The Soul’s Journey – Faith vs. Belief.

Recently, I mentioned to a friend that I thought that truly held belief had great power, no matter what the belief. She responded that she didn’t like the word belief, she liked the word faith. I reflected for a moment, and realized that I didn’t like the word faith.

Now I know language can carry baggage. Words can create different feelings depending on one’s views and past. I recall teaching a group to explore poetry from a deeper level. When I recited the words, “Oh, Lord Creator, hallowed one“, two thirds of the group criticized the poet for inappropriate language. Yet when we explored deeper it became clear that they all had previous wounds from Christianity.

I examined my own feelings towards the word faith and knew it was connected to my upbringing in an evangelical Christian household. I recall discussing my lack of belief in her religion with my mother when I was a teenager, she responded, “you’ve got to have faith.” My reply, “you can’t got to with faith, mum.” I saw faith as a tool that was used to override logic, reality and science.

Now I sense my distaste for the word 65 years later still relates to that early upbringing. The unconscious is a powerful force as Carl Jung once observed, “once you realize the power of the unconscious, you know you are no longer master in your own house.”

So are belief and faith, the same thing and is the difference purely the feelings that my friend and I have towards the words? I was curious, and began my research with dictionary definitions: the Cambridge Dictionary state that belief is, the feeling of being certain that something exists or is true. It defines faith as “great trust or confidence in something or someone.” This did not entirely reassure me. It reminded me of an encyclopedia I had a school. When you looked up gnat it said “see fly” and when you looked up fly it read “see gnat”

Continuing to explore I found a paper on faith vs belief by an Oxford professor of philosophy Mark Wrathall who stated, “Faith involves reliance and trust, and it endures in the face of doubts, whereas belief is simply something we take to be true.” Plausible yet not entirely convincing and seemingly contradictory to the Cambridge dictionary.

I journeyed on. In the Thesaurus faith and belief are considered synonyms of each other. In religious terms faith seems to be considered more resolute than belief which can be transient and shift. In the Merriam-Webster Dictionary they imply that faith always has certitude whether there is evidence or not, while belief may or may not imply certitude.

Alan Watts, bringer of Eastern philosophy to the west in the fifties and author of Wisdom and Security, A Message for an Age of Anxiety goes a step further and says, “We must here make a clear distinction between belief and faith, because, in general practice, belief has come to mean a state of mind which is almost the opposite of faith.” He goes on to say, “Faith, on the other hand, is an unreserved opening of the mind to the truth, whatever it may turn out to be.”

My challenge with that statement besides its absolutism, is that it is dangerous. Who decides on what is this truth in which to have faith. Too many religious zealots have proclaimed faith in their dangerous assertions. Too often it seems to me that faith becomes “blind faith” and is no longer open to change or healthy transformation.

To suggest there is generally confusion between the concepts of faith and belief is an understatement. The old idiom comes to mind, “you pays your money and you takes your chances.” So far I have been informed that faith and belief are the same, they are opposites and many variations in between the two. Perhaps each of us need to discern what works best for us, I have held many beliefs in my life but have always tried to be open to transition when life, experience, knowledge or perspective encourages me to shift.

My conclusion is that I will avoid faith and stick with belief even if I can be accused of inconstancy and lack of certitude – because maybe that is a good thing. As my teacher and mentor, author Jungian analyst James Hollis says, “ there are only answers that make sense to you at this moment in your life, and they will fail you tomorrow. What is seemingly true today will be outgrown when your life also brings us a larger frame through which to view them.”

The Soul’s Journey – Midlife Crisis

Carl Jung believed that mid life was a psychological age not a chronological one. He considered the first half of life was all about living in the world: education, career, family, material things and generally establishing our persona. He thought the second half of life would focus on finding meaning, purpose and understanding of our place in a larger context. By the time I began to study Jung my mid life crisis was years behind me.

A friend, knowing of my experience, sent me a link to a recent episode on the CBC program called Tapestry. Mary Hynes did a program on the midlife crisis. She interviewed Andrew Jamison the author of a book titled Midlife Humanity’s Secret Weapon. He describes being a successful businessman and part of a loving family when he suffered from what could be described as a clinical depression in midlife. The impact kept him confined to bed for weeks. He tells the story of how, with the help of a Jungian analyst he recovered, and eventually became a therapist himself. He describes the midlife crisis as a rebirth, a desperately needed evolution for humanity, “breakdown leads to breakthrough.”

After listening to this podcast I began reflecting on my own mid life crisis. Like Andrew Jamison’s mine had resulted in transformation but from a dramatically different journey. At the age of 45 I fell madly in love with a stunning 27-year old, who resisted my advances, not wanting to get involved with a married man. Eventually I wore her down by literally promising her the world and two-years later I left wife, career, home and friends to cash in all my airline points on two first class tickets around the world. It was an amazing trip and somehow we survived in relationship. At some point I believe it was in Switzerland, she told me she wanted to get married so we planned a wedding for our return.

In hindsight it all looks so boringly predictable. Older man, fearing impending aging, tries to recapture youth in what Freud referred to as the “repetitive compulsion”. There are so many men reportedly following this path that Mary Hynes suggests that the idea of mid-life crisis has become a joke.

Mine was certainly was not a Jungian psychological break through and I gave little thought to meaning, purpose and understanding life. Then the unexpected occurred. After only 17 months of marriage she decided to leave. I was “gobsmacked”. Nothing had prepared me. It was as though the foundation of my life had crumbled like a sandcastle in the waves. Without realizing it I had built all my expectations for my future to be established on another person. Without her I felt like the earth with no sun. I was lonely, despairing with no anchor to my life.

Thanks to some therapy, personal resilience, and support of friends I began a recovery and finally began to explore what my life meant. I entered the second phase of my mid-life crisis. I am curious whether a midlife crisis requires trauma to result in any permanent change. In hindsight it became clear to me that I needed a dramatic shake up to begin the second half of my life.

I could see similarities in my experience and that of Andrew Jamison, but I could also see significant differences. I got to travel around the world, rather than be unable to get out of bed. His trauma seemed to erupt from a positive, rewarding life, much of which he has retained. Mine from a chaotic life in advertising that was shallow, self serving and spiritually bereft. (In fact an astrologist I once consulted thought I would have died in my fifties if I had not changed my life.)

The consequence of his crisis was to find meaning in psychology and eventually becoming a therapist. The consequence of mine was to find meaning in spirituality; I explored all the great wisdom traditions, spent some time at theological college and became a spiritual coach. Eventually my search led me to Jung and an exploration of my psychology. I had to learn that spirituality without psychology creates a lack of balance.

So we both had a breakdown that led to breakthrough yet I am left with so many unanswered questions. What proportion of us have midlife crises? Does everyone face what Jung describes as “the second half of life”. Do women and men experience this equally? What proportion of midlife crises lead to breakthrough? What proportion result in trauma and can you achieve transformation without trauma?

My friend and author Nancy Monson in her book Midlife Rebirth, suggests that many women at the age of 45, give or take a few years, will experience a crisis in their lives, often exacerbated by menopause. She suggests this can be the catalyst to discover a “deeper more fulfilling life”.

If this indeed is an integral part of our evolution then we must learn to treat it with respect. We owe it to ourselves to explore the issues underlying the dramatic and at times distressing moments in our lives. As the great Socrates espoused over 2400 years ago, “the unexamined life is not worth living.”