Posts by wanderlust

50

My daughter's wedding dilemma

by RULES & REGULATIONS in

my daughter will be getting married this coming august.

she and her future husband are not jehovah's witnesses.

they will have a non-religious wedding ceremony.

Wow Rules and Regs...that is....super crazy. The only thing that I can offer is that there is no easy solution here, but I do not think your daughter should have to bear the burden of your family's decision to be JWs and their choice to follow all of the JW unwritten rules.

The ones with "rank" along with their wives will have to make a decision whether or not to take the risk; the others that don't really have a rank to lose perhaps will stay and just avoid the cousin. I wish your daugter the best with the wedding planning. Wedding planning is enough hard work without having to worry about this stupid shit.

33

Did other JWs judge you? What for?

by Julia Orwell in

jw
friends

some judged me for going/having gone to university.

some judged me for being 'too smart.

' some judged my non jw brother for being in the army.

wanderlust

I was counseled several times and judged for my decision to go to college. I felt judged for not succeeding in bringing my non-jw parents and siblings into the "truth" and now i'm grateful that they are not.

Additionally, two sisters cornered me after a meeting to tell me my skirt was too short (it was .5 inches above my knee! gtfohwtbs!). A young brother told me they were just jealous because they couldn't pull off that skirt and then i felt better. A holy roller "counseled" me about my cartilage piercing. Umm...that's about it. Not too bad - there are judgmental folks inside and outside of the cult so I have learned to grow a thicker skin.

50

My daughter's wedding dilemma

by RULES & REGULATIONS in

my daughter will be getting married this coming august.

she and her future husband are not jehovah's witnesses.

they will have a non-religious wedding ceremony.

wanderlust

I know this question was posed to Designer Stubble, but IMHO it is no one else's business who your daughter decides to invite to the wedding. I don't see the big deal - can't they just, like, not talk to him? They don't have to sit next to him, right?

50

My daughter's wedding dilemma

by RULES & REGULATIONS in

my daughter will be getting married this coming august.

she and her future husband are not jehovah's witnesses.

they will have a non-religious wedding ceremony.

wanderlust

I agree with Designer Stubble. She should invite him and let those idiots walk out if they want to. It's their loss. When I got married to my "unbelieving" ex years ago, most of my JW family members decided not to show up. I was expecting that but it was a wonderful day and we had a good time regardless.

20

Look! It was very good or: Evil in the Animal Kingdom

by TheOldHippie in

i have fed a number of birds regularly thru winter, and among the species were some doves.

this spring, two of them took a liking for each other and teamed up.

for a couple of weeks, extensive construction work was jointly done and resulted in a nice little nest, undoubtedly a cosy home for the small family which expected to multiply.

wanderlust

TheOldHippie are you a writer? I have nothing useful to add, I just found your writing style very engaging. Thanks for sharing. :)

35

Live Forever on a Paradise Earth

by HeyThere in

sometimes this sounds good...but....forever?

forever in a jw idea of perfection?

does this mean no sports, or detective tv shows, or bad neighborhoods?

wanderlust

No thanks, I'll pass.

Actually, I never really found the idea of living forever in a "paradise" very appealing. For one, most of the people that I cared about wouldn't probably be there since they weren't JWs, and for another, it seemed that it would be a rather bland existence after a while. I'll take my 60-70 (hopefully) or so years here rather than have eternity as an automaton.

20

Do you still keep in touch with the Witnesses?

by Iamallcool in

jw
friends

wanderlust

Only [some] of the ones that are family members. When I left, I pretty much did a preemptive reverse shun. I sometimes lament having wasted so much time on superficial, conditional friendships, but it is what it is.

37

10 Pragmatic facts why Jehovah's Witnesses can't face reality

by Terry in

jw
friends

1.the organization itself denies access to reality and substitutes its own version, interpretations and meanings.. a.only watchtower approved publications are allowed.. b.no higher education is to be pursued.. c.no non-jw friends or associations are encouraged with their "outside" points of view.. d.no free-style questioning of doctrine or criticism permitted.

curiousity is verboten.. e.threat of being "marked" or disassociated looms over them.

2.between every real-world event and the rank and file jw's mind is a roadblock.. a.the moment of identifying is short-circuited by an interpretive moment of re-labeling in watchtower-speak.. b.all things happening are forced into a narrow storyline and propagandized as end times happenings leading to armageddon.. 3.social and personal identity is expunged and replaced by a collective persona: "jehovah's witness".. a.private thinking is red-flagged as selfish and sinful.. b.personal improvement, welfare and ambition is crushed and door-to-door ministry substituted as "worthy" endeavors.. c.self-conscious obsession permeates witness awareness as each person is transformed into a public spectacle of performance for judgement.. d.since you aren't an individual you don't really have a right to fall in love and marry or educate or earn.

wanderlust

Excellent!

9

Another night, another JW dream

by MrMonroe in

such a ripoff when you dream you're back at the damn meetings.

i once dreamed a local (rather liberal-minded) elder, jack hoogendoorn, was smoking a cigar while he was giving a talk on the platform.. last night i was back there again: one elder who suddenly decided he was going to be "encouraging" gave me the latest stats on baptisms, while someone else i was meant to go witnessing with was not-so-subtly probing me about how many magazines i'd been placing lately.

i chose not to tell them i had decided against placing mags any more.

wanderlust

Funny. I recently had a dream that I was attending a meeting or assembly (can't remember) and I didn't have any books with me. No song book, no bible, nothing. This is a recurring dream for me that I seem to have perhaps once a year. I usually don't have any books with me and feel a little bit of anxiety and embarrassment.

It reminds me of another recurring nightmare that I have that I am back in college and a half a semester has passed and there are one or two classes that I have completely forgotten that I signed up for. I panic because I have to catch up on 8 weeks worth of work that I missed and the deadline to drop a class has passed :( LOL

I guess these sorts of dreams center around high anxiety periods in one's life and being a JW was definitely one of those for me...

43

DF'ed and Confused...

by Stumbeline in

so i think the title pretty much says it all.

i have a tendancy to be long winded about things, so i'll just give a general introduction and maybe tell things as i go along.

i don't even really know what i want from this site (ironically i remember jehovahs-witness.net mentioned from the platform as a site not to go to).

wanderlust

Hi Stumbeline, I have been lurking around here and there for a little while, but something about your post inspired me to come out of lurking. First of all I would like to say that although I am not DF'd, I sympathize with what you are going through. I was actually going to suggest just what LisaRose posted, to perhaps consider getting RI and then fading away in order to maintain a relationship with your mother. However, this could come with it's own challenges and you will have to weigh the pros and cons of remaining DF vs being RI as a JW.

I faded away about 12 years ago and moved away to another state. I live my life completely the way I want to - celebrating all of the holidays, I have visited various churches, befriend whomever I want, no FS, no meetings, no guilt. It was like a heavy burden had been lifted from me. Since I am out of state, I don't have to worry about watching my back and worried that someone might see me with Christmas decorations or any stupid sh!t like that. If I were DF, on the other hand, I could live where I wanted to live and do what I wanted because I would no longer be considered a JW anyway. I do wonder on ocassion what would I do if I moved back near family. In fact, this is one of the reasons I'm not on Facebook. I still have a fear of being "found out" and then subsequently DFd. I still have a large amount of family in.

Lastly, regarding JWs being "good people". I know how "Society" loves to tell us how wondeful and so much better than worldlies JWs are, but something that I knew even before I faded is this - JWs are no different then average, regular folks. In fact, due to the nature of the religion, I found that in general, JWs were actually less compassionate than average! I remember shortly before my fade, my dad had some serious health issues and I missed some meetings due to spending time with him. When I came back to a meeting, this "holy roller" sister says to me, "I haven't been seeing you! Where have you been? I'm gonna whip you!" I told her my dad was sick, and she said "Oh", and walked off. No "I'm so sorry" or "how is he doing?" or anything to that effect. Never spoke to her again and that was one of the last meetings I ever attended. On the other hand my "wordly" coworkers were very supportive and concerned and happily covered for me while I was gone. I could give many more examples like this.

Sorry for the long winded post! I wish you well in whatever you decide, Stumbeline.