What if this is all there is....??!

I have sometimes heard people try to justify their faith with essentially the notion that they'd rather "be on the safe side" and believe, rather than risk not believing and having to be judged for it later.

But these folks never indicate that they also supplicate themselves to Allah, keep kosher, follow the 8-Fold Path, make sacrifices to the Great Spirit, or any other things they might also do just to "be on the safe side."

I do not "believe" and it is for that reason that I am the best person I can be.

You see, I believe that when I die, Im gone, thats it, kaput.
For a while, I went through emotions because of this, fear, disbelief, pretty much every negative emotion one can feel.

But when I finally accepted the fact that when I die, thats it, and that I am in fact going to die, I began to think, well what should I do with this one chance I have.

I decided that the only thing left once I die, is everyone else who is going through, and is about to go through the same thing I am going through. And that whatever I do with my life had better be to allow the next guys time alive be that much easier and enjoyable.

I am not at all religious, and it is because of that, that I find myself a much more caring, and noble person than most religious people I know.

I feel that some religious people think that "hey, if I screw up, I get another chance."

I dont believe I have another chance, and I had best do everything I can with this one.

IF there turns out to be a heaven, Im quite sure they wouldnt deny someone who did their absolute best to help those around them as if it were their one and only shot. Regardless of what some bozo wrote over 2000 years ago in a book.

[edit on 10-3-2006 by johnsky]

[edit on 10-3-2006 by johnsky]

What a greta thread

A decent logical thread that looks at the REAL world and not some fantasy.

The fish example was a good one. Just because us Humans have the mental capacity to dream and HOPE that there will be something for us we are governed by the same laws as the fish

We'll both end belly up

Life starts and life ends and that's it for all eternity. People spend far too much time wondering about this and that and waste their time

let me paint this picture

Lets say the Universe is 10,000,000 years old - please dont flame my example I could look up a factual estimate just go with me

Now lets say the Universe will 'run' for another 100,000,000 years.

For only 100 (if your luckly) of those years will you have life, will you have thought, will you see and hear and laugh and love

Use your time wisely. I say this not in some great biblical way ........... its the same as eating a delicious cake. Dont scoff it all in 2 seconds but equally dont nibble and leave most of it.

USE your life - for one reason

Imagine as well if you will all the 1000's of sperms that YOU swam with before you were concieved. YOU were the product of that 1 sperm that won the race.

Think of all the people YOU might have been if those other 1000's of sperms won the race

YOU got the chance to live.

If there is such as thing as a soul and lets presume that all those sperms HAD souls they are sitting in the blackness and will do for eternity. They came from darkness and left with darkness.

Dont waste your life - for all the people YOU could have been. Live life for them, for all those that would have tried harder, all those that would have laughed more and had more sex.

Snatchypaws

If this is all there is....love & laugh...enjoy it because you only get one chance at life

Joust thinking about existing in your body and being able to feel/experience all kinds of things, it's amazing. I really dont want to dissapear to nothing.

If the soul exist its all good. If it dont exist I would say we have to create it then. else what a waste of infinity(if there is).

I am not religius or believe in any form of religion. I joust love my and peoples(life?) existance.

excuse my english

Have a nice day.

[edit on 10-3-2006 by Diclonius]

I really don't want to disappear to nothing.

Yeah, I know the feeling. Although when I've been unconscious and not just asleep, I have to say that I really didn't care one way or the other about existing. I could have stayed that way forever, and it wouldn't have made any difference. I don't feel happy or sad about it. The kind of non-existence I experienced doesn't have any qualities to it. "Balance," maybe, but it's not really a satisfying kind of balance. It's not anything.

It is hard to imagine not existing forever. It's like trying to remember what the universe was like before you were born. Before your first memory as a little kid. Nothing there. Not even the thick grayness that you get on a cloudy day.

Now, the Buddhists, and some Christian mystics, will tell you that those moments of "unknowing" are the only true experiences of reality. The true reality that lies underneath all the falsifications and distortions of perception and awareness. Maybe.

Enjoy pleasure, avoid pain. That'll work for me until I die, at least. At which point, all bets are off.