Do you decide your beliefs, or do they decide you?

@awildsheepschase I’m not sure what part of that convinced you of conformity, but that is not what I meant. Many things happen to us beyond our control. A negative thought is based solely upon that. Conforming to society or not is entirely up to you.

@Reject As at one time negative/positive would not be placed in this binary choice we now place it as. Not sure I can explain it more right now

@awildsheepschase I think these two concepts are much simpler than you think. So simple as to be binary. Subtraction or addition. You take, or you give. Something happens to you, or you make something happen. It’s not that complicated.

@Reject i realised there is no end game. There's no final 'knowing' . That what one knows and works for one stage or context of life, doesnt mean it works for another stage or context. Life is in constant flux. I may work and live happily in my parameters for a while, but it takes only one element to disrupt that peace and i may need to change the workable rules i live by. My beliefs may change to cope or find solutions to that new dynamic.
It was a hard awakening to know that i will never know enough pentultimate knowledge to know peace and be wise and feel i have it all sorted out. But then learning that is what opened the door to stopping the struggle to attain the unobtainable.
With no ultimate goal, theres no pressure to attain it. Therein is the joy of knowledge for learnings sake as opposed to knowledge for accumulations sake.

@NOS4R2 So life is a matter of constantly adapting and accepting that helped you. I can see that. So I guess one might say the only absolute is that there are no absolutes.

@Reject yes. That's a good way to put it. And that there is no need to strive for absolutes.

@Reject I was brought to rock bottom with no way out.
I found myself on my knees pleading for help. I asked the Lord, and received.

@Iwillwait Thank you for this. It’s kind of amazing. I think oftentimes when we’re left with nothing to see, our only recourse is to believe. To make our own sight and that guides us through a life that didn’t have anything to believe in. I think that is the lords strength.

@Reject Yes.

@catastrophecarnival If everything is indeed subjective, then there would be people who do find it that simple. Cut and dry. Maybe we just overcomplicate things ourselves.

@Reject This is true too ..
You're not wrong

@Simulation Lol. True. Nature and nurture play a part in the cultivation of an individuals beliefs, but would you say it’s possible to find those who have an innate disposition so powerful that it flies in the face of any kind of environment they’re presented with?

@Reject Those individuals will be in the very small minority. They would need to have a special kind of disposition that makes them hyper-independent and immune to social pressures no matter how strong.

@Simulation I agree. It’s certainly not common, but I do believe that those few are the ones capable of deciding their beliefs instead of being decided by them.

@Reject Mine has been a different life experience, but I’m aware that some can choose to see things that way.

@Reject I had to mull this over because I strongly disagreed. But in fact it’s the core of the divisions I’ve been seeing in my country for awhile now.

Reality for a man is probably not the same as for a woman, based upon general life experiences.

In Western countries, reality for a white person probably differs from that of many people of color. Even now.

Reality for a heterosexual person is probably different than that of someone from the LGBTQ community.

And so on.

@bijouxbroussard Yes. Any two people can experience the exact same thing. Let’s say the smell of freshly baked brownies. That is reality, yet these two people might have very different views on that smell because it’s subjective. One might say it smells good, the other might hate the smell as weird as that sounds.

@MartinTheFirst The most unnatural thing I ever did was decide a belief. While the most natural thing was letting them decide me.

@Musicman I’m saying that you make a belief when it doesn’t depend on something else. Yes, technically as we gain knowledge and experience our beliefs are formed from those. I’m not talking about that though. I’m asking about the idea of an original belief. At least as original as a belief can be. I wanted to see if anyone else had that. That’s why when I wrote the post, I wasn’t just asking how beliefs are made. It was more of a personal question.

@Reject I honestly don't know. I had never thought about it from that prospective.

@Musicman I think it’s like a belief you develop that isn’t shaken when life challenges it. Something that is reliable and keeps you strong even when things gets hard. That belief doesn’t depend on anything else. It’s something you made.

@jshm2 Faith is a belief. Not all beliefs have faith, but all faith is a belief.

@Achelois While I would say everyone has to see before they can believe on a technical level, would you say it’s possible to learn how to believe first in order to see in a different way?

@Reject

I believe that too. Things can change when you believe, it’s happened to me.

@YoMomma A belief decides you when it’s based on something that happened to you. You decide a belief when it’s based on something you made happen yourself.

@Reject seems more like opinions and feelings imo

@YoMomma What else is a belief if not those things?