by punkofnice 35 Replies latest watchtower bible
I'm in it for the wonderful smells and the beautiful decorated trees :) I've always been attracted to the Christmas time of year and always secretly hummed along to the dreaded songs.
I'm having a great time with it, even though I bought my first real tree a little to early and it starting to die. I'm just hoping it last til Friday.
Hi PunkofNice:
I can understand that Christmas might not mean anything to somebody raised in the Witness religion! And you are not "abnormal" because you can't get into the spirit of it. It has become very commercial.
I had a Catholic upbringing and came into the JWs as a young adult. As a child, Christmas was magical to me - and I'm glad I had it.
Now, as an EX-JW, the Holiday season is an occasion to get together (or correspond with) my loved ones and enjoy companionship with the ONLY people who ever really cared about me and guess what? None of them is a JW.
This is a lesson I learned before it was too late and one I will never forget!
It's ok to feel and do what you do now.
If you wanted to, you could make up your own little traditions.
It's solstice and the end of the year--time to beat the long nights by curling up with a warm drink and some pretty lights or candles. Or a fireplace. There are seasonal foods--a special treat only at this time of year.
You could use your day off to treat yourself to a nice meal, nature walk or movie.
And remind yourself it's another year of freedom for you.
Thanks for all your replies.
This year, as last year, I'm spending X-mas away from home with another xJW. Someone else is cooking. This xJW became a JW later in life so has a nostalgic, childhood memory of X-mas.
I'll be glad when this time is over because I feel like a square peg in a round hole and it's hard to adapt at my age.
Never mind, armageddon(tm) will be here soon.....it's just around the corner.
I'm there, like a neutral feeling about the whole thing. But it's sort of similar to other games the world plays together, like daylight saving time. Well I mean, with dst we don't have a choice; but I'm talking about how an agreement is made to pretend it's 1 o'clock when it's really noon. With Christmas we agree that "it's that time of year again," - time to pretend a bunch of stuff, time to play a big game.
I feel the same about the Renaissance festival every spring, time to pretend with a bunch of strangers that we're in a different century. If we wear costumes then we're indicating how much we really want to play, and that's sort of a gift to the other attendees.
Since leaving the criminal wt mind control cult we have jumped into Christmas for the grandkid, but also because we have the freedom to be like worldly people, and really I want to be a worldly person. This is my world, I'm not an alien residing in a strange land anymore, LOL.
So we give a little energy, as we can't spare much, and put a little money towards tokens of our esteem, and help the economy along a bit. Also donate to toy drives a small bit, to help kids have fun which makes Christmas more real.
The story of my childhood Christmases is not happy at all. My father took my brother and me away from our mother at young ages. His idea of a Christmas present was a bar of chocolate (Here ya go). So between that assho!e and the JW, Christmas became hugely painful to dread every year. I'm happy to be grown up now and free to decide about it all for myself.
Hey dear Punk, I would love another rock n roll video for Christmas!
Marina
Hi Punk
I can relate to this a bit - I never feel very 'christmassy' - I never bother sending cards but I think I'll text a few family members and wish them merry xmas. Aren't they lucky!
But, the thing about it I like is meeting up with family. I don't know your full situation, but perhaps concentrate on meeting up with family and friends that talk to you?
Have a good Winterval, Punk ...
