enjoying the good life without gods.pdf

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Enjoying the Good Life Without Gods:

Gods, Religion Not Needed to Enjoy Life

By Austin Cline, About.com Guide

Living Without GodsIt's common for religious theists to be incredulous at the idea that a

person could not just live, but enjoy life without believing in any

gods and without following any religion. Because of this, religious

theists also often make all kinds of assumptions about irreligious

atheists and the sorts of lives they must lead. These assumptions arerarely, if ever, true. Religious theists must learn that neither their

theism nor their religion are necessary to living a satisfying,

fulfilling, and happy life. It's not merely possible to be a godless,

irreligious atheist who enjoys a fulfilling, meaningful life, but

common.

If We All Die, Why Bother?A popular objection to living well without gods is the claim that

since life is short, everything we do is temporary and thus pointless.

This assumes that something can only have a point if it is eternal in

some fashion, but does anyone really believe that? Every meal we

eat must end, so is there no point in eating or enjoying a meal?

Every movie ends, so is it impossible to enjoy movies? Of course

not. What we do will have a point if we create one being eternal

is unnecessary. Atheism Does Not Lead to Hopelessness and

Despair...1

Without God, How Can there Be a Purpose to Life?Religious theists also tell atheists that the theists' gods are necessary

for life to have meaning, but this isn't true either. Things have

meaning to us when we value them, and whether we value

something or not and how much is dependent entirely upon

us. No god, no spirits, and no humans can force us to value a book,a meal, or a relationship. This means that what we value comes from
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the choices we make and the presence of meaning in our lives is

solely our responsibility. Gods are unnecessary and irrelevant.

Without God, How Can there Be a Meaning to Life?

Religious theists also tell atheists that the theists' gods are necessaryfor life to have meaning, but this isn't true either. Things have

meaning to us when we value them, and whether we value

something or not and how much is dependent entirely upon

us. No god, no spirits, and no humans can force us to value a book,

a meal, or a relationship. This means that what we value comes from

the choices we make and the presence of meaning in our lives is

solely our responsibility. Gods are unnecessary and irrelevant.

Your Life is Your OwnThe most important, and perhaps most difficult, thing to remember

about living without gods is that your life is entirely your own. This

means that you must take personal responsibility for all of the

choices you make and for the consequences of those choices. There

are neither spirits to blame nor spirits to call upon for help it's up

to you do deal with your life and this is the only chance you'll have.

There are no do-overs and there is no afterlife where your losses are

made up for. If you want to live, it's now or never.

Importance of LearningWe don't come into this world knowing anything that we need to

know; we don't leave this world having learned a fraction of what

we could use. In between, we need to spend as much time as we can

learning because without knowledge and experience, we won't beable to accomplish anything. Accurate, reliable knowledge of the

world around us is indispensable for adequately navigating our

world not just physically, but socially and mentally as well.

Learning should not stop with school; instead, it should be a life-

long endeavor.

Importance of Teaching

As social animals, our learning won't occur in complete isolationand we shouldn't try to keep what we learn from others. The


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process of learning should be accompanied by simultaneous

teaching. We are all different, possessing different perspectives and

experiences. We all have something to offer, if we can figure out

how to put it together and we should definitely try, seeking to

help others learn even as we ourselves are being helped.

Importance of LovingLove is more than an emotion, it's an attitude a way of

approaching those around you, the things you do, and even

yourself. Love is important because it molds your approach to

incorporate attitudes of caring, kindness, gentleness, and generosity.

The opposite of love is not hate, for hate still implies that one cares

even if in a negative way. The opposite of love is indifference

an indifference towards consequences, towards results, and towards

life itself.

Striving for ExcellenceThere's an old adage that if you are going to do something, you

should do it well. The same can be said about life generally. There's

a lot that a person can do to get the most out of life, but one of the

most fundamental things may able to strive to do the best you can

possibly achieve. Mediocre accomplishments will likely result in a

mediocre life; excellence, even in the seemingly smaller things like

how you conduct your relationships with others, can result in a

richer and more satisfying life.

Meaning, Purpose, Value, and Morality Without Gods

Religious theists may place their religion and their belief in a god atthe center of lives, but the fact that they cannot imagine living a

good life without that religion and that god doesnt mean that it's

impossible and that others cannot. A godless life is not one that is

necessarily without meaning, joy, purpose, and love.

What about weathering life's low points, though? Life comes

with both its ups and downs; while we may wish for life to always

be pleasant, we can't avoid incidents that will make life seem more

of a burden than a joy. If religious believers can find comfort in theirdoctrines what are godless, irreligious atheists to do? That religion


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can provide comfort is undeniable, but not everything that's

comforting is necessarily good for you, especially over the long

term.

Regardless of the "comfort" which religion may offer, it's

typically based upon promises of what happens in some other planeof existence or future life. Setting aside questions about whether

they even exist, it's an indisputable fact that we have to live here and

now. As enticing as the promises may be, it will always be necessary

to drag our gaze away from them and focus on what lies before us

our lives, with all its joys and sorrows. If we don't do that, we'll

never really overcome the sorrows and we certainly won't be able to

appreciate the joys.

Because of this, the "comfort" typically offered by religion maynot be a real benefit at all. Godless, irreligious atheists should thus

not look with envy upon the religious beliefs which people try to

rely on. Whatever life has in store for you, you won't deal with it

any better if your attention is drawn to unreal promises of an

unexplainable, unknown future.


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Myth: Atheism Leads to Hopelessness

and Despair, Atheism is Depressing(Do Atheists Have No Hope,

Nothing to Look Forward To Without God?)

By Austin Cline, About.com Guide

Myth:Without God in your life, you have nothing to look forward to. Atheism

leads to hopelessness and despair.

Response:For many people, their religion teaches that their god gives them

purpose in life and offers them something to look forward to after

they die something that is important because, so often, these

religions teach adherents that their actual lives right now aren't of

much value. Therefore, anyone who doesn't follow this religion and

who doesn't believe in their god must not have purpose in life andmust not have anything to look forward to. All of this is wrong, not

to mention arrogant.

The belief may follow logically from the premises which

believers use, but there is a problem: the people who are reaching

these conclusions are relying upon assumptions about and

stereotypes of atheists, not any interactions with real atheists. This

myth is often repeated by someone who "sees what they want to

believe." You don't find any real interest in learning about atheistsand agnostics because they assume they already understand all

about atheists and agnostics not through personal research, but

because of their own religious assumptions.

As a consequence, even when real information about real

atheists is encountered, it often isn't believed or accepted at face

value. Prejudices and assumptions are given a preferential position

over and above disconfirming facts and evidence. I receive quite a

lot of email along these lines: someone feels sorry for me, assumesthat I dont have anything to live for, insists on letting me know that
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Ill be prayed for, please accept Jesus into your heart, etc., etc., etc.

None of it is very original, but all of it can be quite arrogant.

To start with, it is arrogant as well as mistaken to assume that,

without a belief in their god, then I must have nothing to hope for.

Granted, I cant hope for their particular idea about an afterlife, butthat hardly warrants the conclusion that I have nothing to hope for

or to look forward to in the future.

What do I have to look forward to? Life an enjoyable life

doing the things I love and being with the people I love. Why do I

live? Because of the people I love and the things I love basically,

because I enjoy life. Does it matter that, eventually, I am going to die

and the life I enjoy will end? I admit that that will be unfortunate,

but it doesn't mean that doing what I enjoy now is thereforeworthless. After all, every individual action I am doing will end

every good meal end, every trip to an amusement park ends, every

good book ends.

The same is true for religious theists and Christians, but I don't

see many of them eschewing experiences that must necessarily end

on the basis of the belief that non-eternal experiences aren't worth

having. Since these religious theists don't actually behave as though

they believe this principle is true, it's difficult to accept that reallybelieve this myth or the argument that atheism should be rejected

because it leads to hopelessness.

Does the fact that every moment ends and cannot be

recaptured mean that, therefore, it was worthless and meaningless

to experience and enjoy that moment? Not at all. There is absolutely

no reason to think that the temporary nature of any particular

moment or experience forces us to de-value that moment or

experience and, therefore, to also de-value all of life.

Although it's rare to find any theists eschewing non-eternal

experiences, it isn't unusual to find them devaluing life and our

experiences in life as compared to the "eternal" existence they

anticipate having after their physical deaths. Because this life is

temporary and the assumed afterlife is eternal, only the afterlife is

truly valued while this life is de-valued. At most, this life is given

value as preparation for reaching the preferred afterlife. It is not,


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however, valued in and of itself. This life is not valued for what it is

and for the experiences it offers.

Because of this, the questions these theists ask atheists should

really be turned around: if this life with all of its temporary

experiences is of so little importance while the afterlife with all of itseternalness is the real prize, why do they bother to go on living this

life? Why would they want to be here eating, drinking, reading, and

sleeping when all of that must necessarily end when they die? It

makes much more sense to hasten their journey to their real goal:

the eternal afterlife, where everything has value because it is eternal

rather than temporary.

It is interesting to note that this myth about atheists

contradicts another popular myth, namely that atheists are onlyinterested in sex and other forms of physical, material pleasure. On

the one hand the absence of god and religion supposedly causes

atheists to have no reason to care about living; on the other hand,

the absence of god and religion also supposedly causes atheists to

spend too much time enjoying themselves with worldly pleasures.

Which is it?

I have no need for an afterlife, a heaven, a god, or any

supernatural beliefs in order to appreciate living and take joy out ofmy life. For many religious theists, and for Christians in particular,

it is unacceptable to think that life on earth is all that we have. To

me, that sounds like someone who doesnt take much joy out of

their life. A person who truly enjoys and appreciates their life will

take pleasure in it and enjoy it regardless of whether any sort of

afterlife exists. They might believe in an afterlife and even in some

sort of wonderful heaven, but they wont depend upon the existence

of such a heaven in order for their lives to have meaning or purpose.

The disagreement here is thus not between theists who believe in an

afterlife and atheists who do not, but rather between theists who are

unable to find value in this life and everyone else atheists as well

as theists who can.

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