All of my life I have been a Secret atheist. I was brought up in a very strict religious family with many brothers and sisters. We attended church in a small store-front church in Newark NJ. Our faith required something called ‘tarrying’ to receive the Holy spirit. You had to get down on your knees and chant ‘Jesus’ until the Holy spirit supposedly entered into your body, at which time you would jump up and start shouting. This was very embarrassing to me, and I could not understand why God would want anyone to feel embarrassed. I didn’t want to be on my knees chanting, sweating, and drooling, and then have to get up and shout around the church floor. It really scared me a lot when I was younger. I wished that we were Catholic, and only needed to eat a cracker, drink some grape juice, and go to confession. I didn’t believe a lot of the stories that we learned about in the bible, but we were never allowed to question anything.

I decided first that I would rather not go to Heaven because it seemed boring, and I couldn’t believe that God would send you to Hell because you were too embarrassed to tarry to receive him. I had to pretend that I believed for fear of my family more then fear of Hell. I had no reason to believe that there was really a God, other than that I was TAUGHT to believe. I had more proof in my experience that there was no God then I had proof that there was one.

I had a horrible childhood in spite of how much I prayed for a better life. I spent my whole childhood being molested by three older brothers, and not one time did God save me from them.

When I heard about The Secret I was about fifty years old, and I didn’t believe in anything. I bought it shortly after I had been fired from my last job, and I was feeling a little depressed. I had the most incredible feeling after watching it that I decided to test it with the very DVD of The Secret that I had watched. When I first put it into my player there was something wrong with it. I could hear it OK, but the picture was completely out of focus. I wanted to take it back and exchange it, but it was so interesting from the start that I decided that I would play it through as long as I could hear it OK. Once it was over I didn’t feel like taking it back to the store, and I decided that I would put it back inside the DVD player, and it would work. I put it back in, and it did work – the picture was perfect.

I starting trying it out with parking spaces, and spaces opened up for me – it worked.

I also realized that my thirteen year old daughter had been doing this kind of thinking all along when she wanted something that I couldn’t get her. She always managed to get things that she wanted regardless of whether or not I could get them for her. At the time that I noticed this, she was about eleven years old. She wasn’t aware of doing it, she just knew that she wanted something, and she didn’t doubt that she would get it.

Now I have something to believe in. I know that I have a lot of work to do in reconditioning my thinking, but I love the process, it gives me hope, faith, and happiness. Oh!, and a challenge… I love challenges.

Sincerely
ShirleyOShirley