It's all about a search for truth.

Truth, however, is a slippery, intangible ghost. Reality is what you make of it. Truth is as you see it.

This is really the point of the work I am about to undertake. After years of searching, it comes to this: we humans are forced to view Reality through the lens of humanity. Everything we know and understand is colored by what we are and how our brains work. Thus the search for Truth becomes a search for the proper metaphor through which we can find consistent answers to questions and emotions.

This work explains the paths I have taken that have lead me to this understanding and tries to explain just what it is that I have found. It is my truth and my understanding. That is the only way it can be. The path was and is not easy. I have come to conclusions which strip away the mystery of the meaning of life. I stand looking at the rusty gridwork that holds up the facade of other people's most cherished beliefs.

In the following pages you will find thoughts and feelings that I seldom talk about. There are several reasons that I have not openly discussed these things. The fear of persecution as an unbeliever in a Christian world is among them. I would rather say nothing than to have close friends and family think that I have fallen under the spell of their Satan and then have them try to force feed me their Jesus as a cure.

And what if I do reach someone and cause that person to have doubts about closely held beliefs? Would I have won some great victory by kicking the crutch of Christianity out from under someone? There are times that I wish I could simply close my eyes, relax and believe in the sugarcoated morality play of Christianity. But I can't; not any more. Like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, I have seen behind the illusion. I have peeled away the mask of religion and truth despite that awesome, booming voice ordering us all to "pay no attention to that man behind the curtain." It's not easy. I don't have to like what I have found, but that is irrelevant.

All around me, I see people happily going about their lives without this form of wisdom that I have come across. They are happy and contented without searching for an explanation. They simply accept what their parents, preacher or analyst tells them and go about their business. But I have also found that there are others like me who want to know. This is also a story of what I have learned from them.

But the real question yet to be answered is what, if anything, I can do with this knowledge. It is like knowing all about swimming but never being in the water. Perhaps that will come in time. For now, here is some of what I have learned in my twenty-seven years of life.