The Truth Is, You Don’t Have To Agree With Everything You’ve Been Taught

Let’s face it, we are products of our parents or whoever raised us. From the moment we are born we are told what is okay and what is not okay. Whether that be religion, sexuality, or if it’s okay or not to jay walk- we grow up conformed, shaped, and molded. This is a consistent pattern; parents pass their beliefs to their children, it’s what they were taught and it’s what their grandparents taught their parents to do. It’s how traditions get passed along, but it’s also how individuality dissipates.

Every space I am at in my life, I always find myself with such a wide variety of friends, and they are all completely diverse. One night I was talking to my mom and my friend from a youth group I was going to about homosexuality and I asked my friend from youth group her thoughts on homosexuality, and she literally responded with, “I’m not sure if it’s okay or not, let me text my dad.”

We are so warped by everything we have been taught, that we rely on other people to tell us our opinions on things like love.

Once we start relying on others to tell us what we think, we become victimized and we start to believe that those are actually our honest thoughts too.

Another example of this is a few months ago when I was having a conversation with someone I had newly started seeing and he was telling me how he thinks same sex marriage should be legal, but they just shouldn’t call it marriage. I was questioning his beliefs and responded with, “So you’re saying they should be allowed get married, they just shouldn’t call it marriage? That is like saying white and black people are allowed to both attend school, but black people have to call it something else besides school.” You could see that once I challenged his beliefs, his mind started spinning; he then replied by saying, “Well, that is just what I have been taught and how I have been raised”.

In high school I had this best friend who was really religious; I believed in God but I wasn’t as familiar with the Bible or specific religious teachings. One day I was questioning her beliefs and she literally told me, “I don’t think we can spend so much time together. You are making me less Christian and it’s affecting my relationship with God.”

We are puppets to everything that we have been taught to the point that it affects the way we interact with connection, love, and everything else important.

The difficult and unhealthy thing with living like this is, we are raised and taught to such a strong extent that when it comes to creating our own beings, we can’t even answer a question without texting our dad and asking him what the answer is.

Some people grow up, they never leave the town they were born in, and they have no problem questioning anything they have ever been taught. When people do this, they are limiting themselves and disengaging with parts of this universe that they may actually find a more authentic truth in.

Wherever you are meant to be in this life, you travel there by questioning everything familiar. You ask your own questions, find your own answers, and stay open minded.

Sometimes people do this, and they find that their truth is in fact what they were taught, but you have to be the one to decide that for yourself.

It’s necessary to acknowledge when we are thinking based on what we have been taught, and when we are thinking based on asking our inner self for guidance. If we live our life believing everything we have never dared to disagree with, are those our beliefs or are those someone else’s?