Become Your God

What happens when you try to become your idol? Given enough time, don't you eventually become them? What happens when you try to achieve an ideal? Don't you embody it?

What I'm wondering is... if anyone who believes in a god similar to the Christian god, and also tries to do as he does, won't they become him? It seems that whatever you try to be, you always become. Maybe god is just a concept and we, as creatures with the ability to grasp concepts, are the only beings able to become it. Yet many followers of the Christian faith act as servants. Why be the servant when you can be the served? I think its a matter of choice. This is what really bugs me about many religions and people in general. Instead of truly doing, they give it the half assed approach, doing wrong, deemed wrong by their very belief, and just saying 'God will forgive me'. But you are the god you try to be, so you just forgave yourself, how easy is that? A person who really gave a shit about the religion they were in would lead by example and not by citing lines in a book created by humans which must be imperfect, have we ever achieved perfection in anything? The answer is no, we have never created or even seen anything that is truly perfect. Perfection is a concept people, just like God.

If you get anything from what I've said, I hope its this. Find your god. Get to know him. Learn his characteristics. And finally, become him. Don't go to church every Sunday, reading the paper while some preacher quotes passages in the Bible and then go home and abuse someone you love. Don't be a hypocrite.

Also, I don't want to paint a picture of God as some guy in the sky but rather your own idea of moral perfection. That's what god is to me, moral perfection.

Isnt trying to be something or someone your not denying your own existence? I see my life reaching levels by my own devices not trying to aspire to be any god or idol.

"Isnt trying to be something or someone your not denying your own existence? I see my life reaching levels by my own devices not trying to aspire to be any god or idol."

You completely misunderstood everything I said. I'm guessing you believe in originality and uniqueness, and I find that thought hilarious. The fact is, we have no original thoughts, we are not special, we only put things together through what our senses give us to analyze. That said, we also deem things as good or bad (or we like them or don't like them if you don't like the idea of good or bad). So we only aspire to become what we like or dislike. If we like the idea of something, we try to become it or incorporate it in our lives.

Now, a lot of people shoot to become things that are very petty without realizing it. For instance, girls these days seem to dream of living in a Laguna Beach fantasy and their actions reflect (at least a lot of the girls I knew from highschool did). But my idea is why not become the ultimate... your god. It's all in our grasp but we think its impossible. When you see a bug on the ground, you can choose to kill it or let it live. To that bug you are a god and to you that bug is an insignificant being. You can be a kind god or a merciless one. God is relative, like everything else in this existence. We are gods and we are servants at the same time. But we often forget to act out the god in all of us.

I think I see what you're saying here...I find this idea facinating, especially after reading a series on "The Foundations of Religion and Philosophies: the Cornerstone of Humanity and its Existance." The books propose the idea that over the centuries we have found to cast 'God' as we see fit, and by casting him as a flawless sinless being who we strive to reach the level that *isn't* unattainable where he sits gives us a purpose and a moral cornerstone by which to base our assumptions of our purpose in life. In casting him, striving to reach our own ideal of the level of perfection we all know to be unattainable, we climb up and are rewarded; we fall and we punish ourselves or forgive; depending on the nature. The idea of 'self-deity' is sort of a national sovreingty, on a personal, emotional level. Consider: Nations live and govern by our own rules which the people choose to accept to adhere to. We live our lives by a set of rules that we choose to accept to follow as either our limitation or our benefit, the same as any sovreign nation or individual.
I consider the idea of "God" to be one soaked in blood as we all battle and wage war over what particular words mean in the old books; who is in, who is out. By becoming our own pillar by which to build ourselves on and strive for completion, we are the ideal of 'God' within us all.

First off I really like you're picture vortex, did you take that?

And to go on further about this subject. I agree with what you have said thus far, but, we are not the ideal of our own gods I don't think. We are the imperfect forms of our gods. Our idea of god, different for everyone, is a perfection. If you are familiar with this life then you know that perfection is non existent. It is a concept, it is not tangible. Therefore we can never actually become the god, but we can create a projection of it.

"You completely misunderstood everything I said. I'm guessing you believe in originality and uniqueness, and I find that thought hilarious. The fact is, we have no original thoughts, we are not special, we only put things together through what our senses give us to analyze. That said, we also deem things as good or bad (or we like them or don't like them if you don't like the idea of good or bad). So we only aspire to become what we like or dislike. If we like the idea of something, we try to become it or incorporate it in our lives."

That makes a bit more sense.(guess right now I see god in a sentence and just go into super skeptic mode) I tend to agree to most of what you are saying. You present a lot of very good points but I see it as a reflection of dichotomous reasoning. What is determining originality or lack of it? Is that not also a very intangible concept?

"Our idea of god, different for everyone, is a perfection."

Is this not a contradiction to your claim of absolute lack of originality?

True we deem things according to our likes and dislikes and assign simple variables on the tangible and the intangible with tags of good/bad. Then respond to them respectively. This is a simple process of causality which you seem to be identifying with. I am confused by the want for a projection, to me this is embracing a false reality. It is reacting to causes outside of one's self without giving credit to the same self for existing determinants that lead to any particular aspiration. It is an attempt to self-cause something which the concept of causality does not permit in it's paradigm.

""Our idea of god, different for everyone, is a perfection."

Is this not a contradiction to your claim of absolute lack of originality?"

This is true, but you are looking at very minuscule originality, if you get what I'm saying. What I was trying to say was that our thoughts and ideas are limited to what we gather from our senses. Yes, everyones thoughts are different, to an extent, and you could deem that original. But, if you went to a toy shop and looked at 2 of the same action figures, you could say that both of them are original if you found microscopic differences or maybe slight differences in the paint. You see... I think originality is relative like anything else. I had the macro form of originality on my mind whereas you were thinking of the micro.

"True we deem things according to our likes and dislikes and assign simple variables on the tangible and the intangible with tags of good/bad. Then respond to them respectively. This is a simple process of causality which you seem to be identifying with. I am confused by the want for a projection, to me this is embracing a false reality. It is reacting to causes outside of one's self without giving credit to the same self for existing determinants that lead to any particular aspiration. It is an attempt to self-cause something which the concept of causality does not permit in it's paradigm."

I think I see what you're saying here. Forgive me if I interpreted it wrong. You are saying that I am forgetting that the self must also take into account the existence of the self along with the aspiration. I understand what you are saying and I believe you are correct. I believe there is a level of influence of the self into the ideal. A recognition of the limitations of what you can achieve in the body. But even though we have these limitations, we still aspire to achieve these ideals.

An analogy for this is a guitar player. The perfection of a guitar player would be a player who could play at any tempo he pleases, hitting every note sound and perfect. Now, at a certain point, a human can only go so far. His fingers can only hit the notes so fast. There is a limit because of the vessel we inhabit. But that doesn't stop a guitar player from playing. He can still try to reach that perfection, and a serious player will. This is what I mean by imperfect projections. We take a concept and project it within ourselves, maybe its impossible to reach it in this vessel, but we try anyways.

Chris doesn't believe in original thought because he has none. You're offended by this statement therefore you do believe original thought exists. It doesn't make sense that over thousands of years we have done everything the same way and looked at it the same way. Original means new or fresh. Our senses gather information mostly the same but our brains process it differently thus creating original thought. To say that there is no original thought would mean that everyone thinks the same way and thus the same inteligence level yadda yadda. Obviously not true.

lol you are so wrong. The things that change the way people think are how they are raised. Notice how people in families generally act similar. And also that saying that goes 'A man always ends up marrying his mother'. The fact is, we do as we only know how to do. We do as we are taught to do. We do as what we know will be good for us. You can't see the bigger picture. To say I have no original ideas is correct! My idea is completely unoriginal, I agree. But I came to it through logical reasoning and noticing patterns. My mind didn't magically come up with it one day. No, things don't work like that. I've been searching for answers my whole life. Not because I'm original but because its what I enjoy doing and know how to do. I was probably raised into it without even knowing it.

"I've been searching for answers my whole life. Not because I'm original but because its what I enjoy doing and know how to do. I was probably raised into it without even knowing it."

This forum lets us see ages, not sure if I really like that btw I can relate to that so much. Let me tell you that when you get to where I am in life you realize that enjoyment is now an addiction. Dont stop searching.

I disagree with the originality, what we find to inspire us might not be original but how it enlightens us, each as an individual, cant be anything but original in the way we respond to it.

I guess the past will always dictate the future for you then chris...