Here's a clip of a thread from debate . . . I answered the question there, but it seemed appropriate to copy it over here.
Mookey asked me:
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Jay, did you feel like you were in the twilight zone when you started questioning your beliefs and seeing them in a different light?
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<and I answered: >
I mostly felt numb . . . I was going through a terrible time in my life, and was enormously depressed -- a lot of it dealing with attitudes and emotions my faith had instilled in me. I literally felt that to accept "the Apostolic way" would be a fatal choice for me, and that the only way I could "live" was to leave the Borg . . . to disassociate from the collective. College had ignited a part of me that had nearly died -- my sense of self and self-worth -- and it seemed as if I only had one choice: that or me. They couldn't cohabit the same body.
What shocked me was the lack of change in my life. Things around me didn't change one iota, but my perceptions changed as I accepted a world that wasn't conspiring for my spiritual destruction. No lightening cracked, no thunder rolled . . . when I first left, I denounced God and declared myself an atheist (I really wasn't, I was just angry) -- and yet, nothing happened.
When I wasn't destroyed for my declarations, it seemed I woke up . . . the numbness left, and I began a slow period of re-growth . . . a life without the overbearing nature of the Apostolic doctrines. Sometimes it still seems as if I'm taking things slowly . . . taking baby-steps around the world and around my life . . . just out of caution. I know the dangers of jumping into something out of faith . . . and it ain't a pretty thing.
Mookey asked me:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jay, did you feel like you were in the twilight zone when you started questioning your beliefs and seeing them in a different light?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
<and I answered: >
I mostly felt numb . . . I was going through a terrible time in my life, and was enormously depressed -- a lot of it dealing with attitudes and emotions my faith had instilled in me. I literally felt that to accept "the Apostolic way" would be a fatal choice for me, and that the only way I could "live" was to leave the Borg . . . to disassociate from the collective. College had ignited a part of me that had nearly died -- my sense of self and self-worth -- and it seemed as if I only had one choice: that or me. They couldn't cohabit the same body.
What shocked me was the lack of change in my life. Things around me didn't change one iota, but my perceptions changed as I accepted a world that wasn't conspiring for my spiritual destruction. No lightening cracked, no thunder rolled . . . when I first left, I denounced God and declared myself an atheist (I really wasn't, I was just angry) -- and yet, nothing happened.
When I wasn't destroyed for my declarations, it seemed I woke up . . . the numbness left, and I began a slow period of re-growth . . . a life without the overbearing nature of the Apostolic doctrines. Sometimes it still seems as if I'm taking things slowly . . . taking baby-steps around the world and around my life . . . just out of caution. I know the dangers of jumping into something out of faith . . . and it ain't a pretty thing.
