Observer

by Robert Lanza

But Kierkegaard wrote something that has stayed with me for a long time. He said, ‘There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.’

religion reflected humanity’s need to codify natural impulses of curiosity about nature and a desire for order, plus perhaps gratitude for life itself. Start with feelings and then build up around it beliefs and strictures that got thicker and thicker, like layers of nacre around a grain of sand. You ended up with rigid laws—cover your hair, no meat on Fridays, sit this way during meditation even if it hurts your spine, build points on roofs to keep out evil spirits. Or else. The original impulse to worship life was smothered in rules and fear.