Ancient Wisdom and Pagan Spirituality

I also had a childhood influenced by fundamentalism, but later transitioned to a mainstream version of Christianity and then later still to a period of time as a solitary Wiccan.
But those experiences were all "religious" oriented and never quite fit just right. I didn't believe there could be an anthropomorphic deity as in a big guy in the sky or even a pantheon of deities, but I did believe that there had to be some sort of eternal essence or meaning to all of this.
Reading the works of Thomas Paine and then later the writings of Marcus Aurelius finally led me to an awareness of the universal oneness concept, that we are to the universe like waves are to the ocean, that our lives just like ocean waves are temporary abnormalities, and that when we die we simply return to normal only to become part of a new wave. In other words, we are continually and eternally being recycled.
Two of my favorite quotes are from the writings of Marcus Aurelius: "Constantly regard the universe as one living being, having one substance and one soul" and "I am composed of the formal and the material. Neither of them will perish into non-existence, as neither of them came into existence out of non-existence. Every part of me then will be reduced by change into some part of the universe, and that again will change into another part of the universe, and so on forever."