Posts by JamesThomas

Dear AGuest, Thank you so much for your thoughts and kindness. If I may, I would like to ask you some questions. What are your thoughts, or feelings as to what your future would be if you did not celebrate your Lord as you do? What if you did not acknowledge Jesus as your Savior? What if you did not love Him? What if you didn't really care one way or the other weather Jesus existed or not? In your view, what then? Would this change your future you think? Would you be forced to pay the piper? and if so, in what way? I don't want you to feel that I am setting you up, so I will be up front in my reasons for asking. I was raised as a Witness, and what haunted me the most, what ate at my soul was that I could not find in my heart the ability to honestly love a god who would kill me if I didn't. I secretly ached and bled for years wondering what was wrong with me. Honestly, I do not feel it is truly possible for a human to legitimately and genuinely love that which will kill or condemn them if they do not. It's seems to go utterly against the grain of love. It's like someone holding a gun to your head. So, I'm asking if you feel you will be judged and punished in some way if you do not honor your Lord and Savior. If this is the case, which I believe it is in most Christian circles, does this eat at your heart in any way? Or, how do you explain it away? Or does it simply not concern you? JamesT

25

Small introduction.

by Faust in

jw
friends

this is a just a very brief posting (although i'm not sure if i'm making it in the right forum

my background is like so many of yours i'm sure.

just a brief run through of my life will be made, i don't have anything exceptional to say since my life is pretty plain in comparison to most people

JamesThomas

25

Will I Ever Belong

by rebel in

as a jw, i was always on the outside, looking in.

i never belonged and boy, did they make sure i knew it!!!.

all my life i have been an outsider.

JamesThomas

Rebel,

Sometimes these feeling of separation, a sense of being cut-off, of not quite touching life, can be a spiritual message.

Meditation and things along that line may bring you some peace and understanding.

JamesT

31

Is Relgious belief a trick of the mind?

by sleepy in

jw
friends

.

what is it about our brians that drives people to religious beliefs that are so obviously nopt founded in fact or reason?is it an inherant founction of our tiny brians or is it in fact our brians going wrong in trying to make sense of the world?

maybe its the psychological equivelent of an optical illution were your brain in trying to make sense of what it sees constructs an impossible reality .like say when you draw a "3-d" box on a flat piece of paper and the brain tries to work out which face is on the front , but it can't, as none is, but the brain will put one in front whatever.maybe religion is what the brain makes to explain the world and uses it so the weiredness of reality makes more sense.

JamesThomas

Gita wrote:

"What causes suffering?"

The drop analogy is too good to let go of, so lets don't. We suffer because we have an extraordinary amount of identity, commitment, belief and attachment invested in our less than genuine drop-selves; and we desire to improve and better our dropness in whatever way we can. There is nothing wrong with improving our drop situation, except that the drop is not our true and natural existence. We are fighting and scratching to improve on an incomplete and false sense of "self". It's an endless circle, a no win situation; and there is much suffering. The way out of this mess is to simple see. It's all about seeing. It's all about awareness. Just see what is false and the Truth is already there...because it always has been. When attention (which is really all we have to give) is placed on the drop, our vision becomes very myopic, and there is no comprehension of the Sea. It's there (here), we are just blind to it. And thus, seemingly (though not really) we have become cut off from our Sustenance. Suffering again. All your other questions are relevant only to a drop. Dwelling there only enforces the sense and story of drophood. We are free to do that....but for now lets not. If there is hunger and yearning for ultimate understanding and living true, then just watch the drop and it's story, it's thinking and questioning, it's worry and past, it's future and confusion, etc.. And somewhere in there, begin to notice what is watching all this. It's very subtle and very much untouched by anything that goes on around it. It doesn't move. It's always been there, and has never changed. What is that? This is like scientific investigation. The willingness to question everything that we have for so long accepted as true and real. No one can tell you what is true. You have to look for yourself. There has to be some clear and undeniable seeing and feeling. It comes down to a deep investigation within ourselves; and a tenacious, almost warrior-attitude and willingness to have our entire rug of reality pulled out from under us...if that's what it takes. The drop does not want to loss itself. There is a level of deep fear attached to such investigation. Though this is all very simple, it can be quite intense at times. You may have noticed that this is different that most every other "way"...which are more about the "me" who I believe myself to be (the drop), earning and moving to a higher plain of existence and understanding. What I am saying here is more like "you will see God, when there is no you left, to see God". Suffering will end, when Identity is shifted from the drop, to the Sea. These are little things that have been picked up along the way. Hopefully there is something here that can be of help, something that may have a ring of truth for you. JamesT

31

Is Relgious belief a trick of the mind?

by sleepy in

jw
friends

.

what is it about our brians that drives people to religious beliefs that are so obviously nopt founded in fact or reason?is it an inherant founction of our tiny brians or is it in fact our brians going wrong in trying to make sense of the world?

maybe its the psychological equivelent of an optical illution were your brain in trying to make sense of what it sees constructs an impossible reality .like say when you draw a "3-d" box on a flat piece of paper and the brain tries to work out which face is on the front , but it can't, as none is, but the brain will put one in front whatever.maybe religion is what the brain makes to explain the world and uses it so the weiredness of reality makes more sense.

JamesThomas

Gita wrote:

"You said a drop of water can not encompass the sea, but I would add that only a drop can experience the sea. The drop in fact, is the sea. What first seems macro becomes micro, and yet the pattern remains. It becomes a pointless matter trying to distinguish sunlight from the sun. The Non-Dual viewpoint rips away at the curtain of this concept of "This" and "That", leaving only "That." In a sense, the universe itself, and whatever particules, minds, egos, and forces it is made of, is God itself. That makes you and everything else divine. Getting to know yourself, then becomes the most "religious" of tasks. Far more difficult then dreaming of some angry invisible man in the sky."

I would basically agree with everything you said and said well. Ultimately there is only the sea. But the drop will not experience it...beyond perhaps a glimpse. There is the Infinite Sea, which mistakenly comes to believe that it is a drop, separate and apart. Then, feeling less than whole the drop creates religions, belief systems, methods, teachings and practices to guide it back to the sea. But, it will not succeed, except perhaps in enforcing and supporting it's belief in a separate-self ("see, I must be separate from the Sea, or why would there be all these religions to help get me Home"). It wont succeed, it won't get anywhere, because there is nowhere to go. The belief in a separate-drop (self) is bogus to begin with. Bogus efforts, by a bogus drop = bogus. Cut to the chase. Go to the root. See that there is no drop. See that there is no real separation to form such a drop; it's only thoughts, a story, a construct of the mind. Just see that the drop is not genuine. And what Is Genuine, will be seen. Of course this moment of true-seeing is not accomplished by the drop...it is seen through the eyes of the Sea. The ego, the drop, does not want to die, it wants to be in the Ocean and be a drop at the same time. problem is...what happens when you drop a drop in the Ocean? JamesT (of the ramblings class)

22

What does it take to live forever?

by JH in

jw
friends

.

as a jw, we were told that we had to be saved in order to live eternally.

do you still hope to live eternally, or did this dream fade away?

JamesThomas

Francois wrote:

"I don't know who you are, James Thomas, but you have found The Way, haven't you?"

I can only say Francois, that I have discovered that the only distance between me and what the word God points to, is my thoughts. Of the deeper sense of this I cannot speak. It is a moment by moment journey. A more and more letting go of everything that hides That, which has always been and will always be. A growing trust and realization that to totally let go is to fall into the arms of Truth. For me it's not about seeking anymore, so much as just coming back to the moment and being more present and quiescent. Being more open, more accepting, more willing to die of what can die. Just being. Just being. But not being anything in particular. JamesT

31

Is Relgious belief a trick of the mind?

by sleepy in

jw
friends

.

what is it about our brians that drives people to religious beliefs that are so obviously nopt founded in fact or reason?is it an inherant founction of our tiny brians or is it in fact our brians going wrong in trying to make sense of the world?

maybe its the psychological equivelent of an optical illution were your brain in trying to make sense of what it sees constructs an impossible reality .like say when you draw a "3-d" box on a flat piece of paper and the brain tries to work out which face is on the front , but it can't, as none is, but the brain will put one in front whatever.maybe religion is what the brain makes to explain the world and uses it so the weiredness of reality makes more sense.

JamesThomas

"Religions" are simply thoughts, beliefs, ideas and concepts. Futile and desperate attempts of the mind to come to understanding and knowing what it can not know or understand. For the finite can not know the Infinite; as a drop can not encompass the sea. $.02 JamesT

22

What does it take to live forever?

by JH in

jw
friends

.

as a jw, we were told that we had to be saved in order to live eternally.

do you still hope to live eternally, or did this dream fade away?

JamesThomas

Francois, I enjoyed your comments. Yes, they make sense. Eloquently said. Indeed, they have painted themselves in "the Mother of all corners." Francois wrote:

"What I observe is that the JWs have a religion that is essentially nothing new, a mere offshoot of the adventist movement of the middle/late 1800s, a religion appealing to logical interpretations of scripture (for the most part), a religion of motivation by fear: a religion of the mind."

I agree, but the "offshoot", I would say goes back to the Jews and their very tiny and limited, tribal ideas of God as a person, a warrior, a killer, a god of armies. Building a religion on a carnal-minded concept of God, leads only to disaster if it is not seen for what it is: a mind created, finite, anthropomorphized image, of what is formless, Infinite, and thus unknowable by the finite mind. To base ones life around the worship of a god (a most high) that punishes and kills and rewards a few, breeds greed and fear, the two things most destructive of spirituality. It is so true and so sad that the Witnesses discourage all deeper contemplation and meditation (the emptying of the minds limited ideas and concepts) in fear of the great Satan moving in. It is only when we get some inner inkling, some unspeakable sense that what the word "God" points to is not limited and is here now if we have but eyes to see, that we begin to embrace a "mystical", an intimate sense of living-truth. But what are the chances of this occurring when all day and night we are fed on empty words and ideas about a person god, out there, rather than directed to the meat of the Presence within? There is one scripture that I feel is the most important in the entire Bible as it gives clear direction to where we can find Truth. Luke 17:21, which says "the Kingdom is within". However, of all the Christian religions the Witnesses chose to change even this; so that now it uses the ambiguous phrase "in your midst". Which points us away from inner Truth, out into the carnal and material. Funny thing is: was it not the Pharisees with their tiny concepts of a god, that went to Jesus and ask "when" (in time), this "Kingdom" of which Jesus spoke would appear. And Jesus responded by saying it is not "Lo here; or Lo there" (in space and time) but within (our own consciousness). So, what do the Witnesses do but bastardize this important guidance and place our attention once again in space and time (that it may jive with their teaching). The Pharisees would applaud them. If the G.B. had consciously planned to direct people away from an intimate understanding of God/Truth, I can not imagine they could have done a better job than they have. As far as needing to be saved by Jesus: who can love a monster who will kill you if you don't? As far as I can tell, this is humanly impossible. Jesus, to me, was a man, a mystic who had intimate knowledge of the Infinity of God, and thus his Oneness with what he called the Father. Why do I need any mans acceptance, when what I seek is already here? JamesT JH, your original question seems to keep changing. It's quite confusing.

18

Sexual abuse by my father covered up by JWs

by brandi in

i was wondering if anyone else on this board had an experience similar to mine.

when i was 7-12 years old, i was sexually abused by my dad (also a witness) and i confided in another witness- a friend of the family's.

he also ended up walking in on the abuse at one point.

JamesThomas

Just wanted to welcome you with open arms.