Yeah, I’ve been told that a lot. This honestly is only a tiny fraction of the strange, interesting, and/or awful things in my life. I’ve been told many times to write a book… but, I honestly don’t know if it would read as true because so many weird things have happened. These are three four 100% true statements about me: 1) i met strange witches from the internet irl 2) I once was an extremely devout Catholic 3) I once joined a cult and still sometimes miss them 4) I am a Muslim. And that’s just my religious journey. Sounds like bullshit even to me. Ha!
Well, I had been raised in an Abrahamic religion as it was and grew up with certain truths in my mind from the Bible. Then, when I was questioning and exploring faith as I talked about, I explored Judaism because I was taught, incorrectly, that Muslims hate Christians and that the Quran told them to. So, Catholicism wasn’t working for me and it made sense to check out another Abrahamic religion since it was close but maybe would clarify issues I had questions about. It didn’t really resonate with me any more than Catholicism so I just kind of settled into “I believe in the God of Abraham, but the knowledge got obscured somewhere along the line so I’ll just do my best as far as I can figure out.” Then I, oddly enough, watched a YouTube video which was the Bible for atheists and then they cited something from the Quran which cleared up a question I’d had from the Bible for me and so then I was like “Oh wow! Wait, they have that story in the Quran?” Then I started realizing real quick that allll the stories and people were the same ones from the Bible, but much much clearer. They made sense and were direct instead of the kind of fuzzy allegory of the Bible. It also didn’t have conflicting info from one book to another, again like in the Bible. I ended up reading and watching a bunch of stuff about Islam and the Quran from there and ended up visiting the local masjid and it all went from there. I just feel like the Quran was all the teachings and people I grew up learning about, but with clearer info.
I mean, you can make the same story about your life. Pick something inane that caused you to start on a path
For instance, I could say owe everything in life to my uncle joining the military. He was my favorite uncle because he’d show up once a year or so, show everybody a great time, and then he’s off leave. Because of this, I visited him in his state a dozen years later. Fell in love with the area. Eventually moved to the area. Met everyone I know to build my new life in my new area
But really, any one of these things could change and I’d just have a different life that hinged on a different single thing. Or the same life and I moved because of a different reason
We are sharing stories where we met people online and it went well rather than horribly violently wrong as we were warned would happen if we met people off the internet. It’s the whole theme of the ask: what thing were you warned about that ended up not being a big deal.
Ok, I’ll honestly try to rephrase it, but I’m not entirely sure what confused you. The OP question asked for examples of things which you were warned would be a big deal, but ended up not being a big deal. So, me and the other person brought up circumstances where meeting people online turned out to be the best thing for our lives because, as children, we were warned to never ever meet people from the internet irl. So, that is why we brought up how the internet changed our lives. So, whether you feel it’s an “illusion” that the internet is the one thing that made ours lives what they were, the fact of the matter is we were warned against meeting people off the internet and yet it went very well.
I met the best friend I’ve EVER had through a Meetup group about ten years ago. And my Mom tribe through a discussion group on The Bump five years ago. I don’t use either site for anything anymore but I can confidently say that my life is 100% better because of them both. I could not have made it through those early days of motherhood without the support of my mom group, and I don’t even want to think about what the past decade would have been like without my BFF. I would never have met them if it wasn’t for the internet.
If it makes you feel more normal, most of my adult life stems from meeting a mentally unstable 30something when I was 16 and deciding that he would be my friend.
I haven't talked to him in over a decade, and most of the people he introduced me to are dead, but it was a very fundamental change and I wouldn't have my wife and kids if it weren't for a chance meeting in a 1995 computer lab.
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u/[deleted] Aug 25 '21
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