After A Day In Field Service, Did You Get Euphoric Or A Spiritual High?

by ÁrbolesdeArabia 38 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  punkofnice

  I felt good because my guilt trip induced by the disgusting WBT$ has been removed......for at least a day!

  Then you go to a meeting and are told everyone needs to do better.
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  WTWizard

  I felt the kind of fake spiritual "high" in the beginning. This was because I was self-righteous, thinking that I was going to survive and others were not. This was pure vanity, since once I dedicated my soul to the enemy jehovah, this feeling totally vanished and never came back, despite my putting in as much time as before. Usually, I felt that I wasted my time and energy by going out in field circus, and they were determined to extract as much out of me as possible.

  Ultimately, I just did what I was expected to and never felt any joy out of it. Rather, I could somehow sense, even in the miserably degraded spiritual condition I was in, that certain calls meant damnation. Once, I went on a call where there was an ugly guy with legs that reminded me of chicken legs--quite wasted, with a dozen or more visible prescription drugs on his kitchen table. Another, even worse, was where an ugly guy was spitting blood into a mayonnaise jar at frequent intervals. Both times, I felt damnation impending--even in the totally numbed condition I was in back then. Not to mention, wishing to puke. As I am not there on a medical call, those conditions should not have been my problem.

  Most of the time, it was just drudgery. I would be in on a call that I was hoping would be cut way short, and it never got cut. I have been on calls that rambled on more than half an hour, where each time it was coming to an end, they would extend it another 10 minutes. I couldn't wait to get out of there, so we would run out of calls that much sooner--never happened that way. Instead, they would intentionally hold me out another who-knows how many hours late. No spiritual high there.
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  Theocratic Sedition

  I think you might be mistaking euphoria with the feeling of relief from it being over.
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  wha happened?

  In the early days I always had a sense of accomplishment. Later on it was always the feeling of getting a chore done
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  RoosterMcDooster

  No, just really, really, really tired.
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  sickandtired

  Yeah, I used to feel good because I did what I thought I ought to have done. Then, I could do all the other things I REALLY wanted to do without feeling guilty.

  Now, I still have to go out in service and it's torture for me since I've been mentally out but not physically out.
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  JWOP

  I hated the actual door knocking, but when my two hours were done, I felt good that I'd done the "right" thing even though I hated it.
  Though I did like the donut shop breaks.
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  wallsofjericho

  i was just happy it was over
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  Theocratic Sedition

  i was just happy it was over

  This. I think some people might be mistaking feelings of relief as euphoria. Me personally, I cringe thinking about field service the day before like right now I'm thinking about going out tomorrow, possibly Sunday too, and it's not a pleasant thing to look foward to. It's kind of like the anxiety I have right before having to stand on the platform, but once I'm up there it all goes away. Same with field service. I actually am more irritated with the people in our field service group than I am with talking with complete strangers. After that hour and a half or two is over, I feel like a huge burden has been removed. Driving away from the group is such a relief like coming up for air after holding one's breath too long under water and thinking to myself I won't have to do this for another week. A more fitting way to describe the relief after ending a couple hours in field service is the feeling of relief one has after taking a dump. You know that feeling you have right when you have to take a dump? Then if you swallowed something like shrimp shells and the sharp pain of those partially digested shells coming through your anus, and then the relief when it's all said and done? That's the same kind of relief I feel after getting done with field service.
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  Muddy Waters

  At first, I really thought I was doing "the Lord's work!" Used to exclaim to everybody at the hall how wonderful it was, that it was "just like being a disciple!"

  I really thought and believed that Jesus' disciples actually did this kind of door-to-door thing. *ugh*

  But after things went on, and you're knocking on empty house after empty house (and walking past people on the street!! What's up with that?? I could never understand how so many JWs could do that... I was one of those super-zealous, annoying JWs who wanted to talk to everybody and who leapt out of the car to talk to somebody if they were walking on the sidewalk toward us.

  I was in field service for a WHOLE YEAR before I saw anybody place a magazine with a householder. So all those assemblies and conventions (or should I say sales meetings!) that interviewed people who placed dozens of magazines and literature always mystified me.

  I used to wonder at the lack of urgentness and spirituality of my brothers and sisters in field service.... it seems like so much time was WASTED! Why the long coffee breaks? (I brought my snack and drink along with me!) Why walk so slowly to the doors?? Why drive round and round in circles when we should be OUT THERE witnessing to people who could DIE at any moment!! Armageddon was coming!! Their blood would be on our hands!!

  All the preparation, all the paraphernalia, all the changing literature, all the tracts/brochures/booklets/magazines.... you'd just get one presentation worked out and accustomed to it and it would change all over again. This was frustrating. Placing different books all the time was frustrating. Trying to keep track of service time... and YES, of course I was one of those honest-earnest people who reported their EXACT time, beginning with the first knock on the door. (When I first started, I wouldn't even count this time UNTIL someone actually answered the door!) It took a lot of work for me to count even the minimum of hours.
  
  So it wears you down. And at the meetings, you're told to do more! More!! What's wrong with YOU?? MORE!!!! MORE, MORE, MORE!!!!

  Field Service became drugery... I began to dread it. Even packing a service bag was tiresome. The field service groups were horrid. And I'd get terribly car-sick at times. Oh, gawd, it could be quite awful. Come home and feel like you've wasted a whole morning.

  I am SO GLAD all that is O-VER!!