this is my 200th topic after 14 years here on the board.
i hope i can make it a good one.
so my topic is stories.
Hey Tenacious
You missed the point buddy. The stories I have related here are true enough. The roles I've played are not who I really am. I played the role of Jehovah's Witnesses for over 50 years and yet that is not who I truly was. I believed in that role. In the end it was just a role. I have stepped off that stage.
What roles are you currently playing that are not who you really are?
this is my 200th topic after 14 years here on the board.
i hope i can make it a good one.
so my topic is stories.
This is my 200th topic after 14 years here on the board. I hope I can make it a good one.
So my topic is stories. We all I like them... actually no I think we LOVE them, don't we? I know I do.
And let's face it I've heard some great stories here and even had a few of my own to share.
I drove a taxi in Portland Oregon for six months back in 2008. In was amazing! One of the most spiritual things I've ever done. I drove everyone, the rich business owner, the hooker, the bums and the woman dying from cancer. We laughed and we cried together. Just like we have done here on this board.
Everyone had a story and everyone believed their story is true.
We seem to as a species who want to identify with "form" or our story.
We have created a story and believe it is true.
As soon as you met someone they start telling you their story.
I'm married and a mother of two. Wife and mother.
I'm a Jehovah's Witness and from England. Religion and nationality.
I'm a student by day and a stripper at night. Vocation.
But really, are any of these things REALLY you. Or are they simply a story or a role you have chosen (or others have chosen for you) to experience right now or in the past?
Maybe you are bigger than these roles or stories. I believe we all are.
Are you happy with your current story or role? If you are not, you really have just three options for happiness.
1. Change it and leave it. Easy to say but tough to do. Change is rarely easy.
2. If you can't change it or leave it for whatever reason, then make peace with it and accept it. This can be also tough to do but will be necessary for your happiness.
3. If you can't do either of the first two. Then the third option is to piss and moan and complain about it. This does nothing to change the existing situation. It does makes you feel a little better about it, by telling other people how miserable you are.
Just like the story about the dog and the nail.
A man walks into an old general store that has a wooden floor. There is a big fat blood hound lying on the floor next to an old pot belly stove. The dog is in pain sounding bad. Whooooo.... Whooooo, the dog bellows. "What's wrong with your dog?" the man asks. "Oh he is lying on a sharp nail." The clerk says. "Well, why doesn't he move?" The man asks. The clerk smiles and says. "I guess it's not hurting him bad enough yet."
Yes, the dog like many people like option three the best.
Time to move yet?
maybe it's time for a less serious thread .
i have just finished watching dirty dancing ( again ) .
what is your feel good movie , the one that makes you smile and cry happy tears ?
"Shawshank Redemption" after serving many years for impersonating a minister I can relate
"Field of Dreams"
how was your wedding?
did you have a jw wedding or something different?
my wedding was not what either of us wanted at first, but it turned out very lovely.
I got married on March 30, 1974. People would ask me if I going to get married as soon as I left Bethel?....................I would say "NO........I'm waiting 2 weeks." I was hot to trot.
It was Allen Andrews who gave the wedding talk at the Newport R.I Kindom Hall. I was there with "My Boys" Jack Sutton best man, Roy Baty, Randy Robertson "Country" and Mike Stillman. True to what my future inlaws told me to do "I just showed up." We had the reception at the V.F.W. hall. My father inlaw Ben Regan (Gomer Pyle) braged to everyone at the wedding, that it only cost him $300 bucks for the whole thing. Debbie made her own wedding dress......she wore a ripped pair of panty hose (no cash for new ones). We had a great time and danced our asses off. There was only one problem.........Jim Pipkorn who was to take our wedding pictures (to save money)....... got lost and finally got there and hour before the reception was over........Debbie never did forgive him for that. Debbie and I were the last ones out of the V.F.W. Hall........we just didn't want it to end.
We didn't move to Califorina after the wedding, like I tolded her parents.There was just too many changes happening. I just couldn't see making four of the biggest changes in my life with in 2 week period 1. leaving Bethel 2. getting married 3.moving to Califorina 4. getting a job.I was tired and exhausted. We had got 1,500 bucks at our wedding, the most money I had ever seen in my whole life."We were RICH"...........so we played for a whole month. Do you want to hear something really sick? The only place we went to on our honeymoon was, guess were?............Thats right New York City, and Bethel. Since her parents would never let her come down to visit me while we were going together, I wanted to show her the city. At the time you could rent a room in the Towers Hotel from Bethel for cheap......so we went there for a weekend. I must say on some crazy level, I liked the idea of having "legal sex" in a Bethel room. I got some kind of sick pleasure from taking her on a tour of the factory, so I could show off my new bride to all my "Horny" friends.......Who still needed to "make their time"......Kind of a "Hey......Guys, look what I got!....You can get one too.........someday if your lucky!"
they said we are all the same in god’s eyes.
that everyone is equal.
to prove this they call everyone “brother and sister.” sadly, this really isn’t the case.
Your right I have been out for sometime, about 15 years. Things have changed but I guess the more they change the more they are still the same. I remember a few more class distinctions.
Unbaptized anointed. Very scary.
Baptized anointed. Respected if over ninety years old. Very scary, if they are under forty.
they said we are all the same in god’s eyes.
that everyone is equal.
to prove this they call everyone “brother and sister.” sadly, this really isn’t the case.
They said we are all the same in god’s eyes. That everyone is equal. To prove this they call everyone “Brother and Sister.” Sadly, this really isn’t the case. There are those who are definitely thought better of then others. That being said, this is their list of rankings as a Jehovah’s Witnesses in every congregation around the world. This rank does make a difference in how people treat and respect you.
1. Unbaptized, irregular, publisher. Someone that is going out in Field service inconsistently and is not baptized yet. This rank is OK if you are a child, not if you were an adult.
2. Inactive Publisher. Someone is baptized and who has not gone out in field service for over six months. This person is “weak spiritually” and should be avoided.
3. Irregular Publisher. Someone is baptized who might miss a full month of field service every now and then. This person is also weak spiritually but not as bad as inactive publisher.
4. Publisher. Someone who never misses a month in field service. This person is in “good standing.”
5. Axillary Pioneer. Someone who is putting in a minimum of 60 hours (hours have been lowered over the years) in field service a month. This is a super charged publisher and is admired by others.
6. Pioneer. A person that puts in a minimum of 100 hours a month (hours have been lowered over the years) in field service a month. Except for being an Elder this is the highest rank in the congregation.
7. Special Pioneer. Someone who puts in a minimum of 150 hours (hours have been lowered over the years) in field service a month. There are very few of these around.
8. Ministerial servant. Any males who want to be made into an Elder someday must first be a ministerial servant. The do all the jobs in the Kingdom hall that the Elders don’t have time to do ( or want to do).
9. Book study overseer. This position is held by a ministerial servant or Elder.
10. Elders. This is the most respected position a male can have in the congregation.
11. Elder’s wife. This position technically has no power, if you believe men never listen to their wives.
So you have ten or more different rankings in a congregation of less than 150 people.
There are other rankings outside the local congregation.
1. Circuit Overseer. He is in charge of 12 to 15 different congregations or one circuit.
2. District Overseer. He is charge of 12 to 15 circuits.
3. Zone Overseer. He is in charge of all the District Overseers in a whole country.
4. Gilead Student. A pioneer missionary.
5. Bethelite. A worker at one of the worldwide headquarters. At the worldwide headquarters there are too many subrankings to even mention here.
They purposely keep their congregations small, usually 100 to 140 people. This way they can keep better tabs on you and better tabs on each other.
If you missed more than a couple of meetings or too much field service, you might get a phone call or a visit from someone making sure you were “OK” and not spiritually sick.
It’s a tight nit group. With everyone “knowing” a lot of everyone else’s business. Part of the fun in going out in Field service is catching up on all the gossip. Even though this is discouraged, it has always been done.
Whether you are god’s chosen people or not, people just feel better knowing they are doing better than others. Plus it’s really fun to have some piece of information others don’t have, some little piece of dirt. It’s just human nature. Though most of it harmless, a lot of it can be real nasty stuff. Yes, the “Brothers and Sisters” know way too much about their “Brothers and Sisters.”
Yes, one big happy family.
my writing a book about my strange life as a jw.
i need some help.. does anyone remember when they used to get these charts out at the service meetings which had all the hours, "back calls" and bible studies on it?
what did they call that?.
Since there is so many stories about the pianos.
Here is a strange piano story. Does anyone here, know Gary Kennedy? I went to Bethel with him and his brother Jim. lives in Alabama or Georgia. He lived many years just north of San Francisco. Any way he told me a story that is kind a weird.
His father had special job for the society back in the 1960's. He was a terrible shooter for the WTB&TS. They would send him and his family into congregations they thought were hiding something. They sent them to this rural congregation in Georgia. There was rumors of spirit activity in the hall. So he told me they went there to there first meeting. They stood up to sing the song and piano started playing but there was no one there playing it. It wasn't a player piano! He said they had to disbanded the congregation.
my writing a book about my strange life as a jw.
i need some help.. does anyone remember when they used to get these charts out at the service meetings which had all the hours, "back calls" and bible studies on it?
what did they call that?.
wow! Thank you all for the things you all have helped me remember.
Yes, I remember the pianos now.
"The written reviews"
The "quotas" and then the "goals." The "National" averages and how your hall fell above or below those. One bible study each minimum. 6 "back calls" I thought it was 10 hours not 12.
The breaks at the meeting. When us kids would run around the KH.
The reasons why people got DFed. I guess the society had to change that one, after they got sued a few times.
The canned "8 minute sermon."
In the sixties with the short dresses and the below the knee rule.
my writing a book about my strange life as a jw.
i need some help.. does anyone remember when they used to get these charts out at the service meetings which had all the hours, "back calls" and bible studies on it?
what did they call that?.
My writing a book about my strange life as a JW. I need some help.
Does anyone remember when they used to get these charts out at the service meetings which had all the hours, "back calls" and bible studies on it? What did they call that?
Remember when they did skits in the services meetings.
Anything else you can remember about that time period?
they brag about the fact that they the don' t baptize their babies because "how can a baby 'know' what religion it wants to believe in the rest of it's life!".
but a 14 year old does?.....they put so much presure on their children to get dunked, that if your not baptize by 18 years old there is something really "wrong" with you.. so the poor kid does it, just to get everyone off their backs.
legally a minor can't be held to a contract if they are under 18 years old and why?
Had to repost this after the thread about the 14 year old getting DFed
What bull shit!
