Connecting to a Higher Power or Purpose

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. I’m motivated to write but don’t know what about, so I looked through a collection of journaling prompts. For some reason, the section on spirituality and belief caught my eye. One of the prompt questions is how I connect to a higher power or purpose.

This, honestly, was a lot easier when I still thought of myself as a progressive Christian than it is now. Back in the day, it was relatively easy for me to find inspiration and spiritual guidance. Now, I still occasionally look at Christian-based sources, because I still have a ton of devotionals downloaded off Bookshare. Still, it feels off. It feels as though I’m not playing by the rules of the game that is religion. Not that religion is a game, but one of the reasons I left Christianity is the fact that it is too much tied to hate towards for example the LGBTQ+ community. I always knew, even when I had suppressed my queer identity, that I was an ally to the community. However, the truth remains that the Bible is horribly homophobic. One could say that it was written 2000 years ago, but then one would essentially abandon one of the core concepts of Christianity, ie. the idea that the Bible is God’s word. I could say that I don’t care, call myself a spiritual seeker and take what speaks to me and leave the rest. But I wouldn’t be a Christian. And, if I did still find inspiration in Christian devotionals, wouldn’t that be me essentially betraying my queer self and, furthermore, the entire queer community?

But I desire to find meaning in life. I’m still struggling with connecting to a higher power now that I no longer follow Jesus. I do believe there’s “something”, some kind of higher power, but I don’t know what it is and where and how to connect to it.

I keep trying to meditate on Insight Timer, but this feels as half-hearted as my prayers were when I still claimed to be a Jesus follower. I’m struggling to genuinely believe in and surrender to a higher power. Maybe this means I’m actually an atheist or secular humanist, but I do “feel” there’s more. I just don’t know how to align my thoughts and actions with this feeling.

There are other ways of finding a higher purpose in life. I tried acceptance and commitment therapy, which is highly based on the idea of living by your values. Then again, do I really know what my values are? No, I have no idea.

I actually often feel drawn to the fluffy side of spirituality. Affirmations, essential oils (when I still had a diffuser), that kind of stuff. There’s nothing wrong with this, really, except that it often leads to a “take what I like and leave the rest” kind of attitude. And I think there’s something wrong with that, but I can’t pinpoint what it is.

I Am Myself (For Real This Time!)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. I haven’t blogged in over a week and it’s not for lack of wanting to, but for lack of feeling like I belong anywhere within the blogosphere. I have myself to blame, having tried to fit in simultaneously with the traditional lifestyle blogger crowd, most of who are Christian, and the more open-minded if not secular community that is mostly on WordPress. I have always had to sacrifice part of myself in order to belong with the lifestyle crowd. That’s, of course, the essence of the Christian faith and one big reason I now seriously proclaim I’m no longer pretending to be a Christian. I’m not. I am spiritual, but I choose my own path.

I mean, I could of course quote Bobby Schuller, who is big on belonging before you “behave”. However, at the end of the day, he too condemns everyone who doesn’t ultimately “behave”. And I never “behaved”. For one thing, my first crush was a girl. For another, I didn’t live with my spouse for the first six years of our marriage and not ever since 2019 either. For yet another, we don’t have kids and that’s 100% by choice. In short, I refuse to be bound by the rigid standards of sexual and gender roles that traditional “family values” impose on me. I honestly don’t care about being a “good” woman in God’s eyes. I’m done with sacrificing part of me just so I belong. Maybe along the way I’ll discover who I “myself” even am.

2023: The Year in Review

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. It’s the last day of the year. I am dealing with a nasty cold and very much overloaded by the early fireworks. I really expected the institution town to be quiet, but it isn’t. Regardless, my sense of duty is stronger than my wish to crawl into bed with a PRN tranquilizer and that sense of duty tells me I need to review the past year. So here goes.

I started out 2023 cautiously optimistic. I mean, I admitted in my hopes for 2023 that my day schedule, though better than the one my then support coordinator had given me, was far from ideal. In the months that followed, it would turn out that “far from ideal” was really a euphemism and that the intensive support home wasn’t suitable for me. I know my staff there blame my critical attitude, but honestly my current day schedule is pretty much ideal and, moreover, at least my staff try to think in terms of validating my needs rather than fueling competition for care.

By late January, I had pretty much decided I didn’t feel I could live in the intensive support home long-term, but it took till mid-March for a meeting to formally make the decision to start moving plans again. Then I waited two months before hearing any steps had been taken, then another two before that awesome E-mail from my now assigned staff to my mother-in-law asking what color of paint I wanted on my wall.

In the meantime, I didn’t sit still, though sometimes it felt like it. I indeed wasn’t as active as I was during 2022. I participated in the April #AtoZChallenge on my blog, which was really my only active month this year.

I also helped set up swimming for the intensive support home. After all, the idea to ask the institution pool whether they had a time slot for me and a staff to try out swimming, came from me, and then it turned out this time slot wasn’t available just once, but each week.

For the most part though, over the spring and summer, I struggled. It didn’t help that my support staff came up with the conclusion that I got more one-on-one support than I was getting funding for. This led to regular arguments with my former staff about how to cut those hours once I moved.

When I actually moved and my hours had to be cut, the staff soon enough figured out that this wasn’t a viable situation. Thankfully, I got my hours back, first through my care agency and then through funding from the Care Office.

Once this had been sorted, my life significantly improved. For one thing, I was spending more time creating things out of polymer clay. I also explored other activities, such as baking.

In the health department, 2023 was a mixed bag. I did reach my goal of getting to a healthy BMI, but over the past couple of months I have been struggling to get in the movement needed to meet my activity goals. That is, I haven’t met my movement goals several times this past month. One reason is the weather and the fact that, now that I’m at my current care home, I cannot (yet) go swimming regularly. Another factor though may be the fact that I’ve lost weight and haven’t adjusted my movement goal accordingly. Still another factor may be laziness though.

Lastly, 2023 was the year I left Christianity for good. I mean, I’m still spiritual, but I don’t care for a God that condemns the vast majority of people to eternal suffering, many of whom simply for being themselves.

An All-Inclusive Society?

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. Today I am answering Jewish Young Professional’s Provocative question. The question is whether it is possible to create a society or community that is all-inclusive of everyone.

Like most other people, I think a society that truly meets everyone’s needs, isn’t possible. After all, some people’s human needs clash with other people’s human needs.

Then there is the complicating factor that not everyone wants to include everyone else. How do we deal as a society with exclusionary people? Racists, homophobes, transphobes, ableists, etc.? In intersectional feminist spaces, it’s clear: these get an instaban. But then, is the society still inclusive of everyone? I mean I for one, belonging to quite a few marginalized groups and being an ally to others, don’t care that racists, homophobes, transphobes, ableists, etc. would get a one-way ticket to the moon if they act out their exclusionary nonsense. But then society would be inclusive of them only as long as these people shut up. And I don’t mind privileged people shutting up, honestly, but that’s not the question. The question was not whether we could create a society that centers marginalized people, but a society that’s inclusive of everyone.

JYP also asked about religion and politics. Well, there’ve been too many wars based on religion and political disagreements for me to believe a truly inclusive society in this respect is possible either. In short, no, an all-inclusive society is really an illusion.

This doesn’t mean we can’t create a more inclusive society. We have, after all, still a long way to go before even thinking that our society comes close to including everyone. And, of course, I’m referring to my society, a modern, high-income country. Even here, disabled people, LGBTQ+ people, people of color, Muslims, women even, are still regularly being excluded. To claim that everyone is accepted these days, is an incorrect statement, and usually one used to silence the marginalized person one is speaking to.

In short, a truly all-inclusive society isn’t possible, but that doesn’t mean we can’t strive for a more inclusive society. And, in my opinion, we should strive for that.

Gratitude List (November 28, 2020) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

Hello everyone. Like I mentioned yesterday, I have not been more grateful than I am now in a long while. Part of the reason is my recent depression, but part is also my increased attitude of gratitude. For this reason, I am trying to make posting about gratitude a weekly habit again. As always, I am linking up with Ten Things of Thankful (#TToT).

1. Quiet dinners in my room. Last week and early in the week, I was very stressed out about needing to eat in the communal room with the other clients. This has been a stressor for me for a long while already. I was given the opportunity to eat in my room if I didn’t cope in the communal room, but was struggling to say I didn’t cope on time. For this reason, me and the staff decided I for now will always have dinner in my room. Yesterday, a staff noted that I eat much slower now.

2. Extra staff. I may’ve mentioned this before, but there is now an extra staff member to support me in the evenings. I am not yet sure how they will cover this financially, but we’ll see. Today, I thought there wouldn’t be an extra staffer, but thankfully there was.

3. Podcasts. I’ve mainly been listening to church services. I am so grateful for my podcast app that enables me to listen to church services from all over the world. Oh and of course also other podcasts, like the Parcast Network originals.

4. The YouVersion Bible app. I have only a three-day streak so far, because I missed one day of Bible reading on Wednesday. I am determined to make this streak much longer though. Right now, I’m on day six of a seven-day devotional on forgiveness.

5. Soaping supplies. My day activities staff ordered 3kg each of white and clear soap base as well as a few micas (powdered colorants). She already ordered them early last week, but they finally arrived last Thursday. In addition, my husband brought my Christmas tree soap mold. I am really looking forward to soaping again.

6. Cake decorating. In addition to the extra staff in the evenings, there’s an extra staff in the morning on week-ends. The one who had this shift today, asked me earlier in the week whether I’d like to decorate cupcakes with her today. We ended up using regular slices of cake, not cupcakes, because these are easier to decorate. I loved it.

7. Beautiful skies and sunsets. I regret not having taken a photo of the pink sky we had on Monday. I didn’t really see it, but did see some and loved the staff’s description. Also, on Sunday, I saw the sunset. This was really cool.

8. Eating lunch in the car. My husband came by this afternoon to take me out to lunch. Since all restaurants and such are closed due to COVID, we drove to a Subway drive-through. We each had a chicken teriyaki wrap. It was delicious!

9. Homemade wraps. Okay, they weren’t as good as the Subway chicken teriyaki one, but they were good too. We made wraps with chicken and lettuce on Monday and, because we had some wraps still left over, made some more with minced meat and beans on Thursday.

10. Good talks with my husband. He keeps me interested with his knowledge of theology in particular.

What have you been grateful for lately?

Faith Is a Verb

Posted on by Astrid

Last Saturday, my husband told me about a book he had been reading. He said: “It’s a Christian book.” As a progressive believer who struggles with her faith a lot, I wasn’t sure I wanted to read a Christian book. Two weeks earlier, he had recommended Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis to me and I hadn’t picked it up yet. After all, some of the passages he read to me had me angry.

My husband though explained to me that the book he was recommending now was perfectly suited to my recent struggles. You see, I have been struggling with feelings of worthlessness due to my not living the life my parents had envisioned for me.

The book is called You Are Beloved by Bobby Schuller. My husband was so convinced it’d help me, that he offered to buy me the eBook on whichever platform suited me best. I said I’d look whether it’s available on Bookshare, an accessible book service for the print disabled, first. And it was. I downloaded it as soon as I had access to stable WiFi.

I looked up Bobby Schuller first before starting to read the book. My husband isn’t very conservative either, but still more conservative than me. I wasn’t sure I’d like what Schuller had to say.

I so far only read the introduction, but was immediately enthusiastic. Not just for Schuller’s book, but for my faith in general.

I don’t have a church I belong to normally even without COVID. In fact, I usually listen to American church services despite living in the Netherlands. I hadn’t listened to them in a while though and the ones I usually listen to are so progressive they’re hardly Christian at all. On Sunday, I decided to listen to the prior week’s sermon (since the current week’s wasn’t available yet due to time zone differences) from First United Methodist Church in Baton Rouge, LA.

In it, the pastor discusses Ephesians 4:22-5:2, in which Paul tells believers how to be Godlike. The pastor also quotes an original Methodist work that explains the character of true believers. It said, among other things, that we are happy – always happy. The pastor uses this to tell the believers that the goal of the Christian life is not just to go to Heaven after we die, but to be Christlike in the current life too. This very much resonated with what my husband said to me when recommending Schuller’s book: that faith is a verb.

My husband meant to say that, if we truly believe that God loves us, we will also extend this to others and live an ethical life. He also said that the goal of every religion, not just Christianity, is to find true peace of mind. In other words, the goal is not just to sit on a cloud and play the harp after we die (in case that’s how you picture Heaven), but to experience the kingdom of God here on Earth.

Schuller’s main point, by the way, is that we are not what we do. We are not what we have. We are not how others see us. We are beloved by God just because we are.

”Grace

Such an Inner Strength

Posted on by Astrid

Yesterday, I listened to the latest sermon at Holy Covenant UCC. As regular readers know, I’m a very progressive believer, hardly even calling myself a Christian. I tend to doubt God’s presence a lot. I mean, why is there so much suffering in the world when God is loving and ever present?

The pastor delivering the sermon said that Jesus could’ve had these same doubts while on the cross. Yet what seemed like God the Father abandoning His son was, according to the pastor, the greatest moment of all creation, as God opened the gates of Heaven.

One of the things I find hard to deal with in Christianity is the idea that only certain people will make it to Heaven. I mean, according to the Bible, only 144,000 people who ever existed will be allowed entry into the Kingdom of God. My husband uses this as one of his reasons for being an atheist. My former pastor at the psych hospital though said that this number may be symbolic: twelve times twelve times a thousand is a lot! I like that. Some other progressive Christians at one point told me that there’s a theological theory that says that all of Hell was shattered on the cross when Jesus died for our sins.

At first, when listening to the Holy Covenant UCC sermon, I felt weird. The pastor said that God had hidden his treasure in the plain and ordinary, that is, us. That had me go uhm. I somehow wish I was more than just an ordinary being and a sinner at that. Isn’t that a bit narcissistic of me?

Then the pastor went on to tell the church that we are more than our outward appearance. In other words, we are more than ordinary beings. Because of God, we each harbor a huge inner strength. A treasure. We are more than how we come across to others. We are also more than our experiences. We are more than the racism, sexism, ableism, etc. we endured. Through God, we can overcome the odds!

This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t fight for what is right. The pastor, who I assume is of color, talked about the great abolitionists and civil rights activists, who maintained their faith in the presence of immense hardship. They kept going despite opposition and oppression. That is what we should do. Don’t give up, but fight knowing that God is by our side. Ultimately, even if evil prospers right now, it will not always.

#WeekendCoffeeShare (March 8, 2020)

Posted on by Astrid

Okay, so the 10-day writing challenge is going nowhere. I actually missed yesterday’s prompt reminder and cannot think of anything to write on today’s prompt. Then again, the challenge is to write and that’s what I do. At least, I try. Today, I’m joining in with #WeekendCoffeeShare. I just had a nice cup of coffee and a slice of cake. There’s some left over, so come on in and have yourself some.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you that this week was a mostly good one. On Tuesday, I reached the recommended daily step goal, something I hardly ever do. I walked to our neighborhood supermarket for some groceries for the day activities group and bought some for myself too.

If we were having coffee, I would share that I also got weighed in on Tuesday. Though I had a tiny gain of 100 grams, I am very satisfied. After all, I’ve not been minding my diet much at all lately.

If we were having coffee, I would share about my renewed interest in religion and spirituality. As those who read my blog regularly may know, I don’t really practise any organized religion, but I do believe in God. I was discussing my renewed interest in particularly progressive Christianity with one of my staff on Wednesday or Thursday. She actually invited me to her church. I read one of that church’s pastor’s sermons and it touched me.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you that last Friday, I had a meeting with my support coordinator and the behavior specialist from the care facility and my community psychiatric nurse (CPN) from mental health. It was a good meeting. My CPN is going to look into getting me in touch with the team’s psychologist for trauma treatment. We are also working on my fear of rejection or abandonment. For this purpose, we will incorporate cognitive behavior therapy into our regular sessions.

My husband did warn me not to work on too many things at a time. I agree with him that wanting to progress too quickly is a pitfall for me.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you that my husband came by for a visit yesterday. He didn’t make it here till past 4PM because he had a problem with his car. Thankfully, he was able to fix the car and make it to Raalte anyway. We drove to a nearby forest intending to go for a walk, but there were no roads and I can’t walk through the bushes. Then we drove to McDonald’s, but it was overcrowded, so we ate at the Subway restaurant next door, where we were literally the only people.

If we were having coffee, lastly I would tell you that one of our staff is going to buy us clients Chinese food this evening. The reason is that she graduated from social care school recently. I think I’ll love it.

What have you been up to lately?

Something Between Me and God

Posted on by Astrid

So Christmas is over. My own family doesn’t care about it much. We didn’t visit my parents this year. My sister, brother-in-law and three-month-old niece saw our parents for a few days before Christmas. My husband had to work, so we didn’t have time to come over then. We could have come over today, but I personally don’t like visiting my parents if my sister and brother-in-law aren’t there too. All of us live in different corners of the country and my sister and husband both work irregular hours, so ideally we find a day when we can all be together. That doesn’t have to be at Christmas. It helps that my family aren’t religious. My parents are both atheists.

I am not an atheist, but I prefer not to subscribe to organized religion. Yes, I derive meaning from reading Christian devotionals and listening to Christian music. I also sometimes pray. I no longer attend church and never attended regularly. I take the Bible with a large bucket of salt. Yet I feel very touched by the nativity story.

Recently, when going through my Facebook profile and privacy settings, I chose to delete my religion off my profile altogether. It listed “progressive Christian” up to that point, but really I think it’s none of my 500+ friends’ business. My husband says religion is something between him and whatever higher power he believes in or not. It is not that I don’t want to share – I am doing that now -, but I don’t want to label my belief system. Maybe in some respects I’m still a seeker.

And yet, sometimes I wish I subscribed to an organized belief system. I mean, I love to connect to spiritual and religious bloggers, but it’s hard to find this connection without sharing their doctrine. Am I truly being honest when I tell a Christian blogger that I agree with their spiritual message even though on fundamental matters of doctrine, we most likely strongly disagree. I mean, my husband at one point read me the Nicene creed, on which all Christianity is based and I didn’t agree with some points.

Then again, it’s not up to the humans who wrote that creed to judge me at the end of times. They may kick me out of their blogging communities, but they won’t ultimately decide whether there’s an afterlife and if so, how I get to spend eternity in it.

I love to derive meaning from all sorts of spiritual sources. Most are either Christian or New Age-based. I don’t think believing in God and Jesus contradicts belief in one’s inner spiritual power. I don’t think I need to take the Bible literally or even semi-literally to consider myself religious. Like I said, my spirituality is something between me and God.

I’m joining in with RagTag Daily Prompt, for which the word today is Spiritual.

Religion: My Thoughts on Spiritual Belief Systems #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Welcome to a possibly even later day 18 post in the #AtoZChallenge. I was visiting my sister-in-law with my husband earlier, so didn’t have time to post this one earlier today. Today’s letter is a hard one too, in that I didn’t have a topic set for it prior to today. This post may be controversial, as I am going to share my thoughts on religious belief systems.

I was raised atheist. My mother grew up in a small, sectarian Christian church, so she despises Christianity in particular. My father did tell me about religions when I was young. However, when I went to a Christian school for the blind, because it was the best school for the blind, the teachers refused to respect the fact that we’re non-religious. This got both of my parents to hate religion even more.

I started developing an interest in spirituality at around age 15. At first, it was just New Age’ish stuff and I didn’t look into it deeply.

At around age 18, I started being interested in Christianity. I didn’t go to church, as I didn’t feel ready to do that. However, I did start to read Christian devotionals and Bible verses and stuff.

When I was around 26, I started going to church regularly, only to stop going again by age 30. I still feel Christianity has a lot to offer in the way of spiritual guidance, but like I’ve said before, I don’t like the politics associated with it.

My husband got confirmed into the Protestant Church of the Netherlands in 2010. I attended the service and felt really off, because one of the hymns played made me feel like those who don’t believe, will burn in hell. This thought has always sat uneasy with me. It did with my husband too, which is why he rejected Christianity ultimately.

I currently use both Christianity and general spirituality as inspiration. In other words, I subscribe to what in the Netherlands is called “something-ism”. This means that people believe in a higher power but don’t subscribe to any particular religious belief system.