It's difficult for me to reply to topics like this, partly because I don't know if I can say I believe in God, it depends on what you mean by God. I don't even know if I'm religious but I do know I'm an admirer of the bible and I believe the stories in the bible contain deep wisdom about being, they're extraordinary significant with regards to I would say either evolutionary or psychological truth, and they're very helpful. The other part is, topics like this are always kind of mysterious because what exactly is the reason why you're reaching out to others about this? Which btw I think is a form of prayer, you say you haven't prayed in years but the way I see it, reaching out to hypothetical people you don't know, trying to see what they think, hoping that someone has something useful to say, looks close enough to a prayer to me. People do this all the time, just not to God. You say you don't believe in God anymore, I think what you have to ask yourself is, is that a problem, and why? Because you can say you believe something, but that doesn't mean you truly believe it at all, or act it out. And I don't mean that in a negative way. I think how people act is what they truly believe, and unless you've witnessed a significant change in your behavior or actions since you stopped believing, that has proven to be hindering in your life, or a disadvantage socially, or maybe even harmful to the people around you, then I would say you don't need to worry about this, but I don't know if I'm being helpful with this. I'm assuming you think it's a problem, from the way you put your words. The way you put your words makes me believe you think you're better off believing in God, so how are you going to fix that? Well the story that comes to my mind is the story of Cain and Abel, I think it's an extremely good example and useful lesson of what to do (or what not to do) when the odds are not in your favor let's say. So my advice would be to examine or maybe re-examine that story, and really give it a good thinking how it correlates to your own life. Life is unfair and full of suffering, there's no doubt about that. The question is what are you going to do about that? Is there something you could do to make your life better? There's definitely things you can do to make your life and the lives of people around you even worse, there's also no doubt about that. And I think everyone knows what that is. And that's clearly what Cain does, Cain's path is first feeling that things are unfair, as he thinks his sacrifice is just as worth as Abel's, but it simply isn't in the face of God, and as far as I'm concerned you can think of God in this story as a sort of judging entity but a helpful one, or even a goal, that will let you know right away whether your sacrifice for the future is going to help you achieve that goal. But even if it doesn't, it's okay because you've done the best you could, at least that's what you should do, always. And the fact you did the best you could should also be your comfort, because there's nothing else you can do. And if you didn't do the best you could, well then you're the reason why things aren't working out for you, which is basically what God tells Cain, it's his own fault. Then he goes into despair and opposes God, and ultimately he takes vengeance on being itself. I just think it's a brilliant story, and one that is acted out by everyone, the question is are you going to be a Cain? Or are you going to keep your faith up, do you keep on trying to structure your life to the best of your ability, **despite** the odds and despite not being where you want to be, yet. I hope there's at least something useful I said.