“God is dead”, was the sound of a warning from Nietzsche to us that something horrible was about to happen. The sound of alarm, not the jeering sound of victory over God, was what he made with his words.
Have you thought about how an eternal God could ever die? Maybe nothing so dramatic occurred. Nietzsche did not describe a decisive battle in which faith the cause of the sign was slayed with great pomp and circumstance. What he was describing seems to be a much more subtle, and far more disturbing, reality. In actuality, what if God was not exterminated or even vanquished, but only left alone? In the absence of any other actions taken to dismiss or destroy God, it is more likely that God was only forgotten or not cared about, as people just lived their lives.
Here’s the thing, faith doesn’t always fall because someone shouts it down or pulls it apart with arguments. Sometimes, it just slips away because we stop paying attention. Not with a crash, but with a sigh, and then silence. It’s the distractions, the endless scroll, the constant background noise that drowns out what once mattered. The rituals and questions that shaped people for centuries fade, not from attack, but from neglect. We lose them, often without even noticing.
This is my primary takeaway. The most unsettling aspect of this is not necessarily living in a godless world but instead living in a world that has all but forgotten what it has lost. There is no volume associated with the void; there is only the slow, gradual loss of something we once had. Not an overthrowing; rather, a loss of memory. And finally when you stop mentally, you realize how tremendously heavy the void actually is.
Long before the philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, expressed his inquiry regarding God and purpose, an entire religion, Vedanta, had quietly given its answer. In fact, Vedanta did not shock one with its discovery nor announce the death of anything. It simply and softly said, “You are That.” The Universe??? Not something you have to chase or beg for; it is already here, now, manifested within your own consciousness.
God does not exist “out there” or “up there” waiting for someone to kneel, and repent; God is conscious! God is the essence of being-consciously! God is your pure consciousness that always existed, that today, in your states of consciousness, exists as a constant that binds all thoughts (regardless).
So when people say, “We’ve forgotten God,” it’s not just about empty temples or dusty altars. It digs much deeper than ritual. We’ve grown distant from ourselves. We’ve wrapped ourselves in labels and stories and busy plans, mistaking all those costumes for who we actually are. Instead of listening to our own presence, we let the noise lead.
Unlike some spiritual traditions, Vedanta does not bemoan the absence of a deity or divine force. Rather, it provides an image to illustrate how we have abandoned the divine presence in our lives, even if we did not realize it at the time we departed.
As a result, the greatest discomfort associated with this loss of divinity is that most people do not detect the moment when they crossed over into this state of disconnection. The phenomenon happens quickly; you find yourself in our modern consumer-oriented society, filled to capacity with countless information streams (e.g., social media), opposing viewpoints from others, an overwhelming number of opportunities to distract you from your spiritual path, and the illusion that you can cultivate unlimited relationships.
If you were to avoid all of those distractions and sit quietly with yourself in a still environment, you would eventually begin to experience this emptiness—the same emptiness that millions of people are attempting to avoid through various forms of escape techniques (e.g., eating, watching TV, and working) or simply by scrolling through their endless list of notifications on their smart phones.
This emptiness, otherwise known as forgetfulness, is not an obvious experience; it does not present itself to us with loud noises, grand states of being, and millions of moods (as many of the aforementioned distractions do), nor does it invade our lives when we are busy, ambitious, or joyous; it simply enters our consciousness slowly, without us realizing it. Therefore, you may find yourself at a large party, surrounded by your friends, when you will suddenly become aware of a gap or void—something is missing. However, you are unable to identify what is missing.
The answer is simple; there is nothing missing; it is only the lack of presence in your life that creates that feeling. There are countless moments of depth in our lives, a core level of awareness that allows us to feel that we are deeply rooted and alive, even in our day-to-day lives.
We’ve gotten really good at filling up time and space, but most of us still haven’t learned how to just be. We trade meaning for movement. We stay busy so we never have to face that still spot inside, and that’s where all the truth sits, quiet, waiting to be remembered.
It’s not about believing in God as an idea or chasing after a spiritual checklist. It’s about rediscovering the real experience, the felt presence that turns existence from a blur into something luminous and whole. That’s what we’ve lost, and also, what we can always find again by pausing, listening, and finally coming home to ourselves.
Here’s the truth hardly anyone says out loud, remembering God isn’t about checking into a religion or nailing a list of dos and don’ts. Nobody’s asking you to show off how spiritual you are or stack up perfect prayers. It’s something quieter, and a lot more raw. It’s about coming back. Maybe in fits and starts. Maybe with a lot of doubt, and a little hope. It rarely feels graceful.
Begin with silence. Not the kind of silence where you sit in a quiet room scrolling through your phone, but rather silence where you just are with yourself, without running away from yourself, without numbing out, and without constantly reaching for the next distraction. As you become aware of your thoughts, you simply observe your thoughts as they pass by – and you do not allow your thoughts to draw you in. There may be some awkwardness, or discomfort, as you become aware that you have been holding your breath for too long.
You begin to see your life through different eyes; the question “Is this how I want to live?” becomes more relevant than going through life without any thought. In the beginning, it may feel that nothing has changed; there may have been a brief moment when you felt present or you heard a truth cut through the noise in your mind. However, there is an internal shift, and you will begin to see changes in your external life.
Whatever you named ‘life’ no longer feels like an endless scramble for something. You’ve slowed down enough to finally experience a real life versus just surviving. Even though there is still noise and chaos in the world, they do not control you like they did before. You begin to understand that what you are seeking is not ‘out there,’ in the next shiny object or escape; it has always existed within you, buried beneath everything you thought you needed to be.
God wasn’t lost; He was just hidden under layer upon layer of distractions: all of the old stories of how you perceived yourself to be, and all of the worries you accumulated along your way.
So what? Maybe your breakthrough is not about proof of God or disproof of God, or even about certainty about either of those concepts; perhaps it is freeing yourself from the bondage created by the need for faith and belief altogether and simply remembering. Waking up. Awareness.
Honestly, the scariest part isn’t wondering if God is gone. It’s waking up one day and realising that, somewhere, you lost yourself. That in forgetting Him, you forgot how it feels to be fully, painfully alive. To touch life right where it hurts and where it heals. And maybe, in coming back, even slowly, even fumbling, you finally remember what you’d nearly let slip away.
Discover more stories on Her Campus at MUJ. More articles by me coming soon at Vaibhav Chaudhary at HCMUJ; he who watches the world and its miracles very closely, noticing what slips between all those moments, between those infinite possibilities of what all can happen.