A short defense of my atheist beliefs

Acceptance, appreciation, approval, these are all just part of human kindness. We all have similar needs. There is a necessary unity that must be created between any pair or collection of people in order to survive in a way that the needs of all can be met sufficiently.

I feel this unity is the definition of the human spirit, and I don't feel that it comes from this god character we have invented.

This unbreakable spirit is what has allowed humanity to become so strong and develop such intelligence. It has been no mistake that over the generations of history, mankind has chosen to cooperate and adapt to a harsh environment. This is what inspires me- this recognition of my deep history as a human being and the awesome mental capacity it has left to me.

Life should be cherished because consciousness is a gift we scarcely deserve, and has an expiration date we cannot avoid. Being kind and positive and harboring the desire to help every person in your life, unconditionally, is the only choice that honors the resilience of this great race properly.

I will never live my life as if it is a temporary challenge whilst some unknowable consequence awaits. I live my life for the consequences that occur now. The world that was left to us by those whose time ran out needs to be made better for those who will inherit it once our time is also at an end.

about feeling severed from any and all family

this feels increasingly odd because if there is one thing that i really know, as a truth in the core of what makes me what i am, it is that i am exactly the same as those of my family, just a human creature, almost exactly the same as every other on this planet.

so all at once i have these feelings of estrangement not just from them but from all of humanity. i've dealt with these feelings before, however i never interpretted them in a well-adjusted way and often would have extreme reactions or aggravated bipolar episodes based on the feeling of being alien.

at this point i just feel kind of unjustified in being estranged, like i want to connect with the family no matter what they believe, because we are alive right now on this planet and human beings need each other to properly thrive.

my battle then is figuring out how to be more social. i think my self-image is one that is afraid to be social however i know i am capable of being social and communicating (though easily misunderstood or often have to repeat myself) because at work my job is to communicate and solve problems for people, in addition to that recently to teach people how to improve themselves at that specific function of communication for the purpose of problem solving. teaching them how to get others to cooperate, in essence.

i feel like a therapist at times in that role, trying to help people identify why they approached something with a particular assumption that ended up thwarting the best solution. how can i teach my family to drop assumptions about me or what i believe so we can create productive, problem-solving relationships?