by sleepy 26 Replies latest jw friends
I pioneered for over 10 years. I went out in winter storms, in scorching heat, in soaking rain. It didn't matter, I was out. I must have gone thousands of miles marching around blocks peddling watchtower literature. The bookbag was heavy, my feet hurt. It didn't matter I would still go on. I was doing it for Jehovah. I was such an uber-doofus.
Had I not decided to go with my heart,and leave my now exhusband I may have never found out the things I have learned since leaving the organization. Over the 37 yrs in the org. I spend seven yrs vaction, later auxillary pioneering and regular pioneering. Went to serve where the need was apparently greater, and worked my ass off. I lived in a pioneer group some of the girls where spawns of evil hell bent on making your live miserable. Gossip oooooooh gee, gossip like you never seen. I have seen cliques. dissention, anamosity back biting. I have seen people hurt and people depressed and suicidial............. Good grief how long was I an idiot for?
I have seen me go in the ministry in 100 temperatures and had my legs bleeding from the chaffing of panty hose, because sisters "were not to go out in the service without pantyhose on because if you did it was a bad example for the sister in the congregation" I have preached in blizzards, been nearly killed in a car accident, because the brother was a jerk and had faulty brakes on is car and he knew that and we almost went over the Champlain Bridge in Montreal on our way in a blizzard to an assembly. "IDIOT YES", that is way is say today that HINDSIGHT IS 2O/20
PLEASE PASS THE POI!!!
The only people that should feel stupid are the ones who joined the Borg after becoming adults, then only to leave again after years of faithful service...bitter, disgruntled, etc....bought that ticket and took that ride as it were...
For those of us born in the borg, well we should probably feel stupid for not running away from home shortly after birth!
Sincerely,
District Overbeer
When discussing Dateline with my limbo-hubby (we're separated).. I thanked him over and over again for his de-programming efforts in the year that followed my Dfing.
It scares me how an organization can control otherwise rational people. I don't feel like an idiot - I feel frightened that I was like that, and thankful that I'm now out.
Mimilly
"Our lives begin to end, the day we become silent, about things that matter" ~~Martin Luther King
Orangefatcat, I forgot about the panty hose! Once in the dead of summer I couldn't stand it any longer and sneaked into a hallway and tore them off! Literally. Memories.
Add me to the "A" list of braindead idiots. I actually had the audacity to think I was serving Jehovah during it all. All I was doing was serving as a throw-away unpaid magazine salesman for a Religious Printing Corporation that offered me "air" and constant guilt in return for those decades I gave to them.
And now they think I am the "bad guy!"
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
Farkel
One thing that stands out to me about each one of you who have told your stories in this thread is your sincerety. You weren't just going through the motions or living a lie. You were, like me, true believers. Notwithstanding that we were totally wrong in our beliefs, our motives were very noble. To save our fellow man and in the process ourselves.
So I don't think it is necessary or right for any of us to self-flagellate ourselves with claims of being stupid. We did what we did based on care and concern for our fellow man. If that could be bottled up and distributed to more people, we really would live in a better world. I really mean this when I say that many of you were much more diligent in your efforts than I was and your stories touch my heart. Especially you ladies, because you really did put up with an awful lot of shit from the organization and the men in the organization.
ME TOO!!!
can't say all the times were bad-- i had some good times, some great friends....
thos if course, the party line prevents them from contacting me ... but, i know in their hearts they think of me.... as i do of them...
the strange thingis, that if my repressed sexual feelings had not returned (like a tidal wave) i would probably still be there... babbling on about you apostates, out here..
dfing was a swift, hard kick in the head*** that caused me to start thinking...not str8 away, mind you.. For 6 months i tried to change myself back...studying & praying 2-3 hours a day...preparing every talk in the program -- well, not the SM, wasn't allowed the precious kingdom ministry, looking up every scripture mentioned in the meeting, even tho i prob. knew it by heart.
i missed my kids like crazy, my heart was covered in a black fog in my despair at not seeing them
i goaded myself to change again with the threat of suicide, if i failed!!! and knew at the end of 6 months that i had failed and must face death.....
now a double sin enveloped me!! so i set out to plan a great final holiday on Visa card..and then to drive a car of a cliff that i knew .. i could not face a gun, and the final trigger, but could set a car in motion and drive over a cliff..
well!!!! i am still here!!!
but sad, i guess that i wasted my life on trash!!!!!
and cheeeee!! some of my gay friends that are religious find it hard to understand my dislike of christianity..
*** interesting isn't it... dfing is supposed to ahve the opposite result...but i observe here, that for many it became the trigger that caused them to think and AWAKE from spiritual sleep (drugged more like it..) LOL!!!
I've been going around some of the people who I more aggressively preached to, apologising.
I gave some local Christians a right roasting over the Trinity doctrine, etc., in the past.
It's a small community, as the Highlands of Scotland tend to be, so it went around pretty quickly that I'd left.
I've also got in touch with some old schoolmates and a few DF'ed friends from the past.
It's a wonder that I managed to find them, but by some small miracle of modern technology...
Yep, count me in. I feel like a dumb ass sometimes knowing
how I defended this sick mess.
In balance, it keeps us humble.
metatron
