Yes it was a very closed society so I would leave very quickly after the meetings and rather soon (after about a year) saw no point in being there at all.
Were you like me, or was I different?
by JH 18 Replies latest jw friends
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drew sagan
I was never part of the 'in' crowd, nor did I ever have many friends at the KH. What I have come to see is that in areas where JWs have been for a long time everybody has their friends and arn't looking for any new ones.
I know this story where somebody studied with a person for about a year or so and then after she got baptized never talked to the person again. Talk about making friends. -
lovelylil
drew,
that happened to me and my hubby as we were baptised together. We studied with an elder and his wife. We thought they were our best friends but right after our baptisms, they completely stopped asking us over to visit. It was so abrupt that my hubby asked the elder about it and he said the "society" recomends that you try to help new ones make new friends and not make them dependent on you after their baptism as it is healthy to widen out. Has anyone heard this before or was he just tired of us and felt his duty was done?
The KH we were in over 10 years never did warm up to us as they were a very closed group so we never had any friends at all and never got invited to anything. Come to think of it, they did us a favor as it made our exit even easier. Lilly
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misanthropic
My little sister was "miss popularity" in the JW circle, so whenever there was no meeting there were always a large group of her friends over. I got used to JW's around constantly.
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Taythan
I've seen both sides of that coin. When I was first introduced to the Kingdom Hall it was forced and as a young teen it was excruciating and I wanted to spend as little time there as possible. Eventually I did get to a point where I decided to stop fighting it and see what it was all about and then I wanted to spend every minute hanging out with my Witness friends. This was followed by a brief three or four months drifting away period in which once again I found it difficult to be around them. It's been more than ten years since I've seen anybody from that lost chapter of life except for my immediate family.
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Fleshybirdfodder
When I felt really bad about myself, I used to do my best to talk JW "newspeak", with the fellow sheep. After a while I had to crack and did the sitting in the car thing. I made friends with one person in the hall (he is still in, confused and a really good guy...) and we both got counselled about widening out, because we were spending too much time in discussion exclusively after the meetings which perhaps might gradually evolve into acts of sedition against the watchtower... come to think of it...
FBF
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MsUrsy
I had the worst case of the "I GOT TO GO's" right in the middle of the meeting...like an antsy panic attack....I would write a note to my husband the said..."I gotta go now" The whole family knew this would happen at almost every meeting...it just became easier not to go...so as for talking to people after...I'll up ya one, lol, I got to the meeting just as the song or prayer was happening as to not talk to anyone before either..LOL!
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dh
i was born into it, and grew up in it, so like, because of that it was always natural to be part of whatever closed circle there was in a congregation, because you'd grown up there. that didn't change the fact that i always hated tuesdays, thursdays, saturday mornings and sundays, and never wanted to be there.
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Dismembered
We did the stay til the last minute things for years. Many times I locked the doors to the hall. Then we'd have a family or two of the "friends" over, for "sweet fellowbullship". In retrospect we were daft.
Dismembered