Posts by halcyon

31

What Draws Out The Lurker/Newbies

by Not Feeling It in

jw
friends

i'm sure this has been discussed.

i was wondering what attracts a lurker/n00b to post for the first time.

i made my first post in someone else's thread eschewing the "hi, i'm new" thing.. for anyone, particularly the lurkers/noobies:.

halcyon

I first posted cuz I'm the kind who can't keep her hand down when a question is asked. :) I have too much to say.

But I'm still wary of the "introduction, here's my story" part, which it is SUCH a relief that most of you understand that without me having to explain it! Other boards/friends would be like, "why? What do you have to hide from? Aren't you an adult?" But of course, when you have family still in, and you've faded rather than jumped out, you still have to practice the whole spin control thing.

What has simply amazed me and taken my breath away, is that for so many years I had all these thoughts swimming around in my head about just exactly "why" I wasn't comfortable believing anymore. And then when I dropped in here, rather than being a whole bunch of "complainers" who are spewing "lies and half-truths" (what's a half-truth, anyway? It's either a lie or it's not.) you're all mostly (well yeah, complaining) but about EXACTLY the same things I had spinning around in my head!

It's not like anyone here has put anything new into my head. It's all there already, and I'm a highly rational, logical, intelligent human being. I normally see through crap in the secular world. I don't fall for "lies and half-truths" anywhere else in my life. I haven't fallen for any spammers, or gotten involved in any shady business deals for not reading the fine print, or had my life screwed up due to my own stupidity. Yet I'm sure if my mom ever got wind of me being here, she would INSTANTLY peg this board as the "cause of it all." It couldn't possibly be a rational, logical decision based on the realization that I needed to abandon a sinking ship.

Seriously, I have a finely-tuned sense of trends ... I am constantly "inventing" things right before someone actually invents them, I seem to be on the cutting edge of style, technology, and even financial trends before others, with not too much effort. And a bunch of years ago, I started feeling the "trend" in my gut that the WT organization is sagging, headed in the wrong direction, and was simply becoming WRONG.

And after I left, gosh was I ever right!

Yet I don't feel it's mine to tell anyone else what to do. Everyone must come to it by themselves. I wish my family could be reunited again, have a family reunion where it's not "us against them", and even if my parents don't agree with my decision, recognize that it is my RIGHT to make it!

See, I can't shut up. :)

20

Consequences of being a JW

by Regretful_J in

i've been thinking about what its like to be born and raised as a jw and the mistakes that parents make as an almost direct result of this cult.

for one thing, the children are not allowed to think freely, and if they say or do one little thing their parents disapprove of, they are chastised and basically bullied into abandoning that thought or action.

another thing is that no matter what you do, and no matter how good your reputation is among friends, teachers, administrators, etc if you don't want to go to meetings, and don't believe in this faith, they do what they can to make you feel lower then dirt for this and will often resort to verbal abuse, and sometimes violence to force you to believe in them and conform.

halcyon

I hear ya on the self confidence thing. I have been called brilliant by numerous people throughout my life. Pretty much everything I've tried, I've excelled at. Yet just this past year I had someone puzzle to me over why on earth I didn't believe in myself? Why was my self-confidence so low, when I can do anything, he wondered. And yes, I'm constantly told to quit apologizing.

I feel like I have to be perfect or I'll be rejected. Seriously, this is HUGE inside me. I live in abject FEAR of disappointing someone ... when I do I am CERTAIN that they will turn their back to me and walk away forever.

And of course I'm not perfect. So I live in constant fear.

This is a HUGE problem for me.

17

Question on Headship

by insearchoftruth in

i am not fully in tune with how the wts defines headship and applies it to the members.

.

how does it apply to an unbelieving mate when the ubm is the husband and the female is the jw?.

halcyon

I actually used this to hide behind when I went inactive. Back when I was single and would miss meetings, I got phone calls and knocks on my door. Then I married a weak JW. He "lets" me stay home (he's rarely there himself!) and there hasn't been a single person bothering me. I guess they figure I'm my husband's responsibility. Yay for me!

4

Opinions?

by chappy in

jw
friends

i can't get this to woek as a hyperlink for some reason.

copy and paste it to your browser.

if this doesn't make you think i don't know what will.

halcyon

where are the freakin' references? As a college graduate, I've become accustomed to not trusting anything without references. This makes a lot of assertions; I'd love to be able to verify them. (on a website OUTSIDE of a religious-themed one!)

21

Why i liked being a Jehovah's Witness...

by digderidoo in

jw
friends

there are so many reasons why i liked being a jehovahs's witness.

1. we got to count time when we share our faith with nonbelievers or our young children.

2. we didn't have to go to college to get a good job as a janitor or a window washer.

halcyon

ooh! I learned to be very good at using and understanding metaphors, too! I can now speak in all metaphors if I wish.

I learned to apply any scripture to any thing at any time. If I happen to look up the wrong scripture, well, heck, I can make it fit!

I learned to see both sides of any situation ... I can see the bad side of good things, and the good side of bad things.

I learned how to ignore all kinds of things I didn't like or didn't understand.

I learned how to give the "right answer" without actually believing it. This comes in handy for lots of situations. I first learned this skill in school, trying to pass the evolution exams. I tried not to use the skill at meetings, preferring to keep quiet instead. But sometimes social pressure forced me to use it.

I learned how to write a speech so that people are moved to applaud. There's a formula to it: it starts with a rhetorical question, proceeds with a quotation from an authoritative source, and ends with a rousing "we SHOULD do this if we want to do what's right!" This skill got me "A's" in college speech classes.

(I also learned what the vocal sound pattern is when one wants others to applaud. Even if they're sleeping, they know when to wake up and applaud. This skill was mostly used for my own amusement at assemblies, on Sunday afternoon during the last talk.)

I learned how rude it is to walk on people's grass and not on the sidewalk.

I learned what lots of people's homes look like inside, and got lots of decorating and gardening ideas.

I learned to read a map very well, and learned where all the streets were in my neighborhood.

I learned how to sit still and tune out.

I learned how to completely disengage reality from the ideal. This would sometimes cause me conflict as I'd drive home from an assembly, wishing I could live up to what I just heard, but as I drove through each town I realized how impossible that would be. That real life was not anything even close to what I had pictured at the assembly.

I learned how to ask innocent questions when challenging authority, so that they'd never know I was doing it. I use that skill a LOT in business.

I learned how to "stay out of" the really important issues, but how to butt into everyone else's private lives. This was encouraged, in fact.

I learned to be proud of being poor and to flaunt it. The poorer, the better. "Bought those clothes at goodwill? That's nice, but I got mine at a rummage sale even cheaper! I'm better than you."

I learned how to love, but with conditions.

I learned how to idolize humans, like Pioneers and COs and stuff.

I learned that "being single" is the only compatibility test needed for anyone to set you up with "the other" single person in the congregation.

I learned that all one needs to do when one wants to get married is to ... well, to WANT to. Apparently if you desire to get married, a suitable mate suddenly appears. I never knew that before. I always thought people had to have things in common.

I learned all there is to know about what constituted immorality and how to avoid it, and was shielded from knowing anything about sexual problems within a marriage. Apparently all marital sex is always wonderful? Because there's no practical advice anywhere on things like impotence or lack of libido.

20

What to do???.

by integ in

jw
friends

hey folks,.

just curious what your take would be on this.. i have a witness friend, who happens to be a radio announcer (dj) on a rock station ( yes i know, that is weird in and of itself).

anyway, he wants to leave the "truth" but family keeps him in.

halcyon

~~Can't turn a Ho into a housewife !~~

Yes you can. You don't know all the circumstances. Don't be so judgemental.

HOWEVER, if you posted this question on "the most worldly of message boards of all" -- a board devoted to discussing sexuality openly but reasonably -- you'd still get the same advice: If you want out of a marriage, the honorable thing to do is to end your marriage before taking up with someone else.

All "worldly" people aren't animals with their pants down. Most have standard values. Even with those values, there are lots of individual circumstances that color these situations all kinds of shades of grey. But still, 98% of people answering -- people with no religion telling them what to do, but instead using their own consciences and thinking abilities -- will say to leave an existing relationship before having sex with another.

76

What JW teaching did you find hardest to defend??

by karter in

for me it was that god is killing billions of people just to prove a point.

what about you?

halcyon

It's not something I ever had to defend, except to myself and I couldn't:

When reading in the publications about "One doctor", "One scientist", "One Expert", whatever, without any sources. I always got the idea that the Governing Body sat in a room for their weekly discussion, and this week's writer would speak up and say, "we need a scientist to provide a quote to support this article," and another brother would raise his hand and say, "I consider myself a scientist! What do you need me to say?"

I mean, without sources, what else am I supposed to think?

76

What JW teaching did you find hardest to defend??

by karter in

for me it was that god is killing billions of people just to prove a point.

what about you?

halcyon

Ha! I thought I was alone in thinking it ridiculous that THE BIBLE would have prophesied AN ASSEMBLY. Gah!

42

A birthday in "bizarro world"

by changeling in

jw
friends

i'm sitting in the living room reading jwd on my laptop.

my elderly parents are in the adjacent dining room having lunch.

my mother pulls out the "daily text" and asks: "what day is it?

halcyon

My mom used to call me on "my day", every year. It wasn't a "birthday" call, but it was everything but.

23

Question

by Newborn in

jw
friends

do you still believe that jehovahs day and the paradise will come?.

i still believe in god and the creation.. /newborn.

.

halcyon

I believe in God and Christ (haven't yet been able to believe that Christ IS God, but I also don't believe I know everything). I believe Christ gave up his life to redeem us all. What a gift!

I believe that I am to enjoy the life he has given me now, not sit around and waste it (what disrespect for God's gift of life!) in wait for some future life. I don't believe in the nobility of suffering, unless the suffering is truly helping someone else. The nobility is in the helping of others, not in the suffering itself.

And I have put my trust in God that whatever He does is what He does. I'm not "serving" Him for what he gives me. Whatever he chooses to do with me after I die, or before then, is completely up to Him. I 100% accept that and grovel on my knees in thankfulness for his giving me life to begin with. Who am I to expect more?

I believe that God hates a liar, so I need to live my life truthfully, which means I do not put my butt in a seat in order to be visible to others for what I'm doing. If people hate me for living my life truthfully, but I can make them like me if I live a lie ... I need to choose truth. For God's sake. I am the only one who stands before Him.

If I die and go to paradise, yay! If I die and go to heaven, yay! If I die and just stay dead, well I guess I won't know about it, will I? If I die and go to hell, oops! If I die and come back as a fly, well then I will just die and come back as something else eventually. If I die and come back in 100 years, cool! If I die and go to the Mother Ship, then I'll take back what I said about Scientology. (although I will have a few points to argue with them about!) My point is, I can't know for sure what's going to happen in the future, and it's presumptuous to think I can. So, I don't spend a lot of time stressing about it. If you were to press me on which way I lean, I guess I have to believe more in heaven.

What I *DO* believe firmly in my heart (due to abundant personal evidence), is that God still listens to my prayers. I can't be that bad of a person then, right? Or, more likely, I'm just a human being like all others, and God listens to all of us.