The Leaving-Religion Do and Don't List

Reflections of a heretic... 25 years later.

25 years ago, after a crisis of faith, I walked away from the Christian religion and my megachurch ministerial career. I had to stumble forward and figure things out myself. It’s just the way it was back then. Religious “deconstruction” wasn’t a thing. The term Religious Trauma Syndrome was still many years down the road. At the time, all this was so off the radar that a Senior Editor at a major publishing house stumbled upon my blog, and contacted me to ask if I’d write a book about my journey. This led to my first publishing contract - a two book deal, which resulted in Divine Nobodies, and Wide Open Spaces.

After being published I was inundated with people contacting me about their own religion crisis, and began meeting with others to discuss this. I recently estimated that the time I have professionally invested with people in religious trauma recovery is 40,000 hours. I documented my discoveries in the notes, records, and files I kept. At the time, counselors and therapists were hesitant to address topics of God and religion with patients or clients.

Eventually I founded the Center for Non-Religious Spirituality and started training and certifying people with the knowledge, tools and expertise to support and guide others in their leaving-religion journey. Based on my personal and professional experience, I decided to write a “leaving-religion do and don’t list” with five don’ts and five do’s.

What is Religious Deconstruction?

The term “deconstruction” is not uniquely related to people leaving religion. To get the backstory on the idea of “deconstruction”, you’d have to explore the work of Jacques Derrida, who was an Algerian-born French philosopher. Derrida developed the philosophy of deconstruction, partly based upon the contributions of Ferdinand de Saussure, Edmund Husserl and Martin Heideggerian in the philosophy of linguistics. If I could recommend only one primer resource for understanding Derrida’s philosophy of deconstruction, it would be this Philosophize This podcast by Steven West.

A simple definition of deconstruction could be: A method of critical analysis, which scrutinizes the internal workings of something materially or conceptually. Derrida’s “deconstruction” was a response to the assumed belief that the vital aspects of human existence have a firm and permanent foundation. For example, take language. We are more or less convinced that the word “chair” corresponds directly to a self-existing external object in the world, namely a seat typically having four legs and a back for one person. Sounds like a pretty sound assertion, right?

Not exactly. Derrida pointed out that virtually everything assumed about the above explanation (both the word and the object “chair”) is false, and if one carefully scrutinized every aspect of it, they would see this.

To fine-tune the concept of “deconstruction” for our purposes, let’s define it this way:

Deconstruction is a theory that critiques and undermines traditional beliefs, structures, and systems in order to expose their inherent contradictions and inconsistencies.

Why does this matter? The word “undermine” seems so rebellious and pernicious. Well let’s say you learned as a child from religion to fear God and detest yourself. You believed all of this was true because these ideas were taught as absolute truth. And let’s say that these toxic beliefs about God and yourself became the source of deep suffering and psychological neuroses, which poisoned virtually every aspect of your life. In this case, it would be liberating to “undermine” these religious doctrines to demonstrate their falsity and absurdity. Right?

How does a person become trapped in a toxic religious system? Here are a few ways:

• Some people are raised as children in a religious community and belief-system

• Other people join a religious group out of a felt-need such as a sense of family, community and mutual support 

•  There are some who become attached to a religious community and belief-system through a significant or affecting conversion experience 

• The need for existential certainty and security is often met though a person's affiliation with a religious group and belief-system

Our beliefs, attitudes and mindsets are shaped by many factors such as family upbringing, religious tradition, cultural values, education, media, and social conditioning. We are influenced by external sources to approach God and life in a particular way. It’s not like one day we sat down and thoroughly considered all the options, critically weighed them all out, and then carefully reasoned out the best choice. 

We are governed by a nexus of understandings and assumptions not because we chose them, but because we were indoctrinated or socialized into them. The fact that this happens is inevitable. No one can independently reason out every matter in life, especially in our younger and most formative years. We rightfully depend upon and absorb the knowledge of others. Some ideas and assumptions we are conditioned to believe can be good or useful, others can be toxic and destructive.

Religious deconstruction is liberating oneself from a damaging or toxic religious belief-system.

In many cases, leaving religion can be a very destabilizing experience. There is often a crisis of faith or distressing event that sets in motion the volatile process. Typically, a person’s lifelong beliefs are crumbling, there is a loss of personal relationships and church family, one’s sense of personal identity is shattered.

The personal work involved in religious deconstruction include areas such as:

• addressing human development deficits

• engaging trauma work

• investigating toxic indoctrination blind spots

• self-relationship healing, recovery and repair

Another term often used around this conversation is “reconstruction”. This is the post-religion rebuild process of one’s spirituality, identity and relationships.

Even as someone who for many years has done this work with others and identified useful principles, process and methodology in doing so, there is still no one-size-fits-all deconstruction and reconstruction blueprint or formula, nor can it be compressed into a workshop or seminar. The process is different and unique to each person.

Post-Religion reconstruction is cultivating existential health and a meaningful spirituality.

In my view, three noteworthy distinctions about the post-religion reconstruction process should be made:

1. Reconstruction is not merely swapping out an old belief system for a new one. (In my view, this seems to be the most common deconstruction mistake people make.)

2. Reconstruction empowers a person with the freedom to guide their path forward with autonomy. (Deconstruction counselors should not be steering people toward their preferred belief-system.)

3. Reconstruction results in greater existential health. (Existential health includes living with purpose, relating meaningfully to the givens of human existence, and adopting a rationale for being a person of compassion in the world.)

The Do and Don’t List

What follows are a few deconstruction do’s and don’ts that might be useful to people in the religion-leaving process. They are not chiseled in stone, and should not be taken as a definitive list. Based upon their own unique deconstruction process, any person would have their own lessons learned about navigating a spiritual crisis.

The Don’t List

1. Don’t rinse and repeat

The urban meaning of the “rinse and repeat” phrase is the idea of mindlessly repeating the same thing over and over and over again. With respect to religious deconstruction, to “rinse and repeat” is to unknowingly duplicate the same dynamics from one’s damaging religious past in their post-religion journey.

Typically, in most religious systems deference is given to religious authorities such as Christian pastors, leaders, theologians, teachers, authors, and personalities. I went to divinity school, learned Greek and Hebrew, received my theological degree, and people looked to me as the authority on all-things God and the Bible. Additionally, there was often this unspoken list of approved Christian teachers, authors and personalities that people followed. I sometimes refer to this as the guru-model of spirituality. The idea is that their are experts and authorities to follow as a necessary component of spiritual growth.

There’s a certain logic to this. For example, here are a few fill-in-the blank questions that have obvious answers:

• If you need professional legal advice, you call a ________?

• If you need medical care, you call a ________?

• If your check-engine light comes on, you call a _______?

Right? Now here’s the last one:

• If you need spiritual direction and guidance, you call a _______?

Yes of course, there can be a benefit to connecting with people who have devoted their lives to their spiritual journey or have a wealth of knowledge and experience about a religious tradition or spiritual path. But this mindset can be taken too far, and even become detrimental.

Within religion, there has often been the distinction between “clergy” and “laity”. The “clergy” are the professional religious class, and the “laity” are the amateurs. The downside of making too much of this distinction can be:

• Uncritically or blindly following religious leaders

• Unlikely to disagree with or question religious leaders

• Becoming too dependent upon religious leaders

• Lack of self-confidence, self-trust and self-reliance in cultivating one’s own spiritual path

It might be useful to note that clergy have no innate authority. Holding a church leadership position or having a theological degree does not imbue a person with special divine authority or superiority. The terms “anointed”, “called”, or “chosen” or titles such as ‘pastor”, “priest”, “bishop”, “elder”, “evangelist” or “apostle” do not confer any innate authority on an individual or group.

The “rinse and repeat” aspect of this in religious deconstruction is that a person might simply switch their dependency from their former fundamentalist or toxic religious leaders, to a new group of progressive or non-religious leaders, authors and personalities. Out with Oswald Chambers and in with Eckhart Tolle; out with Jack Hayford and in with Richard Rohr; out with Lee Strobel, and in with Jordan Peterson or Sam Harris.

Sometimes when a person leaves religion, they can easily become beholden to the people who represent a new set of spiritual ideas and beliefs. In other words, we once handed over the reins to the church pastor or Christian theologian, we leave it all behind, and then we hand over the reins to the progressive or non-religious thinker or influencer.

Whether it’s religious or progressive/non-religious leaders, authors and personalities, a person might be allowing someone else do their thinking for them, or giving them an inordinate amount of influence on their spiritual growth journey. Of course there is nothing wrong with gaining knowledge, wisdom and insight from others. However, but one’s spirituality is not dependent upon finding the right guru, but operating within one’s own critical thinking, direct experience, self-reflection, innate wisdom, and seeing all of life as your teacher.

Marcel Proust wrote:

“We do not receive wisdom, we must discover it for ourselves, after a journey through the wilderness, which no one else can make for us, which no one can spare us, for our wisdom is the point of view from which we come at last to regard the world.”

Rumi wrote, “It's your road, and yours alone. Others may walk it with you, but no one can walk it for you.”

Be aware of secondhand spirituality. This is basing your spirituality or beliefs on teachings transmitted by a teacher, influencer or guru. It's a surrogate spirituality that substitutes someone else's teaching, beliefs, experiences for your own critical thinking, direct experience, self-reflection, intuition, and personal investigation.

This doesn’t mean a person walks the path alone. After all, I am a deconstruction counselor and work with people all the time. But the focus of my work is supporting a person in cultivating greater self-trust, discovering and utilizing their innate skills, capacities and tools in directing their own lives, and cultivating an authentic spirituality from the inside out.

2. Don’t Scorch-Earth Religion

It’s normal and even necessary for people to feel anger toward religion after leaving. Right? If you were wronged, damaged, abused, victimized or traumatized by your church or religious group, it only makes sense you will experience feelings of betrayal, disillusionment, anger, bitterness and resentment. It’s important to process these experiences and feelings in a healthy way. Otherwise, a person can get stuck in religious hate, which can thwart a healthy deconstruction process.

Over the years I have done a lot of religion recovery work with people through individual counseling, religious trauma support groups, leading retreats, and speaking on the subject and the steps, stages, and process of disentangling oneself from toxic religious beliefs and practices.

There are deepening levels of “deconstruction” involved. Many people begin by removing themselves from a religious community that they feel is having a detrimental impact on their mental, emotional, psychological well-being and health. Another level of deconstruction involves divesting ourselves from various religious beliefs and practices that we no longer accept. There is a cause and effect nature of toxic religious beliefs. The recovery process involves identifying the deeply rooted toxic beliefs that are the root cause of self-sabotaging dynamics and neuroses that govern our lives such as shame, fear, anxiety and powerlessness.

Deeper still is a level of deconstruction that sees our religious entanglements as representative of a more deeply rooted problem. Religion is the perfect system for the ego to grab onto. The ego, which is the part of our conscious activity that establishes individual identity and agency in order to effectively navigate our daily existence, can become a runaway train and take on a life of its own.

When the ego goes off the rails, it’s desperate to reify its existence, and starts looking for something, anything, to fortify and validate its significance. Religion gives a person something important to be “right” about and to build an identity around. It provides a solid identity structure in the form of a defined set of beliefs and practices, sub-culture reinforcement, an in-group or tribe, and sense of mission. The runaway ego needs something to feel special and superior.

When you leave religion, if you don’t go deep enough into your deconstruction, your ego will simply look for another identity-train to jump onto, which is often the anti-religion train. Essentially, the person makes an anti-religion religion, and repeat the same dynamics. We now become “right” and religious people are now “wrong.” We find a non-religious tribe or subculture to bolster and validate our new identity. We use a different system to gain a sense of superiority, and a new set of answers, explanations, and beliefs to achieve a sense of security or certainty. Being against religion can become it’s own fanaticism.

Anyone can be a fundamentalist. The term “fundamentalism” is normally associated with religious extremism. It doesn’t just apply to ultra-conservative, fundy Christians. I’ve discovered there can be:

• Liberal Christian fundamentalists

• Atheist fundamentalists

• Buddhist fundamentalists

• New Age fundamentalists

• A Course in Miracles fundamentalists

You get the point.

A person can create a fundamentalist mindset out of any new understanding, concept, experience, or discovery. We become beholden to our latest epiphany, make it the new standard, and it becomes our new religion. You don’t necessarily have to be nasty or belligerent about it but there is still a certain insistence, silent pride and arrogance to it.

The alternative to becoming an anti-religion fanatic, is to put forth compelling and inspiring ideas and views about living life well and building a world that works for everyone, based upon the merits of reason, critical thinking and your natural human abilities. Live your convictions and highest truth, and be a tangible expression of transcendent values such as love, compassion, justice, harmony, and solidarity.

If you genuinely feel a sense of conviction about exposing and opposing the abuses and harm of religion in the world, do something more than whip up frenzy among the already convinced, and develop more strategic measures to make a difference where it really counts. Connect people with resources to help them recover from the damage done by religion, and create new avenues for cultivating a life of well-being, meaning and fulfillment.

As you know, I make no apologies for being an unrelenting voice against the abuses of religion. I have dedicated a lot of my life to helping people recover from spiritual abuse, toxic indoctrination, and the psychological damage afflicted by religion. I have written books about my own journey out of religion, and I do personal development work with people to help equip and empower them with the mindsets and tools for cultivating and living the life they desire.

However, it’s not my mission in life to wipe out religion from the face of the earth. First off, that would be quite presumptuous because it assumes that all religion is always bad for everyone. How can I project my experience of religion onto everyone else or conclude that religion could not or should not have any value or meaning to any person? It’s obvious that some expressions of religion are in fact valuable and meaningful to some people. It’s not for me to judge or decide, or even understand.

Secondly, the idea of eradicating religion from the face of the earth is ignoring the good religion has done and does. I have a friend who is the minister of the Unitarian Universalist Church in Nashville, which is an inclusive congregation that is on the forefront of social justice issues in that city. I've been connected to the interfaith movement around the US and world, and have encountered many extraordinary human beings.

I know individuals and faith communities who place significance and meaning upon the life and teachings of Jesus but do not subscribe to traditional Christian theology and practices. I am also friends with the Imam and Resident Scholar at the Islamic Center of Nashville. We have had great conversations. He has a PhD in Comparative Religion. I know him to be an intelligent, compassionate, generous and open-minded person.

Let our mantra be, “In all things, love.”

3. Don’t become a contortionist

Someone needs to hear this.

It’s okay to be you and where you are. It’s not necessary to have it all figured out. It’s okay not to know exactly what you believe. You don’t have to fit in. You have no obligation to defend your journey. There is no jury for you to answer to. You aren’t required to accommodate people who don’t agree with you. You don’t have to filter, edit or tone down what is real to you because of what other people might think. It’s not mandatory to have a label, claim a camp or tribe, or align yourself with some ism. It’s not your duty to pretend to agree with everyone, mute your opinion, or take responsibility for the discomfort of others.

It’s okay to speak your truth with authenticity and conviction. It’s also okay to say nothing at all. People leave religion and become more progressive or liberal Christians. Others leave religion and become atheists. When I first left religion as a high-profile Christian leader, I felt a lot of pressure to make my evolving beliefs somehow sound Christian-ish.

Being the chameleon or contortionist after leaving religion can be tiring, draining, and filled with anxiety. I get it. It was for me. Yes of course there are those who are going to think you are deceived, deluded, apostate, confused, foolish, and in danger of all sorts of horrible things and punishments from God. Some of these people may be your former closest friends or even family members.

Psychologist Carl Jung believed that the goal of the human journey was what he called “individuation”, which is the self-actualizing process through which a person achieves a sense of individuality separate from the identities of others, and consciously directs his or her life from the inside out.

About this, Jung wrote:

“Why are you looking around for help? Do you believe that help will come from outside? What is to come is created in you and from you. Hence look into yourself. Do not compare, do not measure. No other way is like yours. All other ways deceive and tempt you. You must fulfil the way that is in you.”  

Likewise, Friedrich Nietzsche wrote:

“The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.”

I realize it sounds easy for me to say don’t be a contortionist. Feeling misunderstood, lonely, judged or shunned, hurts. A big shift in the deconstruction process is from people-pleasing to authenticity, but it’s not for the faint in heart. The good news is that there are countless people in the world who actually can and will accept you as you are, and not require you to be someone else. Even the idea that people must share the same religious or philosophical belief system in order to be friends is not true. It doesn’t happen all at once and the deconstruction process involves navigating the tensions of reshaping one’s relational world.

Only you get to do you. Other people don't have the authority to decide for you what your spiritual journey looks like. Whatever you do, you need courage. Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong. It requires courage and determination to create the life you want because it is likely antithetical to what you've been told your life "should" be. If consciously directing and living your own life was easy, everyone would be doing it. However, there are many people waking up and living self-directed lives, and you will discover these people as you go.

It’s Bob Wiley’s “baby steps”. Right? It’s typically small and incremental steps to regain your voice, be okay with you, and trade in fitting in for authenticity.

4. Don’t stress over figuring “it” out

Do you need a well-defined set of truth propositions about the sunset in order to experience it? Does it take effort to know the sunset? How smart do you have to be? Is there a process or steps one must take in order to attain the sunset? Should we read books, attend seminars, or take classes on how to experience a sunset properly? Is knowing the Greek word for “sunset” necessary? Do we need a sunseteology to get it? Is there a “right” and “wrong” way to see and enjoy the sunset?

Deconstruction is not merely or fundamentally swapping out an old belief system for a new one. It’s okay not to have finely-chiseled answers to all of life’s epic existential questions about God, the meaning of life, and what happens when you die.

Consider the possibility that the theological questions that religion got you absorbed in are not the most important questions for you to answer or focus on in life. In other words, the goal here is not to come up with better answers to the same questions, but discarding the questions entirely, and asking a whole new set of questions altogether. For example, have you ever seriously asked the question: How can I address the root cause of my psychological suffering and know true happiness? Of course you haven’t because you were told that concern for your own happiness is selfish, ungodly, and self-absorbed. Give yourself permission to set aside every theological question you were told you had to answer, and look inside yourself for the questions to guide your path forward.

After leaving religion, it's possible you may grow weary of constant theological discussion and debate, and the never-ending hamster wheel of new and improved beliefs. It all might start to sound like, “Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah...” You might grow weary of the perpetual quest of figuring “it” out, and wake up one day and say, “Okay, I'm done!” Don't feel bad about this. Jumping off that hamster wheel may be the most liberating step of your spiritual journey.

In place of all the big belief questions, here are a few practical ones to consider asking:

• What makes you come alive?

• What satisfies you most deeply?

• What fills you up?

• What brings you joy?

• What centers you?

• What is a source of delight and pleasure for you?

• What areas, fields, or subjects are you interested in exploring?

• What makes you feel connected to yourself?

• What forms of self-expression are the most gratifying?

• What makes you feel strong and well in your body?

• What would your sense of adventure tell you to do?

• What way of being in the world resonates most deeply with your heart?

• What injustice or suffering in the world lights a fire in your gut to act?

• What would you do if you didn't care what people thought?

• Where does your sense of curiosity take you?

• How are you most compelled to aid the liberation of others?

• Where in life are you inspired to be a tangible expression of love, acceptance, and compassion?

• What nurtures a greater love for yourself and others?

• What is the plain and simple truth that most resonates with your spirit, heart and humanity?

• Where do you need to step out of your comfort zone?

• What would you do if you had no fear?

5. Don’t fall for the binary trap

Binary thinking, by definition, is thinking there are two sides, and you can only pick one. Also known as dichotomous thinking, this way of thinking becomes simple for us to process complex ideas and situations. The gray area in the middle of these complex issues is often ignored or goes unnoticed.

There are a lot of false choices that come up in religious deconstruction. Here are a few:

• False Choice #1: The God of Christian fundamentalism (Christian Theism) OR no God at all (Atheism)

• False Choice #2: The Bible as the infallible and inerrant word spoken by God for all humankind OR the Bible is trash and worthless

• False Choice #3: Jesus as the divine Son of God, bodily raised from the dead and at the right hand of God in heaven OR Jesus didn't exist

• False Choice #4: Religion as toxic fundamentalism OR all religion is worthless

This binary thinking is not critical thinking, and often leads to the kind of fundamentalism I mentioned previously. The post-religion spiritual landscape is diverse, complex and nuanced. I just recently wrote an article about philosopher Baruch Spinoza who was considered to be an atheist, but called his central philosophical insight, “God”.

In case you weren’t aware:

• You can believe in God, but not be a theist.

• You can ascribe significance to Jesus, but not be a Christian.

• You can appreciate the Bible, but not believe it is the only or absolute truth.

• You can believe in eternal life, but not believe in streets of gold or flames of torment.

• You can accept you are capable of wrongdoing, but not believe you are a sinner.

• You can cultivate deeply meaningful and authentic relationships, but not go to church.

• You can be drawn to a particular spiritual path, but not write off all the others.

The problem with binary thinking is its inaccuracy. There are more options and possibilities available than what binary thinking offers.

The Do List

1. Do work a deconstruction process

Healthy religious deconstruction typically doesn’t just happen on its own with time. There is work to be done to disentangle oneself from the tentacles of harmful religion. Rooting out toxic religious indoctrination requires effort.

Recovering alcoholics in a twelve step program are often encouraged to “work the steps” or “work the program”. The idea is that substance addiction realistically requires the support of others, a structured program, and a step-by-step process. Likewise, the deconstruction process can be aided by this kind of support and process. That’s why I created the Life After Religion 30-Day Detox Guide, and founded the Center for Non-Religious Spirituality - not only to provide an online community and a network of resources to support the religious deconstruction process, but to train others to do this work professionally.

A few additional resources for religious deconstruction work include:

• Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion by Marlene Winell

• When Religion Hurts You: Healing from Religious Trauma and the Impact of High-Control Religion by Laura E. Anderson

• No Nonsense Spirituality: All the Tools No Belief Required by Brittney Hartley

• Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion by Sam Harris

In addition to the Center for Non-Religious Spirituality, Recovering from Religion has a lot of useful resources, including a network of support groups.

It’s important to also remember that Religious Trauma Syndrome is likely to be included in the DSM-6 as a recognized as a psychiatric diagnosis. A recently released study in the Socio-Historical Examination of Religion and Ministry Journal, or SHERM Journal, found that 1 in 3 Americans suffer some form of trauma related to religion at some point in their life. Religious trauma effects people differently. For example, LGBTQ people experience religious trauma at disproportionate rates and in unique ways. In their religious deconstruction process, many religion-leavers seek professional therapy, which include many trauma modalities.

2. Do address human development deficits

Religion plays a role in human development. Toxic religion can prevent, hinder or sabotage normal and necessary human development.

There are several characteristics of some religious belief systems that can hinder the process of personal growth, human development, and self-actualization. Here are five to be aware of:

• Conversion transformation

The idea that religious conversion is a defining and transformative experience in a person's life doesn't preclude the necessity of a person doing the the personal work to address psychological dysfunction, unhealed wounds, destructive mindsets and behavior, and mental health issues, nor does it preclude the need for a person to cultivate the necessary tools and skills for healthy and whole living.

• Divine or Miraculous Intervention

Seeking, hoping or expecting God’s favor, blessing and intervention in your life to better your circumstances, solve a problem, rescue you out of a situation, or miraculous change your life, can become a case of wishful or magical thinking and cause passivity whereby a person doesn’t take responsibility or action for their lives.

• Religious façade

The pressure to maintain the appearance of religiosity, spirituality, piety and happiness can mask and disconnect a person from the brokenness, emptiness, numbness, loneliness and suffering within them, and prevent a person from addressing their lives and condition at a deeper level. Meeting-based and surface-level relationships, which sometimes characterize institutional church, can often lack the depth, honesty, authenticity and vulnerability that we need in our relationships to support our growth and transformation.

• Human inadequacy

The premise that human beings are naturally and inherently bad, cannot trust themselves, and desperately dependent upon God as a result of their human inadequacy and weakness, sabotages a person’s human agency, self-trust, self-confidence and self-determination, which are necessary for healthy and whole living.

• Homogenous church culture

The separatist mentality of religious subculture can cut people off from connection and relationship with others outside that subculture, which limits the people, relationships and viewpoints that could be contributing to our journey of growth and transformation. Religion can also lead people to believe that the Bible and theology are the only or most important fields of knowledge for cultivating a meaningful spirituality and avenues for exploring matters of ultimate truth and reality, as opposed to other significant areas of inquiry such as philosophy, psychology, the natural and social sciences, history and art.

Some of human development work to address in religious deconstruction can include:

Developing strong critical thinking skills

Addressing negative beliefs about self-ability and self-worth

Processing difficult and complex emotions such as depression, anxiety, anger, grief, loneliness, difficulty with pleasure, loss of meaning

Addressing sexual dysfunction as a result of religious sexual repression and purity culture

Broadening one’s base of knowledge beyond religious mindsets, teachings and dogma

Learning healthier relationship dynamics, untethered from patriarchal gender roles

3. Do repair and rebuild a new relationship with yourself

Religion focuses people on cultivating a better “relationship with God,” but what they may most need is a healthier relationship with themselves. People are suffering every day, not because of a deficient relationship with a deity in the sky, but because of a dysfunctional relationship with the person in the mirror.

Cultivating a new relationship with yourself could include things life:

• Becoming more aware of your self-talk or mental commentary about yourself and your life

• Questioning the ideas, beliefs, mindsets, narratives, stories, and ideologies that are influencing you

• Taking responsibility for your own happiness, well-being and life

• Outgrowing yourself and the definitions and expectations that have defined you

• Discarding the mask, and being a more real, authentic and human person

• Honoring what most matters to you about life and your own inner guidance, deep feelings and intuition

• Offering yourself acceptance, love, compassion and patience

• Choosing not to remain actively connected to toxic people or those who judge, shame, control or bully you

• Practicing the self-care that promotes and rejuvenates your vitality, energy, wellness

• Inhabiting your uniqueness and expressing it freely and authentically

Here are a few important areas to explore and cultivate with respect to cultivating a stronger relationship with yourself:

Self-awareness (exploring your authentic and innermost thoughts, feelings, beliefs, needs, desires, fears, motivations, patterns, habits)

Self-love (regard for one's own well-being and happiness)

Self-acceptance (seeing the totality of yourself without judgment)

Self-compassion (extending compassion to one's self in instances of perceived inadequacy, failure, or general suffering)

Self-care (actions and attitudes which contribute to the maintenance of well-being and personal health and promote human development)

Self-trust (following what your own thoughts, feelings, beliefs, intuition, judgment, insights, and body tells you)

Self-confidence (empowered to rise to new challenges, seize opportunities, deal with difficult situations, and take responsibility if and when things go awry)

Self-reliance (reliance on one's own abilities, capacities, powers and resources rather than those of others)

Self-efficacy (confidence in one's own ability to achieve intended results)

Self-actualization (the realization of one's own maximum potential and possibilities)

Self-expression (giving expression to your unique thoughts, feelings, gifts, personality individuality)

Self-respect (feeling a sense of harmony, dignity and gratification in life as a result of taking consistent actions that are aligned with your values and convictions)

4. Do make new friends

Feeling alone and isolated is a common struggle I hear (and experienced myself) after leaving religion. It’s not terribly difficult to make new friends and connections with people online who are on a similar path, understand, and accept you as you are. That’s a big reason why I founded the Center for Non-Religious Spirituality. Finding people on social media who are in a religious deconstruction process is fairly easy. Whether it’s people on TikTok sharing their journey or groups on Facebook, there is no shortage of people to follow and engage. As mentioned above there are deconstruction support groups that might be nearby.

Here are a few avenues for exploring and cultivating face-to-face connections and friendships in the space of non-religious spirituality. You can plug-in your zip code and see the opportunities near you.

• American Humanist Association Chapters

• Meetup.com affinity and personal interest groups

Here are a few more suggestions:

Volunteer in your community

Join a local gym or sports league

Visit a neighborhood coffee shop or juice bar regularly

Join a professional networking group

Support your community arts, zoo or museum organizations

Take your dog to the dog park

Visit neighborhood food, art and music festivals

Take a class or learn a new skill through a community college or learning center

I realize that the above items can sound a bit cliché or something akin to Dear Abby advice, but in the age of social media, virtual community and Zoom relations, the practical aspects of befriending others may have long lost in time.

Depending on your personality, making new friends can sound like an exciting adventure or a horrifying nightmare. I realize it may not be a comfortable thing, requiring a person to break out of their comfort zone. It’s never easy to rebuild your relational world after leaving religion. I get it.

5. Do explore new experiences and new knowledge

After leaving religion, I began to investigate many different fields of knowledge. During my religious years this was off limits because the only approved sources for spiritual knowledge or existential investigation were the Bible, and a list of approved commentaries and Christian books.

Philosophy was one of those areas of post-religion investigation that was meaningful for me. Philosophy is a gold mine for exploring existential matters outside the religious framework. Later in life, I taught philosophy and philosophy of religion classes. I am currently doing a Substack series titled, Philosophers You Have Never Heard Of. Other branches of knowledge that have significantly impacted my post-religion growth journey are: psychology, natural sciences, social sciences, history, anthropology, linguistics and others.

Here are a few ways to explore new experiences and new knowledge in your post-religion journey:

• Educate yourself

After leaving religion, I can’t tell you how many free online classes I took through Coursea, on a variety of subjects. Why not explore a new area of interest or curiosity? Coursera is one of many education platforms that partners with top universities and organizations worldwide, to offer courses online for anyone to take, for free. Classes are offered in about every subject imaginable in the sciences, humanities, arts, technology, health, computer science, etc.

• Express yourself

Throw caution to the wind and explore a new form of creative or artistic expression. Sketching, painting, Haiku poetry, photography, collage, writing, cooking, woodworking, film/video, music, theater, dance, digital art, gardening, landscaping, craft design, sculpture, etc. Choose some form of artistic or creative expression that interests you, and start dabbling, exploring and experimenting. Have fun with it!

• Challenge yourself

Every day men and women are challenging themselves to be more fit and healthy, or achieve a goal like running a marathon, completing a triathlon, hiking a mountain, or cycling across their state or country. Joining a sports league, finding a tennis or golf partner, or attending yoga, dance or taekwondo classes are all possibilities. Set a personal fitness goal. Start walking, strength training, swimming or whatever resonates with or inspires you.

• Volunteer yourself

Do some research and find out what needs currently exist in your community or city that you would be inspired and skilled to meet. It could be a need nearby that you could directly respond to...a single mom down the street who could use a break, a senior who would enjoy some conversation, or being the welcome wagon for the new Indian family who moved in downstairs. Maybe it's just reaching out to a neighbor in need or performing random acts of kindness. Perhaps there is an organized community effort of interest such as a food bank, homeless shelter, English tutoring effort, child mentoring program, or community beautification project. Volunteer at the local animal shelter, rescue group, or humane society. Help build a home with Habitat for Humanity. Contact your local United Way, Red Cross, or Salvation Army for discovering new service opportunities in your area. Where in life are you inspired to be a tangible expression of love, help, kindness, and compassion?

• Enjoy yourself

Many people learned through their religious involvement that enjoying oneself is selfish, even sinful. Time to cast off the guilt, and allow yourself to do things for no reason other than pure enjoyment, delight, pleasure, and satisfaction.

The word “pleasure” has dicey connotations. A person's religious training may have taught them to be wary of it. They learned that pleasure is sin’s cousin, and not fitting for the pursuit of holiness. Seeking worldly pleasures is seen as making a deal with the devil. It certainly does not square with the instructions deny yourself and serve God.

Religion often views pleasure-seekers as hedonists, obsessed with gratifying the impulses and desires of their flesh at the expense of losing their soul. Religious training can cause a person to mistrust pleasure. These are mindsets we must unlearn in order to enjoy life.

The secret to pleasure is finding it in the common experiences of life. This ensures that you will never be disappointed because these pleasures are readily available. These experiences of pleasure are fissures in the crust of news headlines and life’s hardships, reminding us that there is another reality that reaches toward us in the common hours and affairs of our lives.

If one ties their well-being to possessions, luxuries, achievements, or outcomes, they will anxiously strive to obtain and maintain them and be disheartened when they are lost. Even if a person is fortunate enough to secure the external conditions they desire, the law of diminishing returns means they will have to strive harder to procure more to maintain their happiness.

There is a longstanding school of thought that argues that pleasure and happiness are the highest intrinsic good, and the aim of human life. Some people are uneasy with this idea because they equate pleasure with self-indulgence, immorality, or vice. Yet I have discovered that my experiences of pleasure are not harmful to myself or others. On the contrary, what ultimately feels good and brings pleasure are things such as: expressing love; beholding beauty; offering compassion; acting virtuously; enjoying nature; human touch and affection; cultivating a talent; creative expression; authentic relationship; strengthening the body; learning new things; acting heroically; and fulfilling a sense of purpose and meaning in life.

True pleasure is not hatred, greed, selfishness, revenge, addiction, deceit, irresponsibility or harming others. Though these choices may offer a temporary perverse gratification, they ultimately bring regret, hostility, brokenness, loneliness, suffering, anguish, dysfunction, and hardship. One could make the case that the greatest good is to make life better by increasing pleasure and happiness in the world and decreasing pain and unhappiness. It is self-evident that if people experienced more of the pleasure of love, beauty and goodness, and less of the pain of hatred, greed and malevolence, human society would be enriched and fortified.

Most of us have not given much thought to the pleasures that are most satisfying or the opportunities for enjoyment regularly at our disposal. To live life well is to enter into and embrace those moments and experiences as fully as we can.

Some useful questions to ask yourself about cultivating more pleasure in your life are:

What makes me feel good? (What brings me joy, pleasure, well-being, energy, inspiration, fun, and tranquility?)

What makes me feel bad? (What brings me anxiety, stress, fear, boredom, shame, and dread?)

What makes me feel whole? (What way of being in the world is a reflection of what matters most to me in life, and an expression of my highest truth?)

What makes me feel purposeful? (In what ways do I want to learn, explore, build, create, grow, deepen, and make a difference?)

Cultivate in your life those experiences that make you feel good, whole and purposeful, and divest yourself from those things that make you feel bad. Enjoying pleasure is a pathway to living life well that is accessible to everyone. People expend great effort in self-help programs or achieving enlightenment, not realizing that if they thoughtfully answered the four questions above and applied them to their daily lives, they would be living a meaningful and fulfilling life.

There are a couple deconstruction resources related to my Substack subscribers. All paid Substack subscribers automatically receive two of my unpublished works related to religious deconstruction and reconstruction:

Life After Religion 30-Day Detox Guide

This 30-Day guide is a 50,000-word resource I created to assist people in disentangling themselves from the damaging impact of toxic religion. I created this guide out of my 25 years of individual and group work with people in toxic religion recovery. Each subject area includes a personal investigation assignment to aid in the detox and deconstruction process in light of their own spiritual journey.

Some of the themes addressed in the guide are:

• making peace with your religious past

• rooting out toxic religious indoctrination

• navigating a crisis of faith

• new ways of approaching life’s existential questions

• learning new tools for personal growth and development

• exploring what spirituality is for you

How to Have a Great Day Without Religion

This unpublished book of mine offers natural and non-religious pathways for cultivating a more human and authentic post-religion spirituality. The book is divided into three parts:

• Part One: The Fundamental Convictions of Living Life Well

• Part Two: The Essential Pathways of a Life Lived Well

• Part Three: Six Ways to Start Living Life Well Right Now

• Part Four: Three Mindsets that Sabotage Living Life Well

• Part Five: What If We All Lived Life Well?

• Part Six: Ending Life Well

Both the Life After Religion 30-Day Detox Guide, and the unpublished book, How To Have a Great Day Without Religion are free gifts for a paid subscription, which is $5 monthly or $50 annually. I also previously published a Substack series on religious deconstruction that you might find useful.

On being a heretic

The sub-title of this article is, “Reflections of a heretic... 25 years later.” In my Substack article, Evolution of Religion: Part Three (My personal religious evolution story), I share in detail my own leaving-religion story. It includes being publicly accused of heresy by my Christian publishing house, and losing my book contract. Several hundred years ago they might have burned me at the stake. This all happened over my third book, Being Jesus in Nashville.

Philosopher Yevgeny Zamyatin wrote,

“The world is kept alive only by heretics: the heretic Christ, the heretic Copernicus, the heretic Tolstoy. Our symbol of faith is heresy. If we have no heretics we must invent them, for heresy is essential to health and growth.”

And Robert G. Ingersoll wrote:

“Heresy is the eternal dawn, the morning star, the glittering herald of the day. Heresy is the last and best thought. It is the perpetual New World, the unknown sea, toward which the brave all sail. It is the eternal horizon of progress. Heresy extends the hospitalities of the brain to a new thought.
Heresy is a cradle; orthodoxy, a coffin.”

It’s okay to pave your own path. If you are branded by some as a “heretic”, wear it as a badge of honor.

Heresy is any belief or theory that is strongly at variance with established beliefs or customs. The advancement of civilization has always been on the side of heretics, who have done most of the heavy pushing. In their own way, the founders of America, the leaders of women’s rights and the civil rights movement, the pioneers of astronomy and physics, and the greatest musicians and innovators were all heretics. They challenged, defied and pushed past the status quo. Galileo was a heretic, Darwin was a heretic, Jesus was a heretic. George Bernard Shaw wrote, “All great truths begin as blasphemies.”

The best way to shake things up is to question everything. Sometimes you have to break the rules in order to find your true self. It's okay to be different. Doubt is not a weakness, but a strength that challenges the status quo. Questioning authority is not rebellion, it's a quest for truth. Spirituality should encourage critical thinking, not conformity. Maybe there is no absolute truth, only different perspectives. Embrace your inner heretic, for it is the path to self-discovery. Don’t let the fear of being labeled a heretic stop you from speaking your truth.

In Summary

• The ways toxic religion damages people is unlikely to simply fade away over time, but working a religious deconstruction process can be healing and liberating.

• Binary thinking is not your friend in your post-religion journey.

• You have no obligation to defend your spiritual journey.

• The world needs more heretics.

“Re-examine all you have been told. Dismiss what insults your soul.”

- Walt Whitman