So…
As a little voice inside my head once told me, the problem with contemplating God.. is that I can’t do it justice.
Looking around – and even if we restrict the world to three dimensions and say this is all there is – God is too large and too complex for me.
At this point, I geniunely wish that I could return to either A: not thinking about the problem at all or B: thinking about it in the sense that I can abstractly bandy it about and not get eternally tormented for it.
I need to get to sleep.
July 15th, 2005 at 8:40 am
if you could do God justice, then you’d be as great as God. And I’m sorry, but NOBODY can ever do that. Unless you’re a saint. or something.
But yea…a little lofty of a proposition, I’d say. 😛
July 17th, 2005 at 6:02 am
Goamaki expresses many wise ideas, both in the comments on in her blog in speaking of an addicted friend. Half full views of the glass are much healthier than half empty ones. On my most recent vacation I met a woman who had undergone a great loss in life, perhaps one that is most difficult to bear. On advice from another, she took a photography class and was looking for beauty. Her photographs were not of the usual “tourist” items, but of the beauty she found in nature and people.
One reason that people perhaps turn more conservative as they get order is the “this too shall pass” point of view. Having been through financial depressions, atomic bomb shelters, 1980, birth of new generations, death of loved ones, they perhaps take a longer view of things. Yet, that does not necessarily mean that they lose their concern for the people or their environment. Often they support environmental or humanitarian issues and raise children and influence others to work toward making the world a better place.
I also agree with Goamaki that you are an artist and a thinker. You are still searching for a comfort zone.
I also agree that you need to work through issues, not try to drown them with artificial means. That would be no better and probably worse than those who drown out concern for the environment or others by immersing themselves totally in their own world of materialism. Neither solves any problems that exists or makes one a better or happier person.
As to the Bible and God, here is where I must disagree. As I see it, the Bible is not an easy read and even those who have studied it the most do not understand everything yet. It helps to keep in mind which audience various authors were addressing, the life of that group, the overall message of the author, that references that do not always mean the same to us and may require some explanation for understanding, the overall thread and message through the whole of the Bible, and the fact that, yes, there are parts that do not seem to be understandable at all at this point in time. God is beyond us all. Overall, there is a clarity about how we are to treat one another, particularly those who can least help themselves and a clarity about worshiping God in a way that is heartfelt, not a building up of ourselves as great worshipers.
July 20th, 2005 at 5:17 am
Remember Jen Wesp? (Off topic, the whole time I lived in Santa Cruz I kept trying to figure out where she had lived when we visted her, and never did manage it) Remember her telling me to take up meditation?
I did, eventually, and found that it was good. And this is me telling you the same thing. It’s safer than drugs and (in my experience) a more effective way of experiencing the divine than thinking really hard.
I have a new email address. I sent email to sheer@sheer.us from it, but I’m unsure if it arrived. My old email address no longer works.