7.28.12

"Hold out your left one,
The number three finger from your thumb"
-- The Maccabees, Seventeen Hands

I ask myself this question often: why believe? Lately it has been running through my mind incessantly as, perhaps, it runs through yours.

The other day I was sitting in a coffee shop. To my right, just outside the window, there was a little Buddhist shrine. As I sat at the table, I watched as one of the employees of the shop went outside and placed a cup of coffee and a croissant inside the shrine. She then lit some incense and walked back into the shop. The whole transaction had taken a minute or less and yet it left a profound impression on me. The simplicity with which it was carried out seemed to imbue the action with a deep and meaningful purity. Belief is everywhere.

But why? Why the croissant and the coffee? Why the folded hands and bended knees at night? Why the a cappella hymns when the electricity is out? Why the orange robes and bald heads and the banging of gongs early in the morning? Why?

Father: For some time now, I've been comparing the disparity of our callings -- doctor versus priest. You fellows are always able to see the end result of your work. I mean, you know immediately if you've been successful. For me, the results are far less tangible. Sometimes ... most of the time ... I honestly don't know whether I'm doing any good or not.
Hawkeye: I used to have a professor in med school who always said, "God cures the patients, but the doctor takes the fee."
Father: Do you think that's true?
Hawkeye: I'm able to do a lot of things in surgery that I'm not really good enough to do.
 -- M*A*S*H, Showtime

Do I believe because it makes me more than a man? Because it amplifies my talents? Because it makes me more able to meet life's challenges?

Those all seem like beautiful reasons, but they honestly just make me feel guilty most of the time. They push me into "should" territory. I.E. Because I believe, I should be more than a man; because I believe, I should be better at what I do; because I believe, I should be better able to meet life's challenges. Of course, "should" almost always exposes a disparity, and disparity + belief most often = guilt.

And maybe we should feel guilt. Guilt has been a powerful motivator in my past, maybe I am too quick to adhere to its negative connotations. But the truth is, guilt is exhausting and I'm so tired of it. I've been pushed to the point where the question of whether it's right or wrong is irrelevant.

Now more than ever belief doesn't feel like a transaction, like I often want it to, it feels more like a relationship. Indeed, it includes most of the elements of a relationship and especially the big one: commitment. So perhaps my questions isn't so much "why believe?", maybe it has to do with commitment, with me being tired of committing to something that can feel so right, but over which I never can have complete control. Belief is a commitment that includes so many unknowns.

"I ain't looking for help from on high. That's a long wait for a train don't come."
-- Malcolm, Serenity

Ironic that I usually hold so tightly to my beliefs in an effort to escape unknowns, but ultimately the allowance of unknowns is what a real commitment requires.

So will I commit? And why? Why do we commit to things? Why do we believe?

Maybe, in the end, it comes down to trying to get something you want vs. admitting to something you need. And in my experience, believing for a purpose inevitably leads to guilt, hurt, and anger. But believing as a necessity -- although it implies unknowns that are frightening -- ultimately leads to a relationship.

In the end, I believe that I need love.

And I love you.