For most of my adult life, I professed that I had no faith; well, at least in God. A bold and belligerent bellow that was big headed because of my own blind spots. An ego stoked by wealth, worldly success and wanting to evade the examination of my own earthly expiration.
Mellowed by maturity and humbled by heartache, I’ve come to realize that I’ve always had a faith in something or someone. An unsettling truth discovered when I stopped chasing everything and everyone that I thought would bring me happiness. An aha moment that transformed my life and tamed my troubled heart.
If faith is trust and conviction in that which we can’t always understand, than purpose is the foundation to our faith. It’s our motivation to get out of bed every morning. The reason we continue to participate in life as opposed to departing life. Without a sense of faith or a semblance of purpose, suicide is the only sane solution when life is purposeless.
Faith and purpose are two sides of the same coin. Our currency to continue with each new day, no matter how happy or horrible it happens to be. Faith and purpose are the fuel of perseverance, the petrol to power through life. Faith and purpose often have nothing to do with God or spirituality; mine did.
As a teenager, my young life was all about safeguarding my secret sexuality. Doing whatever I needed to do to make sure that no one knew that I was gay. Dishonesty, deception and duping others all in my effort to protect my reputation and ranking in this realm.
Even while I was pretending to be pure and pious. My purpose, my faith, was all about proving my worth to the world. A world that I believed would find little worth in someone who is gay. A young man hiding his heart from humanity and himself; haunted by who he is.
Finally in my twenties I would break free from my shackles of shame, only to be enslaved by more false faiths. Pursuing pleasure like a predacious predator. A pirate pillaging and plying one fleshy prize after another. A path of pursuit that eventually left me purposeless with the ascent of age.
Abandoning pleasure for professionalism, my career became my new purpose. A firm faith in myself, and in a system that taught me to believe in meritocracy, fair play and the institutions of this world. The American Dream sold as salvation through success; a faith focusing fully on fame and fortune.
My faith once again shattered. Losing my job at fifty-two after a lifetime of increasing responsibilities and rising income. A loss of faith not only in meritocracy but also in my own talents. Unemployed for the first time ever in my life, my ego purposeless.
My faith in myself failing me at the same time as my faith in our government and “expert” institutions failed me. Quizzical and questioning the disconnect between policy and performance during COVID. Realizing and recognizing the decline of our physical, mental and material well-being over the last fifty-years, regardless of which party is in “power.”
My life has been a litany of false faiths. Beginning with reputation, pivoting to pleasure, then making it about meritocracy while elevating my ego. Searching for purpose through my powers, or misplaced meaning in malevolent institutions, or the Midas myth of the American Dream.
Finally at fifty-five, I came to believe in a power much higher than I. Understanding that my lifetime of floundering faiths was built around imperfect people; myself at the top of that list.
Understanding that my lifetime of pursuing purpose in corrupt human institutions was built around flawed people; myself at the top of that list. Understanding that everything under the sun will ultimately pass away; cultures, countries and children.
My faith, my purpose in life, is no longer rooted solely in the material world; in what only my sense can perceive. I believe we are both dust and spirit because while we were created from the earth we are animated by the breath of God. Children of consciousness conceived by our Creator to care for all creatures of creation.
A purpose no longer about my desires, my demands, or even my death. My faith in the Divine providing me my purpose. To love and honor God; to love and honor all people. God is love.
Peace. God loves you.