Are you a better person for having been involved with witnesses?

No, absolutely not. JWs have been the most negative influence on my life. The effects continue today mainly because of extended family. It affected family for me even in my father's family and none of them were JWs. They hated us being JWs so much that it affects relationships even today. There are still so much miscommunication and misunderstanding and confusion. The repercussions have been endless.

John Doe

So, you're saying you're a worse person because you don't have good familial relationships?

Scarred for life

Yes.

John Doe

I see it differently. I still have family in that I do not have a close relationship with, but I think I'm a much stronger person who's more willing to question the status quo than I would have been in a different setting.

beksbks

Absolutely not

gubberningbody

I learned a number of things I might not have otherwise. I got to feel popular, something I'd never felt before. I learned to speak in public, something which most people are really uncomfortable doing. I had a rather shaky, unstable start as a young adult and the discipline helped me coalesce. I really liked it all at first. So much was new. It was the last ten years that was downhill. The change in 1995 didn't really hit me. It was in 2001 when I was involved in a discussion online with Dr. Muramoto that things began to change. I got quite unhappy with the cowardice of the organization and the misrepresentation of the blood issue in general. Still I stayed and tried in my mind to work things out. Later on as we know things got worse and worse. It became clear to me that the organization itself had completely abandoned the faith they'd claimed to represent. In my mind they've become no better than the unfaithful servant who said "My master is delaying". Still I tried to see what I could see. But as things go, when your plumage begins to glow differently from those around you suspicions grow, even if you are an elder, even an elder/pioneer/service overseer.

So yes, but it was time to go.

OnTheWayOut

I am a better person than I was before I joined the JW's, but I would be a better person regardless.
I am a better person despite having been involved with Witnesses.

its_me!

That is kindof a hard question for me to answer, I think that being in the ORG set me back EONS in my emotional maturity. I still do not know who I am. My entire identity was wrapped up in the neat little package of a JW. I now have a TON of emotional baggage to overcome, but at the same time, trials and tribulations do give us character and can make us stronger. Hopefully, it will do that for me. I am so new to fading , that I think much more time will have to pass before I can give a more definitive answer to this question. But, Kudos to you John Doe, very thought provoking.

Are you a better person for having been involved with witnesses?

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