Is free will real?

[Mudhammam]

And you think all this is a simpler, more meaningful explanation for your behaviors than free will?

No, it's not simpler, but it is more meaningful, and correct.

Anyway about the Buddhism, it sounds like you are engaged in the practice known as "watching the watcher," where you start observing that little homonculus and realize that it's an idea, rather than a thing. Avoiding Buddhist philosophy because of religious stigma will mean you miss out on some of the philosophy of mind that is most closely related to your philosophical position.

I don't avoid any ideas. I just finished reading Theologica Germanica, a 14th century work written by an anonymous Christian mystic. One of the main goals of mysticism is freedom and transformation from what is vulgarly understood as the "self."