After another round of worthless debate, my criticism of faith is now considered a belief system. I disagree, but I do need a belief to counter the destructive belief of modern monotheism. Forced to unbelief by the non-results of Christianity—I am a believer it has wasted years of peoples lives.
I went to town today to pick up some supplies. Everyone is in a hurry, to and fro like a street corner hooker trying to buy a moment of happiness. Traffic was a disaster and nobody smiling. Where is the happiness in America?
Speaking to my wife on the way home today about reincarnation—after looking at the still growing population and the stressful, non stop anxiety of colonialism, if reincarnation is real, I think I’ll just pass on it next time around—unless I could maybe go back in time.
Agreed, who needs that?!
People are too overloaded with ”stuff” these days, & don’t have the time to enjoy the simpler things because they don’t seem to want simple, therefore have to work more, to get more……round & round…..
We have a modest home, decorated the way we like, & enjoy everything here. It is paid for, no mortgage….yaaaay! We live quietly, & don’t need so-called luxury which is a big turn off for us. We’re built for comfort & live that way.
I have NEVER not had time for something.
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Which time? I want your top 3
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I wouldn’t mind hanging out on the road to Damascus about 30 CE and stop the nonsense before it started, heh.
Hanging around the Chauvet cave in France about 35,000 years ago would be cool, or when the great civilizations lived who built the megaliths.
I have a feeling you’re thinking a little farther back… Mr. Zande, meet Mr Progenote…?
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Fun for a stop over, to be sure. I’m with you on the caves. Would like to meet the man/woman who made the Thais bone, too.
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Hopefully they were friendly or we might be discussing the Zande bone 🦴
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It’d be housed in UN, right next to the Zande Cylinder, opposite the Zande Stone 😉
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Hahaha. Everyone taking pictures, pointing and looking at your bone. Hope nobody laughs. Hahah
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It’s gone and that’s not hyperbole. I’m in my mid-sixties now and I’ve never seen anything close to the level of pessimism and hopelessness in America today – not during the Civil Rights era, not during the Vietnam War, not during the Cold War, not during Watergate, not during the oil shocks of the 1970s, and not even during the 9/11 attacks. The faces I see everyday reflect the stress of a world gone mad and of a problematic future few want to see.
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However the 70’s would be a great time to hang tight.
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The 70s was my happiest decade, but I wasn’t too fond of waiting hours to get gas in long lines that wrapped around the block! And, we could only get gas on even or odd days depending on the last number on our license plates. That sucked big time, but we managed nevertheless.
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Maybe it would’ve turned out better if we actually ran out of fuel?
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Maybe, maybe not. Who knows what would’ve happened?
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I’ll take the 60s. We were fighting, mostly peacefully, for all all kinds of ideas–including real freedom. And besides that, the music was great, as was the free sex. Older teens and young adults, mainly, from all over the world could feel we were part of a world movement. I’ll take that feeling over anything I have felt since.
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I was a young kid in the 60’s. The last best time to grow up before all the regulations. Less beatings for Jesus would’ve been nice, but that was the times.
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Unfortunately.
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Unless humans were reincarnated from insects, there’s too many people and too few souls!
Stephen Hawking convinced me that time travel (based on relativity) is only possible to the future, not the past. Which is a real bummer to us historians.
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I think there is a fixed amount of conscious intelligence and it’s spread pretty thin by numbers, and primarily wasted on beliefs
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Hahaha! And I was wondering how thin Joan of Arc is spread. Or Cleopatra, perhaps. Well, we are recycling the atoms and molecules all the time, so who knows?!
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Insects, that was about 762,179 lives ago, I think. But then, incarnations did not last long then. Two or three a year was common.
Sounds like you only want to go backwards anyway, Eilene. That road is open, if only you can find it.
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Reincarnation, eh?
Imagine yourself awakening from a hellish nightmare only to discover Satan standing beside you. He mischievously asks, “Would you like to relive your earthly experience — again?”
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I’ve had a pretty decent run at it overall, but imagine finding your identity with 16billion people pushing their beliefs around.
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Yeah. Same here. I was being somewhat facetious. Overall, my experience echoes Joe Walsh’s lyrics:
I can’t complain but sometimes I still do
Life’s been good to me so far.
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Reincarnation, as I know it, is never reliving an earthly life. As forl Satan, no worries there, he’s with god in the middle of a black hole, and never getting out.
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Can we call it a disbelief system? Hey, we can meet up with a guru and have some past life regression analysis. But it may take a while.
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They just tell you what you want to here anyway then make some type of challenging obstacle so you can overthink it.
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What were your wife’s thought on the subject, Jim?
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She feels her past as different lives and leans toward believing it. She has a lot of shaman and Babaylan in her history. She’s Panamanian, Cherokee and Filipino with a touch of Irish. She has many things in her life she feels are recollections.
She’s actually headed to Toronto later this month to a Babaylan conference for displaced indigenous. It’s titled “decolonizing your mind” this year and the focus is to restore past understanding of her heritage.
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I wish her happiness and joy in attendence. I have never heard Babaylan, I will have to look it up. I have a lot of aborigine in me, with a definite leaning to spirituality, as you know. Does she have her own blog?
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She does but it’s inactive. She hasn’t posted much about her heritage or spirituality. She’s called Latinagem
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Ah, yes, I had forgotten. I haven’t written much on mine for quite a while now. Been too busy fighting for respect for atheists on those blogs that tell lies about us, and who mostly don’t allow comments of any kind. They are too afraid someone will prove them wrong. But I try.
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Why, you can come back as a cat or as salmonella typhi. I wouldn’t pass the opportunity to reincarnate
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Salmonella typhi would be cool. Talk about intimate power! Are the awful viruses miserable too, or just make people miserable?
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Viruses can’t be miserable. In fact, instead of coming back as bacteria, virus is the real deal. You can act dead until you find a carrier and wreck havock
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Aah the life of herpes. Just lay around playing possum til someone get an inkling. BAM! Everybody wakes up and takes notice if you show up. Sometimes on national news
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Exactly.
As a virus, humans must spend money to find a solution to your menace.
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You could easily switch the word virus to human…or religious imagination; the largest of pathologist family virologists.
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Religion is a con game. They have invented their disease & the cure
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I had a New Age person do a past lives for me – I was a dragonfly, salmon, koala, wombat, manatee, and mosquito. Humans were further back. So, anything goes in this past lives thing. Personally one life is enough for me.
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One life is enough for anyone who has lived well and fully
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To each his own. Personally, this life has been enough for me. Of course, I may think differently while lying on my “death bed,” but as of this moment? Thanks, but no thanks.
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This one life should be sufficient for anyone who has lived well in this life
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Ah, mak, but how many can live well having only one life to learn in. Not many, IF ANY, from my point of view. I guess the questions are: What does it mean to live well, by whose standards, and who decides? I believe, with reason, that it takes many many lifetimes to be able to even ask those questions, let alone answer them. (Our egos only live once, but we are not our egos.) I can remember/imagine right back to a time before life developed on Earth, but I do not expect anyone to believe me. That was my journey, and mine alone. What other people remember/imagine, if anything, is up to them.
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Robertson is simply a very silly boy who likes to think he is a Big Player in the world of religio/political/blogging.
Fools like him simply have to assert that atheism is a belief system so as to try to make their theist beliefs seem more legit.
In fact he is just a bit of Nob that most people laugh at.
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My husband who is Mennonite says that if you say you are Napoleon, they put you into an insane hospital. But if you say you were Napoleon in a past life, people think you are special. hmmmmm.
In Polytheism, the discussion ranges from yes to maybe to no. The usual rule is that if you have unfinished business in this life, you can come back. Most don’t.
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Oh! Ooo! Ooo! Pick me! Pick me! I KNOW THIS ONE!!! 😛
Sir Jim, happiness is CLEARLY found in 1 state of this peaceful Union of 50-states! Come on man! It’s found in…
• El Paso, TX
• Odessa-Midland, TX (yesterday)
• Santa Fe, TX
• Sutherland Springs, TX
• Plano, TX (just north of me!)
• Dallas, TX, (3-4 miles from me! Woohooo!)
• Harris County, TX
• Hutchins, TX,
• Waco, TX
• Spring, TX
• Fort Hood, TX
• Fort Worth, TX
• Waco/Axtell, TX (Branch Davidians)
• Killeen, TX
• Grand Prairie, TX
• Dangerfield, TX (how ironic)
• Austin, TX
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_shootings_in_Texas
Obviously we Texans still do not have near enough high-powered weapons and assault-weapons in every Texas family member’s hands to stop all of these insane mass killers running around everywhere with guns!!! We MUST do more! We must encourage all 29-million Texans to carry and own multiple weapons to combat this weaponry madness!!! CLEARLY we are not getting enough lethal weapons into every age-group’s hands! CLEARLY we can’t make enough body-bags for all the murderous suspects (or not-so-suspect?) piling up everywhere who also had multiple weapons in case another mad pissed-off white man attacked them!!! 😵😫
TERRORISM!? Islamic terrorism!!!??? What tha hell are you talking about you sane, moderate Washington D.C. politician!? America’s biggest threat, especially in Texas, is NOT Islamic or Hispanic terrorism!!! It is pissed-off American white men with way too many high-capacity, high-powered arsenals we Texans are PROUD to own and point at each other in shear FEAR of each other!!! Hahahahahaha!!! 🤣
Want me to keep going Jim? 😉
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Did you see Roberts post this morning? Evidently lawmakers are repealing restrictive carry laws for schools and other public places. Their knee jerk reaction is more guns. I think it’s not working, but that’s just me I guess.
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Well, if more attention and sympathy/empathy were given to the FAMILIES of killed victims or those permanently maimed by injuries and all that long LONG-TERM rehab, the story would be completely different and much more humane, civil, and imagine this… more intelligent!!! 😮
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But think of the economy, Prof, enbalming and funeral services are well used, hospitals and ambulance services are making money hand over fist, gun sales of all calibres are skyrocketing, pick-up trucks come with rifle carriers, and fossil fuels are sold by the kilogallon.
Twenty-nine million people still alive in Texas? Shit, you’ve only just begun…
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Hahahahaha!!! Great economic point rawgod! 😉
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Geezzz, the stupidity never ceases to baffle me. 😦 As I’ve repeated 100,000 times… good fortune or luck to those poor law-enforcement officers, SWAT teams, etc, trying to figure out with each other WHO THA FUCK ARE THE ACTUAL KILLERS/SHOOTERS!!!!??? EVERYBODY AROUND US HAS A GOD DAMN WEAPON!!! And I can hear all the paramedics screaming to each other… “HOW IN THA HELL CAN WE GET TO ALL THE LEGITIMATE VICTIMS BARELY ALIVE IF EVERYBODY HAS A FUCKING WEAPON AND FIRING IT EVERYWHERE!!!???”
Talk about the Fog of War right here in your backyard or front-yard! Pure insanity Jim.
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Now, aside from what has become “normal” and expected every 2-weeks in Texas/USA, here’s my contribution on reincarnation. 😉
Given the Law of Conservation of Mass/Energy, I do not think one bit it is unreasonable for humans to imagine or theorize (with solid logic & evidence) that human consciousness merely transitions into another form in another dimension and time. And there is certainly gobs and gobs of endless tangible evidence that recently passed family members, close friends, etc, somehow in the aether, the unseen, stay around the living in various forms… some able to communicate to the living or the gifted, highly sensitive and tested/validated living psychics. 🙂
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I really like the idea of its possibilities, but I can’t really do more than speculate at this point. I have this picture in my head if this universal web of energy infiltrating and binding all matter and consciousness in a fabrical weaving of energy and us, popping up for air now and then and make ourselves known. Idk how to word it yet.
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Well, if we living beings are completely and truthfully honest with ourselves and others, 😉 there’s a TON of speculating going on about an afterlife. HAH! Don’t you just love the comedy of extreme understatement? 😛
Many of us don’t know how to word it Jim. After all, even our own language is so incredibly diverse and subjective/constrained that over time even IT evolves into something slightly different than once was.
Nevertheless, I CAN SAY with my own absolute 100% conviction, intelligence, and 50+ years of global experience… that Monism/Binary-ism — which is the cornerstone of Abrahamic religions — are so far off base, untenable and without a thread of cumulative corroborating evidence to support its system/ideology, and will only continue to keep humanity’s cumulative potential brilliance and evolution metaphorically chained to cinder-blocks in the limitless oceans of existential knowledge. 2,000+ years of clinging to antiquated paradigms has done a HORRIBLE disservice to our species, to put it mildly. 🙄😒
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The bar of acceptance is extremely low. We’re to thank god for one damn problem free day and expect no better than what he graciously doles out for breath and accept forced, mentally pretended happiness to mean god loves us. It’s all good man. God is in control.
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🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 ad infinitum…
Oh FUCK! Then some other god please help us! 😉
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“Fuck” is the new god…it means whatever you want it to,,,
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Ooooooo… that greatly soothes my hedonistic twisted pervertedness! Mmmmm, thank you! 😈
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Just a note, but reincarnation has nothing to do with an “afterlife!” That concept belongs to religion. Afterlife is itself a self-denying concept, if you have life there can be no “after” life. You could have an “after death” if you really want one, but afterlife is an illogical concept. Just ask Mr. Spock!
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Are you saying the stars can communicate with each other?!!?
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That’s a GREAT question Nan! 😉 😛
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As a 30 year old, who spent the first 20 year of his life trying to break free from the brainwashing campaign of my Christian roots, I would say that I couldn’t agree more. Let kids grow up to be 18 before you even tell them about religions, then let them choose. I bet religion dies out in a hurry at that point.
But on the other hand, if you don’t believe in telling your kids about God, does that mean you refuse to bullshit them about Santa Clause, The Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy? Because honestly, I’ll probably never lie to me kid about that stuff. The moment they ask me about it, it’s all coming out 😛
Nice post Jim
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I have refused to fool them with Santa, Easter bunny and tooth fairy, but we still play, they just know up front it’s a game. Nice work on getting out of the Faith game young. I was 50.
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Millenials are generally falling out of love with religion and statistics are starting to show that it’s dying. I wrote about this trend just a little while ago actually. Maybe one day we will all actually be without religion.
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Post a link here anytime you like.
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https://blogofthewolfboy.com/2019/08/21/the-family-on-netflix-religion-blind-faith-and-the-future-of-humanity/
Cheers 🍻
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That day would be beautiful! 😍
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This is beautiful and no no no
I’m not interested in reincarnation
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It’s seems to be that whatever option we choose to believe doesn’t change the world we are in now. Existence is so central to our being and experience that we fail to notice we are most likely just a part of life and its core. We get a chuckle out of it when we think these thoughts, that we spent so much time worrying about the future that we failed to enjoy what we can’t help but do.
This has been going on a long, long time. We have fossilized human footprints from 100million, 250million, and 500million years ago embedded in the different layers. We been around…
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Exactly
People forget that the universe doesn’t need us
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With all due respect, Chidera, I know that is incorrect. If the universe did not need us we would never have seen the light of day, so to speak. We are a part of “all that is” and if we are not aware of the necessity of our presence, something or someone else is. Can you honestly say your body doesn’t need your left leg or perhaps your heart? Those who develop their sense of empathy discover what it means to be truly alive, i.e., a necessary living part of the whole… even if we are still too “young” within the big picture to understand how that works. The new born doesn’t understand how her family works but she will learn in time.
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Hi Jim! I suppose many people do approach life the way you describe, worrying about the future, appeasing blood-thirsty gods etc. and yet… and yet… is it really either or? Most Christians (example only) I know are not the least worried, or concerned about the future, quite the opposite in fact. They believe in Christ and they are assured that is their passport to heaven, what they think or do here and now having nothing to do with it since that would come under the label of “works” and one is saved by grace (Paul’s older sister, hahahahah!) through faith. That said, what about those of us who know they are reincarnated beings, with a very long past and a future that stretches to infinity? We remember who we were, what we did, what we believed and having reached this far, we have the means to basically decide what to become, by the power of our mind. What about those of us who have real relationships with non-earth entities who guide, teach, admonish, sometimes intervene?
If I have the power to change myself, then it is logical that this changes the world I am in, to some degree now, to a greater degree “later” as I empower myself to decide what is best overall, for me and for the world I currently exist in. The “trick” is to see through the lies of religion, but also those of the secular order that would have us throw out the baby with the bath water. It’s one thing to reject the false gods of organized religion, it’s another to reject our gift of life as mind beings, to reject our spirituality. It’s also extremely dangerous and certainly disempowering to reject the concept of “gods” just because they cannot be seen with physical eyes, nor heard with physical ears. For every physical sense we possess the same exists for us in the etheric, or spiritual worlds. Denying is easy whereas accepting that all possibilities exist, then mentally “swimming” through these possibilities to find one’s own place in it all is a tall order. My motto therefore remains, ‘believe all things, believe in nothing.’ I don’t build walls nor do I attempt to round up confused individuals to come and feed in my particular loafing barn, huh!
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If I may, S’T,
“Imagine anything, believe nothing.”
But that is just me.
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Well said!
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