I can totally relate also. I was in my mid 40's when I woke up. So many wated years that I would love to have back. Pioneering, Bethel, go to where the need was great, etc. Some days it is just hard to not be bitter.
LITS
life is to short
JoinedPosts by life is to short
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70
Feeling sad over a wasted life in watchtower
by wannaexit init's been 12 years since i first read ray franz's books and the scales came off my eyes.
by that time i was in my forties.. since 2002 i went back to school and have worked with 3 very professional organizations.
but my biological clock is ticking away and while my peers are looking forward to retirement, i am only beginning.
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Looking Back, Do You Ever Think You Loved Jehovah God?
by minimus inas a child, i was made to believe that i loved my mom and family and close friends but that i loved no one more than jehovah god.
did you ever really love him?.
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life is to short
I really, really wanted to and told everyone one I did because that was what I was supposed to do right?
But deep inside He never felt real. It was like I was praying to the air. I prayed my brains out and the only way things changed were when I did something to make them change. I tried and tried to say it was Jehovah who did this or that for me but in reality it was because I worked and did what I could to make this or that happen.
Like I was raised in the "truth" in a very abusive home. I prayed and prayed and prayed as a child, got on my knees and begged, pleading with Jehovah to help me with my parents so they would love me. To feel like I mattered to someone. I was just a kid of 8,9 years of age. I got nothing. No one stepped in though everyone knew my parents were abusing me. I have been told that now as an adult by the older ones in the hall that they knew. Yet not one did a thing to help me. And Jehovah never used them when He could have.
So no I never did love Jehovah because he never seemed real.
LITS
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Reading the Watchtower and Awake! is like getting a college education!
by kairos inanybody remember hearing this?.
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is that comment in print anywhere?.
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life is to short
A elderly sister just said this at the meeting less than two months ago and she totally belives it.
LITS
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What Was Your Opinion of Elder's Wives?
by minimus ini think that many of them were saints.
some were bitches and others seemed like they hated their status.
many wives were very good examples and were more "qualified" than their elder husbands.. .
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life is to short
I married an elder. It was beyond horrible, it was pure HELL. I never saw my husband we did not have a marriage as he was alwasys gone. Spent my second year anniversary sitting in the car until 12:00 am and then was told I needed to go over to another elders wives home who HATED ME and I stayed there until 2:00 am with this elders wife pissed off at me for being there. Than my husband and I got into a huge fight on the way home because I had planned a nice evening evening to celebarte our anniversary together which was ruined now but my husband told me that I married an elder and just to get used to sitting in the car forever. We never made up for the lost night of our anniversary it just became another day of the year after that. Found out years latter that my husband had spent the night holding the hand of this old bitty of a sister with another elder. This women knew it was our anniversary and was trying to cause problems in our marriage she admitted it to me. I was just blown away as to WHY??? The people in the hall were so mean.
Elder's meetings were pure HELL also as I was never invited into any of the clicks of the elders wives. There would always be two to three groups of women huddled together gossiping and when I walked up they would all just stop and stare at me untill I left. They all did things together and I was NEVER included. Than when the elders would come out of their big important meeting this one idiot would say are you elderites ready to leave. I was one of the only wives who worked and sometimes we would not get home until 12:00 or 1:00 in the morning I would be so mad and worked up that I could not get to sleep and then I had to be up at 5:00 for work.
One time my husband had an major heart attack the morning of the school and service meeting. His first heart attack they had him back up conducting within three days of his getting home from the hospital. My husband always was given the worst assigments that none of the other elders wanted and he was always the school overseer. Well I called the CoBE'w wife on my way to the hosiptal and told her my husband would not be at the meeting that evening as he was having a heart attack. This elder's wife told me "What do you want me to do? I can't help you as I have to go out in service today."
I told the CO in our first year of marriage that I was totally losing it and he was so ticked off at me and told me that Jehovah needed my husband now I could have my husband in the new system.
If I could go back I would never stand to be treated the way I was. Plus I could not do anything, my job would have paid for me to take collage class which I could not because I had to set the example, I could not go running because it upset so many in the hall that I was putting my body to such a use. I could as an elders wife I should be using my time in field service not doing something I enjoyed. You name it was I was told it.
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Warwick Building Project Fluff Stories
by bruh2012 intalking about an article that makes you want to throw-up in your mouth- wt-study jan 15, 2015 the offered themselves willingly.. amazing the psych job of selling your business, moving your entire family, quiting your job to be a "temporary" worker at the new world headquarters!.
throw your livelyhood away only to get the "feeling" that jehovahs is blessing you!
i wish there was away to track the psych job during patterson and other major projects of what happened to all the "friends" that sold and got rid of their livelyhood then and where are they now.. did you ever sacrifce it all for a building project only to be left with nothing after your "spiritual high"?.
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life is to short
Yes Justnowout I remember one time we had just recived out monthly stipend and at morning worship that day the GB memeber conducting tryed to guilt us all into putting in at least $1.00 to help out some natural disater somewher. I remember the guilt was huge to us at Bethel. The GB who was talking went on and on about how good we had it at Bethel and how we should give even more than the dollar but at the very least we all needed to give at least a dollar.
A dollar to me at that time was huge as all we had was the stupid stipend and it did not go very far with having to pay for rides to the meetings and buying toothpast, etc that Bethel did not provide. I never gave the dollar but I felt horribly guilty at the time. Now I think what a waste of my life to feel the guilt when I was giving my life to them. It just makes me so mad now that they had the gull to even ask us.
LITS
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Warwick Building Project Fluff Stories
by bruh2012 intalking about an article that makes you want to throw-up in your mouth- wt-study jan 15, 2015 the offered themselves willingly.. amazing the psych job of selling your business, moving your entire family, quiting your job to be a "temporary" worker at the new world headquarters!.
throw your livelyhood away only to get the "feeling" that jehovahs is blessing you!
i wish there was away to track the psych job during patterson and other major projects of what happened to all the "friends" that sold and got rid of their livelyhood then and where are they now.. did you ever sacrifce it all for a building project only to be left with nothing after your "spiritual high"?.
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life is to short
wallsofjericho
You wrote "as I get older I have concluded that it's not about a lack of love, it's just that people have their own lives & problems and don't particularly care about yours. Why should they bail you out? Who's bailing them out? No one, they have to deal with all their own problems and if your dumb enough to buy into the WTS hype about all those awesome blessings then you can bless your way back to reality with the rest us."
I understand some of what you are saying but when you are young and this religon is all you have ever known, than to have someone your age up there conducting the WT and praising what it says. Glorifying what the GB is asking for us to give up everything and saying how great the expreances are and what blessings from Jehovah we would receive if we did what is asked. What are the young ones to think.
I know, I know, I was stupid and have only myself to blame. I get that now, I was very stupid, because I never really looked at what you were doing yourself. How you were not buying into the hype but I was always taught by ones like you to keep my blinders on and not to look at what other people were doing only what Jehovah wanted me to do and when you are on the stage spouting off while conducting the WT or during the service meeting telling me as a parrot for the GB that I should be doing this and telling me it was coming from Jehovah. How can you not feel you have some skin in the game for causing the ruin of people's lives.
I know when we were selling off our few possessions we had older ones in the "truth" offer us a dime on a dollar for what we had. We heated our home with wood and we had over six cords of wood we needed to sell as we went to Bethel in December. Cords of wood were going for $125 a cord back than in our area. This one elder knew we needed to sell it but he thought no one would buy it from us so two day, two days mind you before we were leaving he came to us and offered us $ 20.00 a cord. He thought we would just jump on it. I was so mad. We had luckly fortunately already sold it but the look on this elders face was like WHAT!!!!! This thief had not gotten on the wood he needed because he was banking on us just jumping at his kind offer.
Thoes are the kinds of things that even now, even though I know I was stupid still get to me. Why wallsofjericho are you still in, still misleading people by being there even if you are not an elder or MS you are still supporting it by just being part of it.
You say they can just bless themselves back to the reality with the rest of us. We did but it sure would have been nice not to have been mislead in the first place and to have been told the honest truth,
LITS
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CANDACE CONTI - What's the current status?
by EdenOne ini'm in a little urgency to know this, so please, if you can help:.
as far as i understand, this is the sequence of events:.
a) june 14th 2012 - on a trial by jury, cancace conti wins a civil law case involving child sexual abuse.
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life is to short
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CANDACE CONTI - What's the current status?
by EdenOne ini'm in a little urgency to know this, so please, if you can help:.
as far as i understand, this is the sequence of events:.
a) june 14th 2012 - on a trial by jury, cancace conti wins a civil law case involving child sexual abuse.
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life is to short
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Warwick Building Project Fluff Stories
by bruh2012 intalking about an article that makes you want to throw-up in your mouth- wt-study jan 15, 2015 the offered themselves willingly.. amazing the psych job of selling your business, moving your entire family, quiting your job to be a "temporary" worker at the new world headquarters!.
throw your livelyhood away only to get the "feeling" that jehovahs is blessing you!
i wish there was away to track the psych job during patterson and other major projects of what happened to all the "friends" that sold and got rid of their livelyhood then and where are they now.. did you ever sacrifce it all for a building project only to be left with nothing after your "spiritual high"?.
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life is to short
I posted this on another thread last week about this subject, I just cut an pasted what I wrote last week.
My husband and I did exactly that in 1991 when they needed to build 90 Sands in Brooklyn. I felt just like all those couples mentioned and was sure that Jehovah would provide if and when we left. We sold everything except what we could fit in our 1984 Hond Civic.
All I can say looking back is what a fool I was and what fools they are.
I literally prayed by brains our begging Jehovah for help, for a place to go, etc after the job was done at Bethel and we were laid off. Jehovah did not provide anything for us when we left, not even a congregation that wanted us. Many in the hall we went to looked down on us for being so stupid. It was such an eye opener to how much there is a huge lack of love in this religion. No one offered us anything, any help, a place to stay NOTHING. One sister did offer us her home for $200.00 over the going rent in the area and it was full of her junk which we were suposed to live with. Literarlly it was full of boxes and boxes of her stuff that we were just suposed to put up with. She was bat beep crazy. Here we were just out from Bethel and no jobs. She was offeded that we did'nt jump on her kind offer.
I was in my mid 20's and very idealistic, all I can say is that someone in their 40's, 50's, and 60's should definitely know better and they are headed for ruin. Now I can kind of understand why some in the hall looked at us like they did. I just felt like most of the ones in the hall felt we were so stupid and most truly did not care about Bethel. No one wanted to hear any of our experiences or see any of the pictures we had taken. In fact I showed some of the friends some of the pictures and this one sister left just glanced at them then left the pictures in the sun, when I asked her where they were so said she had just thrown them over on the this table in full sun and they were ruined. We did not have a lot of money and I had spent a lot to get them printed. This was before smart phone, etc. I was just amazed at how most of the JW's could care less about Bethel. In fact most of the JW's in the hall we went to in Brooklyn had never even been to visit Bethel. All they had to do was take a train ride and well over half the hall had never been to Bethel even through they lived in New York.
And now looking back I realize that 90 Sands was just for them to make money off. What a joke it all was, I gave up so much. So many years that I could have been making money to take care of myself in old age instead of having to work so hard now. Those people quoted in the WT are are just such fools.
LITS
Another thing they fail to mention is that a lot of those couples who are in their 40's to 60's have worked full time jobs or at least the husband has while the wife pioneered, they have pensions and other money coming in from investments. So they are not going to Bethel with nothing like we did.
I know ALL the couples that were in their 40's, 50's and 60's we when we were there for 90 Sands had outside money coming in, most still owed their homes and rented them out or had the money from the sale of their home sitting in a bank account. No one who was older just came on a prayer and the hope that Jehovah would pick it up for them. My husband and I were one of the few truly stupid persons that bought into the garbage in the Watchtower.
Also Gill Nazroff who was head of the building program at the time and a real jerk we soon found out, told just my husband and I on our first day at Bethel to expect nothing from anyone. Gill said that he was 'so sick of people selling off everything and then running out of money and getting mad at Bethel for putting them in such a place.' Gill said 'no one made them come.' 'That Bethel even recived letters from ones who were broke with nothing and no one to help them asking Bethel why Jehoivah was not helping them.' But Gill told us 'it was not Bethel's fault nor Bethel's place to help them.'
I wonder why they do not put Gill's comments in the WT?
I was so stupid and even though Gill said that right off the bat on the first day to us I still thought Jehovah would help. In hindsight if Jehovah was involved it was Jehovah telling us to RUN. I was to stupid to see it.
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Worker falls from KH roof during quick build
by piztjw ini heard through the grapevine that one of the slave laborers was walking backwards on the roof of the falls city, nebraska quick build this weekend and fell of the roof.
i heard he landed on his back and head and sustained some pretty serious injuries.. anyone in that area that might provide more information?
extent of injury?
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life is to short
When I was at Bethel in the early 90's we were working on the Jersey assembly hall while waiting for 90 Sands to start. I am extremely afraid of hights, I just am, I have been my whole life. So my overseer wants me go out on scaffording three stories high. I was so scarred and I told my overseer I am really freaked out over heights. My overseer was sooooo MAD at me and asked why I even brothered to come to Bethel if I was not willing to work. So I really tried to put aside my fears and climbed out on the scaffording, I tried not to look down which is almost impossible but the boards on the scaffording were so warped that they were wobbling the whole time and the scaffording shaking. I just froze in frear gripped the sides of the scaffording and couild not move.
Talk about being ticked off, my overseer was extremally livid with anger at me. He yelled for me to just come back inside and found something else for me to do. It was hard for me because of my overseers anger and he showed it so clearly. I mean I really wanted to be at Bethel and to be told that I was lazy and only there for the free food and shelter (which my overseer really did say) was hard for me to take.
I know I did things that were not safe but I felt I had no chose.
LITS