From Atheist to Agnostic

The Unexpected Peace of Not Needing All the Answers

Some roads take us forward. Others take us back to the places we tried to forget. This one took me inward—to the gray, the questions, the mystery I used to run from.

From Belief to Beyond

There’s something haunting about going back to a place that once hurt you.

I’m on a bus ride to Houston, staring out at miles of flat land and empty fields. There’s nothing here—just the hum of the engine, the faint scent of someone’s lunch, and the silence that only a long road can bring. I’ve been here before, physically and emotionally. The difference is, I’m not the same person who came through last time.

The first time I felt truly free was when I left Manila for Kansas. I was chasing something—maybe a dream, maybe a new identity. I left behind a life that felt small, hard, and devoid of purpose. Atheism was survival. Meaning was irrelevant. And yet, in the cornfields of the Midwest, I found something surprising: faith.

I became a Christian. I believed that there was a divine order behind the chaos, a purpose for my pain, a God who saw me. For over a decade, I held onto that faith like a lighthouse. Until one day, the storm came, and it didn’t hold.

Life hit me with a truth faith couldn’t answer. And just like that, the belief system I had built my world around shattered. I went back to atheism, bitterly at first. It felt safe again. Predictable. No God, no betrayal.

But something shifted. I discovered New Age spirituality—manifestation, Source, inner being, higher self. It was lighter, more forgiving. I felt powerful again, even mystical. I played with the unseen. I explored dimensions I never thought existed. Almost died in the process.

Then, I stopped trying to label it.

Now I say I’m agnostic. And that is, strangely, a softer, truer place. Agnosticism doesn’t claim to know. It doesn’t need proof or doctrine. It allows doubt. It allows awe. It holds mystery without the burden of certainty.

And that’s the beauty.

You don’t have to know. Maybe we can’t know. But we can still walk through the fields, back into the cities we once escaped, and live.

We do it scared. We do it tired. We do it angry. We do it unsure. And we keep going, not because we’ve figured it all out, but because we’re human—and this, too, is sacred.

So here I am again, heading back to a city full of ghosts. Not for closure. Not for answers. Just to see who I’ve become.

And maybe, this time, I’ll bring the light with me.