For Better Or Worse?

[jackbauer]

Do you think you're life is better now that you're an exchristian, worse, or no different.

 

I ask this because for me it was a lot better and healthier, but I've read posts on here by people who say they are saddened that they no longer believe. I can deffinately understand that point of view. I still hope for a good, merciful God who won't condemn me to eternal torment, but at the same time, I am also glad to be free from that mental prison and depressing worldview that is fundamentalism.

[Wings]

I've only been officially "out" for a few weeks now and although the reaction and backlash from some family and friends has been horrendous... I'm so much happier having let go of my faith!!

 

I was always told not to question... in fact, when I did my confirmation, my pastor said to the congregation, "Kristen always asks so many questions." Over time, this started to wear on me. I couldn't find comfort in faith because I just couldn't understand or believe it, but I was too afraid to admit that I didn't believe it. So I went through with the actions and played the role I'd been taught.

 

Eventually, every sermon and every prayer I heard made me feel uncomfortable and anxious. I would lie awake at night thinking about it and questioning, because it became impossible to reconcile what I was supposed to believe with what I really believe/disbelieve.

 

Leaving church has been a very difficult process because of the external influences.... but for the first time in a lonnng time, I don't feel kind of crazy or at war with myself. Ah, now that's a proverbial load off the shoulders!

[♦ ficino ♦]

I'm much happier for a whole slew of reasons that I think everyone on here relates to, so I won't enumerate them! I actually wept on the first day I realized that my faith was not going to survive. I wept that I could no longer pray the Rosary. But things settled into place. I do think it's good to realize you're not autonomous in the universe, to realize a sense of awe before that which is greater, to be serious about belonging, to make loving your neighbor (or at least, justice) a principle. I have to say I'm glad for my Christian years. I think that phase was what i needed at the time. I'm not sure I could have handled being at atheist at 19, quite frankly, given "where my head was". But I am glad for being able to see a way out of it when its system was shown up to be an illusion.

[owen652]

my experience has been a bit back to front. i left church a couple of years ago and since then i bascically put God/church/Jesus/Christians et al completely out of my mind and didn't really think about any of it. It has only been since a few weeks ago, when I wrote my extimony and posted it here, that all these issues have raised their ugly heads again. It has forced me to revisit those days, in particular my fundy childhood, and consequently all the anger and resentment has returned. I feel like I'm only just starting now to deal with it, even though I left Biblegod behind years ago. I suppose I should thank Ex-C though, because even though it is difficult, it is necessary and I might as well get this phase over and done with and move on with my life. As to whether life is better or worse; I haven't really noticed any difference in my quality of life, although the promises that if you stop tithing you will be financially cursed have proven less than accurate. Letting go of God has been depressing, sure, but if you'd asked me ten years ago if I could live without God i would've said no. In fact I always thought suicide would be the only alternative to Jesus. But that's just an immature attitude to life and the universe.

[Positivist]

I am definitely healthier. My rage at the God-who-will-not-act is gone, and I look for real-world solutions to my problems. I'm less anxious, far happier, more loving, more passionate, and much less obsessed. I used to obsess to the point of despair about all these things in Christianity that don't make sense. I was like Princess and the Pea. Now, I am free.

 

I only officially deconverted this past summer, after a few years of sheer torment from cognitive dissonance, so I still have my bad days but overall, it's a definite improvement.

 

There is a sense of sadness from finding out that that which I lived for (and would have died for) was not real. I think when we invest so much--our marriages, money, relationships, hobbies, time, lives, careers, decisions--for a cause, only to find that cause completely void of truth, has simply got to be depressing. The deeper you were in, the more you've lost/sacrificed, and the more it's going to hurt. It's like excising a tumor: it's been there so damn long that it's got its own blood supply and is sucking up important resources you need for living. Now that it's excised, the surrounding tissues need to fall into their proper places and the wound has to heal. Healing takes time and resources.

 

But, I am pleased to say I'm well on my way. And thank you to my friends and fellow journeyers here at Ex-C, for making the process less painful, more bearable, and definitely funner!

[OMneg]

Definitely better. The more time passes, the better it gets. I'm sad that the purely good and loving god that I believed in doesn't exist. I'm baffled at how I didn't see all the ugly awful stuff about god but it made it easier to let go when my eyes opened. The hardest part now is living a double life since I haven't told my family.

[blackpudd1n]

My life is shitloads better. I used to be such a firecracker; I'm much calmer now. Life can be lots of fun. Sex is fun. People are people, no longer the saved and unsaved, whom I treated differently depending on which category they fell into (I am ashamed to say). I can laugh at bad jokes. I could go on and on, but basically, life fucking rocks now, and I'm not even completely in the headspace I want to reach yet

[Suzy]

A lot better. Christianity was the root of my many problems (constant feeling of guilt, fear, cognitive dissonance, slight OCD) and now all those problems are gone! I'm so happy that I am allowed to think for myself now, I'm allowed to point out now what I have always felt during my Christianity only repressed, that the Emperor's (Christianity's) clothes are missing! Physically and mentally I feel a LOT better since my deconversion.

 

I don't miss the delusion either. I'm pretty content with the fact there is no eternal life - and this is better than the Christian concept of the majority of mankind going to Hell -, no invisible sky-daddy, no invisible friend (Jesus). I don't miss any of those. Looking back, I think now that I actually never needed them. The only reason I converted when I was about 12 because my father did and as a child I put a bit too much trust in his judgement because I looked up to him. And after that I was indoctrinated into accepting everything the church says by faith, as most of you were. But now when I look back and see how unhappy I was all through my Christianity, how many thoughts those protested in me against it I repressed, I think I was never really of "religious material", I never needed it. I'm not attracted by anything in the Christian worldview, the thing that kept me in for so long was rather the fear of hell that they made me believe in.

[Akheia]

Oh, no question: worlds better. I really suffered with the delusions Christianity imposed on me--as a woman, I was a second-class citizen in my entire denomination, and that bothered me. People told me how great a preacher I'd have been if only I'd been born a man. I got shunted to Sunday school (I dislike being around kids) and music ministry (I love singing but can't carry a note in a bucket). I panicked whenever I couldn't get ahold of friends, thinking I'd been "left behind." I felt resentful of the time I wasted sitting in church, felt shocked at the number of times I caught a preacher or congregant in a boldfaced fib, and distrustful of God for his constant lies. I went through so many mental gymnastics trying to reconcile the Bible's many issues and glaring inconsistencies. The fear-based worldview destroyed me mentally and made me willing to put up with abuse for years. I was one of those folks who did genuinely feel terrible knowing everybody around me was going to hell, so I spent more time than I want to think about being a pest to people. And the Christian view of sex really was horrible.

 

I'm a lot happier knowing that there's no way in hell that a Judeo-Christian god could possibly exist, that the historical claims made in his holy book are completely fabricated, that his "morality" is nothing of the sort. I was able to experiment with men before nesting with the one that worked best for me. I am no longer a total douche to people (or at least if I am, I'm a douche in a totally different way), and don't feel the need to waste half a weekend rotting on a pew listening to an old white fart lie about his past or try to force me via guilt and fear to march with the other sheep into the slaughterhouse. I can "live and let live" so much more now than I ever used to be able to manage; I don't feel threatened by people who don't share my ideology and can listen to other viewpoints without getting as defensive. BEST OF ALL: I don't regard setbacks as a divine punishment or "gift." Bad things just happen, and they're part of being alive. The wheel always turns--if things are bad now, I just hang in there and struggle through, and things'll get better again soon.

 

I also know that I'm not special particularly; I'm not part of a divine elect, not on the ground floor of some monumental mystery, not the special child of a living God who created everything. It makes me feel more humble to know this, and more connected to those around me.

 

Life's good.

[JadedAtheist]

Overall I'm a lot better. I'm without the constant guilt and I'm free to explore the mystery that is life without being told "Don't do this" or "Don't think that". I no longer fear hell, or even death and with all these things combined, I'm in a much better state than I use to be.

[Guest danny64]

“People go to church for the same reasons they go to a tavern: to stupefy themselves, to forget their misery, to imagine themselves, for a few minutes anyway, free and happy” Bakunin

 

A good question. Like the adventurous explorer from Plato's cave had to learn, I too realize that wisdom brings pain. And I feel like the damn Christians I live around are beating me up for telling them what I found outside. I deconverted at the age of 34...one year older than jesus. So I divorced god and then went through a divorce with my then wife of 15 years. God was cheaper. So a double dose of change. I felt like the first 33 years of my life were spent in a kind of numb stupor. I feel everything more intensely now. I laugh harder, find more beauty in nature, in the interactions I have with others...just in everyday occurrences.

I do not miss being a Christian. I wasn’t a very good Christian anyway. But I am sometimes frightened by how intense I have become. I am more alone now. My community and family are all very Christian…and even those that don’t reject me; I just don’t feel close to.

The box is opened…you can’t close it. But if I could go back and somehow avoid the epiphany…I wouldn’t. I would rather be sober and experience life than be drunk on god. My new life is lonelier and sadder but it’s also filled with moments of pure joy and laughter…my mind feels challenged; hell, my body is even in better shape. Christianity makes you fat.

[Zephie]

Much better. The difficult things that happen are mostly dealing with my parents who don't know that I'm not a Christian as well as realizing that things happen for no reason at all.

[Mike D]

I don't have the depression anymore that came from having to "make sense" out of the nonsensical. So in that regard, it's better.

 

I've never really been happy though (either then or now).

 

The fact is that whether you're a Christian or not, we're all here doing time - and I suppose you just make the best you can out of the cards that you were dealt, no matter what you believe.

 

That's life....

[Ro-bear]

I have no basis for comparison, as I have been an atheist all my adult life. When you deconvert at twelve, and doubt much earlier than that, there is no Christian life comparable to the adult ex-Christian life.

[expat674]

Life on the whole is so much better now than it ever was as a Xtian. I feel free to be able to make decisions without going around in ever decreasing circles wondering if it is G*d's will or not. I do not have to waste my weekends going to church services and spending hours afterwards in "fellowship."

I no longer have depression or anxiety because nobody is telling me how bad I am or how much I "just need to get right with G*d again."

[lunaticheathen]

It's hard to say, since I deconverted in my teens, and most teens are pretty miserable, in my experience - also, I suffered then, and still suffer, from depression.

 

What I can say is that Baptist christianity was like poking existing wounds, and made everything far worse than it could have been. The kind of things I was told as a teenaged girl would make even the most mentally stable teen go insane. I definitely became a far happier person when I stopped trying to please that misogynistic sadist the christians call god.

 

I believe I can also say I'm better off not trying to pretend to be someone I'm not. I'm not a christian, and I have doubt that I ever really was (not for lack of trying, though). It is definitely better for my mental health to be who I am, who is a definite heathen who has found a measure of peace and acceptance in African traditional faiths. I don't try to lie to myself, that if I just "find Jesus", everything would be fixed instantly. No religion (or lack of) is an instant fix, not even the ones I follow now - my gods help, but at the end of the day, I am the only one who can fix me, and it will always be a process.

 

I still fight for my mental health, but I have one giant bible-shaped roadblock out of the way.

[Deva]

It is better - much better. I consider my deconversion from Christianity the best thing that has happened in my life. It is my greatest accomplishment.

[Will02]

I'm much better off and have a lot less stress. It's such a relief that it is difficult to put it into words.

 

I feel truly free for the first time ever. Christianity promises freedom but delivers the exact opposite.

[Dory]

It's odd, I just finished watching The Matrix, and I swear its like I've taken the red pill and I can't go back even if I wanted to - even if part of my mind believed it was real, because there's this other road ahead. It's a bit dark and dirty atm, but it's getting brighter and more significant the further I walk into it and allow myself to be rational.

[Galien]

It's different. I am no longer terrorised daily by the thought I may be letting god down. Now I am removed from the terror, which basically lasted from when I was nine until when I was forty five I marvel at how much pain and suffering I went through. Some days I still have the filthy tase of it in my mouth and I have an extreme reaction when I see others still suffering from it, and those who would hold them captive.

 

I am angrier, less likely to tolerate bullshit, more likely to tell you to jam it up your ass if you try and tell me what to think. Conversely, I still have nightmares, sometimes a panic reaction when I hear certain songs or hear preaching. I am completely phobic about groups and abuse of power and probably always will be.

 

But now I sink or swim on my own say so, no one else's. I have had my first two years free of suicidal ideation since i was fifteen. I miss my so called "friends", I miss the certainty. I don't miss being encouraged to beat myself to death every single day of my life no matter how much effort I put in.These days I actually like myself, warts and all

[Akheia]

Galien, I hope it's okay to say that so do I