JW's from "The World" have a easier time going "Back Out Into The World"?

by BBOARD 45 Replies latest jw friends

reniaa

hi blue :)
4. I saw MANY young JW's get heavy into drugs, and having unwanted babies, so its on both sides of the fence
I agree with this i'm just saying with Jw's they get an alternate social group of kids brought up within the same belief structure (this is not to be sneezed at, as time goes on I can only see the morality gap between current practises and biblical teaching only widening), This cannot protect them completely and certainly not from still making mistakes...
was then FORCED to get married to a dub at 18
So was yours recent and if i may ask was it similar reason to my example below?
The only forced marriage i know of while i was a witness was when a witness lad got a 16 year old girl pregnant it was doomed but it was between both sets of parents, He was 19 at the time and was the one to persuade the girl, it was a case of two families going on vacation together. This was also 20 years ago when morality outside of Jw's still went along with marrying if the girl got pregnant too. Things have changed on the moral front outside the Jw's now
That means there is a real conflict between what the bible teaches and current practises were frankly sex is a recreational thing not to be taken seriously, safe sex being the main thing parents teach now, nothing to do with find a person you actually like before jumping in.
5. Do you want your kids around all those molesters that the Borg protects? I know I want NO PART of that. There are sickos on BOTH sides of the fence. But the ones "in the world" get thrown in prison, not protected by a CULT.
While true, this is an out of date statement, your talking to a clued up single mum here! why do molesters need to embroil themselves in organisations anymore with the eyes of world on them? when they can secretly groom young girls off the internet, or find an isolated single mum with more kids than she can handle (an increasingly common thing) and be the loving new supportive partner offering to help look after kids so she can go out on the town, trust me this is were we have to be ultra careful now I know this personally.
The one thing of living on a rough council estate you quickly learn where danger lurks and a new fella who shows too much interst in your kids is the new danger these days.
NOW, my witness family on the other hand shuns me, and won't speak to me or meet my girlfriend. They constantly are thinking about Armageddon and being destroyed. They don't have a whole lot of fun, and their lives are for the most part pathetic. They work, they go to meetings, and that's it. Some try to live a little like "worldly people" but they always fail, or get held back by their brainwashed Dub tendencies.
With shunning I agree its something i do not approve of, if my kids were df'd da or just not interested in JW's I would treat them all the same, from my experience while encouraged shunning is still a personal judgement thing,
"Armgeddon" hmmm swap that with "heavenly hope" and you can interchange it with any other religion, swap it with new job promotion, vacation in hawaii, of lottery win with non-religious peeps and you get a very human need to want and hope for a better future whoever they are!
As for just Jws just working and going to meetings, from my experience witnesses make a real effort to socialise together with parties, movie outings etc so again a slightly misleading statement i've come across on this site before. Personal judgement again makes this a difficult one with some being stricter than others.
To be honest any problems I have with JW's is doctrinal not with practises, a little bit more strictness with morality doesn't hurt as much as the opposite in my experience, obviously others may disagree with me on that one.
Its really very simple, life that is. You as an adult have choices to make. You put yourself in certain situations, and then try to make the best of those situations by making GOOD choices. Your life to me, from what I've read on here, you need to make better choices. If someone is a creep, a druggie, an alcoholic, etc., you GET THEM OUT OF YOUR LIFE!!! If you find you are seeing TOO MANY of these people, CHANGE WHERE YOU HANG OUT!!! Really its not hard. I mean if you hang out in a seedy neighborhood bar (pub), then you probably won't meet the best people. Maybe ask co-workers out for drinks? Join a social club? Join a church? Etc. DO SOMETHING!!! There is an old saying that I heard in marketing class, and it applies here:
lol I wish it was that simple as i hung out in seedy places and met creeps there! These guys don't come with signs on their heads telling me beforehand what they'll be like, they are charming take me out for meals, nice intelligent... The alcoholic my first husband was the manager at my work and my second the gambler was a fellow co-worker too so your 'go out with co-workers' had me lolling, I don't drink so erm i've never really hung out at 'seedy places' so the men i've met all had good credentials but it still didn't make a difference.
I want to teach my kids thats there more to life than just ringing the last ounce of personal pleasure from it, I've had greater enjoyment from helping others than making sure i got what i wanted.
Basically your life will ALWAYS be terrible if you sit around and dwell on all the bad, and don't do anything to make it any better. You're forgetting about some of the badness that goes along with being a Dub. Remember all the meetings? Service? Mind-Control? Weird, looney people? Assemblies? The constant cry for MORE MONEY?? How bout constantly living a life in fear of Armageddon?
I haven't forgotten the badness I just didn't find the grass was any greener on the other side of the fence and in many cases it was worse,
If i'd have said i was treated by badly abc Jw you would all be blaming the JWs and simpathising but because I said abc happenned outside the Witnesses I am told to pull my socks up and deal with it, you can't see the hypocracy of this?
reniaa

hi ip
Yes, both scenarios are not good. Good morality needs no authoritative 'base' Good teaching is not an appeal to authority. Good morality is not an appeal to authority.
How do you get 'good morality' then? in my experience morality is a very fluid thing changing from country to country person to person, belief to belief.
If i watched any current action movie! (I recently watched the new "Rambo") what morality do i take from them? basically if a person is "bad" I can blow/slice and kill them horrifically. if you don't give your children a good moral base to draw from they will get it from other sources usualy TV or peers, if i'm lucky myself.
Example of a fluid morality is the Mafia they are quite moral they even have there own set of 10 commandments although its a twisted morality to suit them hense the fluidity
The 10 'Mafiosi' commandments are:
1. No one can present himself directly to another of our friends. There must be a third person to do it.
2. Never look at the wives of friends.
3. Never be seen with cops.
4. Don't go to pubs and clubs.
5. Always be available for Cosa Nostra, even if your wife's about to give birth.
6. Appointments must be respected.
7. Wives must be treated with respect.
8. When asked for any information, the answer must be the truth.
9. Money cannot be appropriated if it belongs to others or to other families.
10. People who can't be part of Cosa Nostra are anyone with a close relative in the police, with a two-timing relative in the family, anyone who behaves badly and doesn't hold to moral values.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=492449&in_page_id=1811
Thats why i like the morality of the bible since its better than my own imperfect judgement and can give solid examples of why as well.
bluesbreaker59

Reniaa,
Just make it simple for yourself. Go back, and enjoy your time. You don't need my approval. But what I've read on this site from you, is that you had two failed marriages outside the Borg. That sucks, it does, BUT, what I'm telling you is that there are genuinely GOOD people out here that will accept you, for WHO YOU ARE. Witnesses only accept you, if you play by their rules.
As far as my marriage being very forced, yes I can say that it was very forced, by her family and the elders at both halls, threatening to DF if we didn't marry, so there ya go, no pregnancy. But you'd never believe that because you are a JW "sympathizer" or "apologist". You believe that their "world" is better than the real world in which we live. Some people need blinders on, and to be lead around like a bull with a ring in their nose. I prefer to have freedom of choice, and to go to a church where I may ask questions, and have freedom of thought.
At my church, people that go there aren't constantly obsessing about "heaven", or "hell", etc. They are normal people. Now if you get real old school southern Bible thumpers, maybe, you'd have that. The people I go to church with talk about the sermon, and how it applies to their life, and then we talk about every day things, REAL LIFE. We don't focus on doom and gloom, we try to focus on being good people and doing good things towards our fellow man.
Everyone gets to choose what they wanna do in life, so the choice is yours... Choose wisely. Afterall you could end up married to a former Bethelite, that is now an elder, and oh btw, he likes to hit women or be abusive in speech, etc. There are MANY tyrants in that organization, I knew of alot in my circuit, and they ran their homes with an iron fist.
Thechickennest

I was sucked in to the Borg along with my sister when I was 18. I handed over a letter of resignation to the local congregation five years ago at the age of 44. I was a good rank and file witness to a point. While I believed most of the witness doctrine, I knew from day one that the organization was wrong about the end times. How could anyone actually know? My faith in God was stronger than holding his feet to the fire with dates. I guess the powers that be knew that I was not as "meak" or as "humble" as they would have liked to see a brother "reaching out" to be. The PO in our congregation confided in my wife that I was a "proud man". Yes, (I did'nt leave my brains in the baptism tank-actually a cementary vault at the funeral home LOL!) I always kept an open mind. I met a wonderful young woman who was raised by a crazy witness mother and disfellowshipped father. We married when I was 24 and she was 19. We spent many happy years going out in service and attending all the assemblies. We made many life long friends in a serveral congregations. We had our first and only child eight years into our marriage and that is where we both started to question the wisdom of the brothers in charge. Our child was a handful to put it lightly. The brothers said we should not "spare the rod" Our doctor said that this kid was never going to hold still for more than 3 minutes no matter what...We found it easier to stay home and care for our daughter as we seen fit (no beatings in the KH bathroom) on many meeting nights. We faded and faded some more....yeah. Our daughter is graduating from High School in three weeks. She is going to college, she is a remarkable young woman that we are extremely proud of. You guessed right...we did not raise her in the witness ways. We stopped going to meetings all together when she was in the third grade. My wife and I are celebrating our 25th wedding anniversary this month as well. My wife was raised in a crazy witness home from infancy along with 9 siblings. She resigned from the congregation when I did. We had already moved on long before our resignations. We joined up in the Methodist church I was baptised in as an infant and our little family was welcomed with open arms. We are not very active in the church but it is there for us and on our terms. During our fade I went to college and got a degree. I now have a good job with all the benefits that you don't get when you are waxing floors all night with the other JW men. Having said all this, it was just as easy for my wife to walk away from the witnesses as it was for me, maybe even easier to a large degree. Her siblings are all messed up from their upbringing in the crazy witness home and actually they do not have much to do with us. My wife is fine with that if not relieved. Her crazy Mom has not spoke a word to either of us since 1996. Her Dad is at least socialable with us. We still consider many of the witness people we left behind as good friends even though we know they have to do what they have to do in the shunning of us. We just hope and pray that they will find their way out some day like we did. There is life and a good life outside of the organization for everyone, raised in the truth or, if you came in later. You just have to work it at a little. It may take some counseling, taking a few medications, making good use of your computer and reading books like the ones Ray Franz authored, or whatever but, take it all one day at a time on your own terms with confidence, loose the resentment and move on. Do it for your kids, do it for yourself. Don't look back.
jehovahsheep

why do you need to go back?is it about serving god according to the bible or needing to be accepted by a group so that you can function?evidently you were lacking discernment and judement abilities wheather you were a witness or not.
Sirona

Firstly if i was bought up Outside of Jw's how would my thinking be different and by definition because you say i need counciling to get rid of the indoctrination better?
Reniaa,
The comment above tells us all a lot about you and your thinking.
Your thinking would be vastly different if you hadn't been brought up as a JW, but you can't see that.
As for counselling, yes, I think all cult members, including yourself, would benefit from it. I know I did.
You take everything I say as an attack and you refuse to listen to reason in any way, so I will politely leave you to your delusions.
Sirona
wildfell

I was baptised at age 20 and left over 20 years later. My husband was born in. I think waking up to the truth about the 'truth' has been really hard for both of us but in different ways. I think it hit me even harder than him. This is how I felt . . . X 1000% I had really believed it, and I made that decision as an adult, so did not question at all (until the paedophile scandles came out). My husband, being born in, had questioned the hypocrisy and strange doctrines since childhood.
I think that I am more optimistic about the future - re-building our lives, making new friends, etc, than my husband is. I had to lose all my friends and family when I became a jw, and had to start again in the org. The congs I have been in were initially very unwelcoming until I got baptised, so I was extremely lonely for a good while. But I built a new life for myself as a faithful sister. So essentially, I started from scratch once before, I know that I can do it again. My husband, however, always had been part of the 'club' of the jw's. He has never had to start over before. We are very grateful that we have each other and that our abrupt exit (we didn't fade, we just stopped going), was done at the same time.
Re whether I have gone back to my old personality . . . I have always been myself. I may have been a more wound up, depressed wildfell as a jw, but I was always wildfell. I am just enjoying feeling free, and finally, after a very long and painful journey over the last year, a LOT HAPPIER!
jehovahsheep

if you can be happy as a witness-go for it.jesus is not going to destroy the rand f.he is coming to show what is truth.there is no one out there who knows exactly how god is coming at armageddon or what that entails .so we should stop condemning our fellow humans to gods wrath.a view not shared often on this site-is that there are millions of happy jws who feel that they have lived fufilled lives.

pahsun

You might want to check out "Biblical Unitarian" I have found their understanding of the Bible to be much aligned to what I have learned of the Bible during my "Watchtower" experience.

I remain and will always remain a Witness of Jehovah, but I have stopped from following the "Watchtower". Their actions have brought much reproach to our Heavenly Father's Divine name.

I have found that there are many moral people who have never read or heard about the "Watchtower".

Had I been raised in United States I could never have been a "JW of the Watchtower".

My 30 yrs amongst them, here in the US, as a MS as well as being an "Elder" has exposed me to the egregious hypocrisy prevalent within the "management/control" of the Watchtower movement.

Rank and file WT people however are fine and I do feel sorry that they have had the wool pulled over them.

Quirky1

Ranaia - I thought the very same thing as you are right now. I was a parent who was indoctrinated ito this cult in my mid 30's and thought homeschooling my children and bringing them up as witnesses was the safe thing to do. I was wrong and now feel guilty for not allowing them to share the memories of school, holidays, birthdays, etc.. My children are adults now. I will tell you that the teens in the halls are a tight knit bunch and keep everything very secret. If you think you are going to protect them from drugs, alchohol, stds, etc.. you are gravely mistaken. Since my children are now young adults they have shared with me the things they done with the other witness children and it is no pretty. They have engaged in immoral sex, even with witnesses from other congregations. They have drank, smoked and experimented with drugs. So, how is being a witness going to protect them?
Now, back to the topic question: Yes, I do feel that coming from the world makes it easier to go back to the world. Even though I have had some lonely moments at times it has gotten much better of the last month or so. I just reconnected with freinds and family and spend a lot of time here on JWD.
Have fun!
Quirky1

JW's from "The World" have a easier time going "Back Out Into The World"?

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