How to become religious 101

Yeah not really...

But I do often finding myself saying something like

It's not that big of a thing. There was no dramatic story. It's not like one day I was walking along and almost got hit by a car. I had no sudden realisation due to someone on the street approaching me. Etc.

But that is only sort of true. I do think that sometimes I am fighting the expectation that it will be a story of inspiration due to its 'drama'. But I should remember that any story can be a story of inspiration to the right person at the right time, if said in the right way.

Side note

I have always been super interested in survival. Whether it be tools, tv shows, skills, tech, gadgets, other equipment. In the woods, in the city, in the world as it is now, 'post apocalyptic' worlds, on an island etc etc. And something I would sometimes sit and daydream about, was the idea that words are powerful. As a child this is easy to dismiss - but words are very powerful. I came to realise that given a certain situation you are finding yourself in - let's say you were taken hostage at gun point (as you do) and you are trying to stall for your life. I would imagine that this would be very stressful, completely terrifying and likely there is little you can do. That being said, if only you knew what words you could say, there will be some that will help, or even just get you free. So I guess I must add, that knowledge - and words, are even more powerful. If I happened to know the gunperson's family, I could cite their brother, sister, mother etc to them - this would certainly have more of an effect than just staying silent - perhaps good or perhaps bad. There may well be some detail I know, some way of talking to them that should I happen to know all there is to know about them, that I could 'get out' of the situation somehow.

Was interesting before I reverted and is still interesting now

If you haven't read 1984, by George Orwell , then it is worth your time. The middle chapters are a bit meh at times, but there are many good principles in there. The two to mention here are *Double Think** and NewSpeak.*

Double Think

In the book is something used to describe how an individual can simultaneously hold two opposing beliefs at the same time. The must accept a new truth presented to them, whilst also accepting that their previous truth was never a thing at all. Consider it a whole step beyond cognitive dissonance, which is the mental discomfort felt when someone tries to do so. In 1984 they 'know' that both are true

NewSpeak

The is just the language that they speak, but constantly adapting and evolving - as all language is. But in the book people are actively trying to 'shrink' the language.

(paraphrased) How can a resistance formulate thoughts and opinions of resistance, of there is no such language or words that exist to describe such thoughts, feelings and actions.

They also do lots of removing negatives - so good and bad, becomes good and ungood.

The point I started on - and the purpose of my tangent - was to basically say

Sometimes stuff makes more sense to people at certain times or in certain ways.

Or more Islamically

Allah knows best, and Allah is the best of planners

Interest and Research

Over the course of my adult life, I looked into religions briefly and in bits, as most people will who are curious enough to want to know things.

I worked with people who were Christian, who were Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu etc and to be a better person to them I would every now and then look up and research something. Whether that be

• What even are the core belief's of a Buddhist (I had no idea)
• What are the differences between X Christian and Y Christian?
• Why do Hindu's celebrate that festival
• What do Muslims fast for a month, and what even does that entail

Of course this helped when I was working with others, but also helped me to navigate some political moments, like one of the many times that the media has turned on Muslim women for wearing Hijab.

I was far from being knowledgeable, but I would cite this as the beginning of me learning - even if not actively.

Skip forward a bit

At some point I started to realise - like I said before in a previous post. That my ideal character, and that described by religion (as I perceived it) was similar. Again as before I always liked the idea of being religious, even if I could never see myself in that place. So I made a point of looking into them. I think back then 'as a logical person', 'as a person who's life beliefs kinda rest in science', it makes sense to look into the thing you think is a load of rubbish... right...?

I didn't go into it planning to become religious at all, obviously. And I feel like I had actually left the teenage years of 'it just stupid' behind - and still believe that I was looking into it out of interest. Yes, I thought if I understood it all a bit better then I could better formulate the reasons I thought it was wrong. But even so - it came, I think, from a point of interest with a dash of respect, not from a point of arrogance.

So I looked into the main ones, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism - I actually didn't really look at the Sikh religion much to be fair - but I researched the main things I could. I also looked into other ones commonly discussed, like Mormonism, Scientology and Jehovah's witnesses. I studied other things briefly - like certain philosophical views on the world that were 'between science and religion' even completed an online Uni module on it. I learnt about Greek mythology and things of a similar nature. And of course, I looked into Islam.

Now I am not here to mention anything negative about any of them, that is not my aim at all. I will only say that every time I learnt something in one of them. I realised later that the same topic covered by Islam, made more sense to me. I learn that religion A and B and C all talk about a thing, but with small differences? Islam's version makes most sense to me. I discover that belief systems exist that are at their core belief's in opposition to Islam - when I read those books, watch those documentaries and begin to understand those concepts, I saw them all as the same as Islam, but to me the way Islam explains it, it makes more sense.

To give an example of something I noticed when looking at greek mythology 'Prometheus' supposedly moulded men from water and earth (or clay). This approximate occurrence shows across many different things - for example see the wiki page on it.

Another would be that the Abrahamic religions (Islam, Christianity, Judaism) each claim to be monotheistic (worshiping one God). So for these it just comes down to me believing in Islam - as opposed to the others, since they are all very similar in a broad sense.

Hinduism is a big and well known example of a Polytheistic religion. Within which they believe in Brahman. I am sure there is diversity within the worship in Hinduism beyond my knowledge and perhaps not all believe in this - but when I learnt of this part I felt like I was still drawn back to Islam. My thoughts at the time being:

Even in this religion with so many gods - they believe that all of their gods come from one. That the various gods and deities in Hinduism, such as Vishnu, Shiva, and Devi, are seen as different manifestations or aspects of Brahman, making Brahman the ultimate source of all creation.

Just a couple of the many things that I noticed.

Please if someone is reading this - I mean only to explain my thoughts and feelings at the time, no disrespect, you do you.

So where does that leave me?

• Well, at this point I was still very much atheist, I just felt a little more knowledgeable about things that I still didn't agree with.
• I still believed that it would never be me - even a couple months before my Shahada (testimony of faith that enters you into Islam).

However:

• I liked certain things
• I agreed with certain things
• I strongly linked with the character of a Muslim as described by the religion
• And I respected in multiple levels the lifestyle prescribed for those in the religion