Well. as an atheist, I have been with the same girl for several years, I ride motorcycles with my friends, I go to work everyday and try to set goals for myself. I love hanging out with my co workers, I love learning new things and reading, I love the wonderous mysteries that our universe has to offer and feel that religion limits that. Just check out a program on the science channels, and see how little we know. Physics and the study of evolution blows me completely away. We are in a vast and mysterious universe. To put a face on that and call it god, seems very short-sighted in my eyes. Friendship, family, empathy, knowledge, sympathy, those are qualities I strive  for to have happiness in this life. Check out this video by my favorite writer, Harlan Ellison :www.youtube.com/watch?v=le-vDXMLKOI

 

Happiness is a point of view. It's also the opposite of not being completely miserable. If I break my leg tomorrow, I'd realize that I was pretty happy the day

before. You don't always plan happy times. They just happen. Everything in between is just trying to not be bored or miserable and leading a productive life

and fulfilling your responsibilities to others, while learning more along the way. Everyone tries to fill the gap with different things. When we get bored with one, we just try to find  new

interests that aren't self-destructive.

I don't think there is a permanent fill for that gap or "hole" as you put it. Believe me I've tried them all.-even religion.

I think religion was the most destructive of them all. I've done almost every illicit drug known to man, and I can definitely say that I escaped drug addiction

much easier than ridding myself of the poison of christianity.

The question of love is a tricky one. It can be dangerous too. Some guys fall in love and think they

have finally filled the gap, only to wake up one day and realize that the illusion of being "in love" has worn off and they are stuck with alimony and child support

payments.-kinda like buying a new car you can't afford. Hopefully you can be one of the lucky and have a mate that you still love after the thrill of being "in love" is gone.

That hole in your heart is just a natural mechanism in you brain that keeps you going.  If we were all truly satisfied with everything in our world, we would all

be lulling around like  tree sloths. Learning more and more about this universe is the most satisfying thing in my life.

Turning your life over to an imaginary spook in the sky will NOT make you happy. It will make you a fucking retard. I should know. I used to be one.

"And she called out a warning: Don't ever let life pass you by." -Incubus

Ellison makes some interesting points.. it was funny when he said how God is rooting for one person and not the rest of the runners

Everytime i watch any shows that deal with science i always end up learning so much.

 

 

lols

cruuuuuz,

 

You should find the state of fascination as happiness. And we're not meant to be anything-happy or sad. It's up to you how you take things. Some people are better at taking things in stride. It's the old "do you see the glass half-empty or half-full" question.

 

No universal "joy" or "happiness" criteria for "atheism" is possible, but I would think "survival" and "sexual gratification" would go a long way for most atheists as those two concepts have the greatest instinctual priority amongst human-animals, with the contention that each individual defines "survival" in their own unique way.

(most human-animals have a silly "afterlife" concept these days)

There is this old fallacy of religious people. God is their everything, so they can't imagine someone without God to be happy. They somehow can't figure out that atheists are free to search for happiness elsewhere. 

People vary. There is Maslow's pyramid of needs and not everyone can climb up equally high on that pyramid. Lots of people are satisfied at the bottom, with good food and drinking. Most of us, as long as they have material security, pursue social contact and prestige. Some of us move even higher, to pursue personally meaningful goals and interests, regardless of public opinion. And very few people transcend even that and serve the whole world, selflessly. But Christians won't tell you that, they don't know shit about psychology, their iron age book is one size fits all and we cut off what sticks out.

Theoretically, the proverbial God (iow, the soul) may give you lots of happiness. But even if you'd become sort of a modern mystic and would have the ability to experience divine bliss, it's just a temporary fix. I developed - or maybe awakened - this connection through the meditation I mentioned earlier. But these things never last, they come and go as they please, so you'd rather take them as a source of inner strength while they last and do something in the world with people around. We'd better try to not become junkies on mystical experiences, lest someone up there might close the tap. But if we use this inner connection in outer service, activity or volunteering, this is a good generalized method to become happy and probably the reason why we may have the experiences to begin with. The method doesn't matter that much, some help the poor, some educate people or lift their mood with artistic talent. 

For example, once in winter I worked in a Korean car factory. It was tough, but I did my best to cheer up my co-workers and make them help each other - and I felt happy. For no rational reason and a plenty against, in that terrible job and unpleasant environment, I was flooded with happiness as long as I could do that. Then I had go get out, my role was finished. So it doesn't matter where you are - if in prison or battlefield, as long as you have a role there, a service, a way to give something out of yourself to others. If not, get the hell out of there and find another place.  

But there is not much for me to do here now, I'm stuck in a backwoods region where I don't belong. It's a similar problem as atheists have among rednecks in Bible belt. I want to achieve happiness by becoming a university student in a big city, where should be a significant concentration of intelligent people of my age, even girls. (who had the sense to escape the backwoods regions sooner than me) It's nice to be all egalitarian, tolerant and stuff, but facts are facts.

It is absolutely necessary to find out what you are, what you need, what you want and what you don't want. If you have blind spots all over your self-image, you'll make wrong decisions and waste precious young years. I had to make many mistakes, waste lots of time, find out many things about myself (sometimes paralyzingly shocking) and change a lot. And the work isn't nearly finished. Hell, I even learned astrology and a couple of other methods to find out things.

The trick is, you need both worldly and spiritual achievement, to be happy. Usually people focus on the material world while they're young, pursue career, find a partner, create a family. And then comes the midlife crisis and they don't know what to do, they don't know all their previous life was a preparation to start doing something greater than themselves. So they break up, find a lover, buy a big and fast red sports car, and then get senile or die from a heart attack. In our cases I suspect we have to turn that upside down. We need a highly compatible woman (intellectually and spiritually), we need to find a highly compatible jobs (because we tend to wither or get crazy in meaningless jobs) and we need to handle practical life. 

 

They assume, and usually correctly, that all people are lowly and sinful materialists who only care for money, food, and a piece of ass. So by default, Jesus is the half of Life that is missing. 

Which is kind of ironic when Christians meet a de facto mystic like me and they completely wrongly wish me to be more religious and turn away from the materialistic greed. Screw them! I need someone to wish me money and sex! Can't they see they missed the mark?

I think the pursuit of happiness is necessary. Imagine that it would be possible to achieve happiness with one thing forever. Then we would never evolve anywhere. I think the best happiness we can have is in becoming a good and steady runner in the pursuit of happiness. That way you're never far from a new source of happiness when the old one gets empty. That way you won't sacrifice the happiness for the sake of the familiar and secure life style. When you'd do that, you're dead - or as good as dead. When you stop running, decades will pass, midlife crisis will be your harsh judge and then likely heart attacks and diseases of the old age will catch up with you. Then either heart attack will finish you off quickly, or cancer a little slower, or you'll spend years as a senile zombie. Living is an artistic discipline with rules to keep and these are some of them.

 

In your opening statement you speak about a "hole in your heart needing to be filled" but now you say "why do religious folks talk about this "hole" people have that must be filled with Jesus/God".

Hmmm. I'm intrigued.

 

Thanks for the comments and advice everyone.

 

                                            Eeeeew, scary !!!