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I'm so glad that you brought this up Abi. The whole idea of "kosher" has always boggled my brain. Now it makes some sense. Thanks.

I resemble that remark!

Oh...just let the left side of your brain sleep for a while! That should be plenty....hehehe

Dooj, that was awsome! I'm gonna listen to that one again, and if I have more questions I'm gonna bug you...ok? That was great discussion by all, very illuminating! Thanks!

No feathers or sand, just stuffing and cat fur...it is called FURniture

Oh of course...gentle is my middle name. So really is it 4:30 EST or 5:30 EST? Please say 5:30, 'cause then I can make it on time. Or even 5:00. That makes it 2:00 her on the west side.

Our identity revolved for a great many people around our nametags. I have kept every last one of them and I am puting them in a shadow box with the caption "Remember your past, remember the lessons you learned and use those memories to help you build a better future." My identity is now in Christ Jesus where it belongs, where it belonged all along. But the progressive nametags remind me how I got there. I am who I am and I really dont care who knows it anymore. I've been beaten, flogged, humiliated, belittled, repressed and down trodden but I will never again deny Christ! Never again! I still get bad way brain thoughts but I beat them down as fast as they come up...or as fast as I recognize them. But as Kathy said not all of them are bad. We were taught some useful stuff and even bad stuff can be used as a comparison. As children of God we are required to "prove these things to see if they be so". It is no different with TWI stuff, we just need to prove it, see if it is good. Toss the cr@p. The harmony of TWI was false but the premise was good. Too bad it could not be executed with real people. Dog gone it this couch is just spitting coins this morning...got enough for a large fries and a milk shake now! Bow to the sofa alter....

So right T-Bone...GSC is an amazing place! And it is amazing because as you say we all can come here to argue and fight and freely express ourselves without having to make potato salad! And yup I got all that out of the couch...darn nice couch...got it at a rummage sale for $10. But I had to put the change in the cushions myself...

Maybe if I scrounge around some more I can have Micky D's for lunch and get fat like the rest of America! Hehe Ok so here's my opinion on the whole can't make a commitment thing. It's not the commitment, because you made one to your family. It's a commitment to an organization because in TWI making a "commitment" was akin to signing away your soul. It was for life, "never break a commitment to God!" But the hook was commiting yourself to twig three times a week, that's not hard, it was "fun" to see everyone and if you had a good coordinator then it was a blast. But then they asked "could you help set up for the branch or Limb meeting? or bring something for the BBQ afterwards?" Then it was "Have you thought of going WOW?" Then it was "Have you thought of the Corps? or Univ of Life or Pick your favorite...?" The point is it all started with the little commitment of a bowl of potato salad on Sunday and became a lifelong commitment to der Vey. It was the ultimate Domino effect. The really sad thing is that we were the ones that did it, we are "they" and today we still group together sometimes based solely upon the group(s) that we were once in. This is not always a bad thing, because of the groups we were in we share similar memories and experiences so it is natural for us to want to talk abuot them. But sometimes we still think like we are still in that group...and we are not. We are grease spots now; all of us. TWI, what's left of it lingers in our memories and sometimes our actions. As much as we beat it down it rears its ugly head at times and spits obscenities at everyone. Just like it did when we were "in". It makes me laugh when I read some posts where people claim to have "thrown away" their "Way brain" along with the books and stuff. But then in reading their posts it is obvious that they are merely denying its existance. It is true that some were more immersed than others but all of us were touched and became part of the "tree" of der Vey in one aspect or another. Ok...I am so going to stop digging in the couch now...

Dooj!! So good to see you and know that you are "on line" again. Let the harrassing begin! But first to harrass you on the radio tonight will be most satisfactory! I love you... You believe me....right? :unsure:

I had a total of approximately 5 sets of nearly everything, both of my parents were in and they are asleep and my niece was in and she is also asleep. I kept one full set for research and sold the rest on ebay, minus the sylabi (sp) I kept all of those as they are personal and my neices children may want them one day, just to see, to learn from their notes, just to have. Made quite a profit. I've got tapes, music, Corps teachings, Univ of Life etc, etc...was in a long time and I got everything that "had to do with the bible" when mom fell asleep and when Ann did as well. I sold on ebay because I figured that people that do that specific search on ebay are already looking for that material because they are already exposed. They might as well get what they want. It's not like some unsuspecting lop will accidently search Wier#lle. The chances of them getting the stuff with a general search is also slim. My opinion.

ASpot, I think I agree with WW and Kathy. You are profound, have a great heart, easy to read, refreshingly honest, just plain loveable and you have the cutest little kitten avatars in the world! Thanks for starting this thread it has been quite enlightening. So now that I'm done schmoozing (spelling nazis just stay away from that one!). Lets see if I have two cents in the couch cushions... I think that you and Kathy have touched on something here that I hadn't considered. Involvement with a cult, especially one that was so powerful in so many ways changed our overall outlook on a great many things. I think that our experience was different than many cult survivors. Our cult was huge in comparison. It was not isolated to one geographic location or a limited number of people. TWI was a massive organization. Its leader was actually known by some really big names. We had no real reason as young people to doubt their dogma or to believe that they were a cult. Consequently the overall experience made us less tolerant of religious organizations having any control in our lives. Even the big groups hold no intimidation factor with the majority of ex wayfers. We've all been there done that and have tons of t-shirts to prove it! So as we wander out into the world befuddled, scarred and determined we find ourselves still seeking a spot to call "home" or a nitch to fill. As we search for just the right place we investigate and discard numerous possibilities that before TWI would have been more than adequite but after TWI now seem tarnished or calloused or simply lacking. Where once we might have overlooked little doctrinal differences as just that; today we see them as glaring contradictions that we cannot stomach. We now have, like it or not a huge bible based repertoire of knowledge in our heads that we use, right or wrong to gage all other doctrines that we hear. We weigh them and balance them and if they are found wanting, we decided if we can live with less or if we keep searching. I think that something that many here tend to forget or choose to ignore is that we weren't in TWI we were TWI. We gave it its strength of numbers, we gave it its head knowledge (corps research papers), we gave it its arrogance, we didnt do these things because we didnt want to do them. We were young and looking for something that would help us to make our mark. TWI offered the best of two worlds, to be big with both God and man at the same time and all you had to do was give away your soul and sear your conscience. And for a time all of us did it. We all stayed, we all continued to fellowship, we all continued to attend and run classes and witness and anything else they asked of us. It wasnt until the MOG, the man that we gave our lives to was found to be wanting did we say "No more" and leave. But upon our leaving (whether it was by choice or not) our departure deflated TWI because it lost most of what sustained it, the robotic numbers that were willing to exchange part of themselves to become the better robot. Ok...so I found a dollar in the cushions...

I read our poem to the family and they laughed so hard that one of 'em fell off of the bed! Then she said "What's cod?" This of course initiated another round of laughter. So today were cooking up some banana boats! I'll let ya'll know how they turn out. I got vetoed on the hausenpheffer, God forbid we eat a bunny rabbit, got called a "hillbilly" for even mentioning it! I did get the ok for the fried apples and bacon...even though "we" dont eat cute little piggies! Gimme a break! What they dont know wont hurt 'em! Hehehe...now to find a muskrat! Should have seen the reaction when I told 'em I was waiting for a "hush puppies" recipe. "OH MY GOD YOU EAT PUPPIES!!!!???? I swear I couldn't breath I was laughing so hard! My response when I could speak again? "They are soooo good fried up in little chunks with onion and garlic. Just wait till you try the kitty tacos next week...delish!" Yup...I got some really good looks for that one! The next line in the poem.... I never knew I could hold so much...

Outside of the cheese referrence, I've never heard of a Cracker Barrel...might I assume its a diner?

Beautiful! Wonderful to put the faces to the names! Lovely to finally see Rascals face and Sushi's as well. But I gotta ask...didn't Rascal hold the camera even once? That's pretty sneeky Abi. The pics also bring back fond memories from my childhood. My entire family is from Michigan I'm the only West Coast baby. But I've been in all of the lakes (even if it was only my feet in Superior) but they are beautiful!

As always the "cure" for the poison is so much more simple than the poison itself.

I was just sitting here thinking when I re-read this section of your post and it came to me that the theology of TWI did in fact de-throne God. God was not sovereign it was our believing that was supreme. Our believing could move mountains and tell God exactly where and what was going to happen at any given time. Then I couldnt help but apply that verse to my life as I have been in doubt a bit lately. To be reminded that it is God that does the proving and not any man is very comforting. To know that we stand proved and approved before Him and Him alone by what is in our hearts and how we walk in Christ, is liberating. A wonderful person recently reminded me it is our responsibility to do good to all and give to God the injustices that are done. In this manner we serve Him. I think that keeping his ways first regardless of personal discomfort is walking in love. Something TWI didn't really teach. They talked about it but when put into practice they werent even "loving' to those that they knew were in the household. This is a cool thread!

I loved it. It was very entertaining. Nothing ever compares to the book so I stopped comparing them years ago. But I really liked it. I thought that they did a pretty good job of developing the characters even more especially considering the time constraint.

What an intiguing line of thought and an incredible statement T-Bone! I think that perhaps to some "this particular idol of knowledge" is exactly as you propose a "means to an end" not an object of worship as we perceive worship. In TWI the more we mastered PFAL the more we knew exactly what to say to move up the ladder to gain more power. The first chapter of Romans talks about what happens to believers when they leave the true God that they know and begin to worship false idols. The record shows that when believers forget or neglect to thank God for what He has done for them their thoughts become unstable. They then turn the truth of God into a lie and begin to openly worship the creation more than the Creator. They adamantly profess that they are correct in all that they do and refuse to be told otherwise. Sound like "someone" you know? It is hard to thank God for anything when you are too busy acquiring head knowledge. God is love, not knowledge. There is a great line in a song that I love "We're just here to learn to love Him" Once upon a time I would have adamantly disagreed with that statement. But today....maybe it isn't so wrong after all.

Indeed...Exquisite! TWI tried to do just this..make God an object that responds to our "believing" like a car does to pressure on the gas pedal. God was a machine, something that gave His Son to die for us so that we could be more powerful than His Son was. God didnt do it because He loved us but so that we could "Know" that we know....They talked about love but didnt have to manifest it because they were "under grace". They talked about God but as ASpot said to get close to God or to do his will you had to be able to work the formulae and like some other religions if you didn't kneel at the right time or say the right thing "just so" then you had to start all over again, after you fixed what you messed up by not doing it right the first time. Wow what a vicous circle!

Now I find this to be interesting information. I had no idea that they made "deputies". What a very interesting and insulting way of telling the rest of the BOT that he did not consider them or would not consider them for his replacement were it necessary. (Which of course it was). I dont know for fact and am most certainly speculating but from what I have read on this thread, I surmise that perhaps Rosie was holding the information about Craig as an ace in the hole and maybe even used it as blackmail a little. Drawing that thought out just a little further, maybe all of the "crimes" have not yet come to light and this is why Criag stays near but not to near to HQ. Just thinking.

ASpot...so much has already been said and I dont' feel the need to repeat it. You got him home, not just to a house but back into your arms and life. He was always in your heart but for a short time he strayed from your life and now returns. So beautiful, so warm, and so perfectly godly...this unconditional love is exactly what the love of God in Christ is all about. You and your son are living, breathing examples of how we should all be towards one and other in the body of Christ. Rejoyce my friend, it is always a day of rejoycing when a child returns home.

My goodness I leave the thread for a couple of days and all of this wonderful stuff gets posted! T-Bone that last paragraph with the picture analogy is priceless! Kathy and Larry, I couldn't agree more on the idea that our "head knowledge" and TWI's drive to give us bigger heads certainly hindered our ability to love or express true enthusiasm born of love for pretty much anything that would involve interaction with others outside of TWI. What do you think, is this gorging on "knowledge" cause the Pharisees and perhaps their religious counterparts throughout history cause them to forget "why" they wanted to serve God's people to begin with?

Happy Birthday bro! Have a great day, live it up and enjoy!

Officer. A couple of times in my career I have had to take a 'desk' job because of an injury, (like now) but the bulk of my career was spent in the trenches or training others. Now you're getting into causational factors. Certainly a woman may confront a man because he just came home drunk at 2 am and has nothing left of his paycheck...and she "starts" a fight. Or a woman may ask the man if he will watch the children while she goes shopping and he refuses because they will interrupt the game and she "starts" a fight. In my experience many times the man initiates a fight by what he does or does not do and then the woman starts verbalizing, eventually she has to yell to get the mans attention. It escalates. Now of course this is not always what happens...but in a majority of cases when traced back to the actual beginning... It is possible that these women that "start" the fights are asking for or expecting something unreasonable from the man. And then the man gets frustrated because of this and verbally "strikes" back at the woman. Physical abuse almost always starts with verbal abuse. As I said this is only from my experience. When I say "mutual slug fest" I dont necessarily mean a physical slug fest, it can be a verbal slug fest as well. But I was vague and I apologize for that.