Loving God = Stockholm Syndrome.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Billionfold
You believe in 'destiny' in other words? Not me. It's all random. You can plan to build a bridge, but to factor in and prepare for everything that could happen is all but impossible. There's very little we have control over in this world.
Destiny, I don't believe in that.. I said I don't believe our future or present are random or chaotic. I mean WE MAKE our future.. We make our situation. You're right, it's impossible to factor in all the possibilities, but why even try to.
You try to assess any logistical problems you come across and make the best decision you can.
I could be taking a dump in my house and a guy could bust in the bathroom and shoot me. Random as hell, but is that likely.. no. So I feel it's moot to even worry about it.
We make our present and future to the best of our abilities. And we do this everyday even when we make trivial decisions like where to eat.
Loving God = Stockholm Syndrome.
We make our present and future Dai..........to the best of our abilities.......that part is up for debate imo.
Loving God = Stockholm Syndrome.
I think I will try this agnostic approach for a little while and see if it works for me.
Thanks you guys. :)
Loving God = Stockholm Syndrome.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Weedhound
I think what I'm talking about is the energy expended. I do things....say....assist someone on cdot....becasue it does something for me. So all that lovely chatter about helping mankind really is just that.......bullshit
I don't believe so. If you've ever seen a beautiful mind, and I hate using a movie reference for an in depth topic like this but it truely fits, there is a part where Nash is at a bar with his buddies and they are all eyeballing this girl. It was at that point he conceptualized that "what's best for the individual is best for the group". Meaning that if every one of them went for the girl she would turn them all down, but if they all went for other girls they would get what THEY WANT, and in turn the entire group would benefit.
The same holds true for just about anything. Yes you may be helping someone on here because it does something for you, but at the same time you are helping them. In that sense you are helping each other.. and all that lovely chatter about helping mankind is not bullshit, because by helping yourself.. you can help other people. :thumbsup:
Quote:
But action takes energy.......where does this energy come from? What makes you expend energy in one direction vs another? Is it the rewards that you get immediately? The thought of a future reward perhaps? Or do you really run around and expend energy because you simply aren't dead yet? And because you aren't dead yet doesn't explain your choices either.
Ps....If that was the best I felt I had......"I'm not dead yet"........I'd be dead.
Well the answer to your question is different for every person. There's no clear cut reason. I struggled with this myself. Initially I would do things in what I thought was from the goodness of my heart and would always end up disappointed by the other person. Eventually I realized I was doing things because I expected an outcome from the other person. To be honest this really isn't bad except that it will lead to countless disappointment, heartache and other things.
Now I do things because I want to. If I get a reward or something back from it I will GLADLY take it; however if I don't get the response I was expecting or the favor reciprocated or anything along those lines I really don't care. I let go of having expectations and FOR ME that was the best thing I could have ever done and taught me so much more about myself. I realized recently that I really didnt know myself.
Loving God = Stockholm Syndrome.
I think for me it is deciding more or less WHERE to expend my energy. It seems limited these days. Random and chaotic just doesn't cut it as a reason to choose one over another and the addition of a time factor (not saying I have one.......just saying I FEEL like I have one if you see the difference) is making me more and more confused. Probably just me feeling confused in general.
Even this post sounds confused. :wtf:
Loving God = Stockholm Syndrome.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Weedhound
I think for me it is deciding more or less WHERE to expend my energy. It seems limited these days. Random and chaotic just doesn't cut it as a reason to choose one over another and the addition of a time factor (not saying I have one.......just saying I FEEL like I have one if you see the difference) is making me more and more confused. Probably just me feeling confused in general.
Even this post sounds confused. :wtf:
The answer seems simple to me. With energy being a valuable commodity I would say spend the little energy you have where it would make YOU happiest. Especially if you have a time factor or it feels like you do. There's no sense in losing time over things that will not add to your life (when looking at time as a factor in all this).
If you question if an activity, interaction, or what not is something you really want to do then chances are your energy is best spent elsewhere. :hippy:
Loving God = Stockholm Syndrome.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Billionfold
I see what you're saying, but in the grand scheme of things our plans don't matter. :
Worrying about the if ands or buts that are outside our control are not even worth being concerned about. What benefit do we reap from it? I feel the opposite, I feel our plans matter and any crap that comes along the way doesn't matter. You can't help what is out of your control, you can only do your best to move beyond it.
I don't worry about the Random. If I did then I would not have accomplished many of the things I have in life.
Think about it like a hydro grow. You control every aspect of your grow, there are things that you can't control such as the yield, contaminated resevoir, you could get insects, cat might eat a plant.. etc etc.. crap happens, but you move forward, adapt and you don't worry about the bad that's happened because it can't be changed.
All you could do was try to plan your grow as best as you could before you started. AKA Creating your future to the best of your ability.
Quote:
I mean sure we get along pretty well, but there's always the possibility of something happening that effects how we make our decisions... in other words it's all random if you ask me. :stoned
Of course there is... you are right, that's why I said we make our present and future to the best of our abilities. Meaning we make decisions based on logistical information presented to us and try to choose the best path forward. A plan can occur on the fly or pre-meditated. We do this on a daily basis as humans.
Loving God = Stockholm Syndrome.
Well I was born and beaten into the catholic way of way so there's a natural "you darn well SHOULD feel guilty" seam that runs through that entire religion.
I remember an old saying from AA. If you aren't happy with your God....fire him and get a new one. That worked for me once before (and by "worked for me" I mean it gave what I felt was a purpose to my life) so I've been shopping around.........
Loving God = Stockholm Syndrome.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Billionfold
Well, sure that works on the present, but you also said the future. The future is never certain. The past has already happened, the present is what's happening now, and the future is subject to all the chaos of the universe. :stoned:
Sorry to sort of hijack your thread, Weedhound. ;)
You're saying that the future is not certain, but this does not mean that we cannot plan for it to the best of our abilities. If we did not then nothing would get accomplished.
Life is a calculated risk. You can sit on your ass and do nothing; or you can assess the risk and move forward accepting that things may not go as planned and you may have to change things accordingly.
The way you make it sound is as though we can't do anything about it so screw it. I would never conform to that mentality personally.
Loving God = Stockholm Syndrome.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Weedhound
Well I was born and beaten into the catholic way of way so there's a natural "you darn well SHOULD feel guilty" seam that runs through that entire religion.
I remember an old saying from AA. If you aren't happy with your God....fire him and get a new one. That worked for me once before (and by "worked for me" I mean it gave what I felt was a purpose to my life) so I've been shopping around.........
I know all about catholicism. My family is all catholic, well my mom converted to Pentecostal recently... which I will not even get into. She seems happy, all that matters to me even if parts of that religion seem silly to me.
If god wanted me living in guilt then I wouldn't want to know god. It sounds sacrilidgeous and it probably is, but if god loves us so much as Christianity likes to tell us then I refuse to believe that he would want us to feel like we're being punished our entire lives in order to get into heaven.
Regardless of the path you take WH I hope you find what you're looking for. If you ever need to vent or what not feel free to contact me on the boards or elsewhere :hippy:
As far as Im concerned if I knew you in person, you would be a person I would want in my life and therefore are my friend :thumbsup:
