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Personal responsibility is really hard if we don’t have faith in positive outcomes. If we have no faith that anything will work out or that hard work pays off or we can make changes in our lives, then of course we believe that the system or our surroundings or our people are either not supporting us enough or they are downright out to get us.
I know, because this is how I used to operate. I felt very much at the mercy of fate, and therefore it was hard to look at my role in life as an active participant. It was even harder to to acknowledge that I was making consistently BLEEPY choices, and relinquishing my autonomy to others. I didn’t believe in a possible positive future, and so everything became everyone else’s fault.
Only experimenting with faith gave me back my agency. And I’m not talking about a bearded wizard who blesses or punishes me. If that’s your bag, baby, and it’s working for you, great, but I had to start much simpler than that.
My overly critical, analytical brain was not about to buy into the Book of Job or swinging smoke around in a church gilded in gold. I had to keep it reaaaaaaal simple.
Do I believe in Good or not?
Do I believe I am worthy of all the best things in life?
Am I willing to see what happens if I just operate as if everything is going to work out?
Call it Good, call it God, call it whatever I want to, just opportunity to experiment with faith worked wonders in my life. At first, the wonders were rather small, but consistent experimentation and a willingness to believe has done incredible things for me over the last five years, even while I endured incredible setbacks, confusion, heartbreak, and failure.
And as I have cultivated more faith, I also have been willing to look at and take responsibility for the faithless dysfunction and debauchery that came before. It was all me and it all stemmed from a lack of faith in myself and other people. The further I get into faith, the more empowered I feel, and the more I can forgive myself for those fearful or destructive choices I was making.
I’m also making consistently better choices, both because I believe in the possibility that things might work out better than I imagine, I know I don’t have all the answers, and I have a much stronger internal infrastructure for supporting myself that is grounded in faith, hope, and positivity. It’s hard to prioritize positive outcomes and make sacrifices for them if you don’t believe.
So, if you’re looking for any other reasons to experiment with faith in Good (or God) as a way to live differently, here is just one more. Faith gives us the strength to really look at the holes in our foundation, fill them in, and build something better from the ground up.