With the RC coming I was wondering if anyone else noticed how some JWs seemed to have everything somehow?
The operative word in the sentence above is "SEEMED".
In any group of people, there are always those who manage to do better than average and become the cream that rises to the top. But what do JW's really do? They meet often and talk about how much they are accomplishing but really, it's mostly driving around in cars, sitting in meetings and talking about how great and how happy they are. Most of what they do is for them....about them....and isn't exactly rocket science. Rather it is repetitive pablum that anyone with two brain cells can get the gist of in a few months. They keep busy with work they've created for themselves....it's all talk and rhetoric.
To be fair, there is an advantage in living a clean lifestyle. Less money wasted, better health and looks, but lots of people accomplish this without being a JW. For many JW's , just like those they call "worldly", it's all show.....and no Dough $$. There is a certain peer pressure that keeps the standard of grooming and dress at a higher level than is typical. JW's are dressed up all the time and are practiced at their grooming and there is a certain amount competition and keeping up with the Jones's that goes on. They like to appear as if they are being blessed and are living the ideal life in a spiritual paradise especially at assembly time. If my family was typical, more emphasis was put on what clothes we were going to wear to the assembly, than on importance of the assembly itself.
Everyone looks good or at least better than normal and seem less flawed when they are dressed in their "Sunday Best" and sitting quietly in a meeting minding their P's and Q's. Over the long haul you see the casualties of all of this. You see the hidden alcoholism, the indebtedness that leads to bankruptcy and the pressure that leads to depression and anxiety and sometimes divorce. Others who manage to pull it off, are wondering how much longer they can stand it. You see it in the eyes of the sisters especially, who seem to have lost track of who they are and what they are doing on this endless treadmill.
