“Nothing is so easy as to deceive one’s self;
for what we wish, we readily believe.”
—Demosthenes
What have you deceived yourself about because you wanted it to be true?
I did it with Christianity. I wanted an afterlife for myself and those I loved, absolute truth, punishment for the wicked, and a rebellious cause to believe in.
I did it with prayer. I ignored all the unanswered prayers, or believed that God had really answered them with an inaudible “no.” And the answered prayers were always things that could have happened without God’s help, but attributing them to God gave him a better track record.
I did it with believing in a young earth and intelligent design. I disregarded a massive amount of scientific evidence because I wanted to believe the Bible was true and inspired by God.
I did it with ignoring environmentalist claims about anything. I thought they were crazy and figured the world was going to burn up in the end anyway.
And I’m sure I’m doing it now with things I don’t yet realize.
How about you?
(Quote HT:Â Barry de la Rosa)
We all do it all the time. Most of the time we’re not even consciously aware of it, so ingrained are those deceptive fallacies into our mode of thought. Realizing you have a delusion is the first step to ridding yourself of it.
As to a recent unreasonable and utterly false deception I maintained in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary was that women were intellectually inferior to men. I honestly believed that for way too long a stretch of time. The fortunate and abrupt end to that delusion arrived when I started dating a woman who is much smarter than I.
I guess I’ve deceived myself about love a few times, one way or another…
I’ve deceived myself into thinking that my happiness and emotions are not under my control.
that knowing anything from a book is greater than or equal to learning things from experience and critical thought. and that includes *everything*, from a driver’s manual, to a textbook, to the Bible.
I used to believe in a lot of woo-woo — an embarrasing amount, really, for an atheist. Hell, even atheists can have delusions. I really, really wanted to believe in magic, in fairies, in the magical power of symbols. Like you, I realized that it was entirely wishful thinking. Then I allowed my logic and reason to gradually chip away at all my silly wishes. Now the reality of biology, physics — all of the natural world — is the only “magic” I need. I no longer need the supernatural.
I’m so glad you could share that quote Daniel – it deserves widespread dissemination! I use it as my email sig but I must admit it’s incredibly hard to live by.
[BTW I created a WordPress account hence the change of name...]
Don’t know then if I am still a christian! Because I “became a christian” hundreds of times, just to be sure. Never noticed a transformation, then felt guilty when it didn’t happen. Transformation did come, though – and I was reborn. It was through therapy, positive affirmations, and realizing that the christianity I had believed in all my life was a big lie! I am now a new person – no longer living in a narrow life of bondage and fear. I am an atheist who loves life, myself, and others. I’m glad you are reading articles like Daniel’s, outside of your “comfort zone”, but it would be even better if you read it with an open mind. We cannot find wisdom or truth if we think we already have it. I am open to changing my mind, based on evidence. Hopefully you are too.
Daniel:
I found this site researching for information about Joe Barron. Consequently I read your story. Speaking as one who was raised in a Christian home and had the bible pounded down my throat 7 days a week for 18 years, I understand where you are.
Though I walked down the aisle more than once, my life was lead as a testimony for Satan. There is no way anyone can be a former Christian. If you lost it, you never had it in the first place.
God draws us; we do not summon Him at our whim. You are an intelligent man. I wil continue to read your work. I pray you God will call you in His time as he did me.
@Andrew
It would fit your worldview nicely to think that Daniel was never a “real” Christian. I’m guessing that you’d accuse me as well, and all the other ex-Christians who’ve left comments here.
Just because you wish it were true does not make it so.
Know this my man. I do not hate you nor would I accuse you. I do believe there is a great deception going on right in the world namely a lot of people in church who claim they are followers of Christ. They are deceived and thus the collective body known as the church appears no different from the rest of the world.
If someone is not a Christian or does not believe in God, I refuse to be cruel to them. I have enough sin in my life to worry about. I will treat my fellow man as I want to be treated. I will not look them in the eye with a smile and then go talk about them behind their backs.
A gift is not a gift if you can lose possession of it. A gift is not conditional. I am sure you have read the Bible and you have read Romans 3:23 “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
I am not here to condemn or argue. I can only testify to what has happened in my life. I can tell you it is more than a slogan or a motto. It is supernatural. I believe we are all on a journey for significance. I believe all of us in our core want to love and be loved and not in a sick or selfish way.
There is no way I can truly explain it except to say when God is calling you, He will make his presence known. I just think in America, we have had it so well we believe we control everything. We believe we must have everything now. The truth is God does the choosing. If you ever feel that calling from God don’t close the door to your heart, let Him in. Don’t worry about changing, He will take care of that for you.
I just sense there are so many people out there hurting from bad experiences they had a church due to the fact there are so many goats among the sheep. Know that there are true brothers and sisters out there who will love you in a selfless way and true believers who will not condemn you as the world does.
@Andrew: You say you’re not accusing me, but you already accused me of not “really” being a Christian. I know that’s what you’re taught at church (do they skip over Hebrews 6, or just explain it away?), and I’m sorry you feel like you have to condemn others and think they are going to hell. I believed that for over a decade.
But still it irks me to be accused of not being genuine in my faith. That’s very insulting.
@Andrew: So let me get this straight:
“God draws us; we do not summon Him at our whim.”
… but if we don’t believe in god then we go to hell. Just what sort of god do you believe in?
I am not here to condemn anyone. I better get the log out of my eye before I worry about the speck of sawdust in the eye of anyone else here.
Andrew, you are an arrogant man.
And you’ve sidetracked the topic. Usually someone who makes the claim “I am not here to condemn anyone” actually is.
Back on topic.
Ghosts. I really, really wanted them to be real, and for many years, I took the possibility very seriously. It wasn’t until I realized that all pictures of ghosts we have were taken after the invention of a camera that could double expose the film and that most people, on experiencing something potentially supernatural, actually prefer the idea of that supernatural special event over looking for a natural explanation.
Ironically, I deceived myself over religion as well, and that second revelation happened about god much, much earlier than it did for ghosts.
@Spajadigit: I also did it with ghosts and UFOs, though just as a kid. I had forgotten about that. I remember reading books on UFOs and believing very strongly that aliens visited people.
After I became a Christian, I explained UFOs away by saying they were demons. The psychological explanations were never explained to me, though they make a lot more sense!
Hey, Daniel- Yeah, when I was 12, I had read every book and magazine and watched every television show I could get my hands on about the Bermuda triangle, UFO’s, bigfoot- essentially every subject they discussed on “In Search Of.”
I had discarded most of those things by the time I had become a Christian, but ghosts seemed more intrinsically real, and my belief in them lasted much longer than my belief in a god.
Weird, huh?
Yeah, I twisted myself into a pretzel trying to believe the wild stories in the bible. The biggest thing I deceived myself about was when I repeatedly asked Jesus into my heart, but nothing happened. I didn’t question christianity, I questioned myself. Clearly, my heart (at age 9) was so hardened that God couldn’t get through! I went through years like this, devastated that it seemed to work for other people (key word – “seemed to” – now I see that they are mostly as miserable as I was), but not for me. Amazing to me how many people still believe in this stuff.
I found myself pulled up short by an ingrained belief I’d never thought to question. I was writing a magazine article on marriage for my creative writing class, and one of the basic assumptions I made during the writing process was that marriage is societally recognized as the threshold of adulthood. Once you are married, and not before, you are considered an adult.
I was raised in a religion that propagates that belief (LDS), whether consciously or unconsciously. But even after I rejected the LDS belief system, and soon after all religious belief systems, I didn’t question the marriage = adulthood fallacy. I don’t know why — the best I can figure is that it is, to some extent, still a fairly common idea in romantic comedies, etc. Therefore, I’d unconsciously assumed that this wasn’t just a Mormon belief, but a societal belief.
Anyway, while interviewing various women on their beliefs about marriage, I happed to ask some question that touched on this assumption. Something about not feeling like an adult until you’re married. I was quite surprised when one after another, each interviewee stated that it’s not marriage that “makes” you an adult, it’s the ability to fend for yourself that signifies adulthood. For instance, your own housing, buying your own groceries, having a job — contributing to society in a measurable and responsible manner.
Once that thought process was pointed out to me, nothing seemed less logical than the marriage = adulthood fallacy. But somehow, despite questioning all my other most deeply held beliefs — the bible, the book of mormon, whether monogamy is the “only” way of maintaining a relationship, the nature of love, the relative merits of abortion and euthanasia, the legalization of drugs — somehow, I’d never questioned marriage = adulthood. Until now.
Odd.