My teacher in Intro to World Religions was talking about how people come to realize different faiths. He said some people call themselves "Christians" or "Hindus" or "Buddhists" What do those terms really mean because many Christians believe completely different things about Jesus and Mary and God and heaven. He asked us about ourselves, saying he didn't want to tell us his own thoughts on it. He said, "I don't know what I am and don't plan to find out because I'm not interested in forming an image of myself to have something to hold on to." He said it so passively, but I thought that was the most proverbial thing he has said in all our classes.
Think about that for a minute. My whole life I have been trying to classify myself as all these things so that I would know who I was. I was a white, christian, southerner, seminole fan, doctor's kid. There's hundreds of labels I gave myself so that if someone asked me to describe myself, I had classifications that described me. It's a natural thing, something we all do because classification makes our brain work faster. But this passing comment made me stop and think about this. I have been trying to figure out my beliefs because I lost all hope in Christianity after my ordeal. He gave me the answer. I don't have to be "agnostic" or "atheist" or "christian" because I don't have to lock myself into a category or label. I am me, I change, my life changes, and my labels change. That doesn't mean my personality has changed or I am a different person altogether, it just means these things are always evolving.
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