Higher Powers?

A friend and I have had a few chats about religious beliefs and whether God or some other supreme being really exists. For myself, I believe in some sort of higher power, but this conversation got me thinking. Here are my musings on the subject:

I believe that there are (perhaps sentient) forces greater than I that affect my life, that I cannot explain, and that I do not fully understand. It may be that I think of these forces in human terms because that is what is familiar to me. Giving human form to this power provides a shape and context that helps me define what I feel. Is it possible this power is just another part of me? Perhaps we all have an intuitive, unconsciously-tapped inner resource that only seems to us to be an external being.

I believe that this power - these forces - are possible to alter by virtue of the choices I make but although I might influence events, they often resist change: Our paths are to some extent pre-determined, but there are many and we can choose. I see life as a room full of doors: some will open to me, some may open with effort, some are not for me and will never yield. Each of these doors eventually leads to more rooms, more doors, more choices. Sometimes there are obstacles, false paths, dead ends. Sometimes I must retrace my steps and start again. But there is always a guiding force - a higher power? a sentient being? my own instincts?

Considering all of these things, I realize how a good debate such as the one between my friend and I forces us to closely, perhaps intimately, examine our own beliefs.