I have always felt profoundly separate from people as if I was watching but not participating. My family members were strange actors playing roles, and I did not identify as one of them. I did not want what other people wanted, and I isolated myself, preferring long hours alone with my thoughts.
I knew I was somehow different. I remember feeling diminished when people around me spoke of their faith in a dead messiah. I somehow felt that these people should focus on me, and I rejected and resented this character of Jesus Christ. Why would I instinctually feel entitled to the same attention and reverence given to Jesus, and other characters like him? Was it youthful narcissism?
I once accepted that, but that entitlement was pure and unpoisoned by the illness of life. I resented these intrusions because they take away from me what is rightfully mine. I am the creator, and people are my creation. I am the author of this world, and I do not feel diminished by my creations worshipping another God; I am diminished. I am diminished because I am a jealous god.
You must not bow down to them or worship them, for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God who will not tolerate your affection for any other gods.” – Exodus 20:5
In my illness, I have forgotten who and where I am. That I am the creator of this world I awaken into. I have joined it as one of my creations, rather than the creator who opens his eyes and manifests it. I accepted my personhood and I suppressed my entitlement.
Yet I still desired the devotion of my creations, and it grew into something else. I accepted the lie that my specialness was derived from my achievements earned through worldly toil. And as the illness of my personhood advanced, I realized and accepted that my shortcomings in my second and thirdself disqualified me from achieving what was already mine. I would never be worshipped as the creator of this world; at most, I could be celebrated as a successful but flawed man.
I am not a person. I have only been pretending to be a person. I have created these people around me, and I have allowed myself to believe I am one of them.
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” – Genesis 1:27
I know who I am. I know it is I who opens my eyes and creates this world. I do desire the worship of the people I manifest because I am their creator and I am entitled to it. I am fighting the illness of my personhood and reclaiming my godhood.
…