Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Talk About Your Predestination


I am behind today and what does that mean when you don't have a job or any real commitments for the day?

I need to:
Take a walk
Go see Lily and Owen
Feed my chickens
Go to the store.

Big deal, right? So where does this sense that the day has gotten away from me come from? What is it in our internal selves that dictates a schedule, that creates anxiety if that perceived schedule is not being followed, that mysteriously ordained time-frames are not being kept?

I swear, I am beginning to think that everything and I do mean EVERYTHING is just part of our DNA, RNA, chemical make-up, brain chemistry, hormones, etc.
And that any attempt to change any of this stuff whether with drugs or meditation or exercise or knitting or praying is just an attempt at trying to control these internal, set factors. The more scientists learn about the brain, the more we know this is true. Buddhist monks can, with chanting, change the way their brains work over the years.
A person set to small, crafty tasks creates as much serotonin as certain antidepressants.

I have always said that I do not have the god gene, the religion gene. And I swear, I do not. As much as I wanted to believe in a comforting, all-knowing god when I was a child, I just could not bring myself to do it. I prayed. I read the Bible. The whole Bible. And none of it turned out to change the way I felt about god at all. The whole concept, no matter how god was framed, seemed anything but absurd to me.
And now science seems to be finding that yes, some of us accept as complete and utter fact that there is a god, while some of us just can't.
Ms. Fleur sent me a link to an article about this the other day. It is here if you care to read it. She also sent me the abstract to download of the study and it's too long for me to read through and too scientific and too filled with frontal lobes and MRI's and so forth but I don't need to muddle my way through the whole thing.
I know it's true.
Some of us are chemically inclined, from birth, to accept and need religion in our lives and some of us are not.
Phew!
I'll be glad when they can just do a test so that when someone tries to convert you you can just say, "Nope. Sorry. Don't have the gene," and be done with it. Of course, according to the study, the religious person will not be able to conceive of the truth of that matter, just as the non-believer cannot conceive of the idea of Jesus coming back to earth and there will be no more agreement or understanding than before.

So there you go.

In related but not as earth-shaking beliefs that I have, I don't believe I have the Patriotism gene, the fly-a-flag-with-colorful-symbols-of-the-season-from-your-front-porch gene, the need-to-control-my-children's-lives gene, or the club-joining gene.

I do have the writing gene, the chicken-raising-gene, the desire-to-love-and-be-loved gene and the gene which causes me to tremble with a bit of joy every time I walk into a library.
I also have the gene which causes me to get really angry about things which I perceive as intolerance and injustice and prejudice and feel I must do something about it.
And then there's the I-hate-housework gene, the I-love-to-cook gene, and the timidity-and-intimidated-in-the-presence-of-anyone-wearing-a-white-coat-even-if-she's-standing-behind-the-cosmetics-counter-at-the-mall gene. Let us not forget the old-southern-lady-yardworking gene.

Yep. I'm blaming it all on my genes. And when some of these genes get in the way of my life, I suppose I need to do something about it and the easiest thing seems, at this point, to take a pill, which helps but does not cure. Believe me.

And I need to go take a walk now because that helps too.
I am trying, timidly and with great reservation, some meditation.
I don't have a lot of faith in that one, but why not try?

Just please don't ask me to pray about it, okay?

I don't have the gene.

22 comments:

  1. If it is all in the genes, then I am so totally fucked. Becuase if nothing "we" do really can change anything, if I can't overcome my genes, then there just really isn't any reason for me to keep trying. Cheerful thought.

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  2. Kori- I don't think there's no hope for overcoming genes. I just think certain things are set and it takes a whole lot to change them. Which is NOT impossible and certainly work worth doing.

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  3. I've got the lazy gene. I am programmed genetically to want to sit at home on my couch with my cats and dog around me and do jack shit.

    I love you.

    SB

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  4. I think we might be related. On the basis of that, I think you should really try meditation -- I have a hunch that you do have the meditation or at least the mindfulness gene. There's a cool course out of northern California called Awakening Joy that I did online last year. I wonder if you have the gene to do that and benefit from it. I think you might.

    Have a good day, cousin.

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  5. Oh my, me too. I have the same religion gene, and thank goodness there's some science to show that I'm not evil. All my family either lost or never found their religion, and we just joke that we're too evolved to need it. Just might be true. I also got the library gene, yardworking gene, hate housework gene and especially injustice gene. Are you sure we're not related somewhere back a few branches???

    Good luck with the walk, the chickens, the crafts and the meditaion. Today, I'm going to do nothing but read - if I ever get offline!

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  6. I often have a similiar issue with God. It's a tough one. I respect those that have that in their lives, but it doesn't do much for me personally either....other than make life difficult to navigate at times.

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  7. Great post! I would add that, just because you don't have the religion gene, doesn't mean that you don't have the spirit gene (I hate the word spiritual) But you know what I mean... and that's a good thing!

    I like your genes.. and your jeans!
    xopf

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  8. Jeremiah and I have this conversation all of the time.
    I'm so interested in why we are the way we are...I'm constantly over thinking it, actually.

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  9. Ms. Bastard- Well, you will not be surprised that I have a theory on laziness. It is this: To conserve energy back in the days when we had to hunt down the woolly mammoth, kill it with spears, skin it, gut it, and haul it back to camp to eat, it was necessary for our survival to rest when rest was possible.
    We are still programed that way but alas! we no longer have to kill the woolly mammoth, we mostly just have to operate the computer.

    Elizabeth- Yes, we ARE probably related somehow. I mean, we all are somewhere, some just more closely than others. I will think about the meditation thing. I know it has helped many people.

    Mel- Science once again proves its worth. Or something like that.

    Marsha- Yep. I think you either have it or you don't.

    Ms. Fleur- Well, as I say- I do believe in magic.

    Erin- I'm an overthinker too. And so what? Someone has to do it.

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  10. I don't have the god gene either.

    I think you will love meditation. Really. Can you find some kind of group there? I think it's easier to start off with someone leading. I suppose there's plenty good YouTube videos around, but I found it helped to talk through the stumbling blocks with other people.

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  11. You've done it again! You give me things to think about and expand on thoughts I rummage through. Thank you!

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  12. Mwa- I must start out small.
    Thank-you for your sweet encouragment.

    Joy- I'm glad!

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  13. I believe in goodness and since it spells with two oos it may have little to do with God. I was raised Catholic which in my case was an instant way to discover that the God gene was missing, the religious gene was missing, the "you don't ask question just have faith" was completely missing, and so forth.

    I do believe that the Universe is not an accident, that we have plowed carefully our own survival until some rogue meteorite hit the tyrannosaurus over the head and that was that for them, and one of these days the nuclear power from some mad man is going to hit us all over the head and that will be that for us. But until then the idea of religion keeps on making me wonder about human interpretations of it. When I was very young and studying the Crusades I kept wondering about the concept of killing for the love of God or about the love of a God that would allow his own son to be crucified for the likes of a race who would kill each other.

    No offense to anyone reading this;
    I think you have a gene I am lacking and apparently Ms.Moon has
    the same difficulties I have believing that if we are capable of feeling love and compassion for others, it is hard to believe that any God wouldn't for the miseries that plague our planet.

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  14. Doesn't seem to be anything wrong with your genes to me! You seem to have your priorities the right way. Science has so many secrets yet to yield, but we are also creatures of habit. I reckon there's more than a smidge of OCD in all of us! I try to practise "Mindfulness". It's non religious, but has it's origins in Buddhism. It's a peaceful kind of meditation in which you find your calm place and try to practise to completely empty your mind, and also, you learn to appreciate the beauty and detail of every aspect of an object or even something as simple as just holding it and really looking at it, noting how it looks/feels or even walking... feeling your feet touching and leaving the ground and acknowledging it. It sounds strange but I find it helps to slow me down. You have a calmness about you... you're halfway there x

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  15. Disagree completely. As someone who had a child with a guy who turned out to be a psychopath, I have to disagree otherwise I wouldn't be able to take joy in my son.

    I've also actively worked to overcome negative things that my dad passed down to me... and I've had some success.

    If you have good genes though, more power to you :-)

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  16. I think that prayers are commune with the divine in ourselves. And that some people need to believe that they're talking to a bearded deity to access that.

    I don't think praying is 'pleaseletmelivepleasemakemerichpleasemakemethin' or now I lay me down to sleep, I think praying is gratitude and requests for openness and for the our consciousness to shape the world around us as we need it to, or at least an expression that helps us process our need and cope if it is not met.

    Praying can be finding the stillness when you feel the sun on your closed eyes and you feel the trees moving agaisnt the blue sky. Or the bubble of protective white light you place around your children when you need to make sure they're ok.

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  17. Ms. Jo- I think prayer, like faith, spirituality, can be or should be what we each perceive it as and used as we perceive it needs to be for ourselves in our own lives. I think your way-of-prayer sounds very lovely.

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  18. Ms. Allegra- The interesting thing about this study was that people who are believers, process statements in their brain like, "Jesus Christ is coming back to earth," in the same place they would process a statement like, "I am sitting on a chair."
    Fact, fact. And the nonbelievers did not.
    It's all interesting, but there are, as you say, great mysteries.

    Ms. Lilac- Well, you do not know me so well yet. I have many genetic difficulties- believe me.

    Cat- I am not saying that we are destined to repeat things- I am saying we probably have proclivities which are genetic which we CAN overcome.
    Frankly, I was sort of going for humor in that one and it obviously touched off some ragged edges. And I'm sorry for that because I did not take it so seriously when I wrote it.

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  19. I have the I-adore-Ms-Moon gene and the I-hate-homework gene and the I-love-the-wrong-people gene.

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  20. Don't we all? It's what makes us human x

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  21. Ginger- I think we all start out with loving-the-wrong-people gene. Thank you.

    Ms. Lilac- I wish I had more of the orangutan gene sometimes.

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  22. Oh that is sooo much fun. It all comes down to being who we are and letting everyone else do the same.

    Sounds to me like you've got a powerful brain gene too.

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Tell me, sweeties. Tell me what you think.