All of the Time!

If the revelation were a stick it would be dangerous. The impact with which it hits me shakes me so profoundly that I cannot do anything other than look at the truth. I am unkind to myself.

“Have an affair with yourself”, I said. “Love you the way you love your lover”, I opined. I have taken this work seriously, and have been nearly devastated at what I have found.

I have a vivid memory of the first years of passionate love with my husband. I also recollect a few years ago when I was honestly and frighteningly tempted to have an affair with another. I remember what I so freely gave away:  attention, compliments, strokes, desire and yearning to be near them.

To have passionate love for me as I would a lover is a metaphor that has shone light on that which I have not before seen so clearly. Thinking of all that I gave, and still give to another - it is striking how much I do NOT give to me.

While realizing this distasteful reality I have also received several interesting comments on my book, Religion Made Me Fat. These are from Christians who are angry, disappointed and sorry for me because I no longer have God, and who assert that I must be, without question, miserable, afraid and confused.

There is a shared core in these journeys.
1.    To find self-love as powerful, intoxicating and freeing as when another loves us.
2.    To move the location of our good from being on a cross, in a Christ, God, Church or system of belief to inside of our naturally good selves.

Both locate the power of good, of love, inside of us. Both claim that power is potent and can be used to create more good love and power.

Both share this obstacle: We are uncomfortable with too much self-love and don’t really want the responsibility that comes along with loving our core-good.

My TEDx Talk, Asserting Human Good, is a 16-minute romp into this idea that is both a mind-blowing paradigmatic shift as well as a blasé concept with no apparent teeth.

Blasé because I have found since giving the TEDx Talk that most people initially reject the idea that they are not good, or that God is the good in them, or that our cultural understanding is based on the idea that humans are born into sin and cannot get rid of it ourselves.

They reject it until the idea of ones own power and therefore responsibility to use it, gets too big and they run for the cover of don't blame me, I can't do it or I am not enough.

The angry Christians who write to me, feel sorry for me and know that I am sad, confused and miserable because they want to believe this must be true for me. They need it to be true. If I can be happy, content, contributing to my community and world, and do it all without God, the foundation of their belief falls apart.

What is that foundation? Wait for it…  “You must have God to be good.”

It is God, Allah, Yahweh who gives us what we need to finally make it through the pearly gates or otherwise get on that welcome wagon into the proverbial heaven or celestial palace that awaits the “good and faithful” after death.

God makes us good, not us. God gives us what we need to be “enough” for God – and for the religious, that’s ultimately what it’s all about.

I interacted with one of the Christians who told me I was miserable and explained how grounded, content and free I felt. I said that I was helping people & proud of the work I am doing. They wrote back: “It does not matter if you help people or what you do in life. What matters is your salvation, if you are fit for Christ.”

Right. Back to my TEDx Talk. It’s the Doctrine of Original Sin and the foundational belief that without a God, humans cannot be good enough to do anything really good because the ultimate prize isn’t making the world better – it’s getting into heaven, making the celestial grade and being stamped with “Approved”.

There are other clues that the majority of people in our culture are being dishonest about what they really believe about their good capacity.
•    The many Facebook reply’s that say “God is good!” when someone posts a win.
•    The posts that say “I’m sure God is going to make this a good day!”
•    The license plate that reads “I am Good in God”
•    The call, response used by hundreds if not thousands of churches; Leader: “God is Good!” People: “All of the time!”

What would happen if we changed these few examples with the idea that humans are good?
•    I post on Facebook: “Wow, just finished my book!” and then post “I am good!” or a friend replies “You are good!”
•    How about a license plate that says “I am naturally good!” or “I am good in me.”
•    A call response that says “You are Good!” and the people respond “All of the time!”

This is the stuff of the mind-blowing paradigmatic shift. If we truly, honestly and genuinely believed that as humans we are first good, and, have all the capacity we need right now to make more good, we would live in a different world.

This is where I want to live and it is the world I seek to create for my children, for you and yours. It will be a struggle; not just because of the engrained idea that on our own we cannot do and be good, but also because we are dishonest about believing that truth. And, we’re afraid. We fear too much self-love and the responsibility for our own life, and the improved life of our community and world.

Fear is not more powerful than our good, and our challenge to passionately love ourselves begins with claiming that good.

Start today. Make your own call/response to repeat in your head. “I am good! – All of the time!”

I think it is time to take the true leap of faith and believe not in that which we cannot see, but in our own good, lovely, complicated, incredible selves. All of the Time!