I hear ya! I have to say that when i found this forum, i felt reassured. Ive always needed a support group to hear people discus issues and make public their beliefs. I like questions. They could be what i want to ask. The feedback is awesome and its from educated people. My freedom is based on what I've read and agree with. Its all in here.

I have the same feeling. Knowing that there is not a hell to fear or an afterlife with which to be concerned came through contemplation of the idea of: "Do you remember what it was like being alive during the Civil War? Then what makes you think you will miss out on 2080?" I think Mark Twain said something to the effect of "I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it."

However, trying to convince someone who is a 1-3 on the Dawkins scale that the idea of no afterlife is very liberating is a tall order.

Why You Want a Physicist to Speak At Your Funeral" was the first step in my contemplation of no afterlife.

[dailykos.com]

Yeah. I kind of enjoy telling religious people who approach me with intentions of conversion that I was miserable when trying to be religious, and it wasn't until I gave up religion that I finally found happiness. It stops them in their tracks and generally leaves them speechless, because i8t is contrary to everything they have been taught about what people will and do experience.

Agreed!!

It took me a long time to feel the liberation but now that I do, I never want to go back.

Congratulations on your freedom, now go out there, ask some big questions and seek answers. Life is full of mystery.

Realizing there's nothing out there that can hurt, or help you, is liberating. Ending the fustration of trying to come to terms with having an un-knowable entity running around in your life, judging your every action and thought. It can be a little scary, that now you and you alone are responsible for all you say and do. And if what you think is rational, right, or wrong. Be kind to yourself, and good luck with your life.

Agreed!