What Happened When I Left God and Religion?
I have always had doubts when it came to religion and God but I never dared to even think about it because I was taught that if you doubt, you will be severely punished. I was terrified. I was terrified of my own mind.
I have always been a reader, and very curious. But what amazed me the most was the human mind. How it functioned. How thoughts control us. How one little thing in our childhood can affect us for the rest of our lives. How the reason we are the way we are is because of a programming, a trauma, a parent, genes, repetition…
From a very young age, I was subjected to religion and all of its teachings. I prayed 5 times a day, fasted every month of Ramadan, wore the hijab, read the Quran, participated in religious events, listened to lectures…
Religion and God were always in the way of everything I did. God was always with me “telling” me that if I do this or that I will be either rewarded or punished.
I was scared of getting punished by God (aka going to hell). I was always careful about praying on time. When I was fasting, I was careful to not drink the water that I brushed my teeth with by mistake. I was careful about covering myself well enough to not show any bit of hair or skin. I was careful about not touching a man by mistake…
I was 9.
Too much pressure on a kid. Too much expectations on a kid. Too much stress on a kid.
I was taught by religious scholars the ways we are punished by God. I was taught how we get punished inside the grave by snakes, scorpions…and the horror we face when crossing the path to reach afterlife.
I was 14.
If fear is the only way to convince someone of something, then he isn’t really convinced, he is just terrified of the consequences.
That is how I was; Terrified. I was afraid of the punishments. I was afraid of the snakes and the fire. So I conformed to the system.
I used to feel deep shame and guilt towards God because I never felt like I was good enough as a Muslim.
As much as I tried to bury the doubts and just follow God, I couldn’t. They were too strong. Some of the contradictions were like:
“God is Love” yet punishes you badly,
“Islam gives women their rights”,
or “Islam is a peaceful religion”.
Yet they all show the complete opposite in the Quran.
My doubts were stronger than my fear.
Fast forward, I left religion.
The amount of relief I have felt ever since. I no longer felt like anybody was judging me every single second of my life. I felt real freedom.
But the weight removed off of my shoulders was so heavy that it came with a price:
Yes, I no longer had any belief, but it took me a long while to not feel guilty for doing things that is forbidden in Islam. Something so simple as hugging my male best friend felt like I’m doing something so shameful.
Why is that?
Because of mind programming. The programming that was imposed in me since the day I was born was so strong that it took me years to START getting out of that box.
The brain is afraid of the unknown. That is why many people, including you, find it so difficult to leave a relationship or a country, for instance. Your brain got so attached that it is now afraid of leaving something familiar and going into the unknown.
Imagine the programming and attachment of religion and God since you were a kid. The mind programming into a kid is so easy because their subconscious minds are open to all the information and actions a parent or a teacher gives. Everything they see and hear, is entrenched deeply into their minds. And as years pass, it becomes more and more difficult to change that programming.
That is why I still felt guilt and shame even after leaving religion. It’s because the programming is so buried in me that even to this day I feel shame sometimes.
But I’m getting out of it. I’m taking baby steps. It’s slow but it’s progress.
The World and its unknowns fascinated me. With reading books and getting exposed to different people I got to learn one very important thing:
No matter how much we know, no matter how much we read and discover about the world, we will never reach a point and say that we know even 1% of it.
Because the universe is unlimited.
That is why I am an agnostic atheist. Because:
We know nothing.
