I hear this all the time.. Without Islam or belief in God your life must be so miserable sad depressing. Turn back to Allah now before you end up a pitiful miserable wreck! Infact one of the comments on my blog said

Know that I once was an apostate too for a number of years. It brought me nothing but misery and suffering. I am glad I saw the error of my ways then. If you wish to repeat the experience for yourself, be my guest.

I asked him why this was, but did not receive any response.

I am happier now than I have been as a Muslim. Why?

Islam does not equal happiness in life.

Too many people have been brainwashed by Islam to think that all non-Muslims are depressed miserable sad souls, even if they look happy they are really not.

This is just not true. Happiness is more about finding your way in life, finding joy in the things you do, with your family, or with your friends, or with making the most of your life, with achieving your goals or getting where you want to be in life.

This excellent comic explains how to find meaning in life without believing in God:

Comic: Life and Donuts by Stanley

How I am happier now

Well for one there isn’t the constant guilt of worrying “am I good enough for Allah?”. The fear of the day of judgement, the one that will turn a baby’s hair gray and will make you run away from your mother and father. The guilt when you slip up on one of your five daily prayers or commit some sin that Allah hates. This excessive fear that’s put into Muslims in order to scare them into being a good person has different effects on different people. For me, it was a constant worry and analysis about everything I ever did.

With difficulty comes ease

Some people think that a depressed Muslim is a Muslim that doesn’t pray enough, or is not religious enough. This is so wrong. Depression and unhappiness are challenges that certain people face from time to time. Not being happy does not mean you are missing God in your life. That’s just silly. Sheikh Yasir Farzaga has spoken about this – that depression is actually a sickness and not a lack of faith. Likewise I would argue believing in God or remembering him doesn’t bring happiness. A lot of ex-Muslims have contemplated suicide, and the reason for this is because of their families abusing them, kicking them out, harming them, telling them they are worthless and stupid, and so on. It didn’t come from not believing in God, it came from the harm of the Muslim community targetted towards that individual

If you are a Muslim, consider that Islam does not equal happiness. It can bring you some happiness, but that happiness can come from other means too.