Not that l remember. It was some 50 years ago, maybe more.

I think most religious people are faking it... Thier pack animals... But if you ever truly believed... And was really educated in your faith... It's probably harder.
I'm agnostic, not athiest, not even a little, so I really don't have a belief at all.
I find so much comfort and freedom in agnosticism.
I also still like to study religion and science.

If you took comfort in things like prayer, singing to god(s), dancing, yoga or any other practice that gave you peace, it's probably going to be harder than the average person that just sat next to mom not asking questions.

Also, so much has to do with community and what else you have to help you feel safe and secure.

I've traveled a lot... It depends on where home is... If you even have a home.

It depends on how traumatic you childhood and life was and if you have hope for the future.

It depends on if you are raising children on your own or with religious or non religious partners or parrents.

You might even go back and forth.

Religion is a tool all humans use differently.

It's like a gun.
Some cops work in violent neighborhoods for decades and never discharge... Others shoot 3 people in thier rookie year in the same community.

I definitely miss some things about my church days. I really wish I could stomach the nonsense sometimes

I went to a relatively liberal protestant church during my teenage years, by my own choice and mostly without the rest of my family. I really enjoyed some of the sermons I heard, and likely still would today because the some of the pastors were really intelligent, thoughtful men. Eventually, though, I realized I was just moving with the herd and left it behind. Leaving the community aspect was harder than realizing I didn't believe. Believing didn't come naturally, and letting go was pretty easy.

...sense of relief as in returning to
the family of """Humanity"""
Also I didn't want to abandon others
to their plight; a trifold dilemma with
untold amounts of variables.Reality
is a peace"Everything Beauty" Group I like to share!

Nope. I think I was about 12 or so that I decided the religious ideas I was raised with were not meant to be taken literally, with atheism following shortly thereafter. Looking back, I just see it as another part of the process of growing up.

Not really. My unbelief was a long process. I let go a little at a time, or I should say I lost a little at a time... eventually I just realized I didn't believe in God anymore, that I was just kind of going through the motions... once I came to that realization I "came out" as an atheist.

Yes, I did! I'm surprised by how many people commenting here said giving up religion was easy for them. I went to a christian elementary school, so maybe I was more indoctrinated than most...

When I was religious I found great comfort in the "knowledge" that there was of an omnipotent man in the sky looking out for me and who had a plan for me. It made me feel safe. Also "knowing" there was an afterlife for me to go to made dying a less scary prospect.

When I realised that I no longer believed it was a long time before I could admit it to myself. I felt very alone and vulnerable. Watching stand up comedians helped a surprising amount, making light of what was for me a really heavy topic was cathartic.

No, I went to a very liberal church or it would have come out earlier. Church was fun but the preaching was laughable. If I hadn't attended church as a child, I may have been able to get into religion as an adult. We'll never know.

I struggled for a long time with trying to force myself to believe. I was always skeptical about religion and always asked questions. I became even more skeptical when I was met with the standard "you shouldn't question God" response. I find it much easier to accept my lack of belief than I ever did accepting a belief itself.

Not at all. I had the impression it was something i needed for too long.

No. Not really. For me, it happened over a long period of time.

Nope

Yes because I was a Christian my whole life before finally accepting I truly didn't believe it. I think I had been subconsciously forcing myself to believe it for about 8 years before I actually accepted it. There was an immense amount of pressure to believe in God from my family, plus the fear of eternal damnation. But in the end right before I came to terms that there was at least no Abrahamic God I knew that if God "knows all" that he would know that I was pretending to believe and would probably be damned anyways. So I did the research with less fear and there are no regrets. I think finally saying it out loud too that I was agnostic was really fulfilling too. It seems kinda dramatic but it was a huge milestone in my life because it involved my sexuality too (bisexual).

I think it depends on how deeply you believed, and on how tied you were to a church community. I wasn't tied to a church community, so I didn't get a lot of the social/peer pressure. However, I did deeply believe, and that was hard to make sense of. I joined a website for deconverting Christians (ex-christian.net) and that helped in the early stages. After that, I just stopped worrying about it.

At first my main concern was along the lines of "but what if I'm wrong?" As the possibility that I was wrong faded, so too did my concern.

Not at all I think I may have been a non believer most of my life. In my early days I was always scheptical of the Catholic beliefs. As I got older and learned more it started making absolutely no sense at all. I studied more science then put the pieces together finding out it is the way life happens.

I think when I joined the dots up it was a cross between a relief and a wow moment. All of it made more sense when I stopped trying to make sense of it.

I was a lemming for years, as I so wanted to believe. But I kept asking the same question, “where is god, why so much suffering and pain.” I began to see religion as a crutch and belonging to tribe that is hypocritical and lacks the understanding and proactive of brotherly love.

Nope I think I have always been non religious as when I was growing up I was never once indoctrinated or forced to go to church on a Sunday. I do feel that I might alienated myself from my grandparents on my dad's side who are Prodestant and attend the church of Scotland. They can't seem to get their head's around the fact that I don't believe in their God or any God for that matter

Hi.. I was born atheist, so my trouble came trying to accept "belief" in religion and I've failed miserably.

Not a bit.

Well, I've been non religious since I was a child and never once had trouble accepting it.

I could see people who grew up religious having that issue though. I've also spoke to many and they in fact did have trouble and trepidation.

No trouble. I follow the truth, not to my emotional preferences.

Not really, I had just studied all of the religions/ theories that I could find and the nearest I could come to religion is that it's logical to me that, 'spirit'/ life in some form probably gets recycled and that respecting/ protecting our environment makes sense. But couldn't identify with a theory that cows' souls were acknowledged before women's! I was pretty happy to throw in the towel and say I'll just wait until I die for the greatest adventure: I'm in no big hurry for it either

NO, I did not have trouble. I decided at about age 16 to mentally throw out all the beliefs that had entered my mind without my having considered them carefully. Then I would only accept those beliefs that I had examined thoroughly. REligion never made it past that screening. But I tried to keep an open mind in part because religion was so pervasive. What could I be missing, I wondered. What really made it easy to reject religion was when I read about how there is a scientific and evolutionary explanation for why so many people are hard wired to believe. Once I understand that I had no hesitation. I am that way with most things where I reject the conventional wisdom. I need to check two Boxes. Why am I right, and why do other people believe something that I have disproven to myself.