The higher power...
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The higher power...
So I'm running into a problem with the steps. I've been reading the forums and they suggest using the group As a higher power but, and no offense or anything, but I don't see how a higher power with the same problems I have is constructive. I'm an absolute atheist. Perhaps I'm too logical or something but the idea of gods or higher powers just don't make sense. Have any other atheists gone through the steps? Do you have any advice on this topic? Thanks
Grant
Grant
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Originally Posted by LoneJakalope 
no offense or anything, but I don't see how a higher power with the same problems I have is constructive.
your statement makes much sense to me
either do I
ones that pick the groups as their higher power
are usually lost
Mountainman
either do I
ones that pick the groups as their higher power
are usually lost
Mountainman
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Hi. I'm not or have ever been religious so had a similar dilemma until someone suggested that I get one and choose something besides myself. I’d always believed in the power of nature which I seldom got angry with so I chose Mother/Father nature, certainly far more powerful than any being I’d heard about. It’s worked so far for me. I understand mileages differ.
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Addiction used to be my HP, it guided my behavior, decisions etc.
No Sobriety is my HP. I act and live like a sober person. I make decisions based on reality. I don't allow my feelings to drive me to do misguided things. I behave like the person I want to be, etc etc.
Nothing mystical and "woo woo". Nothing dramatic...dang, my active addiction was WAY dramatic. I surrendered crazy, dramatic, self destructive behavior, for sane, reasonable, productive behavior.
No Sobriety is my HP. I act and live like a sober person. I make decisions based on reality. I don't allow my feelings to drive me to do misguided things. I behave like the person I want to be, etc etc.
Nothing mystical and "woo woo". Nothing dramatic...dang, my active addiction was WAY dramatic. I surrendered crazy, dramatic, self destructive behavior, for sane, reasonable, productive behavior.
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Wow! Great suggestions, thank you all! I can definitely do the universe and nature. I can see myself using quantum theories to create this world and universe as the one where my decision is to be sober. It can definitely work for me. This universe can be the best one! Wow! :-)
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Originally Posted by LoneJakalope
Wow! Great suggestions, thank you all! I can definitely do the universe and nature. I can see myself using quantum theories to create this world and universe as the one where my decision is to be sober. It can definitely work for me. This universe can be the best one! Wow! :-)
And the "good orderly direction" also made sense.
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I also find that the universe is completely awe inspiring to me. The last picture of earth taken by the voyager is one of the things i can't stop thinking about. I feel so small in the whole scheme of things. I am not sure if that is the purpose of the higher power thing, but it helps to put things into perspective for me. I am also an atheist, not that I don't admire people that have that faith thing going, but I just can't get there. This is one of my favorite quotes.
From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity – in all this vastness – there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.
The Earth is the only world known, so far, to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment, the Earth is where we make our stand. It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.
—Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space, 1997 reprint, pp. xv–xvi
Hope this helps a bit. I am new to this myself.
From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity – in all this vastness – there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.
The Earth is the only world known, so far, to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment, the Earth is where we make our stand. It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.
—Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space, 1997 reprint, pp. xv–xvi
Hope this helps a bit. I am new to this myself.
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Bluedot, it reminds me of a Youtube video where they show the earth and then move outward until you see how vast this one universe really is. Especially now considering the whole "multiverse" ideas from the string theory and all that good stuff. Mind boggling and humbling. I don't see how anyone can see it this way and not be forever changed.
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SoberJennie, Right!!! I totally agree!
These are just some of the things I want back in my life. Feeling curious and interested again in these things that are all around me. I guess finding that child like fascination again. The universe is a good start
These are just some of the things I want back in my life. Feeling curious and interested again in these things that are all around me. I guess finding that child like fascination again. The universe is a good start
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Yeah man I'm crazy about trees right now, theyre so majestic and beautiful. I was at a meeting last night and was talking about it all. Maybe the whole planet speaks in a language we can't hear too, this might explain coincidence lol who knows. But it's a nice place to put this mad head of mine.
Peace
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Great quote bluedot thank you. Sagan is a genius. And soberjennie, the multiverse can be super overwhelming if you think about the past and all the worlds of what-ifs. Equally daunting can be the possibilities of futures. But we make those futures through our decisions today. Good way to focus on the present and be mindful of our decisions and actions. Awesome responses, thank you all.
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Hi Lone Jackalope. Thanks for starting this thread. It is really nice to hear that there are so many people who think of nature and the universe/multiverse as their higher power... greater collected power maybe...
I've mentioned this in a thread before, but the only 'religious' experience I've ever had was when I became familiar with systems theory and subatomic physics, and fractal geometry, etc.... Fritjof Capra stuff. When it clicked that interconnectedness into infinity is the true framework... I felt like I was having a holy experience.
Also the reminder of our smallness AND hugeness, our importance and unimportance synchronistically, it's like massively relieving. Just staring at a mountain range, and considering its geologic life, reminds me how short mine is. Its size reminds me how small I am. How infinitesimal my problems. How precious and fleeting my lifespan.
I'm telling you it is helping a lot))))
I've mentioned this in a thread before, but the only 'religious' experience I've ever had was when I became familiar with systems theory and subatomic physics, and fractal geometry, etc.... Fritjof Capra stuff. When it clicked that interconnectedness into infinity is the true framework... I felt like I was having a holy experience.
Also the reminder of our smallness AND hugeness, our importance and unimportance synchronistically, it's like massively relieving. Just staring at a mountain range, and considering its geologic life, reminds me how short mine is. Its size reminds me how small I am. How infinitesimal my problems. How precious and fleeting my lifespan.
I'm telling you it is helping a lot
))))
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Another interesting concept that caught my eye is Synchronicity, Carl Jung. I know it seems rather hoaky, well it does to me in a sense... he seemed to think it fit right along into quantum mechanics (not sure exactly how as I don't have a background in physics... though we did read some physics in our philosophy classes), and it seemed to me to perfectly fit a Higher Power description, after I read more about it.
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