ONSITE Believe in Yourself: An Autotheism Discussion w/ Matt Willi

From the Greek meaning “self-god,” autotheism is the practice of turning worship and prayer inward toward the self, focusing on one’s own divinity or divine connection as a wellspring of spiritual understanding and power. It is a simple and often intuitive philosophy which, for a variety of reasons, is largely overlooked in religious discussions. The format for this group is a casual discussion of religious philosophy with a focus on bringing concepts of autotheism to into the modern spiritual awareness. The objective is simply to get people talking about the ideas and finding their own interpretations and potential applications within their own religious philosophy. As a largely unexplored concept, autotheism offers great potential for new interpretations and schools of thought and being your own god (or goddess) of your religion puts you in control of your own game with your own rules. While the main focus will be the discussion of philosophical and religious concepts, we will also discuss methods of implementing practices of self-worship for anyone interested in applying them in their own lives.

This being a religious discussion, Participants will be encouraged to share and discuss beliefs and practices in a tolerant and nonjudgmental atmosphere. The format is a discussion group rather than a lecture or class, so the focus is on getting the conversation started and allowing the group as a whole to guide the narrative, and on allowing individuals to interpret and apply concepts in their own way.

I am a relative newcomer to bliss. I joined the community in an effort to increase my spiritual awareness, and I am creating this discussion group in service of that goal, to learn from and incorporate into my own life the beliefs and practices of others within the community while at the same time introducing them to my own perspective and philosophy.

My journey with autotheism began as an attempt to contextualize a deep and often overwhelming personal connection with the divine that I have experienced in my life. Like many denizens of the Holy City, I had a fairly traditional Catholic upbringing. Attempts to rationalize the feelings that came over me in the context of Christian monotheism only led to greater confusion, as I had been taught that divinity was reserved for God alone. When these attempts at rationalization ultimately failed to accomplish anything more than to cause the people around me to begin questioning my sanity, I set about creating a philosophy of belief for myself that centered around the spark of divinity that I believe resides in each and every one of us. After a bit of research, I stumbled upon the term “autotheism,” and found that it was a perfect fit for the philosophy I was attempting to embrace. However, I was disappointed to learn that further information beyond a simple dictionary definition of the term was almost non-existent. Coming to bliss, for me, represents an opportunity to share my beliefs and ideas with the community, to bring awareness to this often poorly understood concept, and to develop and expand upon that concept within the context of modern spirituality.