Greetings: dyed-in-the-wool atheist, complete 180 in less than 6 months

[Parsons]

Thank you, brother (sister?).  As you know, I have felt all this first-hand. It took me several years to heal myself, but I have got to a place that I truly feel happy with me life. Or at least I now fluctuate between a baseline neutral/okay all the way up to truly elated to be alive. The roller coaster is slowly evening out. I still have only a couple close relationships, but for the most part, it's enough for me. I am kind of lone wolf. I posted the OP in late 2011, after being very dysfunctional for probably 10 years. I reached multiple milestones where I thought I had fixed myself (10 months prior to Dec 21st 2012, I felt and acted like a zen-master or something). One year after 2012 I (again) thought I had healed myself. It turned out I was pretty suicidal still (I thought myself and everyone else was going to abruptly transition, which essentially meant dying). I had to heal that 'wanting to leave' feeling. I would say I came to this state around late 2013, maybe 2014. I have my melancholy moments, but they are brief and I have learned how to process things much more effecietly.

One of the biggest things I have gotten very good at is acceptance of my current state of being. It's a lot trickier than it seems because it's easy to trick yourself into thinking you've accepted a particular personality trait, then catch yourself unconsciously slipping out of acceptance (sometimes much later). Once you can accept it, catalyst in that area will actually let up to some degree. Specifically, I have accepted I am a lone wolf. The best way I've come to think about it is likening it to the wildly different types of animals. Try comparing an eagle to a porcupine; they live vastly different lives in vastly different roles. Is one truly 'better' than the other? Should the porcupine go around trying to act like an eagle? Isn't it better for the eagle to act like an eagle, and the porcupine to act like a porcupine? I think it's possible to consciously change your personality, but I think it takes a great deal of time and effort. And if you try to do that, you can't be something that you're not. You can only change your nature if you truly accept and become that nature first. It's kind of like looking at your car parked 10 miles down the road and trying to imagine / will the car to drive down the road. You have to walk up to the car, get in, and gradually drive to your destination. It may seem like a mountain of work looking up at the summit from the bottom, but if you take it one step (one day) at a time, it gets easier and you become pleased with your progress looking behind you down the hill. You just have to keep slowly progressing, however. (Sorry for all the cheesy metaphors   ) Anyways, that's my 2 cents. Do what you will.

As for trying to share the LOO, I never did anything extremely satisfying. I ended up with a close friend that I met at work around mid 2012 whom I later found out has been a very close friend over multiple lifetimes. It's kind of odd though... He's my best friend, but we still very much keep each other arm's length. We stopped working together and started hanging out at a bar a few times a month. I sort of spilled my guts out to him about the LOO and my life philosophy / beliefs. It took me about a year of that to finally go over everything. He's always said that he finds it interesting; he even tried to start reading the LOO a couple times, but it never seemed to take hold. Either way, after I told him my beliefs, I have felt pretty satisfied about it ever since. I let my beliefs color my actions, but practically never tell the source of my philosophy (if it happens to be directly from the LOO material). Mostly I keep to myself. I do have a small desire to speak about the LOO and related philosophy in person, but I mostly get my fix from this forums.


Anyways, I wish you well and hope something I said helps you in some way.