You believe what?

At our Unitarian Universalist fellowship yesterday, we had the first of two messages about belief.  It's been rattling around in my head ever since. This week was a defense of the notion of belief and the part it plays in the life of an individual and a liberal religious denomination. Next week will be a message entitled "Beyond Belief". I won't be there to hear it, but I hope I'll be able to read the transcript.

Years ago, there was that series on radio called "This I believe". It's been revived in various formats from time to time, most recently that I'm aware of, on NPR a couple of years ago. It's an exercise in defining core beliefs, and I always find it interesting to listen to other people's thoughtful declarations. I have never yet attempted to write one of my own, and I'm not going to start now ---- so don't worry.

At this moment, I'm more interested in the construct of belief than the content. To that end, a definition is in order: (from dictionary.com)
1. a conviction or opinion
2. confidence in the truth or existence of something not immediately susceptible to rigorous proof
3.confidence; faith; trust
4.a religious tenet or tenets; religious creed or faith

The underlying principle that ties those together is the invisibility of the thing believed in. And that, my dears, is what catches my attention.

There are those among us who are die-hard realists. They want everything to be measurable and provable. If it's not, it's not real.

On the other hand, there seem to be many people for whom the so-called real world is more of a backdrop, the scenery before which the actual drama of life is played out. Life takes place in the realm of the unknown and unknowable, the ineffable, the spirit.

I suppose I fall somewhere in between. I really do like to know what I know that I know. I am usually ready to ask for references or some sort of documentation, and have a healthy skepticism about solemn declarations of fact that sound a little too pat or a lot too self-referential.

But I also harbor some fancy. Maybe it's the creative writer in me, the one who goes into plays and books with a willing suspension of disbelief in order to experience an emotional connection.

I will tell you flat out that I don't believe in ghosts, but I also believe in reincarnation. Not as something I would defend, but as something that helps me make sense of my life and the world. I wouldn't say I believe in magic, but I do think there are some things we don't yet understand how to explain, having to do with energy or magnetic fields or some property not yet named.

I won't limit myself to only objects and phenomena that are provable. And really, I don't think anybody does, at least on a conscious level. But what about those unseen influences that shape our thinking? You're having a conversation with someone you care deeply about (unseen - who measures the degree of feelings?) and you anticipate that it will be an upsetting conversation. You will read tiny, probably unconscious signals in voice, body language, or breath, to gauge how it's going, and then adjust what you say by what you perceive. Those are unseen and probably not conscious signals from the other person. You will come away from that situation with a number of beliefs about it ---- how she is feeling, whether she told the truth, what she'll do because of the conversation. Those beliefs will then influence your own behavior and be incorporated into the ongoing active file of memories and experience of the other.

If that micro level of belief, which occurs countless times every day, gives rise to evaluation, belief, and action, based on unseen and largely unmeasurable observation, how much more powerful could be the Beliefs that underlie religion, politics, nationality, ethnicity and the whole host of identifications we all carry around?

When I think of it that way, maybe 95% of life is belief-driven!

The things I believe about myself are the most powerful, and often predictable, motivators of my behavior. I don't have a degree in it, but I do believe I am a good listener and can help people find their way out of their own problems. I don't have anything but a little anecdotal evidence to back that up, no quantifiable data. I believe that I was/am an effective, good mother. Yeah, my kids are grown up and doing well, but that's not actual evidence to support that assertion or belief. Sometimes my beliefs run counter to my well-being. I can measure my body weight on the scales and get an objective number. I can read numerous articles with statistics that tell me the potential hazards of continuing to make that scale number go up. But I believe that it's a hopeless situation and I'm just stuck with that number no matter what I do or think to alter it. All the data would point me otherwise --- isn't there cause and effect involved in eating, exercise and weight? But my belief in the hopelessness and stuckness of it all seems to trump any kind of objective reality.

We have come to a time in which beliefs seem to trump everything else ---- logic, reason, facts, common sense, tradition, even rule of law. The voices of people with opposing viewpoints continue to get louder and more strident, drowning out most everything else. Facts have become irrelevant in the face of conviction---  confidence in the existence of something that cannot be rigorously proven. My belief in helping the poor regardless of how they came to be that way is dead wrong in the eyes of your belief in the righteousness of hard work and pulling oneself up by the bootstraps. Your faith in the inerrancy of the Christian Bible trumps my faith in the right of an individual to search for truth and meaning. Those folks believe it is murder to perform an abortion, while those other folks believe murderers should be shown mercy and spared the death penalty.

It is certainly the right of citizens in a "free" society to choose their own beliefs, and base them on whatever makes sense to them. Jesus, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, the Zombie Apocalypse, or Transmigration of the Soul ---- they all have their adherents and that's fine. I celebrate the plethora of divergent views in the people around me, even though I don't necessarily understand or agree with them. But we are all on this little blue globe together, and it seems to me that it is far more fruitful to accept that others have different beliefs, than to try to annihilate them. Until the world is populated solely with clones, and probably not even then, there will be different, unprovable, unexplainable, invisible beliefs.

It doesn't hurt you a bit if I believe I have already been on this plane many times, learning lessons, and will continue that cycle until I'm through. See? You can read that sentence and nothing has been pinched, cut, stomped, pounded or assailed in your belief system. You might think differently about me, but YOU are still the you you've always been. So if my invisible life-helpers don't affect you, yours won't affect me, either.  Unless either one of us is hellbent on converting the other. Whoa, Nelly!

You might tell me one of your beliefs, for instance, that girls shouldn't wear pants because it makes them too masculine. I might think you're wrong, stupid, archaic, impractical and out-of-your-ever-lovin' mind. But you having that belief doesn't affect me, and my belief that girls can wear whatever they find comfortable doesn't hurt you. Unless you use that belief to make a law that women must wear skirts at all times. THEN what you once "believed" was right has become coercive.

So that's the sticking point. When beliefs --- our convictions about things unseen and unknowable ----- become codified into law or public policy, then we're in a whole different ballgame.

Do me a favor. The next time you get all het up because somebody just stepped all over your pet belief, stop and take a breath. Ask yourself "How important is it?" Maybe give your own opposing belief (imaginary construct) a little hug, and walk on. We don't have to defend. We don't have to impose. And everybody doesn't have to believe in the same brand of unmeasurable reality.

To quote an old Unitarian, "We don't have to believe alike to love alike."

We're all worm food

Jill and I had the great good fortune of being visited last week by one of my oldest friends, John, and his wife of 42 years, Anneli. It turned out that we were all compatible and had a great time laughing, talking and excursioning around the Triangle, visiting friends and touring gardens and looking at outsider art. I even introduced them to Eastern North Carolina BBQ. They may not have been as taken with it as I am; it's an acquired taste.

It helps to have visitors from far away in order to see my own home through new eyes. The internet helps, too. John had identified a few things he wanted to see, especially the whirlygigs by Wilson artist Vollis Simpson. Had I ever heard of him? Well, yes, in a way. That enormous whirlygig installation down at the NC Museum of Art is one of his. But I sure didn't know what we would find down in Wilson, and never anticipated the delightfully slow, friendly conversation with the 93-year-old artist in his hilariously cluttered and junky-looking workshop, way out in the piney woods.

John and Anneli live in Sweden; Anneli is Swedish and John is a Navy Brat, which is why we were in high school together in Rota, Spain back in the stone ages. He is one of the few friends I've really kept up with from high school.

So what does all this have to do with worm food? Well, it goes like this. Anneli is a smoker. She's also a teeny, tiny, petite little person who a good wind would blow away. She apologized a couple of times for smoking out on the deck, even though neither of us has a problem with it ---- that's why there are ashtrays on the front and back porches. She even assured me that she was well aware that it's bad for one's health, but . . . (shrug of the shoulders). It made me think about the things most of us do that we KNOW are not good for us. I couldn't help but think about that, about me that is, because I felt like an elephant beside her and was acutely aware of my own indulgences that are bad for my health, but . . . (shrug of the shoulders).

Don't we all have them, almost everybody? It might be smoking or overeating, drinking, drugs, cheating on spouses or taxes. Could be uncontrollable anger or stress, inactivity, overspending, gossip, bad decision-making. There are so many colorful ways to self-sabotage and this is just the obvious stuff. What about reckless driving? risky sports? setting fires for fun and profit? Anything that momentarily takes attention out of the humdrum here and now and has even a minimal bit of risk or excitement to it, qualifies.

So if everybody has their own little (or big) ways of cheating death, does that mean it's simply a human trait and not something to be condemned or feel guilty over? After all, nobody is going to get out of this alive. Which brings us to the worm food.

After mentally slapping myself around for awhile, I shook myself off and came back to ground zero. This journey through life is plenty perilous without using myself as a punching bag. Yes, I have some self-sabotaging behaviors/obsessions/compulsions/habits. That puts me in line with 99% of the rest of humanity. I'll allow for the possibility of 1% sainthood. Could I do better? Probably. Should I do better? Probably. But when you get right down to it, just exactly how healthy do I want to be and what's the trade off?

My mother, who counted every calorie and never met a chocolate bar she didn't long for, did it almost all correctly. She did smoke lightly for many years, but she quit 30 years ago. She ate obsessively right, exercised regularly right up until she couldn't reliably stand up anymore, walked two miles a day rain or shine, drank moderately and really put a lot of effort into staying healthy. Now it's all paying off ----- her healthy body has far outlived her mind.

Given the choice, I would easily pick the major heart attack (number 1 killer of post-menopausal women) over spending the last 5-10 years of my life chugging along without my wits. I'm carrying more weight than I'm comfortable with, probably putting myself at risk for weight related health problems or a shortened lifespan. I may change my tune if the doc says look, you're fixin' to check out really soon. But for now, I settle myself with thoughts of probability.

These are the odds: The chances are 100% that I'm going to die. Just like everyone else. No matter how utterly fit you are, how completely you follow every rule of good health and sensible living, your odds and mine are exactly the same. It's just a matter of when and how. And as far as I know, getting hit by a bus or run over by a tornado is just as deadly for an Olympic athlete of 25 as it is for an ice cream lovin' 61-year-old  couch potato. I walk my dog, I hang out the clothes, I take care of my family and I sit and read and write and savor the smooth, creamy caramel crunch. So sue me.

We're all worm food in the end.