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Friday, February 4, 2011

You don't believe in WHAT?

So this relatively new friend of mine found out today that I don't believe in God. She was so hurt. I bowed my head and waited for the inevitable barrage of bullshit points and attacks, all of which I have heard so many times before. And one by one, I shut them down.
I really don't like arguing this shit. I mean, when I find out that YOU believe in God, do I immediately start trying to convince you otherwise? Fuck no. I'd appreciate it if you just let me be. For real. But since I know that you won't , I'm writing this, so that in the future, I can just be like, "Add me on Facebook, then read my note on God."

I'm just gonna lay this out now . . . . this is ME. All me. You can take it or leave it.

First of all, my parents are Nation of Islam. If you don't know what that means, here it is in a nutshell:

1. Black People came first. 2. God is a black man. (Physically, a living, breathing, mortal, black man). 3. White people are the devil. (As in, white people were artificially created from black people a mere 6000 years ago, and as such, are intrinsically evil and anti-God). 4. One day soon, God, in the form of a black man named Wallace Fard Muhammad, is going to fly down in a massive wheel shaped spaceship called the mother wheel. This ship has 1500 smaller ships on it, like little bomber planes. These planes will be used to bomb America and a handful of European countries, to punish white people for enslaving black people and murdering the indigenous people of the earth. 5. Some juicy details....the planes each contain two bombs, each of which has a drill on the tip, which when activated, drills one mile deep into the earths crust and will, when detonated, raise a mountain one mile high into the sky. After lots of bombs over the major cities, Wallace Fard Muhammad (who is actually mixed, and looks white as fuck) will commission his student, Elijah Muhammad (who supposedly is still alive, instead of dying in 1975 like history shows) to somehow "short-circuit the atmosphere" and set the sky over America on Fire. America will burn for 490 years, and take 610 years to cool off and become livable again.

Now, there are millions, MILLIONS of people around the world, not just in America, who believe this crock of shit. And my parents have been gung-ho since I was 2 years old. I'm 23 now. Think about that shit. Just think about it. My niggaz, to all of you who idolize Malcolm X as a freedom fighter for black people, I'm right there with you.....but, there is no getting around the fact that he believed the shit I just explained to you wholeheartedly.

I never bought into this shit. I had to go along with it, of course, until I moved out of the house....but I never bought into it all the way, I just went along so that I wouldn't get my ass beat in that house, lmao.

Then I took my 4.0, honors graduatin' ass off to school, and I applied my incredibly sharp brain to Computer Science, with a little theology on the side. I quickly realized that my parents cult was not the only crazy religion out there; ALL of them are crazy.

Like, let's say I believe the Bible. Then I believe that homosexuality is a sin punishable by death. Even though it has been witnessed in everything from horses to dolphins, and we definitely can't accuse animals of sin, because they never got any "word of God" or "prophets", right? But somehow, my friends who are attracted to the same sex are "sinners."
In the Bible, God says, "Thou Shall Not Kill." Of course, modern versions changed it to "Thou shall not Murder" so that we could give ourselves a little wiggle room, since our societies have made killing a necessary evil (death penalty, war, etc.) But notice, in the old testament, while the Israelites were busy spending 40 years to make a 3 day trip, God ordered the systematic extermination (read:genocide) of race after race of people....GO READ IT!!! He's like, "Kill EVERYONE, women and children, even livestock!" Why? Apparently because God only chose the Israelites.

Um, really? This book can justify anything. I know, I've read it 13 times cover to cover. Check it:

God can't lie, Hebrews 6:18
But, he lies by proxy, sending forth lying spirits to deceive in 2 Thes 2:11/ 1 Kings 22:23/ Ezek 14:9

Robbery commanded
Ex 3:21,22/ Ex 12:35,36
Robbery forbidden
Lev 19:13/ Ex 20:15
Um, really?

Circumcision instituted
Gen 17:10
Circumcision condemned
Gal 5:2

No work to be done on the Sabbath under penalty of death
Ex 31:15/ Num 15:32,36
Jesus Christ broke the Sabbath and justified his disciples in
the same
John 5:16/ Matt 12:1-3,5

Man was created after the other animals
Gen 1:25,26,27
Man was created before the other animals
Gen 2:18,19

John was in prison when Jesus went into Galilee
Mark 1:14
John was not in prison when Jesus went into Galilee
John 1:43/ John 3:22-24

I'm sorry, I'm one of those guys that noticed all the little frame-to-frame inconsistencies in Star Wars....and that's my favorite set of fucking movies.....you don't think I would notice things like that in the Bible? *chuckles*

I could go on, but I'm not a Bible-Basher, I'm just making some points here.

Anyway, study and research showed me that there was tons of inconsistency, even outright lies, in doctrines ranging from the Qu'ran and Hadith, to the New Testament of the Bible. And suddenly I decided that since NO ONE has ever proven that there is a such thing as God, and since all of our accepted doctrines about God come from books that are flawed, and religions that are even more flawed.....I rejected religion. Completely.

Does that mean that I'm a devil worshipper? No. There was never any need for the concept of devil, until someone decided there was a such thing as God. Let's be logical, people.

People ask me, well, what about when you die? Where do you think you'll go? My answer? I don't know, and who the fuck cares? Really?
Come on, y'all. Every person that told you about heaven or hell hadn't died yet. So how the hell would they know? Hell and heaven are convenient concepts, because as humans we like everything to be fair. And yet, every day, bad things happen to seemingly good people, while sometimes the evil people appear to prosper. So, to content us, the architects who came up with our religions created "Heaven and Hell", where, after you DIE, everything will be made right. What a crock. With all our telescopes and technology, we still can't find any evidence of either......but there's plenty of evidence that proves evolution. Christian theologians often say that evolution is just a "theory" and is unproven. Every time they say this, they prove their own ignorance about the very science that allows them to even spread their message so widespread. In technical terms, ACTUAL technical terms, a "theory", is a hypothesis that HAS been proven, thru some agreed upon amount of testing , and these tests have to be performed by multiple scientists and at multiple different times, and all these tests must show conclusive evidence that the hypothesis is true.....and even then, these results must be tested and retested and it must be shown that other scientists can get the same results, before the scientific community as a whole is willing to say that the hypothesis is apparently true, and can now be called a "theory." Yeah. That's how it actually works. so when a scientist says "theory", that's what he usually means....in layman's terms, a theory is just an unproven idea about how something works....I'll talk a little about evolution in my next note, tho. I just wanted to write this so that people would have a little more understanding about how I feel about the whole "God" thing.....I mean, come on. There are over a billion people in the world who believe that if you have a tattoo, you are cursed, and that consuming pork or alcohol is guaranteeing yourself hellfire.....get real!

I have a steady moral code that guides me thru life, and it doesn't come from any book or religion. It comes from something that every one of us was born with.....well, except for the psychopaths. And that, my friend, is "empathy". Empathy guides my actions.....of course I'm not gonna rob/steal/murder/lie to you....i wouldn't want you to do it to me, it would suck! Lol. Too simple? Yeah. That's how I like to keep it.

Thursday, November 18, 2010

Still A Work in Progress, I Am

At this moment in my life, all I want is a cigarette. Hang on a second. I'm gonna take this note writing outside and light one now.


.............



There. Now that I'm smoking, hello, Facebook! What's new witcha?

For 18 years or so, my life was slowly built on a foundation that I had no control over. Many people say that life is what you make it, but I have to argue that this is only partially true. My life wasn't what I made it at all when I was little. It was carefully and meticulously crafted and controlled by people who had more power than I. I realized this early on, and I hated it roughly from day one. But when I was allowed to fly from the nest I took the opportunity to absorb the world around me and analyze it. I made a couple of decisions that would inadvertently change things forever. One of those was my decision to reject the cult-like mindset of the household I grew up in, and instead to think for myself. Well, like with everything in life, there were consequences for that decision. Was I prepared for them? Hell no. I wasn't. I can't say that I didn't have any idea what would happen . . . . but I also chose to have faith in some ideals that are unfortunately not always reality, such as family and love. Boom! That foundation, so carefully built upon years of lies and half-truths and fear and control, crumbled. And I fell hard.

But I got back up. I spent months in despair and even regret. But I also believed in something greater than being a slave to the wishes of others. And eventually I rebuilt my little house with this new set of cards I had been dealt suddenly. My goal in life changed from making everyone else happy to making just one other person happy. And I made the mistake of rebuilding my foundation on that person. Boom! One day that shattered too. I sat there in my apartment after work every day and hated the doctor that handed me to my mother when I was born, and the bus that only almost hit me when I had my Honda. How ungrateful of me; but if you've ever been at the bottom, you know what I mean.

Then I focused on what was left. My job. My weed. My music. I got lucky and made some new friends, mostly from work and weed and music, go figure. Some of those friends are still friends . . . . some stabbed me in the back. I started doing things that I had never done. I even started doing things I said I never would. But in the meantime, life was getting hard as fuck. Money was getting tight, and despite my best efforts, everything that I tried to build and maintain was failing miserably. People who cared, and people who didn't, started to pity me. And I hated that. I hate being pitied. It makes me feel guilty. So I started being distant. I'm still that way, more now than ever. I don't confide as much as I used to. To cope, I started doing things that people call "dumb". Who the fuck is anyone to judge me? You don't know what I go through inside my head and in my day to day life. Of course, there are those who feel the need to give me the Good News that He loves me and that everything will be okay. But we all know that it's not really as simple as that. Knowing that you'll go to heaven doesn't mean a thing when you can't pay the rent and fridge is empty. And knowing that people would rather judge than help. . . . . knowing that getting ahead at your job means sacrificing both honesty and respect for yourself. . . . . . knowing that starting over at this point is a process that will take years, not months or weeks . . . . . and knowing that no matter how true any friend is today, tomorrow's circumstances can convince them to kill you next week . . . . yea. Comfort in religion? Been there, done that. The same people that taught me to pray also taught me what hypocrisy is.

Recession+( Bad luck/Bad planning)=Eviction and Lost Job

I can look back over all the above and think about everything that I could have done different, or done better. There are a lot of things that I could have prevented. But I like to go back to the beginnings and the roots of things. And the first thing that comes to my mind is that I would have done a lot of things differently if it were not for the faith I have always had in other people, and the determination in my mind to make everyone else happy with me. I come from a background that is as bizarre to most people as soap is to Oscar the Grouch. And no one ever wrote me a guide for what to do if I had to go it alone, without family. My guess was to make friends, love everyone unconditionally, bust my ass for my money and my loved ones and be generous no matter what.

You really think I'm gonna change that? Bitch, please.

To let the evil of the world around me change who I am would be to fail. I want to be a blessing to every person that I ever meet. Yes, you just heard an atheist say that. I don't believe in a God that runs everything and expects us to worship him. But I do believe in a world that, flawed as it may be, works only as well as the people in it. And people being good to people . . . . well, that's as good as it's gonna get for any of us. Make no mistake, I see this world slowly but surely destroying itself. But I'm gonna do my best to be happy as I can be, and even if I'm not happy, I'm gonna try to put a smile on someone else's face, at least.

It's cold outside. I'm taking this back in.

...............


So then, it's November 18, 2010. I am twenty-two years old. And I honestly have no clue where I am going in my life. It's not the first time. But this time, I see an opportunity. I'm done with looking behind me and wishing things had been different. I don't like lemons, but I fucking love lemonade. There are people who think that I'm crazy, that I'm fuck up, that I'm worthless. Who knows? They're probably right. But I know that whatever my life ends up, I'm going to make the very best of it. And I'm not gonna let the bad times change my heart. I've still got room in there for people. But most of all, I've got room for me. There are things that I want in life. And I don't know about you, but I have had that sobering moment of clarity when I realized that most of the things that I want the most in life are never, ever going to happen. It's ok. I'm not going to sit and not try. I'll do my best while I can still do anything at all. I'm gonna live my life by the beat of the music, man. Enjoy as many of these short moments as I can. Because I don't know what's gonna happen next. I know that I owe it all to every person that has touched my life, good or bad, because thanks to them I've learned much and become stronger, kinder, hopefully wiser. And the best part of this life thing is that as long as you're still breathing, anything can happen.

Something happened this morning . . . . . it made me realize that not knowing what's next is the beauty of it all . . . . . .and being happy right now is the reason for it all. It's how we're made. They tell us that we're here on accident . . . others say we're made to glorify God . . . . . but whenever I hear someone ask, "Why are we here?" I always think "Why not?" I mean, you're here. Enjoy it.

peace

Sunday, August 15, 2010

"Wishes"

I'm at work, sittin' in the training room on my lunchbreak. Practically every website worth going to is blocked up here, so to entertain myself, I'm blogging. Gee, I should do this more often ;).

One of the sites that actually isn't blocked is www.soundclick.com, and as such, I've opened another window up, playing some of my music.

Right now, one my most popular beats, "Wishes" is bumping. I named it that because I feel like if all of the wishes and dreams that I have were to suddenly come true, the emotion I would be feeling would sound like this piece. It's beautiful, if I may say so myself. I also gave this one to one of my homeboys so that he can write to it and put it on his mixtape. I'm excited to see how that turns out, as he's definitely a talented individual.

There's gonna be a store meeting tonight, which is why even though we close at 8, I'm scheduled til 10. Looks like I'll be breaking my fast this day of Ramadan with some Little Ceasar's, so graciously ordered in by our store management for this meeting. Shit, I remember when they would have the store meetings catered by Dickey's barbecue, at least. What is this world coming to? Oh well. All I can do is smile, ya know? It's good to have a job, it's good to be alive and still have another shot at making something out of my life today. I'm still waiting on my wishes to come true. But I'm not just sitting around waiting for that shit to fall in my lap. Why the fuck do you guys think I MAKE these beats, or write this music, or even write this blog? If I never get rich or famous off anything I do, at least I tried. And at least I did something, you know what I'm sayin'? You only live once.

That is, unless that last wish comes true . . . . . . .

Thursday, August 5, 2010

August 6, 2010

Usually, at the beginning of a post, I make some mundane reference to how long it's been since I last posted. Then, I promise to start posting more often.

Well this time, I've decided not to do that. Instead, as you can see I simply made a reference TO making a reference.

I'm sorry. I'm trying to make myself smile here, too. I feel your pain, it's not working for me either.

Rather than be specific about what's going on in my life right now, I just want to make an observation. It has been a long, long time since I woke up happy. And that's some serious shit. Depression is a motherfucker. I know I have so much to be grateful for. But I also know that the emotion of happiness is one that I haven't enjoyed, beyond getting fucked up, in months.

Alone, in my head, with my thoughts. And alone in general. It does things to me, things that you cannot see, things that only I know about, because they happen inside my head. I literally can't stand looking in the mirror, because I'm so tired of that reflection being my only friend. I'm struggling to make new friends. I'm also watching in terror as old friends either disappear, or attempt to fuck me over. I'm sitting in a corner, crying and helpless, as love moves further and further away. Loneliness, being poor, and boredom. Those are the things I look forward to each day. Son of a bitch. I can't stand it. Not too long ago, I asked my dad for advice. He says, in words, "Quit crying like a little bitch." I said, "Now I know what NOT to say when someone is down."

My little sister is 17.

And then I clock back in at work. Do my job. Try to smile. Stress about how tight my check is gonna be, and the one after, and the one after that. Fiddle around on my phone, try to mess around on Facebook, looking at that horribly cracked screen. My phone's having issues now, and is going to completely go to shit at any time now. However, it is the only phone I have, and I'm too broke to afford a jew one. Oops.

Still at work. Listen to bullshit from various people . . . . some are supervisors, some are customers, but both are trying to use me in one way or the other. I make just enough to live. Never enough to enjoy, or thrive. And then I go home, and try to sell another beat (so far, lots of beats made, no money) and maybe hit my homeboy to see if he wants to kick it. No? He's too fucked up to answer his phone, probably. Damn.

Food. Or rather, whatever I have that appears edible. And then, the internet. I'm always studying something, researching something, or else annoying everyone with "Check out my beats at www.soundclick.com/smoketheoriginal".

I avoid sleep. Or does it avoid me? Both. I crave and crave sleep, and yet, I'm afraid to go to sleep because then it brings on another day of going silently mad. As if that's not enough, I'm a chronic insomniac anyway, so sleep is running away from me even when I try to hold out my hand.

And then the sun comes up on me again . . . . . . . Like I said, I know I have plenty to be thankful for.