JO: "One of the things that actually helped me wake up was taking a look around at beauty and goodness in the world and honestly saying to myself, "It's actually not that bad...""
Pioneering in rural and semi-suburban central PA (Halifax, Dauphin, Lebanon) got me to a lot of landscaped beauty and well-appointed porches right out of Homes and Gardens, a lot of hill-top and mountain-top vistas, a lot of river-side (Susquehanna) and creek-side residences, a lot of farming fields, in all weathers, under a covering snow, sheets of rain, mists, baking summer sun, under day-long overcasts. Drove across bridges over the Susquehanna, etc, hundreds of times - passing the naturally serene while selling genocide. During one of the last years, I and my younger cousin went up the west shore of the Susquehanna and stopped at some teens who were fishing. I trotted out my tired line, it was just what I did, knowing it was all nonsense, but I just did it, like a small number of other persons, apparently. And the oldest boy, younger than me, but clear-headed enough to know nonsense when he saw it, hears what I trotted out, flings his line out skillfully, plonk in the gentle eddy of a backwater behind some of the islands that dot the Susquehanna like a beauty you've never seen in the lush springtime unless you've seen it, and then he turns to me and says, "Why are you doing this?"
Nature saved me, I would have to say. I knew it was all crap because Nature announced it to be so. I had to verify it was all crap by doing time at Bethel and Patterson, and by giving one public talk, and conducting Book Study groups, to overturn any last stone of evidence. But that last bit was calibration data, not actually crucial to the brutish conclusion, but more of a refinement. The brutal truth was watching a teenager fishing.
Are JWs more negative than normal people?
by Julia Orwell 74 Replies latest jw friends
-
rmt1
-
Apognophos
That's true 3rdgen, I've definitely had to play the "I wasn't feeling well" card to explain some of my absences. The main reason I go to the number of meetings I do is to avoid being nagged by certain individuals who I can't avoid, and because I can only play that sickness card so often for it to be believable.
Since I learned TTATT and saw posts here talking about how knowing TTATT has caused some to get upset/ill at meetings, I've begun to wonder if some of the sisters who were considered to be "sickly" were actually just trying to avoid the meetings.
-
OUTLAW
...
.......................
...OUTLAW -
3rdgen
Outlaw, so true!
-
Julia Orwell
Outsmart the System probably just summed up the Jw psychology in a nutshell.
Isn't it amazing how 'the pressure of this system' seems to ease up once you're no longer a Jw? Gee, you'd think it would be harder to keep on top of your bills and obligations when you leave cuz you no longer have 'Jehovah's' help. Guess it was Jehovah putting the pressure on me and not 'this system'. That's not to say life is easy by any stretch, but take out the whopping great slice the wt demands of you, and you suddenly have time to do things that make life easier like sleep in on a Saturday morning and chill on the couch after work on a Tuesday night.
-
LisaRose
Of course dubs are negative, it's the core foundation of their belief system. It's a never ending loop of "this old system is so bad, can't do anything, we need Jehovah and the new system, then every thing will be perfect" . Every negative news event is magnified, and anything contrary is ignored.
This is easy for the delusional because it requires them to do nothing and take absolutely no responsibility or ownership of their life. Every thing bad is Satan's fault. Can't pay the rent? It can't be because they don't have a decent job because they didn't go to college, and they didn't plan or save, nope, its all Satan's fault, what can you do?
They love bad news, they all have a serious case of schadenfreude, joy at the distress of others.
-
Julia Orwell
Every thing bad is Satan's fault.
Magical thinking! Oh yes, I'm so familiar with that! A sister I knew had some major disagreements with her non-JW mother. Mind you, the non-Jw mother is no bed of roses, but before she was a JW, an argument would be, "Had a fight with mum again. Gosh she's a difficult woman. She drives me nuts!" Now it is, "Satan's using mum to get to me! Mum's persecuting me because I'm a JW!"
-
rmt1
The most insufferable, infantile, petulant, pernicious scripture I have ever heard from the NWT is, "It does not belong to man who is walking even to direct his step."
-
westiebilly11
agree...so programmed to trip out the 'critical times hard to deal with' routine....everything is bad about this system of things....everytime there's an earthquake or a disaster they smile and proclaim the end is nigh........put another way..'those who concern themselves with life in the next world are no damn use to those in this world..'
-
adamah
rmt1 said-
"The most insufferable, infantile, petulant, pernicious scripture I have ever heard from the NWT is, "It does not belong to man who is walking even to direct his step."
Word.
In fact, I had some Christian make the bald-faced claim that God was actually the GREATEST humanist EVER, in spite of my pointing out the constant ego-bashing and verbal strip-downs of mankind in which the Bible partakes, eg God's boastful braggadocio to Job ("where were YOU when I....") to the scripture you cited. God is hardly a cast member of "up with people!"
JWs are only one symptom of the disease, where the teachings of the Bible are the underlying cause which manifests in many other Bible-based religions.
Adam
..
...OUTLAW