The Harmless Secret

Pre-buttal

This argument is not meant to be analyzed. It is not meant for rebuttals of “You don’t need to be religious to have morals” or “The atheists I know are kinder than most religious people I know”. This is a talking out-loud for those stuck like me in figuring out their balancing act, their inconsistencies, or for the rebuttars- Level of Fundo.

Buttal

There’s a direct link between becoming more God conscious and feeling bad about yourself. It feels overwhelming to constantly be second guessing your thoughts and actions once you realize what is favored in religion. There is not one day that goes by where I do not feel uncomfortable about something I said or the way I treated somebody. Today I realized that none of these things bothered me a few months ago when all I ever thought about was the present and my obligations to myself. If I don’t figure out how to reconcile feeling bad about myself and coming closer to religion, either the confidence in myself as a human being or confidence in religion would be sacrificed.  I’ve decided that I don’t want to sacrifice myself or my religion, and the only way to reconcile the two would be to confront this feeling. The feeling of “badness” comes up a lot in one particular instance.

The Harmless Secret

Scenario: A friend tells you in confidence or you find out from another in confidence a particular fact or story. It does not matter whether that story is harmful to the reputation, because all you are going to do is tell it to your one friend who you tell everything to. The one friend where, even though you dont have to say it, you make sure to start the conversation with “i know you wont, but dont tell anyone…” How can it be such a bad thing if there’s no intent on either side to divulge this fact to anyone else?

About six months ago, this thought would not even enter my mind. Had I known something, sharing it would not feel bad because in the end, it really was harmless. Today, I feel completely different. I have never been the type to talk about people or to divulge anything anyone has told me in confidence pre or post god consciousness. But now even the harmless secrets do not come out so easy. I second guess myself and feel bad if anything does slip out. I feel uncomfortable when someone is telling me a story about a third person who is not present in our conversation. Knowing that all of this is harmless, why does it make my stomach feel queasy?

There’s two solutions. One is to keep doing it to familiarize myself with the feeling and thus let it eventually vanish. The second solution is much simpler: Stop. If an action makes you feel uncomfortable, stop it. The fact that it is harmless has no effect on the ultimate decision because it is about how the action makes you feel. Which leads me to believe that God consciousness is not suppose to make you feel bad. It’s purpose is to build knowledge thereby forcing you to confront your feelings. For example, many vegetarians stop eating meat once they have seen the mishandling of animals. For many, looking at meat evokes the memory and makes them feel sick, eventually leading them to a life without meat. The knowledge they obtain gave them an emotional/physical reaction which they had to confront and resolve by: Stopping.

It is harder to stop when others around you do not have the same feeling. It takes strength amongst unlike thinkers to build your own base and more importantly, let them know your viewpoint. The one thing I find peace in is knowing that every step I take is towards the improvement of myself and my relationship with others. And that anything that is harmless, can’t be worth talking about anyway.