Finding Your Own Path
“As a former Christian was it difficult for you to leave the church? I’m finding that I can’t seem to let go of the guilt, fears and insecurities of it. It’s not that I believe anything new, but I just can’t seem to fully step out of it to even look objectively.”
To me, there is often a great difference between being a Christian and being a follower of Christ.
You say, ‘I just can’t seem to let go of the guilt, fears and insecurities of Christianity.’
Guilt, fear and insecurity. These have much to do with Christianity, little to do with Christ. And the more your mind associates guilt, fear, insecurity—whatever—with Christ, the more you can be sure your religion is not his religion, your religion is the religion about his religion. It is natural to let go of one to become the other.
You say, ‘As a former Christian, was it difficult for you to leave the church?’
Leaving the church outwardly is easy. It happens in a moment. Leaving the church inwardly—mentally and emotionally—is a different thing.
We’re conditioned with many beliefs. Many of them eternal and universal and all before we know how to tell time or what’s beyond the mailbox.
The sooner a belief is planted within you, the more difficult it is to uproot. It will feel too close to home. You will feel you can’t get enough distance to see it as separate. But this does not mean the belief is you or intended for you.
Perhaps this belief system suited your family, your friends. It made them sweeter, more yielding or gave them hope and a reason to keep going. But just because a jacket fits your mother, doesn’t mean it fits you. Just because your cousin wears a size 8 shoe, doesn’t mean you’ll be comfortable walking around in them.
All flowers follow different paths to the light. Stop looking to what others are thinking and doing and know that the truth awaits through the path that is intended for you. But you will never find it until you have the courage to first admit that you don’t know.
And that is all you are saying—‘It’s not that I believe anything new’. You are no declaring something new is right and something old is wrong. You are simply saying I’m not sure, I don’t know. It is one of the greatest tragedies of humankind that we have turned such an honest admission into eternal capital punishment. In higher reality, it is the opposite.
‘I don’t know’ is a virtue. ‘I don’t know’ is closer to holiness. It is the mouth expressing the truth of the mind. Only if you are aware can you see it. Only if you are aware can you see that you really don’t know what this life is about. Where the dandelion comes from, why it grows, what purpose it is headed towards—who is to say? Only if you are honest can you admit this.
Fall in love with your ‘I don’t know.’ It is a liberating admission. Relax into it. Children don’t know—they are blissful. In moments of wonder, surprise and amazement, you don’t know—you are open, free. Loving becomes so easy. You start seeing yourself in everything.
So celebrate step one; unknowing. It takes great courage. Far more courage than clinging to the original belief and not searching. And then simply shift your attention.