Does this ever happen to you?

by stillin 11 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  stillin

  Not very often, something will come up that makes me get a sense of having lost something. Maybe a television interview with a Witness who does an exceptional job of explaining the Kingdom preaching or something. Maybe accolades from the medical community for their stand on blood, how that has helped some other, supposedly superior alternative to be developed.

  Or Maybe it's just a particularly poignant meeting. One that actually has a thread of something running through it that makes me wonder...

  but usually, they present themselves in a way that embarrassed me when I was counted among them.
• 

  compound complex

  Greetings, stillin:

  I feel the same, as though something truly wonderful has been lost forever. The "Truth" was something special when I came in, especially since I knew so many of the anointed. Many of them took a personal interest in me. It was a spiritual good time. I was proud to be a Jehovah's Witnesses.

  Now, I look back with mixed emotions since so many family followed me in, and they, along with cherished friends, remain in this bizarre mutation of a faith I once held dear.

  Thanks.

  CC
• 

  Pete Zahut

  Naturally there are some good and redeeming qualities about JW's and or the organization. Obviously these were what attracted us to it or kept us in it long after it stopped working for us.

  Those positive aspects were eventually overshadowed by the not so positive ones. For my family and I, it was a death by a thousand cuts. Little by little the changing doctrine, the revelation via the internet of what is really going on behind the scenes at H.Q., the nonsensical changes made in the generation and blood teachings and the fact that nothing they've ever claimed has ever turned out to be true or accurate, all led to the realization that we were involved in a farce. The few nice friends and JW social aspects weren't enough to keep the charade going. My big regret is that we didn't exit before we lost one of our family members in death because of the blood issue. That one was/is hard to bear.
  
• 

  stillin

  Coco, nice to hear your voice. Long time. I was starting to think that this was going to be the loneliest thread in the world. Doing any writing these days?

  pete za, so many changes in that religion until it's barely recognizable. It was a network of decent people. I miss that... But even the human decency seemed to be just a charade; that's exactly the word.
• 

  Muddy Waters

  This is so relevant to me right now... just the other, night, for the very first time in a long time and in a very painful way, came the remembrances of my JW life and the "zeal" I had... The feeling that I was really doing something that was worthwhile and important. And the friends and the "worldwide brotherhood"..... That feeling of family and togetherness and unity they always bang on about.

  And now... Here I am, getting older.... Realizing my mortality is gonna happen.... Yet I would not want a single active, indoctrinated JW to ever be at my funeral.
• 

  rip van winkle

  My time started in the mid 1990s.

  There's not a single romanticized jw bone in my body.
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  compound complex

  Thanks, stillin, for your reply.

  I appreciate this thread because our JW group here is loving and kind. I miss them terribly. Numerous times I have tried to reintegrate at the KH, but can no longer do so. It's so difficult seeing all their wonderful outings and parties (lots of them) posted on Facebook. Witnesses, in general, don't socialize with inactive JWs like me. Nevertheless, they are kind to me, especially when I've been ill.

  I do no new writing currently though I do edit for other writers and recycle through the stuff I've written here and elsewhere online for the last dozen years or so. Thank you for remembering that I write. Don't get much response to stories and poetry here.

  Best regards.

  CoCo
• 

  Slidin Fast

  I agree, there are moments that are undeniably touching in some way. We are human, we respond to people who have genuine emotions and beliefs.

  I have to mentally separate the many good and genuine dubs from the ruthless leadership. I have a feeling that they are all misled, even members of the gb. They think that they are doing all the coverups, all the flip flops, all the defensive self justification of the indefensible for the greater good.

  I can't decide who in the organisation is the real bad guy, at what level in the hierarchy the real culpability starts.
• 

  Bonsai

  There are tons of good people in the organization and i miss them dearly. it makes me cry sometimes all the friendships that i lost to be replaced with...not much. But there are so many effed up things that I can no longer condone, and they need to know that I no longer condone them.
• 

  Xanthippe

  Perhaps it's the fantasy we miss stillin, the 'worldwide brotherhood', the instant friends, people who show love to one another in times of trouble. It's a lovely dream but in reality I know it just wasn't like that.

  When I was a child people gave us clothes which was a really big help with four children but it would have been better if my mother could have put her foot down and defied my father and the headship nonsense from the religion and have gone and got a job. She did that once and he told her to give it up, being one of these very old fashioned men and being a good JW wife she had to obey, which caused huge financial hardship.

  When I think of the congregation they did sometimes help one another but nobody outside the religion mattered. Last week, after the terrible sad pictures of drowned children in the press, a colleague at work suggested we send toiletries to the Red Cross for the refugees at Calais. Everyone is very keen to help strangers suffering because of desperately trying to get their kids out of a war zone.

  We've also sent money to disaster appeals by making cakes and selling them. It was fun, we enjoyed a lot of cake for two weeks and people in desperate need were helped.

  So I have managed to find a group of people who are nice to be around while I'm working, we support one another when we go through tough times and someone always pops up with a suggestion to help when there are people in desperate need in the world.

  I've found a good group but there is no paradise coming, we are far from perfect but we don't have to live our lives crippled by impossible rules - just remember to bring cakes when it's your birthday !😀😀