The transition between faith to no faith.

[Whateverist]

Yet in this insanity, I felt I did see potential beauty, glory, and greatness but that these were archetypes that exist in me and is both imaginative but has some basis to reality. I don't know.

Perhaps a first step would be to acknowledge that all the experiences you've had were about your god. As you say your imagination along with whatever patterns come with our brains (archetypes) as well as all your acquired beliefs conspire to color your out of the ordinary experiences. They may apply beyond you, but you have no way to know that for sure. It may be that your god is not a dick about holding him above all others. Maybe He doesn't insist that he is anything more than your god. Next time you're in an altered state, try asking Him.

So you don't have to toss your god out on his ass. You can simply start envisioning Him as possibly being an aspect of you. Keep admitting you don't know and possibly can't know.

Also, give some thought to what you have to offer your god. You need to try to even the playing field. Your god may value having a relationship with you. Just get out of the habit of projecting him out into the world. Remember, you don't know where he is so don't be too quick to humble yourself. He gets respect but so do you. And everyone else gets respect as they wrestle with the same puzzle as you. They don't need you to proclaim the objective status of your god. They've got their own daemon to deal with.

[Lemonvariable72]

For me it was mine own curiousity and thinking improving and maturing as I got older. Then in college I met and became good friends with a insanely smart man named johnny. He was odd as he was a genius with ocd but a great company, and one thing he loved to do is challenge himself and others around too think more, and then my natural sense of skepticism and curiousity took over as I started reading the Bible and then critically examining my own beliefs. Now since I had reconciled genesis and the flood and what not my faith lasted right up till exodus. Then I read the story of moses and she all fell apart. After all wasn't this the same god that cared so deeply about free will that he allowed the suffering of billions?
But yet he fucks with phoroahs freewill pretty much because he felt like it. I mean let's face it, could have come up with a much better way to free the Israelites. Then once that doubt took hold the damn floodgates opened and many more popped in. This was in the space of a week.

[Mudhammam]

I'm reading Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion by Sam Harris at this very moment. I'd say there's a lot in there that you might find insightful regarding the context of your experiences.

I haven't read that yet, but one thing I find that differentiates me from many atheists is what I term "spiritual" -- which is the term I think I use when I'm trying to describe the connectedness I feel to the Universe at large.

The reality of that connectedness--that our "self" is in fact the sum of a conglomeration of environmental particularities--was perhaps best succinctly put by David Hume when he wrote, "I never can catch myself at any time without a perception, and never can observe anything but the perception."

[Simon Moon]

The hardest thing for me is that I'm schizophrenic and I've had a lot of mystical experiences which I know is only a product of my mind. Yet in this insanity, I felt I did see potential beauty, glory, and greatness but that these were archetypes that exist in me and is both imaginative but has some basis to reality. I don't know. I feel like I know spirituality can have high levels, intense levels of devotion to God can lead to high stages, I feel like I witnessed some of these high stages even though I was going through psychosis. I feel like I witnessed what it means to be holy.

At the same time, since I'm schizophrenic, I question all my beliefs to the supernatural. I feel like I have a soul but how do I know this isn't delusional? I feel there is stages of closeness to God but how do I know this is not delusional.

Well that's the thing, isn't it?

How would you go about figuring out whether you are having an actual experience with a god, or misinterpreting what is going on in your mind?

There is a man here in LA that is an atheist (studied by UCLA neuroscientist Ramachandran), who also has temporal lobe epilepsy. During and after his seizures, he has a mystical experience where he believes he is communicating with a god. This last for a day or two.

When it is over, he understands exactly what caused his experience, and as incredible his experiences are, he remains an atheist. His epilepsy is controllable by medication, but he refuses to take them.

If this man lived, lets say in 610 CE and went into a cave and had a temporal lobe seizure, he might have hallucinated that he received direct communication from the creator of the universe.

At the same time, if we do have souls and God did in grain us with spiritual knowledge, I would be hasty in just giving it up saying I don't know absolutely or based on evidence therefore should do away with these feelings. Or giving them up simply because I have a mental illness.

'Spiritual knowledge' sounds like a incoherent phrase to me.

The feelings you are having are real. Connecting them to a god is just not justified.

I don't want hold beliefs that are delusions and not based on knowledge but I don't want to give up on spiritual knowledge if God gave that to me.

How can you tell the difference between an experience occurring in your mind that you are misinterpreting as 'spiritual knowledge' and actual 'spiritual knowledge'?

That put's me between a rock and a hard place it feels.

No, it puts you in the position of basing your beliefs on a feeling, which is known as a poor path to the truth, or basing them on demonstrable evidence and reasoned argument, which has given us just about everything in our lives.

[Jacob(smooth)]

The question I have for you in particular is have your morals (other than those involving worship) changed with conversion?

Nope, not at all.

[Whateverist]

The question I have for you in particular is have your morals (other than those involving worship) changed with conversion?

Nope, not at all.

I'm curious to know how your conversion has gone over with your immediate family. I suspect you would have been the one most concerned with faith at the outset. Hopefully you still find as much in common between you now as before you changed.