by minimus 32 Replies latest jw friends
I often regret not keeping some of the friends that I had when I first became a very active JW.
Finishing college.
Fortunately, life goes on and i'm making new friends and running into old ones left and right seems like. I also plan on going back to college next year.
I didn't date. I miss that.
(Dad was not a JW, but Mom was, and the funeral was conducted by one of the Elders).
Whoa, that must've been quite a eulogy, considering every funeral conducted by Elders I've heard contains "our dear brother died with the assured expectation of being resurrected...". Please, oh, please don't let the Elders speak at my funeral!
Effectively sacrificing all social life for 20 years as a faded JW and letting my 4 children be led by my ex along WT lines whilst I was a worker bee 100% with zero personal life or any social friends. I was completely wrapped in my own cell of reluctant religious ideology with a single outlet - my workplace! So I suppose I regret not getting a divorce with a young family which undoubtedly would have meant some of my children wouldn't exist which I would never wish. But from a totally selfish perspective that is what I should have done and likely would be in a more connected, established and stable situation at this point in time. I'm sure the feeling is a common one - the longer you suffered for, the more you suffer later!
Not putting importance on education. That held me back for so long. I finally have my diploma, and for the first time have a job outside of retail.
I gave up my ambitions to become a great ballerina. It was my dream to one day join the American Ballet Theatre and dance at the Met. I rehearsed Aurora's solo from Sleeping Beauty so many times it drove my sister insane. I was damn good, and I gave it up since it was not considered very theocratic to have such ambitions. That is one thing I can't fix, you can't try to start a career as a dancer at 29. Ten years too late.
I was in the army and I sought, and won a discharge as a conscientious objector. I started studying with the witnesses in October of '87, filed for discharge in March of '88 and left service with an honorable discharge on December 12, 1988. In so doing, I had to forfeit my $30,000.00 GI Bill college fund.
I have mixed emotions on this. I sure could have used the money to get back to college and receive my degree, but at the same time, I do believe I am a person that could never willingly kill another person. So, while I regret doing this in association with the Jehovah's Witnesses, I do respect the decision I made.
Other regrets involve how I talked to my first wife when she didn't want to study the bible. I was very judgmental and self-righteous and while that didn't give her the right to cheat on me, it does explain why she fell out of love with me when we had been so close.
I regret:
1. Not being involved in extra curricular activities at school.
2. Forgoing fun stuff because they fell on "meeting nights".
3. Not nurturing friendships because they were "worldly" people.
4. Not enjoying my teenage years.
I just wish I could have had a closer relationship with my pet pig who lost it's mother and I had to bottle feed it. The society was always against beastiality
In the latest AARP mag, there is an article on regrets, and in general, a lot of people list not getting an adequate education as their main regret in life.
I would guess that this would be much more so among ex-JWs.
I would say that it is my main regret.
S4
Wasting time in a cult rather than joining and interacting with a serious mainstream Christian religion with a normal outlike on human existence and God. The JWs had a totally cultic and warped understanding of the proper relationship between God and man, Lord and slave rather than Father and child.
Because youngsters are taught that sex, masturbation, even thinking about something sexual is evil, I think it made some of us become late bloomers. I regret that I didn't have a normal/aka/"worldly" perspective. The other day I watched the movie "Kinsey" and related to the common feelings of our forefathers. Sexual matters were not talked about; they were taboo. The result is that sometimes, when freedoms occur, is the pendulum has wild swings, kind of, making up for lost time.
I feel bad for all the JW youths who are suppressed.
