I’ve been having this sensation for a while now. This mystical sense of connectedness. I’ve had it before but it’s never lasted this long. It’s been manifesting as a minor sensation of euphoria. The same tingly sensation I get in my body listening to certain songs has also manifested just telling people about it. Laura thinks I’m going mad. But I just think I’m happy. And I do feel connected to something greater than myself right now, through film, theory, friends, and even the Internet.
Just a moment ago I was admiring the beauty of the walls in my bathroom, then the towel hanging up on the wall. That is what inspired this. A pure sense of the beauty of the world. It’s an awesome feeling, everything being beautiful. It’s kind of like admiring a piece of art, then stepping into the frame and letting that piece of art form your entire world. I finally get that thing people say about looking at the beauty in the world and seeing God, only I don’t make a separation between the world and the “divine.”
I have often said that without some God “out there” this world becomes GOD. You, me, everything. This is pantheism of course. I don’t see it as being incompatible with atheism. And I have always had a hankering for instrumental theism, where people use the word God but just as a sign to point to something here in this world.
The Church of the SubGenius has always been quite enjoyable for me, but I’ve never quite been able to disengage myself from Discordianism. Now I know why (at least for me). I figured it out when I told a friend that I am not able to pray. Then after I thought about it some I told her that actually I could pray, only it would have to be to something ironic, like Mickey Mouse. The Church of the SubGenius captures the irony part of things, but it doesn’t supply that spiritual experience. That’s what makes Discordianism different. It’s the religion for people who have these experiences but have to find a suitably ironic context to couch them in, because they are real but they don’t mean what most people in this world think they do. They’re just natural experiences. Some have them, some don’t. I do. They are what others might call “spiritual.” I don’t know what to call them. But it’s there and I hope it sticks around for a while.