If you grew up a JW, did you always know you weren't going to be one when you grew up? Did you ever have that spark?
I don't think I always knew I wouldn't be one. I grew up thinking I had the "truth". But I would look around at the other gung-ho people and knew I could never be that. It just wasn't me.
I always HATED field service. I would be so embarrassed if somebody from my school ever saw me out and begged my parents to work territories that didn't include my school's territory (which they mostly complied with).
I HATED the ministry school. I didn't want to prepare talks and I was shy and hated getting up in front of crowds. Each time I had to give a talk was a trauma. I hated my parents for making me join.
I never felt up-to-speed on doctrine like my dad. I knew all of the basics. Who couldn't with all those meetings? But the minute distinctions between the modern-day "this" and the modern-day "that" classes? Forget about it.
Meetings, for the most part were super boring too. I'd always bring something to distract me. Paper to doodle on or even a calculator to play with and hope not to get them confiscated. After that, all that was left was daydreaming. "Daydreamer" was always listed on my elementary school report cards. Wonder where that came from?
And I always enjoyed the company of "worldly" friends. I didn't feel like I had to prove anything to any of them or be on best behavior. It was just comfortable.
I never saw myself as into it as these other people. I don't think I ever thought I wouldn't be a JW because I did believe it. I just expected that it'd be something I'd struggle with to be gung ho about. I thought it might come eventually when I was older. It never did. I never had that spark.
To me, it sounds like what gay kids must go through. They know they're not like the people around them. Maybe relationships with the opposite sex just don't spark anything. Maybe they don't even realize what's different at first. Some of them come to realize it. Others just suffer either in the closet or knowing they're different but not why.
I think I was like that. It wasn't for me and I eventually found a way out. I wound up with sloppy meeting attendance and dating a worldly girl. She had me watch a TV show on JWs and I ordered Crisis of Conscience. I ate it right up.
I don't know that it answered unanswered questions that were lingering around. But it did show me what a man-made sham the religion was. It gave me the excuse to reject this religion that I never really embraced to begin with.
What about all of you? If you were born in, did you ever feel the spark? Or did you really feel it? What had to happen to get you out?
...OUTLAW