Preamble: (Written October 2008)

 

I know that some day I will desire to look back and reflect on the powerful changes and feelings in my life right now.  So much has changed for me, so much has changed within me, I feel as though I am awakening from a restless dream to find life both more beautiful and terrifying than my dream.

I feel like I am standing naked, with no barrier between myself and cold, harsh reality.  The pretenses have fallen and the truth lies before me cold and unforgiving. 

This is what I wanted, all along- to see things as they really are, but like Neo in "The Matrix" I can not go back to seeing things as I once did.  Now that my mind has been expanded to accommodate greater understanding, I can not return it to its previous state.  And, to be quite honest, I would not choose to do so even if I could.  The truth is all that is rightly mine.  If I haven't integrity, then I have nothing.  I could no sooner pretend to believe a lie, or choose to follow a falsehood, than I could choose not to be myself.  And in my new life, according to my new understanding, the only true sin is to be untrue to your real self.

How did I come to my new chapter in life?  I surely wasn't seeking to change.  I actually am very reluctant to change.  I do it only when I absolutely have no other viable options.  I believed, truly, that I was happy in my old life.  But change is the only constant, and life's conditions forced me to examine my old life, and that examination is what brought me to my new life.

In my old life I was meek, humble, and desiring above all else to do what is right.  In other words, I was the same person I am today, with one notable exception.  I was living my life in a cage, which I believed to be for my own benefit.  The cage I lived in was a cage of the mind.  It was constructed for me before I was even born, and over the years it has been my home.  As sick as it may sound, I actually miss it now that I have freed myself from it.  It was the only life I ever knew; my happy youth, my contented life inside the safety and familiarity of my mental cage.  I know the exact dimensions of that cage like I know my own face in the mirror.  I know the inside of it better than I know my own mind.  I know the shape and feel of that cage like one knows the voice of a beloved spouse or child.  But now, I know it from the outside as well as from the inside.  I will no longer view it from the inside; not ever again.  For my entire life to this point, the cage provided the dimensions of my mind.  It could not grow beyond the limits of the cage.  Now that I have escaped it, my mind has grown beyond the boundaries of the cage and I couldn't fit back into it even if I chose to.

But without the cage, there is nothing to protect me from the harsh realities of life and death.  There is no pretense to cushion me from thoughts of the inevitible grave.  I know that the gilded promises offered to me by the cage were merely brass, that there is nothing truly gold in them- merely lies.  But while I believed them, they offered me the semblance of security.  Peace of mind.  I made a choice.  I chose to sacrifice my peace of mind, because it was not rightly mine to begin with.  It was never real.  I can not accept it if it isn't real.  Now I stand naked in reality, and sometimes it a bitter place.

Sometimes I forget that I once viewed the world as a magical place.  I look at myself in the mirror and see only skin stretched over muscles and sinews attached to bones, animated by electrical impulses and controlled by chemical actuators.  I see one of trillions of products of the universe, just another singular result of evolution and natural laws.  I see the world as a tangle of mathematics.  I see only guarantees of pain and death, and no promises of anything more.

Then other times I am able to see that, despite the fact that life offers no other guarantees, I HAVE had magical moments in my life.  I have known happiness.  I have experienced awe and wonder and peace, and none of those very real experiences were brought to me by the cage.  They came from within.  Something very real within me.  My true self.  I'm still that innocent child I once was, deep inside, somewhere.  Sometimes I am able to dig him out and remember.

But other times I find the child is not the same as the child I once knew.  Try as I may, there are happy memories and feelings that I simply can not recall.  I know they are there.  I remember that they made me happy once, but the feelings are different now because my perception of the world has changed.  The child has changed, and the feelings are tainted.

I believe that I must put aside the child that has changed and become a new child.  I must create new feelings rather than trying to rely on old ones.  The trouble is, every high I find is accompanied by more than a fair share of lows.  I must climb out of this maze.  I have to find a way out, or I will perish here.  I need calmer vistas- smooth and hospitable plains.  This life is not good for too long.  I have learned, and grown, and experienced much, but my muscles have been caged for far too long for me to continue this arduous trek over ridges and pits much longer.  It has taxed me to the breaking point.

 

My Exit Story: (Written October 2008)

  

What brought me to this place? How did I get here? How could I have not seen this coming?

Never in my previous life could I imagine a scenario where I would mentally leave the faith of my childhood. If someone would have suggested the possibility to me, I would have been offended. It was not something I would ever entertain.

Indeed, it is likely that it may have never happened at all if it weren't for certain events which unfolded in my life.

I suppose you could say that it was truly my own sense of personal integrity which brought me to my current place. I was raised to believe that I am important, that my views matter, and that being honest is the most important virtue a person could attain. I was taught that being honest to one's self is the most critical form of honesty, because if you can not be honest to yourself, then you can not be honest to anyone else.

In my childhood home was a plaque on the kitchen wall with a poem on it written by Edgar Albert Guest. These words ended the poem and always they resonated true to me;

I never can hide myself from me;

I see what others may never see;

I know what others may never know,

I never can fool myself and so,

whatever happens I want to be

self respecting and conscience free.

I could not go through life conflicted about who I was. I could not, for long, resolve myself to want to believe things which I simply did not know to be true.

When I was young, I never much questioned the things I was taught about the Mormon faith. My parents knew it to be true; it was the glue which bound our family together. It defined us. It defined me. It was my entire life.

When I came to be a teenager and began asking myself profound questions, I felt a need to put my faith to the test. The prophets had promised that if we prayed often, we would see a difference in our lives. So I decided to give it a try, figuring there could be no harm in the experiment. Surely enough, I found my daily prayers to be a source of strength in my life. I really did notice a difference. I felt that I was a part of something greater than myself. My daily prayers gave me the opportunity to go over the concerns in my life and to be grateful for the blessings I had been given.

Thus I came to accept that there was a God who listened and heard my prayers. But what did I believe about the Mormon church itself? I decided to pray about it. I was probably about 15 when I really put this trial to work. I prayed, and at first I received no feelings on the matter. But it was important to me- after all, my whole life and perhaps my immortal soul depended upon an answer. The church was pretty much my entire life, so if it wasn't true, I really wanted to know it. So I continued to pray. I prayed and prayed, for nights on end, until one time when I had prayed for several hours late into the night, yearning deeply to have that burning, happy feeling that the church leaders had described.

Sure enough, as I lay there pleading to know that the church was true, asking for that burning happiness, I felt a sudden calmness, almost like I had transcended my physical being and I felt a happiness and peace envelop me. At that point, I knew that I would never again need to question the truthfulness of the gospel. I had received the answer promised to me- my own personal witness of the truth of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

But several years later, when I received my mission call, I was terrified. I didn't know why. I should have been ecstatic. I should have been thrilled. I should have been delighted at this opportunity to serve the Lord, but I wasn't- and I didn't know why. This troubled me deeply. The bishop told me that the calling had come from God himself. Then why did I not feel that this was true? If God wanted me to go, why didn't he give me some indication that this was so? I needed to reaffirm that this was, in fact, what God wanted for me, because it just didn't feel right to me.

Again I turned to prayer, and again I asked for guidance. I prayed as before, long and with much dedication. Eventually I received the same good feeling as before, but this time it came when I expressed to God that I did not believe that this call came from him. This feeling was as real, as peaceful and as happy as the feeling I'd had before. I knew then that I did have a good reason for not accepting the mission call.

When I told the bishop and my parents of my decision, they could not accept it. I was "wrong." I had mistakenly translated the Lord's answer. The calling had come from God, and my own personal witness to the contrary was just my own selfish mind giving me what I wanted- a good feeling about something to allow me to make the decision I wanted instead of following the Lord's command.

Yes, this troubled me a bit, but I stuck to my guns and did not go on a mission. To make up for it, and to ease my anxiety over the ordeal, I strove to be the best non-missionary member that I could be. I accepted callings and fulfilled them without question. I poured my heart and soul into my church work. I met and converted my sweetheart and we were sealed worthily in the temple. I continued to expand my callings to the best of my abilities. Life was not always easy, but I never doubted the truthfulness of the church. I only doubted my own worthiness of having it in my life.

The first troubling experience to me came when the local leaders told me that we had been instructed by the area authorities to hand out pamphlets to our neighbors and put signs in our yard showing opposition to a proposition which would have legalized the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes when prescribed by a physician. I was a good Mormon who had never used illicit drugs or alcohol in my life. I was opposed to the use of them on a moral level. But on a legal level, I did not believe it was right for me to tell others who did not share my views that they could not make their own choices on this matter. Particularly in the case of a trained physician's instructions. I was not trained in medical matters; who was I to overrule a medical physician's best judgment on the matter?

And even if I were all in favor of it, this bothered me because the church has repeatedly promised us that it would not tell us how to vote or get involved politically. Yet here they were, telling me not only how to vote, but how to tell others I believed they should vote as well. I talked to my Elder's Quorum adviser about this, and he assured me that this was not a mere suggestion but an instruction. We were not being asked to volunteer, we were being told that this was God's will. When I expressed the reason for my unease, he told me that if it bothered me that much, then I should just be quiet about it and not disseminate the material. That was what I did.

I told myself that this was just an isolated instance of men being men and making human mistakes. But a seed was planted; God's leaders sometimes make mistakes, and they sometimes do it in the name of God.

Children came. Life's struggles increased. My wife began having troubles with the church, and our relationship became strained. Eventually my wife left the church. When I love I do it unconditionally, and I planned to stay by her no matter what, but the double life and the challenges were more than she was willing to bear, and so we were divorced. As time has gone on, I believe now that this was all for the best, for many different reasons. But at the time, it was devastating to me.

I had always tried to do what was right, to do what I believed God wanted me to. Why was this happening to me? I told myself that God's ways are mysterious, and that somehow it would all work out for the best. This incident did not shake my faith; if anything, it strengthened it. This point must be made very clear.

But then something unexpected happened. As part of the divorce decree, I was granted the right to raise the children in my church and to make the decisions regarding their formal religious indoctrination. I truly believed that God was intervening to keep the children safe in his one true church, and out of the hands of my ex-wife and her apostate views. But as I began to embrace this new development, I found myself reluctant. Unexpectedly reluctant. I was often late getting the children to church. Sunday mornings were difficult; getting the kids' hair done, getting them dressed and bathed and to church on time. I began missing sacrament and getting there for the later blocks, and then started missing the occasional meeting entirely. Most interesting of all, I kept finding myself frequently sick to my stomach on Sunday mornings so I often just stayed home with my kids. I told myself that I was being selfish, trying to spend more time with my kids rather than giving them up to the Lord on the Sabbath. After all, I didn't get to spend nearly as much time with them as I had prior to the divorce.

But all these excuses were just that- excuses. Eventually I had to face the fact that a large part of me was deliberately avoiding church; the very same part of me that grew physically sick on Sunday mornings due to anxiety. There was something else at work here. If the church was God's plan of happiness, then why was I not happy? Why did the thought of going to church make me physically ill? What was the deal? Was there a problem with me, or with the church? More than my own salvation and life rested on this, but my children's future and happiness was on the line. This was the critical hour and I needed guidance. I needed to return to fervent prayer once again.

So I prayed. I prayed and prayed and prayed. I prayed for God to let me know what the truth is. I prayed not for hours or for days but for months. I prayed for the benefit of my children, not for my own benefit alone. Their happiness was and is everything to me. I prayed until I could not stand it any longer. And then I made myself pray some more. I pleaded, I bargained, I cried.

But why? Why would God not answer my prayers? This violated the promise made in the Book of Mormon that God would manifest the truth to us. I could not believe in a God who did not keep promises. I started to wonder whether the lack of an answer was an answer in itself. But what could this answer mean? I concluded that if God did not answer, it must be because I already had the answer myself. So did this mean that I'd already had a witness once in my life and that was all I supposedly needed all along? Or did that mean that when I got a witness that I was not meant to go on a mission and was told by church leaders that my witness was wrong it meant that such witnesses could not be trusted in the first place?

The more I pondered and prayed, the more I realized that the witnesses I'd received in the past could not have all been correct. Either the gospel was true, or I was not meant to go on a mission and the leaders were wrong to ask me to hand out propaganda. The mix of signals were not the work of a divine guide, because they did not make any sense. They left me feeling confused and hurting, and no divinely inspired source would do that. Thus I concluded that these feelings I had believed to be a witness from the Holy Ghost had never been anything more than my own brain telling me what I wanted to hear. How then could one tell the difference?

I began to think that I had wanted to believe in the church so badly, to please my family, to give myself security, to calm my questions about what happens when we die and why people suffer, that my body fashioned its own answer in the form of a peaceful feeling. This was not unequivocal proof of anything, but my own "warm fuzzy" feeling about something that I felt I could believe in and be okay. To put this to the test,and because I had been praying for so long with no answer, I asked once more in prayer; hopeful this time that I might be on the right track.

But even as I started to pray and ask if this was the truth, I got the same euphoric peaceful feeling and I knew instantly that I had the answer all along. If I was to find the answers I sought, I had to use the tools God gave me; my own brain has the capability to find the answers I sought, and if God was there he wanted me to use this tool. This confirmed two things; that I could get the positive feeling anytime I wanted to reinforce my own desires, and that I had been ignoring my brain all this time in lieu of an exterior source (wanting wisdom from God). What arrogance I realized I must have had; repeatedly badgering and cajoling and pleading and bargaining for an answer from Deity when I had the power already given to me to find the answers the whole time. It was a humbling experience for me.

This much I knew; if God existed, then he existed as a source of truth. Thus, shining the light of truth and reason on my faith would not offend him nor would such a God justly punish me for doing so. This was an important step for me, because it was the key I needed to open the door to the cage my mind had been contained in for the first 36 years of my life. At last I was free to actually look at things the way I felt I was meant to; not through a filter, not with fear of what I might find, or fear of being punished for thinking thoughts not in alignment with the dictates of the church. Our minds are precious gifts, and I can not imagine a God cruel and twisted enough to give them to us and then expecting us to not use them.

I began searching in earnest for truth. I had already been studying the gospel fervently, but I had been studying only those passages of scripture, only those carefully selected texts which were designed to support a position which would not lead me away from the safety of the flock. At this point, I expanded my search for information to include anything which I could historically or scientifically determine to be factual. I was not interested in anti-Mormon information, as I had already learned long ago that it was not to be trusted. There may be some truth in it, but much of it is mixed with half-truths and outright distortions or lies. I was only interested in knowing what was true.

The first thing I wanted to know was a little bit that had puzzled me for years, and that had to do with Noah and the flood. Was this even remotely possible, even with divine intervention? I once told myself that it had to have been a local flood; one that covered all the earth (known at that time) with water, but not one that actually flooded all the globe covering even the highest mountains. That only one of each animal known to the people in that particular geography were actually gathered. This made the story plausible. But according the the LDS church, the flood was global- no ifs, ands, or buts. Eden was in the New World, and after the flood the ark landed in the Old World, and it was, beyond a doubt, a literal global flood. So for the first time I removed the blinders and allowed myself to look at the facts. And I thought about it without prejudice. And I realized very quickly that it was not only impossible, but it was absurdly, incredibly, beyond any ridiculous fairy tale impossible.

My own interest in ecosystem biology means that I have always understood that animals must have evolved to fit their local systems. Polar bears don't live in Antarctica. Despite the fact that animals could survive in many different places, they only live where their kind live; tetras of all sorts fill the Pantanal and Amazon basin. In other parts of the world such as the Congo, other similar-looking but utterly unrelated types of fish live. This is how nature has evolved; not on an individual creature basis but as a system. One which would have been destroyed forever by a global flood. Saltwater animals would have died from the influx of freshwater; freshwater fish would have perished from the sheer force of flooding and the mud and mixing with saltwater. You'd find fish of the same sorts mixed all over the Earth, if any of them could have survived at all. Plants would have been stripped to pieces. To flood the entire Earth, raining for 30 days and nights, it would have had to rain thousands of times harder than any torrential downpour ever known to man. The Earth itself contains nowhere near enough water to pull this off. The force of the rain itself would have smashed Noah's ark to pieces within minutes. There would be no way to get the animals back to their appropriate geography, and even if it could be done the genetic pool would be too small to rebuild- and what would the animals eat? And how would Noah know put the Galapagos tortoises back to the Galapagos Islands, and the marsupials back in Australia, and the three-toed sloth back in the Amazon? People who believe this story can't even begin to understand just how absurd it really is. I can't think of an Aesop's fable or a tale by the Brothers Grimm which would be as impossible to believe.

I began to see that the reason I always felt anxious about church was because my mind was trying desperately to reconcile what I was being taught and what I wanted to believe with what my brain told me could not possibly be true. I was getting sick and avoiding church not because I was not worthy, but because it was pure nonsense and deep inside, on a level I dared not allow myself to access before, I knew it was not true. My mind was screaming inside because it could not quietly tolerate being a prisoner any longer. It was straining to believe the absurdities of things like the ark story, and it just wanted to be what it was made to be- a thinking, rational brain capable of reaching its true potential.

When I looked into the facts of the church's origins, it was as though missing pieces of a puzzle were being put into perfect placement. Complex-shaped gaps in my world view were being rapidly and flawlessly filled in, and the pieces which filled those gaps were the exactly precise shapes needed to fill them. The entire picture began to grow clear and unmistakable. The world fell into place- the questions were being answered in a way I never though that they would. It was both enlightening and terrifying for me.

The Kinderhook plates, the Book of Abraham fraud, the example of plagiarism in the Book of Mormon, the anachronisms, the editing and covering up of church history, the whitewashing of the church doctrine, the failed prophecies, the lies and coercion used by Joseph Smith; all these things were undeniable facts. But they were not merely facts, they were just the highlights. The list of facts goes on and on and in its entirety it completes the puzzle so perfectly, so clearly, that once one has seen it there can be no sane denial that the church was a fraud from the beginning.

Where does that leave someone like myself, who has known nothing but the church his entire life? What does that mean for my future, when the church is the glue which holds my family together? My security has been stripped away and I find myself standing naked with only the cold hard truth as my companion.

Yet I still believe that without the truth I am nothing.

I started writing this last night, and this afternoon I received a letter from my mother. In it she expressed her concern for my spiritual well-being. She bore her testimony that she has gone through difficult times like mine and yet she knows that if I would only pray, that the Lord would guide me through. She believes that my depression is the result of my divorce and the hardship it has brought on me, and that as a result of that, I have not felt worthy to pray, wear my garments, or go to church. She wrote me a letter despite the fact that I talk to her multiple times each week and see her quite frequently. This letter follows short on the heels of an incident where I was rushed to the Emergency room and where she discovered that I was not wearing the garments. She wanted to talk to me about it right then and there, but due to the circumstances I refused to talk about it at that time. I would be willing to discuss it under more reasonable conditions, but I believe she is afraid of what I might say. Writing a letter is her safe way of telling me that I should follow the flock. Perhaps I should write a letter back.

I could tell her that my depression is not due to my divorce. I got through that just fine, testimony intact. It was what happened after that which opened my eyes to the truth, and made my testimony of the gospel a thing of the past. I now have a working knowledge of the truth- the truth that the gospel is a fraud. This is not something that she can ever understand. It is not something she would ever even consider; nor would I want her to because her faith makes her happy. It's fine for her. It just isn't for me.

My depression and anxiety comes from the cold, hard reality that I have woken up to. I am 36 years old, and I'm only now beginning to understand what the world really is, to accept who I really am, to trust myself and to stand up for my own integrity rather than leaning on the church for my every thought. I am depressed because I have lost my cage, my security, and my lifelong imaginary (but seemingly very real) friend. My world has turned upside-down and I am being forced to do 36 years' worth of growth in a very short period of time. The anxiety and depression is also due to my fear of of dealing with family and friends who will not be able to understand my position, and who may even turn their backs on me when I need them most.

I know that they can not accept my new understandings, because it would challenge their very way of life. I know because I've been them. I was them when my own wife left the church, and I could not understand nor would I listen to her reasons (not that she left for the same reasons I did, but it would not have even mattered to me then). Everyone must find their own path in life. Ultimately this is true even if the path we choose is the one which has been laid out for us. We choose not to deviate, or we choose to make the choice which best fits us. For me, the choice was clear; I could either live a lie, be dishonest to myself and others, force myself to be a part of something I knew was a fraud and subject my children to the same anxiety, pain, and challenges which I faced as a result of that path... or I could face the truth, be honest with myself and maintain my integrity, and teach my children how to think for themselves and reach their own conclusions about how to live their lives. This choice was not as easy as you might hope, but it was as clear as crystal to me which choice was the right one, even if it did bring me much pain and depression. It's like being asked to choose between laying your foot on the tack in front of a speeding locomotive, or pushing your child in front of it instead. One option presents much personal pain, but the other is not really an option at all. People could later say that you chose to put your foot in front of the train and thus you asked for the pain and consequences, but there really is no choice to be made when those are your only options.

I remember clearly listening to conference as a child and hearing one of the leaders speak about making righteous choices. He said that when we face two options, there is usually one which we know will be the most difficult, the most unpleasant option. Usually, he said, that option is the one we know in our hearts to be the right choice, and the reason we avoid it is because we know it will not be comfortable. I made a choice, and it was the one I most feared. It was the path I most wanted to avoid. It was the one which was the least comfortable to me, the least familiar, and the most unpleasant personally. But I have no doubt that it will turn out to be the right choice; not only for me but also for my children. My family members will not approve. They will not like it. They will protest, they will plead, they will pour out their testimonies, they will make assumptions about my worthiness and the influence of Satan in my life. I know, because I've been them.

I will not mince words; my decision is about what I understand to be right, and not about any other thing. Would you have me follow a path that I don't believe to be right? Mormon doctrine teaches that Satan's plan in the preexistence was to take away our free agency and force us to follow God's plan. Christ's plan was to let us choose for ourselves, even though it would not be easy. I have not taken the easy path.

If you say that you know that the church is true, I must say, "No, you don't. You believe it is true, just as I once believed it was true. But you don't know it is true. You can not know it is true. The church requires faith, and faith is the belief in things which can not be known. You have faith. That works for you. If it makes you happy, then I am happy for you. My path is different from yours. It is not the path of Satan, despite what you may believe. Your beliefs do not have special priority over my beliefs. Mine are at least as valid as yours; perhaps more so, because I earned mine with great personal anguish. Please don't tell me that I am being deceived by Satan. Not only is it insulting and pedantic, but it's patronizing and just plain untrue. How would you feel if I told you that you were the one being deceived? You wouldn't like it, would you?"

I am the same person I ever was. The only thing that has changed is that I have accepted what I have always avoided before; the truth at any cost. I came to a point in my life where the truth was more important than the price I had to pay to get it. Perhaps many never reached that place, perhaps many never will, or perhaps they came to that place but followed a different course. Whatever the case, now I am paying the price for finding the truth. Yes, it is painful. Yes, it is hard. The right choice often is.

I would hope that those who have been closest to me my entire life, my family and friends, would still be there for me even if they do not approve of my beliefs. This is the love Christ taught; unconditional love. Christ did not love only those whom he felt were worthy. His love was not conditional. My choices and my beliefs do not make me any less a member of my family or community. They only make me more completely me, but the same me I've always been. I've not turned my back on any person or group. I've merely been forced to recognize certain things. I'm not going anywhere. I'm not being led astray. I'm simply finding my way through life, just as we all must do. I am not lost in sin. In fact I have changed very little; I still hold to the same basic values as before. I think there is wisdom in much of the church's teachings. If there weren't anything good about it, nobody would choose it in the first place.

I believe that people are basically good inside. I believe in loving others unconditionally. I believe in being humble and acknowledging that we have an imperfect view of reality. I believe in trying our very best to be the very best us that we can be. I believe in allowing others to believe what they choose to believe. I believe that there is something divine in each of us, and in all of creation. I still use prayer as a source of strength in my life, although I believe now that the strength it gives comes truly from within. I am not being led astray by the devil, by lies or by temptation. I believe that fear, especially fear of the truth, is the single greatest threat to society. I would exhort everyone to put aside their fears and be the best that they can be, no matter how great the personal cost. Or, if not, at least be respectful of those who are trying their best to do so.

 

Post Script: (Written March 2010)

 

I have found myself in the most unlikely of places...

At that crossroads where I stood naked and raw against the cold backdrop of reality, where there initially seemed to be nothing of beauty or wonder or imagination I have finally focused on a world so incredible, deep, rich and beautiful... I marvel that I ever lived without it.

Life loses no wonder when it is understood more fully. Love, nature, and life are no less beautiful when they are seen in sharper focus; it should not come as a surprise, really, that their beauty only increases with a clearer understanding of their reality.

What I first believed to be the loss of something important and dear has become the most freeing and fortunate event of my life so far. Had I not surrendered that cherished delusion, I would have missed out on the far greater half of life.

I do not begrudge my parents for their role in my early years of mental bondage. They were prisoners of the same warden. They have never known what it is to be free. I merely rejoice that I am free now to be me- the me that I was afraid to be. Afraid because I was taught that I could not trust the me that wanted to be. The natural me. The me that knows the joys of exploring every wonder, every thought, every hope, every marvel. Words are inadequate. I am no great poet. The wasted years... but I am here now, and there is no telling whether freedom would taste so sweet had I always known it.

Life, love, exhilaration, real purpose and liberated laughter... to think that a year ago I was wondering whether I'd ever find happiness again... but now I proclaim that I had never fully known it to begin with.

When one is a mind caged, told to fear the world outside, to fear one's own true self even except within the safety of the cage, one has little to compare when deciding what happiness is. Now that I have explored a portion of the world beyond bars and I know that there is the greatest happiness available only for those who are able and willing to seek it without impositions, my new passion in life is to help others obtain this freedom. How could it be otherwise?

The idea of a personal god who created us and intervenes in our lives seems absurd beyond measure to me now. I think of the incredible odds against me being here, typing this, feeling the way I do, recently married to a wonderful woman who is so unlikely and so unlike me and yet so wonderful for me... the children I am blessed with... the very condition of my being... the odds that any of this world would be what it is... somehow, it loses no wonder at all knowing that there is no humanistic intention driving universal events. They are all the more incredible for their incredible unlikelihood! Reality, no matter what it may be, must, by definition, have beaten great odds to be what it is. But it is, and I am part of it, right now! I may not be tomorrow, but I am today, and that holds infinite merit right now.

A few years ago I set out on a personal journey, terrified and not knowing where it would take me. I only trusted that the star I followed was fixed and true. I didn't know if it would lead me to calm shores or icy seas. What a wonderful thing to trust reality rather than forcing blind hopes, only to find the destination that reality brings you to even greater than you ever imagined either to be.