Right now, the thing I am struggling hardest with is a loss of faith.
I've been through so much in my life. I was abused in my younger years, bullied mercilessly throughout my teens, abandoned by my family as an adult. I have lost a child and survived a divorce. I have battled with addiction to many different substances, I have been homeless and without friends, attempted suicide, spent time in a mental hospital more than once. I have been been beaten and broken in nearly every way that a human can be. But through it all, I had a spark inside, I had a belief that there was Someone out there who was looking out for me, and that it all had to happen like this for a reason, and that it would all turn out okay in the end.
And then, it started this past autumn- the creeping, terrifying realization that maybe the world is so fucked up because there is no god at all. Recently this darkness has taken my soul over completely. With world events in the past three months, the destruction inside me has become complete. I cannot feel god anymore. I cannot feel any rhyme or reason anymore. And this is the most painful, frightening, ugly reality I have ever had to live through. This is the worst thing- everything else pales by comparison. This is so big, so deep, that I am being completely consumed and drowned and shattered.
I don't know how I can ever be at peace again. I know that's a crazy thing to say, when I have never really been at peace before. But right now my life is finally stable, and I have every reason in the world to be happy, and for a year or so I was happy, for the first time in my life.
But now I am in Hell. I try to pray, and I feel like nobody is listening. And even worse, I am starting to believe that, when we die, we just stop. There is nothing to look forward to. Literally nothing. And the pain and fear this brings me is worst than my darkest nightmare.
I feel frantic inside. I want to go around shaking people by the shoulders, asking them how they can believe in god, how they can believe in an afterlife, hoping that someone will say something that I have not heard before, that someone will hand me a bit of wisdom or magic that will allow me to believe again. But it's not happening. Nobody can tell me anything new. And I fear that this, finally, is the thing that will break me and leave me completely incoherent and insane.
When you lose your faith, how can you have anything left at all?
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I struggle with this sometimes, although not nearly on the level that you do. I gave up a long time ago believing that there was a "god" out there who loved me and wanted me to succeed. It was nothing more than a fabrication to me, and I have finally decided that it's not okay for me to continue lying to myself. I'm lucky enough to have Ted, who, almost singlehandedly, keeps me from losing MY faith. I hope that yours comes back.. I really do. It pains me to see you so miserable.
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