Just because you're paranoid

[outandabout]

I've been reevaluating and thinking more about my time in twi - and I think I am thankful for it, in a weird way. Without twi I would not have been able to do the kind of soul searching and deep thinking I have done in the last seven years. I have developed empathy, and tolerance, and greater spirituality. And I don't think I would have been able to do that sort of deep introspection if I had not survived the hell that was twi on the field, in a limb home, as a fellowship coordinator, WOW, Way Disciple, Staff, and peon. SO, in a way, thank you, TWI for ruining my life so that I could grab it back as my own.

That being said, and rethinking this thread and all the weird conflicting things we were supposed to believe, I started to think about how I thought when I was in twi. My mind was constantly consumed with a cacophony of thoughts that I now realize were designed to drown out my real inner voice (and probably the real still, small voice od God.) I was constantly obsessing about the Ministry, and how I was or was not "doing the Word" - was I speaking in tongues enough? My desk isn't "decent and in order." I shouldn't condemn myself. I am righteous now. I should go into the Way Corp. I am scared to death of going in the WC. That's devilish. Fear is of the adversary. Is that guy possessed? Am I being influenced by spiirits? Is my life really abundant? Why do I hate witnessing? That's not godly. I'm supposed to be an ambassador for Christ. Why don't I have someone in the class? Someone wants to talk with me. It must be a confrontation.. What did I do this time. If it's a confrontation I should be happy to recieve it because I want to be meek and change. I miss my family. My family is evil and devil possessed.

And it just went on and on and on like that all the time... I didn't have enough room in my head to think my own thoughts, and when they came up, I would squash them back down with some retemory, which I never knew enough of.

There was always more to do, and never enough time to do it all, and it was never good enough.

I realized last week that my internal voice sounds like a WC overseer, or like LCM. I yell at myself when I screw up the way LCM yelled at everyone at all times.

I would never speak like that to anyone else. Why do I speak that way to myself? A better question - WHY DO I STILL TALK THAT WAY TO MYSELF??

I am going to have to work on that. A lot.

But, TWI, I'm not afraid of you anymore. Or of your made up adversary. Kiss my @$$.

You really hit the nail on the head! Totally! That is so like what I used to think! When I was in the process of extricating myself out of TWI, I would think a thought, hear Craig's or some other leader's voice in my head negating that thought, think a thought, hear a voice about what's wrong with my thought, and back and forth in my head.....eventually my own thoughts superceded the "voices" and I was "free to be me."

It was a long process and today that "Voice of Craig" (imbedded in my brain from all those meetings and meals in the WC) is a distant memory.

Great description, JJ!

Edited January 20, 2013 by outandabout

[newlife]

Golly, reading your description of your thinking while in TWI....Hurt my head!! LOL Yes, I thought the same way too....so glad God has healed my mind from then.

[waysider]

The whole "likemindedness" concept was a cruel scam.

“Where all think alike, no one thinks very much”.......Walter Lippmann

Edited January 22, 2013 by waysider

[chockfull]

The whole "likemindedness" concept was a cruel scam.

“Where all think alike, no one thinks very much”.......Walter Lippmann

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds" - Ralph Waldo Emerson