Thought and belief

Thought is a conscious idea, while belief is a subconsciously chosen, chosen from thought, idea. If there is no belief to contradict a thought that thought becomes a belief. If a belief contradicts that thought, then either the thought can replace the belief or not. There is more than a binary in how the thought can relate to the existing idea, however. A thought can coexist a contradictory belief, and vice versa.

If a thought occurs which in some way invalidates the belief, and the thought is valid in relation to one's other beliefs, then the thought can replace that belief. If the thought replaces that belief, depends on the subject's beliefs on belief. That is, how trustworthy one believes a new belief to be, if they believe the source (themselves, others) to be fallible. A thought can be valid (non-contradictory) without being true (trusted).

A child will believe what their parents tell them, as they believe them credible, but as one grows older and more jaded their trust (which is just a belief of trustworthiness) typically diminishes, solidifying their beliefs. This is what leads to conviction being associated with adulthood and experimentation as something childish.

Conviction implies the beliefs are not just unchanging but un-negating, but what is conviction is often thought disguised as belief. If a thought negates a belief, but no thought takes that beliefs place, then the belief may still be recalled as a thought. A thought which is not believed yet still utilized is faith. The disbelief is what gives faith merit.

A child can readily believe in God, presented with nothing contrary, or just as readily believe there is nothing or any other belief they are fed. This belief is easy, since there is no thought nor belief to sew doubt. As one finds new ideas though, they either lose their belief, replace it, or keep it, possibly now with faith in contradictory thoughts.

If their belief is lost then they may, as said above, continue to call upon the belief as a thought. A thought is harder to use as guidance than a belief since it cannot unconsciously negate another thought, it requires choice to call up. The difficulty of disbelief gives its attempted belief (faith) merit. It is easy to forget one's faith and take in a new thought as belief, if only for a short while, until the thought is called back again and negates the newly taken belief. The acceptance of beliefs in contradiction to faith is sin.

Faith is difficult because it requires being reestablished with each new thought, and as long as faith exists so does sin, which continues from sin's first appearance up until faith is brought back again. Sin, then, since it only requires being brought up once (as it is belief), is easy.

Instead of faith being created from an old belief, it can also be created from a new thought, if the new thought is not true according to the persons uncontradictory beliefs. If the thought has no contradiction, then it could still be not believed due to lack of trust, and so only brought up consciously as faith. This is frequent with high-level ideas, which one might accept as valid but not internalize as truth. If the thought does have contradiction, and it cannot negate the belief it contradicts, then one may still be faithful to it even if the belief remains, often also having faith in that the belief is false.