I think the class said it would give your life meaning, but when that meaning is a pompous self-righteousness, it is the wrong meaning. Thinking you know more than everyone else, is the wrong meaning. Thinking you're part of the elite remnant, God's chosen people, when you are not, is the wrong meaning. Thinking that your life's responsibility is to do what your "leaders" say, is the wrong meaning. Does it "profit" you in some way? --> Yes. Is that the best way to do it. No
You see this sort of thing happen in many abusive situations. The abuser gives the abusee's life meaning, it is their life. Abused women sometimes live with their abusive husbands or boyfriends for many many years. They leave and come crawling back. Why? Brain damage? No.
Learning that life has meaning outside of that horrible relationship is the begining for those that want to escape.
What is the meaning of life? Why am I here? These are questions that can be answered in any number of a countless number of terrible ways. It can also be answered in good, positive ways. For the one questioning the line between the terrible and the good is not all that clear when they are desperate for answers.
... It's called "learned helplessness"...the dog refused to leave the cage even though the door was wide open and electricity was shooting through him...why? He was conditioned to stay where he was.
Groucho, so then your belief is that we refused to leave because of Pavlov-like brainwashing? Preposterous.
This is probably going to cause some flack but i'm going to say it anyways.
I realize a big part of GS is all about opening people's eyes as to what really what went on in TWI and to help them make an informed decision to get out.
BUT people have the right to live their lives as they see fit without being judged and ridiculed even if they are still in. (After all wasn't that one of the things we despised about TWI) But when it comes to name calling towards people that are still in, it's abusive. What about the people that have left and still have family in and they come to this site and read how dumb or stupid, or what a twit they are for staying in.
I haven't walked in their shoes, I don't know their situation but I think resorting to name calling because of their decision is pretty low.
There are multiple levels of "conditioning", from the effects of TV commercials to marine corps bootcamp. In a way, nobody goes through life without being "conditioned" by the environment that he or she exposes themseves to. Humans are creatures of habit that have a need to associate with and relate to, other humans. Oftentimes this occurs in the context of belonging to a specific group, which affords them acceptance to the collective...they "belong".
I have been conditioned in the past, by my highshool football team, a college fraternity, a group of people that I worked with in business, etc, etc. All I am saying is that in twi, we were "conditioned" by a flimflam operation that manipulated and abused...THAT's what folks got "conditioned" to. How did it happen? God was involved...plain and simple, twi exploited us at our most vulnerable point. That's why the bible condemns shepards that screw their own sheep.
Growing up, I went to church twice on Sunday & every Wedn. nite. Also went to every revival at our church, and other churches as well. I was probably miserable most of the time.
Then a year after graduating from high school, the guy I was dating started going to a home fellowship. (He had gone off & on during high school.) Anyway, like so many of us here, it was a person of the opposite sex that kept me going. Then we both went WOW....we broke up. Lots of things happened. I went WOW again, then came back home & got a job which I ended up staying with for 18 years, moving around for them, not for twi. Thank God for small favors.
I think I went to twig out of habit. Then when I moved out of state away from my family & friends, I hooked up with the 'local believers' in SC. They were nice and I didnt have to go out & meet other friends. I had 'built-in' friends, so to speak. Then the same thing when I moved to AL, TN, and AR. I was living in AR when Loy started spewing & spewing every week about cleansing the household.
My fiance' had moved from FL to AR for a job with the same co. that I worked for. So he moved in with me. Well, that was living in sin and I was contaminating the household. So one nite after another spewing teaching by Loy, I told my TC that I had never been kicked out of anything in my life, and wasnt about to start. So I quit going to twig. Thanks, Loy.
My life has been SO MUCH better these past 10 years plus than the whole 19 years that I was involved with twi.
Why stay when you're miserable? HABIT.
I left in 1994, before it became unbearable.
I have to say that I still held onto the beliefs that I had. It wasnt till my sister told me about Waydale that I learned how awful this organization was and is.
Cowgirl...I appreciate you're sensitivity towards people's feelings but sometimes it takes a rolled up wet towel to wake somebody up. It's difficult to warn people of the dangers of this cult without being descriptive of what it turns people into...I simply describe what I believe to be true and if the shoe fits...take it off, that's the point.
The folks who are still "standing" with twi, are living, breathing, caring, human beings whose lives are extremely valuable. They deserve better than being scammed by this insideous cult. I spent 13 years of my life "standing" with twi and I know what I know. My hopes are that any "innies" who might read this, will pause...and begin asking themselves some honest questions.
Football players NEVER were required to do what we were to remain on the team or play in the game :-(
There would have been severe consequences.
When you say that folks chose twi because they wanted oldies....it is now your turn to speak for yourself and your motives....you cannot possibly speak for the rest of us or accuratly speculate on our motives or the pressure applied.
Oldies...ok, we all chose our affiliation with twi...agreed...and we all chose to continue that affiliation...agreed...and I also agree that that were different levels of conditioning. Some folks dove in head first, while others dropped in one toe at a time. Some went in over their heads, while others waded up to their ankles. I think that I was a diver, but I stopped when it got up to my chin. :P-->
When examining the various levels of involvement and conditioning, it's wise not to lose sight of what we were diving INTO. When I graduated from highschool, I was no longer a member of the football team...I got over it almost immediately. When I quit the college frat, I felt badly for about a week. The "nature" of twi's conditioning inflicts a degree of harm on the individual that oftentimes, causes them severe problems for YEARS!
The "nature" of twi's conditioning inflicts a degree of harm on the individual that oftentimes, causes them severe problems for YEARS!
Amen to that Groucho.... I forgot to add in my previous post, that I was scared to death for months that something awful would happen to me or my family for walking away from the 'household'. My, my, the things we forget.
Perhaps the nature of twi's conditioning reached down into a very vulnurable and delicate area of the individuals psyche...and perhaps the habit patterns that had developed, oftentimes motivated by fear, resulted in a form of "learned helplessness"...perhaps it was subtle, perhaps it was not. In either case, the end result was like a junkie who continues to shoot up because of the instant gratification of a desired state of mind. Both allurring and destructive in the long run.
Fear and loyalty to something that wasn't there kept us in.
We lived out in a rural area for a number of years, ran a small, sweet fellowship. We were aware of the fog years crap, but were able to stay somewhat isolated. Most of the corp folk we knew left in '89 or so, but we believed we were standing, keeping the truth alive etc. We both really believed it was the TRUTH and only the Way had it.
In the nineties we were counseled to sell the house and move to be in the limb city, where the believing was hot etc. I'd had a rather scary health situation come up after my last delivery--debt, ya know, was an open door. Well, this was what the great minisry wanted, so we did it.
We were then on a roller coaster. The limb coord loved us, but our HFC had issues with me...but he couldn't take it up the way tree for a couple years, due to our being favored by the limb guy. Others were not favored by the limb and got trashed.
We saw some unbelievable dirt done to good believers, the whole Mark and Avoid thing.
But where would we go? There was no other place with the TRUTH. Hubby firmly believed this. We hung in there, thinking it would get better.
But it continued to get worse. Our Limb buddy got the boot. Then we were really under the microscope. I wanted to leave, but hubby wanted to hang in there--he just kept thinking it would get better, we'd just try harder etc.
It got worse and worse. I didn't want a divorce--my husband was NOT the problem. Still I began making tentative plans to leave. I figured the devil spirits on the outside couldn't be worse than what we were living through in the ministry. Also, I knew some people that had left, and their children etc didn't die! I was willing to take the risk. Finally hubby decided he'd had enough.
It is weird looking back on that time--the chains were all in our minds, due to the doctrine we believed had to be the truth, because it came from the one and only True ministry.
I think only people that have been there can understand that. To other people--you're just nuts.
the little home fellowships were so wonderful, so we figured it would be even more wonderful rubbing shoulders with the guys who led this outfit.
Had I known what kind of hell we were sending people into, I would have thrown a fit. I didn't have a clue- the abuse, the continual stream of ladies marched through the motorcoach-
Cripe- people DIED because of THEIR evil and ineptness.
Not to mention the present thought of where all of that ABS was really going- down the belly of that hellish place without so much as a "thank you".
Sure we made a choice- based on what? The facts? "Well, we don't deal with facts, we just wanna talk about truths..." Lets just be "blessed".
No wonder that they did not want "Da Ministry to be blamed"- for anything. The secret things now have been laid out in the light of day, thank God. And they're still the same outfit. Same numbnuts running it.
It finally took for me to see Loy's (and crew's) unparalelled evil and insanity before they started losing their grip on me. They just made it TOO miserable. No more jumping through hoops.. no more.. I finally saw it was FRUITLESS.
Of course some people stuck with it over the long haul because they were blessed, or to put it another way, got some profit or benefit out of it. I don't think anyone is claiming that. Why is it so hard for you to accept that some people stayed beyond the period of "being blessed"? That some folks were trying to salvage marriages, or felt that there were no opther options for one reason or another?
How nice for you that you left at the exact instant that TWI stopped being a "blessing". --> How spiritually perceptive of you
Recommended Posts
Top Posters In This Topic
11
15
7
13
Popular Days
Apr 7
58
Apr 8
14
Apr 9
6
Apr 10
4
Top Posters In This Topic
rascal 11 posts
oldiesman 15 posts
A la prochaine 7 posts
Ham 13 posts
Popular Days
Apr 7 2005
58 posts
Apr 8 2005
14 posts
Apr 9 2005
6 posts
Apr 10 2005
4 posts
A la prochaine
Groucho,
Good synopsis.
Enjoyed your post.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
oldiesman
Link to comment
Share on other sites
A la prochaine
OM,
The 'Relentlessness' is referred to you and your insistent ways of telling people they're stupid for holding the ideas they do.
That's not 'debating'.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
lindyhopper
One of the reasons some stayed...( a big one)
-A feeling of importance... superiority-
I think the class said it would give your life meaning, but when that meaning is a pompous self-righteousness, it is the wrong meaning. Thinking you know more than everyone else, is the wrong meaning. Thinking you're part of the elite remnant, God's chosen people, when you are not, is the wrong meaning. Thinking that your life's responsibility is to do what your "leaders" say, is the wrong meaning. Does it "profit" you in some way?
--> Yes. Is that the best way to do it. No
You see this sort of thing happen in many abusive situations. The abuser gives the abusee's life meaning, it is their life. Abused women sometimes live with their abusive husbands or boyfriends for many many years. They leave and come crawling back. Why? Brain damage? No.
Learning that life has meaning outside of that horrible relationship is the begining for those that want to escape.
What is the meaning of life? Why am I here? These are questions that can be answered in any number of a countless number of terrible ways. It can also be answered in good, positive ways. For the one questioning the line between the terrible and the good is not all that clear when they are desperate for answers.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
coolchef1248 @adelphia.net
i had more 'meaning in my life' before the class than i did after! at least i had my 4 kids and wife.
oldies i don't want to be mean. you seem very intelegent but maybe you should consider a "check up from the neck up"
Link to comment
Share on other sites
oldiesman
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Cowgirl
This is probably going to cause some flack but i'm going to say it anyways.
I realize a big part of GS is all about opening people's eyes as to what really what went on in TWI and to help them make an informed decision to get out.
BUT people have the right to live their lives as they see fit without being judged and ridiculed even if they are still in. (After all wasn't that one of the things we despised about TWI) But when it comes to name calling towards people that are still in, it's abusive. What about the people that have left and still have family in and they come to this site and read how dumb or stupid, or what a twit they are for staying in.
I haven't walked in their shoes, I don't know their situation but I think resorting to name calling because of their decision is pretty low.
Cowgirl
Link to comment
Share on other sites
GrouchoMarxJr
oldies...YOU used the word brainwashing, not me.
There are multiple levels of "conditioning", from the effects of TV commercials to marine corps bootcamp. In a way, nobody goes through life without being "conditioned" by the environment that he or she exposes themseves to. Humans are creatures of habit that have a need to associate with and relate to, other humans. Oftentimes this occurs in the context of belonging to a specific group, which affords them acceptance to the collective...they "belong".
I have been conditioned in the past, by my highshool football team, a college fraternity, a group of people that I worked with in business, etc, etc. All I am saying is that in twi, we were "conditioned" by a flimflam operation that manipulated and abused...THAT's what folks got "conditioned" to. How did it happen? God was involved...plain and simple, twi exploited us at our most vulnerable point. That's why the bible condemns shepards that screw their own sheep.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
act2
Growing up, I went to church twice on Sunday & every Wedn. nite. Also went to every revival at our church, and other churches as well. I was probably miserable most of the time.
Then a year after graduating from high school, the guy I was dating started going to a home fellowship. (He had gone off & on during high school.) Anyway, like so many of us here, it was a person of the opposite sex that kept me going. Then we both went WOW....we broke up. Lots of things happened. I went WOW again, then came back home & got a job which I ended up staying with for 18 years, moving around for them, not for twi. Thank God for small favors.
I think I went to twig out of habit. Then when I moved out of state away from my family & friends, I hooked up with the 'local believers' in SC. They were nice and I didnt have to go out & meet other friends. I had 'built-in' friends, so to speak. Then the same thing when I moved to AL, TN, and AR. I was living in AR when Loy started spewing & spewing every week about cleansing the household.
My fiance' had moved from FL to AR for a job with the same co. that I worked for. So he moved in with me. Well, that was living in sin and I was contaminating the household. So one nite after another spewing teaching by Loy, I told my TC that I had never been kicked out of anything in my life, and wasnt about to start. So I quit going to twig. Thanks, Loy.
My life has been SO MUCH better these past 10 years plus than the whole 19 years that I was involved with twi.
Why stay when you're miserable? HABIT.
I left in 1994, before it became unbearable.
I have to say that I still held onto the beliefs that I had. It wasnt till my sister told me about Waydale that I learned how awful this organization was and is.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
rascal
conditioning/manipulation/brainwashing....call it what you will...it wasn`t nice.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
act2
Groucho, we were posting at the same time. Similar thoughts!!!!!!!!!!
Link to comment
Share on other sites
oldiesman
Ok Groucho, "we" were conditioned.
But, folks chose their level of conditioning.
From the weakest level to the strongest level...
Going to twig once a week...
Going to twig twice a week...
Going to twig three times a week...
Going out WOW...
Going out Way Corps...
All different levels of conditioning of the participant's own choice, depending on their level of belief and commitment.
You chose to be conditioned in football because that's what you wanted to do.
Folks chose twi because that's what they wanted to do... no brainwashing, no excuses.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
GrouchoMarxJr
Cowgirl...I appreciate you're sensitivity towards people's feelings but sometimes it takes a rolled up wet towel to wake somebody up. It's difficult to warn people of the dangers of this cult without being descriptive of what it turns people into...I simply describe what I believe to be true and if the shoe fits...take it off, that's the point.
The folks who are still "standing" with twi, are living, breathing, caring, human beings whose lives are extremely valuable. They deserve better than being scammed by this insideous cult. I spent 13 years of my life "standing" with twi and I know what I know. My hopes are that any "innies" who might read this, will pause...and begin asking themselves some honest questions.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
rascal
Football players NEVER were required to do what we were to remain on the team or play in the game :-(
There would have been severe consequences.
When you say that folks chose twi because they wanted oldies....it is now your turn to speak for yourself and your motives....you cannot possibly speak for the rest of us or accuratly speculate on our motives or the pressure applied.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
GrouchoMarxJr
Oldies...ok, we all chose our affiliation with twi...agreed...and we all chose to continue that affiliation...agreed...and I also agree that that were different levels of conditioning. Some folks dove in head first, while others dropped in one toe at a time. Some went in over their heads, while others waded up to their ankles. I think that I was a diver, but I stopped when it got up to my chin.
:P-->
When examining the various levels of involvement and conditioning, it's wise not to lose sight of what we were diving INTO. When I graduated from highschool, I was no longer a member of the football team...I got over it almost immediately. When I quit the college frat, I felt badly for about a week. The "nature" of twi's conditioning inflicts a degree of harm on the individual that oftentimes, causes them severe problems for YEARS!
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Ham
Another quote of Schwaigers that needs repeating..
Conditioned- yes, in my opinion- at the "twig" level.
They really got some mileage out of the good that some of us poured into that cesspool..
Link to comment
Share on other sites
act2
Originally posted by GrouchoMarxJr:
The "nature" of twi's conditioning inflicts a degree of harm on the individual that oftentimes, causes them severe problems for YEARS!
Amen to that Groucho.... I forgot to add in my previous post, that I was scared to death for months that something awful would happen to me or my family for walking away from the 'household'. My, my, the things we forget.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
GrouchoMarxJr
So, going back to the original question:
Why stay when you're miserable?
Perhaps the nature of twi's conditioning reached down into a very vulnurable and delicate area of the individuals psyche...and perhaps the habit patterns that had developed, oftentimes motivated by fear, resulted in a form of "learned helplessness"...perhaps it was subtle, perhaps it was not. In either case, the end result was like a junkie who continues to shoot up because of the instant gratification of a desired state of mind. Both allurring and destructive in the long run.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
oldiesman
There really are only two ways to go with this. Ya either chose to be there, or ya didn't.
I suppose you may say that children whose parents were in didn't have a choice.
But adults must accept responsibility for their actions.
That's my belief, and I'm sticking to it.
Why did folks choose to be there and stay under sometimes trying circumstances?
Love of and for God, fellowship, commitment, longsuffering and doctrine; I think all those things played a part.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Bramble
Fear and loyalty to something that wasn't there kept us in.
We lived out in a rural area for a number of years, ran a small, sweet fellowship. We were aware of the fog years crap, but were able to stay somewhat isolated. Most of the corp folk we knew left in '89 or so, but we believed we were standing, keeping the truth alive etc. We both really believed it was the TRUTH and only the Way had it.
In the nineties we were counseled to sell the house and move to be in the limb city, where the believing was hot etc. I'd had a rather scary health situation come up after my last delivery--debt, ya know, was an open door. Well, this was what the great minisry wanted, so we did it.
We were then on a roller coaster. The limb coord loved us, but our HFC had issues with me...but he couldn't take it up the way tree for a couple years, due to our being favored by the limb guy. Others were not favored by the limb and got trashed.
We saw some unbelievable dirt done to good believers, the whole Mark and Avoid thing.
But where would we go? There was no other place with the TRUTH. Hubby firmly believed this. We hung in there, thinking it would get better.
But it continued to get worse. Our Limb buddy got the boot. Then we were really under the microscope. I wanted to leave, but hubby wanted to hang in there--he just kept thinking it would get better, we'd just try harder etc.
It got worse and worse. I didn't want a divorce--my husband was NOT the problem. Still I began making tentative plans to leave. I figured the devil spirits on the outside couldn't be worse than what we were living through in the ministry. Also, I knew some people that had left, and their children etc didn't die! I was willing to take the risk. Finally hubby decided he'd had enough.
It is weird looking back on that time--the chains were all in our minds, due to the doctrine we believed had to be the truth, because it came from the one and only True ministry.
I think only people that have been there can understand that. To other people--you're just nuts.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Ham
Had I known what kind of hell we were sending people into, I would have thrown a fit. I didn't have a clue- the abuse, the continual stream of ladies marched through the motorcoach-
Cripe- people DIED because of THEIR evil and ineptness.
Not to mention the present thought of where all of that ABS was really going- down the belly of that hellish place without so much as a "thank you".
Sure we made a choice- based on what? The facts? "Well, we don't deal with facts, we just wanna talk about truths..." Lets just be "blessed".
No wonder that they did not want "Da Ministry to be blamed"- for anything. The secret things now have been laid out in the light of day, thank God. And they're still the same outfit. Same numbnuts running it.
It finally took for me to see Loy's (and crew's) unparalelled evil and insanity before they started losing their grip on me. They just made it TOO miserable. No more jumping through hoops.. no more.. I finally saw it was FRUITLESS.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Oakspear
Oldies:
Of course some people stuck with it over the long haul because they were blessed, or to put it another way, got some profit or benefit out of it. I don't think anyone is claiming that. Why is it so hard for you to accept that some people stayed beyond the period of "being blessed"? That some folks were trying to salvage marriages, or felt that there were no opther options for one reason or another?
How nice for you that you left at the exact instant that TWI stopped being a "blessing".
--> How spiritually perceptive of you 
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Ham
Yep.. love for God and people played a big part. I was a friggin sucker. Makes me feel used.
The loving thing I should have done is said, "you wanna take this class, come to twig and have fun?"
"Well, yes"
then kicked their foot, told em to go find something better to do..
Link to comment
Share on other sites
oldiesman
Oakspear, I never left twi. They left me.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.