Posted by long time exer on July 05, 2011 at 12:23:28
In Reply to: Re: Slaves by choice? posted by Skep on June 30, 2011 at 19:26:35:
I can relate to what you say here. That initial surrender of will, for me, was couched in truly believing that God was very real, very aware of my thinking and I believed in a very child like way what I was taught. The initial resignation was first to ideals that seemed innocent enough but there were always things happening that made me wonder. Not enough though, to overcome indoctrination which was extreme in early cog. In those days, people literally had a "buddy" who went everywhere with them, even to the bathroom and the doors to the stalls were missing. Thought stopping signs were everywhere- from "Pray without ceasing" to how god sees you when u use more than two sheets of toilet paper. There were even classes on how to do that. Then shipped off to TSC, there was a guard dog, greeters, security and all day long classes and work followed by "inspiration" which really felt good after the long day, until persecution skits started and then purging sessions occurred. Those were pretty horrible. Anyway, I did eventually choose to leave, but it took a lot of horror to get to that point as well as fear of what would happen to my kids if I stayed in. That fear was forefront because I also had begun to doubt after many experiences of getting glimpses of the nature of the beast and hating what I had become. I had "rebelled" for some time and been on the fringes before jumping ship. The sharks in the ocean of life were nothing compared to resignation of life. So many things to learn after leaving, right down what do I like to wear? What politics or religion do I lean towards (or not)? It takes time to clear out the cobwebs, and work, too.