What does changing a core belief feel like? If I have a crisis of faith, how will I know?
I would particularly like to hear from people who have experienced this but never deconverted. Not only have I never been religious, no one in my immediate family is, none of the extended family I am close with is, and while I have friends who believe in religion I don’t think I have any who believe their faith. So I have no real point of comparison.
A sense of panic and dread, and a feeling of being lost were some highlights for me. I think it would be hard to not know, though perhaps others experience these things differently.
I think there are many ways how beliefs get changed.
Take a belief such as: “The world is an hostile place and therefore I have to hide myself behind behind a shield of anonymity when I post online.”
Ten years ago I would have feared that somebody associates my online writing with my real identity at that time I thought I needed the shield. Today I don’t (Nickname is firstname + first 2 letters of lastname).
How did that process felt like? At the beginning I felt fear and now I don’t but it was a gradual process over time.
For most practical concerns I think that we use religion way to often as reference concept. Children get usually taught that it’s bad to talk to strangers. In our world it’s a useful skill to talk to strangers in an friendly and inviting way.
Most people hit walls very quickly if the try to start to say to hello with a smile to every stranger they pass on the street. The come up with excuses that saying so is weird and that people will hate them if the find out that they will engage in such weird behavior.
If you want to experience a crisis of faith those social beliefs are were I would focus. There are more interesting because they actually have empirical results that you can see and you can’t just pretend that you have changed your belief.
What does changing a core belief feel like? If I have a crisis of faith, how will I know?
I would particularly like to hear from people who have experienced this but never deconverted. Not only have I never been religious, no one in my immediate family is, none of the extended family I am close with is, and while I have friends who believe in religion I don’t think I have any who believe their faith. So I have no real point of comparison.
A sense of panic and dread, and a feeling of being lost were some highlights for me. I think it would be hard to not know, though perhaps others experience these things differently.
I think there are many ways how beliefs get changed.
Take a belief such as: “The world is an hostile place and therefore I have to hide myself behind behind a shield of anonymity when I post online.”
Ten years ago I would have feared that somebody associates my online writing with my real identity at that time I thought I needed the shield. Today I don’t (Nickname is firstname + first 2 letters of lastname).
How did that process felt like? At the beginning I felt fear and now I don’t but it was a gradual process over time.
For most practical concerns I think that we use religion way to often as reference concept. Children get usually taught that it’s bad to talk to strangers. In our world it’s a useful skill to talk to strangers in an friendly and inviting way.
Most people hit walls very quickly if the try to start to say to hello with a smile to every stranger they pass on the street. The come up with excuses that saying so is weird and that people will hate them if the find out that they will engage in such weird behavior.
If you want to experience a crisis of faith those social beliefs are were I would focus. There are more interesting because they actually have empirical results that you can see and you can’t just pretend that you have changed your belief.