I’d like to tell you about a client of mine, with whom I’ve been working for a few years now. She suffered from ill health, a stagnant career life, an unfulfilling marriage, and was living in a small rural town with limited resources. The friends she would mention were usually those who let her down and otherwise undermined her.

This client did not, at least on the surface, seem to appreciate me reminding her that many of her life’s circumstances were of her own choosing. She may not have liked them, but she was very afraid to let go of them, either. Likewise, she had a defeatist attitude towards embracing what she could do to at least begin to make some changes.

One evening, we were going around and around in circles as usual, with me insisting that if she chose to act, she could completely transform her life. Likewise, if she chose to do nothing, then she would be at the mercy of other’s whims, desires and life directions. She defended her position intensely: “whatever I try, it doesn’t work!”

Finally, I stepped back, took a breath, and asked her, “Do you have any kind of religious or spiritual faith? Do you ever just pray for anything?” She immediately responded, “Well, I used to, but how can I believe in any kind of God who would allow me to suffer like this? There’s either no God at all, or the God that exists isn’t worth my time praying to!”

Wow. So the conclusion is, if God doesn’t give us what we want, we give up on the relationship altogether? Or we deny the existence of God altogether? Either way, that doesn’t sound very comforting.

I cannot prove God exists. As an anthropologist, I know that people in different cultures have widely varying belief systems. Some believe in one God, some believe in multiple gods. Some believe God is a vastly improved human-type, with human sympathies, compassion and wish-granting abilities. Others believe God is judgmental, intolerant, punishing and favors one group of believers over another. I also know that many happy, successful, positive and deeply moral atheists and agnostics are rattling around…I met plenty of them growing up in the Unitarian-Universalist church.

But the reason I was concerned for my client was not that she had given up on God. Many people lose faith in their religions, and go through deep periods of questioning and doubt. I do not believe it is wrong to question dogma, as long as you hang in there long enough to come up with your own answers to it. My reason for being concerned for my client was that she had given up on God because she’d made an assumption that God was there to give her what she wanted. If she didn’t get what she wanted, she was “breaking up” with God, and leaving it at that. She didn’t replace her relationship with God with anything else. Not a philosophical understanding, not faith in humanity—not even a willingness to stand alone in the void and just wonder. Rather, she was stuck in her rejection, staring at a door she’d slammed and unable to knock on anyother.

My client seemed to suffer from a deep sense of being cheated by life and abandoned by all. She desperately wanted someone, anyone, to ease her pain of isolation and frustration. But looking outside ourselves for remedies only brings us misery. Each and every one of us, I believe, has the Divine Force of spirit within us. I can’t define it, I can’t prove it, and I don’t care what it’s called, but I do believe it’s there. But likewise, I do not give God the job of making me happy or making things go the way I want them to. If I pray, it will be for things like strength of character, or peace of mind, or courage or good cheer, or compassion or generosity or forgiveness. I don’t pray for stuff. If I want stuff, it’s up to me and my relationship with my fellow human beings to work that out.

If your relationship with God goes through some changes in life, don’t worry. After Mother Theresa died, very private letters of hers were released in which she admitted that it had been many years since she truly felt what she was urging others to have faith in. Life IS mysterious, and there are questions that we may not ever find the answers to in this lifetime or even the next (if there is one!). But it is my experience that the greatest suffering a human can put himself through is to live shallowly, fearfully and greedily. These characteristics indicate a fundamental lack of trust in the life process. You are a spiritual being having a human experience, so when your humanity pains you, turn to the greater part of you that is more connected with the Universal Divine Force. In this you will find greater peace, the inner godhead.

 Be of good cheer!