Leaving dogma behind is like discarding a confining diving suit

I've read a couple of chapters in David McRaney's book, "How Minds Change: The Surprising Science of Belief, Opinion, and Persuasion." 

One chapter I skipped ahead to read, because I was curious to learn how some people enmeshed in the hateful Westboro Baptist Church were able to leave this Christian cult. 

(The book says Westboro members would do things like protesting the funeral of Matthew Shepard, "a young gay man who was beaten, tortured, and left for dead in a remote portion of Wyoming by two men who offered him a ride home from a bar. At his funeral, the church carried signs that read NO TEARS FOR QUEERS.")

Here's some excerpts from the Westboro chapter. They're about Zach, who used to be a Westboro member. The first passage relates to the fact that a gay waiter at an Olive Garden restaurant recognized Zach as having recently left Westboro.

After that meal [which the gay waiter paid for], he started wondering if all of the assumptions tied to his former life were true. If his beliefs about gay men were wrong, then what else? 

His first thoughts were of Lady Gaga and Katy Perry and how Westboro had told them the girls who go to their concerts were "simple sluts." Simple-minded, stupid, and promiscuous. He immediately, and for the first time, questioned it.

He felt overwhelmed by a torrent of information that he once considered noise. All at once, he began to feel an intense uncertainty not only about what was true, but about who he was.

He said the most alarming thing was the realization that if he had gone to Olive Garden while he was still in the church, the waiter's act of kindness might not have made any difference at all. He would have found a way to interpret it differently.

Zach was still unpacking what it all meant. He was shocked to realize he was open to all sorts of change, and once he realized it, an array of alternative beliefs, attitudes, and values became newly acceptable.

"The first time I talked to a Jewish person, I thought what Westboro taught me at first, and then I was like, 'I don't want to listen to that.' I want to try to see reality for what it is. I want to think with an open mind and to make discoveries. There's a great deal of mystery in this world that I walk in, in this universe."

Today, he said, "I have gay friends. I have bisexual friends. I have pansexual friends." He was still struggling, though, still rebuilding his models, still expanding his mind. Zach said he recently began dabbling with Buddhism.

Zach reiterated that he didn't leave the church because he changed his opinions; he changed his opinions because he left the church. And he left the church because it had become intolerable for other reasons. 

Leaving opened him up to the possibility he could be wrong about many things, and that began a difficult period of rebirth.

...His whole life, Zach remained trapped in dogma, wearing it like a diving suit, interacting with the same world as the people shouting from across the picket line but never making actual human connection with it.

Zach has since taken off that suit.

He is even taking part in the parallel universe across the street. He's spent time at Equality House and participated in pickets against the church, holding signs with messages like YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL and FORGIVE AND FORGET. At those protests, he shouts, "Let's kill them with kindness," and "Let's show them what loving your neighbor is all about."

...I said it reminded me of what we had spoken about earlier, an insight from Piaget: how once we learn something is incorrect, we also learn that the source from which we learned that thing can be incorrect, which opens us up to the idea that maybe the sources we trust could be wrong about a lot of other things.

Comments

[Ron E.]

“Leaving dogma behind is like discarding an confining diving suit.” “...His whole life, Zach remained trapped in dogma, wearing it like a diving suit. . .”

An apt way of describing the dogmas we carry about with us. Not as dramatic as Zach's' story of leaving his deep conditioning behind, though I’m sure we all have strong investments in our own particular dogmas (beliefs, opinions etc.) We do seem to approach life from a position that is in effect from within a sphere, a thought sphere or bubble. This solid sphere consists of years of accumulation of knowledge or information acquired from birth through experiences.

The spheres are our minds, the storehouses of our experiences and though useful and necessary to us we do attempt to solve our problems and to ascribe meanings to the world, the universe, life and ourselves from within our own limited sphere.

The mind demands explanations. It seeks security (a natural reaction) through ideas, opinions, knowledge, beliefs and ascribing meanings for everything. And our cultures are awash with 'explanations', explanations that effectively block us from our own self inquiry. Instead, we accept the current religious and other explanations and try to live with their inconsistencies.

We are conditioned to believe that the ego/self is a separate entity that 'runs' the show called 'me'. Such a concept is difficult to break away from mainly because each successive generation perpetuates the myth, enclosing us effectively in our own protective thought sphere. Everyone has their own created bubble bouncing along on the sea of reality which effectively acts as a buffer toward realising the reality that is all around.

Perhaps then, what is generally called realisation (enlightenment or awakening) is to see this sphere for what it is and if its myriad facets are seen clearly enough to know that such seemingly impenetrable constructions are the main cause of our troubles

[Karim W. Rahmaan]

RE: Leaving dogma behind is like discarding a confining diving suit

Some things can be misleading or bad. Causing an association with those who only live to spread an abomination.

On the other hand, one may find a yogi who was given a bad reputation. But in a real life encounter with this lowly yogi of some bad wacky rumors, one may find that one's life had been saved, if it were not for the yogi. See, in the ghetto we had a saying; never listen to the jaw jackers -let's go ask the original gangsta himself.

So if I believed even an man from India was a rooty poo, just cuzz some internet gangsters said so. I'd be a fool to judge this yogi who may really possess the hidden Secret of the Fame, I helm from the streets & dodged bullets, some point blank, to survive, and hold out for.