How did/do you break the "thinking" chain?

by lurk3r 23 Replies latest jw friends

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  lurk3r

  One thing about being an active Jdub is that you are never encouraged to actually think. Sure you THINK your thinking, but once your out, and start asking some questions that you never even considered before, it becomes apparent that you weren't. It becomes clear that we were indeed "conditioned".

  Decades of sitting in a chair listening to the SAME thing, over and over again. Eating it up as "new". THINKING about the same shit over and over again, and saying those same things to reinforce it. Not thinking efficiently, and not even REALLY THINKING!

  How did you break free from this once and for all? Take away the religious indoctrination, and your still left with your thoughts and your WAY of thinking. I'm thinking that the longer your "in", and especially from a young age when your thought processes are being formed, the harder it is to break free from.

  I guess this is all part of the process of "getting to know myself", and I find I am captive to this scenario of being analytical, but not expanding my thoughts to think "forward". I often rehash the same thoughts in everyday life and recognize it as being pointless more often than not. It's a tough one to break.

  Can you relate? Any suggestions and comments here would be most welcome.

  lurk3r
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  quietlyleaving

  I don't think it can be broken completely but we can get out of the groove. Remember that while you/we all were sitting there week after week listening to the same ole stuff, life was going on around us in all its various forms. I find adopting a lateral form of perceiving helps me to realise that the life I haven't personally lived as a consciously remembered experience isn't completely lost. Switching off my thinking mind and the I, just for a few seconds is renewing and refreshing.
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  lostjdub93

  I was never baptized a Jw but was raised ti be on. i have just started to let go after 16 years of being out. I only wish i could show the mother of my child that her sovereign grace ministries church is too much like being a JW and breaking up our family.
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  poppers

  Most people are a slave to thinking, whether they are unknowingly a cult member or not. People create an identity that is thought based, and that identity gets reinforced as they tell themselves their "story of me" all day long, year after year. But there is the possibility of breaking through that identity and realizing that you are not a thought-based entity at all, and once that happens the "thinking chain" (I love how you put that) begins to dissolve all by itself.

  How to do that? Begin by examining who/what you are. See if you can locate the "essence" of what you are. Can you "find" yourself within the mind? See if you can. Isn't the mind just a bunch of endless thought forms that are constantly changing? Can you "be" thought then? So ask yourself, "Who/what am I really?" and then look honestly and intently.

  Doing this will bring up lots of ideas/concepts about who you are, but those are only ideas/thoughts. But notice this: aren't those thoughts being observed by something? That "something" is what you are. It isn't actually a "thing" at all, it is consciousness/awareness. You won't be able to "locate" awareness as an objectbut it can be noticed/realized to be present. That awareness is silent and still, and it watches everything that happens, including what happens in the mind. You ARE that awareness; discover directly for yourself the truth of this and the mental image you have identified with will begin to dissolve. Identity will shift away from the thought processes (conditioned thinking) that have created this sense of "me" as you rest consciously within/as awareness itself. Mind may continue to spin for a while out of habit and conditioning, but identity will shift away from that conditioning. Then mind will quiet on its own.

  There is tremendous peace in the discovery that what you are is awareness; there is a silence and stillness that pervades everything, and it even is present when surrounding circumstances appear to be chaotic. This is where freedom is found, where peace abides unconditionally. The very essence of "you" is peace itself.
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  Dagney

  The thing I love most about being out is that I am free to think about everything. It's the best part. Embrace it. It's wonderful.
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  BabaYaga

  Poppers, my thoughts were quite similar to yours when I first read this thread! But I certainly do understand Lurk3r's point... to be able to THINK for one's self as the individual is a very VERY important step to extricating oneself out of the organizational mentality!

  What you describe I think is the next step... to get past even the thoughts that hold us bound to yet another identity: That which we perceive as ourselves.

  Edited to add... Lurk3r, as far as suggestions go for encouraging the independant thinking... get enrolled in school. Take philosophy classes, science classes, all manner of classes that would have made your cult-think shrink in fear. Engage yourself in reading as many books on these subjects as possible. Revel in your ability to think and REASON for yourself.

  When I first broke free, I was frightened when I discovered that the rule book I had followed all my life was not true. I didn't know what the answers could be. I finally realized that part of the joy is being able to say "I don't know".

  "Imagination is more important than knowledge." Albert Einstein.

  Love,
  Baba.
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  MissingLink

  Thing back over the last year. How many things have you changed your mind on? Things you were sure about before, but have recently been convinced that you were wrong, either thru education or just reasoning with other people. If the number is 0, then be worried.
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  Chalam

  Hi lurk3r,

  I truly believe that many JWs are left with a legacy of fear, condemnation, judgement and the wroth of "Jehovah". However, this is not the will of God, rather the opposite.

  2 Timothy 1:7 (New King James Version)

  7 For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

  All the best, Stephen
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  BurnTheShips

  How did/do you break the "thinking" chain?

  I think that as dubs we though too much. We overrationalized everything. That is the chain that was hardest to break for me. If only we did not think so much and block out the inner voice of God, we would have realized how wrong Dubdom was.

  BTS
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  BabaYaga

  Burn said: I think that as dubs we though too much. We overrationalized everything.

  Very interesting point, Burn! Yes, that whole "rationalizing everything" isn't very good for a relationship, I can tell you that!