Service as a way of relieving our pain (page 2)

LoisLane looking for Superman

Londo, Thank you for sharing your worthwhile "service time". Your joy comes across.

At a Women's Shelter, where I went for refuge from my Elder husband, I was asked if I had done any volunteering. As a born in, I have been knocking on doors and ringing doorbells for well over half a century. My embarassment for being a JW and in my predicament, I said, "no" but another part of the component was, what a waste of my time and life volunteering for free to a billion dollar publishing house masquerading as god's one true religion. I don't want anybody to know, what a wasted life, I've had. So, no, I haven't done any volunteering.

But good for you! What you did, can actually, help somebody.

Just Lois

notjustyet

I think that this might apply to going out in service.

( I had to make a edit and removed the word "severe" and replaced it with the word "MILD" as "severe" was used in both examples in error)

This is taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance

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Effort justification paradigm

Further information: Effort justification

Dissonance is aroused whenever individuals voluntarily engage in an unpleasant activity to achieve some desired goal. Dissonance can be reduced by exaggerating the desirability of the goal. Aronson & Mills [16] had individuals undergo a severe or mild "initiation" in order to become a member of a group. In the MILD -initiation condition, the individuals engaged in an embarrassing activity. The group they joined turned out to be very dull and boring. The individuals in the severe-initiation condition evaluated the group as more interesting than the individuals in the mild-initiation condition.

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I believe that going out in service, aka severe initiation, would have us rank the JWs as "more interesting" of a group to be associated with as this would help us reduce the dissonance.

The more unatural or severe the initiation. What's more unatural than going from door to door to tell people that they are wrong and also giving public talks as public speaking is ranked high on the list of phobias.

Food for thought.

NJY

2+2=5

Good man Londo. Jesus didn't jam religion down everyone's throat like we are told to as JWs.

LisaRose

I started to volunteer also. I am with an organization that helps the elderly with learning. The volunteers are assigned a partner and we help them with whatever they want to learn, whether it be art, crafts, writing, reading, or whatever. The goal is to prevent age related dementia. It is hard sometimes, but also rewarding. When I was a Witness I found the field service to be very difficult. Going around telling people that they were in the wrong religion and would die at Armageddon just never felt right. I always thought it would be more rewarding to help people in a more concrete way. It took a while, but I finally got to do it.

perfect1

Its a pyramid scheme!

Service as a way of relieving our pain