I'm Valerie, 23 and a brand new atheist. I was directed to LW on a (also newly atheist) friend's recommendation and fell in love with it.

Since identifying as an atheist, I've struggled a bit with 'now what?' I feel like a whole new world has opened up to me and there is so much out there that I didn't even know existed. It's a bit overwhelming, but I'm loving the influx of new knowledge. I'm still working to shed old patterns of thinking and work my way into new ones. I have the difficulty of reading something and feeling that I understand it, but not being able to articulate it again (something left over from defending my theistic beliefs, which had no solid basis). I think I just need some practice :)

EDIT: Your link to the series of posts on why LW is generally atheistic is broken. Which makes me sad.

"If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough." Albert Einstein

This relates well to my earlier frustration about the cop-out of vaguely appealing to life experience in an argument, without actually explaining anything.

I'm a brand new lurker. I just found the site yesterday, but it will likely be a while before I get up the courage to post something relevant :)