gonna see it ). Love is both the greatest feeling in the universe, and the worst when it leaves. You will find that over time you will be able to put a mental wall in front of all this stuff you're obsessing over now. It will still be there and still be a sore wound, but at least the wall will be there to keep your attention off of it 24/7. After more time, maybe months, you will be able to deal with it more rationally and come to peace with it.

Another thing that helps a lot is to find another constructive (or at least not destructive) hobby that you can engross yourself in.

It's still true though... It's better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all.

I felt that too with my gf. It's been 3 years and our relationship has had ups and many downs (downs related to other facts of life - not over how compatible we are) and even though I can't be with her, I am not interested in anyone else. She was it for me.

Without knowing your life I don't know how true it is that you are as alone as you say you are. I am still pretty certain there is someone out there for you. Out of 6 billion people on the planet there must at least be thousands, maybe millions. The trick is in finding them. And if you never find 'The One' then unfortunately that's the way it is. Happiness needs to come from within you and not from someone else. I've heard these words before when I was going through my dark times and it didn't really sink in, but now I believe it's true.

Perhaps that's the good thing to come out of this then. Maybe you've held some beliefs that you now know to be untrue. If you accept this, it seems like it might make you less of an outcast?

It's painful, but still probably a good thing in the long run that you are going through all this. The universe may be here against all probability for utterly no reason. But that doesn't really matter. What matters is that you're a lump of matter that is self aware and can forge your own destiny. Take advangtage of it. Most lumps of matter are not so lucky.

 

Hey MrStiffy, Thank you for taking the time to analyze my situation. You bring up a lot of interesting points.

About the meds to manage the OCD, I'm on 100mg dose of Zoloft right now, I've been on that for about a year.

As far as the rest of it, it's just painful to suddenly find out that everything you've believed in your life was probably based on erronious assumptions.

By being an outcast its like I was always the one who got the short end of the stick, had it done to me everyway it can be done, while everybody else around me got a better deal.

My sister, my gf, my best friends, everybody. As for the friends, they have suffered in their own ways, but different ways, related to the 21st century. Whereas my problems are rooted in the 20th. Thus making me an outcast in my own time and a relic from a forgotten era, as no one can relate to anything I've ever experienced.

My gf suffers from MS, which she was diagnosed with 2 years ago, and had hardly any truamas to speak of prior to then. She frequently speaks of an idealic childhood. Some of us are not so lucky.

The circumstances of our meeting were so surreal that I thought there may have been something supernatural behind it, through both the good aspects and the bad, it seemed written in the stars, and I felt like maybe we came together because she could understand me because we shared some kind of a similar background.

Nothing could have been further from the truth. Despite growing up a mere 10 miles apart, she is quite literally from a different world than me.

And how am I supposed to feel about that? I was always the outcast, alone and depressed, and I end up with in a relationship which seemed to be the supernatural cure to that condition, only to find that I am as alien to her and she to me as I've ever been with anybody. That's painful in ways that can't even be described.

It's hard to stay in a relationship when its virtually an insult to everything I've ever experienced, but I have feelings for her and can't leave her.

Even if I did, I would still be in the same position with anybody else, because something essed up in the cosmos. Somewhere along the lines I came out unique, destined to be the freak unlike anythone else this world ever created.

And about those supernatural events- It seemed my girl and I both shared certain interests that most others don't share, and when we met she spoke with a certain degree of what I can only decribe as familiarity, like she experienced some of the same stuff that I did, wich brought me to my curent state of affairs.

My favorite type of bed is a sleigh bed, she had one. My interest ws utilitarian in nature, hers was cosmetic. That could be an example of different opinions leading both people to a similar conclusion. No such luck. The fact that we both like sleigh beds was the only similarity there.

Early on she spoke of her childhood in a way that led me to believe her ubringing was similar to mine. As time progressed, it turns out it was like we were raised on different planets. Its not that she changed, its like the whole situation changed.

Those are two of the little examples, small things that made me believe that the powers of this world were trying to convince me that I am not alone that there are others who had similar circumstances.

One of the bigger ones was the nature of our diseases. I've suffered from OCD my whole life, My gf's MS was a much more recent revalation in her life, but at first it seemed to lead her to a similar mental state to mine. Trauma is trauma, regardless of how long ago it occurred.

I had viewed that as personal differences leading to the same place. She wasn't in the same place. She's happy and perky almost all the time, I'm dark and depressed. I'm very glad she's found happines in her life but she is completely incapable of understanding the source of chronic depression. Similarity converted to complete opposition.

And then there is the night of our first date, when I took her to of all things, a suicide. It was the first night we had ever met. There isn't much to do in a town like ours, and after dinner I suggested we go to the riverfront to watch the ducks. We did, and we ended up watching a man die. he had driven into the river and ended up shooting himself after hitting the water.

I figured our traumatic expereince together would either draw us closer, or would push her away from me altogether. She agreed to go out with me again, and thus began our relationship. I guess when you experience something so horrifying that it defies explanation, you begin to look for clarity in supernatural terms. There's not really any more I can say to explain that except it seemed to bond us in very unusual ways.

The simple fact is I misjudged the situation, thinking we were more alike than we ever were. Instead it is clear that we're just two different people who bumped into each other online. There was never anything mystical about any of it for either of us.

I just figured that with all the negatives I had suffered maybe there was some justice in the world. Maybe someone or something was looking out for me, and gave me a bond with someone similar so I wouldn't be a lone. But I am as alone with her as I would be with any other. There can be no sentient deities in the universe. if there ever were they have betrayed me. between the two options, I'll take the second. I'd rather believe in nothing at all than to believe the supernatural powers of this world are manevolent and provide no service to mankind.

Like you said, philosophy is entirely within the human mind. In that case, it is more a figment of the imagination than anything indicating a tangible supernatural force.

between the two philosophical option that my situation has presented me with, the option of not believing anything at all is the only one I can accept. the alternative is too emotionally painful to consider.

 

I'm going to have to say that the best advice I have for you has already been said.
Find a way to get out your feelings.

Also, I find your struggles to be a marvelous read; but I'd much rather see them end. =)

 

woodsman, why is it that you are so depressed? I mean before you met her. Why do you see yourself as such an outcast?

As for your change to agnosticism or atheism, it happens many times because of feeling letdown by not existent deities. Once you start looking at the world this way though, you will start to see that when things go bad it's not necessarily anyone's fault or god's fault. Sometimes shit just happens. And if you find yourself at the raw end of the deal all the time, you can also let go of the feelings that someone out there in the sky just likes to see you suffer. It's just shit happening.

But you can change the pattern. Do not look to others to make your life better. Everyone has their own lives to worry about, and you are responsible for yours. I'm not a doctor and don't know if the medication you're taking for OCD is the right thing you should take or not. You can find out though. Get a 2nd opinion. If you are suffering from depression, get treated for it. If the town you're in sucks, then move. If your past is dragging you down then leave it in the past and let go of it. Take charge of your life and stop playing the victim.

 

That's good advice MrStiffy. A new outlook is what I need. As for your question, I was depressed becaue I've lived to be 30 and never accomplished anything, never had a decent shot in the world, lived my whole life with an incurable disease that no one on Earth can ever understand, and have been betrayed by those closest to me.

It just seemed like after everything I had gone through, maybe some force was finally throwing a break my way. But I was wrong. I misread the signs simply because there were no signs there to be read. Just a series of seemingly consistent, but completely random circumstances that were nothing more than cooincidental.

My second mistake was looking at a relationship as the solution to my problems. I figured that if I found a good girl who could understand me my life would become easier in some way. Once again, I was wrong.

I found a very good girl who loves me wholeheartedly and gives me her unconditional loyalty. However she can never understand me in the way I felt I needed. A mate can't solve a problem like that. I expected more than a relationship could ever provide. And I guess that's the most disheartening aspect of the whole thing.

It seemed like everyone else in the world was happier with a mate than without one. I figured if it worked for them it could work for me and things would be easier. But now I find I'm under the same stresses I was always under and no woman on Earth can ever change that.

So I'm going to start trying to find a new outlook and se where it leads. In many ways I've already started, the transition in my spiritual views being the bigest transition of all.

If I can't be happy as an open minded skeptic then I'll try to find happiness as an Atheist. It seems a natural transition at this point.

 

All that being said, I don't want this thread to devolve into a debate on whether or not a man can find happiness by finding romantic love. That is a discussion for the relationships forum.

My relationship with my girl is not the issue, in fact we have a very good relationship together. In 6 months of dating, we've never even raised our voices to each other.

The relationship only becomes a factor in that the circumstances of our meeting and the the events that followed were the keys in leading me to my current points of view.

In my original post, I mentioned my Priesthood in the Arcanite Hermetic Lodge and described the nature of that organization, its objective being to explore all things mystical.

I met with the founder of our lodge today. I mentioned these problems to him and he was supportive, but a bit saddened by the fact that I have become disheartened with my current lot in life. I said I didn't think anything was worth believing in anymore. His response was that the individual shouldn't bog himself down with belief systems, but empower himself through self discovery.

Its a very optimistic outlook but not one that resloves my personal issues at the moment.

Aside from looking for advice on my problems, the other reason I started this thread was to find out what everyone else thinks about the original question, can anyone believe in anything anymore?

I'm thinking beliefs of any kind are just a waste of mental energy.

 

At the risk of seeming completely crass and insensitive to what I realize is a real spiritual and emotional crisis, may I ask: what's the Arcanite Hermetic Lodge? What are your supernatural beliefs that have been thrown into crisis by this development? And I do feel your pain and offer support for what its worth. Love has its down side.

 

What kind of beliefs? Do you mean in supernatural things? In things other than detectable energy and matter? Ultimately atheism leads you to reductionalism and a realization that reality is all there is.

The rest is just stories for entertainment.

But that's ok with me. To think of anything supernatural now just seems laughable to me. No offence to others who believe that, but knowing what I know about science I just see no evidence of it and can't fathom how anything supernatural could be.

 

Sounds a lot like my point of view. And to answer your question, yes I mostly meant beliefs in the supernatural.

I don't mean to weird anybody out and lead them to belive I'm some kind of overly depressed nutcase, it's just that my change in world view came on rather suddenly and a quick change is usually a hard change.

But I'm quite happy in my new found veiwpoint and no longer feel bound by mythology "stories for entertainment" as you put it. Not being bound means I'm free.

Maybe that sudden transition has some traumas that naturally follow, but I'm mentally free and not bound by the direction of invisible (and non-existant) forces wich are merely the figments of imagination.

Freedom is a very good thing.

 

Welcome to atheism then

I say "stories for entertainment" because many people who are religious, when thinking about atheism, say "what is your purpose then?" as if life required some plot and a protagonist and antagonist. And of course there is the movie "The Greatest Story Ever Told" with obvious references to entertainment. It also seems like a lot of the really entertaining movies out there have a large element of the supernatural.