How belief holds on for dear life

It's not, believing you have a personal life, and then believing that your personal life is an example of anything at all, that's so confusion-producing in the one engaged in that mechanical process of self-delusion, it's that your thinking can't determine how to intercede, and where necessary put a stop to it.

Could you do that, think about what's going on in there - mechanically - you could intercede, in realtime, and become "more" enlightened than you already are, at least in that one endarkened area of belief.

To wit: and this is funny. People get away with saying any damn thing they want, because they realize (incorrectly) that they don't have to back any of it up. They can't (and so don't) cite proof.

So, they say there IS a god, and no one can say to them otherwise, because they can't cite proof and >>believe<< they don't need to, they "believe it", it's part of "their life experience", so... it must be true.

They say there IS a problem with such-and-such a person, for something they did or said, but their memory is so faulty (and apparently their time so valuable) that they don't/can't cite proof, and so continue believing any damn thing they want.

If your own consciousness would NOT ALLOW you to say things, for which you could not cite proof, then you would say a lot less than you do, and you would not continue believing most, if not all, the unprovable claims you make.

Consider that over dinner, if you've got nothing better to do.