I Believe

I believe I do not know much about anything.
I believe I know now a lot that I did not know before.
I believe people can kill in the name of their beliefs.
I believe people can get killed for their beliefs.
I believe I inhabit a physical body that will perish one day, as is the “dharma” – the innate nature – of all things physical.
I believe I do not know for certain what happens to me after this physical body disappears.
I believe I have been told many things about the meaning and purpose of life (and the afterlife) by well-meaning parents, teachers, clergy, perfect strangers, books, films, paintings and diverse sources too numerous to list here.
I believe I do not believe all of them any more.
I believe I am a seeker of truth.
I believe as a seeker of truth I cannot afford to either believe or disbelieve in the absence of direct evidence.
I believe what commonly circulates as truth are sets of cultural axioms that are half-understood, poorly-digested, infinitely interpreted, endlessly argued, and very, very tired.
I believe humans have a genuine desire for truth.
I also believe most of us don’t have the energy or stomach to embark on an authentic search for truth.
I believe we settle for half-truths, dogma, and rituals when we don’t have enough energy or courage to ask those questions that challenge what we are told is sacred.
I believe there is an awareness that is greater than all our culturally-relative versions of truth put together.
I believe truth is not dogma, ritual, or the ideas of the culture I was born into.
I believe all cultures suffer from racism, bigotry, injustice, prejudice and intolerance.
I believe the unquestioning acceptance of 'truth' keeps us imprisoned – in prisons of hate, fear, grief, and cycles of suffering.
I believe Truth is Love.
I also believe we don’t fully get what love means.

I believe in sunrises.
I believe in sunsets.
I believe in dewdrops.
I believe in tears that wash into rivers that merge with oceans that flow into dark rain clouds once again.
I believe that these too shall pass one day.
I believe in holding you close to me as your body is wracked with grief.
I believe in splitting my sides as we laugh together.
I believe in the glimmerings of humanity I see in a few, including myself.
I believe in much more than I can conceive of or write about.
I believe everything I believe could be wrong.
I believe some of what I believe just might be right.
I believe in this moment that we share … this moment in which I believe in you.
This moment in eternity in which I believe in me.