Yeah, I lurked for a good year-and-a-half to two years before joining (I'm shy), and that was mostly because somebody posted an article about me here and I figured I should at least register and say hi
brizzzy
JoinedPosts by brizzzy
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18
Were You Ever Nervous To Post Here???
by minimus inwere you apprehensive to put up a post on this forum?.
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This commercial illustrates why I envy those who didn't grow up in a JW household.
by miseryloveselders ini don't want to sound like i'm whining and for the record, i'm not mad at my parents at all.
i love them dearly, and i have many fond memories of my youth despite the jw upbringing.
at the same time, i often wonder what it would have been like to play sports during my school days.
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brizzzy
Dance and piano. I took about a year's worth of ballet/jazz/piano/saxophone (also later joined a swing dance troupe in my teens - was with them for 5 or 6 years and even choreographed some for them). My instructors seemed to think I showed a fair amount of promise at it and encouraged me to progress, but my sister got bored with all of them and quit, so my parents yanked me, too, gave my saxophone away, etc. I wasn't allowed to do any extracurricular activities unless my sister accompanied me (I guess maybe they were worried that I was the "difficult" one and that I'd get involved with "worldlies" unless she was around to rat me out).
Strangely, it was a double standard - she was allowed to take up any extracurricular activity she wanted by herself, since they figured she was too goody-goody to make friends outside the bOrg. But she could never stick with anything long. She got bored and quit not only dance and piano, but flute, horseback riding, guitar, drama, and ice skating. Meanwhile, I really loved the arts and was never allowed to stick with them. Now I'm 25 and way too old to ever get flexible again the way I used to be. I have a piano in storage that was gifted to me last year, but my brain isn't a sponge like it was when I was little; I don't pick up music anywhere near as fast. Sucks.
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Did You Ever Really Listen At The Meetings?
by minimus intoward the end of my meeting attendance, i started to pay attention (as best as i could) to what was being said and that was truly the final nail in the coffin.. when you actually decipher the "reasoning" of the "truth", you can't help but see things clearly..
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brizzzy
No. I read most of the publications, because I love to read, so research was at least somewhat interesting to me. But from the platform, they just droned on and on, re-drilling in everything I'd already read. It wasn't nearly as interesting and it made me sleepy.
My parents would often test me and ask me what I liked about the talk or the assembly (I got in trouble if it became clear that I hadn't paid attention). So I got into the habit of deliberately listening to maybe 5-10 minutes' worth of material, or one experience, or one illustration, and then holding it in my brain to parrot back to them, so that they'd leave me alone. The rest of the time, I was off in my own little world daydreaming to keep myself from falling asleep.
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brizzzy
@Lozhasleft And the squirrel... "It was a nightmare, man! I hid in a colander!" (I *heart* Eddie Izzard. He will be my husband one day. Just watch.)
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Auchwitz Video
by man in black inthis was on the news last night, it seems many people are having a hard time figuring out how to deal with it.. the man in the middle is a survivor of this camp, and he is surrounded by his children/grandschildren/great-grandchildren.
is this video an insult to the people who died at aushwitz, or a celebration that life went on for the survivors ??.
personally, i look at it 50 - 50, but a more time appropriate song might have been a more positive thing.
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brizzzy
I never thought anything set to "I Will Survive" would make me well up. I stand corrected.
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Is This Pretty Typical?
by bazackward inso some guy on youtube with user name "sweetmikser" posted a bunch of videos about the 2010 convention drama.
my grandma mentioned how much she loves the drama, so i thought i'd see what she was talking about.
wow!
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brizzzy
Positively Shakespearean. Actually, I'm a bit jealous. I wish I had such command of insults at my disposal. 'Twould be the height of my ambition to memorize all of the Dr. Cox rants from Scrubs and hoard them to use against some poor sap who cheesed me off.
Also, is that last bit multiple choice? What if I'm an arrogant, neurotic, atheist apostate?
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Dealing with the reality of death. How do you?
by confliction insince i've come to the realization and conclusion that i've been living a fictional lifestyle for the last 17 years, i've also come to identify with agnosticism.. .
but one issue that's been taking it's emotional toll on me lately is the realization of the fictitious paradisiac earth.. it was the ultimate goal as a witness- the answer to everything.
even if you had questions that couldn't be answered, you were to "wait until the paradise and ask" when you got there.. .
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brizzzy
Hi confliction,
I stopped worrying about death once I realized that I didn't even really want to live forever, so much as I was conditioned to believe that's what I wanted. It doesn't seem to be a natural desire built into me. The only reason that Paradise Earth sounded groovy, really, was because I figured I'd get to have a pet gorilla and a killer whale of my own. I'm not cut out to be a farmer, I love technology, and living in a smiley, dystopic Stepford society with people I really didn't like, spending eternity singing hosannas to a petty and childish overlord...doesn't appeal to me. Really, once you cut out the novelty of getting to hug a gorilla and getting to see your dead loved ones again, I figured out that I'd get sick of the immortality bit pretty quickly. You can only ride an orca so many times before it starts to become old hat.
Ever read Natalie Babbitt's Tuck Everlasting? It's a pretty thought-provoking book that explores the themes of eternal immortality, youth, and health. Just because I don't want to die now, doesn't mean that I won't be ready to someday. Everybody dies. I suspect that there is no god (or if there is, I highly doubt he/she/it is like any of the religious textbooks make out), in which case there's not much need to worry about what happens after death. In my opinion, you just aren't any more. That's not particularly a scary or bad thing; simply an absence of being. Since this life is quite possibly the only one any of us will have, make the most of it while you've got it. Instead of spending it worrying, create your own happiness.
"I wanna live 'til I die. No more, no less." ~Eddie Izzard
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Is The Watchtower Organization A Cult To You?
by minimus ini used to call them "cult like" but i do believe they are a "cult".. what's your opinion?.
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brizzzy
Yup. And a few years ago, even when I no longer believed in the doctrine, I still would have been the first to defend them against the "cult" label. But now...yes, they're a cult.
I also believe that all religions do have cultish aspects, and that sometimes the difference between "religion" and "cult" comes down to sheer size. But then, I also remember reading something like, "it all distills down to this: the main way you can tell if you're in a cult is by answering the question, how easy it is to leave?" Do I believe that the Catholic church, for instance, has a lot of cultish-ness to it? Yup. But then again, if you decide you're no longer a Catholic, nobody's going to tell your family and friends that they can never speak to you again.
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I write like Stephen King- Find out who you write like!
by moshe inno wonder i feel like i missed my calling.. http://iwl.me/s/b3a26720.
any other potential novelists here?.
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brizzzy
@cameo-d That's what I said. But they insisted on paying me to write one anyway. So I was happy to oblige.
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I write like Stephen King- Find out who you write like!
by moshe inno wonder i feel like i missed my calling.. http://iwl.me/s/b3a26720.
any other potential novelists here?.
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brizzzy
Hm, out of curiosity, I did the rest of my book in sections. I get three recurring authors: Douglas Adams, David Foster Wallace, and William Gibson. I'm not familiar with the other two, though...guess I have to check them out.