How Does Having Been A Jehovah's Witness Have An Impact On Your Life?

minimus

For me, on the positive side, having some religious training did keep me out of trouble growing up. Now, on the other hand..... I think because I was a Witness, I want to enjoy what I might've missed as a young man. I'm much more liberal minded and much less judgmental than ever in my life.

Mysterious

I defend myself quite well in debates with religious folk due to knowing the bible so well. I am also far more skeptical about religion and what they claim to teach. On the other hand I feel I quite often have no social skills. I find holidays awkward since I don't know what is generally done or expected.

fullofdoubtnow

I wasn't brought up as a jw, joining at 21, and I never married, I never met the "right" jw male, whereas if I hadn't been a jw I would have been less restricted in my choice of a partner. I am more confident when I have to speak to people, and that's probably because of my years in the wts.

As for my social life, having had only jws as friends for so many years has inhibited ne a little, but I have a good trainer in "worldly" skills now as I live with my boyfriend.

greendawn

I doesn't have any impact now since I left so long ago and everything changed in the meanwhile, I got rid of all the negative influences and I had nothing really positive from them eg I was not a smoker when I began studying with the dubs, for others giving smoking cigarettes or worse may be one of the few positive things they got out of the dubs.

Otherwise I learnt a lot about religion and the psychology of cults and of being in a cult.

parakeet

I was dragged into the JWs as a child. Being a JW stunted my emotional growth with the result of depression, breakdown and hospitalization in my 20s. Left the cult in my mid-20s.
Thirty years later, it's hard to assess the long-term damage of having been in a cult for 14 years, but I can say it scoured out of me the need for organized religion and belief in god. I look at it now as an early-life catastrophe that I was lucky to have survived.

minimus

My exjw friend just saw a JW and the JW ignored us.

anewme

Huge amount of pain and loss

elliej

I have a hard time making friends. I don't seem to fit in anywhere. I never fit into the cliques in the hall, I found out early that I had to stunt my sense of humor because all the sisters took everything so literally. I fit in better with the men, but, of course, that was frowned on. I learned to keep my mouth shut and nod in agreement to everything that was said. I didn't dare bring any interests up because they were not theocratic enough. the result is that I am a social retard. I have a hard time starting conversations because I am so used to being negatively judged. i have a hard time jumping into conversations because I feel like I don't belong (or am not welcome). I probably come off as reserved or cold when I would give anything to just be included.

restrangled

The habit of internalizing things that bother me and then blowing a gasket on little stuff. I steel myself in all relationships for the possiblity of it coming to a sudden end.

r.

mama1119

I tend to feel overly guilty about everything, sometimes I even feel guilty for no reason, I just can't shake the feeling. I also think it made me more judgemental, because , as much aas they deny it, we JW are trained to judge everyone. I find myself immediately trying to fit someone into a good or bad mold.......

How Does Having Been A Jehovah's Witness Have An Impact On Your Life?

Share this