This

  This question jump-started thirty years of well-honed defense mechanisms in my brain. I couldn’t do that! I couldn’t let go! It could ruin my life!

  As an evangelical Christian kid, I was taught that our belief in God was the only thing that kept us from being like the murderers and prostitutes “out there.” I was not quite as deluded as that anymore, but still, I didn’t know what exactly would happen to my moral compass with God completely out of the equation. God was, and always had been, the source and foundation of all my ethical assumptions, aesthetic sensibility, and moral framework. For me to fully embrace an atheistic nihilism—that nothing had any inherent meaning, that the universe had no moral arc—was to throw myself into a completely new universe. What kind of person would I become? Would I care about people anymore?

  I shouldn’t think about that. I lowered my face to the floor again.

  • • • • •

  It was as if I was a man in a rushing river, clutching tightly onto a branch. That branch was the only thing keeping me from the perilous unknown of the rapids’ pull. I could feel my Allahu akbars falling into that same abyss that my words had in that chapel in 2009. There was nobody listening.

  But what about Lisa? My bride. The love of my life. My first gift to her had been a navy blue, leather-bound Bible with her name engraved in the cover. I had underlined our verse in it: Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. That was the foundation for everything in our lives and in our relationship. To lean on my own understanding right now would be to fall off the path entirely. What would happen to our marriage? Would I stay faithful to her? Would I resent the fact that I’ve only ever kissed one girl and just start sleeping with whoever will let me?

  No! I couldn’t let go!

  Allahu akbar!

  God, if you’re there, please, help me here.

  Allahu akbar!

  Allahu akbar!

  I could feel my hands slipping from the branch. It was out of my control.

  What about Amelie? What about my friends? My parents? My career? Bloom? How would they feel about me losing my faith? They would be mortified, of course. I could lose all of them. My whole world could fall apart. Why am I even considering letting go? This is God I’m thinking about letting go of. The Daddy who was there for me even when my earthly daddy had failed me. My best friend, whose healing presence I had felt so strongly in that room as Lisa and I sang worship songs over my wounded parents’ marriage. My source of grace and forgiveness when all I felt was shame. How many times had I sung of his faithfulness? How many hours had I spent studying his Word? How many tears had I shed in his presence? He had been the anchor that kept me safe in the storms of the chaos and pain of the world around me. How hard I had tried to keep my faith in him, to stay faithful to the one who I had believed was always faithful to me.

  Allahu akbar

  All . . .

  I stopped.

  It was as if my hands had grown numb and cold after so much clutching, and the muscles just weren’t obeying anymore.

  My clenched fist continued to weaken, as I realized the futility of my internal debate. I couldn’t unsee what I’d seen. I couldn’t unexperience what I had experienced. I couldn’t create a faith I didn’t have.

  For a terrifying moment, I took my focus off the branch and braved a glance at the river—its torrents swollen and fierce. What was this river exactly? The movement of evolution and life and chaos and entropy? Everything that’s brought me to this point? I wondered . . .

  Could it be possible that this river might be . . . good?

  It occurred to me that if there was really anything or anyone real or worthwhile remaining in my belief structures—any form of any god worth having faith in—certainly He/She/It/They would be secure enough to handle my lack of belief. Was I so narcissistic as to think that my personal doubts were going to throw the entire universe off its course? Any god worth his salt would surely have enough self-confidence to put up with people who didn’t believe the “correct” things about him, right? I’d long ago let go of the cartoonish, vengeful, angry Santa Claus figure in the sky who was always watching, always needing us to believe the right things. I, who am not even invisible by the way, certainly wouldn’t care much if I found out some dude didn’t believe I existed. Was God less self-realized as a being than I? Why did I feel like ultimate love would be threatened by or dependent on my own personal belief constructs?

  Maybe John Mayer was onto something when he wrote, “Belief is a beautiful armor but makes for the heaviest sword.” I’ve never had a server at a restaurant question my beliefs about human thirst after I asked for ice water. Bankers don’t often hold inquisitions for the depositors of checks in order to determine whether or not their client’s beliefs about the tenets of capitalism are orthodox or heretical. I have had a lot of preachers ask me about my beliefs about God though. Seems to me the word belief is used when people are expected to enact the opposite of trust—to grit their teeth, shut their mind down, and swallow.

  Maybe this wrestle in me to have to believe wasn’t actually about God, but about me and the culture that I come from. Maybe the wrestle was simply me being afraid to leave the flock that I found my identity and safety within.

  Maybe this river is good . . .

  It echoed again in the quiet center of my heart. I felt that ever-present longing for truth. For freedom. I felt a sincere desire to seek, know, and love reality—whatever that is. I was there on my knees because that is where the journey toward truth had brought me. The river, whatever it was, had brought me here, and I could see now that I was simply afraid of where the river would take me next. That was the source of my suffering. That’s why I had been trying so hard to hold on. I had fooled myself into thinking that holding on to my faith had been an expression of love and desire for truth, but it was actually an act of fear—fear of the unknown, of the river, and what she might take from me if I let go.

  I let go.

  I took a breath.

  I stood up. Alone.

  Nobody was there? Nobody was there. What a strange feeling to think that there wasn’t anybody listening to my thoughts but me. Nobody was judging me. I didn’t have to perform. I didn’t have to measure up to anything. I was just a guy standing alone in a spa in a bathrobe. How wonderful was that?

  My chest felt lighter. My mind clearer.

  I suddenly remembered that my brother, David, was in town. I had avoided hanging out with him because of my existential angst spiral, but now I realized that I wanted to see him. I got dressed, left the relaxation lounge, and headed outside to call him. On my way out, I saw the young woman at the front desk again. THIS young woman at the front desk. A fellow human with all of her own suffering and dreams and desires and possibly even her own occasional existential crises. I no longer had any mythical metaphysical constructs of divine calling or purpose that made me need to be nice to her. I didn’t need to manifest any divine love for her to experience the kingdom of God. And I didn’t even have to repent under my breath for those blasphemous thoughts. I was just standing there. She was just standing there. That was all. And it was enough.

  I smiled at her, said thank you, and wished her a good day. And I really meant it.

  When God Is THIS

  When God is THIS, God is here.

  When God is that, God is dead.

  Do your idols make you happy, my love?

  If they do, then play with them with a full heart.

  Worship them. Lift your arms to the sky and dance with them.

  Dress them and paint their fingernails.

  Give them as many heads or eyeballs as you’d like.

  But when the paint begins to peel or the brass begins to tarnish

  Feel free to throw them into the flames of Love

  And peer into the reflection of your own Divine Face.

  WALKING MY DOG IN THE RAIN

  A P
arable (PART 2)

  I've run into some issues. It’s been a really stormy season around here, and as a result, my resolve to stop walking my dog in the rain has really taken a pummeling. I think I finally realized I didn’t have the willpower on my own to stop. I tried and tried, but it seemed like every time we were out there on overcast days, and I was staring at those rain clouds, willing it not to rain, it wouldn’t work. It rained anyway, and there I was with my dog. In the rain. That disgusting wet-dog smell. Being fiscally irresponsible. And hating both myself and my dog for it.

  I decided to get some help. I enrolled myself in some online positive-thinking courses that I am optimistic about. I feel like I’ve been making some good internal progress and am pretty sure my will-power is increasing, as we’ve been getting a lot less rain than we were last week. I’ve also been studying the power of habit and the law of attraction. I’m learning that if I can visualize what it’s like to not walk my dog in the rain, I’ll be able to actualize an ability to stop. I can see now that my problem was that I was too focused on the negative aspects of walking my dog in the rain rather than positive aspects of me as a human being who doesn’t need to step outside every time there is even the slightest chance of a sprinkle. When I can see that, I can believe I am complete and whole as I am, and that I don’t have to walk my dog in the rain after all.

  Again, I think all of this is working pretty well so far because I’ve had a really good stretch of sunny days lately. It’s been so sunny that I barely even thought about walking my dog in the rain. I really am feeling good about myself with all of this, but don’t want to let my guard down, because we all know that pride cometh before the fall.

  To Catch the Fly

  When we, through reflection or therapy, probe into what we think of as our problem (that extra drink, white fragility, too much porn, etc.), we almost always can find a layer in which our problem is really our solution. We swallow the cat to catch the bird to catch the spider to catch the fly. Or in my case, the theological problem I was trying to solve was really a solution for shame and anger, which was really a solution for daddy issues, which were really a solution for that fundamental sense of not-okayness at the core of my being.

  This is not to say that the problems that stack up aren’t real and troubling issues. Whiteness (the racial construct and all that goes along with it, not the color of people’s skin) really does create systems of racism and oppression for people of color. Patriarchy really does lead to more rape, body shame, and unjust pay scales. That drug addiction really did destroy that marriage. Some theology really is inherently more beneficial to human thriving than other theology. The problems we feel are real demand our attention. But until we begin to look at the mechanism by which all of the problems continue to mount and build on other problems, we will never be fundamentally okay. We will always be scratching at our poison ivy—temporarily relieving some discomfort but creating new problems in the process.

  Our suffering is never fundamentally about what she said or what he did or that I don’t have enough money in my bank account this month. The source of our suffering is never anywhere but inside our own minds. Our suffering is always and only the result of our clinging to our desire for THIS to be that. Anthony de Mello, a Jesuit priest and psychotherapist, said it like this: “If you look carefully, you will see that there is one thing and only one thing that causes unhappiness. The name of that thing is attachment.10 What is an attachment? An emotional state of clinging caused by the belief that without some particular thing or some person you cannot be happy.”11

  This is an absolutely necessary realization for your freedom, and one that many of us are reluctant to accept, and partly for good reason—it’s an easy truth to misunderstand and misuse. For that reason, I would like to remind you once more of the dangers of abusing this truth. Imagine someone telling a widow who recently lost her husband that her suffering was her own problem because it was just a result of her attachment to her desires. That would be an inhumane twisting of this truth, and one that misses the point entirely. After all, to assume that someone else should experience anything other than what they are experiencing is to be attached to something other than THIS. Sometimes loving THIS looks like fully experiencing anger and rage. Sometimes loving THIS looks like grief. When you understand that loving THIS is not the same thing as apathetic resignation, you will also be able to see that there is no reason for you to try to judge the internal experience of someone else. You have no idea how deeply they are clinging to the pain that they are experiencing, and therefore have no right to tell them what freedom should look like for them in their circumstances. The truth that our suffering is a result of clinging to that rather than loving THIS is never a truth to impose on others, but rather an infinite ocean within yourself that you are free to swim in if you so desire. It’s as simple as letting go.

  As we will see in the third Noble Truth, when we see that and learn to love THIS as it is, with all of its warts and tiaras, something amazing can happen: The feedback loop of suffering can actually dissipate and we can become more like our wise, old grandparents—the sun, the moon, and the trees. You see, trees don’t waste a lot of energy clinging to their desires or aversions, trying to live in an imaginary reality that isn’t THIS.

  ___________

  9. It makes you wonder, doesn’t it—whose image is made in whose?

  10. It’s an important distinction that the second Noble Truth teaches that our attachment to desire is the cause of suffering and not the desire itself. Desire is natural and important. Without desire, we wouldn’t eat. We need desire, but when we get attached to our desire, we suffer.

  11. Anthony de Mello, The Way to Love: Meditations for Life, Kindle ed. (New York: Random House LLC, 2011).

  6. Riding the Ox Home

  THE THIRD NOBLE TRUTH

  The End of Clinging Is the End of Suffering

  Myths

  Let There Be

  Light (2014)

  Karma

  Shaman (2016)

  One Becomes Two

  Sub Ek (All Is One)—Neem Karoli Baba

  WALKING MY DOG IN THE RAIN

  A Parable (Part 3)

  Letting Go of Yourself

  I Am

  Myths

  “Chop wood, carry water.”

  —ZEN SAYING

  After my experience of letting go of God in the spa, I felt free, alive, and openhearted again, sort of like I felt after Assisi. Only this time, I didn’t have to try to live up to anything. I didn’t have to repent under my breath anymore. I didn’t have to strive to be anything other than who I was in any given moment. And ironically, the result of this was that all of the elevated “spiritual” feelings I had been seeking my whole life were suddenly available freely and without strings. It was as if I traded my old, tattered idea of God for the glorious reality of what I had loved when I loved God. This had nothing to do with the specific content of my new myth of atheism, but simply because of my changed relationship to THIS.

  The word myth is not used here as an equivalent to saying stories that are simply not factually accurate. Myths are big stories that contain and explain other stories. For instance, if you could show an iPhone to someone from ancient Greece, they would have a fundamentally different experience of that story than an Apple technician would. Whether one experiences that object as an unfathomable magic crystal radiating the divine light of the gods from its belly or the second-generation iPhone X, an advanced telecommunication device, depends entirely on which myths you inhabit. All of our relationships, religions, nations, money, war, law, medicine, art, technology, philosophy, and science12 are rooted in some sort of mythic structure that allows us to make sense of the world and gives us a sense of identity within it.

  Scientific materialism is a myth. Modernity is a myth. Post-modernity is a myth. Theism is a myth. Atheism is a myth.13 Again, myths aren’t “false stories”; they are big, meta-stories that help us interpret and make meaning from the w
orld around us. If you didn’t have myth, you wouldn’t have any meaning, any language, any concepts. This is why it can be hard to recognize the extent of how your own myths color your thoughts, feelings, and fundamental experiences of reality—trying to conceive of how you conceive is sort of like trying to see your own eyeballs.

  Our most fundamental assumptions about existence—the meaning of life, where we come from, what we are doing here, whether we are real or illusory, material or divine, magical or mundane, fragile or immortal—all of our baseline assumptions about what THIS is, who we are and how we should act, come from the stories that we tell and the myths that we experience the telling of those stories through. You may think that “you” “live” “on” “Earth,” a “planet” “in” “the” “universe.” But all of that is story. You live in story. You are story.

  Because of the power of story and myth, people are willing to work most of their waking hours for an imaginary construct called a corporation in trade for an imaginary value called money and pay a high percentage of that imaginary construct to another imaginary entity called the United States of America. One of the reasons our myths are so powerful is that they not only offer us a sense of meaning but an identity and feeling of belonging.

  I am the oldest of four children from the Gungor household. Rob, David, Lissa, and I were all raised with the same parents in the same places. We had a lot of the same teachers. Same friends. Same vacations. A lot of similar experiences overall. And wouldn’t you know it? None of us are devoted practitioners of Zoroastrianism. I think this is for the same reason that there is a fairly strong statistical correlation between the number of Canaanite Baal worshippers in any given society and whether or not that given society is ancient Canaan. It’s because our belief systems are the result of where and when we were born. Our myths, and therefore self-identities, are given to us by our cultural context and social bonds. As such, those stories become central to our feeling of identity. We get attached to them (in fact, as we will explore soon, what we think of as ourselves are those attachments). We die for these stories. We kill for them.