The final part of a three part series
The idea of free will has fascinated me for quite some time. It's fascinated man for hundreds and hundreds of years. The first time I can remember grappling with the concept involved trying to reconcile an omnipotent God knowing if I ended up in Heaven or Hell at the end of my life.
Our modern God is the grandest of most previous gods. Not too long ago, relatively speaking in the near 14 billion year existence of the universe, the gods were tasked with only one or two duties. Making the Sun come up was all one god would do. Another might make it rain. One could make people fertile. Today's God can do it all. It would be an incredibly godly feat to actually have the power to create the entire universe, but today's God also has the magical ability to know the thought of every human that lives on the planet and knows the outcome of every event that will take place. Truly amazing.
This next revelation might come as a huge shocker so be warned. I was president of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes while in high school. The club didn't really exist when I entered high school. Perhaps it had in the past but it didn't when I began my four years. My wood shop teacher was brand new to the profession my freshman year and I really liked him. He just kind of brought up the idea of having the Christian athletes meet at his house and have food and talk about The Word. It was a blast. Since I was in his original group and participated regularly all four years I went to him and asked if I could list my title as the president of the group on my college applications. There wasn't really a president, it wasn't like that at all, but it looked good and he obliged. The thing that sticks with me most about those gatherings, besides the incredibly good times with good people, was how real it was. We would ask real questions about the religion and God and our adviser would answer as honestly as he could. He wasn't afraid to say, "good question, I don't know." I loved him for that.
There was nothing about the universe, to that point in my life, that had made me question my capacity to freely make decisions for myself. It was my studying of The Bible and the powers and abilities of God that first made me wonder about my destiny and my ability to do anything about it. It was my understanding that God knew every decision I would ever make and ultimately if I would "choose" to end up in Heaven or Hell. Was that really a choice I had? Who in the world would choose eternal damnation? I couldn't really choose to go to Hell, could I?
Then the miracle of prayer began to perplex me. It made me question even God's free will. Was I to believe God created me and then knew I might need Him to intervene when I asked him to with a pretty please with a cherry on top and a lifelong vow to never ever again do something I'm currently doing and He could actually alter the course and grant my wish, changing the outcome from the way it was going to resolve? If so, did He freely choose to change His own fate that He had created for me? Did He create me and then know what I would pray for in advance and know His own answer to my question? What choices did I control in any of these scenarios? Which choices did God control? And which God, the one that originally set my fate or the one that answered my prayers to change my fate or is that the same God and if so could He have "chosen" a different answer to any of my prayer requests? It was all very complicated to me. I thank religion for that experience. It played an enormous part in creating a sense of clarity in me and my approach to the universe. I was far simpler and less complicated than the requirements for believing in God.
I mentioned in the second piece of this series that letting go of the necessity for a god, and The God, was very liberating. It seems to me in my experience that most people who teeter on the verge of giving up on the idea of God are most tormented by the afterlife. It scares them. For some of my closest friends the thought of not existing at all scares them more than Hell. This wasn't an obstacle for me. The biggest hurdle was accepting that I might be on my own, in control of my own destiny in THIS existence. When I came to terms with that then the true feeling of liberation occurred. Instead of the instructions to life being carved in stone (literally), everything was now wide open. I was in control of me. I could only pray to myself now when I needed to face one of the many challenges life would inevitably present me. I was God. Not the God that has all of the magical powers we prescribe to him, but God of me and my journey.
Years later when I would discover the ability to actually acquire quiet time in my head and silence my mind then I began to scrutinize my new god. All of the gods of the past were only needed because of the unknowns of the time. My god came with some unknowns as well. My first real question of this god was where did It exist? I know where it feels like It exists, somewhere behind my eyes kind of floating around in my head. But there is no "real", physical thing that exists that we are aware of. That troubled me. My god was kind of magical too. This god existed in some other dimension, yet simultaneously existed in my head and could control my actions and was me. I (and billions of other people) had created my own personal Trinity. That also became complicated to me.
Many people that seek out enlightened states search out techniques and try to have some idea what they're getting into. My experiences with silencing my mind were created by happenstance. I wasn't looking for anything. I just happened to arrive at this place where I was totally functioning, far better than normal, and not giving any thought to it at all simply by chance. The experience was truly indescribable. It made me question what was happening and how I could function without consciously making decisions. In fact, if I dared make a decision or even think about making one then that experience would instantly come to an end.
Just as I had once questioned my first God about His ability to actually change the course of actions, I now began to apply the same questions to my current God. What power did I actually possess that could alter the forces of nature? Was I to believe I was this magical spirit energy that could "will" things to happen? Could I choose to be an alcoholic? Could I choose to kill myself? Could I choose to molest young boys? None of these things I seemed capable of, I couldn't make them happen. My powers were limited; I couldn't do all things. Maybe my god couldn't do anything. Again I had lost faith in my God and I felt liberated.
There are other animals we share the planet with that have developed forms of language. Even though their library of words isn't as sophisticated as ours, they are still capable of passing on knowledge to one another. Knowledge. Elephants and dolphins and some higher primates share many of the thoughts we share. They are an entity that took a different path than us but have developed many of the same skills, although it's in their own way. When an imprisoned orangutan can devise and plan his escape do we think it "willed" its actions? Do we think that animal has the same abilities to make conscious choices as we do?
What makes us unique is the complexity of our brains. We are unaware of anything in the universe as complex and powerful when it comes to "thinking". But the day is coming when there will be things more powerful than our brains. I don't know what that day will bring when we create that technology, but I do know that what will make it more powerful than our brain is its processing power.
We don't believe animals have "souls" that control their actions; we think we're special. Why would we be? Organic and non-organic things in this universe seem to share the trait of trying to learn. It might be different for a rock or a plant or an elephant, but all things seem to operate on the principle of becoming more knowledgeable about their environment. Obviously the "decision" making process of a rock isn't very complex compared to that of a human brain, but it has decided to be a rock. There are a lot, millions and billions, of molecules and atoms that have joined together in the form of a rock to exist as long as possible. Somehow they figured out that they have a much longer lifespan when they join together to make a rock than they do when they battle entropy alone in the universe. So is true of every single thing in the universe. We are just more sophisticated than most other things, at least in our opinion.
We attribute to no other thing in the universe an ability to "will" a decision, even things we have created to do nothing but make decisions. The key word here is "will" and what it means to wish something to happen when you're human. This implies multiple options and then some outside force coming in to generate a verdict on what action shall transpire. We are certain decisions are made all of the time; we aren't certain what controls those decisions. It feels like we do, but that's just how it feels. It feels like my car is moving forward at the stop light when the car next to me is the one slowly drifting.
As I mentioned in the first piece of this series, I struggled for a long time to figure out how to share these ideas that are very meaningful to me. It's impossible and pointless to present these topics in a way that makes sense to others in the same way it makes sense to me. My solution was to present them in a way that demonstrates how they influence my life and my thought process. It might seem like these beliefs hold no room for spirituality and I would argue it's the exact opposite. When I work to silence my mind and find peace and harmony with the universe I am transcending the self. All of the false creations that plague people and hinder happiness dissolve when the self disappears. I can honestly see me in each and every person I encounter and them in me. My life is far more meaningful to me when I understand it's bigger than me and some reward I might receive in some other non-guaranteed existence. When I'm not tormented with "decisions" that I must render I find happiness. When I accept I am not special and I can only sail where the wind takes me then I find happiness.
I don't begrudge anyone that finds there own happiness in their own way. I always wish others well on that journey. I know there are more roads than one to get to that destination. I just wanted to share my journey and the fact that anyone, if even only one person, can take anything at all I've written and use it in any way to make their experience on this wonderful ride more enjoyable then that brings me happiness.
Thanks for not choosing to not read this.
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