An Atheist’s Guide to Achieving Lasting Transformation

Growing up in a conservative Christian home, I noticed that lasting transformation rarely happened despite constantly being discussed. I observed how the same people had the same problems, years and even decades later, myself included. As I grew into my early twenties and my problems with emotional regulation and mental illness worsened, I developed a personal interest in psychology as I tried to heal myself. From then until now, I’ve noticed that most people who achieve any real, lasting change do so through the principles of modern psychology, not religion. While religion usually encourages people to transform through prayer and surrender to a higher power, those who actually change do so through personal, internal transformation. Even among the religious people I’ve personally known, the ones who have achieved significant growth and lasting change have almost always had a hybrid life philosophy, combining their religious ideals with an understanding of modern psychology. I’ve noticed that those who rely upon religion alone often stay stuck in their problems, especially those with mental and emotional problems. They often mistake their intention to change for being actual change. Therefore, real, lasting transformation comes not through religious practice as some would think, but instead through an intentional, honest encounter with oneself. Also, anyone can do it, regardless of religious preference or life philosophy. That being said, I’m now going to share with you how to achieve real transformation from the perspective of an atheist, starting with the two pathways to change.

The Two Pathways to Change

The Path of External Discipline – Forcing Change

There are two pathways to change: The most common and ineffective path is through external discipline and the less common and more permanent path is through internal transformation. Most people choose the first, often not realizing that the second option is even available. Modern society teaches people that the key to change or growth is to just try harder, to force yourself to be who you want to be or to do what you want to do. This path of trying to force behavioral change is also the one that religion often tries to use. Religious people pray to their gods to help them change and when their prayers inevitably never get answered, they then try to force themselves to change to convince themselves that their prayers were answered. Instead of achieving real transformation, they’ve only forced a temporary change. In the same way, non-religious people also do this same thing, assuming that the only path to change is to fight to be different. As a result, they regularly wonder as well why they can never maintain the change they’ve worked so hard to achieve through discipline. Therefore, everyone on this path either ends up abandoning their goals for transformation OR deluding themselves into believing they’ve achieved real change when they actually haven’t. So what’s the alternative to never getting anywhere with external discipline? The answer is internal transformation.

The Path of Internal Transformation – Being Change

One can only achieve lasting change through internal transformation. When someone tries to force change on the outside without transforming on the inside, they end up constantly fighting against who they are on the inside. That’s why external discipline never lasts–it has no sustainable source on the inside! What you’re really doing is attempting to constantly override your internal self over and over until you exhaust yourself and collapse into being who you really are on the inside right now. Because of this, the inside always eventually shows on the outside. You might be able to act differently than how you really feel internally for a while, but eventually, your inside world will become your outside world again. However, if you recognize this pattern of constantly fighting yourself and burning out, you can change the game in your favor. By identifying the internal source of your behavior and using this knowledge to transform your inner self, your outward self will automatically align! You will no longer have to constantly fight against your inner self to achieve the outer self you want because your inner self and your outward goals will be the same! Therefore, the key to achieving real transformation is to change who you are on the inside so that you can naturally and permanently express your new self on the outside. The reality is that the results you’ve been getting have always been a reflection of who you are on the inside. You may be able to temporarily fake change on the outside, but you will always eventually return to living in alignment with who you are on the inside. Therefore, the only path to sustainable outward transformation is living in alignment with a transformed inner self.

The Three Steps to Achieving Internal Transformation

Step 1 – Acknowledge the Problem and Take Responsibility for It

So the question is, “How do I achieve internal transformation so that the external change flows automatically?” I’m glad you asked, because this is where the real work of transformation begins. Instead of trying to force yourself to change on the outside, you’re going to take a deeper, honest look at yourself on the inside. Begin by acknowledging the problem you have and taking responsibility for it. Maybe you have a problem with a relationship, your work, or your health. Maybe you’re not happy with who you are or you keep falling into the same behavioral patterns over and over again. Whatever it is, just acknowledge the problem and accept that it is your responsibility to resolve it. If you get this far, you’ve already made it further than most people because it’s uncomfortable to admit that YOU are at least part of the problem. Without being willing to acknowledge your responsibility in creating this problem in your life, you will get nowhere. Therefore, you must accept that you need to change to solve your problem. Don’t worry about what others in your life are doing because you aren’t responsible for their actions, nor can you control what they do anyway. You are only responsible for yourself and can only control what you do.

Step 2 – Be Honest with Yourself about the Problem’s Origin

Secondly, you need to ask yourself why you keep having this problem: Why do I keep doing this? Why am I acting this way? What is motivating me to continue in this pattern? These questions will help you determine the internal source of your problem. Don’t let excuses or blaming other people get in the way of digging deeper into yourself. Instead, you must be honest with yourself and ask yourself, “What is wrong with ME that is making these issues continually surface in my life?” Without the humility to admit that you’re at least part of the problem, you will get stuck here and be unable to find the root cause of your issue. However, if you choose humility and are willing to receive constructive criticism from yourself, you will eventually get an uncomfortable, but powerful answer to your question. This answer is going to tell you something about yourself that you’ve probably been trying to bury, repress, or deny for a long time because you haven’t wanted to face it until now. However, you’ve known this truth deep down for a long time, haven’t you? So the next question to ask is, “Do I actually want to take responsibility for this issue and work to change it, or do I want to take the easy route and stay the same?” Be honest with yourself, because if you don’t really want to change, it’s better to accept the results you’ve always gotten because nothing is going to change. However, if you do want to change, it’s time for you to start intentionally creating an internal shift that will transform your life forever.

Step 3 – Replace the Problem’s Origin with Healthier Alternatives

The third and final step to achieving internal transformation is to start replacing the old values, beliefs, and ways of interacting with yourself that have been compromising your goals with new ones that will naturally facilitate the transformation you seek. While this process is much more involved than I have time to communicate with you in this article, sometimes these things can be processed and solved on your own and other times you will need the help of a coach or therapist to understand yourself better and create the change you’re seeking. But for now, I’m going to give you the three foundations of inner transformation upon which all lasting change is built. With these three concepts intentionally applied to your life, you will be able to create tremendous change for yourself, even if you choose not to seek guidance from a professional.

The Three Foundations of Internal Transformation

#1 Self-Respect – Keeping Your Promises and Following Your Leadership

Oftentimes, the only thing getting in the way of achieving lasting change and transformation in our lives is a lack of self-respect. We make promises to ourselves that we don’t keep and decide to do things and then fail to move on them. In my own life, I realized that while I would keep promises that I made to others, I kept failing to keep promises that I made to myself. When I started to think about this and be honest with myself, I found it ridiculous that I valued upholding the honor of my word to someone else but would regularly choose to dishonor my word to myself. My lack of self-respect was causing me to only follow through on commitments that I made to others instead of the promises that I made to myself.

Besides failing to respect my promises to myself, I also regularly failed to follow my own leadership. When someone else in authority told me to do something, I would immediately do it,  respecting their leadership. However, when I told myself to do something, I resisted my own authority and procrastinated like a lazy, disrespectful employee. In the workforce, this behavior might get you fired, but when you disrespect yourself this way, you just suffer the consequences of ignoring your inner wisdom and rightfully start losing respect for yourself. When I finally started demanding the same respect for myself that I had always given to any other authority, THAT is when my life really started to change. When I made promises to myself, I started keeping them. When I told myself to do something, I started complying immediately without resistance or procrastination.

#2 Self-Love – Doing What is Best for Yourself and Giving Yourself the Life You’ve Always Wanted

Self-love doesn’t mean lazing around, doing nothing, putting in minimal effort into your life, or otherwise going easy on yourself. Instead, self-love means doing what is best for yourself and giving yourself the life you’ve always wanted, even when it’s HARD. In other words, when you choose to love yourself, you stop neglecting yourself and settling for less. In my life before transformation, instead of doing what was best for me, I often did whatever was easiest. I also regularly avoided my fears and did the bare minimum to get by. Lastly, I consistently chose weakness and avoidance for myself instead of strength and courage. Instead of determining what would be good for me and doing it even if it was hard or uncomfortable, I kept choosing to neglect and abandon myself because I didn’t love myself enough to do anything differently.

I also had given up on my dreams because all of them seemed either too difficult or too scary. For a long time, I chose to give into my anxiety because I didn’t love myself enough to raise the courage necessary to conquer it. I always knew I wanted more, but I never loved myself enough to be honest with myself and figure out what was wrong with me. Instead, I kept supporting the successes of others because it was easier to be a part of someone else’s journey than it was to walk my own. I had given up on myself. However, all of this changed one day when I chose to love myself the way no one else ever had. I started holding myself accountable to treat myself with love in everything I did, from how I talked to myself, to how I took care of myself, to how I let other people treat me. Choosing to love myself started out as a commitment that I didn’t always feel like doing, but over time, it became a natural way of being. Now, I do my best to love myself in everything I think and do. As a result, this commitment to self-love has transformed almost everything in my life. I am now living MY life for ME and am finally giving myself the life I’ve always wanted. Therefore, letting go of the expectations of others and taking back my life for myself like this was only possible through self-love.

#3 Self-Worth – Tolerating Less and Working to Transform

Once I started treating myself with respect and love, my self-worth started to rise and I began noticing how much disrespect and lack of love I had been tolerating from both myself and others my whole life. I also saw how I had been allowing people to neglect me and use me for their benefit in one-sided relationships without reciprocating anything of value in return. Many of them had been drawn to me because I previously lacked boundaries and would allow them to manipulate me to meet only their needs. As a result, I had spent my entire life feeling drained and neglected by them because I had never prioritized my own wellness instead. However, as I continued to practice self-love and self-respect, I eventually decided that I had been tolerating far too much from them and that I deserved better. Because I finally believed that I was worthy of being treated better, I started setting boundaries, holding people accountable, and ending relationships that weren’t good for me.

In addition to tolerating less and expecting more from the people in my life, I also realized that I was worth putting in the effort to transform both myself and my life. Most people know that transformation and a better life is possible, but because of a lack of self-love, self-respect, and self-worth, they rarely put in the effort to change their life and that is why they keep getting the same results. However, as a person’s self-worth rises and they realize that they are worth the effort of changing and living a better life, transformation finally becomes possible. No one else in my life had placed that level of worth in me previously, so it was up to me to value myself enough to break free from my fear and choose a life of strength and courage instead. After all, it’s called self-worth and not others-worth for a reason.

A person will only put in the work to transform themselves if they think they are worthy of it. It doesn’t matter whether others think you are worth the effort or not, because ultimately, the only person’s opinion that matters is yours. Do YOU believe you are worthy of the effort to change?

Real Transformation Versus False Transformation

Everything I’ve said so far has set the foundation for understanding the difference between real transformation and false transformation. Real transformation occurs on the inside and naturally expresses to the outside, whereas false transformation is forced on the outside, but never fully aligns with the inside. It all comes down to the difference between forcing behaviors (false transformation) and becoming behaviors (real transformation). As previously mentioned, forcing is unsustainable and inauthentic whereas being is sustainable and real. Therefore, if you want to achieve lasting change in your life, you need to focus on becoming who you want to be on the INSIDE instead of trying to force inauthentic behavior on the OUTSIDE.

Are You Working on the Real Problem?

If you’re tired of trying to change and keep finding yourself always falling back into old habits, the truth is, it’s probably because you haven’t changed on the inside. You’re probably still trying to override the natural behaviors of your unchanged inner self.

If you really want to change, you’re going to have to change who you are on the inside. How will you know it's working and that you’ve started to change internally? You’ll know when your previous problems and behaviors start to go away and stay away. Instead of having an undesirable inner self producing undesirable outward behaviors, you will now be a transformed person producing transformed behaviors.

Put your work into yourself, not your problems. Choose to respect yourself, choose to love yourself, and watch your self-worth grow. Your behaviors have never been the problem; your relationship with yourself has always been. And in the same way that you’ve been the source of your problems, you can also become the solution to your problems. Don’t let denial or pride or blame or excuses keep you away from the transformation you desire; take responsibility for who you are right now and put the work into yourself to become who you want to be tomorrow. You are worth the effort, even if you can’t feel it or see it right now.

Engage with yourself in a newer, healthier way and watch your transformation unfold, because

Real, lasting transformation starts with how you treat yourself on the inside.

Trust Their Actions, Not Their Words

A person’s actions are the most reliable evidence for assessing who they are and what they value. While an honest person’s words may convey truth about their intentions, a dishonest person’s will rarely match their actions. Even sometimes an honest person’s claims will not be true because a person’s subconscious often has motives of which their conscious mind is unaware. Because of this–the dishonest person’s lies and the honest person’s occasional lack of self-awareness–one would be wise to stop trusting what people say (unless they’ve earned your trust consistently) and start trusting what they do instead.

I Learned This Lesson the Hard Way

Having been raised by two covert narcissists, the truth in my home was far different than the deception of my parents' words. Things were said with the appearance of kindness or love, but the manipulation underneath was anything but lovely. Furthermore, they taught me to not trust my observations because they knew that I could see that their actions didn’t line up with their words. Love was spoken, but rarely shown and frustrations were placated, but only temporarily to do the same exact thing again later. 

My Heart Always Knew the Truth

The dishonesty and deception of my mother and father showed me how people have the ability, whether they are conscious of it or not, to use their words to keep others confused–in other words, to lie. I knew that people could lie, but discovering that the people you’ve trusted your whole life are lying to you is a completely different experience. Since my teens, my subconscious always knew that my parents weren’t worthy of my love, empathy, or adoration, but I gave it to them anyway because they had convinced me with their words that they deserved it and that I would be wrong to withhold it. However, I always knew on a subconscious, emotional, and intuitive level that something was wrong with them. While my parents had consciously convinced me that I could only trust them and not my much more honest heart, my heart always knew. Why? Because the subconscious mind (our heart) processes information at a much higher level than our conscious minds, noticing the disparity between a person’s actions and words long before our conscious mind does.

Seeing the Truth for the First Time

Once I began trusting my lifetime of observations instead of their words–the deception, hypocrisy, and double-standards of my parents began flooding into my conscious awareness. I had seen and felt who they were for almost two decades, but had repressed and disregarded my perceptions of them due to their continual efforts to destroy my self-trust and protect their delusional egos. Now that I began to trust myself, I began to see them and everyone else clearly by their actions instead of easily spoken and broken words.

Where to Look to See People Clearly

Everyone will show you who they are if you objectively observe their actions for long enough instead of overvaluing their words. If you want to know what really matters to a person, look at how they spend their time. If you want to know if someone loves you, look at how they treat you. If you want to know if someone can be trusted, look at their history of keeping promises. It’s so simple, yet the pontification of so many people would convince us to ignore this simple truth and instead believe their delusions, dishonesty, and lies.

Ground Even Your Trusted Relationships In Truth

Even the people you love and trust should be held accountable by their actions. While understanding and empathizing with them is healthy, your empathy should also be grounded in the truth of their actions. Why? Because blindness is not a virtue and opens the door for dysfunction and disrespect. If we want to have healthy relationships, we must see people for who they are–not who they claim to be. Those who’ve earned our trust may get some free passes, but if their actions begin to consistently show contempt, dishonesty, or disrespect, they must be held accountable and repairs must be made before resuming trust again. Otherwise, if they are unwilling to apologize and change their unhealthy behaviors, those relationships should be reconsidered as a valuable use of our time and effort.

Place Your Trust in the Right Place

Deceivers will take advantage of our trust if we allow them by ignoring and minimizing their toxic actions. That’s what happened to me with my father and mother. While trust is wisely built upon consistently observing the actions of others, I would argue that many of us have instead mistakenly placed our trust in what people tell us about themselves. Instead of allowing people to convince us about who they are with their words, we would be wise to let them convince us with their actions. This is the foundation of reliable trust: evidence, not words or stories or feelings or promises, but instead what people actually DO.

Are You Confused By the People In Your Life, Even Yourself?

If you’re confused about who the people in your life really are and what they actually think and feel, stop listening to what they say and start observing what they do. Manipulative people in my life taught me that words are cheap, but actions reveal the truth of who people are. Even when applied to yourself, this concept will help you to develop incredible clarity and self-awareness as to who you really are, what really matters to you, and areas in which you could grow. 

Conclusion

The words that come out of a person’s mouth only have value if they continually align with their actions. If they don’t, ignore what they say and stay away. 

Life is too valuable to waste on dishonest people.