Lanikaigal

How right you are!

Krys, I notice your location is in The Hudson River Valley in NY. So is mine -- Cortlandt Manor. We're neighbors.

Yes, Animatronics, Rocky. Thanks! That's what I was describing. Here's a good example: Walt Disney's "Carousel of Progress" display:

Sitting through a video presentation of ANYONE expounding the Bible again is just not something I ever want to do again! And it's not because I think the Bible is BS (I don't) or any number of negative things some may say it is -- but just because I feel I've sat through enough Bible "teachings" to last a hundred lifetimes!! Hehehe. It's funny ... the fact that one man is still doing the same thing he did for well over 30 years now -- in exact style and content and delivery -- over and over and over again ... is sorta weird to me! Also, when I've popped on JAL's facebook page or clicked on a couple of his YouTube videos ... what I see and hear just does not seem authentic to me. It doesn't seem to be coming from the HEART of the man ... that sacred core where our deepest convictions/passions reside. His presentation almost seems robotic to me ... like some of those eerie Disney displays at the 1964 World's Fair -- where the characters look life-size and true to the human form, but move and talk in a slowed-down, mechanical way! I don't know ... maybe I'm being too harsh in my impressions. Or maybe all those teachings of "a hundred lifetimes" have just taken their toll on me. All I can say is that I've never been so thankful to have walked away when I did from the programming that I acquiesced to in TWI for far too many years! Real life and real people living in the REAL world are just a whole lot ... well ... more REAL than anything I ever lived in when I was a wayfer. Hearing JAL do his JAL thing is like going back in time to the unreal! "Get a chart - get a life"? I don't think so!

Hey, all youz guys ... Thank you for the warm welcome! Look forward to "getting to know" you a bit more in the days ahead. This website is a great resource for so many. Kudos to those who keep it up and running -- especially the ones doing the most work as computer geeks and moderators!! ("Geeks" said with pure affection, of course.) Thank you!

I put this in my "About Me" area -- but figured I'd post it here too. I joined GSC recently ... mostly to learn, but occasionally to contribute. Recently, I've been reading posts going back years. It's amazing how many "light bulbs" have already gone off for me on many levels since reading what I have here already! I've been lurking for a couple of years here -- but only very sporadically. I tried to "join" a few times, but could never get my log-in to work over a period of about a year or more! Only now -- with the new format -- was I able to register and actually get into the site successfully under a screen name and password. (To say I'm a bit slow technology-wise would be a huge understatement.) : ) A brief "bio" ... I was involved in da way from 1977 through about 1992 or so (witnessed to by wows, Jim Baker, Bob Darnell and a gal named Annie in Mt. Vernon, NY in June of '77); went wow twice and graduated 11th Corps; first assignment was Limb Coordinator Brit Lynn's secretary in West Virginia; next year became slave labor for Way Home leader and perv Area Coordinator Alan Licht in Yonkers, NY; extricated self by moving to NYC for new job; occasionally attended "way offshoot" events/fellowships there until about '92 or so, at which point I called it quits on anything having to do with TWI or any of its offshoots. I reached that point of walking away after a rather dramatic (and I think Spirit inspired) moment after a chance meeting on a cross-town bus in NYC -- where I got "witnessed to" by some wide-eyed-with-wonder Church of Christ "disciples" who invited me to their home fellowship on the Upper West Side of Manhattan that night. I had a HUGE "ah-ha" moment when I realized that THEY were ME 15 years earlier, when I was "witnessing" to others with that same wide-eyed zealous wonder! When I got off the bus a few minutes later, I was in deep thought as I walked up the two flights to my little studio apartment in a lovely brownstone a half a block from Central Park. I sat down at my table, opened my Bible to the gospels, and asked Jesus (out loud!) to be the only one I'd ever listen to again. I read only the Gospels and Psalms for the next several months -- asking only that Jesus -- if he were REAL -- would reveal who he was to me. It really was a beautiful epiphany -- in that I figured if this Christianity thing was really true -- than certainly The One who began it all would and could illuminate me. I've never regretted that choice. There were a few years in there when I succumbed to the propaganda that we MUST be in some sort of "congregation" and so I church-shopped for a while (with some hilarious results along the way!) ... but I always came back to the exact place I was on that day in Manhattan when I decided to leave Wayville and get back in touch with the Jesus Who'd shown me who He was years earlier -- when I was just 14 years old! ; ) Thanks for reading this ... I look forward to getting to know some of youz guys here in the days ahead.

(This may be off topic ... and my apology if it is ... I'm new here!) ... but this topic made me think of something a lot of corps folks may recall. Maybe some "mind-reading revelation" in TWIT came about because vee-pee (and other select "leaders") had access to certain people's "autobiographies"! A requirement for Corps folks -- after a certain year, I think -- when one arrived on "campus" was to write one. It was to be titled "From Birth to the Corps." This was a virtual blueprint to identify the most vulnerable among us, for sure! For instance, if one shared about sexual abuse in your past -- it would pretty much make a person ripe for the picking when it came to choosing someone who could be persuaded to engage in the sexual exploitation/abuse/crimes that we all know now were rampant among the corrupted leadership, starting from vee-pee on down. God only knows how many people had access to those things -- and how they may have played a part in how people were manipulated by false "revelation" from those in leadership who wanted that information to use people. Again, sorry if this is not quite on topic. Little did so many of us who were so trusting and idealistic ever think that sharing our life stories with someone as "Godly" as Dr. Weirwille to read would ever have such a darker side to it!!