Unlearning what one has learned.Can it be done?

by Blueblades 7 Replies latest jw friends

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  Blueblades

  It has been said that one cannot unlearn what one has learned.When it comes to all the years of learning from the Watchtower, is it easy or hard for you to unlearn, get it out of your mind so to speak and go on to learn newer and more meaningful things outside the walls of the Watchtower.

  When I was active in the Watchtower there was the potentially endless cycle of assertions, analysis, counterassertions, qualifications, redefinitions, exceptions,extentuations, complications, hidden presuppositions, emotional colorings,and summations, ad infinitum.It had been exhausting.But now, I find a measure of relief, not from unlearning but from dismissing from my mind all of what I have learned from the Watchtower for over 30 years.

  And yet from time to time all those things taught by the Watchtower for all those years resurface on my mind,so for me it is not easy to unlearn what I have learned.What about you?

  Blueblades
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  pc

  It is extremely hard to undo all the years of brainwashing. I have been away for years and still kept most of the beliefs. It was not until I found this website that everything I thought was true turned out to be a complete lie. I now feel free to believe as I wish but it is still so very hard. MY sister-in-law told me something yesterday that I felt was a way to go forward. She said "you need to look ahead not back, nothing can be changed from the past, but everything can change going forward. You are the person you are because of what has happened in your past". Even though we all feel that sense of what might have been we need to keep striving forward.

  (I know it sounds pretty pathetic but I just wanted to respond) PC
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  ohiocowboy

  Why, Yes, it can be done, actually with a quite a bit of ease. The answer is....

  Frontal Lobotomy!

  Seriously though, I think that one can never really unlearn, but the info can be filed away in our minds as far back as possible, so that the info that we want to forget doesn't come up as often.
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  Amazing1914

  Good post! It takestime to unlearn JW mentality ... it is easier if a person was not raised a JW, so then they have something to draw upon and set as a baseline ... but, no matter how much unlearning goes on, or how effective ... I don't believe that we can ever forget ... at least not completely.
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  Nina

  Can you "unlearn"? Sure you can!

  Learning is that which results in a change in behavior (according to some class I took)...

  If you have "learned" things that you now wish to unlearn, think of this: you learned once, you learn every day, you can learn again. Nothin' to it.

  Are the things you heard while involved with WT influencing your behavior at present? Or are they just "memories"?

  One of the more erudite members of this discussion board may wish to fancy up what I am saying which is....

  It sounds to me like you are talking about "memories" and not "learning". Good. The discomfort associated with memories usually fades with the passage of time.

  Keep moving forward..it will get easier!

  Nina
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  myauntfanny

  Actually, I think it can be pretty challenging if you were raised JW, because then it's your baseline of reality, and a lot of their beliefs got mixed in with how you formed your personality. I was raised JW in the 60s, so 1975 was gonna be the big A, and there was never any discussion or thought about what I might BE when I grew up. I still have this deep underlying feeling that there's no point doing anything, even though obviously I don't believe it in my head anymore and haven't for years. And beliefs like, WE are superior, and strangers are dangerous and evil, and anyone who doesn't agree with me is evil, and there's only one way to do things right, stuff like that is structural and much harder to get rid of than religious doctrine, for me anyway. My main weapons in the fight against old JW beliefs are logic, and looking at what other people do.
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  natalienu

  Anything is possible if you want it bad enough, it just takes alot of effort and time.
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  Lady Lee

  egads if we hadn't learned anything we would still be stuck there.

  What would be the purpose of doing anything new if it impossible to learn.

  Mind control is a bit different in that we need to examine what we believe and replace the things that don't work or aren't true with beliefs that do work for us.

  If the WT wasn't so scared people would learn they wouldn't be so uptight about controlling the information.

  Here and everywhere we have the opportunity to check out other beliefs and examine them in the light of what we have been taught.

  Ask questions. Search out the information. Test your beliefs.

  Personally the day I stop learning is the day I die. And well.... I haven't got a clue after that.