I’m going to start this blog in what may seem slightly unexpected place, with a discussion of religion, and its place in contemporary living (for some people). Without divulging my own religious or non-religious stance, I intend to highlight how various religions fall within the broader knowledge-base of thought systems, which aim to provide meaning, guidance, structure, and predictability, to an otherwise overwhelming and chaotic journey through life. While these spiritually-based phenomenologies are useful, though arguably not essential, other psychological, philosophical, sociological, or exploratory writings may serve a similar, albeit more tailored, though difficult-to-access, purpose.
The Old and New Playbooks
There are many world religions; from the Holy Trinity, Sin, Saints, Commandments, and Prophets of Catholicism, to the Gods, Dharma, Karma, Samsara, and Bhagavad Gita of Hinduism. The world religions form an important, and necessary part of life, for many members of the contemporary global community. Wars have been fought over differences in these beliefs, countries have based entire legal systems on them, historic figures have been inspired to commit immense acts of bravery and community building, with others using their religious doctrines to justify or participate in horrific cruelty, and injustices. Religions, like other ideological approaches to life, such as communism, capitalism, secular humanism, psychoanalytic and other psychological thought systems, stoicism and other philosophies, are neither good, nor bad. They simply serve to guide human action, whether you believe that guidance to be inspired through a divine order, or whether through the ingenuity and intellect associated with human agency. Religion is the old and, with secular philosophical or psychological texts representing the new playbooks for life.
The ultimate name-of-the-game is, to understand what constitutes a good life, and how go about living that life. I, am not going to delve in to this in the current blog post. The reason for this is simple, it depends; on your specific outlook on life or your set of values, your adopted or inherited belief system, your identity, and the various things which comprise you as a living, and breathing entity. What may constitute a good life for one, is unlikely to be satisfying, or even acceptable to another. The question of what feels idiosyncratically good is complex, and potentially requires a lifetime of personal, spiritual, philosophical, and other forms of exploration.
The Continued Relevance of Religion
There are, however, some clues and guidance available to us. Religion is one such source which the vast majority of people on the planet are born in to, and derive their guidance, morality, reasoning, and decision-making processes from, to varying degrees. It’s estimated that in our modern world, approximately 84% of people identify with some religious grouping in the spiritual sense. For many (certainly not all) of these people, religious belief offers a meaningful, comforting, and satisfying way to engage in the act of living every day. This is arguably why the world religions remain, as relatively focal, ideological belief systems for the vast majority of humans.
This raises an ostensibly important question though, what happens to the 16% of the planet, who don’t affiliate to one of the major or minor religions. The atheists, agnostics, and other secular groupings who live lives largely independent of religious belief. Many of these souls were born in to, and subsequently turned away from religion, some were outwardly born in to secular environments where divinity and spirituality were overshadowed, or wholly neglected.
The Importance of Secular Philosophy for the Non-Religious
In such cases, I would argue that one cannot be guided or informed by nothing; no ideology, or belief system, or no way of confronting or making-sense-of the world. To do so, confronts you with the stark, and overwhelming entropy associated with existence. This terror is vast. It involves grappling with nihilism or meaninglessness, chaos, and the potential reality that there is no greater guiding force, which is believed to bring some order to the universe.
The human mind operates on metaphor, symbolism, timelessness, feeling, dreams (manifestations of an unconscious or implicit architecture outside of awareness), and other conscious structures quite distinct from a concrete and tangible world. To exist, is to establish a good capacity to make sense of things that initially seem senseless, or give form to seemingly formless or nebulous parts of life.
What is important, is that a given mind, possesses the tools which enable it to make sense of its existence and to act on the meaning it creates to its own satisfaction and for its own protection (and ideally, to balance this against the satisfaction and protection of the community of minds with whom it is connected). At the very least, a mind without internalized tools requires external support to process the complexity inherent in the world which it faces day-to-day.
In plain English, religion serves as an old form of external support. It gives its followers a way of understanding the world, and of engaging with it. In its absence, a person would need to turn to the multitude of secular texts in philosophy and other disciplines, such as stoicism, minimalism, hedonism, radical environmentalism, and the many other approaches to living, as a means of constructing a personal, and alternative way of making sense of, and traversing daily life.
Secular book options
Worthwhile books which I think touch on this subject, and which by no means represent an exhaustive list, include:
Philosophy-related texts
How to live a good life by Massimo Pigliucci
12 Rules for life by Jordan Peterson
The School of Life by Alain De Botton
The Practicing Stoic by Ward Farnsworth
Algorithms to Live by by Brian Christian and Tom Griffiths
Psychological texts
The Happiness Hypothesis by Jonathan Haidt
Man’s search for meaning by Victor Frankl
The Farther Reaches of Human Nature by Abraham Maslow
The Hidden Spring by Mark Solms
A Therapeutic Journey by Alain De Botton
Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman
Conclusion
So… have a religion, have a creed, have a system for making sense of the world, and guiding your actions. Don’t have a nothing. If you find that you do, and youre struggling, get help… from a thoughtful, knowledgeable, and compassionate other, whether they’re your local sangoma, doctor, priest, pastor, or psychologist.
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