I think I never developed the ability to question. I never thought I would be able to leave, so why bother? I don't really think I started questioning until 6 months to a year or so after I left.
Ilovebirthdays
JoinedPosts by Ilovebirthdays
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42
Did You Tend To Question The Organization Or Did You Just WANT To Believe?
by minimus ini know some who always questioned the elders, the society, and others because they were typically skeptical.. there are those who just seemed to want to believe whatever they were told.. i was more a skeptic, during my last decade.. .
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33
How Has The Economy Affected Your Spending Habits?
by minimus inwill you go on vacation this year?
will you curtail your driving habits due to the cost of fuel?
will you cut back your spending for special occasions?.
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Ilovebirthdays
Actually, I think we'll be spending more money this year than we have in the past. We've spent a lot of our 12 years of marriage saving, and putting money away in savings and for retirement, and we decided this year we're going to enjoy spending some of it. There's been a lot of times where I secretly called my husband a tightwad in my head, but I've been especially greatful the past few years that my husband has practiced living below our means and not getting into debt.
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Ex-inlaws are trying to JW indoctrinate my daughter....need some advice
by James_Slash incould do with some help please.. i found out last week that my daughter is being taught how to pray before meals "dear jehovah" and taken to meetings by her mothers family (that are jw's).. myself and her mother are divorced - we live over 100 miles apart.
neither of us are jws anymore (i haven't been for 5 years - not d/f or d/a) and i am contemplating my disassociation letter as we speak.
her family played a part in separating me from my daughter during our divorce in 2007 - they even wrote lies to support her.
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Ilovebirthdays
I have a 5 and 7 year old. This is what I tell them:
Grandma doesn't believe in celebrating fun things like Christmas. Her religion won't let her do fun things like birthdays, Halloween, Thanksgiving or any other fun holiday. Grandma won't go and see fireworks. Grandma won't let the tooth fairy come to her house because her religion doesn't believe in it. Grandma's religion doesn't believe in people getting to play sports with their friends. Grandma doesn't believe in Harry Potter. She won't buy Harry Potter legos. When I was growing up, Grandma wouldn't let me go play with my friends from school because her religion told her I couldn't. Grandma's religion makes her go to a lot of boring meetings, where all you do is sit down for a really, super-duper long time and just listen to people talk about boring things. You can't get up and play or even whisper. Instead of watching cartoons on Saturday, Grandma's religion makes her go knock on people's doors and talk about boring things.
If you sit down and think hard enough, you can come up with endless boring things Grandma's religion won't let her do. They really are too young to apply critical thinking skills, but it doesn't take much for them to realize Grandma's religion isn't fun, and they would get a lot of things they love taken away from them if they join. I just try to stress that it isn't Grandma that is bad, it is her religion that is.
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Ilovebirthdays
No. Last one I went to was 1998, also. There's no way I'd ruin a night of my life to give my JW family false hope I was coming back. And there's also no way I'm going to show my kids that setting foot inside a Kingdom Hall is a good thing.
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49
Did you watch R rated movies when you were in it?
by ldrnomo inlast night, i watched an r rated movie that featured violence.
at least 30 people were shot in the first 45 min of the movie.. while i was in and an elder, i watched r rated movies all the time just didn't talk about it.
so how many of you watched r rated movies even though "mother" said not to?.
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Ilovebirthdays
I did. Actually quite often. I only did because the other JW's that I hung around with always did. I always managed to feel bad about it, though, and never was really comfortable.
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74
How many received the memorial invitation?
by IMHO inhow well is this territory being covered?.
how many on here (active jws excluded) received an invitation?.
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Ilovebirthdays
I got two. But this is the first time in years I've seen any activity around here.
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14
Twenty Centimeters!!!
by tec inwe have hit ten centimeters and counting of snow.
unbelievable, lol.
yesterday it was green.
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Ilovebirthdays
I don't "do" math in the afternoon. (Or in the morning, evening or night for that matter.) I'm sure however much 20 cm is is too much.
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Lost Legitimate Opportunities For Love
by PublishingCult inwhen you were in the organization of jehovah's witnesses, did you shun legitimate courtship attempts from "worldly" men or women who were otherwise very desirable and suitable because they were non-believers?
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did you fancy them as well, but tried to get them to study and come into the organization in order to justify the relationship?.
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Ilovebirthdays
I had one really nice guy that while we didn't say we dated, we did for a little while, and it was great. I ended up feeling guilty and cut him out of my life. I tried to get him back some time later, but he'd found a girlfriend, and --very understandably-- decided I was way too much of a flake. I became very depressed for a long time after. Then I had another one that was even better than the first one ask me out. I pushed him away a few times, but he kept coming back. It struck me that this was my second chance, and a third chance probably wouldn't come, so I eventually left the JW's, and married him a few months later. Twelve happy years and 2 kids later, I'm so greatful, relieved, happy I didn't let him get away. And no, I never tried to study with either of them.
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32
Just had my first JW visit in almost 13 years. . . weirder than I could have thought.
by Ilovebirthdays ini have an old friend from jw's that has been trying to track me down.
she finally found me today.
of course to invite me to memorial.
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Ilovebirthdays
Oh, no. I don't hold out any hopes getting anyone out. I'm a pessimist by nature, and most of the time I don't really want to get the JW's in my family out, because I don't think they'd be able to cope without the religion. I definitely don't take anything personally that a JW does, I just blame the religion, not the person.
I do, however, want to do something about getting her out of her current situation, but I totally agree that I need to carefully put out feelers and not do much more than be here for her.
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Just had my first JW visit in almost 13 years. . . weirder than I could have thought.
by Ilovebirthdays ini have an old friend from jw's that has been trying to track me down.
she finally found me today.
of course to invite me to memorial.
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Ilovebirthdays
I'm still tense just thinking about it. I'm a few weeks away from having been gone 13 years, and just her energy that she was putting out brought back all the stress and anxiety and all that came from being a JW. It was exhausting enough for 25 years, but how tired she must be living it an additional 13? She said the reason she was out today was because she didn't want to be home with her husband and she was looking for an escape. That made me cry. I remember those days.
I got her number, and had her take mine. I figure she has to be Aux. Pioneering this month. I thought maybe I'd call her at the end of the month, and if she's already not agreeing with all the rules, maybe she'll be one of those that will count their time for anything, and she'll look at it as an easy way of getting hours? I don't even want to 'un-convert' her. I really just want to give her a place to vent if she needs to. I do think she has the slightest clue that JW's just go through the motions of having emotion, and show her that just because I'm now 'worldly' doesn't mean I'm heartless and evil.