Note: This article is not about questioning religious beliefs. Its about what faith stands for.
Life is a struggle from the word go. Probably a bunch of free-loaders and people with rich mommy and daddy would not agree to this but for a larger percentage of people, life is indeed a struggle. It poses a series of challenges and ups/downs. Either you evolve or you perish as you try to navigate yourself through life. Most of the times, you tend to look at areas which would be comforting, areas or entities that would allow a person to cope well with the challenges.
People tend to believe what they see. More often than not, its what other people saw which goes virals makes people believe that yes it did happen. How many have seen God and His work? Very few? a handful? and how many people believe in God and the fact that His work is always something that happens and solves problems? Billions, Zillions? Countless number of people still believe that God works His way to restore order in lives of people who have been hit by a number of challenges. Some is just simple blind faith while some is experienced faith.
Mostly, it is the former. However, psychologically speaking, His presence in thoughts does help the people who need to be helped. But over time it does get converted into blind faith. I have seen a lot of really bad people (bad in terms of character and approach) donating a lot of serious money to temples in the name of God. I am not sure of the thought process behind this. Maybe they think that paying such a big load of money would rid them of their sins (yea they really think bribing is the approach here as well). However, the lesser people tend to follow in their footsteps. This is a form of faith transference. So, people see a rich person getting away with a lot of crap, getting blessed with an awesome quality of life, start to believe that yes big sacrifices would give them the key to solving life’s problems.
Ultimately what i think is that faith is the most purest form of sense of support. When up against a lot of adversity, the mind still wants to know that it is still been accepted and supported by someone. Most of the people inherently take support from God and His ways in order to get their ways through. This is because of everything in and around your life, God is omni-present and can be found almost everywhere. So, a readily available supply of support is what people get when they want God on their side. Support gives strength, strength gives coherence of thoughts, coherence gives confidence, confidence gives self belief, self belief solves problem - simple with a tricky starting point.
It all comes down to what you think would give you the best confidence and SELF BELIEF. For me for instance, is the notion that my parents, my wife and the rest of my family would be there for me no matter what which allows me to get through my troubled times. Recently, I came to experience that. I tried finding solace in God but I found better solace speaking with my loved ones, giving me coherence, giving me confidence and belief. That is all that is required to get the requisite tools to solve a problem.
Life throws you a curl ball one after the other. People need support to handle the tricky nature of this life’s aspect. Most find comfort in God. A few, like me, find that same comfort in my loved ones. In the end, it is the form of faith that equips the person to find that particular ounce of strength needed to overcome life’s problems and give person a confidence to move ahead in life. We need to think where we put our faith in?
