Meatloaf

You thought you hated meatloaf, but you just had never had good meatloaf.

Then it hit you, Wait, I like all the stuff in meatloaf. Why would I not like meatloaf?  

I like what meatloaf is supposed to be.  

You decided that meatloaf itself not bad; poorly-made meatloaf is bad and well-made meatloaf is delicious.

After some research, you learned that meatloaf is not really a set dish but a way to simply and deliciously combine leftover ingredients that need to be used and turn them into something new together.

Once you broke it back down to the ingredients,
tried different recipes,
realized what it really was
and got a taste of what it could be,

you were amazed to find
you loved meatloaf.

My God is like your meatloaf.

Different people in my life and for thousands of years throughout history have cooked up God wrong. Mostly good-intentioned people made God bland or mushy or overcooked or cheap, added incorrect ingredients or just totally misunderstood the whole thing. Worse, bad people used meatloaf for bad reasons and gave people a bad taste in their mouth for even the best meatloaf.

I got sick of the kind of God I was always being fed. But then I broke God back down to the ingredients.

life and love and wholeness
peace and joy and goodness
freedom and empowerment
acceptance and belonging

centeredness
groundedness
a deeper focus
on the few things that really matter

and true connection
to self,
to this moment,
with others
and somehow with reality itself

I even learned new meanings for these words. The ingredients tasted so different when fresh. They weren't loaded anymore with the chemicals, additives and processes others had put on them. They were a new thing entirely, being used in a whole new way.

I tried different versions of God, read about different religions and mindsets and arguments
and eventually decided God didn't fit in a set religion, and that I didn't need a recipe.

God wasn't a set thing, concretely defined
but a way, a source, a force

Much less objective than I had been told,
much less certain
and so much more delicious.