so i faded over a year ago...i told the elders that if i needed them i would call them.
1 year and 3 months later, today, i get a call from an elder who used to be my good friend...he calls and i dont pick up..he leaves a voicemail, saying "hello ____, please call me back at 444-444-4444 whenever you can".
i was like wow, this has to be one of those calls to get inactive ones back to the memorial.
Snare&Racket - I so totally agree, I look back and have a hard time believing that I ever managed to swallow the things offered up as truth. I guess we are all examples that even intelligent people can be fooled by emotionalism and twisted logic.
I'm embarrassed that I used to defend this bizarro religion to people I worked with. Almost want to contact many of them and say, hey, I'm not as nuts as I used to be...
hi everyone, i was discussing with a family member recently and was encouraged to at least consider the benefits of being raised in the truth.
for example,i'm not a drunk, don't do drugs, respect others etc.
the point is i've found lots of nonwitness friends who have similar behavior.. growing up, when a worldly person does something good like help someone i'll hear things like "that's nice of him, for a nonwitness.
I've seen a male pioneer routinely leading service meetings wearing wrinkled, dirty tie and pants obviously picked up from floor where his dog laid on them. I've seem female pioneers on the platform giving talks wearing clothes that were highly provocative, and others which appeared to have come from the laundry basket. I've heard elders and their wives discuss which houses they would like to take over after harm-aggedon kills everyone "else" as blithely as if they were discussing which sofa to purchase in their current large, expensive house (and you need someone else's why?). I've watched as elders lectured everyone about the need to keep life simple and pioneer, while they buy the newest autos and bigger and fancier houses. I've known young children, boys and girls, who were sexually molested by "brothers" yet not once was any compassion shown to those molested, as all the energies of the elders was spent keeping the incidents buried. One dear friend had two children molested by a jw neighbor (ministerial servant, indeed) and could not get anyone to help her file a police report but was left to deal with a sorely damaged young family alone. That same friend had separated from her husband because he would come home from work at lunch and force her to have sex in the bedroom of the home where she was running a daycare...with infants and toddlers unsupervised in the house. Yet all the "good" witneses shunned her as bad association because she was the one who took action and asked him to leave the house in order to protect the children. I attempted to hire a jw for remodeling work many years ago when I still owned my home, but was refused on the grounds that he no longer worked for any witnesses as he'd had so much trouble getting paid by them. As for clean houses, well I know several pioneers whose living quarters would fit right into a fraternity house.
I could go on and on, as I'm sure many of us could...but the fact remains that No, jws are NOT better behaved than anyone else. In some ways they are much worse as they are so hypocritical about the values they force upon people. What they are better at is churning out the propaganda which promote their ridiculous ideas.
my mother broke her hip last week.
she had an emergency partial replacement surgery friday night.
we don't know how she did it as we have caregivers with her at all times, she may have fallen while in the bathroom for a few minutes.
Jeff, you are showing your mom such honor by the way you've taken care of her in this time. She sounds like a wonderful woman and surely has raised a wonderful family. Love to your mom, you and your siblings.
life is tough when you've spent your best years in the borg...how do you reconnect when kids are grown and you're close to retirement age?.
Thank you all for your kind suggestions. I do wish that I had the funds to retire and open up my time to spend it helping others, that is my great joy in life. That and seeing others smile. I don't think old, but sometimes the flesh isn't as willing as the spirit!
LoisLane, what, humbled - thank you for your encouragement! I'm still trying to force myself "out there" to do things alone. So many years doing things with others makes it weird so have to get used to it. The only thing I'm good at doing alone is shopping.
NameIsLame - wish I had the freedom and funds to go on adventures! Thanks for the encouragement.
Quelly - would love to do volunteer work but don't have the hours to give quite yet. Actually used to volunteer for a "worldly" organization while still in the borg. So perhaps I need to move that to the top of my bucket list!
Aude and Band - I'm not in a large metropolitan area but not rural either. Big area for rich retirees and young families so most events require big (to me) money or focus on the bar scene.
hortensia - would definitely drive to visit you if I was near Mount Shasta! Hope others are able to take you up on your kind offer.
mouthy - thanks for sharing, it's sad that you've suffered the emotional and physical loss of your family. Going to check out your website next!
Zeb and LisaRose - thanks for the PM opportunities, you may hear from me soon. LisaRose, so happy for you that you and hubby get to spend these years together. I am somewhat jealous but only for myself as I don't/haven't had that privilege. (Children's dad died, "jw" hubby turned out to be a control-freak pornographer, mooch, adulterer and slanderer but he and new wifey were df'd and promptly reinstated less than a year later.) At my age, everyone carries so much baggage that the thought of another relationship seems like a distant dream so even though I wish I wasn't alone, I'm always happy for couples who have made it work!
Even though I may not be able to do some of these things right now, just having all of you encourage me is making me smile and helping me to change my mindset...so THANK YOU ALL!!!
i was reading brant jones' experience (published on jwfacts.com).
i read both letters: the one he wrote to the gb and the one he recieved from them.
link: http://jwfacts.com/watchtower/experiences/brantjonesunresponse.pdf.
Surely the justification provided wil be Yes But They Disassociated So It Doesn't Matter Anymore.
this is, of course, a recurrent topic that's made possible whenever a kingdom hall decides to march out on your neighborhood and street.. today it happened again in my neighborhood as a drum up for the memorial observance scheduled for monday the 14th of april.. why christ's passion and death should be observed on a monday of holy week i failed to ask this morning.
perhaps someone else might like to volunteer, but it seemed just another reason to be sceptical about the whole thing, though hardly ranking with changing ancient chronologies to get jerusalem's temple destruction 2520 years before 1914.. anyway two gentlemen in white shirts and ties greeted me politely enough at my door and presented me with a flyer about an event which they described as momentous.
they asked me if i had ever intended one and i assented.
That's a wonderful reply, nicely done!
i've talked with some good friends on the board about this before and we seem to be in agreement : one reason ( among many ) that some disfellowshipped jw's go back and return to the wt organization is because they are full of uneeded guilt or uneeded fear because they haven't educated themselves about how the wt society uses mind control tactics to deceive them into thinking they have " nowhere else to go " .
i understand that some dfed ones may go back to the organization for family and friends- however- it's an exrecise in futility because once you learn the truth about the truth you cannot undo what you heard.
so some may just go back and live a fake jw life to appease family- but just think of how that can damage a person's emotional and mental health playing the fake jw game the rest of their lives !
FL_Panthers
(a) If you believe in Jehovah, why do you promote a worldly sports team?
(b) Being a good human being and treating EVERYONE with Love is the best way of life. Pretty sure Jesus would agree.
what can a person do who is stuck in the watchtower cult movement but don't want to be shunned or disfellowshipped but want to follow a course of passive resistants, like ghandi did to the brits to get them out of control over india?.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/nonviolent_resistance.
Wish I thought to turn in fake field service reports, that's hysterical!
Everyone needs to be made aware of the child abuse going on, and bringing up the Candace Conti legal award is an awesome idea.
Thanks, metratron and frankiespeakin! Hope you have a great weekend!
life is tough when you've spent your best years in the borg...how do you reconnect when kids are grown and you're close to retirement age?.
Thank you all for your kind posts. I am not feeling sorry for myself, or wishing I was back in the borg, and I no longer miss the false friends, but it's been difficult as I still have a jw adult child living with me. My old school chums I've looked up are wow so boring, although a few of us hang out once or twice a month. Can't really join a bunch of clubs and such as I work full-time with no hope of retiring for another 5 years...just really hoping to find others in a similar position to hang out with on the weekends and some evenings. I'm horribly social, love to cook, am open to lots of activities, just having trouble finding anyone in my area. Have been listening to "worldly" music for decades as do my adult jw kids. Never was really an issue in our house. No longer have guilts about what I watch or listen to, I am my own person. Just a lonely one, and don't wish to spend the next 20-30 years alone!
i was wondering why they're so uptight about magical things (cough cough sparlock cough) and was just remembering some quotes in the publications about demons and stuff i saw on another thread and i seriously think that they believe this stuff is real.. once i asked my mum why previously she said not to watch magicians because they're bad blah blah when it wasn't real, hence the term magic trick.
she admitted that while most of them are probably innocent, she still thinks some of them (anyone heard of dynamo?
) have some demonic power behind them.. i seriously wanna hear some other views on this .
Anything THEY do not or cannot control is BAAAAAAAD.
