Maybe I'm too rational and maybe I'm too "intellectual", as my Aunt accused me today. Sometimes I feel like faith is a crutch people use because they are unwilling to accept that this is all there is. Sometimes I'm really jealous of their ease of dealing with the world. They just throw all their hopes and fears up to this "higher power" and it's all just taken care of. I'm not really jealous very long. Eventually they start to sound delusional to me.

Why is this bothering me now? Easy. It's time to pick an officiant for our wedding. Neither Azura nor I are Christians, but the real stickler is me. See Azura knows there is a God. She believes in souls, and spirits. She has some vision of an afterlife. I don't.

About the only thing we agree on is energy. I can see my grandfather putting all of his personal energy into my grandmother, to make her well, or at least better. When I say that, I'm not sure if I mean that actual energy is passing from one person to another, or if it's his efforts--his actions in a physical sense--that give him the same result. I can sense the 'energy level' of a room or how people in the room get along with one another. It's an intuitive sense for me. And when I talk about it, Azura knows what I mean. Personally, I think it's the way I perceive it, not something tangible, measurable. And that's part of where we disagree--I think.

While I'm an agnostic, all that does for me is put a big question mark on the whole God issue. I've made up my mind about a lot of the other 'supernatural' things. And I know Azura and I disagree about it.

I don't believe in the afterlife. Or reincarnation. Or ghosts. I don't believe that when someone is 'channelling' that they are in contact with anything outside themselves. I don't believe that 'spiritual healing' is from an external source, even if it's real. [Both Azura and my Aunt say they've seen it. I haven't. I doubt I'll ever see something that I'm convinced is real.]

I don't believe in ESP, or telepathy, or precognition. If Tarot cards give you an accurate reading, it's because the reader is an intuitive person who judged you correctly. There's nothing mystical or magical about it.

Look around you. Pinch your arm. Touch your computer screen. Feel you love for your SO and children or pets. That's all there is.

And it's wonderful.

Why do people insist on inventing all this stuff? Faerie tales, and UFO's, Ghosts and God? Look around you the world is a wonderful place. It's mysterious, but knowable. I believe that humans are amazing, that it might be possible to 'faith heal' yourself, if not another person. [It's amazing what just getting rid of stress does for people's health--and that's certainly all in the mind.]

I don't need all this mystic nonsense to order my world. I do it for myself every day. My world doesn't need a purpose or reason beyond the one I give it. I'm satisfied with that.

This is my one life. I'm going to live it.

Generic Joe's A Typical Male