Welcome Outofthelionsden! It is always "happifying" to see new members.
Posts by JeffJ
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51HI! im new here...
by outofthelionsden ini have been reading post on this forum for many months and i wanted to thank you all for all the great posts and comments that have really helped me get through this hard year of fading.
my husband and i where born in jdubs and almost 1 year ago we started to fade , now that we think about it has been a few years that we were suffering from cognitive dissonance without knowing it.
we feel that finally we have our life back , a life that is just starting.
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9
Apostacy a one way street?
by zound indo you know anyone who has 'awakened' that went back to 'sleep'?.
i'm not talking about concious class, but someone who somehow got suckered back into the wts little game.. (i for one could never ever ever ever ever return - but interested if you've heard of people that have).
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JeffJ
I know someone who dissasociated, was widely reguarded as appostate for many years and then came back and got reinstated. I don't know why but I suspect he only did it for his wife who was having health issues.
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44
Were You Ever Interrogated By The Elders?
by minimus insome elders enjoy giving the business to the lowly flock thru intimidation.
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some love to ask you to enter with them into the "backroom".. of course, there were many that never had run-ins with the shepherds because they were under the radar.. did you ever get interrogatted by the elders and if so, how did it go??
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JeffJ
One elder questioned me after I was seen talking to a girl (we were both 17) who was studying. He asked if I ever talked to her on the phone, saw her outside of meetings etc. I gave him my best "aw shucks no brother elder! I wouldn't do that!" Boy was he mad when he reproved me 6 months later for sleeping with her.
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29
Maybeso
by MaybeSo inim very sad, upset and disappointed all at the same time.
why couldnt i just stay away from this dam forum and live my life and blindly dedicated it to the borg.
now i know ttatt, i cant ignore all the facts and all the stories of the great people in this forum.
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JeffJ
Maybeso,
Several people have mentioned the Matrix and as tacky as I found those movies, it really is the best analogy. There is no going back. At first it is easy to envy people who have the answer for everything when you are finding yourself with no certain answers. It does get easier as your mind becomes used to freedom and trained to look at issues from the beginning and not work backwards from the answer provided by the WT.
I have not been in the same situation as you, I faded out of laziness and then woke up years later. I can only imagine the pain you are experiencing but I do know after lurking here for years that there are others who have been through the same experiences and we are all here to help. You have a large family here on JWN to assist you in this transition.
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207
Ripping a persons faith away, a heavy responsibility?
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[endif][if gte mso 10]> <mce:style><!
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JeffJ
Great post Seraphim. This is a lesson society tries to teach us early about bullying but it tends to go over our heads until we get older. Are we trying to tear down a person just to give ourselves comfort that we are better or are we engaging them because we are genuinely looking out for their best interest.
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11
Nearly Lost It at Work
by LouBelle ini've made no secret that i do not like the place or the people where i work.. i've had to borrow money to get my drums/brakes fixed.
i dropped my car off this morning before work.
i hesitantly spoke to one of the bosses (female that is so irritating) asking if i could please go pick up the car once they phoned to say it was ready - if i could use the time i usually took for lunch.
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JeffJ
Don't let on that you are looking and just be as pleasent as you can. She sounds like she would go out of her way to ruin your chances at a new job if she felt any animosity.
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89
Mouthy Grace is not well. Please send love.
by return of parakeet inin another thread, mouthy said she was "not well" and mentioned "kicking the bucket.
i believe she needs some encouragement and well wishes.. mouthy, you don't need to respond to this thread if you don't feel up to it.
just consider it an exceptionally long get-well card..
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JeffJ
Wishing you well, my Dear Mouthy
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107
HA! Take that Watchtower! One less Borg for you!!!!!
by Gojira_101 inlast week a friend of mine contacted me out of the blue asking if we could have lunch together.
my friend has been studing with the jw's on and off for about 11-12 years i think.
she has told me everytime i see her that she can't wait for jehovah to end this evil world...she can't wait for the new system...the end is so close....etc.. i sent her a message back telling her that i left the jw's and asked her if she had heard that.
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JeffJ
That is great Gojira. You really went into this prepared. The sad part is it just reminds me of how little most of us knew about the religion before baptism. I was baptized in '87 and didn't realize until you just mentioned it that the WT had admitted where the name came from just a few years prior to my studying with them.
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136
After the cult how many reject faith in anything?
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JeffJ
Now THAT would take faith, since the universe is only 13.8 BILLION years old
That is the time since the big bang. There are cyclic theories that the universe continously expands and contracts. Going from big bang to big crunch. I know there are other theories also but that was not my point. Forgive me as I don't remember much of high school and science class, I was part of a cult that told me education didn't matter.
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136
After the cult how many reject faith in anything?
by Seraphim23 in[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:officedocumentsettings> <o:relyonvml /> <o:allowpng /> </o:officedocumentsettings> </xml><![endif].
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JeffJ
Most everything you do requires faith, whether it is called by that name, a theory, truth or just a guess. You go deep enough and it always requires faith.
You can't possibly know that God exists, but some have faith he does.
You can't possibly know that the universe has been expanding and contracting for untold trillions of years, but some have faith it has.
You can't possibly know your tire will not blow out on your home from work but we all have faith it will not.
All we can do here is keep our personal faith in whatever we choose to believe and try to help people recover from a destructive cult. It is not up to us to replace their truth with a new one.