A worrywart can benefit from a connection to God. If I believed prayers were answered, I wouldn’t need to worry anymore.
Even though I’m an agnostic, I consider my relationship with God a pretty good one. Like those halfway-decent, parallel-play marriages between two independent sorts, God and I go into our individual orbits, then come together now and then for some support (for me). I like to think He understands our lopsided arrangement.
He can bet on hearing from me when any of my kids or I are about to be airborne. Then, after I know a plane one of us is on has landed, I repeat in quick succession “Thank you, God” four times. Four times, that’s the way it always comes out.
I do a lot more thanking than asking and not only because happiness gurus are always promoting gratitude as a path to well-being. It just seems as though He would appreciate that. For instance, if a poppy seed is stuck between my teeth and I begin rooting around in my purse for a toothpick and one stabs my finger right away, a silent “Thank you, God” for not wasting my time comes out automatically.
On the other hand, I impose considerable restrictions on asking for things. This is an effort to amass credit for future health and safety needs. So I never request anything like a good parking space or that the roof will stop leaking, even when it’s gushing in the middle of the night.
Although I wish I didn’t worry so much, this system with God and me is working out so far. Thank God.
[...] LORD IS MY SHEPHERD BLUES By susan fishman orlins I’m a high-functioning agnostic in that I do ask God for things. But in the same way that, as a kid, I was creeped out every time we had to sing “My Country [...]
[...] wish I believed in a higher authority who would answer all my prayers, because then I’d no longer need to worry. If I ever attain my quest for greater belief in religion, maybe I’ll want to give up my tree. [...]
A worrywart can benefit from a connection to God.
I’m not following. Can benefit if it is true that God exists (but agnostics don’t know), or can benefit from working to connect herself to this deity (who must exist in some form)?
Either way, the only benefit I can think of to a belief in (or a connection to) God is the comfort and security you get from faith. But if you’re a worrywart, presumably you’re low on comfort and security: God, whatever version of Him or Her you’ve connected to, isn’t delivering the goods.
Of course you might worry even more than you’re worrying now if you didn’t have your connection to the deity. Is that it?
Yes, that’s it. The more I can lean on God, the less I worry. But as an agnostic, it does turn out in reality to be a bit of a wishy-washy relationship. I do my best, however, to suspend disbelief when the need arises and, as I’ve written, I like to think He/She understands. Oops, forgot to be gender-neutral in my post.