Being Different Essay

Being Different? Thinking for yourself is a scary thought to a lot of people, myself included, as I was nervous of expressing my own opinions openly to others without conforming to the masses around me that believed in a certain thing. Around the age of twelve or so back in middle school, I made one of the biggest decisions in my life thus far, and that was becoming an Atheist. It’s a scary word to a lot of people, the negative connotation behind it haunting my thoughts even to this day because of how it sounds and how people think of you when you tell them it’s what you believe. I hadn’t thought it would be a problem at the simple age of twelve, trying to enjoy life for what it was as I played video games, sports, and stuck …show more content…
I was elected as a student body officer for my class, having visions of being able to design school dances, pep rallies, and sporting events. It was something that seemed to come from an old high school movie from the 80’s, and I couldn’t wait for the year to kick off right. I had a laid back schedule, my first class being a computer basics class that everyone had to take in order to graduate. I figured since this was my junior year it was time to make a large variety of friends to be able to do stuff with on a constant basis, so I confidently sat near a group of several unfamiliar faces as my eyes shifted attention to each of them. There were four people on my row, one of them notably named Maddie Granger, the other Jefferson Evans. I introduced myself trying to make a good first impression as best I could as they soon did the same. We all had very similar interests, we all liked to take pictures, go to sporting events, talk about our futures and what we were going to do with our lives. I was excited about how this year was planning out …show more content…
“What ward are you in Chandler?” she asked with a bit of a charming grin as I tried to think of something to respond to that question. I shrugged a bit, “I’m not in a ward.” I replied hesitantly, and with that one statement each of their smiling faces soon became dull glares of disappointment. “Well what are you then?” she asked, the questions to me became harder to answer as I knew as soon as I were to say what I was the negative thoughts would soon enter their heads. “I’m an Atheist, I just never really got into the whole religion thing I guess.” I responded after several moments of silence, the feeling of their glares impaling against my skin as my anxiety slightly rose. The remainder of class was an awkward situation, mainly me keeping quiet as they went on about how they all met through the church at a young age, the missions they were going to go on, the activities they were going to do. I sighed a bit, hearing the bell ring as that conversation sucked the life out of me and the rest of the day seemed to be a