____________What do we have here?_____________________
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Two ball bearings manufactured at the same time, in the same factory, by rigorous engineering standards, and produced to serve the same function inside a particular machine.
QUESTION: Are they IDENTICAL?
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The practical test of identity is separateness which identifies some reason for a rational distinction our mind demands!
You can replace one ball bearing with any other ball bearing of the same batch. This replaceable quality, practically speaking, makes them interchangeable and identical. A batch of 8 million are ALL the same!
The same may be true of a jar of pennies! Ten cents is any set of ten pennies. Although each penny may have distinguishing characteristics of date or location of origin--for all practical purposes--they are identical in value.
Question: How could a penny become MORE than just a penny?
Note: One tiny distinguishing difference at the time of manufacture can dramatically change the collector value of that individualized penny.
Why? Because a “distinguishing characteristic” is most valued above all things!
This penny, for example, is valued at $1 Million dollars!
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The problem of IDENTITY
To exist is to be something somewhere rather than nothing nowhere, both functionally different from the surroundings and actually distinguishable (not merely hypothetically.) To be unique is to STAND OUT among others. (Did you ever notice how "special" the GB is? It is "distinguished" by being anointed and appointed like NOBODY else but them. Once upon a time, other anointed were part of the FDS, but that was stripped away. Now the GB has a special, elite identity distinguishing them from EVERYBODY else in the universe. Get it?)
Everyone tells a story about themselves inside their own head. Always. All the time. That story makes you what you are. We build ourselves out of that story. However, IF our story tells us we are a Jehovah’s Witness-our human value becomes a list of liabilities to be overcome. Being human, you see, is a problem.
________________PHANTOM LIMB SYNDROME_______________
A phantom limb is an amputated or a missing limb which a person’s brain feels still attached to the body. The human senses an imaginary reality as though it were actual.
The limb that isn't there can 'itch" or ache.
No, it is a false report by your own mind giving you false evidence which you then BELIEVE.
When our mind hallucinates imaginary information about our self and surroundings, we are fooled. False reporting equals false conclusions.
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noun: non-entity
1. a person or thing with no special or interesting qualities; an unimportant person or thing.
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JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES may well be nothing more and nothing less than non-entity 'things' like ball bearings denied distinction in their thinking, behavior, and mindset.
Do you (really) EXIST you Jehovah’s Witness?
Is each JW replaceable, functionally identical, exactly sharing the same characteristics? You know--like those ball-bearings at the top of the page?
If JW’s are active and in good standing, their human differences are cosmetically unimportant. They are seen more as a flock, congregation, group of slaves, a Great Crowd, or an anointed remnant. They are Publishers, Elders, servants, friends, and other generic non-entities who can’t wear stylish, trendy, unique clothing. You can’t obtain distinguishing tattoos. You can’t wear your hair in a self-identifying flashiness. Forget about a beard. Do you possess attractive physical attributes? Well--for God’s sake--HIDE THEM!
Should we protest and declare, “But to their family and friends they are irreplaceable, unique, and invaluable assets!”
Oh really? Would you care to test that assertion?
What happens when a JW is disfellowshipped? What happens to those irreplaceable qualities of uniqueness--the invaluable place they hold in the hearts of others?
The answer is shocking!
The Brother or Sister who enters the Kingdom Hall before Disfellowshipping is all those things until they walk out. Then, the announcement strips away that person’s artificial human identity and value as though they now consist of a worthless nothingness in the mind of others.
They are labeled in categories of cursed and forbidden “things.” Apostate, Satanic, accursed, Evil, and mentally diseased.
A DF’d “person” isn’t worth praying for or speaking to or being casually friendly with!!
Why? Because they dared to THINK as an individual!
Each JW is a statistic whose importance is a function served in the congregation, a cog, a machine part--a tool, and mostly a wingnut!
If an Elder has a personal problem, they are treated as though they are a fuse in a fuse box: Removed and Replaced.
A Publisher with personal problems can be “Marked” like a tire with thin tread warily tolerated and considered unsafe to rely upon.
Human qualities are of little importance. Talents, ambition, education are irrelevancies.
WHY?
“Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.”
― Oscar Wilde
Conclusion: You are not your job, you're not how much money you have in the bank. You are not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You aren’t your clothes or your reflection in the mirror. What you are is WHO you are when you think unique thoughts outside the box of conformity and expectations of others.
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“Sleep my little baby-oh
Sleep until you waken
When you wake you'll see the world
If I'm not mistaken...
Kiss a lover
Dance a measure,
Find your name
And buried treasure...
Face your life
Its pain,
Its pleasure,
Leave no path untaken.”
― Neil Gaiman, The Graveyard Book
