I believe.
I have silently despised that word for decades. Believe? What does that mean?
To know without proof? To trust in the uncertain? To place one's weight upon a hypothesis, while relieving oneself of the onus of proof?
Is believe not the same as guess? Both put forward a statement and presume them to be true. But "guess" is a shaky opinion, while "believe" carries with it the weight of ideals, religions and nations. Is it merely a difference in the intensity of one's guess?
"I believe in you". A strong endorsement of trust, often meant to provide encouragement to a wavering friend. It's very different from "I guess you could do it". That does not sound encouraging at all. Is it only a difference of intensity? Is it in the amount of mental weight I am willing to exert on the metaphorical bridge whose foundation has not been exhaustively determined?
It is all a matter of an approximation to knowledge. To believe, to trust, to guess, to surmise, to suspect, to suppose, to hypothesize. Are these not but varying intensities of the same concept?
Knowledge comes necessarily from experience. That is our only source of information in this existence. There is no other channel through which knowledge may arrive. We perceive, we process, our mind creates frameworks and models of knowledge, and we come to understand our knowledge within our mental web, whatever that may end up being. The tacit presumed goal is to weave a framework of knowledge within the mind which reflects most accurately that same structure as we could find outside. And we find proof of our knowledge through accuracy of prediction, by recognizing patterns of being outside that we can hum to ourselves in our mind's sanctum like a catchy tune. This is how the knower gains value. He perceives, he analyzes, he understands, and he weaves new knowledge into his web of mind so that he can "see and hear the world dance and sing along to the tune he already has within him". That he may follow the rhythms of the world within him, and thus more gracefully be able to weave and to insert his own rhythm into the outside world – the lone dancer amidst the apparent chaos, or an ever-better observer and collector of knowledge within the endless museum of worldly events.
But if knowledge is the strong foundation of our web, the proven and unbreakable foundational elements that support the structure of our web, what are then the rest? Guesses, hypotheses, beliefs? Are they all merely different ways to describe a tentative, unproven new thread in the web? A bridge under construction, but which has not found a solid foundation of experience yet. Perception and understanding cannot fully corroborate this new thread, and thus it remains unproven, uncertain, with a sign. "Warning: Unproven knowledge. Test at your own risk".
And we do. Of course we test unproven knowledge. That is the process by which guesses become known truth.
What I despise about "believe" in particular is its fanatical connotation. It carries with it the baggage of history. Nations have believed in some ideal and made indelible marks upon history, both for harm and for growth. Religions have flocked millions of sheep into mindless rituals and moral straitjackets for centuries, and believers continue to impose them generation after generation, with no true understanding of what is being done. The problem with "belief" is that it is used as a social badge to mark those who are "in the club", or "out of the club". "Do you believe in God?" "Do you believe in our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ?" "Do you believe the government is conspiring against its citizens to exert ever-increasing control over us until we are nothing but slaves to them?" "Do you believe the billionaires are taking over the world?" "Do you believe in fairies?" "Do you believe in aliens?"
I dislike that the word is used as a social marker. As a method of pushy contagion from person to person, from group to group, as a method of coercion. I despise the fact that "belief" has been used as a marker of discrimination between the "believers" and the "non-believers", that it is used to separate and polarise sections of the population, rather than to find new avenues of cooperation and union, which I "believe" is the way by which us humans, as a budding collective, can continue to healthily grow and mature.
I dislike that it has been used as a tribal marker of separation rather than as a method or path towards knowledge. So many get stuck in the tribality and separation of "belief" that further refinement towards knowledge becomes impossible. Fallen into the zeal of tribal demarcations based on belief, the "believer" cares more about protecting one's own team and turf, upon feeling superior to the other bands, of soothing their own self-worth with superiority, than with finding and ascertaining actual truth. And that wastage of resources, that misguiding of attention, that chaining down into tribal obligations, loyalty to one's arbitrary personal teams, becomes more important than the pursuit of truth. This attitude holds back the growth of the learning human, for he gets swooshed and smooshed into the metaphorical whirlpool of emotional battles and reactions, charged with generations of blame and resentment, and keeps him unable to move forward, unless he realizes the futility of the conflict, and chooses to move forward into the seldom-trodden path of those who choose truth over tribe.
I find it is this fanatical pull of belief, etched deep into our collective subconscious, that brings me to write today. That has kept me silent until now. I have refused from associating myself with such beliefs, instinctively perceiving it as an icky, sticky substance that would not allow me to be free. I see now that it was not the fact that belief relies upon an hypothesis that made me despise it, for upon this method relies our whole human method of gathering knowledge and visioning truth. No, it was never the uncertainty. It was the tribal stickiness. The competitions. The emotional cesspools of opposing groups judging, despising, and criticising other groups, which kept me removed from the word.
And in the process, as I removed myself from the tribal battles, from the petty feuds, from the decades and centuries of blame and criticism and perceived superiority and competition between so many groups, I gathered all of that criticism, blame, and judgement, and threw it all onto them. Into all those "believers". Into those unenlightened, blind, pitiful masses and crowds of unthinking followers, who rely on others for their dosage of truth, and who give away their freedom in return for group acceptance. I despised all those sheep. I felt superior to all of them. I criticised their pitiful way of life, their stunted path towards truth. "Mindless masses", I thought, and unwittingly gathered all of that criticism, all of that judgement, all of that hatred, all of that superiority into myself. I built a high chair in the middle of my solitary mind, and from there wordlessly cursed and despised their ignorance, silently spitting on their cherished devotions and beliefs. Foolish masses.
The prison of the rebel is his own rebelliousness. In my own zealous rejection of the majority, I created yet another group who fights for superiority against all others: myself. My island of one, my precious high chair... all I did was to take all the emotional baggage of "belief" and projected it from me onto them, isolating me from the world. My mind has been tip-toeing between the slimy puddles of tribal beliefs for a long time now, and it is time to let it go.
To let go of my hatred. Of my separation. Of my perceived self-superiority. I have been depending upon the mistakes and ignorance of others in order to assuage my own insecurities, and as a crutch for my own self-worth. I, he who despised so intensely the ignorant slavery of the mind, have done exactly the same thing unto myself.
"But still, no one else told me to do it", my petty mind still comments. "At least I wasn't scammed by others". Bullshit. My own insecurities are clinging onto the last of their self-determined superiority, and they know it. They know it is not special. That I am not special. That I am also another human. Blind. Ignorant. Bumbling. Scammable. Prone to mistruth. Much less of the unrecognized genius or maverick than I had perceived myself to be. Even writing this my fear grasps at it, points at it, tries to use it as proof of its specialness, but he knows the truth. My discovery is not new. It is not revolutionary. It is not a medal to wear under my shirt, pretending not to notice it. It is my flag of surrender. I am human, and my path towards truth is fallible and flawed. I am not special nor superior, and I have been thirsting along my path for accolades that have kept me a prisoner of my own isolation.
But I am also like them. I, too, choose to believe.
But I cannot use that word with the baggage it now carries. What is to believe? The word implies unproven knowledge, but it carries with it a sense of aspiration, of a nebulous draw towards it that one does not understand. Aspirational uncertainty, I would call it. That certainly carries within it an emotional bias, and thus it is easy to see how such a word may have produced the rifts and conflicts we see in the world today, when our aspirations just happen to differ (or to seem to, anyway). But as I see it, that is what it means to believe. To suspect something is true, and to be drawn towards it aspirationally. To *desire* for something to be true, but not merely by petty desire. By the higher desire – that one we have yet no words for.
The trust to be placed in belief, however, is strong. It is strong enough that one is willing to place one's weight upon it. It is strong enough that we may jump on it, swing on it, and struggle to find a foundation of truth for it. That one is willing to place one's bulk of life upon that bridge, knowing that if the belief turns to be false, one's dear life, accomplishments, and strivings may fall down to the chasm of failure underneath. Belief is a trust one is willing to support one's life upon, encouraged by his aspiration, and willing to risk his efforts upon this unproven truth.
So I propose this new mnemonic-definition for the word "believe". To believe a belief is to "live by that belief". To "live by that uncertainty that we aspire to be true, yet are honestly uncertain about". Without proof, without guarantee, belief nevertheless convinces a man to support one's life upon the weight of that uncertain truth, and be willing to *test* that belief with the gamble of one's own life.
"To live by". That is to believe. This is a high standard, I'd say, and I'm certain that a great many so-called beliefs would not pass this test, particularly when it comes to religious teachings (the most nebulous of all social beliefs). For so many still use belief merely as tribal badges and marks of separation... but that I have written enough about. No need for further criticism, mind. You've made your point.
So what do I believe in? I have sought truth in my way, as have many, and I have gathered opinions, experiences, teachings, analyses, conclusions, and intuitions. I've filtered them in my web of interwoven knowledge, and now I hold a bunch of floating hypothesis strands in it, all of which I've been unwilling to believe, lest I "fall into the same fallacies and stupid sheepish followings as have the many before me". But this is past. I am not thus special, we've settled that much. And by refusing to incorporate any of these hypotheses into my working web of knowledge as tentative beliefs, I've deprived myself of the impelling tool of aspiration. I've kept all of those unproven bridges cordoned off, "out of order", unsuitable for walking upon lest they break and I deem myself a fool, or worse, lest others see me fall, and I may find myself on the receiving end of that intense derision and judgement I felt towards them.
But I now release that hatred. I step into belief. I refuse to define myself by the standards of the world, whether by association or by rejection, and I willingly step into the risk of wrongness, both social and epistemological, of inserting my aspirations into unproven bridges. Of upgrading my unusable strands of guesses between my web of knowledge into usable beliefs that I am willing to test, admit, exercise, and actually risk my reputation, correctness, and life upon. Because the reputation we feel is but an overbloated emotional illusion of the social realities around us, whose criticism is prickly at worst. Because correctness is merely the attribute of "rectitude" with respect to another truth or standard, and thus it is futile to remain technically correct about hypotheses that have never been proven. It is the empty boast that "all my beliefs are correct", while my number of beliefs is zero.
As for my life... well... what good is a life untested? What use is an explorer who walks only the marked streets and safe sidewalks? What service can I provide if I remain publicly forever huddled under the umbrella of the acceptance of the majority? "Only the service of maintenance", responds my mind. A noble service, and one to which all of us are called to throughout our lives in one way or another, most obviously with the maintenance of our own bodies. But this I know: that is not enough. That is but the necessary foundation upon which beauty can be created, truth can be discovered, and the cosmos can be explored. It is but the vehicle upon which adventures and discovery can be had.
Thus I allow aspiration unto my hypotheses, and I step into belief. What do I believe?
I believe in magic. I believe in the soul. I believe in fairies, and in forgotten civilisations of old. I believe in auric energies. I believe in divine light. I believe emotions and thoughts are subtle fluids we spill and litter wantonly onto space and time. I believe in angels. I believe there is no death. I believe our bodies are nourished through the sun and our breath.
I believe we're all children. I believe we all hold pain. I believe humanity has gotten stuck in the fears of failure, loss, and gain. I believe in spirit. I believe in love. I believe that these rhymes are no longer worth striving for.
I believe life is present in every microscopic volume between our eye and each star that reflects upon it, crammed into all space and writhing with vitality. I believe the physical world is a membrane continuously floating upon an ocean of consciousness which flows "underneath", and the shapes and forces we perceive are but the outreach of these conscious waves and currents. I believe that matter is but play-dough, sand to build with, infinite infinitesimal lego pieces sticking, breaking, floating, and available for us to play with. I believe matter, situations, and life hold no inherent meaning, and that meaning is our misunderstood and vastly underutilized prerogative to infuse with life and color our experiences with, much as a child intuitively gives life to the dolls and toys he plays with with his natural gift of imagination. I believe many adults have either forgotten or rejected the value of imagination, and they become thirsting ghouls, begging their peers and society to give them the meaning they long for through recognition and appreciation. Those gifts we've forgotten to give to ourselves.
I believe the wholeness of truth is incomprehensible by our human mind, yet our mind has the duty of building the scaffolding of knowledge and wisdom through which purpose and life can pour forth into form. I believe the mind often thinks of itself as the undeniable master of our life, but I believe it will forever thirst for purpose unless it admits that something exists which transcends it, of which the heart is the mysterious gate.
I believe most of us, both individually and collectively, live blinded in our own emotional fog and miasma, trapped in fears, cycles, and Karpman triangles, and that we require honest introspection and courage to clean ourselves before being able to truly grow. I believe that shamanic breathwork, magic mushrooms and ayahuasca, psilocybin and DMT, can be of great help to realize the fact of what is beyond and within, to realize the depths and the responsibility of our own shit and light, and that they can be used to the point of abuse. I believe the highest form of our passion, joy, or excitement is the marker to our "correct" path in life, and like the fabled white rabbit, it unerringly leads us to the unexpected situations where we can best live, experience, learn, and continue to grow.
I believe the fears associated with money and reputation keep vast swathes of humanity stuck in corrals of their own making, who use their own free will to restrict themselves into spaces where they will never find the adventures their heart longs for. I believe the fear of failure, the fear of ridicule, the fear of poverty, the fear of shame, and the fear of death are the ceaseless advisors to him who does not dare question his own life.
I believe in these very years humanity itself is at a rising inflection point of consciousness and vibration, and that each of us has the choice to either let ourselves be swayed upward, inward, and newward through life, or to continue to cling to the old and familiar even while it increasingly shows itself to be obsolete. I believe choosing the former requires us to face and question our darkest fears, and that it leads us to discovering, to unfolding the true, joyful, blissful light within, which can then pour unimpeded into physical form. I believe that extra-terrestrials are somehow involved in this process.
I believe life is a process of self-discovery, even while most of it seems to hinge upon circumstances outside. I believe our waking life is but a fraction of what the entirety of our true being actually perceives, experiences, and absorbs. I believe therefore in the importance of tuning our sensitivity and expanding our consciousness, so that we may better see and know ourselves, and thus more truthfully, capably, and joyfully play. I believe all is play, if we merely choose to.
I believe we are sensationally, invisibly, and spiritually guided to fulfil our life's purpose, and that many of us fail to see the white rabbits past the stress and rush we impose upon ourselves. And that when we do see them, many refuse to face the fear where the rabbit waits. I believe fear itself is an indicator of concentrated energy within our system, and when felt and allowed to dissolve, this energy reveals itself to be a wrapped gift of joy and power, or at least it releases that energy for more useful service somewhere else in our system.
I believe some people often serve as spiritual channels, tools of communication between invisible or distant entities and humans, and that this is merely a borrowing of this same human tool or vessel that is most always used by our individual soul.
I believe in telepathy. I believe in ghosts. I believe in the power of silence, and in the power of words.
I believe astrological influences, divination, religions, tarot readings, energy healing, and similar systems are based on fact, and I believe they are prone to misinterpretation, and even wilful deceit. Nonetheless, I believe they can hold value to whomever investigates or makes use of them with ungullible, uncynical self-criterion.
I believe there is healing in song. I believe there is healing in dance. I believe there is healing in laughter. I believe love is felt when it is infused into our food, music, or service. I believe there is healing in love, in pleasure, in kindness, in work, in failure, and in pain. I believe healing occurs when we see, feel, and accept what we have not.
I believe in the value of prayer. I believe in the value of meditation. I believe in the value of yoga, of exercise, of art, of sports, of music, of theater, of crystals, of books, of science, of technology. I believe all of these can be used for true growth, and that all can be used to the point of abuse. I believe that abuse carries with it its own gift of growth.
I believe the development of artificial intelligence reflects a corresponding shift or transcendence in the spiritual realms that underlie us. I believe that the next leap of growth for us humans involves crossing that bridge for which the external world provides no concrete evidence or support, which poses a challenge to us who have so long relied on external evidence. The supporting evidence, therefore, must become individual and invisible, and requires us to develop self-worth, self-reliance, and self-criterion. I believe many humans will not do so soon. I believe many others will.
I visualize that in the bridge metaphor, concrete evidence corresponds to columns that support the bridge from underneath, from the solid bedrock of matter, whereas the new beliefs for which no such proof exists will be found to be supported not from below but from above. Cables and tethers from which the bridges hang, which correspond to evidence found only within inner experience.
I believe we are mysteriously yet factually literal reflections of one another across an existential prism that I do not fathom. I believe our consciousness is likewise unfolded and built upon literal geometric reflections through planes of spirit-matter beyond the realm of the seen. I believe that some humans have pierced through the veil into ceaseless and unanchored continuous consciousness, and that some of them come back to help lift us up too. I believe many great teachers, artists, discoverers, and leaders of the ages channel such transcended beings, as well as other spiritual entities of diverse and unknown kinds.
I believe religions are plagued with misinterpretation and burdened with deadened ritualistic cruft, yet that many enlightened helpers serve humanity from within. I believe politics are rife with corruption, selfish ambition and childish squabbles, which reflect onto populations as tribalistic hooliganism and social fractures, yet that enlightened leaders and officers do exist and do their best to serve.
I believe meaning, attitude, and positivity are all a continuous choice as we swim in our universal sandbox and sculpt our castles of sand. I believe this sand and all derived circumstances have no inherent meaning or implication, and that even in the face of death, upon losing that which is cherished, upon being proven wrong, or through social humiliation one can choose to feel acceptance and a true smile.
I believe life is simple. And that all complexity and complications fit within it.
I believe life is love. And that all conflict, struggle, and pain fit within it.
I believe.
P.S.: That text in the last image was ALL ChatGPT's. I like it, though.
"I BELIEVE IN THE ENDLESS BECOMING."
