In the Fog, the Truth Wears No Name

In the dim-lit backalleys of social media, I lit a cigarette of heresy—said the Jesus I’d found wasn’t the one in the Bible. This Jesus didn’t glide across water like some divine magician. He walked barefoot through Galilee, through dust and doubt. He didn’t come with answers. He came with presence.

Then came the ambush on Bluesky—a digital shootout. Guy said I’d never been “saved” to begin with. He wore certainty like a badge—issued by an eternal God, stamped by an infallible Bible. Said I’d traded the certainty of eternal life for the shifting fog of Taoism.

But here’s the twist—his shot wasn’t a deathblow. It didn’t choke me. It cleared the air.

Is there trouble in ambiguity?
Is certainty the light?
Or is it just a flickering bulb above a locked door?

The Water that Waits

Someone asked me this weekend if any of my beliefs had changed since my spiritual awakening.

A lot has. But that’s not what I told him.

I said, “Taoism ain’t a set of beliefs or rules. It’s a spiritual philosophy you simply abide by.” And that, I think, throws a lot of people off.

It doesn’t offer fixed doctrines or eternal guarantees. It values flow. The present. The unknowable.

Most people want to play detective—certainty with a badge and gun. They’re chasing down the who, what, when, where, and why of life. They take on beliefs like suspects. Point their weapon at what they think is truth and try to slap it in cuffs.

But the real suspect?

The Tao.

Already slipped out the back door unnoticed—just like always.

That’s the clue right there. The Tao doesn’t need you to understand it.

In fact, the moment you think you do—check again. The ground’s already shifted beneath your feet.

The Tao is like water that waits. Not for you to decode it.
But for you to jump in—and let it carry you.

The House that Doubt Built

If you’ve walked the exit path from Christianity like I have, chances are you’ve had a few awkward run-ins. Concerned faces. Well-meaning believers. Trying to hand you a map back to the fold.

They think I’m rebelling. Backsliding. Losing my way.

But it’s not like that. I’m not falling away. I’m evolving.
And evolution ain’t always pretty.

I used to be as doctrinally sound as B.B. Warfield himself—he's the I Ching of dead theologians, if you didn’t know. I could recite my salvation story like a bedtime prayer. I knew the whole theological playbook: Salvation through faith, irresistible grace, the pre-trib rapture—God’s divine calendar etched in stone.

Certainty was my gospel.

But when the wheels came off the chariot in my real, aching, human life—those certainties didn’t lift a finger. No doctrinal checklist could bind up a broken heart.

The scaffolding didn’t collapse because it was false.
It collapsed because it was incomplete.

That’s when I realised something dangerous and holy: spiritual certainty isn’t a ladder to heaven. It’s a wall around your soul.

So I picked up the sledgehammer of doubt and started swinging.

Call it sacred demolition.

And if you’re standing in a crumbling cathedral of old beliefs, I say let it fall. If something still stands after the dust settles—good. Keep it. But let doubt knock loose the rigidity, and you’ll uncover something deeper: a spiritual landscape without blueprints.

And here’s your next clue:
Sometimes faith has to fall apart… so it can finally breathe.

Everyone’s Hiding Something

When I’m writing noir fiction, I don't bother looking for halos. I reach straight for the shadows. Moral ambiguity isn’t a flaw in noir—it’s the whole damn architecture. The hero's no angel. The villain’s got a point. And the truth? It doesn’t show up to be fingered in a lineup. It’s leaning against a brick wall in a dark alley, smoking a cigarette, refusing to testify.

This is the pulse of noir—it feels true because life doesn’t deal in absolutes. Nobody walks away clean.

You, me, the guy sipping espresso across from you—we’ve all got something tucked away in the closet. In polite society, we zip it up in a nice suit and pretend the closet doesn’t creak at night. But skeletons don't stay silent forever. They slip out in headlines. In fallen preachers. In leaders exposed for the frauds they are. In friends who say grace with you one day and gut you the next.

Noir rips the velvet curtain off and shows you the stagehands behind the miracle. And when you see it—really see it—you nod. Because deep down, you always knew.

And here's your next clue:
Clarity doesn’t always mean correctness.

Spiritual journeys are murky business. The sacred isn’t always bathed in stained glass. Sometimes, it flickers in a dingy room thick with smoke, whispered by sinners too weary to lie.

In noir, there ain’t no saints. Just sinners with secrets.
And those? Those are the ones worth listening to.

Oh, and if you want to check out my noir tale, you can get it here.

The Political Nomad and the Dogma of Labels

Back when I was a Fundamentalist, I was also firmly strapped into the saddle of the political right. That’s often how it goes. Certainty in one area of life tends to spill into another, like ink across a page. And those on the right? They’re in a never-ending shootout with those on the left—bullets of blame, volleys of outrage, each camp bunkered deeper by the day. All because they’re certain they’re right.

But just as a spiritual seeker refuses blind loyalty to a guru or denomination, the political nomad steps away from the flags and factions. He isn’t swearing allegiance—he’s searching for nuance in a world obsessed with absolutes.

Both the left and right have their reasons, sure. But reasons aren’t scripture. They’re perspectives. And that’s what gets missed in the shouting match. Just like the believer who insists the Bible is the literal Word of God—it’s their opinion that it’s the Good Book. And opinions, by nature, are movable. Challengable. Human.

To resist political labels is to mirror spiritual liberation. You step outside the system, you start to see the machinery. You breathe.

And that distance gives the nomad perspective—especially when the world goes mad. Like during the D.C. shootings I wrote about on Substack. While partisans looked for villains to blame and banners to wave, the nomad asked better questions. He looked deeper. He noticed patterns.

We need more of that. More wanderers, fewer warriors. Because crusaders—like Elias Rodriguez—can turn violent in a heartbeat. And that’s your clue:

Certainty is the true addiction. And it doesn’t care which side of the aisle you’re on.

Book Review – Double Indemnity by James M. Cain

At first glance, Double Indemnity reads like your typical noir cocktail—hard-boiled insurance man meets icy femme fatale, and they cook up a murder scheme with dollar signs in their eyes. But don’t let the smoke and shadows fool you. James M. Cain didn’t just write a crime novel—he penned a parable.

Walter Huff, our “hero,” isn’t a villain in the traditional sense. He’s smart, calculating, even charming in a bleak, bureaucratic sort of way. He’s convinced he’s in control. Every angle accounted for. Every lie rehearsed. He thinks he knows the rules of the game—until the game, inevitably, plays him.

And that, dear reader, is the point.

Beneath the pulpy dialogue and cynical wit, Double Indemnity is a tale about the fatal flaw of certainty. Huff’s downfall isn’t simply the murder—it’s his arrogance. His belief that he can steer chaos. That he can dance with darkness and not get burned. But noir, like life, doesn’t work that way.

Cain strips us of illusions. He shows us that the moment we believe we’ve mastered the system—be it legal, spiritual, or moral—is the moment we start to lose our grip.

Sound familiar?

Let’s tie this back to the spiritual journey. The need for control—for dogmatic, buttoned-up answers—isn’t faith. It’s fear. Just like Huff clings to his plan like a life raft, many of us cling to rigid beliefs to keep the mystery of life at bay. But true spirituality, like good noir, demands we sit in the ambiguity. The not-knowing. The unanswered questions.

Cain’s genius lies in how effortlessly he folds this truth into the story without ever preaching it. Walter Huff doesn’t get a sermon. He gets consequences.

Because in noir, as in life, What kills a man isn’t the crime—it’s the illusion of control. And that's our next clue.

The Wisdom of the Fog

So where are all these clues leading, fellow gumshoe?

When we finally piece the puzzle together, we realise this: certainty promises safety—but that promise is a con. It looks like solid ground, but it’s just a well-worn illusion. Because when you're certain of where to step and how to act, you're no longer free to stray from the script. You can’t colour outside the lines. You dare not break the rules. You may only go so far… and no farther.

Uncertainty, on the other hand, is foggy and untamed. But it’s also alive. It allows you to step out into the world with openness and curiosity. To feel the earth beneath your bare feet and not flinch. I’d rather walk barefoot into the unknown with mystery than march in lockstep with those who mistake rigidity for righteousness.

And out there—in that wide, uncertain world—you just might find the barefoot Jesus. Not the tidy, polished one wrapped in doctrine. But the wild one. The one the evangelicals turned away. Waiting in the fog with an outstretched hand.

Not asking you to believe.

Just to follow.

Peace, and keep asking the big questions,

The Sage Wanderer