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What “strategies” (for lack of a better word) are working for you NOW in dealing with your faith crisis/transition? I have 2 I’ll mention, although I’ve consciously done several other things to help my transition — 1. Taking control of my “church life” — Due to work, some other issues AND my faith crisis/transition, I asked to be released from (and not given any new) time-consuming and/or ministerial-type callings. My bishop was great about it. I think that taking CONTROL (literally and symbolically) of my church life has been a very good move for me personally. I currently have a low-stress calling that I enjoy and that doesn’t really take any time outside of the 3-hour block (which I’m already committed to participating in anyway). I suppose in the future I might step it up a bit on MY terms, but for now this works for me. I think putting a limit on my involvement in callings and limiting the mostly unfulfilling social interactions at church while I figure out who/what/why/where I am and want to be has probably prevented me from skipping church completely . . . . and perhaps permanently!
2. Telling my TBM spouse exactly what was going on with my faith/church life was critical for me. I know this is a tough area for alot of folks — and many here do NOT have the support of their spouses/family during their faith transitions (which totally sucks, btw). For me, after a long while, I got to the point where it was important to spill the beans to my wife, regardless of the outcome. I also wanted to do this WITHOUT in any way damaging/destroying her much more orthodox faith — which is probably why I waited so long to talk with her. Hearing her say that she loved me for me, not for my priesthood, my TR, or my callings/activity level was hugely helpful. (As recent RMs many years ago, we were probably attracted to each other initially in LARGE part because of those types of “churchy” criteria). Being open with her allowed me to move on to a healthier place spiritually, I think.
I’m still transitioning, of course, so I’m always curious to know how other’s are making their journey. So — what has worked, is now working, or has NOT worked — for you?
LDSThomas
Thanks for sharing this. These are great strategies and I think they are the top of my list as well. I asked to be released from the RS presidency shortly after I ‘took the blue pill” … and that was super helpful. I also asked for no calling for a while. (Which they responded with offering me a new one the next week, and I declined). Then several months later I asked to teach a class on my own terms. I only go to 2 hours of church b/c three hours is too much for me. When I am not teaching my class, I attend classes such as the marriage and family class and Family history. I avoid anything that talks about church history b/c those are my triggers, which is interesting since my FT has more to do with doctrine, but I know how to filter things to fit my own beliefs regarding doctrine. It has helped me to not research history as much and avoid people who have excess anger towards the church. I am OK with some anger and venting.. I do it myself, but when it gets too negative I seem to easily get caught up in it.
Talking with people who have been through it has been super helpful. I should add, people who are more in stage 4-5 are helpful. I love having advice on “how to navigate” without ruining my marriage. I is also good for me to remember the good aspects of the church and hear others positive reasons of love for the church without the apologies for the ridiculous things.
Writing. Writing. Writing. has also been extremely helpful.
1) It has been very very helpful for me to keep studying General Conference talks, scriptures, and other books, to see how much goodness really is in the church. 2) It has also been a good strategy for me to serve. Home teaching and callings allow me to serve others, care about them, and seperate out the church history or doctrine issues I was facing with the goodness of loving people and seeing how nice and loving others are. It also builds social capital. People see I’m involved, they see me smile…they don’t wonder about me or my deep thoughts.
3) Be comfortable with who I am and how I think.
1) Saying goodbye to guilt. Scrupulosity was holding me back, preventing me from finding happiness in life. Allowing myself to let go of guilt was a game changer, a life saver. 2) I think I gave a lot of power over my happiness to people, if not people then to the organization. Part of what helped me through it all was to genuinely get to a place where I’m no longer a respecter of persons. If I rediscover a connection with deity it will be a direct connection. No imperfect middle man, no imperfect organization as a go-between.
3) I’m shifting my focus. At the beginning of my FC there was lots and lots of new information that needed to be consumed. It was almost 100% negative and related to ferreting out faults, but I
neededto process it. Unfortunately the process made me more apt to look for the bad in everything. To navigate my FC I had to learn to deconstruct things looking for the good. I once heard someone say that the relationship we have with a person we don’t get along with is the thing that is keeping us out of the celestial kingdom. When looking for the good in life I had to go to that worst enemy to discover the good, at the time that “enemy” had been the church which I has spent all that time deconstructing. I had to get to a place where I could see the good again in order to let go of some of that bitterness. 4) Never lose sight of love. Love knows no dogma, it knows no creeds, it does not discriminate. Remember to love and know you’re loved. I think love and service go hand in hand, so I try to serve where I can.
5) Something I saw here stuck with me, it’s currently what has kept me hanging on. I don’t really remember the words, it’s more of a feeling than anything to me. Something like… don’t cut something out of your life unless you can replace it with something better.
Wow, I liked what each and every one of you have said. These are all great strategies. I’ll add one oft-used strategy here at stayLDS. It has been very good for me to focus on what I DO believe, rather than what I DON’T believe. That’s is true whether I am talking with someone else or simply thinking to myself. My faith crisis/transition took place in the late 1990s when I’d been a member of the Church for about six years. By 1998 I had deconstructed to the point of being atheistic (or non-theistic) in my thinking. I asked to have my name removed, but that was more to see if local leaders even cared (they did) and not because I wouldn’t give the Church another chance. Recently, an ex-mo friend of mine asked me how I was able to deconstruct so thoroughly and not go completely inactive or leave the Church. At the moment I didn’t have an answer for him. Now that I think about it for the sake of this thread, I think it’s because I was not raised to be dogmatic about religion. My parents were from the Far East, and Eastern religions are by nature non-dogmatic (that is, if A is true it does not preclude the opposite of A). So when I found out that the evidence against the BOM is damning, I didn’t take that to mean that the Church is necessarily a complete fraud (or a fraud at all) and therefore I have to leave. On the flip side of that, missionaries who serve in the Far East know how frustrating it is to have an investigator conclude the Church is true but not agree that they have to be baptized.
When I talk to atheists I often see this same Western Christian dogmatism in their language, and I am put off by it. Freethinkers and skeptics should search themselves for ingrained habits of dogmatic thinking. It helps so much to throw out the “it’s all true or it’s not true at all” dichotomy. And that is how I stayed LDS.
For me, taking charge of my church life was also important. When my bubble burst, I didn’t have the capacity to move people around, and do a lot of other things that for years, where things I did out of duty rather than love. So, I decided there were three things I would not do anymore — and it was liberating. I also stopped caring what the church (other members) thought about me. In a way, I had to stop caring because something I did (not commandment-breaking, but a cultural no-no) put me on the ostracization list. So, with that bubble burst for me, it was easier to just stop caring so much about what my church community thought about me. In a way, they hastened my coping; I had to stop caring abut what my community thought about me to preserve my inner peace.
The other thing I did was minimize the role of the church in my life. I got involved in other things that I found rewarding, while still keeping one foot in the church. Became, as Hawk implied once — in the church, but not of the church.
Having a spouse that doesn’t pressure me to be Mr. Mormon helped as well. If I was pressured to do all the church stuff again, that would’ve added another layer of complexity.
The first thing that worked for me was to immediately tell my husband what was going on. My FC started in 1996. We were living in a foreign country, but attending an English speaking branch. Believe it or not, I had never heard of anyone going through something like this at that point in my life. The friends/family members I’d known who’d left the church did it for reasons of serious sin or being offended (these were the actual reasons, not ones I merely assumed.) If I hadn’t spilled my guts to my husband, I would have gone insane. He was amazing about the whole thing and still is. I know that’s not always or even usually the case. I think it has a lot to do with him being a good person and with the fact that he’s a convert. His family couldn’t care less if he goes to church or not. BTW, just yesterday we had a great discussion about different thorny issues. It helps me so much. At the same time that I told about my husband about my FC (I told him what was happening, but didn’t give him details of why), I also promised to take a breath and give it time, and not stop going to church right then. He said he would support me later if I decided to leave. He asked me to try not to throw away a lifetime of faith over one thing I’d read and encouraged me to study things out on all sides, pro and con. I did that for a few years and kept going to church, mainly for him and our kiddies, who were young at the time. The good that came out of this was that, in time, was that the thorns mattered much less to me than the people and the good they do. I know some of you have had terrible experiences with people in the church, but that hasn’t been my experience with a few very small exceptions. I think that happens in any aspect of life though. Some people are just d-bags (can I say that here?) no matter which group they’re in.
The last thing that worked was just to keep busy and not think about it all too much. That had a half-life and it’s not working for me now, which I think is why I’m struggling again. The difference this time is that it’s slow and measured, so I can take my time. I think I’m to the point where I need to try LDSThomas’ idea and ask to be released from my calling which is demanding and time consuming. It’s a stake (actually, regional) calling and I don’t know how the stake president will react. He’s an awesome guy that I have huge respect for, but I don’t want him to know all the reasons. I’m also a temple worker and I just can’t to do that anymore. I do have enough big stuff going on in my personal life to be able to use that as an excuse. I hope it works as well for me as it did for you, LDSThomas.
I would say my most valuable coping strategy has been focusing on the central themes of the gospel and Bible study. Also very valuable has been participation in this forum, knowing there are others out there and that I’m not alone, and being able to fairly openly and honestly share what I think. I agree that taking charge of one’s church life is also highly important. I have tried to become more selfless – in the form of allowing members at church to express their ideas that I disagree with without exposing my desire to have my point of view validated. In other words I give the validation to them, willingly without resentment. …Not fully 100% of the time, but sometimes.
writer63 wrote:
At the same time that I told about my husband about my FC (I told him what was happening, but didn’t give him details of why), I also promised to take a breath and give it time, and not stop going to church right then. He said he would support me later if I decided to leave. He asked me to try not to throw away a lifetime of faith over one thing I’d read and encouraged me to study things out on all sides, pro and con. I did that for a few years and kept going to church, mainly for him and our kiddies, who were young at the time.The good that came out of this was that, in time, was that the thorns mattered much less to me than the people and the good they do.I know some of you have had terrible experiences with people in the church, but that hasn’t been my experience with a few very small exceptions. I think that happens in any aspect of life though. Some people are just d-bags (can I say that here?) no matter which group they’re in.
You are so blessed to have such a supportive husband, and I am AMAZED that you could continue to serve in the temple and regional calling. But more than anything I love that you could see the beauty of the people that surround you at church. This is such a great point that I need to remember. I adore most of the people in my ward, but when I was the most angry I couldn’t see that. I only focused on the negative. Thanks for the great reminder.nibbler wrote:1) Saying goodbye to guilt.
This times 10.
:thumbup: 2) Trying to not be angry with those who are ignorant of less savory pieces of church history – either through decision or ignorance.
3) Focusing on the positive publicly while acknowledging the negative privately. BUT tactfully disagreeing in public when appropriate.
4) Candidly sharing doctrines and history with my children. I want to let them decide what’s right for them and I don’t want them to feel like I hid anything.
5) Possibly as important or more important than #1. Maintaining my relationship with my wife.
For me, it’s about remembering things. For example: “A true warrior can walk his own path without needing to scorn the paths that others walk.” (my recollection of a Native American quote I heard once)
The 11th Article of Faith – Seriously, that was HUGE for me as a child who realized he simply saw things differently than everyone else around me.
“We love him, because he first loved us.” (It’s my responsibility, first, to love others, if I want to loved by others.)
I am where I am now because of the foundation I was given. I had a happy childhood, in which I was loved and allowed to be different. That made all the difference in the world. Therefore, I try to model that same love and acceptance of others who are different than I am.
Curtis wrote:
I am where I am now because of the foundation I was given. I had a happy childhood, in which I was loved and allowed to be different. That made all the difference in the world. Therefore, I try to model that same love and acceptance of others who are different than I am.Beautiful! I hope to do the same for my children because your view of life is admirable and inspiring.
Curtis wrote:For me, it’s about remembering things. For example:
“A true warrior can walk his own path without needing to scorn the paths that others walk.” (my recollection of a Native American quote I heard once)
The 11th Article of Faith – Seriously, that was HUGE for me as a child who realized he simply saw things differently than everyone else around me.
“We love him, because he first loved us.” (It’s my responsibility, first, to love others, if I want to loved by others.)
I am where I am now because of the foundation I was given. I had a happy childhood, in which I was loved and allowed to be different. That made all the difference in the world. Therefore, I try to model that same love and acceptance of others who are different than I am.
Really love this. If I was allowed to be myself, who was different since birth. I think it could have grown into a fruitful faith. But alas I can’t turn back time or change the current setting I am in. I only hope others allow me to raise my children with that frame of mind. To discontinue a long standing passing down tradition of submissiveness to past traditions and teachings. Such a beautiful concept. Accept people for who they are, not what you want them to or like them to be. Thank you Ray. It gives me hope.
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