When becoming an atheist there are many things that must be rejected and other things which must be accepted. One of the scariest of those is accepting your own mortality. Once you realize that there is no life after death - all that's left is death. No one, of course, wants to die - but at least the religious have something to look foreword to (science fiction actually has an answer to atheistic life-after-death called "ascension", but I don't buy into it).
Which makes me think; I have already used up a quarter of my life. Just how long am I going to have to struggle to obtain complete happiness? When I finally get everything I want in life - how long am I going to have to enjoy it? Factor in probable senility in my later years and it really gets me questioning things. Maybe I should be putting my full efforts into getting thing I want now, so that I can enjoy them for as long as possible.
And maybe that's morbid, or maybe it has forced me to understand exactly what I want in life. I know I want worldly success - and I have a general plan on how to get there. I know I want the love of my future wife - so I don't fool around when it comes to women (and maybe that's a scary idea - but it just means that I don't go for anyone who I don't think is worth it). I even know I want kids at some point.
How many people (guys?) my age can say these things? Maybe I'm just crazy - but I'd like to think that knowing what I want in life makes me a better person. And if you never set goals for yourself, how can you ever expect to get what you want?
July 31, 2008
Something Serious
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2 comments:
The immediate flaw is see in this thinking is in the case of an amoral atheist. What is to keep him/her from committing unethical acts in order to attain his/her goals? The idea of an afterlife whose state depends upon the acts of the current life keeps many people in check.
it doesnt matter what you believe. I have heard that you will see whatever you believe will happen when you die, even if its not happening. For example: people who believe in greek gods will see themselves in the fields of asphodel and christians will see themselves in heaven even if they're just... dead.
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