Just me

There's been a lot going on with me lately, lots of massive changes going on in my life, some of them planned, some of them not, and some of them planned more than others. I've moved to Australia, gotten married, and I've left the mormon church. I feel like I should write about all of these, and there are lots of adventures to detail with my new husband, also associated with meeting him, and everything like that, but I feel like the biggest thing to address first of all is explaining leaving the church, because I feel like I should let people know about it, first of all, and second of all, explain why, especially since I think the majority of the readers of my blog are mormon.

It basically all comes down to one aspect of my personality, an aspect that has become all the more acute and obvious to me since Janardan left me, because I thought two things about him when I married him - that he would never leave the church, and that he would never leave me. These were two things I felt certain of, so strongly about, and I was smacked in the face with the reality that they were both wrong. There have been other things along the way, things that I have clung to as certainty, that ultimately turn out to be uncertain.

And so, coming over here to be with Andrew, and him not being religious at all, there was concern from his family about the match, and so he spent a lot of time explaining his view on religion, and that he is not anti-religion, but that he thinks that it sells certainty on something that can't be certain.

It began to have me questioning, and assessing whether I was just doing the same thing all over again - was I clinging to a sense of certainty on something where there simply is no certainty? Was I consoling myself with something that, at the end of the day, wasn't there? And when I took a hard look at it, the foundations of my "faith" crumbled, and I felt like I could not be mormon anymore.

I still have great respect for the church. There are so many paths my life could have gone down, which I was averted from by maintaining the morals of the church. I think there is a lot of wisdom there, though I think there is wisdom in many other places, and want to seek that out as well. I want to explore my spirituality, as I've felt spiritual things in other places, and am curious to explore that a bit more, though I don't think I'd ever join another church, just simply because I think the whole concept is a bit flawed, but who knows.

It feels like the last step in a process that has been happening over the course of my life, coming to know myself better, and be comfortable with who I am. I remember sharing a quote from Joe vs the Volcano on here a while ago. "Do you believe in God?" and she answers, "I believe in myself." I can be sure of myself, whereas so many other things are uncertain in this life, and I'm not afraid to face them alone. Or rather, it may scare the shit out of me, but I'm more afraid of embracing false certainty than I am of facing uncertainty. So from now on, I'm me. Just me. But all me.