When you've lived your entire life believing that you can cheat death and that you will live forever and then you realize that it's a lie, that's pretty fucking profound...
Can't say it better than UC did...
mine was simply the realisation that if a person had faith they wouldnt need a religon.. infact not associating with any religouse association is a bit like being on the oceon in a rowing boat.
but the thing is i dont care if the oceon gets rough.
it doesnt matter not having the answers.
When you've lived your entire life believing that you can cheat death and that you will live forever and then you realize that it's a lie, that's pretty fucking profound...
Can't say it better than UC did...
i have been reading many posts today and some of you have mentioned your age and how long you have been away from the org.made me start wondering what the average age is for most on this site who no longer go along with the org.
it would be interesting to find out..
I think it depends on when you come "in". I was brought up in a divided household, and really didn't take to the jw stuff, until I did it on my own at 15. I spent the next 3 or 4 years as a brainwashed dubby. A good elder friend of mine, (not an elder at the time, though), told me about 1975 when I was about 19. That is where the doubts first started. They became much stronger after I was first married at 22. It took ten years to leave at that point, (32). I have been out for over three years now.
j
has anyone on this board attended college or knows anyone who attends as an active jw?
how many remain in the organization after graduation?
i was baptized in 1988 and was encouraged to stop college after 2 years.
I attended from 1991-1994 w/bachelors degree. (took two summers full credit to finish in three years). The elders didn't say much at the time, and I started a year before the 1992 "softening" of position on college.
It probably wouldn't happen today. Glad I'm out.
j
i was totally spiritually and mentally out of it at least 2 years before i resigned as an elder.
it was actually a long process but i can say it is a complete one.
It took 10 years from the time at which I began to question things to the point where I had a moment of clarity where I no longer believed anymore. I tried to make myself believe for another 5 months. I walked out of my last KH meeting after those five months. That was about three years to the day ago.
j
thought you'd like to know about the latest fad rippling through the jw community.
it is home-based get-rich-quick business offerings.. a whois search at network solutions (http://www.networksolutions.com/whois/index.jsp) shows the owner of the following websites.
it turns out this owner is a well known congregation coordinator (aka presiding overseer).. www.ontrack2succeed.com.
This type of thing is common among the dubs. Many don't have "real jobs", and this seems like an "easy" way to finance themselves, (hell, they can even pioneer!). Also, I believe the same wackiness that attacts people to cults is found in many of these MLM type schemes. There is a certain "religion" about their approach, that is.
j
so yesterday i was watching the news and i saw something about secret santa.
there is this movement of people who hand random strangers $100 bills at places like laundry mats and thrift stores.
so i was "moved" and decided to give it a shot.
I didn't read all four pages of this, as the point only matters on this one...
You did a WONDERFUL thing!
j
As far as (C) is concerned, we have a term for this where I come from…Douchebaggery.
I love that!
j
word has got our that mr. and mrs. truthseeker no longer attend meetings.. we still live in the territory of our old congregation.
instead of taking the time to call us and see how we're doing, the "friends" prefer to talk about us behind our backs, one of whom passed information to my wife's mother (who is a loyal witness) that we do not attend meetings.. just waiting for the ball to drop.. .
.
Haven't been to a "memorial" for 8 years because we decided no meetings meant no meetings. I didn't want to become one of those people who only came for the memorial for the last 30 years.
Same here, Blondie. When I walked out of the KH three years ago, (almost to the day), that was it. When Memorial came and went, it felt a bit strange to miss the first one, after going for some 25 years. It was at that moment, when I realized I did not want to go to the Memorial because I was happy for the first time in my life. I then ordered CoC, and that confirmed what I already knew.
j
this is a re-hash of a post i made a few years back when i had only just 'left'.
but as time has gone by i have become even more convinced that the witnesses are, how can i put this, a fairly miserable lot.
it seems to me that what separates humans from other animals is our culture and traditions.
We celebrated Christmas as a family up until the time I was 7 or 8 years old, (when the bOrg transformed my mother into one of the collective)...
It was an odd age to stop, just a couple years after I started school, (a mindfuck, if you'll pardon the term).
It would be another 25 years before I would celebrate again.
This will be my fourth Christmas together with my new family.
Merry Christmas all!
they mean the leadership.
all of this is code for: one who is not ready to really study and accept how the leadership of jehovah's witnesses use the bible to their own self serving means.
but to be fair, jw's teach that most all of these characters refer to the leadership of jehovah's witnesses, the governing body.
Toward the end of the class, there is a "shredding" party that would make Nixon proud. Everyone has to turn in their binders, it is loaded into carts and taken into the Patterson basement, next to a garage, where we gleefully shred every bit of the schedule, and all of the tests. YHWH knows they don't want that crap getting out.
Wow! Talk about blatant duplicity!