What the heck does Zab believe?

Welcome

This is where I will try to explain my belief. I will not try to convince you to agree with me or share it, but I do demand that you respect it as my belief and don't try to make me convert into another religion or change my views. I like to discuss this and I am able to change if I find other theories that sound more convincing. Please, ''Jesus loves you'' or ''You will burn in hell'' is not convincing theories.
     I'm also writing this down to help myself to make clear what I really do believe and make the vague feeling I have about my belief more concrete. Feel free to ask me questions or tell about your views on things, but do it in a nice way and remember that I can only answer for myself, not for you or others. I can't get it all down in writing, but perhaps it can help you understanding at least a bit?



I will call myself Pagan. I'm not wicca or following any specialized kind of paganism. I'm taking what I want from other religions among with what I can believe, maybe that doesn't seem serious to you but I just can't make myself believe in the parts that doesn't fit with my way of life, just to squeese it into a name. What I believe is similiar to what pagans believe and some of you/them might say it's completely within the pagan ways, some might say it's not. I don't really care, it's my belief and the name doesn't matter, it's the same way to think no matter if you call it pagan or zabism or metagraphidiculuslios. Pagan is the closest and easiest way to describe it.

Magic. I believe in magic in the sense of manipulating energy to make yourself feel better. You could also call it positive thinking. If you think you'll make it, you'll make it, and if you think you'll fail you'll fail. I'm sure that this works for yourself, and I think that any ritual is only to help yourself focus on the positive sides and perhaps fool yourself a bit so that you'll really believe something good happens (since if you believe it it will happen ;) and that the rituall in itself doesn't really do anything. I'm not sure about how it is with others, if you can affect them. I do believe that if you meet them and talk to them and are happy and positiv, that will help them and in that case the 'magic' will work. If sending good energy through rituals when they don't know you're doing it works, I'm not sure. But if trying makes you feel better about it, why not? At least it can't harm. I believe that you can focus energy into symbols or things to affect the one who wears or uses it.
I have an altar and it happens that I perform some rituals, but I don't believe that the rituals have any power themselves, it's a way for me to express my belief and focus on what I want instead of letting my thoughts wander off.
I also believe in the threefold law very strong; what you gives comes back three times. So if you're nice and send out happy and good moods, then the people around you gets happy and that makes you more happy, as example.

Gods. I believe in the God and the Goddess as symbols, the sun is a god and earth and the moon is goddesses. I don't think they have the allmighty power but I think that by referring to them and trying to think like they would have or in the meaning of what they symbolise we can learn things and see things from other points of view. I do believe in spirits and 'ghosts', I've seen too many dead people not to. ;) Alright..I've only seen two, one of them a very dear friend to me. But that's enough to make me believe that we can chose to stay here a while when we've died. I don't think spirits or ghost can harm us, unless perhaps if they give us bad energy, in the same way humans can. (If you're in a bad mood, chances are you'll make others in a bad mood too.) I believe in guide spirits and totems; even if they're only made up in my mind, I've had much help from totems and spirits because by asking them for help or advice in meditation I have gotten answers. Perhaps I've only opened a door into myself that I didn't see before, but by believing a totem would show me something I found it.
    As I said before, gods and totems might very well be just my imagination, but that doesn't bother me since my belief in them have helped me feel better.

Science. I'm not against science in any way, it's just humans curiosity. Besides, science can't prove that anything in my belief is wrong, it has actually already showed that for example positiv thinking (as my ''magic'' is basicly) does work. And even if science sais that it rains because the water in the clouds gather together and gets too heavy so it falls down, that doesn't exclude that the reason it rains (or the reason the water does that) is to give life to the plants and animals on the ground, does it?

Nature I respect the nature, it has given us life and I don't think it belongs to us to abuse. Without nature we are nothing and we wouldn't survive. We shouldn't try to change it too much, like killing all predators as we have done in at least sweden; the balance is disturbed and now we have too many elks instead. But we have disturbed it so much I'm not sure if any attempts to help now would make it better or worse, I think we should try to stop it and let mother earth heal herself. I also think that both humans and animals needs to be in the nature sometimes, as often as possible. That's why I always feel sad when a cat (or other animal) is kept inside to never get out at all, I understand that it is because the owner care for it and don't want it to be hurt by a car or anything, but I still feel bad about it. I feel that it needs to feel soil under its paws once in a while. I want to keep a strong connection to nature, and since I now live on an old farm in the middle of nowhere, it's not too hard for me to get out and re-connect. I think that so many people who lives in the city feels psycically bad (stress etc.) because they've lost connection to nature. Of course, that is just what I think.

Symbols. I like to use symbols to decorate my belongings, to express myself and in those rituals I do make. My favourite is the pentacle; it looks nice and have a good meaning; symbolising the four elements and the spirit, eternity and the balance between this. I also like the unicursal hexagram, symbolizing the whole and the connection between the opposites. It's also as pretty as the pentacle :P
I usually have a yin-yang inside my pentacles to further symbolise the balance. I actually use most of the pretty looking symbols I can find with a good meaning. I believe you can put power/energy into symbols and things to affect the ones that comes in contact with it, but if there is no effort or focus when the symbol was made it's useless (except for decoration).

Life. I don't think life is a place to be while you wait for something better, life is a gift that you should enjoy as good as you can and live fully. Life is good!

Death. I believe in reinkarnation; that you will be re-born once you've died. I also think that when that time comes you can chose to be reinkarnated as anything you want and that death is just a passage between the different worlds and a new chance. I feel very comfortable ith this. I also think that you can chose not to live more or spend some time among the living as a guiding spirit or ghost.

Sexuality. Sex is good, it's a way to pleasure and a chance to give new life. It's nothing that should be forbidden or secret but something completely natural and healthy. Of course I don't support rape; anyone involved in it should be doing it of free will, that's pretty selfsaid isn't it?

Other people. I believe that everybody is worth as much as anyone else, both humans, animals and plants. I do accept that we kill animals for food and that humans care more about other humans than about for example spiders. I do that too, but that doesn't change that we are all important and that humans doesn't stand over animals in any way. Without animals we'd be pretty dead, and I value them for what they've done for us wether they wanted it or not.
I also think that everyone has the right to believe what they want. If you're christian or budhist doesn't matter for me as long as you don't try to convert me.

Thanks for reading.

I might add more here if anybody asks something interesting.