What makes me shake my head is this: The elders I've ever known have always told youths who are ignored by their peers within the org that they need to do better at socialising with other young people. And that means not in field service or meetings but in non-spiritual social settings. But what angered me was, how the hell could they associate with their peers when their peers left them out of their social circles? The problem lay with the self righteous offspring of parents who 'put Jehovah first'. I only had 2 best friends. Everyone else just knew who I was. It's really sad. So much for obeying the command to "widen out".
Do you (or did you) have much of a social life as a Jehovahs Witness.
by UnshackleTheChains 31 Replies latest jw experiences
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EverApostate
We used to gather only with the Indian JWs in USA most of the time
During those sleepovers, we would mostly talk about our experiences as a JW like "Jah is good, Jah is gracious, Jah gave me a bible study". I hated that because my inner gut was telling it was all fake.
And then we would prepare for the WT study, go out in FS , and all the boring stuff like that.
Looking back it gives me immense joy that I am out of this fake Bubble.
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James Mixon
Social life in the 60's and 70's was great, beach parities, camping out, sports, gathering and lots of booze, square dancing, Jazz concerts, fishing, graduation party for the young ones (high school), once a week brothers would gather in our local gym for basketball (we had some great games). Yes those were the days, friends would stick around after the meetings and have meaningful conversation and then the sh--t hit the fan..1975....
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faithnomore
I miss my social life from when I was "in".
We did something socially several times a week. Lunch after Sunday meetings, games, softball, football. There was always a wedding, baby, graduation party to go to. We were originally one hall and broke off into 4 so we had friends from several congregations and always getting invited to some event.
Absent of events we had a close circle of friends that we always socialized with at LEAST once a week.
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LongHairGal
UNSHAKLETHECHAINS:
I should have used the word "sheltered" as opposed to "closeted" as this word has a different meaning nowadays LOL. Wrong choice of word.
It does seem to me that the born-ins had a better social life and therefore would be more likely to miss the JW religion.šŖ
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sparrowdown
I actually made quite an effort to throw pot-luck or pizza evenings together but aÄŗl my "friends" turned out to be fake when my perfect attendance record became sporadic. Fake friends =fake social life.
JWs tend to invite you when you're "of their sort" and drop you as soon as your congregation social/organizational status drops off.
There is an episode of Black Mirror set in a not too distant future world where your whole is dictated by social points you accumulate or lose and it reminded me of JWs.
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smiddy3
We had lots of social gatherings ,picnics playing sports ,camping and dining out for meals especially after the Sunday meetings.
Also attending meals with a group of us that consisted of going to one another`s place for each of the courses.
Their was never any shortage of booze either.
This was all in contrast to the first couple of congregations in my initial 10 years with JW`s which were lifeless by comparison.
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jookbeard
very active almost too hectic when I was younger in my 20's, house parties at least once or twice a month, meet ups in pubs weekly, ice skating most Sunday nights, it got to the stage when I had to put a block on it, some of the drinking in those parties was getting out of hand though, although even back then a purge had started to curtail these social events, the ice skating rink closed down, the phase of barn dances was banned as well due to one very minor incident with alcohol, when I got married it changed slightly as my ex used to like to have dinner parties with other jw couples, I couldn't stand them and would think of all number of excuses for her to try and cancel them, in the end I just said go ahead and invite who you like around I'll go out, when I faded I made very friends with a neighbour (RIP) and we would go out together a couple of times a week, when I separated and moved away my social life really did change, it became almost non existent , I did have a few girlfriends but life was really quite lonely, I dont mind my own company, I've travelled all over the world on my own, and my standpoint now is quite similar, I dont go out much, separated living on my own again.
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pometerre21
I have basically no social life. And the worst part of it is that Iām made to feel guilty. Itās my fault that I donāt have friends within the organization. I have a lot of academic and intellectual interests, which needless to say do not line up with most JW interests. Iām always the one that has to change in order to āhave friendsā and Iām constantly being told that all that matters is that we have the Truth in common. Or that I should just be content to have friends in their 40s and 50s. Or Iām told that we do not want to partake in the āworldāsā version of fun (which I get, to an extent).
So yeah, no social life. Sorry if it sounded like I was whining.
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UnshackleTheChains
Thanks for feeding back all your experiences. It appears to be a bit of a mixed bag and varies from congregation to congregation. It also depends on the body of elders in each hall. Our cobe is a bit of a kill joy. Not the greatest promoter of Cong parties for sure.
After about 15 years of no social life and avoiding the world like the plague, I decided to attend pretty much every works night out going, that way you can let your hair down and have a good laugh. I also from time to time have a pint out with a faded witness friend which cheers me up big time and not having to watch what you say whilst having a good laugh.
If Watchtower wants to prevent its young people from leaving, they need to structure things differently. As King Soloman says - there is time for work and a time to play. All work no play makes jack a very dull boy indeedy.