I was always very afraid of Satan. During my teens, I was the kid who would not stay at the party if a Ouija Board appeared. I never watched movies about the occult, because they terrified me. Halloween was my least favorite holiday.

My husband worked shift work in the early years of my marriage and then took a job that required a lot of travel. When he was gone at night, I would sometimes become frightened. Not of burglars or rapists, but of Satan.

After studying my way out of Mormonism and then theism, I had one of those scary waking in the night moments. It was then that it finally occurred to me that if there was no God it followed that there was no Satan.

One less thing to fear. Bonus!

That's true. All the boogeymen leave.

Many people figure out Satan is farce first. It's just a symbol for bad things. Then they realize that without a Satan, the God against Satan battle means God is made up too (at least that version of god).

Every once in a while, I would be irritated to think that God and Satan (and other spirits) were presumably watching me all the time. There was no privacy. Why bother with modesty? Satan had nothing better to do than go around trying to trick and tempt me?

It was definitely a bonus to realize that pap had no more influence on me.

Satan is just an imaginary boogeyman under the bed that even many adults don't grow out of believing.

The thing that gave me the most relief was when I realized that there was not going to be a time when all my thoughts would be shouted from the rooftops. I really worried about that when I was a devout mormon. LOL

After Mormonism I was desperately holding on to a higher power or a force for good in the universe. DH pointed out, if there's a force for good, there has to be a force for bad. I had never feared the devil much. God seemed plenty mean and nasty without any help. Tossing the whole thing made perfect sense.