Greetings!
First off, I owe this site a tremendous debt of gratitude. I have been an inactive Witness for 4 glorious years, and the spark that began my fade out of the organziation was this site and Paul's jwfacts.com. It opened my eyes to a whole new world of insight, and I discovered that there were SO many people out there like me - still a "spiritual" individual, but completely disgusted with the JW organization. I then read Ray Franz's 2 masterpieces, Dom Cameron's excellent book, and I knew that we all had been sold a bill of goods. Emotionally, it was better for me not to post on here, but now I feel the time is right. I feel a lot like Ray Franz - I still care deeply for most JW's, feel very saddened by the situation in the religion, have let go of most negative feelings, just realize that the Watchtower is a "myth", one I no longer want to give any portion of my life to.
There are countless posters on here I would like to thank - you are all amazing people for coming on here, especially those who have been gone for a long time, and could just let it go completely. However, you choose to post and keep in contact in order to help others out of the "spiritual paradise"...you are all to be commended.
Like many of you, I was born into the organization, and was a good little Witness my whole life. Avoided higher education, pioneered, ministerial servant at 19, elder at 26, led foreign language groups, etc. I am still married to a wonderful woman - who despite her continued activity, still loves me and understands clearly my stance, as I have explained it in great detail. I have seen a lot of positive changes in her in recent months, so I see a lot of opportunity for me to help her learn "the truth about the truth".....
One day soon I will be posting a longer biography - I feel that everyone who is comtemplating leaving the organization should write a detailed biography. It was the most cathartic thing I could have done - I was clear on my feelings, able to explain them to my family, and now I feel I can "pay it forward" to others who opened themselves up by sharing their life stories on this site and others.
Thanks to all, I look forward to communicating further with you!