The Mandelbear's Musings

When I started -- more than a month ago -- to write a post about my spiritual beliefs and practices, I suddenly noticed that I was actually writing a chronological memoir. I changed course and prepended a fairly crisp summary of what I believe, then posted it separately. This is the remaining memoir. I tried several different verbs in the title, including staggering and stumbling, but, well, Yeats. There was never much uncertainty about the "destination" -- the concept of "awareness" comes from Reformed Druidism (which I'll get to in a few paragraphs). It is more ambiguous and has fewer connotations than "enlightenment" or "revelation". But in any case I don't claim to have arrived at it. I'm still journeying.

It's mostly about stories.

I'm not particularly happy about how this has turned out -- it's long, but leaves a lot out (meaning it may be too short), and it's somewhat disorganized. But I started it last month and haven't worked on it in the past week, so it's what it is.)

( Cut for length. Content warning: death (body count: four), and a little religion. )

... so I had a zoom call with my Spiritual Health advisor, EG, this morning. Right at the end of our last conversation, she asked me to talk about my "spiritual beliefs and practices" next (i.e. this) time. Which, for a second-generation atheist (albeit one with an Ashkenazi Jewish cultural background, Reformed Druidical leanings, and a life-long interest in fantasy and folklore) was very interesting question. What do I believe, really?

Here's what I came up with.

• If there is a "supreme being", it can be nothing less than the entire universe. By definition.
• The universe inspires awe and is worthy of respect. It's okay to call that worship -- the universe doesn't mind. Is looking up at the night sky a spiritual practice? Something close to that.
• Nature -- the Earth and the living beings on it, is also worthy of awe and respect. Personifying it doesn't hurt and can be very useful as long as I remember what I'm doing and don't take it too seriously. (I name computers, vehicles, and musical instruments too.) I usually call it the Earth Mother.
• Prayers and rituals don't affect the universe -- nobody's listening. But they do affect me and the people I share them with, so sometimes I do rituals (mostly by invitation) or pray (usually either to the Earth Mother, or to Bast).
• Sometimes I meditate -- not too often these days. Maybe I should get back to it.
• I try (and succeed more often than not) to write a gratitude post every Thursday. My target is at least five items.
• What happens to my consciousness after I die is unknowable. Hopefully nothing, or at least not very long, because eternity is a very long time. But memories live on, and so do songs. Being kind to people makes the memories good ones. (Never anger a bard -- they are not subtle and people remember funny songs.)
• Just because there probably isn't an afterlife, that doesn't mean I can't write about one. There's a lot of healing in stories. I write memorial posts for the ones I've lost. (My wife swore that she saw a ghost on our back stairs, and I've been visited by invisible cats a few times.)
• Talking to dead people, cats, stuffed animals, and rubber ducks is harmless and often very useful. Sometimes they answer -- detachment and dissociation are valuable tools.
• We don't know everything. Or much of anything, really. Mystery is good for the soul (whatever that is -- probably needs another post).

edit: 0428 to fix broken link