Lifehacks for the Mind | Part 7: If you HAVE to pick a belief might as well pick one that is useful...
I keep saying that nobody really knows what's up on Earth, and with good reason. Often in my life I had reached a point where things became clear, where the interrelatedness of circumstances and bits of information just "clicked" and often even a whole new paradigm emerged in front of my eyes I had never been able to consider before. I could see where the new train of thought was going on the horizon and what implications it would have on my previously held "certainties" in worldview.
However, the more I learned the more I had to overcome these newly established paradigms time and time again when their "catch" finally presented itself to me.
In going through several radically different assumptions about life, reality and what our place in the cosmos might be I did eventually build an idea that - in some way - is still with me to this day. And it is based on the assumption that we can never know everything there is to know about any topic or circumstance in full. How then can we deal with this uncertainty and how could we even choose a direction in life if we never fully know what the truth ultimately is?
Beliefs vs "the truth"
Once we see that things we once held true are no longer likely we can start looking for a temporary dogma that overarches the concrete assumptions of a particular investigation into any topic. This means assuming a more general attitude towards the methodology we pursue in order to inch closer to the best current candidate for "the truth".
In moving through different paradigms we will notice that it is much more beneficial to staying open minded in treating our current attitudes and worldviews as beliefs, rather than as "truths". This will keep open our willingness to reconsider our most basic assumptions and findings when needed, but it will also have enormous impact on our outlook in life, in a society where uncertainty is generally denied and avoided wherever possible because much of the control structure depends on people thinking they know the truth when in all actuality they are merely confusing an artificially indoctrinated belief system with what IS empirically true.
Once we have found enough proof that previously held "truths" turned out to be nothing but impressingly convincing assumptions we can turn things around to our benefit and start treating our most plausible interpretations and worldviews as pure beliefs, consciously. If we know we are believing something to be likely (instead of confusing it with definite actuality) we are way less prone to fall for new hidden traps and informational honeypots lined up to keep us stuck at our level of understanding, whatever that level currently is.
The quality of beliefs
The main revelation I had when I realized I ultimately always pick my own beliefs (based on what I find most likely to be the truth at the time) is that I have a great degree of influence over choosing what belief - or interpretation - is beneficial to my life as a whole.
To make this more concrete let me give you a simple example.
For most people this life is a one-time affair, we are born, we grow up, we die, and then: eternal darkness. We cease to exist and it's lights out forever. Most people in the West see this interpretation as absolutely given and they do not consider this to be a belief at all but "a fact of life".
Well, it gets really interesting once we do start finding out hints that this belief might actually prove incorrect. It's not that we may necessarily have proof to the contrary, but the more we look into this unanimously-held belief the more discrepancies and absence of evidence we can find that we have never been told about, but that have huge bearing on the plausibility of this worldview and its likelihood if we are intellectually honest about it.
Since it is anybody's own responsibility to discern between discrepancies in information this investigation cannot be done for us by anybody else. Nothing external substitutes for our own research and discernment, no matter who you are or what you think you are well-informed about.
BUT, the moment we get to a point where the likelihoods for contradicting worldviews become equal we have a golden opportunity to play with beliefs, instead of getting stuck in erroneous truth-assumptions.
The quality of beliefs then simply means: Since I do not know for sure and the apparent certainty of my old beliefs has decreased or even crumbled completely, I no longer have to pretend that their energetic implications hold true as well.
What does this mean for our example?
It means that once I find out information that flat-out contradicts the notion of life being a one-time affair followed by eternal darkness, I have the luxury of consciously choosing to believe that we live more than once or that death is actually not the end to "me" but instead a transformation of sorts where "I" will simply take another form and continue BEING.
The reasoning for this is rather simple and purely standing on rational grounds: If I can't know for sure that death is the relentless end to me, than why do I keep assuming it when I could simply assume the opposite I already gathered hints for? There are bits of information that point to another possibility with great emphasis, and so purposefully choosing to belief in things like a conscious universe, life after death or the eternity of being beyond the physical form will have tremendous benefits to my current way of experiencing life as a human being, especially compared to earlier restrictive (and untested) assumptions of my culture.
In my view, much of the depression present in our society today is a hangup on the basic assumptions we have been fed since we were kids. If people assumed themselves to be eternal beings that are here to learn, to be compassionate to others and to not fear death - pretty much all the control structures that hold society in place would cease to exist, and because these concepts no longer have power over us, because the fear-coercion has been overcome through inner clarity on the possibility that it's all been a lie.
In this way, assuming a positive outlook on life being eternal in different forms will lift our spirits up, will free us from Earthly coercion of established control-systems and make us find our inner power to overcome even the most rigid of mind-control narratives.
If then "at the end" of our lives we find out that: "Whoah damn, it WAS a one time thing, it's the end, I was wrong!" - GREAT. You will at least have lived a life not controlled by fear and negative concepts keeping humanity small and in servitude but conducted yourself with love and spreading hope and a sense of positivity wherever you went.
BUT, if we find out that in fact we do transform after death and this life is merely one of the stages in an eternal journey of life changing its form, than we will have won as well, because we refused to erroneously believe in a disempowering concept during our lifetime and refused to spread it to other people as a given fact.
A logical conclusion
And so it really comes down to this:
If you can't be certain which of the two likely possibilities you can see is the truth, pick the one for now that is more life-affirming and useful in your day-to-day conduct.
Being a pessimist does not pay in the end, because if you have been right all along nobody will congratulate you for decades of negative self-talk, overly criticizing remarks or the fact that - "yes, this has ACTUALLY all been pointless like you always said."
Being an optimist all your life and then ultimately being proven wrong will at least give you the certainty that: you have seeded hope, and self-empowerment in the world during your lifetime, and that you stayed open-minded in an age when most of society has simply taken over the assumptions of their culture without any solid inquiry of their own.
Gauging the usefulness of any belief for my life and my outlook on reality is something that has become somewhat of a compass for me in navigating and discerning paradigms and worldviews. It's not like I choose to belief something there is ZERO evidence for, but likewise I consciously choose to not belief narratives that already have heaps of evidence stacked against them and that subtly attempt to rob me of my inner strength.
Part 1: "Permission Slips"
Part 2: "Handling Adversity & Multiplying Prosperity"
Part 3: "Mileage Over Results"
Part 4: "Your Ego is Not your Enemy"
Part 5: "Lack of Production = Source of Depression"
Part 1 - Trust Yourself More Than Anyone Else
Part 2 - On Degrees of Certainty & Burned Bridges
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If you spend time in adult care homes, where people are spending their last days, you will find a difference in peace between those who believe in spirituality & those who do not.
I think there is a big difference in healthier people as well. I was raised to be one of the science worshipping too smart for religion type of people. But In college I studied philosophy & came to the conclusion that no human is capable of anything more than belief. We can’t know anything for certain, so believing in something beneficial for yourself & others makes a lot of sense.
However, if I was part of a control structure & wanted to create easily herded sheeple, I would want them to believe they were nothing more than a temporary warm body & should thus fear death at all costs. People who fear death like this are much easier to manipulate than people who will gladly die for a good cause.
I very much like the way you articulated your thoughts on this topic. It’s extremely important
I feel so resonant to your take on things and I feel very grateful to have you in my circle on Steemit. Thank you for confirming this spiritual sentiment from your point of view, I used to be exactly the same way: Too smart for religion and not realizing that I had grown up in one nobody labels as such. Until I started digging somewhere and never stopped doing so.
It's meeting people like yourself that know their shit and have the heart in the right place that is the last drop of confirmation that I can't be all that wrong with my recent choices in interpreting what reality is, and more importantly what it is most likely NOT. Thank you for speaking your mind my friend and for all your support as well, it means a lot to me <3