I have had the unique experience of growing up without religious identity. Mine is a development almost completely untouched by scripture, ritual, churches, or any other institution or custom of religious nature.
As a teenager up until I left college, I slowly came to realize the meaninglessness of all things, whether riches or fame, and fell into an extreme apathy. It was at the height of this that I came to throw out all things that I had grown comfortable with and joined the military, with the intent that if I should have no use for my life, that I should at least let others use it for some purpose. I threw away the possibilities of the many talents, abilities, and opportunities afforded me without hesitation, for I recognized that all the benefits these things could achieve me were themselves meaningless.
It was in this frame of thought that I finally came to lose the pride and vanity that had always held me back and accept a new sort of humility. In this, I discovered that I had always possessed a true faith in humanity, left unsoiled by the sort of disillusionment that many people fall into, whether in realizing that the world their parents and society their parents had painted for them wasn't as nice as it really is (my father had always been upfront and honest about the world and life in general, to include his own experiences and mistakes), or in losing some religious faith they had been raised to never question (I had never had such a thing).
And through humility I came to question myself in a way that led me to feel a higher purpose, that I should live as a just and good man, capable of reason and unaffected by the ebbs and flows of life, ready to help my fellow man and not hold him in contempt, as this was as much nature as destiny. I came to see the gifts of reason, my natural talents and abilities, and the peculiar gifts of character chanced to me by fate as meaningful towards achieving such a purpose.
I came to realize that the past and the present were alike in that I owned neither, only the current moment mattered, and it is in the present that I should always strive to hold myself to a higher standard of character and reason, never wasting this precious moment on idle action or thought, meaningless pleasures, or pointless endeavors in pursuit of the cheap respect and admiration of others. So too did I realize that there is no good or evil in the things that befall us or what others do unto us, but rather good and evil are in the way that we respond to these things and what we constantly choose to do or even think at this present moment.
And so no longer were the hardships of life simply things to be avoided or nothing more than bad luck, but I now knew them to be opportunities to test my strength of character. So too did the positive benefits afforded me by my good fortune take on new meaning as possibilities for me to help others and find my role within the larger society of mankind. No longer would I throw out good fortune in disgust, but embrace it as my fate demanded.
As such, I live life not for seeking eternal happiness or fame and fortune, nor do I let myself fall whim to the basic desires that drive animals. Rather, I am given this single moment that is the present, and endeavor to live it with unquestionable justness and righteousness, that I should treat all honestly and fairly and with compassion and understanding, while doing all that is within my power to improve the condition of my fellow man. Beyond that, I only know what I feel to be true, and I dare not waste time putting that into words.
So don't worry about trying to place labels on yourself or finding your religious identity or some higher truth. If you should find such a thing, and know it to be true with a sincere heart, then take to it wholly and without reservation. Otherwise, know that it is in struggle that we find growth, and take it as a blessing that you have the sincerity of heart to admit doubt and not ascribe wholly to a faith that you don't feel.
In this respect, I don't judge those who would ascribe themselves wholly to any faith as either good or bad, right or wrong. Though I actively strive to take in the thoughts and experiences of others and see things from multiple perspectives, I only know what is true to me and can only question truth as others see it insofar as reason permits. Anything beyond that is a waste of time.
So is Satanism bad? It doesn't matter; I think there are more important questions to be answered and problems to be solved.
