My first year anniversary here.

purplesofa

No birthday, wedding, first year at a job, first year of a relationship............none seem to bring so much introspective thought as my first year here.

I stumbled on this place looking for more JW's to hang out with online. I had no idea what I was in for. It did not take long to know that I was among my own kind.

Deep thinkers come here to talk, discuss, argue, love, hate, heal, share, but mostly give. Not out of fear, or commands, drawn together because we were unwilling to just accept what we are told without searching deep within ourselves for own truth.

I have read so many experiances here. The different roads each one takes.......some are very studious with their exit, some are emotional, some came to accept who they are and took the courage to do just that.

We all have our own opinions and ideas.

I am not sure about my spiritual being right now........it is still a journey. I still think mankind is destined to fill out the script the bible has written for us all. Maybe after that there can be a world filled with peace and acceptance, truth and security. Then maybe we will be "script-free"

I like James Thomas ideas of searching within ourselves...........we have all we need within, Live for NOW. And take this time to thank him for his posts and encouragement.

Special ((((((((hugs))))))))) to sf , IP_SEC, Big Dog, Sith, Terry, Satanus, doinmypart, littlerockguy, stillajwexelder, AlanF, and theotherside for their special encouragement in ways you know and some of you may not realize that you touched me in some way.

I have had tons of laughs reading posts...........thanks for the entertainment. JH, buttlight, kls........you three have cracked me up so many times.

The women here are awesome, jgnat, BillyGoat, Jez, jeanniebeanz, MerryMagdeline, Leolia, Frannie, LadyLee, FlyingHighNow, Barbara Anderson, Mouthy and Blondie to mention a few.

I appreciate AlmostAthiest, DantheMan, Maximus(worth going back and reading his posts) CyborgVision, Oroborus, minimus, gumby, Simon, Elsewhere, Quotes, Englishman(I don't see him at all anymore) ozziepost......seven006.

LyinEyes and wonderlustguy....Hey! hugs to you as well.

I made jedi....Yippie!!!! and grew heaps this past year..........

Thanks everyone!

purps

blindersoff

Hey Purps,

I remember when you started posting and always felt there was a lot of potential there.

Cheers as you continue your journey.

B

myself

Congratulations Purps!

AlmostAtheist

Congrats, Purps. I too remember when you came on. I recall there was some fun story associated with your name, but I can't remember what it was. Would you share it again? I'd happily just RTFM, but I'm afraid I can't fine the M.

Glad you're here, your posts are always so useful. (That sounds so bland, I hope you know it's not!)

Dave

Banshee

DanTheMan

I stumbled on this place looking for more JW's to hang out with online. I had no idea what I was in for

Worth repeating.

The incomparable coolness of ex-jw's makes having been a JW (almost) worth it....I love this place

Banshee

Congratulations, purplesofa!

What a marvelous post! I am so glad to hear that your time here has been helpful and, overall, a good experience. It's great to read of people growing and changing and feeling the sense of kinship and cameraderie here. (BTW, is it just me or do you think you and I are eerily on the same wavelength (in the same kind of reflective mood) tonight?

---Banshee

P.S. Sorry about the empty post above. I goofed!

CountryGuy

No birthday, wedding, first year at a job, first year of a relationship............none seem to bring so much introspective thought as my first year here.

How true. I'm sure most of us would agree.

CountryGuy

luna2

Happy JWD Anniversay, purps!

purplesofa

In a very short time here I have truely appreciated the openess of the people that post here. The ability to share thoughts and feelings in a most respectful and honest way. I have been thankful to be validated with alot of what I was feeling and thinking with some things regarding the JW experiance.

At this time I am sorting out my thoughts and feelings. I love to hear about others but rarely tell about myself.

I am one of the rare ones found door-to-door.

To keep this from being a book, I will skip all the DF part and me working my way back. Although, the experiance of being DF made me realize that elders were just imperfect men and not the GODS they are portrayed to be and I never looked to any humans as I once did after that.

Now all these years later I am back and of course it is different. I do and always find very loving people in the org. Only a very few that are real people though. Recently, I was sitting in a meeting and looked around and the people there and thought to myself, If these are the people I have to be in paradise with ......I don't want to be there!!!! So, I thought ..Ok Widen out. Well, by doing that I have now mostly stopped going to the meetings. It was better for me to have my little fantasies of how perfect everyone was.

My early postings above as Thinking.......and this next quote below.

The more I think about things......I feel as though I am thawing out. I was very pleased to see "worldly" persons as loving people again. With thoughts and feelings and loves and wants. They surely seemed more human than my JW contemporaries. It has been like falling in love......happy and new, exciting!

I have had this nickname online for over five years. When I signed up at this discussion board I really was looking for fellow JW believers, looking for some new freinds. What I found was something so much better. I became very scared to keep my nic as purplesofa as so many know me online as that and even in person I get called purple, purps, sofa.......

I have a purple leather sofa from Italy. I ordered it and waited for 6 months for it to arrive to the US. At the time it was very expensive and bringing myself out of welfare, no formal education (I became a buyer for a furniture store, and some of my design work was recognized at the International Furniture Market, and some other forms of recognition that was cool at the time.) It is quite old now but at the time it was a huge statement, symbolic of so much.

"I'm confused."

I am not ashamed of who I am or my presence here at this site. If anyone I know comes here I would be shocked, and if they get far enough into the site to find me then we probably got some talking to do.

So this is me on the world wide web......purplesofa. When I would the nick Thinking it is just not me. I mean it is but .......you get the drift!

I am on page 122....and although I highlighted certain points.......this is when the little stars came out in the outside margins.
How many favorable decisions would the Witnesses have recieved if the Supreme Court justices had not shown such judicious wisdom, such ability to see where the real issue lay, such concern for the individual? Their decisions were applauded in the Society's publications. Sadly, however, the high standards of judgment and the approach to emotionally charged issues shown by these judges often appered to be on a higher level than manifested in many Governing Body sessions. "

ok done with chapter 5, Tradition and Legalism
Now I am getting pissed, Miss Nicey Nicey is going out the window
From the start of chapter 6.......Double Standards
Katy Bar the Door

I have two chapters left to read of the CoC book. I hardly thought the book would make me cry, but the treatment of the people disfellowshipped was deeply sad. Rene's appeal letter was awesome.
The decisions making process the GB goes through is nothing different than decisions to axe people in corporation that don't agree 100% or to keep making the big bucks. It is very selfish and greedy.
The 8 points Franz brings out looking for scriptual backing should be read by every witness (page 330-331)
his response on page 326 to a Q from GB........."I believed that God had an organization on earth in the sense that He had a congregation on earth, the Christian congregation, a brotherhood." was moving for me.
Rene's comment to Ray 2 years afterwards, what a loving humble man on page 322 par 2
"If I had all to do over again I would be facing the same dilemma. I feel that so much good came from what I learned from the Scriptures, that it proved such a blessing to have things cleared up and brought me closer to God"
This statement, for me, makes all the crap worthwhile.
This guy Bonelli ratted people out. Read this. page 319
Albert Schroeder then expressed gratitude to Bonelli for his cooperation in testifying and counseled him to "keep himself spiritually srtong by attending the meetings regularly,"and added that if Bonellis heard any other information to come to them with it.
Ray's comment on truth......page 286
"I did not believe that truth had anything to fear from open discussion, any reason to hide from careful scrunity. Any teaching that had to be shielded from such investigation did not deserve to be upheld."
and page 274 last paragraph
Similarly, I did not object to "organization" in the sense of an orderly arrangement, for I understood the Christian congregation itself to involve such an orderly arrangement. But I believed that, whateever the arrangement, its purpose and function, its very existance was only as an aid for the brothers; it was there to service interests, not the other way around. Whatever the arrangement, it was to build men and women up so that they would not be spiritual babes, dependent on men or on an institutionalized system , but able to act as full-grown, mature Christians. I was not to train them to be simply conformists to a set of organizational rules and regulations, but to thlep the to become persons "having their perceptive powers trained to distinguish right and wrong."
Had to take a break, One emotionally can only digest so much.

I just finished reading CoC. It will forever change my life.
The last two paragraphs of this book are worth writing down now.
"Life is a journey, ans we cannot make progress in it if out focus is mainly on where we have been; that could lead to emotional inertia or even spirtiual decline. What is done is done. Teh past is beyond our changing, but the present and future ar ething we can work with, focus on. The journey inevitably contains challenge, but we can find encouragement in knowing that we are moving on, making at least some progress, and can feel confident that what lies ahead can be fulfilling.
Whatever our individual circumstances may have been, we can each put confidence in the truth of these words of the apostle, "We know that by turning everything to thier good God cooperates with all those who love him." (Romans 8:28, JB) By holding to conscience and staying true to our Head, God's Son, we suffer to lasting loss, but do gain that which is of immense and enduring value. Assured of that, we can feel as did the apostle:
Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ.....one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of upward call of God in Christ Jesus.---Phillipians 3:7, 13, 14.

My first year anniversary here.

Share this