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dude, i haven't been on here in like, what, a year? Fuuuuuuuu! for the best.

Busy. Not really time for this Gaia s**t but what the hell, I am hanging around again a little bit. How very exciting!

Ugh. I am so sick of mormonism right now. I mean, I like to study it and debate it but the farther I get into my mormonism recovery the less time I want to spend discussing it. It is probably a very healthy thing that I feel less and less like I truly have to try to explain myself and my reasons for leaving. I was unhappy. That's all the reason I really should need. Of course I couldn't just leave the church on that. I wish I could have but it wasn't that easy. I needed more than just the heavy feeling of unhappiness about it. I was convinced that the church was true and the unhappiness was something I had to live with. I have seen plenty of mormons who are unhappy but feel they must continue to do their duty to reap their celestial rewards. I felt like that for a while.

In the end I did a lot of work. I wanted the church to be true and I wanted my suffering to all be worth something great but it wasn't. The more I studied and prayed and tried to put my doubts to rest the more doubts I found. I wanted to know and I couldn't know. I could only regurgitate the testimony I was taught over and over and I wanted to know it was true and not just say it. I spent hours on some occasions kneeling and praying and crying and begging to the lord but all there was was a dark silent room.

It was both a horrible and a wonderful moment when I realized it wasn't true and it wasn't right for me. My world completely crumbled and so much of my perception of myself was shattered but I felt an amazing freedom and peace like nothing else I have ever experienced. It was this epiphany that struck me. And my life has been so much better for it. And really that is all that matters. Sure, the things that eventually lead me out matter. The years of study and the things I learned helped me to understand a lot. But in the end it should be enough for me to just say "I was not happy" and that should be a sufficient reason to look for a change in one's life.

I am happier now. But the church will always be a huge part of my life whether I like it or not. It is not possible for me to abandon my family and somehow wipe out my childhood and all the things that built me. I can't do that and I don't want to. But in a lot of ways I am rebuilding myself into a person who I like better and a person who is real. And most importantly a person who is happier. I am not claiming that I am perpetually happy. Sometimes life is tough to deal with and things seem bleak but the more "spiritual" and intellectual sides of me are much more happy and fulfilled than they were as a mormon. I still go through little bouts of mormonism obsession where I want to study it and understand it more but they are less frequent these days.

Anyway, all I really want to say (and it isn't like anyone will read this anyway) is that mormonism is an especially big pain in the a** to me right now. I am also busy with life and school and stuff so I don't have much time for it. If I am discussing something about it with you I am not backing out of that discussion but it might take a while to reply because it is just too much of a pain right now. When I feel more like dealing with it I will. I am sure it won't be too long before I feel more like diving into mormonism for a little while again.

there are a lot of things that need saying but I just don't feel like saying them. perhaps in the future I will have another rush of zeal. It seems to come and go in rushes. Right now I know it is a waste of time and it doesn't seem worth wasting on these particular things. Most things are a waste of time somehow. I just have other time-wasting things to distract me right now.

I'm still around. just not so active right now.

time for a new and educational sig. stare