Note: This is the second of back to back episodes on the Unification Church, often referred to as the Moonies, named after their leader Sun Myung Moon.
Lisa spent her time playing with the children of the Messiah while living with Satan. Her mother went into the Unification Church, leaving Lisa and her brother behind with their father, a man living a lifestyle completely opposite of what they were to believe in. However on weekends Lisa would go play with the children of the Messiah, Sun Myung Moon, at times while she was visiting her mom in the church. Torn between two worlds, and really between who she was and who she felt she had to be in order for God to love her, Lisa went on a journey of exploration that ultimately led her to the depths of despair and eventual freedom.
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The songs that Lisa chose to represent her story are Thunder Road by Bruce Springsteen and You Don’t Own Me by Joan Jett.
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This podcast was made possible by my original podcast This JW Life. You can find it on any podcast app or on YouTube. It is a 9 part series about life as Jehovah’s Witnesses designed to help you understand how it worked in one comprehensive story and to help you process your own if you came from that environment.
Follow my new podcast called LouisvilleOne at LouisvilleOne.org or look it up on a podcast app. You can watch the live videos on the YouTube channel HERE.
Music by Fair Voyeur entitled “No Hell Yet”.
I just feel such a heart connection with Lisa, I was Raised JW. Lisa you are so genuine and lovely. We really don’t know what is happening to us in the indoctrination process! So glad I found this video, it was very healing to me.
It is so hard to even process after many years out. Still believing I was going to be killed by GOD at Armageddon…… I have awakened now, so don’t believe that anymore. Thank goodness!!!!! Very grateful for my beautiful life I have had out of the JW cult.
Thank you for sharing your story, you have and will help so many people who have been in a cult.
So thank you both so much!
Hi Windy,
Thank you for reaching out. I’m so glad you connected with my story. My hope is to be a resource and to help other cult survivors, especially Second Gens. I hope I can and the book can do that.
I’ve been out decades. A lot of decades. There still is so much to process and the teachings still can feel incredibly and indelibly carved into my brain. But I am changing that every day. I know we all can.
Thank you for reaching out. Please stay in touch!
Lisa xxx
Hello Lisa! I just finished listening to your conversation with Michael and as someone who also derives enormous happiness from things like wild birds, I just wanted to pop in and say that those goldfinches you love so much and were looking for on your trip are in that part of Minnesota year round. The boys who are bright yellow in early summer just don’t have to put so much effort into impressing the ladies that time of year, and so are kind of a drab brown at that time of year.
I’m not quite sure how to articulate the symbolism of this but I feel like it points to how wonderful things are around all the time, we just might not know it. 🙂 Be well and thank you for choosing to spreading love and light.
Hello Heather!!!
Thank you! Do you know if they’re also in PA (where I currently live) year round? If so, I will know to look for them more/more closely…
Which, I think, is your symbolism/point. There are wonderful things around (and within) me all the time. I just need to remember to look for and notice them. I think that’s (also) the essence of neuroplasticity and training my brain (and being) to be less “velcro for the bad and teflon for the good” and more “velcro for the good and teflon for the bad.”
And it always delights me when I remember that I’m not alone and we are in this together. Thank you!!!
Lisa
They are in PA year-round! Here’s a range map for the little darlings: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/American_Goldfinch/maps-range.