If you're an Atheist, what comforts you?

[The Grand Nudger]

Mortality, loss...both things that all people, faithful or faithless, must eventually confront - and...significantly, must confront alone beyond a given point.

The specifics of the question don't seem to be directed at getting some secular description of the world as it is..so much as wondering how secular people deal with the things that the religious might pray over.

In this, we'd have to know why praying worked to calm anxiety.  As it just so happens, we have reason to believe that prayer (and meditation) literally change your brain.  This sounds like it might be a huge claim until we mention that..as far as we're aware, almost everything changes our brains.  Learning complicated tasks, music, environmental chemicals, internal chemical balance, general health - so..in this regard it's completely unremarkable... but the effect....well.

It's certainly remarkable that a religious person can pray and feel better, lol....but prayer isn't the only way to effect that change in a brain.

[Dragonfly]

@OP Q
The same things that comfort the religious.  Let's be honest with ourselves....even when you were a believer, when some shitty thing happened in your life, your mind didn't immediately reel to "well, at least I've got god!".

When your tire blew out on the freeway, and you ran off the road...missed your appt, and the wrecker cost an arm and a leg, you probably consoled yourself in the fact that, at least..you didn't die in a fiery crash.  Not in the belief that you'd been saved from the consequences of sin by jesus christ.

Right?

There is no comfort offered by the abrahamic faiths that amounts to anything other than some currently intangible post mortem benefit...but we aren't exactly running off to our deaths, no one is lamenting the fact that they -didn't- get into the fiery crash so that they could exchange their christ token for admittance to the funhouse in the sky.  The faithful and the faithless are simply glad to be alive - and while they may later attribute their survival to some ghost - it isn't the ghost that gave either of them comfort (even if the ghost exists).

My mind actually DID reel to "well, I have God to pray to and help me through this and possibly intervene."

Occasionally, I did believe that sometimes God helped prevent a crash, and I would pray a thank you. BUT it did bother me that when I had breast cancer, people claimed that prayer worked when mine was cured, while all of my friends who died had also had their families praying for them. I noticed that it was God's answer to prayer when things worked out, and God's will when they didn't. That led to some flickering thoughts of whether there's anyone to pray to. 

Actually, in Judaism there isn't much talk about the afterlife. In all of my years of attending a Conservative synagogue, I've never once heard of anyone mention an afterlife. So my comfort from Judaism was not as much from a standpoint of heaven (that was leftover from my Christian upbringing), but more from the structure for living, rituals, community, help processing and healing from difficult events (like the synagogue shooting), the belief in tikkun olam (repairing the world), and other things. Right now I'm wondering if there's enough value in that to want to leave Judaism altogether. But the rituals that we do certain things "as God commanded us to" is troubling because of the things they say are commanded aren't find in the Torah but have been added by rabbis. So an increasing amount of things are prohibited by rabbis that aren't prohibited in the written Torah, so it's getting even more insane to try to tease out what's in the Torah and what's being hashed out by rabbis. And then there's the fact that I don't LIKE the God of the Torah. He's a cruel and sick bastard. So how can I say good things about him in prayer?

[The Grand Nudger]

Is there anything specific to judaism that you have difficulty imagining a secular source of?

[Fidel_Castronaut]

The love of a woman, and the love of a fine Cuban cigar.

[Angrboda]

Actually, in Judaism there isn't much talk about the afterlife. In all of my years of attending a Conservative synagogue, I've never once heard of anyone mention an afterlife. So my comfort from Judaism was not as much from a standpoint of heaven (that was leftover from my Christian upbringing), but more from the structure for living, rituals, community, help processing and healing from difficult events (like the synagogue shooting), the belief in tikkun olam (repairing the world), and other things. Right now I'm wondering if there's enough value in that to want to leave Judaism altogether. But the rituals that we do certain things "as God commanded us to" is troubling because of the things they say are commanded aren't find in the Torah but have been added by rabbis. So an increasing amount of things are prohibited by rabbis that aren't prohibited in the written Torah, so it's getting even more insane to try to tease out what's in the Torah and what's being hashed out by rabbis. And then there's the fact that I don't LIKE the God of the Torah. He's a cruel and sick bastard. So how can I say good things about him in prayer?

There is a movement of secular Judaism. Have you considered it?

[Dragonfly]

Is there anything specific to judaism that you have difficulty imagining a secular source of?

Rituals that lend to a sense of unity and continuity, such as when Jews light sabbath candles at the same time around the world every Friday and have for hundreds of years. 

Structure: A community that has a structure in place for celebrating and mourning. There's a detailed plan laid out for when a loved one dies. The plan helps the family know what to do and how to grieve and heal. The plan also involves the community, so they are there to support you. 

Prayer and Scriptures: Hope and comfort/soothing in times of stress. I can find some comfort in nature and other things, but nothing so far is coming close to the way I felt/believed when I believed in God.

---

Actually, in Judaism there isn't much talk about the afterlife. In all of my years of attending a Conservative synagogue, I've never once heard of anyone mention an afterlife. So my comfort from Judaism was not as much from a standpoint of heaven (that was leftover from my Christian upbringing), but more from the structure for living, rituals, community, help processing and healing from difficult events (like the synagogue shooting), the belief in tikkun olam (repairing the world), and other things. Right now I'm wondering if there's enough value in that to want to leave Judaism altogether. But the rituals that we do certain things "as God commanded us to" is troubling because of the things they say are commanded aren't find in the Torah but have been added by rabbis. So an increasing amount of things are prohibited by rabbis that aren't prohibited in the written Torah, so it's getting even more insane to try to tease out what's in the Torah and what's being hashed out by rabbis. And then there's the fact that I don't LIKE the God of the Torah. He's a cruel and sick bastard. So how can I say good things about him in prayer?

There is a movement of secular Judaism.  Have you considered it?

You know, I haven't, and that's mostly because I was not born Jewish but converted, so I don't have the cultural background that most would probably share. It's worth exploring, though, so thanks for bringing it up. I'll see if there's a congregation near me.

[SaStrike]

Money

[Dragonfly]

Money

I thought you might be joking, but maybe money could be comforting. It could at least buy comforting things. With enough money, you could probably buy a team of mental health professionals to tend to you at a time of crisis.

[The Grand Nudger]

Is there anything specific to judaism that you have difficulty imagining a secular source of?

Rituals that lend to a sense of unity and continuity, such as when Jews light sabbath candles at the same time around the world every Friday and have for hundreds of years. 

-and many people also celebrate thanksgiving.  All of society is built atop rituals that lend to a sense of unity and continuity.  Lighting candles on a sabbath is a representative of that set.  

Structure: A community that has a structure in place for celebrating and mourning. There's a detailed plan laid out for when a loved one dies. The plan helps the family know what to do and how to grieve and heal. The plan also involves the community, so they are there to support you. 

Here again I fail to see how judaism offers structure in some way that the entirety of human culture and society doesn't?    

Prayer and Scriptures: Hope and comfort/soothing in times of stress. I can find some comfort in nature and other things, but nothing so far is coming close to the way I felt/believed when I believed in God.

The things you were taught to believe when you believed in god are likely the cause of that difficulty, themselves. 

I understand that you get these things from judaism, I was wondering more about things that you couldn't get elsewhere.  Many of us engage in rituals that lend to a sense of unity and continuity, many of us have structure in our lives, all of us have ways of finding comfort in times of stress.  That strongly suggests that you could get all of the above elsewhere, you just don't.  

If I/we were being honest...though.... you already do, and always have, even when you were a believer you availed yourself of secular rituals, unity, continuity, and structure...and all of the stuff you just mentioned has to do with people doing things...the religious import is literally being manufactured out of secular moving parts. I get the yearning for community, what I don't get is the conflation of community with religion, as though these things common to any community of people could only be gotten from judaism. It doesn't seem like god was doing anything up above, you were being comforted by the tribe.

Go find a new tribe - or just stay in the one that you're already in, since they're providing all of the above? It doesn't actually matter whether or not god is real for any of that..right?

[purplepurpose]

"If you're an Alien, what comforts you?". Anal probing.