I don’t know the term to define when you come to believe something you learn as a child and never doubt it.  An example is religion. It is pumped into your head so much, so often at a young age that you actually believe in a Virgin birth and a resurrection.  How naïve I was.

Then one day you read something that suggests you need to investigate your core beliefs.  A simple run through the internet leaves you looking at yourself and wondering why it took so long to figure out the myth.  Then you look back at all the stupid ways you defended this ridiculous belief.

I believed that a person never really changed their personality; always accepted that as fact.  Then I challenged the word personality and somehow I figured the term was not personality but rather “basic” personality that doesn’t change.  I found no studies that supported this belief that did not have a poorly defined concept of basic.

Every serial killer can back track to drinking milk and having a poor upbringing.  But so can many well adjusted people.  The point being there are some things basic to all humans and you can look back and validate that your obsessing over your homework in third grade was and remains part of your compulsive study of Chinese at age 74.

Although I don’t see people changing their core personality, I believe that some do.  I believe that the change is evolutionary.  A genetic characteristic that is allowed to flourish and its sole purpose is change.

My change in my beliefs came as a form of adaptation.  I once had money, spent it foolishly, and did not develop long lasting relationships that helped define a character of giving.  The loss of funds and security led me to change, to adapt if you will.

I believe that if I had money now, I would return to that person and validate that people don’t change at their core, but right now I need to stay comfortable in my newly adapted self.  Then I think I might never return to that self centered person.  And if I did return to that old personality that would mean that my basic personality did not change.  And if I remained the same person I adapted into, only now with money, then people would say this behavior was the basic personality.

I used to want to win arguments, to be right, to show others I knew more about something than they did.  Now I listen, I bite my tongue and listen to people say and defend things I see as indefensible.  I still have the basic personality to be right and knowledgeable only I changed my desire to prove it.  Now when I ask quiet, thoughtful questions others see me as arrogant – and I am told that was always my basic personality.

I believe your basic personality does not change.  You learn, gain experience and adapt.  Sometimes you run out of energy or time. The proof: I still am naïve

My deceased wife was the smartest woman on the planet. Besides marrying me she earned a perfect score on the SAT. Her view on abortion was simple. She said it didn’t matter what she believed, abortion has been and always will be here.

I never gave abortion much thought. My wife had lupus and could not have children. We adopted three great kids. One was 11 years old and he said he was against abortion because he believed he wouldn’t be here if abortion was accepted from the state of his adoption.
I decided to make a decision on abortion. No matter my opinion, nothing about abortion will change. I will not preach to anyone on what decision they might choose but I, if asked, I will have an opinion.
The most frequent response to my question, “What is your opinion on abortion?” was “It’s a woman’s choice.”
When I said that was not an answer to my question, people tended to get a bit testy. (Maybe the way I spoke) I found that the issues of women’s rights and abortion had been merged. It became difficult to separate the issues. But I persisted and pressed the question.
I must have given the impression that I was judging because people responded in angry defensive tones. They answered the question by defending their beliefs against what other people believed. For example, if they were liberal they were for abortion, if they were conservative they were against abortion (but not always-another blog). And with that label they vented anger at the other side more than give a thoughtful response to a simple question. In fact, nearly everyone said it was a loaded question.
I had exceptions thrown at me as a reason to be for abortion. This meant that if there was one exception then it could never be fair. I did not recall asking the fairness of abortion or any exceptions, but I plodded on.
It boiled down to deciding when the fetus became human. I came to understand that an unwanted pregnancy, no matter the reason, could be aborted because it was not human. It was simply a legal definition, not a moral one. To avoid a murder charge, abortion hinged upon the fetus not being human.
That argument made legal sense to me but I asked if a fetus in the womb ever was known to develop into anything other than a human and edgy became angry. This led to discussions about eggs and chickens.
The foreign country I live in has no law against killing an animal. So if I was driving down the street and I saw Gary and his dog, and I truly disliked Gary, I would go to jail if my car struck him. But since his dog is not human I would not be legally culpable if my car struck the dog. I might get negligent driving or something similar but my point is clear. I would not consider killing a dog on moral grounds, not legal definitions.
I heard a comedian say that there is a place called Bimbo where all the aborted children are awaiting their mothers. No men involved there, so I’m clear.
But I know that excluding special circumstances such as rape or incest, that I am against abortion. In terms of unintended pregnancies which are about 46 percent, the percentage of rape and incest is relatively low. The Guttmacher institute tabulates this information state by state, I do not know world wide statistics.
I further understand our culture and its right to make changes in definitions to justify a behavior. There are many ways to prevent unwanted pregnancies that would not make abortion an issue but as my wife used to say, “it’s not going to change.”

I chose this as my foundation blog.  This way some people will not have to follow my blog because they might not accept my belief.

I was raised Catholic and went to Catholic grammar school.  Up until 6^th grade I attended mass every day. I trusted the nuns and believed all the stories.  Deep inside I knew none of this to be true.

When Sister Frances Lucille told us that you could recognize a Jew because they had a horn in the middle of their head, I believed her.  In fact,  a group of us ten year olds went downtown(Chicago) during the St. Patrick’s day parade, shimmied a lamp post and searched for Jews.

We compared sightings after the parade and realized that the commonly worn Fedora sheltered us from our search.  I did not get upset until I was old enough to realize how naïve I could be.

My  Catholic grammasr school tried to block my going to a public high school.  I now know why.  I received alternative information.   I could talk to people about things the Catholics forbade.

I do not believe in a personal God.  No one is watching out for me and if there is, He is doing a very poor job.  I feared telling people my beliefs because it cost me employment and status.  So I feigned religious beliefs.

In my years of work as a paramedic and neuropsychologist I watched people use their religion to garner votes, money and power.  I saw people talk one way and behave another.  Yet I truly admired people who had faith.

I wish I had faith.  But I saw faith as a delusion – a false belief.  If you can hold that belief on your death bed, more power to you.  You will pass calmly with the belief of something more.

I am owed nothing.  I am not going to arrogantly state that I climbed down from the evolutionary tree because I had a God.  In fact, there are too many Gods right now.

When I die, I will cease to exist; nothing more and nothing less.  I know so many people who have substituted God with energy fields, spiritualism, bright lights and other hidden forces.

These alternative beliefs are no different than believing in God.  I enjoy the supreme being people who deny a religious God but acknowledge another being.  A few simple questions and I quickly figure out they don’t have a belief but they are hedging their bets or hiding like I did – from what they believe.

I still am embarrassed by my beliefs, but they make sense to me.  Here’s what gets me;  I will be chastised, pitied, thought differently of by the very people who profess a God.  I will still be me and will end up in the same place as everyone else.

I do not make comments about anyone’s beliefs.  I am fascinated by other beliefs.  I want to know how they attained their beliefs, how they practice their faith and what they believe will happen when they die.

The most common response I get to the question, “Do you believe in God?”  is  “I believe in a supreme being”  I  generally do not get a direct answer and if I do and press the question, I learn much about  the failings of religion.

This is the only question I did not need to research in the A-Z  Blog Challenge, and from the people I questioned about God the responses indicated more confusion than I could categorize.  It seemed my belief had a stronger foundation.

ABBA is not a musical group to me as much as a philosophy. In deciding what I wanted to write about for 26 days in the A-Z blogging challenge I turned to ABBA for guidance.  I realized I can’t know you because I don’t know me.

I live in a city and country, Cuenca, Ecuador which I believe is the return landing site for alien abductions.  What’s interesting is most of the returnees speak English and call themselves expats (Extraordinary People At Their Stupidest).

It’s true I do check my body for homing devices once a day.  But I noticed that I do not do so in the morning, the usual time for suspected alien involvement, but rather in the night after my encounters with the Expats.  Somebody has to be checking my sanity as I attempt to absorb the various spiritual beliefs, the political interpretations,  economic absurdities and social misconceptions while holding on to a science education. Heck, I’m still reeling from the virgin birth and here I have energy fields, bright lights, shaman rituals, satanic practices, near death experiences and angry judgmental people telling me not to be judgmental.  Luckily, any of these methods to salvation can be attained for a nominal fee.

I truly enjoy the intelligent people who believe there are two political parties.  They slam each other as they are actively manipulated to do so.  They call each other names, make money selling their ideas on TV or in books, they have a cottage industry of opposition.  There is only one party –  the Money Party or the Ruling Party.  Either way you are allowed to believe what you want to believe as long as you pay your tithes or taxes.

A disclaimer here.  After 31 years of interviewing murderers, rapists and various criminals as a forensic neuropsychologist, I certainly see things from a perspective not many have.  I begin by clarifying that humans will be heavily influenced by their early upbringing.  I had fantastic, loving, old-school parents.  I came from an intact family yet I feel I must defend this because I was not abused, did not need rehab, went to church and held beliefs.  It’s these early beliefs I find as ground zero for my personality.

My parents were registered Democrats in Chicago.  My dad use to say you were registered at birth and one of the advantages was that on election day your ballot was already filled out.  If you chose to fill it out yourself they called you a conservative Democrat.

Now, at age 64, if you asked my opinion on a subject I would give you my thoughts and I would not necessarily know why I held that opinion.  I now realize how much the news media has influenced my thinking.  I read a lot with a critical eye.  I see the rhetoric, the clever manner in which the truth is withheld or slanted.  The cleverness of this rhetoric is that the truth appears absurd to a mind given a steady diet of GMO’s (Grand Mixed-up Opinions).

So, I decided to wipe the slate clean and find out why I believe what I believe.  I will use logic, even resorting to Plato’s dialectics.  I may even change my thinking but rest assured I will know why I stand where I stand.  I make no excuses for my thinking and the resultant views.  Some of my beliefs may actually be held in abeyance because I can’t find a steady footing.

I invite you to comment on the blog.  Your thoughts or views will be considered.  I will use the aforementioned dialectics in weighing your comments.  Remember you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.

As ABBA said, “one of us is lying, one of us is dying.”  Don’t be both.