Welcome Durden, I'm glad that you have awakened as a teenage, that you have not been baptized as a JW, and that your parents are "Spiritually Weak" (still thinking), because you are in a position of power to become free of the WTBTS and hopefully with your parents if you carefully plan and do lots of research about the WTBTS, its history, and about the Behavioral, Information, Thought, and Emotional "BITE" control techniques that the WTBTS uses to victimize JWs. I hope that you post regular on JWN to vent your frustrations as well as to ask for help to make your plans to fade from the WTBTS, get a better education for a good career, and to help your parents to awaken.
One thing I must recommend to you is do not experiment anymore with drugs as long as you live with your parents. If your parents learn about your experimentation with drugs, it may undo all of your efforts to help your parents awaken and depending on laws where you live it could adversely affect your future plans.
I would recommend that you do the following to help you to get a university/trade education, to fade from the WTBTS, and, if possible, help your parents to awaken:
- Delay getting baptised as a JW for as long as possible, and hopefully never. You can start a thread asking for help to overcome your JW family and friends pressure to become baptised.
- Posting as much as possible on JWN to either vent your frustrations, which will increase with time about the WTBTS, and to ask for help about specific points of your plan. It is better to vent your frustrations on JWN then to JWs.
- Ask your father/mother to explain "Ockham's razor", "cognitive disonnance", and other terms to you that will help them to confront their WTBTS's indoctrination. Ockham's razor is a logical approach to help making logical decisions. You can also ask them about techniques to make logical decisions such as drawing a 'T" on a blank sheet of paper and write what you/they agree with/disagree with the WTBTS (or anything else that you choose) on opposite sides of the paper to help make decisions.
- Visit websites such as www.jwfacts.com, www.watchtowerdocuments.com, and www.jwsurvey.org, and www.freeminds2.org to name a few. Make sure that you erase the browser history everytime you visit non-WTBTS approved websites on the computer that your family uses.
- Visit Steve Hassan's website www.freedomofmind.com to learn more about the BITE control techniques that the WTBTS does use and how to overcome them. If you cannot afford to purchase Steve Hassan's book "Freedom of Mind: Helping Loved Ones Leave Controlling People, Cults and Beliefs" in an ebook format, see if you can either checkout his books at the library or at least watch the following two videos of Steve Hassan at least twice: "Steve Hassan explains SIA method to rescue loved ones from unhealthy situations (2003)" and "Steve Hassan at NYC Ethical Culture Society February 2013.
- Make more non-JW friends. When making new non-JW friends, ask yourself what do you admire/like about the person. I would recommend making friends with people who have a vision/idea of what they want to accomplish in life such as going to the university and staying away from people who just want to get drunk or high.
- In high school take classes that will help you to get a job. Learning about/how to touch type, building things by hand in shop classes, computers, mathematics, and science are very important subjects to take if you have an interest and aptitude for them. By the way what interests you? Have you considered writing a thread about what type of jobs to look for as a teenager that will not offend your parents?
- Ask your high school guidance councilors to help you make decisions about what you should study in high school to prepare yourself for the university and getting a part-time job. It might help to explain to your councilors that your were raised a JW and to ask them to do research themselves about the WTBTS and BITE control.
- Start asking your parents simple questions to help them see what the WTBTS is and helping them to make more non-JW friends such as friends with parents of your friends. Reading Steve Hassan's books and posting on JWN will help you to help your parents.
- Ask your parents to do fun things with you, to do fun things with non-JWs, or to learn about topics that take a lot of time away from them and you going to meetings and/or reading WTBTS propaganda. A very time comsuming topic to learn and one that will help you and your parents later in life is to learn about investing. If you lived in the USA, I would recommend going to the TD Ameritrade website and learn how to use ThinkorSwim to learn more about investing.
Best of wishes to critically think for yourself and get through the double-whammy of being a teenager and a JW.
Peace be with you and everyone, who you love,
Robert