#this is a true example of what i mean by m's spiraling existentialism

[signofthetimes2020]

existentialism with m - 5/3

I wrote this like last week but I forgot to post it so here it is lol

okay so I just finished reading part 1 of Fahrenheit 451 and its making me spiral into an actual existential crisis so ima try and put it into words how I feel

DISCLAIMER: SPOILERS AHEAD

Okay so Beatley gives Montag a whole speech about how books are bad, technology is good and blah blah philosophy makes us sad which is why when we get rid of these things that make you think then you’ll be happier but then it got me thinking; would it truly make us happier? And I was like well the obvious answer is “no” we wouldn’t be happier, why? Thats when my brain broke. I literally cannot decide whether or not we would be happier because on one hand, thinking allows you to…think (whatever) but then when you get rid of the things that make you think, then theres nothing to worry about but like once I was seriously considering that Beatley was right I thought but WHY THOUGH????? because with the way he puts it, Beatley makes it seem like happiness is a set emotion that EVERYONE feels and is the exact same feeling for everyone but its not and then it got me thinking what even if happiness? Have I ever felt true happiness? Of course I have, but what if I havent? Happiness isn’t something you can describe, the same thing goes for love and sadness and anger like how do you describe those feelings and emotions without having to give an example or use a metaphor or be really vague and cryptic about it like???? What if Beatley is truly right and that if we just burned everything that made us think too much and made us sad then we’d be able to truly feel happiness? But then at the same time I love reading books but I’ve cried and felt actual pain alongside the characters in some books but at the end of the day they are just characters… people that don’t even exist… people that were created thanks to another person’s imagination… Have I ever felt happiness? What even is happiness? Why does the world focus so much on the things that we can never explain because it just makes us frustrated and angry and those don’t make us happy. If life is all about being happy, why aren’t I happy? Why am I not jumping for joy at every given moment? Who gave us emotions and feelings? What being made us sentient? Or hell, WHO made us sentient? For what reason? To feel alive? what does it even mean to feel alive? It’s not being dead certainly, but what comes after death? what if it’s better than being alive? What if life is meaningless and pointless because everyday some one dies yet some one is also born but for what? What is our purpose? Why do we even exist? Theres no meaning to anything we do because it just an escape, literally everything we do is mindless, whether that be for pleasure or for whatever else like theres no right or wrong to doing anything if you think about it. Why is swearing bad? It’s just words anyway. Why do we have morals? Who created morals? Why do we have laws and rules? They were created by a government that doesn’t even represent us accurately anymore so why even bother? I could straight up walk up to someone and call them a derogatory slur and it would hurt them but obviously I wouldn’t because thats bad BUT WHY BUT WHY IS IT BAD WHY

thanks for coming to my ted talk

Edit; so it’s been a week since I wrote this so ima put future m’s thoughts here.

So, since we did our ZOOM meeting, I realized that no, we would not be happy even if we got rid of all the things that made us unhappy because then even if we do get rid of these things, how could we even tell if we’re happy if we have no other emotions to base it on? Being sad and being angry sucks and sometimes I want to just be happy all the time so I don’t have to worry about a mindless cycle of when am I going to be happy again, but we need these other emotions because then when we encounter something or we experience more things throughout life, then we can distinguish between our emotions. Like, for example, when I’m walking down the street and I see a dog, I know I feel happiness because I’m able to distinguish in my brain that the emotion I’m feeling is happiness and not anger or sadness. I don’t exactly know how to explain this but it makes sense right? so yeah, Beatley you’re a hypocrite and youre wrong so HA

as for the other stuff... we don’t talk about it

okay thanks for joining me in my existentialism :)

[sbelzinga-blog]

My lifelong conversion story

What is Spiritual Awakening?

Spiritual awakening/enlightenment/mysticism, to me are also known as conversion, spiritual rebirth or spiritual transformation and is the ultimate goal of any religion. It is the positive result of an existential or identity crisis. See Jewish devekut https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devekut Buddhist Boddhi https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enlightenment_in_Buddhism, Islamic Sufism https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sufism and Hindu Moksha .https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moksha

Spiritual awakening/enlightenment/conversion/rebirth is a lifelong journey of coming to know God, finding and and living our divine nature.

To put it simply, God taught our first parents Adam and Eve in Moses 6: 59: "That by reason of transgression cometh the fall, which fall bringeth death, and inasmuch as ye were born into the world by water, and blood, and the spirit, which I have made, and so became of dust a living soul, even so ye must be born again into the kingdom of heaven, of water, and of the Spirit, and be cleansed by blood, even the blood of mine Only Begotten; that ye might be sanctified from all sin, and enjoy the words of eternal life in this world, and eternal life in the world to come, even immortal glory."

Another way of saying it is this: "We believe that the first principles and ordinances of the Gospel are: first, Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; second, Repentance; third, Baptism by immersion for the remission of sins; fourth, Laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost."

Articles of Faith 1:4, Joseph Smith, Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day saints

https://www.lds.org/scriptures/pgp/a-of-f/1?verse=4&lang=eng#p4

If you'd like to see how our first parents Adam and Eve received this awakening, "quickened in the inner man" and scripture recounts on how God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost each personally taught at different times how to be spiritually awakened/reborn and purified in heart to see God, go here http://choosingfaithingodoverfearoftheworld.godfaithsite.com/2018/06/how-god-father-son-and-holy-ghost-teach.html

Here are 3 main parts I have learned of spiritual awakening from my experience 

1. Personal relationship/revelation

Just before He suffered for us in Gethsemane during His intercessory prayer, Jesus said "And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent."

https://www.lds.org/scriptures/nt/john/17?lang=eng 

Therefore, perhaps the most important part of spiritual awakening/rebirth and purification is the lifelong personal relationship building with God, getting to know God by conversing with God in mighty prayer & scripture study daily to build our faith in Christ for repentance and purification.

I think I first started really seeking that personal relationship with God when I was about 14 when my parents weren't able to take care of me because of divorce and my mom's mental breakdown. It's interesting how difficult times turn out to be positive because they turn our hearts to God. At that time I started reading the scriptures every day, specifically the Book of Mormon because someone recommended that to me to help me get through a difficult time. The Book of Mormon brought me peace, love, comfort, and joy like no other book could.

This personal relationship with God starts with faith, just faith that God would care enough to give each of us the time of day to minister to us through his Spirit, constantly encouraging and guiding us each step of the way. As we pray and study scriptures daily, we open ourselves up to receive and follow more promptings of the spirit. As we do those things we are filled with more faith, hope and love from and for God, others and self. It's an upward spiral, staircase to heaven. This seed of faith will then grow up into a tree of eternal life, whose fruit is sweetest above all, full of grace, truth, love, joy, and peace to each of us personally. See Alma 32: 27-43

https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/alma/32?lang=eng

Oh, the joy and beauty of Repentance! Repentance literally means a change of mind. With our free will we decide to sacrifice or give up the desire for a particular sin or sins. We plead to God for forgiveness, confess our sin to anyone else we may have offended and do our best to stop doing that sin. As we consciously decide to sacrifice sin(s) to know God, God can forgive our sin and purify and change our heart, which literally transforms our sinful desires into righteous desires.

And how joyful and beautiful is receiving forgiveness! It is the peace we feel when we are able to let go of our sins and embrace God's love. When I was 19 headed on a mission to share the gospel of faith, repentance, and baptism I remember not feeling worthy to teach because of my past sins, even though I tried hard to repent. Sometimes the hardest person to forgive is ourself.

Then I stumbled upon this verse: "For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more." Hebrews 8:12

https://www.lds.org/scriptures/nt/heb/8?verse=12&lang=eng#p12

That verse brought tears to my eyes; I was so happy and relieved because I knew at that moment, God was speaking sweet mercy and peace to me directly, through his Spirit from reading the scriptures.

Atonement is literally at-one-ment, meaning we make a conscious decision to sacrifice our fallen nature's will to sin and then embrace God's and our divine nature's will to do good and right. Our will, desires, and needs for us become God's will, desires and needs for us and his will for us become ours. We become one in mind and heart with God and each other because we become pure in heart. God is intimately aware of our hopes, fears, and dreams and has a special calling and plan for each of us personally to use our talents, dreams and experience to do good in this world.

And we can find out God's will for us each day. President Russell M. Nelson of the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day saints said in April 2018:

"Follow the example of the Prophet Joseph. Find a quiet place where you can regularly go. Humble yourself before God. Pour out your heart to your Heavenly Father. Turn to Him for answers and for comfort.

Pray in the name of Jesus Christ about your concerns, your fears, your weaknesses—yes, the very longings of your heart. And then listen! Write the thoughts that come to your mind. Record your feelings and follow through with actions that you are prompted to take. As you repeat this process day after day, month after month, year after year, you will “grow into the principle of revelation.”

Revelation for the Church, Revelation for Our Lives https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2018/04/revelation-for-the-church-revelation-for-our-lives?lang=eng

For daily scripture study, the prophet Nephi also said "feast upon the words of Christ; for behold, the words of Christ will tell you all things what ye should do." https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/2-ne/32?lang=eng

I heard one person put it simply at church one time, "I talk to God when I pray, God talks to me when I read the scriptures." Many times in my life I've had a question, concern or desire from my prayer or in my mind and heart which God answered as I read his holy scriptures.

For instance one time, summer 2017, I lost my keys at a wedding in a church building. I said a prayer and had a feeling to go into the nursery room. My eyes were drawn to a hymn book (hymns are a form of scripture and prayer). So I felt to sing a favorite hymn "I am a child of God" as I walked back into a dark hallway to find my car keys. My eyes were drawn to under the water fountain and sure enough there they were!

2. Biological/inner transformation- the mighty change of heart from God

I like this biological explanation of inner transformation of our mind, heart, spirit and body. It involves the pineal gland in our brain which is also responsible for melatonin-sleep/wake cycles- and serotonin-mood balance.

https://prepareforchange.net/2018/04/15/sacred-secretion-christ-oil-true-annointing-heaven-on-earth/

The first time I felt like my physical body was completely encompassed with Jesus' love for me was when I was about 15 in 1999. I had been struggling with a certain sin I was addicted to. I swear my Bishop must've been tired of me coming back to confess to him the same thing almost every week. But he was patient with me and with God's Spirit encouraged me to read the scriptures every day and keep serving like at Sunday meeting, which gave me strength to withstand temptation. I went with family to go watch a video at a Salt Lake Temple visitor center about Jesus Christ, called the Testaments.

I didn't feel worthy to be in Jesus' presence, even just to watch him on the screen. But I wanted desperately to be worthy of God's presence, enough to feel his love. Then, toward the end of the movie, after I watched the depiction of Jesus suffering for me, and when I saw him come back resurrected and smiling. I felt my whole body filled with tingling energy, warmth, light, and love, directly from Jesus, as if he was smiling directly at me, to save me from my desire to sin, because of his sweet grace.

Much later I had a major transformational event in January 2015 when I felt my heart broken and spirit crushed under the weight of several major life changes and vulnerable mental health. My thoughts and feelings were spiraling my existence into nothingness. For a moment I felt completely separated from God's presence, trapped alone in the deepest, darkest abyss; the void. I was experiencing a moment of eternal spiritual death which is separation from God.

Then, with all the will and energy I had left, I willed myself to believe God was still there for me. I put all my faith in Jesus, even if just a glimmer of hope was left in me. Then the words came to me: "Nothing shall be impossible with God." Luke 1. Then, the flood gates opened inside my heart, soul, mind and body like rushing waters of God's eternal life, love, peace and joy for me personally. God's presence and energy filled me overflowing, as if exploding in me like a supernova.

Then I saw evidences of God's love for me all around me for the next several months and I studied in the scriptures and through the believing community online the next 3 years trying to understand what had happened to me spiritually. That's how I came across all of these things about spiritual awakening.

There are many examples of people in the scriptures receiving a spiritual awakening event/baptism by fire/conversion. Jesus said, "Come unto me with a broken heart and contrite (crushed) spirit and I will baptize you with fire and with the Holy Ghost."

So how do we do that? I know one good way is to pray and fast (skip meals) until we receive a sure answer, then apply it to our life. There is power in mighty fasting or "wrestling with God" in mighty prayer and fasting, like Jacob when his name was changed to Israel (symbol of his rebirth) in genesis 32 https://www.lds.org/scriptures/ot/gen/32?lang=eng. There's also Saul when his name was changed to Paul as the Lord Jesus Christ came to him, Acts 9

https://www.lds.org/scriptures/nt/acts/9?lang=eng.

Also there's Enos of the book of Mormon, who prayed all day and night for mercy and the joy of the saints until he received a sure answer and his guilt was swept away, https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/enos/1?lang=eng.

The greatest miracle I know of in the scriptures is when the 12 Nephite disciples of the book of Mormon all prayed mightily to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, God the Holy Ghost's literal spirit presence in them, which Jesus promised they'd receive with baptism by fire after their baptism by immersion.

After the native American (Nephite) disciples received those gifts, they prayed to be purified as Jesus is pure or in other words to become Christ's, sanctified by the blood of the Lamb. Then the crowd watched as Jesus blessed each of the disciples. Then the disciples' countenance, the aura, became as bright and pure white as Jesus. Jesus Christ's literal spirit presence was now gifted to them, as I understand. Book of Mormon 3 Nephi 19:25.

Jesus has also come to me and my children to comfort us. He comforted me in 2016 at the psych crisis recovery unit for bipolar suicidal depression when I saw his hand reaching out to me in a vision. Then again in October 2017 when he hugged me in a dream. Then again in June 2018 when I sawhis beautiful white robe and him smiling at me and my family. But I don't feel that we need to experience a crisis to come to Christ, his hands are always open for us to make the sacrifice or ' wrestle' required to come unto him and his everlasting embrace.

3. Covenants with God in priesthood ordinances

A covenant with God is a promise we make with God of obedience to his commandments to receive more promised blessings from God dependent upon our willingness to be obedient. Priesthood ordinances are outward expressions of inward commitments or covenants.

The priesthoods that perform ordinances are Aaronic, the priesthood John the Baptist used to baptize Jesus, and Melchizedek- the priesthood Jesus used to heal the sick and give the gift of the Holy Ghost.

The priesthood ordinances I have received are baptism by immersion, laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost, initiatories (washing and anointing), endowment, and the sealing of families together forever.

On July 6, 2017 I had the wonderful experience of kneeling across from my sweetheart Tiffany at the altar of the Mount Timpanogos temple to be sealed together for time and all eternity. Now our children are also sealed to us forever because they were born in the covenant.

What about those who didn't receive a decent chance to choose to receive these ordinances? That's why we do ordinance work for the dead in their place to give them the chance to choose to receive the ordinances on the other side. Jesus organized missionary work in the spirit world during those 2.5 days before his resurrection and it still goes on today. If you have questions about family history/temple work, see familysearch.org. Anyone can use familysearch.org for free to learn more about their ancestors. I've had the pleasure of researching information on my Dutch, Danish and English ancestors and taking their names to the temple to enable them to receive the priesthood ordinances by acting in their place.

It's also important to note that people can receive these ordinances spiritually e.g. baptism by fire/purification of heart, before they have an opportunity to receive them physically like the Gentiles in Acts upon whom the Holy Ghost fell upon before they had a chance to receive that priesthood ordinance. That's why I mentioned at the beginning that people can receive this spiritual awakening in any religion. This makes it easier for us not to judge each other because only God knows who's received the Holy Ghost and this great purification of heart. But, the physical ordinances are important, too, just like how Jesus was baptized to keep that commandment even though he was already innocent.

If you need a friend in the gospel, find me on Facebook Steven Blake Elzinga or email me at sbelzinga@gmail.com.

I invite you to chat with missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day saints and order a free book of Mormon at mormon.org