NO SENSE OF BELONGING...

     Lately I've been wondering if a belief in God (or Gods)...religion basically, is tied to one's sense of belonging. Like, did I lose my faith in God and slip into nihilism because I grew up feeling like an outsider to my family and schoolmates? If I had a sense of being included, would I have not skipped out on Confirmation in 7th grade? Would I have had friends? a girlfriend? the wherewithal to remain in college and see it through to graduation? connections? a decent job resulting from those connections?

     I don't know...

     But I think about two particular groups and their stereotyped behavior: Born-Again Christians and Atheists.

     Both groups are notorious for having overly enthusiastic participants eager to get others to join or to attack when their efforts are challenged.
     It seems to me that both those groups have only recently discovered a sense of belonging and in the one sense, it delights them to realize they are no longer alone but then I also think it makes them wish to confront those who had isolated them for so long. They want to know, once and for all, who their real friends are so they proselytize and it should come as no surprise that people who already belong to another group are not particularly interested in throwing all that away.

     And the resistance of others strengthens their bond with their new friends, making them spiral inward to ever tighter and stubborn orbits. Where once they felt judged, now they are able to judge others knowing they have a community willing to back them perhaps for the first time in their lives.

     And if there's any truth to that, it makes me feel even sadder that I never even found an Atheist group to feel like a part of. Talk about isolation! And in that isolation, I sunk to the even-lower level of nihilism: a belief in the utter purposeless of everything. It was the only thing left to rationalize my existence and its suckitude: life is not unfair, because fairness and unfairness are human constructs. No, life is a selfish attempt at perpetuation and the universe is indifferent to it all. Purpose is something we create, not something which is given. You are because you were born and you will die for the same reason. You will suffer the whole way through until you can bear the burdens of living and existence no longer...and my life's burdens are not offset by its joys.

     Nihilism is the Atheist's atheist. I don't know...that made sense before I wrote.

     I write this still never feeling like I've ever belonged. I never thought I had wanted all that much and it bothers me that I can't even have that...