When said church started telling members how to dress, who to associate with and how to have sex.

I've always been introspective and analytical. Because I grew up in mostly evangelical church environments, I used that aspect of myself to dig deep into the Bible and put a lot of energy into praying and worship. When I do things, I tend to go all out.

At a certain point, though, I found that "hope" and "faith" were not enough for me. Being analytical means that I have to progress and grow, and that's where things started to shift. I began to look at questioning and educating myself as a positive thing and not an insult to the "God" I was trying so hard not to offend for reasons I didn't fully understand.

I look at it this way: my analytical nature and my enjoyment of math were good reasons to believe I would have pursued an education in science, engineering, and math -- regardless of what I happened to believe at the time.

You can employ a lot of cognitive dissonance to get past logical fallacies and inconsistencies in Bible stories. Just have that conversation with anybody who still takes them literally. However, social interactions, judgments, and the overall sense that you don't belong was the motivating factor to actually start using critical thinking on myself rather than everybody else =)

Once I dealt with myself, only later did it become frustrating when trying to convey critical thinking to others. They then claim you are being judgmental of them again. C'est la vie!

The moment I realized that a "yes" answer to the question "What if god was imaginary" easily explained the world around me and why humans interact with each other soooo much better than a "no" answer.

Since that point seven years ago, my mind as been mostly at ease. I have zero cognitive dissonance. And, an unexpected bonus, an adult lifetime of medically treated anxiety was extinguished.

Raised in the church till about 13 studied witchcraft till late 20s,but slowly lost faith in that realised finally that I didn't believe in god/gods when I came out of chemical coma in ICU.

Was raised christian, but at 6 or 7, quit believing in god, santa, and tooth fairy. Asked questions about them, and didn't get answers that answered.