The day from Tartarus

I won't bore you with the details...if you're really hard up for reading material you can read my mundane blog to hear about how the car wouldn't start while we were out of town with no cell phone.  Here I just want to talk about the emotional and spiritual shit that was going through my brain as I had a meltdown.

Seriously, my first thought was...this is Zeus getting back at me for leaving the Greek pantheon.

Seriously.

My second thought was...this is God (the Christian one) punishing me for leaving Christianity.

Seriously.

I've got 50+ years of brainwashing to get rid of.  I should realize it's not going to go away overnight.  No matter what Christians say, there is that undercurrent that if bad things happen to you it's either A) God rewarding you with trials so you'll get stronger, B) Satan punishing you for not being a better Christian, or C)
God punishing you for not obeying him.  I never could figure out who was doing all the punishing but apparently every other Christian could.  By the time I left, I figured out the code:  if you were doing something you wanted to do, it was Satan; if it was something you didn't want to do in the first place, it was God.  Any punishments that came from the thing you were doing was the opposite entity.  As in...you really wanted to become a minister, but the financing fell off or you flunked out or you had a bad accident and ended up in the hospital.  That, obviously, was Satan attacking you.  However, if you felt like you should be a teacher but only because it looked like a job you could do while raising a family and the financing evaporated or you flunked out or you had a bad accident and ended up in the hospital, you praised God that he rescued you from the wrong decision by thwarting every effort you put into it.

Seriously.  That kind of shit happened all the time.  And it was especially obvious when someone else could see it better than you.  I can't count the number of times people came to me and told me God was punishing me with financial problems because we didn't tithe.  Or when the car broke down it was because of some unresolved sin in my life.  See?  Other Christians can always see what God wants better than you can.  Because apparently he talks to them.  And about you.

So my first thought was I was being punished.  Until I figured out the problem.  Then I realized that the God/desses were really with me, not punishing me, because why would they?  I mean...what do deities gain from torturing humans, especially when it's not apparent who or what is doing the punishing?  No...shit happens.  I thank the God/desses for helping me figure out the solution, but they were in no way manipulating events like some kind of video game.

I still have a long way to go, but I'm getting there.

And thanks so much to Dark Mother for linking my post about breaking free on her entry today.  She rocks, let me tell you.  She's been my cheerleader for a while now and I can't tell you how much I appreciate her telling it like it is.

Off for a hot shower and an early night.  The meltdown has left me with achy everything from the stress (and the fibromyalgia) and a powerful headache from being out in the cold so much this afternoon.  Without my hat.