Am I subconsciously telling GOD that here I am, listening and practising every life hack, so that He might give me a pass? The irony is that all the optimisation I have done buys no guarantee. I can never outrun death or know the day that I will die.

Belief is a proposition you assent to. But belief was never what I had, which is why the question Do you believe in God was unanswerable rather than merely difficult. Wrong verb.