So I'm finding that one of my triggers (among a couple of other things) is rather existential in nature. As soon as I start thinking about our purpose here on earth (if we have one) and what might happen to our consciousness after we pass, I start getting panicky. I have always said that I am not a religious person, but one of the mods suggested that I was actually more spiritual than I might think, given the nature of my worry. I have never been good with not knowing things, even on a small level (like whether a job offer will come through, that sort of thing), but I find that ever since my anxiety started it is the "big" universal concepts that trouble me. For those of you who have gone on a real spiritual journey yourselves, and in particular I mean those who were not raised at all religiously, have you found any peace of mind? Does your understanding (or lack thereof, like me) of life and death trouble any of the rest of you?
I am still early in the program and as such just being aware of my anxiety and learning what my triggers are seem to help a bit, but I have this intense desire to research connections between chaos theory (patterns out of chaos) and such vs. theories of the afterlife and the human perception of reality... yet realistically I know all these scientists have not been able to figure out a unifying answer yet so what chance do I have? Does my poor brain require enlightenment in order to truly be calm? Or must I simply accept that being alive is like switching a light on and off?
- Marisa
These are thoughts that I have a hard time challenging with logical questions, as the concepts themselves are not at all concrete.
