Did you learn the hard way? Would you tell me the lie you believed...?

Question

I want to know because if it caused you pain I don't want to be tricked into believing it and have to go through all the pain you went through.

Maybe the sheer beauty of your not wanting me to suffer as you did is one of the most meaningful things we can do as people?

Maybe a great joy will chain-react and be experienced by thousands upon thousands of individuals... and all that joy is found to stem back to that grain of empathy within you right now?

What if like being carried in that poem, "footprints" you can could help carry someone else for a little while.

Answer 1

The lie I believed was religion. I was brought up believing that a god existed. Though, I don't know if I would count it as a lie, because the people telling it to me and indoctrinating me thought it was real. Still, it was false.

Since then, I've realized the harm that religion does in the world. If more people freed themselves from religious superstition, there would be greater peace.

Answer 2

Yeah, I had a similar experience to some of the other respondents. I wasn't brought up Christian, though I was sent to Sunday School and in those days we got some basic Biblical instruction in primary school.

I came home from school one day aged six after hearing about and drawing a picture of Moses and the burning bush and asked my dad if this stuff about God was real. He kind of sighed and said that in his view it was all just wishful thinking. Of course at six I thought my dad was the fount of all knowledge and grew up smugly thinking I was wiser than my Sunday School teachers and anyone who believed in God; in other words that man had created God in his own image for his own purposes, not the other way round.

This was the biggest and most harmful lie I ever believed.

It took an awful lot of pain and suffering and a very winding and twisting way for me to eventually come to believe, which a_blvr's story, above, reminds me of.

I wish a_blvr would accept e-mail, so I could talk to him more about this. Love his avatar, by the way.

One more thing. I was also brought up very strictly, by my paternal grandmother and my dad, and was made to be extremely over-polite and deferential to everyone. The church, unfortunately, reinforced this when I became a believer. But once, a few years ago, I heard someone say in a film "Never give respect to those who don't respect you". This has exposed another important and deep lie I swallowed and has helped me immensely.

Answer 3

IDon’t know if this was the hard way but it was definitely the long way and it was miserable.\
I was raised Catholic and had an awesome close relationship with Jesus. My Father was a Christian and my Mother a Black Belt Atheist. My mother got mad at a nun one day because they had asked to reschedule my first holy communion due to a vacation (sabbatical). She told me how good I did and how bad the Catholic Church was and how Jesus was just like the Easter Bunny and Santa Clause anyway. This troubled me greatly because I was very close to Jesus and obviously had mental problems now. I was really scared I was crazy. I was nine years old. I tried to be an Atheist but that didn't sit right because I knew something was out there. I tried being a witch but the spells never worked. I tried being a Satanist because it sounded like fun. Hate is a fun emotion but it gets tiresome after a while. I was Agnostic. No good, to weak and watered down. I got saved in 1991 when a co worker explained the gospel to me in a way I had never heard it before. With Power. Then he got caught cheating on his wife and got upset and stop believing in Jesus. Soon after this my wife who got saved and baptized with me decided to come out of the closet as a crack smoking lesbian. Her grandma told me that the Holy Spirit had told her that I dragged my wife down to the gates of hell and it was my fault. I was sure that the one thing I did know was Christians were scary freaks and Jesus had no control over them. I went pure Wiccan because at least they were nice. I was friends with a coven in Auburn Alabama (Hazelnut Coven) and soon got into Metista the American Mutt Shamanism society under the care of Joseph Bearwalker Wilson and Tori Starhawke.They were and still are awesome and my spiritual parents of sorts. Bear has sense died. Tori kept bringing up the idea of absolute truth and what a wonderful quest it would be to find it. I started to read the Tao at this point also. It was Christmas break from work and I was in the back yard having a cigarette and thinking to myself that it would be the greatest Christmas present of all to finally find absolute truth. Right them a voice went off in my head. It was not my voice. It said. "Merry Christmas Lance" I knew it was Jesus and I knew it was the beginning of my place in my life. I almost instantly felt whole. Complete. Like my life's puzzle had just found it's last piece. I can’t explain how I know. I just knew. I have walked with Christ from that point until today. I am still complete and if GOD never did another thing in my life I could spend the rest of my existence and never finish thanking him for what he has given me so far and for what I do not know he has given me. I truly walk with GOD through Christ today. So that is the long way.
May the Lord Richly Bless you.

Answer 4

I believed in Jesus as a child, moved away and forgot about Jesus.

Came back to God yrs later. Got hurt thinking it didn't matter to not go to church the time I forgot about God. When I did come back, I had to go through it. My comming back was realizing I sinned badly & asking God to forgive me & left it at that. I went into a 1 yr breakdown. I had idols in my life revealed in a breakdown prides, classic rock, mormon family ideals, tobacco, false concepts about God's identity (Jehovah, Jesus & Holy Ghost) & about points of no returning to Jesus, the concept that self hypnosis would reduce anxiety (don't practice self hypnosis you could get stuck in a trance), thought it was OK to yell at God in the breakdown (conscequences a witch spirit oppressed me), in the breakdown told Jehovah, Jesus & Holy Spirit to leave me alone, (don't call the Holy Spirit evil).

The lie was that people in the church didn't care about me. People are offended when I talk about God, so don't. No one wants me to go to Church so don't have to. Then the devil has a snare set up. Then when you do come back to God, you will have to go through it & learn where the lies are.

I am writing to someone right now who is going through it. So, hopefully can help this person.

Answer 5

I believed that after my boyfriend hit me the first time it was my fault. Then, I believed when he told me he'd never do it again, he meant it. Then I believed him when he said he was sorry and that he loved me after he hit me the second time. Then I believed it when he told me I could never find someone who loved me the way he did. That was after being hospitalized after the third time. I got the last laugh. I dumped his sorry butt after putting a PFA on him and he's been on his own for years now. And if you ever get hit by a spouse, either get counseling right away or dump him but never let the first hit go without some intervention or you could get killed.

Answer 6

This is a beautiful question!

The lie I believed was that God and Man were seperate, and that Humans were seperate as well.

The pain it brought me was more a pain of embarassment than anything else. And, I would surely try and alleviate that pain from anyone if I could.

Much love to you!

Answer 7

I believed in many lies during my childhood, and that was because of wrong descriptions. speacily about god.

Real God is very different that most people told me during my childhood and specialy about religion.

And they caused for me some thing more than pain, but now after all those pains i am in peace with my beliefs and happy with them.

Answer 8

I once believed that I could do it on my own. I was a single mother determined to never marry. I hated men yet, I also wanted one. I learned the hard way that it doesn't do any good to live aganist God's Will. When you stray away from Him then life really sucks.

Answer 9

The check is in the mail.

I turned over the title to my car based on this lie, twice.

Always make them show you the money.
.

Answer 10

When I was a young woman, I believed the lie that, unless you had a boyfriend or husband, unless men noticed and liked you and wanted you.....you were nothing. Boy....did that get me in trouble.

I now am older and wiser, and know who I am in Jesus Christ.