Question for fellow Athesists/Agnostics
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Join Date: Feb 2015
Posts: 81
Originally Posted by dwtbd 
Focusing on the euphoric feeling is pure AV, literally. If you step back and look at what is being said through a rational and objective mindset the pov will change radically. Take the negative consequences associated with and coupled to the experience of the euphoria and realize they are inseparable. The feeling , the immediate experience of being under the influence of your doc is so pleasurable ,at a certain level, that price we are willing to pay for continuing that experience is limitless, that is the addiction. The AV will not care if that price literally kills you, it just needs you to pay it. The AV doesn't and will never give a shtt about any negative consequences, but you can and do. You got this, the price for the good and temporary feelings of intoxication are just too gd high, anything that doesn't recognize is lying/wrong and is willing to spend your life as the price for getting it.
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Join Date: Mar 2015
Location: uk
Posts: 27
Going back to the original post.
I am an atheist. I used to be an antitheist, so I suppose that's progress!
People are welcome to their beliefs whether I find them silly, profound or irrelevant.
Not my business.
I honestly don't know what a radical atheist is. Is it some one who constantly gets into arguments in order to prove that they are right? I wriggle out of any disagreement of this type because it is utterly futile.
In the strictest sense of the work, my atheism is a faith position, because I cannot guarantee that there is no creator. However in the main, it is an evidenced based position - my personal journey into evolutionary theory and cosmology (for instance) has led to this.
It's almost never discussed that deism (belief in an intervening god) is far more prevalent today than theism (belief in a god that set the universe in motion, then left it alone).
I rarely meet a theist, in or out of the rooms. If you hoping for a result, there's not much point in praying to a theistic god, because there is no intervention.
So more specifically I am a strong adeist, and a somewhat weaker atheist.
On a personal level, and again people are absolutely welcome to their beliefs, I find deism problematic, because if one person is favoured, doesn't it follow that another is disadvantaged?
I like "not me" - never heard that before. And I know "not me" is very, very big indeed!
Good Orderly Direction generally works for me.
I like to think about legacy as well. My granddad was an abusive drunk, my mum had sociopathic tendencies mainly as a result, and I became an alcoholic. Who knows how far back that chain of abuse went. But if I stay sober, my daughter will have a different life, with love and fun and stability - how far into the future could that influence extend?
That's certainly bigger than me.
I am an atheist. I used to be an antitheist, so I suppose that's progress!
People are welcome to their beliefs whether I find them silly, profound or irrelevant.
Not my business.
I honestly don't know what a radical atheist is. Is it some one who constantly gets into arguments in order to prove that they are right? I wriggle out of any disagreement of this type because it is utterly futile.
In the strictest sense of the work, my atheism is a faith position, because I cannot guarantee that there is no creator. However in the main, it is an evidenced based position - my personal journey into evolutionary theory and cosmology (for instance) has led to this.
It's almost never discussed that deism (belief in an intervening god) is far more prevalent today than theism (belief in a god that set the universe in motion, then left it alone).
I rarely meet a theist, in or out of the rooms. If you hoping for a result, there's not much point in praying to a theistic god, because there is no intervention.
So more specifically I am a strong adeist, and a somewhat weaker atheist.
On a personal level, and again people are absolutely welcome to their beliefs, I find deism problematic, because if one person is favoured, doesn't it follow that another is disadvantaged?
I like "not me" - never heard that before. And I know "not me" is very, very big indeed!
Good Orderly Direction generally works for me.
I like to think about legacy as well. My granddad was an abusive drunk, my mum had sociopathic tendencies mainly as a result, and I became an alcoholic. Who knows how far back that chain of abuse went. But if I stay sober, my daughter will have a different life, with love and fun and stability - how far into the future could that influence extend?
That's certainly bigger than me.
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Join Date: May 2012
Location: canada
Posts: 7,242
no need for sorry.
it's just that...uh...maybe you're (not) an atheist after all?
i've stopped trying to fit into any of these categories. too tightly demarcated.
But if I stay sober, my daughter will have a different life, with love and fun and stability - how far into the future could that influence extend?
That's certainly bigger than me.
yes. that's the cool possibility. the one on the sober side of the scales.
stick around
it's just that...uh...maybe you're (not) an atheist after all?
i've stopped trying to fit into any of these categories. too tightly demarcated.
But if I stay sober, my daughter will have a different life, with love and fun and stability - how far into the future could that influence extend?
That's certainly bigger than me.
yes. that's the cool possibility. the one on the sober side of the scales.
stick around
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Join Date: Mar 2015
Posts: 6
The reason I drink is because I want to feel different. I have an abnormal response to alcohol - when I drink my perception of the world and the people around me change. After a few drinks they look less threatening, more forgiving, etc. In an instant alcohol changes how I see the world.
We'll - that's what AA does. Following the program it gives me a new way to see the world. One of my favorite lines is "Everything is already OK". Meaning nothing needs to change - it's just find as it is. When I am in line with AA I'm finally whole. The only other time in life I feel whole (not wanting things or trying to change them) is when I drink.
AA does for more slowly what alcohol did for my quickly - just with none of the negative side effects.
None of that requires a defined God.
As far as labels go (atheist, anti theist, agnostic) all are attempts to define a position with finality. Life doesn't work that way. We are constantly changing and evolving.
For me, when I put the god debate on hold and just plug into the program, pray and meditate as directed, work the steps I feel better and the desire to drink goes away. The steps are designed to make me smaller, to remove the nonsense and old ideas that I have spent a life time accumulating.
So - there is plenty of room for all of us....
We'll - that's what AA does. Following the program it gives me a new way to see the world. One of my favorite lines is "Everything is already OK". Meaning nothing needs to change - it's just find as it is. When I am in line with AA I'm finally whole. The only other time in life I feel whole (not wanting things or trying to change them) is when I drink.
AA does for more slowly what alcohol did for my quickly - just with none of the negative side effects.
None of that requires a defined God.
As far as labels go (atheist, anti theist, agnostic) all are attempts to define a position with finality. Life doesn't work that way. We are constantly changing and evolving.
For me, when I put the god debate on hold and just plug into the program, pray and meditate as directed, work the steps I feel better and the desire to drink goes away. The steps are designed to make me smaller, to remove the nonsense and old ideas that I have spent a life time accumulating.
So - there is plenty of room for all of us....
Court jester
Join Date: Mar 2015
Location: South Florida
Posts: 508
FWIW, I was sober for 23 years without any belief in the "out there somewhere" western protestant view of a HP. I stayed sober by my own choice and by tapping into the god within me. I drank again because of my own choice. I quit again because of my own choice, on my time frame, when I wanted to, not due to some "bottom". I stay sober today because of my own choice and belief that there is a power within me that can do it.
I have been sober 23 of my 26 years as an adult. No need to find an HP out there somewhere to do so. I only needed to find a mirror.
I have been sober 23 of my 26 years as an adult. No need to find an HP out there somewhere to do so. I only needed to find a mirror.
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Join Date: Jun 2011
Location: The Deep South
Posts: 14,636
Hi there. I am one of those people who did benefit from studying and reading the AA literature (and I highly recommend any of Ernest Kurtz's books, btw!). I own the BB and have read it twice through, along with many of the other conference approved ones. All the biggies. I worked the Steps with and without a sponsor and attended meetings early on in the recovery process. That being said, I've also attended Women For Sobriety meetings, and online SMART meetings, and I've read the AVRT crash course, Rational Recovery, Alan Carr's book and about 35 or so total books in the recovery genre.
I'm agnostic atheist and I don't foresee that changing any time soon. In fact, my personal worldview and lack of belief in a god being has absolutely zero to do with the fact I was an alcoholic drinker, and therefore has absolutely zero to do with my getting and staying sober. It's just a non issue with me. My spirituality is something running concurrently, if you will, with my recovery, neither is dependent on the other. And I like it that way. I can stay sober whether or not I have a crisis of conscience or any sort of spiritual funk or crisis. Although I can see where many people benefit from tapping into spirituality to stay sober. And that's what AA seems to be about. Finding a solid sense of the spiritual to hold onto - and that's a good thing, imo.
Btw, you can be agnostic atheist. It's not necessarily one of the other.
I'm agnostic atheist and I don't foresee that changing any time soon. In fact, my personal worldview and lack of belief in a god being has absolutely zero to do with the fact I was an alcoholic drinker, and therefore has absolutely zero to do with my getting and staying sober. It's just a non issue with me. My spirituality is something running concurrently, if you will, with my recovery, neither is dependent on the other. And I like it that way. I can stay sober whether or not I have a crisis of conscience or any sort of spiritual funk or crisis. Although I can see where many people benefit from tapping into spirituality to stay sober. And that's what AA seems to be about. Finding a solid sense of the spiritual to hold onto - and that's a good thing, imo.
Btw, you can be agnostic atheist. It's not necessarily one of the other.
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Join Date: Mar 2010
Posts: 343
I came to believe--but not in somthing outside of myself. I came to believe that I am an essential cog--not too big, not too small-- in something greater than the world I created for myself while I drank. During the drinking years I was a miserable, self-contained critical mass of ego. As I discarded the thorny shackles of alcoholism I joined the loving spirit that is the universe. I am a non-theist: Coming to believe did not mean finding a power outside of myself. Rather, it meant that I ceased to resist the wisdom of the universe that had been there all along. I can gauge my spititual health by the degree to which I can surrender my fight. It does not mean that I consent to helplessness or that I become a doormat: It simply means that I step outside of my self-centeredness and acknowledge that there is more at stake than my wants.
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Join Date: May 2015
Location: Sacramento, CA
Posts: 7
I'm a pretty devout atheist myself. I believe in FSW though, in all is glorified noodley goodness! And Athesis, the almighty god of atheism!
Athesis is also a genus of butterflies
I sorry I don't have a point to all this...
Athesis is also a genus of butterflies
I sorry I don't have a point to all this...
Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Oxnard (The Nard), CA, USA.
Posts: 13,860
Originally Posted by beddy
But when they talk about having to find their higher power to get sober I shut that off.
I can as I will or I will again. Or the opposite is; I will not, What is between, is indecision.
Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Oxnard (The Nard), CA, USA.
Posts: 13,860
Originally Posted by Bmac
FWIW, I was sober for 23 years without any belief in the "out there somewhere" western protestant view of a HP. I stayed sober by my own choice and by tapping into the god within me. I drank again because of my own choice. I quit again because of my own choice, on my time frame, when I wanted to, not due to some "bottom". I stay sober today because of my own choice and belief that there is a power within me that can do it.
I have been sober 23 of my 26 years as an adult. No need to find an HP out there somewhere to do so. I only needed to find a mirror.
I have been sober 23 of my 26 years as an adult. No need to find an HP out there somewhere to do so. I only needed to find a mirror.
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Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Bklyn. NY
Posts: 1,859
Originally Posted by Zencat
To me the highest power is not in the unknown or known but in the materialization of personal power. That I have discovered comes from in me, not out there in blowing dust and stories of old gods.
Since power is an concept and not concrete thing, how or why are you certain that it comes from within you and not from outside? More importantly, what difference would it make anyhow? Is there any difference at all other than in word choice if someone says they get strength from a power within themselves, or if they get that same power from a universal force outside themselves? Especially if the result is the same?
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Join Date: May 2007
Location: Wollongong NSW
Posts: 241
Originally Posted by Joe Nerv
Not being argumentative, but rather curious as I'm beginning to believe that same as you.... but, Since power is an concept and not concrete thing, how or why are you certain that it comes from within you and not from outside? More importantly, what difference would it make anyhow? Is there any difference at all other than in word choice if someone says they get strength from a power within themselves, or if they get that same power from a universal force outside themselves? Especially if the result is the same?
You could even take this discussion a bit further and challenge the need for any dualistic viewpoints of the source of power. Maybe there is no in, out, up, down, over there, everywhere source of anything other than the meaning we place upon it, the stories we make up about it and the hope that it maybe true.
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Join Date: Jun 2012
Location: Pacific Coast
Posts: 785
Originally Posted by Joe Nerv
Not being argumentative, but rather curious as I'm beginning to believe that same as you.... but,
Since power is an concept and not concrete thing, how or why are you certain that it comes from within you and not from outside? More importantly, what difference would it make anyhow? Is there any difference at all other than in word choice if someone says they get strength from a power within themselves, or if they get that same power from a universal force outside themselves? Especially if the result is the same?
Since power is an concept and not concrete thing, how or why are you certain that it comes from within you and not from outside? More importantly, what difference would it make anyhow? Is there any difference at all other than in word choice if someone says they get strength from a power within themselves, or if they get that same power from a universal force outside themselves? Especially if the result is the same?
One way of looking at it, anyway.
Its_me_jen
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Salina, Ks
Posts: 8,547
Originally Posted by samseb5351
Maybe there is no in, out, up, down, over there, everywhere source of anything other than the meaning we place upon it, the stories we make up about it and the hope that it maybe true.
Laozi Old Man
Join Date: May 2008
Location: Detroit, MI
Posts: 6,665
Originally Posted by samseb5351
Maybe there is no in, out, up, down, over there, everywhere source of anything other than the meaning we place upon it, the stories we make up about it and the hope that it maybe true.
However, it is the translations that get it wrong. What the Buddha believed in was "Dhamma" - not higher or lower than self, but wider than self. Something universal. unbound, all inclusive and undefinable in modern English.
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Join Date: May 2007
Location: Wollongong NSW
Posts: 241
Originally Posted by Boleo
Something universal. unbound, all inclusive and undefinable in modern English.
From the Urban Dictionary Definition
Deepity
Something that sounds profound but intellectually hollow.
Usually has the following characteristics. 1. True but trivial 2. False but logically ill informed. 3. Usually a use-mention error or (UME)
Made famous by Daniel Dennett.
"Love is just a word" is a deepity.
"God is the God beyond Gods." is a deepity.
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