Further Light and Knowledge

http://exposingthetruth.info/top-five-r ... the-dying/

While this is far from some scientific study, it is an interesting view from someone that sat with people as they passed.

1) I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

2) I wish I didn’t work so hard.

3) I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

4) I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

5) I wish that I had let myself be happier.

Three of the five reasons are related directly to my exit from mormonism. Specifically, #1, #3, #5. With #4 I never knew true friendship until I left the church. I had friends, but only one has stayed a friend during my exit, though he's a long ways away. Now that I've left, I vacation with friends, I hang out, shoot the breeze, drink too much, laugh and cry with friends. I don't have a lot, but the few I have are worth the price of leaving. I was never able to feel as though I was myself while in the church. As a teen I remember wishing I wasn't so constrained by mormonism, specifcally the guilt I was made to feel. I can go on about each point. In the end, this article seems to highlight a lot of things I appreciate now that I've left and I thought I'd share.

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Random Stuff from a Random Mind
Ex-Mormons Worldwide

I can relate.
My nevermo parents were alcoholics and everything was fake, fake, fake. The false front I put up to the world and needing to please authority was the flaw in my character that connected with TSCC. In church I was never allowed to be myself, all thinking was done, the only option is the church option. worse yet, for people BIC, you're not allowed to find yourself. All along the way obstacles are thrown up in front of people. Duty to God program, missions, early marriage, bear children ASAP, callings, SAHM, the patriarchy, the church inserting itself into every relationship I have or at least trying to ,the church setting itself up as the ultimate authority. And don't forget to add the clinging of TBMs to the less active. Love bombing and shunning of people will disrupt our ability to process our emotions and thoughts. Of all these things, it's TSCC setting itself up as an authority, or rather me setting them up as an authority, that is the most damaging.
How can I not have a crises of faith, a crises of faith in myself?
I agree that it is so much healthier outside TSCC. TBMs can keep telling me that they are more than happy, that they experience joy, it's none of my business. I have my life to live.

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CW

The universe likes to laugh at us

I've seen that bouncing around the web...

I to see it as confirmation to what I've experienced with my exit from the Mormon Conditioning.

I find it interesting that old people in their rocking chairs reflect back on their lives and counsel to live life as if this life is all there is... even if they are believers in an afterlife.

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Let us read and let us dance: two amusements that will never do any harm to the world.
- Voltaire

I quickly laugh at everything, for fear of having to cry.
- Pierre de Beaumarchais

/grammar nazi