Sorry for more of this, but being stoned while taking a bath, is giving me revelations about Gina that I must make sure I write down in case I forget.
First of all, I must never make my intentions or feelings known to Gina, until I hear from her first.
I won't be able to handle the hurt that a likely rejection will inflict on me. I'll crumble and go to pieces. I won't be able to move forward in life, if Gina rejects me again. I can't do it. And it's not worth the risk. And the risk is so high (pun intended) right now.
Nope. Can't do it. Can't mail her the package. Can't make snowmen with signs on her way to work. I can't leave her a paper flower stuck with its stem in the snow on her lawn outside the front door.
I can't go through with these ideas. If she slammed the door on my sincerity and intentions long ago, what makes me think that any of those ideas will change how she feels? She is not going to look at me in a positive light no matter what idea or scheme I can come up with. This includes accidentally seeing her at the mall, where I know she'll be on Wednesday nights taking her kids to jujitsu.
I have the opportunity to do these things, but I won't. I shouldn't.
And that sucks. But it doesn't mean I should finally let her go and lose hope. It doesn't mean either of those things. I can still keep hope alive, maybe not for her, but towards life in general. Destiny in general.
And there's only two possibilities out there for people like me. You either believe in fate, or you don't. You believe in a higher purpose and meaning outside of and including yourself; or you don't believe in it at all.
We either serve a purpose, or we don't.
That's the sign posted at the door, in case you're curious about entering a house where wise old spirits and a creator resides, waiting expectantly for your arrival.
Waiting to go to heaven. And finding out whether or not our convictions will be tested, by forces far more powerful than ourselves. To a judgment that little of us have any certainty in being able to anticipate.
Is not dignity enough? Self respect? Rationality? Are these attributes not worthy of preserving, and protecting against their invasion by institutional forces that do not actually care much about the salvation of any given human being, by the practice of their ideologies? Isn't being rational and open minded, the correct mode of personal existence and responsibility? Why believe in all that bull, when we can still be good human beings, without needing to believe in God.
There's an argument to be made for skeptics to have as much as, or more of a right to enter heaven, than for those that blindly believe. When much of the evidence points to elitist and egotistical intentions in the origin and subsequent retelling of myths that skeptics know to have been perpetuated with irrational and disingenuous ideas, much of which no longer applies to a modern civilization as a whole. And the contradictions between belief systems all point to the fact that the odds are stacked against you, when it comes to knowing which of all those, is the truest religion to follow.
So with that said, I can still choose which side of the fence I want to be on, and despite how much this sounds like pascal's wager; I am choosing to believe in destiny. For the better or worse of my assessment. Even though I know, that 99% of all religion is bullshit based on flimsy kernels of truth, buried so deeply that you have to study for years, to know whether or not it's true. And oftentimes, being asked to accept lies and human error as requisite in being shown the deeper, more meaningful secrets in all of those traditions. I know this, and still, I believe.
There is something out there. Something profound and loving and powerful. We call it by many names. We've waged war based on these beliefs. We know there is something out there, but we don't seem to have courage to question the story that we are taught.
Well, I've had that courage.
I've lived long enough to have experiences that point towards a higher power that seems to intervene in my life, time and time again. Always restoring faith. Always surprising me. It's not always convincing and it doesn't always leave convincing evidence behind, but it's believable. It could be possible that outside forces are involved.
So then, I must believe that the irrational position can also be made rational to have.
That means I must believe that God does not exist and is exclusive to any one religious system. If God should exist, he would ensure that knowledge of him cannot be withheld based on the geographic and cultural destination of our birth. Just because we are born Christian and grow up as Christian, it doesn't mean that everything else is wrong and we are the only ones right.
Why believe in the story of Noah's ark if it doesn't make any logical sense? Get rid of it! That's the rationality God would expect of his true believers, right?
Why would he want an army of brain dead morons come knocking at his door? Just because they were Christians? Or Muslims? Slapping a name and label onto your beliefs, and then giving independent and rational thought a vacation, is not the way I would think is worthy of God's admiration. I mean, what if you are wrong? What if you ended up going to hell even if you identified as Catholic or Muslim or Jew? Is faith enough? Is it all that God expects of us?
I don't think so. I think dignity, respect, and logic are expected of those who genuinely are on a search to find God. I think those are the best qualities to have. Believer or skeptic the same.
So, in my case with Gina, I'll have to honour what little virtue and faith that I have left. If I reveal myself to her, and she doesn't make the next move, then that's a gamble. At stake would be what little is left of my belief in a higher power, and I don't want to lose that. Even though I have little faith at the moment, it doesn't mean I have lost it. It only means that I know it's still there. And that as long as it's there, I can handle anything that life decides to throw at me. I need faith for that, and I can't gamble it away on this one girl.
The one girl I love most in the world.
So, yeah. I'll have to move on with my head held high.
No matter what.
The alternative is terrifying.
It would actually be hell, if it was true that God and destiny does not exist, and nor would heaven and spirits and miracles.
I wouldn't want to live in that world.
This is a spiritual democracy.
I'm sure of it.
And I'm not hoping to be rewarded with a participant ribbon when I reach the light at the end of the tunnel.
I want the trophy.
Faith matters most, when you have little reason to continue holding onto it.
I see what's going on now.
