The thing that scared me the most about my conversion to Atheism was the thought that there was nothing there anymore. Nothing that I was living for, nothing that would be there to provide for me, nothing to look forward to in the afterlife (although, to be 100% honest, I haven't believed in heaven for quite some time).

I remember surrendering "the plan" in college. Realizing that the way I had designed my life was not ideal and there was something better out there I was missing.
But if God's not there to direct it, what is? How do I keep from going wrong?

I remember being stranded in a caravan park in the middle of nowhere and praying "please get me a ferry ticket and accommodation even though it is allegedly sold out", and just showing up on the day and having faith, and everything worked out as I wanted.
If that wasn't God's intervention, what was?

But now I can look back and say that there is, in fact, a reason to hope in this life and a reason to trust. There is a reason to give up one's possessions and help one's fellow man. In fact, there is something intensely beautiful in this world that people often miss when they're trapped in the box defined by their God.

I was hitch hiking in Victoria on my way home from Wilson's Promontory National Park, where I had just spent 4 days bushwalking and studying birds, by myself, contemplating nature, and came to the conclusion that there is something there and it is something amazing. Its called a national park. It's called Australia, its called planet Earth. Look around. Sure, we can cheapen it by saying that it was created easily by some divine being, but isn't the appreciation of our world enough? It should be.

But the more important issue at hand is who do I trust now that God is gone? And the answer is the same as it always has been. Who is there to support missionaries, who is there to give advice, who is there to volunteer?

Other people.

I got picked up on the road by three different people that week, and had no travel plan whatsoever, except that I had a flight from Melbourne to Perth already booked and a belief in the back of my head that it would work out. I had one change of clothes and a tent. And the moment I gave up any illusion of having a planned vacation, the moment I opened myself up to suggestion and went with it, I felt as good if not better than I did in college, than I did in South Australia.

Giving up your own plan and putting your trust in something you can't control is the most amazing feeling in the world.

There is still faith, trust, hope, in my life. It is far from empty.