We’ll Go To hell Together

If Paradise Is Pressure… We’ll Go to Hell Together

Tonight, I’m writing from a place of deep reflection and connection. Sometimes we plan topics ahead of time, and sometimes life just hands us something we need to speak about. This is one of those nights.

Before diving in, I want to say thank you to everyone who’s reached out lately with encouragement and feedback. Knowing that people connect with what I share means more than I can explain. It reminds me that we’re all part of something greater than ourselves a shared consciousness, a collective wisdom that connects us through love, compassion, and experience.

Recently, I’ve been revisiting The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. In it, he talks about the “un-manifested” this deep source from which everything arises. Someone once described it to me as a giant pond of mercury, where shapes emerge, take form, and then return to the pool. That image stuck with me because it reminds me that we’re all part of something vast and beautiful, constantly moving between the spiritual and the physical.

Leaving the Church

I want to share something deeply personal something I’ve wrestled with for over a year. My family and I recently left the church that had been a part of our lives for more than 20 years.

For most of that time, I was deeply involved. I even served as a bishop. We were what you might call a “legacy family.” But over time, I began to feel tension between my values of love, acceptance, and empathy  and some of the cultural and institutional patterns I saw around me.

I’ve never believed that any loving God would condemn others for being born into the “wrong” circumstances, or for having identities that differ from social norms. I couldn’t reconcile that.

The turning point came when one of my kids returned home early from a mission and was told they were a disappointment. Another was excluded from leadership opportunities simply for wearing a rainbow pin a quiet message of safety and inclusion for others.

That was it for me.

When an organization’s culture even unintentionally harms or excludes people, especially your own children, something inside you breaks. And for me, integrity demanded that I couldn’t stay.

We left respectfully, without bitterness or burning bridges, but I won’t lie it shattered me. I lost not just my church, but my sense of certainty. The beliefs that had given my life structure and purpose for decades suddenly collapsed.

Finding a New Kind of Faith

In that void, I found something unexpected. I began to explore new ideas about presence, consciousness, and what it means to live in alignment with love. Eckhart Tolle’s The Power of Now became a lifeline.

Through it, I discovered that joy doesn’t depend on doctrine. It comes from awareness, stillness, and a connection to something bigger something that can’t be named or contained by religion.

Today, I’m more at peace than I’ve ever been. I don’t claim to have all the answers about God, heaven, or eternity. But I know this: whatever divine source exists, it’s far more loving and inclusive than we can imagine.

A Song That Broke Me Open

There’s a song by David Archuleta called “Hell Together.” It wrecked me the first time I heard it.

“If I have to live without you, I don’t want to live forever
In someone else’s heaven.
So let them close the gates.
If they don’t like the way you’re made,
Then they’re not any better.
If paradise is pressure,
We’ll go to hell together.”

That song became my anthem. Because that’s exactly how I feel.

If “paradise” means conforming at the expense of love, compassion, and authenticity, then I don’t want it.
If heaven means rejecting people for who they are, I’ll walk away even if that means walking through fire.

Choosing Love Over Fear

I know many people who’ve faced similar journeys friends disowned by family, children who no longer speak to parents, people judged or exiled for being honest about who they are.

And here’s what I believe: most people who reject others aren’t trying to be cruel. They truly think they’re doing the right thing. But they’ve been taught to confuse love with control, belonging with obedience.

To those of you who feel unseen, unworthy, or unloved I see you.
You matter.
You are not broken.
And you are not alone.

If your community can’t accept you for who you are, then let them close the gates.
You and I we’ll go to hell together.

Because love, acceptance, and family are worth more than any version of paradise built on shame or exclusion.

Remembering What Really Matters

I once asked a friend, “What would you do for your family?”
He looked at me with absolute conviction and said, “Anything.”

That moment grounded me. It reminded me that heaven isn’t a distant promise its right here, in the people we love and the compassion we give.

When I think about my grandmother the most loving person I’ve ever known I realize that she embodied everything divine. She didn’t preach it. She lived it. Sweet, kind, unshakably loyal.

That’s the kind of heaven I believe in now one we build with love, empathy, and the courage to stand by the people who need us most.

So wherever you are, however you identify, whatever your story looks like I want you to know:
You’re seen.
You’re loved.
And it’s all going to be okay.

Key Takeaway

True faith isn’t about rules or belonging to a group it’s about unconditional love.
When your beliefs no longer align with compassion, choose love anyway.
If “paradise” requires pretending, pressuring, or excluding others, then it’s not paradise at all.

Sometimes the most sacred act is standing with those who’ve been cast out and saying,

“If paradise is pressure, we’ll go to hell together.”