Quote:
Originally Posted by Anagogy  My perspective on religion, god, and spirituality is that rather than making a journey of picking up beliefs we should make a journey of finding ways of emptying them. I see beliefs as filters for reality. No only that, but they oftentimes reflexively engineer the logic we use, making reason suspect as well. For example, if we presume an external universe, we can't help but come to the logical conclusion that since it is "out there" we must be "in here". What if we're wrong? |
But that's just evident from experience, I mean that the universe is external. People philosophize that it may not be so, but to me, that seems silly, and there's really no objective experience that could even hint that such is true.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Anagogy Intuition can also be distorted by belief. If we believe our intuition is given by god, we have already distorted its reality. Beliefs are like the shadows of truth. Shadows are created when light is blocked. Both logic and intuition become clear when belief is dismantled. They might even become one. Or at least, I can say, that is what appears to be true to me, the more beliefs I dismantle. Maybe I'm wrong of course. I haven't completely shed that which separates me, the observer, from thou, the observed.
The more filters we toss out the window, the more able we are to let the undistorted reality flow through. Of course, seeing one who does this, they will not appear to be belief-less, and perhaps they aren't, but they are opening their minds to new possibilities constantly. They become more emotionally "objective". They become less invested and less defensive about what others think of their perspective. When you care about knowing the truth more than what the truth ends up actually being, you are on the path. |
Belief is not evil. In fact, every person believes. The question is, what to believe in? You have a belief that beliefs are bad.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Anagogy So until we can get rid of belief entirely, we adopt the most expansive beliefs we can -- the beliefs that give us the most light (which I believe is something intuitively felt by all to some degree or another). So people turn to the beliefs of the ages. Some of them are enlightening, some not so enlightening. But its a ladder to get you somewhere. Once you're there, you can get rid of the ladder that got you up there. The truth is like a mosaic, and the pieces are found in every corner of existence. It is our job to integrate that. |
What are the "beliefs of the ages"? Any belief that is quite old? That doesn't narrow it down very much. Most beliefs have been around for millenia.