Quandary

[Cinjin]

One thing I've learned about myself is I have the hardest time being honest when I'm evaluating myself. As soon as I question my own motives, I can see the "obvious" answer, but I can also see some reason I might be lying to myself out of convenience. Once I acknowledge that possibility, it becomes next to impossible for me to evaluate why I feel a certain way.

When it came to my own experience of letting go of faith, it was slow-going (taking about two years), and a lot of it was driven by how I felt. If you are losing your faith/in a temporary period of doubt/just asking questions, it's entirely possible you might feel comfortable identifying one way one day, and another the next day. There's no need to rush into it.

This is so true! I remember hearing somewhere that we often make decisions for emotional reasons, and then try and justify them rationally. Once I heard this, I realised how guilty of it I was (if guilty is the right word). I want to do something, and so I look for reasons why I should do it. I start making internal excuses for my behaviour, to try and appease my inner critic. I'm not talking about anything horrible here, just things like having one more game of Hearthstone.

I would personally describe deism as atheism with emotional attachments to the concept of a god. I don't think there's anything wrong with that. One can know/believe intellectually that something is irrational, but yet keep it alive on an emotional level. Like I've said to people before, who are coming out of Christianity but feeling scared, there's no compulsion to let go of the idea of Jesus. Things are as emotionally real to you as they seem. Jesus, or God, can still be your friend, your guide, your inspiriation, your comfort. They can retain whatever characteristics it is you liked about them when you believed they are real. You don't have to purge any of those feelings.

I talk to my pets who have passed away. Scientifically, I know they don't exist anymore in any meaningful way. Emotionally, they are still alive to me, and retain all the things I love about them. I think of them as being happy and safe in another place emotionally, while not having to actually believe it is literally true at all.

Very interesting Rob (both Robs really).  RP touched on it and RV reaffirmed with:  "I would personally describe deism as atheism with emotional attachments to the concept of a god."  
I can understand and get on board with that idea.  Perhaps I've known all along that my belief was always just for sentimentality rather than realistic contemplation.  After all, even when I was a gullible christian moron I didn't ever see god as a loving father that I would miss.  Rather, I was hell-bent on knowing a god that would leave me the fuck alone and didn't commit genocide when he found some humans giving blowjobs and eating crustaceans.  

If there is a God, or there WAS a God, then I'd like to believe that he just doesn't care whether or not I ever believed in him.  Why would he?  
Would it really bother him if I cast off my label only to find myself saddled with another?
Perhaps it is your idea that best answers my quandary RobV.  Scientifically, I know he doesn't exist anymore, but emotionally, perhaps he can remain a part of my hopeful imagination.  I say that, because in truth, I haven't been in the least bit concerned about my own afterlife in many years.  It would seem that I've always been here.  I just didn't really know it.

Yeah, I think I can have peace with that.
I'm not sure what to call that particular label, but I'm also not sure it matters anymore.