by AK - Jeff 48 Replies latest jw friends
If you can't be happy within yourself, everything else is pretty much meaningless.
I agree with this, yes I am perfectly content to be by myself. I really can keep busy, I do love to talk to others and meet new people....but
I love my alone time. I never really have had to survive with others around constantly. Some are just people persons and have to have that contact
to function it seems at times.
Contentment within is important to me......i guess I am a loner in many respects..
h4o
I think I am a loner, and pretty self contained.
I do like to come up for air from time to time.
I enjoy solitary time. I work in a jail from 11 pm to 7 am. Many nights I am in the cell block by myself with the sleeping prisoners. I have lots of time to read and ponder and meditate about things.
When ever an opportunity comes up to go on days, I pass it. Because then I would have to read on my own time.
I remember when I was a tool maker/ machinist. I always liked books and reading, But a line I read stuck in my head for many people a library and books are a symbol representing time they wish they had to read them.
Nowadays I can read everybook I can find and have a challenge finding interesting ones.
I left the tower in 83 at 31 years old. When I was a JW I thought I knew everybody and was friends with everyone.
But then I realized by what I saw that the friendship was very conditional. Not based on anything I did, bout how the witnesses turned on and shunned former friends.
I escaped the tower because of a lackluster Armegedon that was hardlyl noticeable back in 75. I thought all the bad people were going to be destroyed and I was going to live in paradise.
Since leaving I call what dubs call friends, associates and I have had many over the years.
I use people and they use me. I have played on softball, hockey, soccer teams and played in musical groups and road motorcycles with people.
Now in my 50's and my hours of work, I mainly see my wife, son and granddaughter. And that seems fine.
On the weekend I look forward to taking my wife out to dinner and going home to watch a movie on our big screen tv.
I am...I like my job, I like my life. I just want someone to share it with. Having recently faded ( still haven't told my mom, and sure how to ) I no longer have friends in the JW's. I work with some from other congreagations, who have no clue......or least they speak and don't let on that they know. I was in a spanish cong, so I think the 'brothers' there could give a rats a**
While I'm glad to be gone,It's pretty lonely. I'm not sure where to look for friends, thus I come here because.....well I fit in,though I don't anyone, I at least feel I belong. If I didn't have my job, I'd probably be in the dumps. I just get on a plane and fly places and see other parts of the country. I like it here,but you never know if something better is out there.
Bottom Line. I'm Content....just see myself content with someone one day.
When I first left the Borg, I made more worldly friends than you could shake a stick at. My phone was ringing constantly. I was the life of the party, club, bar or social scene. I was known!
One problem....I was home-schooled and sheltered and didnt know how to properly read people or to judge true character. I was "green" and people were drawn to me. I learned distrust outside of the organization as well as I had inside. Horrible marriage, disloyal family and friends who have stabbed in the back to drastic measures.
I still love and believe in people, but, I have few friends and feel better either alone or in the company of a few. I am sure this is typical of many Witnesses who left the Borg in my age frame. Alone time affords me self-reflection which I still need to find myself. I avidly enjoy it. Who knows...I may need to shake my thing by tomorrow, but today is fine.
I really had very few friends in the Borg. I hung out with other elders here and there.
I wasn't much of a social person, but my wife was. I got invited to most gatherings
and I went because the wife wanted to go. I made the best of it.
I have managed, so far, to keep one friend from the JW. He's a very good friend but
sooner or later, there will be too much strain on our friendship because of our
differences over the WTS.
I am rather uncomfortable among co-workers. For so long, I was a JW. They know
I am not, are fully accepting of me, but I feel like a fish out of water around them.
I have made great friends here. Jeff, you are among the best of them. I have some
good friends in the meetup.
Like you, I have been a loner by nature. I am learning to be content with a good book
or on a walk by myself. Ultimately, I was my wife's partner and was content to be part
of a two-person team, but until she leaves the Borg, I need to recognize that
TEAM OTWO will often be headed in two directions. It takes adjusting to going to the
zoo or the museum by yourself while your teammate is at the Kingdom Hall. I am
trying to do that.
Even JWD is just a phase of my life and attempt to be content by myself. I hope to
move on from this one day. I will probably always keep some of my new friends, and
visit them when I can. Either that, or I will move to rural Indiana to be near a good
friend.
I can barely even fit inside myself these days.
Really just another loner type but not psychotically so. Another would-be funny poster but sans the humor. WYRIWYG - What You Read Is What You Get. ...which ain't much.
Thanks for starting this thread AK-Jeff. I've been feeling very defective lately for being a single guy with just a handful (maybe less) of close friends and no prospects for expanding my social circle in any significant way, but after reading the comments here I don't feel so alone.
Content to the core!
I have to be.....Every where I go..There I am..................................
...OUTLAW
Beautiful comments all!
I have determined that, for me, understanding my aloneness does not mean being lonely has been crucial. I find time to spend with a few friends - but I am not tied to those times like a lifeline. As a dub, we had 'instant friends'. Just walk into a KH anywhere, get greeted as 'brother', and in short order you have found a group with which to 'hang' if you wanted.
I recall a move that my wife and I made to Amarillo, Texas in the early 80's. We lived there 3 years, worked, preached, and raised our daughter. Yet in all that time, I did not ever meet a single person outside the organization - other than a few that I worked with - and I never sat foot inside any home that was not 'sprinkled with blood to assure safety from the angel of death', that is Jw homes.
I look back at that now and think how crazy that seems. How much we missed in that.
Another factor is this for me: As a Jw we were taught not to trust anyone but Jw's. When I left Jw's I found that I could not trust them either. That kind of limits the trust that is left to a few close friends. I am ok with that.
Either that, or I will move to rural Indiana to be near a good
friend.
Come on down OTWO. Always room here.
Jeff
