[Music] Hey fellow genters, those of us who like our spirituality with a twist. So we're doing this series on cults and we have today the pleasure of having on Lesie Garrett. Thanks so much for coming on, Lesie. Hello. Thank you for having me. And our idea is to talk to people who maybe went through these kinds of cult experiences. and Lesie's going to tell us uh about her experiences and eventual uh changing of her experiences with the Jehovah's Witnesses. So, that's going to be our episode of today and thanks so much for coming on and sharing your story with us, Leslie. We really appreciate it. Oh, no problem. Thank you for having me. So, we were talking a little bit off mic and I was thinking, well, what's the right first question? And it would be, is it right to say the Jehovah Witnesses is a cult? And you just went, yeah, that's no problem. Yeah, absolutely. That's no problem. Yeah. Absolutely not. Yeah. And there's maybe some doubt about that, but there's certainly a lot of people who are coming out saying, "Oh, no. This is this is a cult." When once people, right? I think you all would be called apostates. That's going to be a special term. That would be me. That would special. There's gonna be a lot of jargon, I think, before the end of Yeah. Yeah. That would be what I would be considered right now. Sure. Yeah. Um, but you know, without, you know, it's like where do you start with something like that? And we thought, well, maybe we'll just start just by talking a little bit about you're sharing your experiences with this. You're kind of explaining you got in with your family like pretty young, so maybe we'll just start there. Sure. Yeah. The uh witnesses uh did their ministry doortodoor. So they came to our door. I was about six and my mom started uh studying with them. And you know, she studied I I believe for it was like maybe close to a year and then she decided to become baptized into this organization and uh my brother and I were raised basically in it. He was a little older than I was when he she decided to make this switch. So, it was, I think, more difficult on him because being 11 and 12 and then all of a sudden everything changes in your world, you know, school-wise, you're, you know, there you're not allowed to do all the holidays, you're not allowed to do the birthdays, and so everything just changed. Uh, so we started, um, she started taking us to the weekly meetings. There was a Sunday meeting. Just out of curiosity, Lesie, was your mom like kind of a searching person? Was there already religion in the family and she converted over or was it? So that's obvious that Yeah. Yeah, that's an interesting question. Um, my mom, this is my adult look back at it. My mom uh was raised in a very controlling family environment. So my grandparents were very controlling um and she they were religious but not overly religious. And my mom belonged um to when I was a young child belonged to a community church and we went to a community church. Um I do believe my mom was searching for for something you know whatever that might be something to belong to. Um but what was interesting is she found the witnesses comfortable and I believe that's because it's another controlling environment. you know, you're you're you go from something that you're raised as and it it's familiar, right? And so even though you think you're making your own choice and you're getting into this great this great community, it's very very controlling. So I think that was my mom's um basis with subconsciously not knowing that. Yeah, that makes total sense. Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah. Back in it, like is there something about like what they were teaching that really spoke to her or was it more just like the sort of like the psychological familiarity kind of thing that you're talking about or was there? I I think there was definitely a psychological familiarity for her. Uh that was number one. Uh number two, the the witnesses they are very biblically based. So, I mean, we studied the Bible back and forth, left and right all the time. Um, it was their interpretation of certain scriptures. Uh, but it was definitely biblically biblically based and it was s it basically encompassed and surrounded your entire life. So, if you if you're somebody who's trying to uh she was also she's also a very black and white person. Uh it's, you know, you're talking right, wrong, good, evil. There is isn't any gray um in her life. And I feel that the witnesses encompass that. It's very black and white, very good versus evil, very right versus wrong. It's there is no room for that gray area. That took me a long time to understand that life is is, you know, mostly gray. You have to, you know, figure that out. But yes, I think that was one of and she's still like that, you know, she's still very black and white. I was writing about that like sense of certainty, right? It almost sounds like that's the feeling. It gives you this real certain feeling. Sure. There's also a superior Yeah. a superiority complex that goes with that. You know, we are we are the chosen people. We are correct. We are the right. Um everybody else in the world is considered worldly. um who who whomever is not a a non-believer and they don't see the light, they don't see the truth and we do. And so there's very much of that superiority complex that I think goes goes along with that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So Leslie, you you're you know, you said your brother was like 11 or 12 when you guys converted. Um say a little because I don't you know I mean maybe I'm sure some of the audience is familiar with this. maybe they had somebody in school or somebody they know, but say a little bit about if you can about what the kind of general just general beliefs are and then how does that impact your life especially growing up because I think as adults we're not having birthday parties or dressing up too much for Halloween at our workplace. But in school you go through all of those, you know, little mini holidays. And uh I I had a friend of mine who was a a witness as a child and his childhood was infinitely different than every other person who he was sitting next to in class. It's a very different thing. So if you would maybe speak from your experience plus you know what you also just know in general. Sure. Sure. It was very the holidays were all lumped into uh basically one belief of they were pagan. That's what they believe that the they they came from a pagan origin. So they didn't want to follow anything that would be paganoriented. Uh also we were not allowed to stand for the pledge of allegiance or vote or uh serve in in the military or pledge your allegiance to anything but God. So that was also not allowed. Um so the holidays and the birthday parties were all kind of lumped into one thing. They they they added they added things that were not allowed during that time. Um you know, you weren't allowed to uh I couldn't go to school dances. Uh that was definitely a no because you would be associating with worldly people. What about dancing in general? You could dance. They had like at weddings. Weddings were a big deal to the witnesses because it was our your literally your only celebration your entire life you could do. That was about all you had. Uh, so they were a big deal. Get your boogie on then. That's your only chance. Oh. Oh, yeah. That was it. That was it. You got a wedding to go to, you were like, "All right, here we go. We get a chance." Um, yeah. Dances were not allowed. So, growing up in that, you were uh, you know, in school. I there were congregations where kids there were a lot of kids in the same school. I was not. I was the only child in my school. So I was very ostracized um you know because of that holiday parties my mom would pick me up from them early. I wasn't allowed to stay for those. Um so those those were all the restrictions I guess during childhood that you know was not allowed to do. You weren't allowed to watch rated art movies. Um, I'm still obviously Daniel, but I'm not going to say that right there. Yeah. So, we weren't allowed to do we weren't allowed to do anything uh like that. And um uh socializing obviously we had to uh get through our school day or our workday, but outside association with anyone who wasn't a witness was discouraged. We're going to say that it was discouraged. Wondered about that, Daniel. I know how it was for you, but I had one girl who was a Jehovah Witness when I was growing up in school, too. And you just sort of knew like whenever anything happened, she would have to leave. So, and I never knew if she felt bad or good about it. I don't I didn't feel like as kids that we thought that much about it. I don't know if she felt ostracized or not, but it does make you wonder. I mean, I guess you said Daniel grew up with kids, too. Yeah. My guess is Yeah, for sure. I mean, I did. And now you look back must have felt awkward for that person. I don't like obviously, but yeah. Yeah. I mean, I just remember like no no, you know, you're you're in a school, public school, sometimes they'll do Valentine's Day things. They couldn't do any of that. There's no uh definitely not Halloween, you know, other kids might be having make, you know, depending on how wealthy your school is. Some kids can put costumes on, some kids just wear some, you know, weird makeup, you know, whatever. And now that you know what, but they but those kids, the Jehovah's kids couldn't do any of that stuff, you know. Yeah. No, like none none of none of this kind of a thing. It's kind of like a FOMO thing, like a perpetual FOMO, but like Yeah, for sure. Did you get crap from other kids and they give you a hard time? Oh, yeah. Oh, for sure. Oh, yeah. I was I was, you know, relentlessly teased. And I, you know, I um actually have one one memory. I was on the bus and I was getting I was getting teased and it turned out that the bus driver was um happened to be studying with them. And the only reason I know this is she actually pulled the bus over. She heard what was going on, pulled the bus over, turned around and said, "Don't you know that Jehovah is God's name and you need to leave her alone?" And it was this whole thing. And I thought, "Oh, don't do this. You're just going to make this worse on me." But it was, you know, I mean, she was trying to stand out for me. And, you know, but during that time, I was I was kind of mortified about the whole thing. But, yeah, it was for sure. I got teased quite a bit. Yeah. For it. It was a It was a big deal. Leslie, how old were you when you realized that like this was not within the confines of what we would consider normal? And one and then the second part is [...] normal. So as an adult, right? But more importantly, when did you realize that this was a det that this was a detriment to your life? Um, okay. Okay. Well, I knew right away that it wasn't normal. I knew right away that we were on the outs. So, that was like I knew off the bat, even as a child, I knew this isn't normal, but it became my normal. It just wasn't, you know, societal uh normal. Um, as for your other question, it that was a slower process. I would say I was definitely when I hit teenage years, I had my little rebellious periods, you know, I was trying to kind of get away with things my my maybe my mom wouldn't find out, you know, like hang out with a whirly boy or hang out with I know hang out with, you know, a couple worldly friends and um you know, but it was this constant battle within myself. So I think I always knew that it was a constant battle within myself of well I have to do the right thing and but then I was like but I just want to be free and so you know you know your teenage years are are really tough anyway and let alone to add that to it and it was this constant pull against with myself. I I was like well I want to do this and it wasn't like I wanted to go be a bad person or do bad things. I just wanted freedom and and then I thought, well, I can't do that. So, I have to I have to be good and serve Jehovah and have, you know, um and and stay within those con confines of that organization. But um so that was a longer uh period and when I hit um end of my 30s I would say uh early 30s I really started to go okay this there's problems here like I started I was um mature enough and adult enough to understand that all right I'm not liking certain things I'm seeing and it was like slowly starting to open my eyes because you got to understand critical thinking is not encouraged at all. that you you are not raised to be a critical thinker. So that took me a while to to be able to go it's okay to start thinking these ways and I started to see the um I think the the first thing I saw that was really a big deal actually was the u the political system within the organization that was a big deal like how your family was set up. So, because my mom was married to a non-believer and um you know, she had her kids, we were actually kind of lower uh on the on the poll. If you had a family that had a husband and wife with their children and the husband was considered an elder and the wife was a full-time pioneer, which is somebody who spent their time in the service field going doortodoor preaching, they were higher up. And so I think I saw an actual political system within that and that started to really bother me cuz you know I mean we're all just humans right who was going to you know and especially there you think you think everybody should be just accepted and you know it's supposed to be like that and it wasn't at all. It was you know you were we were lower on the scale for sure. Can women like you kind of use that terminology and we were kind of joking at the beginning like when you get into these areas there's always this kind of weird language that kind of pops up. So sure there's the elders and like you kind of just said your mom was a pioneer. I wasn't sure when I was trying to learn more about this before you know prepping for the episode. Can women even become elders because I got the impression maybe no. So women like are pioneers and the guys are the women have their place. Yes, women have their place. There is definitely men um are the only ones who can become an elder. Uh women do not hold a position of any sort of um of of any place in that organization. In fact, say that you are meeting uh to go out in service and there is no brother there. So there is no male there. Then a woman must wear uh they had women wear a head covering. You had to wear a head covering to be able to say a prayer. you know, before you went out. Um, so women were definitely, um, we were to suppress any personal opinions, emotions, natural instincts. Um, you know, we were definitely taught to be submissive and humble, which fed into how marriages were as well. Um, particularly mine, you know, because I did marry into it. Maybe like before we do the marriage one because that was you know we talked a little bit off mic beforehand. The other thing you brought up from your teenage years was you sort of saw your brother kind of shunned which is like one of the major notorious kind of things right? Yeah for sure. So my brother left he decided he was like I said 11 12 when he became in and when he was about 20 he was he was done he wasn't going to do this and you know you have two choices. uh there is no there is no gray, there is black and white. You are either gone or you're in it. And you know he left and um he actually joined the military because they uh he didn't have any schooling either. That's a whole another subject. Schooling was not encouraged at that time um you know to go into college. But he went into the military. He left and my I watched my mother. She did not speak to him for years. didn't have anything to do with him. Um, I saw him very little. Um, so being that age, I was 15. Being that age, watching that happen to my brother, um, as we talked about a little bit off camera, is I realized love was conditional and I was super scared to lose that love of a parent during that time. And so that is why we went two different routes. He left. I stayed, you know, I conformed. He left. But they were equally just as damaging and difficult in their own way. And and he and I have talked about that later on. But yeah, he was he was definitely shunned. And if you leave the organization, you are not um all these people that were your social circle, your community for years and years, they will not speak to you. You have nothing. So you they that is where the cult I definitely would define that in in the cult category for being the witnesses because they um they you create they create your entire world around this organization. I can barely even call it a religion but whatever you want to call it. Organization is fine. Yeah. Yeah. Organization that your entire world is that. So your social world um everything is is that your family everything is tied up in that and they practice shunning basically as a control to you know get you back because a lot of people go out into it and they have nothing and they don't they're floundering and they don't know they don't know how to build a life because you have to build a new life if you do that and to start over is very difficult with zero help you know you have no no emotional support, no support from a friend, no support from anybody. So he he left and I watched that happen and it it's it's a tool, you know, the shunning is a tool. They call it to keep the organization clean and moral, but it's it's definitely a tool. Yeah, we recently on like attachment theory. Daniel and I spent a lot of time talking about that and you're really playing people's attachments there, right? Because it's like, oh, I had major problems with that. I had fear of abandonment, anxious attachment for years and years and years. The fear of abandonment was that was a that was years of trying to work through that. And that was well after I left. Um yeah, the fear of abandonment, the anxious attachment um was a huge huge one for me, you know, because that's what I would see. So we have our, you know, our kind of running definition here of our of cults on the on the meta scale, right? So conformity which fits social cohesion and uh a charismatic leader which I do want to before we move on I want to give the background on on this a little bit but from the conformity portion actually I I want to add this because I just when you were talking earlier I was like it it inherently um you have to give up critical thinking and we've talked about this in a previous episode but that specifically goes with that like if you're going in order to conform to this thing whether it's Jehovah's Witness right with you. We had uh I had on one of our other co-contributors, Rory. We had his friend on, Nathan Orchard, who was a Mormon. Uh we're going to have on a friend of my brothers here pretty soon. She was a Menanite. Very similar kind of, you know, story. And you know, even now with the current political climate, we could definitely say it's a cult, you know, without a doubt. And critical thinking is absolutely has to be abandoned because part of it is your ability to withhold even your own judgments, right? is to take the other person's opinion and say, "Hold on, let me maybe I'm wrong. Let's just see. Maybe these Jehovah's peoples are right. Let's just go let's go down that road and then I'm going to put myself in their shoes." But for when you're inside doing it on the outside, that is no good. Cannot. No, you cannot. No, you cannot. In fact, um if you do have any sort of issue or anything heavy going on in your family, you are encouraged to only speak to the elders and not to seek outside sources because you might be influenced by uh worldly thinking. So here you are going through whatever issue you're going through and you you're going to these untrained men, these these men who are not trained to be therapists, who are not trained to be psychiatrists, who who who don't have any sort of formal training. And you're supposed to entrust your your care and your life and through them. And and and also the other factor of that is you didn't want to go to them as well because you never knew if you were going to be judged by them and and then kicked out. So if you did have a problem that they found morally wrong, they could dysfellowship you and you were gone. And so then why would you? So you I learned particularly to not open up to almost anyone about about issues. and I had to I was dealing with a lot of things within myself. One of the things I heard about that that was really fascinating again I was prepping a little bit for this and one of the ladies was talking about there was sort of almost like a little bit of a spying network kind of vibe too where if you said something to a friend you weren't sure if they would tell it to an elder so I better not tell is that like is that the kind of feeling that you had too careful what they say in front of who? Yeah, they would definitely. So they encouraged um to love your brother and if you find that they're on a weward path and you hear that they're on a weward path, then you will then be guilty if you know of such information and you need to step forth and and tell the elders. So you found your like I I found a couple groups where you had like the quote, oh gosh, snitches get stitches. That's the bad group in the in the Jehovah's Witnesses, right? You have that bad group that you could go and we we would party and do a couple things. We had our limit. So these are like Jehovah Witnesses, bad girls and bad boys. Yeah. Yeah. You had your little group. You found it. And then um but you knew who were the ones that would would would tell on you. So you knew not to to you know to trust them. But it was really hard to even really trust anybody because you never knew if they were going to get a guilty conscience and then go and say something. And and literally, we're not talking about anything crazy. We're talking about maybe some underage drinking and stuff like that. Like nothing. There's nothing crazy. Nine-year-olds drinking smear. You know what I mean? It's right. I mean, it was just it was it was But yes, that is true. There is like um there is that little spy thing going on where people would would talk would tell on you. In fact, in fact, one quick story. Um, my girlfriend and I, I think we were, I think I was like 16 and she was maybe 15. And we went up to Kenosha to a skate demo where like they had the skateboarders at the time, right? So, you're talking 89. And um, we were just at this skate demo and it was outside. We weren't doing anything. We were just there. Well, somebody passed and saw us outside and not only did we not get spoken to directly about it, they mentioned it from the stage. They mentioned it from the stage that two of their young people were seen hanging out with worldly people at this thing. And so there's an elder talking about it on the stage and we're looking, we're like, "Oh my god, they're talking about us." And they hadn't even come to us and talked to us. So, it was very publicly humiliating if they found they didn't even they didn't even give us a chance to talk to us about it. They just went and talked about it on stage and I was like, "Oh my gosh." Yeah. Yeah. It was But yeah, you get It's so funny because you want to like even when you're telling the story, you sort of want to laugh. Yeah. Right. Because it seems so absurd, but like it's mortifying like when you're in that, right? It's not funny at all. 15 years old and you're not doing anything technically wrong. You know, you're just kind of doing something that you thought might be kind of fun to go do at that time and and here, you know, you're getting scolded from it publicly in front of the congregation on the stage. So, it was that was that was nuts. But yeah, that did happen. That fits that fits the second second point, right, which is the social cohesion aspect. Yeah. like you you have to conform and and to your to the point about your mother, right, of being black or white in or out. I mean, that's almost a foundational piece to any cult is that you are either in the cult or out of the cult, there is no halfway because, you know, like you said, they were trying to keep it clean, but like no matter how many times you wipe an [...] it's still full of [...] You know what I'm saying? So, like that's that's kind of how it is. But in order in order for that kind of there there's no boundary if it's semi-permeable. It has to be a one-way door. And right it makes it easier to think because then you say, "Oh, you're either with us against us, right? You're either witness or whatever a non-witness is as whatever they're called." Um or and the same thing politically, you're either aligned with us or you're one of them. Whoever them is, it doesn't matter. But in in order to do that, you have to be very like simple-minded and it and it come it builds off the first point of like you have to give up critical thinking that in order to do once you give that up then now you're just left with two choices us or them good or bad me or you you know it's very binary in in decision and it it makes it easy to exclude others. It makes it very easy for you to go they are not us therefore they are bad worldly stupid you know whatever label you want to use you know what I mean and there again you're talking that superiority complex that comes out they think they feel they're superior to others and um and and you know uh and they're in the antithesis of it's the antithesis of what you should be I mean if you're going to be this loving organization and we welcome everybody body in and you know you you know we want to help save everybody but it wasn't it was like you have to do this and we are we are the truth we are the light. Leslie before we move on and Eric you brought you guys brought this up earlier so I'd like for you to touch on it before we kind of move to kind of like how Leslie's breaking out of this you know thing for her or whatever else she wants to talk about. Um a little follow up on the her brother situation too but like I'll catch it in a second. Yeah. So just like so so the last part and we haven't gotten to this in our own episodes which is probably what we do next but the the last portion that we've kind of been using as our working definition for cults is this charismatic leader and I don't think I mean I certainly didn't know about the the witnesses piece of this the kind of this this charismatic leader individual that Eric mentioned earlier. So, you know, if you guys would enlight me and uh our our you know, listening and watching audience on to this part of the Jehovah's Witness, you know, uh that'd be good. Yeah. I can't I mean, I remember that hearing the dude's name, but like what what was it Leslie again? Yeah. So, originally the founder was a gentleman named Charles Taz Russell and it was in the late 1800s and so there was originally and he called them the Bible students. They weren't called Jehovah's Witnesses at that point, but he was the original founder of it. And then after he passed, it went to um oh, I want to say his name was Rutherford. It was another another man who took over and his name was Joseph Rutherford and he took over and then it went to a gentleman named uh Nathan no I believe. So Nathan of like patriarchs it was of yeah patriarchs. But after No is when it got interesting because there were there wasn't that single leader anymore. After No, it became um what they call the governing body. So it was a small group of men that said they receive uh the information uh through the Holy Spirit through Jesus. They they said they receive it from God through Jesus Christ through their his holy spirit and so they became so it is no longer a person it's a group I I want to say it's small I want to I it's like maybe 8 to 10 you know men in this group and um so they are the governing body and they what they say is what you need to follow and listen to. Also, if they are wrong, which they have been about certain things wrong, they're never wrong. When they're when they're wrong or there needs to be a course correction, you just have to accept it and and you know, and they just go, "Well, that's, you know, that's not what Jehovah wanted. We're going to go this way." And um so, yeah. So, it's the governing body. So, it isn't technically a charismatic leader anymore, but then it goes down into they break everything down into uh you I talked about the elders, but then there's the circuit overseer who is higher than the elders, and then there's the district overseer who's higher than him. And so, when these men would come in to your say the circuit overseer was in in town and he was going to come into your congregation, oh, everybody showed up that day, you know, to the Kingdom Hall. Everybody was on their best behavior. Everybody's going out in service and greeting everybody and it was all just it was I think that bothered me. That was another factor that really bothered me and I was like, "Okay, so you know, you're going to put on your smiley perfect face for this man who comes in and it's it's it's not supposed to be like that." But yeah, skate park that weekend, Leslie, don't skate park when the Cricut can't do that. But I got to wear my uh my below the knee dress and and go out and now all those men to dress code. They all those men were uncircumcised or is that not a requirement? No, that was never a topic on that. Okay. That was never No, that was never you could do you could be one way or the other on that. That was not that was one thing that was not controlled. It's interesting in the anthropological conversations we have sort of a like a friend of the show we referenced one Ryan Davenport our anthropologist and he kind of says well a lot of this religion stuff starts with like the charismatic leader and it eventually becomes like a hierarchy organization right at that point you're like okay well guess we'll call that a religion shrug you know but it starts in something that's usually some charismatic person Daniel and I have been trying to like play around with like how does this grow and develop right and that seems to be like the anthropological story of that too, right? I think when it gets larger, religion starts as cults or something, right? And then they kind Right. Yeah. Because it starts with one person, right, who's starting this whole thing and then it grows into I think as it grows and and picks up momentum and speed and gets bigger and bigger, it you know, you lose that one person and you get into this. At least that's how it is with witnesses in my experience. Maybe before we go and do because I am curious like we'll go through like the beliefs and all that kind of stuff hear you I'm curious like what it felt like to you know the marriage aspect that you brought up earlier too but I just with your brother it might be it's one of the things that hit me when we were talking a little bit off mic so I guess I had two thoughts did your brother try to encourage you to leave too or did you keep a relation with him and the other part that's kind of funny when you were telling it was like okay it was okay that your dad wasn't a member but you had to like shun your brother I I guess because his leaving was worse than your dad never participating in the first place. Well, there's a difference. So, my dad never became baptized into the organization and my brother did. And there was a lot of pressure to to get baptized. When you hit about early teens or there's a lot of pressure from u different members of the congregation to get baptized, when are you going to get baptized? You know, it's this whole thing. And so when you get baptized, you make this commitment. And so because my brother had done that, he had made a commitment. My dad never did that. So my dad, it was still okay. He was a non-believer, but it was fine. But my brother, because he made that commitment and left, then that's when the shunning came in. Okay. Yeah. And so my brother never um No, he never encouraged me. Actually, I was I was still a teenager when that happened. And he was just trying to figure it out and find his own way. And I think he was he was so lost in his own way. He couldn't he didn't have any support. I mean, nothing, you know, so he was, you know, building everything from scratch and trying to figure it out as a 20-year-old. And um so no, we didn't have much of a relationship. Uh you know, here and there we would talk or he'd come home and I'd see him for a day maybe or something like that, but um not until really started after I left. after I left when I was 35 then um we started to try to uh repair that you know and now we have a great relationship with each other you know and it's you know we have our shared trauma bonding so it's our thing but uh you know we have a great relationship now and we've talked all about it you know and and he he knows I went through just as a hard time as he went through just like I said different different ways different aspects yeah well Maybe like the other part, Daniel, if it's cool with you, is like so at what age did you sort of get married and was that that's a kind of a deep commitment not only to a person but now you're committing to life, right? Yeah. Yep. That's interesting. That's very interesting. So most witnesses So there is there there is no sex allowed prior to marriage. All right. So that is a dysfellowshipping act um to do that. So most witnesses get married very very young. So you're talking 18 like 18. Okay. Like 18, 19, 20. They get married very young into these um these marriages when you're just I mean you're just a kid, you know, you're just you don't even know yourself and you're you're making this commitment. And it's because they didn't want to commit a sin and then put their life in in jeopardy of of Yeah. That's a whole other, you know, subject of Armageddon, but putting your life in jeopardy. So they um Yeah. So they got married very young. I And and you know, and you also have to think too, you want to talk about your dating pool being small. Okay. So you have like, you know, like six guys from which to choose from, you know, like you which one am I going to pick? You know, you have like this small circle. Um and I was actually 23 when I got married. Um so I was a little I know. I I was like an old lady, right? So, I was older. Um, and I got married and um, it was I thought at the time I was doing the right thing and I was pleasing, you know, it's that peopleleasing idea and I was I was pleasing God and pleasing my family and pleasing and um, and it wasn't like I didn't love him. I loved him and you know he gave me two wonderful children but it was not a a great marriage. It was not in any sort of aspects. There was a lot of issues with that in many yes I was I'm sorry in many orthodox relig you know the any orthodoxy aspect of religion they encourage me marriage at a very young age. So that's not just Jehovah's Witness, but that's right. You know that that's that's for for multitude of reasons. One is because the people are young and horny and that can cause them to, you know, engage Yeah. in the in the nasty, if you will, want to cope with that. Um, but also when you're that young and horny, you're you're also very fertile. So, right, somebody could be by the time they're 23 or 24 strapped down with two or three kids. Well, now you're perfect now. Now you're in you're in this for the rest of your life now. And that's all religions, you know. Yeah. Um I'm thinking of some specific friends that I have in in religions that that's that's the case. You know, you go out with somebody two or three times you're like, "Okay, that's good." You know, they look good. We're going to do this thing. And then, you know, they have a few kids and all of a sudden now for the rest of your life, you're probably in this thing because you have to support your family. You're tired from doing that. whatever energy you have left is probably going to be to bang your old man or your old lady and uh you know you pay your tithes to the to the culture to the tradition or whatever and you're a useful tool for them you know you're you're a hamster in a wheel um so it it it's in your in the where you grew up but it's in many other traditions as well like probably a long time it's almost a mechanism of control really but thinking about thing oh sorry yeah go ahead I'm sorry Leslie yeah no No, go ahead, please. I'm No, I was just like thinking uh Well, I was just thinking about, you know, we've talked about in different episodes because there's sort of this underlying question that we're asking of like how many cult beliefs can still like hang around, you know, in a bigger culture or something. It's kind of a thing you wonder about. But even in talking with my mom who's like born in 1940 or I grew up with my grandma, like the whole idea that you have premarital sex, I've asked my mom about and she was like, "No, no, no way." Oh, so it was like at a certain point the culture changed but like you were living a life that like you go back a little bit in the time machine and it would have been pretty typical. Oh, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. For sure. Yeah. You were you just were was not allowed. In fact, if you wanted to date, you know, you were encouraged obviously to date. Um but you had to have a chaperone. You had to have somebody too. Like it was very limited contact you would be able to have with this person. Yeah. Yeah. You had limited contact. You could spend a lot of phone time with each other, but if you and if your families were around, but to spend one-on-one time alone, you you could not, you know, because they were so afraid you would, you know, commit a sin and, you know, then you're then you got all sorts of heaps of problems. So, yeah. So, you get married very very young, you know, and I was I was a little bit older, but yeah, I mean, if you want to call it hard to even Was your husband older, too? Was he an older guy or was he No, he was younger. He was actually 21. Oh, good you, Mrs. Robinson. I know. Look at me. Look at me. Uh, yeah, he was actually I mean, we were just so young, you know, and then we had our first child three years later and or two and a half years later and then, you know, we had our sec our son, you know, after that. So, um, yeah, you're just kind of you're you're it rolls your life rolls into this whole thing and you're not even really paying attention to what you actually want. You never stop to to ask, hey, what do I actually want here? What's what's good for me? What's what what what do how do I want to build my life? Because your life is already pre-built in a certain way. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, you have people who are uh intentionally guiding horny people and they're deciding for them, right? They're like, here, here, do this thing and then now lock yourself in this system. So, yeah. And anyways, anyways, was there like a kind of a just a psychological aspect? I got like a psych degree in the background. Daniel both collision, but was there like was one of these things where like you're with this person and you have this strange feeling like I never really got to know them that well before we started this thing and all of a sudden you're like, "Okay, now I have to figure out like who this person actually is that you're involved with, you know?" Oh, yeah. Actually, I was um that was probably one of the biggest things is after we got married, I was like, "What? What?" you know, he he put on his best face during our whole dating and engagement and and everything. And then after we got married, it was just it was a big eye opener actually. um you know and I was just supposed to listen and submit and you know I had my place and um yeah it was it was quite miserable for a long time and you know I started I think we talked about I when I was in my mid30s I was married a total of 11 years and when when I was I would say we were about married maybe nine years and I started to really question you know uh the witness witnesses and their teachings. And when he heard me like double thinking about that, it caused us even more problems than we already had, you know, because he was like, "How could you even do that? How what what do you mean you're questioning this?" And, you know, I knew then that if I wanted to change my life and I needed to to do that, I I was going to have to light the whole thing up and burn it and walk away. And I knew what all that meant. But that's scary. It's scary. It's your whole life. You you've built and you know when you come out of it, you're you you don't have anything. You're not going to have a friend. You're not going to have a support. You're doing this whole thing on your own. But I knew that it was going to be that way if I wanted to change my life in any sort of way or fashion. I was also getting physically ill when I was going to the Kingdom Hall. Believe it or not, my body was showing because I was Yeah. Like I would get migraines, um upset stomachs every time I went in. Like I was like, "God, every time I'm here, I get a migraine." And every time I'm here, I feel nauseous and sick because I just I couldn't stomach what was being fed down my throat anymore. And you know, so I was physically getting ill from that. And I just it was it was just I knew it was time when I knew it was time, but I knew what it it was going to cost me and I knew what I had to do to get out of it. So what was the um what was the Chinese medical aspect that Daniel? You want to talk about that just for a sec? Yeah, go for it. Go for It's kind of fascinating because there's a whole I mean psychologically you call that like a smatapform disorder or something, right? The emotions are repressed and they come out in these physical symptoms. I mean but like in Chinese medical world those are all kind of classic symptoms that they tie into what they would call the wood phase and it has to do with the liver and it's supposed to be how the body regulates its energy and its flow. And so to get headaches and stomach aches are classic. And then there's a kind of like in Chinese medicine there's this theory of which emotions are connected. And this is sort of like anger and frustration like unfulfilled desires sometimes is brought up. Yeah. Very suppressed things get suppressed and then you know it all explodes out into these things you know. Um yeah, I mean like you obviously live that you know and probably like freedom on some level maybe tied into you know spiritually those things too like did that desire like I want to be free at some point or another and that's freedom is still the number one the number one thing that is important to me. If you ask me one thing that's important to me I'm going to tell you it's my freedom. It's freedom. this freedom to choose however I want to choose and um and to I had to give myself permission though to to figure out how to do that because for a long time I I didn't even give myself permission you know after I left them I was governing myself you know telling myself I wasn't allowed to do that it was so long to work through all that it was so long and I was I was suppressing my own self even after I got out because I was like oh I I can't do that like you know and I still had that major people pleasing thing and it was I couldn't set boundaries to save my life. I didn't know how to set a boundary. Um so that was all a relearning of a relearning of of building having to build a new life. I had to learn how to do all those things that I I didn't know how to do. I had to give myself permission to do to have a choice like oh I have a choice. Wow I have whoa I have a choice. I didn't know what to do with that for a long time. One of the things we've been trying to talk about I think Daniel too this idea like if you're going to like progress let's say psychosspiritually which is like one of our themes in the whole podcast is you have to be a free person to do it right if you don't have freedom you can't you can't in any individual way say that you can actually progress as a person or grow whether you want to say psychologically or psychospiritually you need freedom to be able to do that it's sort of like ohal right so that's kind of like yeah anyways yeah it's it's been a big subject matter yeah so Leslie Sure. You're okay. So you're in you left. How old were you when you left? Uh I was 30 35. 35. So you're 35 when you left. And you had said that a couple years before that you were starting to question. And so the the questioning is the sort of out the the outpouring of inner workings of your thinking, right? So what were some of the initial um thoughts or feelings or realizations, inspirations, influences, whatever word you want to use that were sort of uh streaming through you that led you to go, hold on, I don't know about this. Like what was the what were some of those influences? Um well, okay. I had um you know, my ex-husband had some siblings. So, I had um a sister-in-law who was very young and uh she got very ill and um she had cancer and uh Jehovah's Witnesses do not allow blood transfusions. So, she man it was like diagnosis to death with her was two weeks. It was really quick. She had stage four, didn't know it. Um, non-hodkkins lymphoma. And, uh, her red blood cell count, you know, dropped to nothing. And so, she seized and and passed. And I think what I mean, obviously, she would have passed eventually anyway. I think what upset me is that she was not allowed. you were your medical decisions on your own life were governed. You were not allowed to take that blood transfusion. They based it off of scripture in Acts about how uh God says you are to stay away from, you know, all blood and anything with blood. And so that's what they base this on. So I think that's what really kind of ignited it. I was angry. I was angry that, you know, and everybody was like, "Oh, she died faithful." You know, she died faithful. And I was like, "What? What do you mean? Who gives a [...] Who gives a fuck?" Because she died faithful. She She didn't have a choice, you know? I mean, she had a choice. She could have taken it, but what would have happened to her? You know, that's what I mean. It's like all these So, she didn't, you know, her choice was wasn't even allowed. And I think that's what initially started it. I was like, "Wait a minute." You know, why why do they get to tell me what I get to do with my body as well? and what happens to me if I'm in a a health situation. And so that was that was the beginning. And I think there was just which I find in any religion, but there was so much hypocrisy. There was so much hypocrisy in in the organization and there was just I just wasn't able to I was starting to really see it and and stomach it or couldn't stomach it anymore. Hence the upset stomachs. But um that was that that was the big one was when she died. When she passed away, I was like, "Okay, like that's when I started to really question what was what was going on." And then I started to pay attention um just to pay attention as to what I was being fed and what what was what was being said. And I was like, "Wait a minute. I you know, I just felt suffocated. Everything just felt suffocated. I didn't have my children were the other thing that was that was also the big one. Um my children were eight and four when I left. But prior to that, I remember thinking, is this really what I want to teach them? Is this really what I want? Do I want them going through what I went through and not having that choice? Do I really believe what I'm feeding them is what I want is how I what I want to give them that experience. And that was probably my biggest um biggest reason was my children, you know, and I I saw them and I was like, I cannot let my daughter see that this is okay to have a marriage this way and this is how a marriage is to be modeled and a partnership because it was there was no partnership. And I those those were the big the big things impetus for me to to get out and leave. I I'm like, I can't I can't do to my kids what was done to me and controlled and shoved down my throat. And I just couldn't do it. I wanted them to be able to have the life that I wanted that I I had desired. And so, you know, I mean, to this day, you know, I think they're both very happy that, you know, I left and and they've both thanked me. You know, they have both thanked me because they both have said, "Wow, our lives would be completely different." I said, "Yeah, it would be would be completely different." And if that's the one gift I can give to them that I was able to give them the the freedom to choose and all that, you know, leave me out of it, but if I could give that give that gift to them, that was that that was the most rewarding thing. Thanks, Leslie. That's like really powerful, actually. Yeah, for sure. And that's like I mean like I I have two kids, too. And yeah, I could just imagine that feeling like of going, "Okay, I better look really deeply of like, is this what I'm going to pass on?" Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. My kids were terrified. They were terrified. Not to interrupt you, but they were terrified of u my ex-husband. He had a horrible temper and they were terrified of him. They were, you know, and um I just I I just couldn't do it anymore. I just was like, "My kids, my daughter does not need to see this. She's seen enough of it. she needs to see a healthier relationship, which of course took me forever to get, but you know, that was that was my own journey on figuring all that out. But, um, yeah, I just wanted to give them something more, and that was definitely my Have you have you been, um, a counsel to any others who were thinking about leaving or have recently left? No, I you know I none of them would talk to me and so I wasn't I I nobody ever came out to me and said, "Hey, you know, I'm thinking of leaving." I do remember though after I left, I ran into um an ex-witness, somebody that um and and I I had gone along with it. I wasn't supposed to talk to her, so I shunned her. I shunned this person because she left and I ran into her and I had left um at a gym. I was working out and ran into and I went up to her and I apologized and I told her I was so sorry that I treated her that way. And she goes, "Oh, Leslie, you were just doing what, you know, they all did." And I said, "I know, but and I I feel deeply terrible for doing that to you when you just the same thing. She just wanted to be free of of her of what happened." So, um, you know, I am in touch with, um, a couple ex witnesses, you know, that I grew up with that are no longer witnesses, you know, we're in we're in touch and I think whenever we're I'm going through anything because, as Daniel knows, like this is a layering process and, you know, I can you think you deal with everything and you wrap it up, but once it unlayers, another layer pops up and you're like, "Oh [...] I thought I dealt with that." you know, and now I'm not um you know, I will reach out um to them and be like, "Hey, this is how I'm feeling." Because they know, they're the ones who totally get it. Like you guys can all, you know, people can conceptualize what it was or, you know, obviously because you didn't have the same experience. But when you have that experience, you know, sometimes those are your people who you you need to rely on and go to. So, I do have them. I do, you know, here and there. I have a couple people that I'll talk to like, "Hey, I'm going through this thing." And, you know, I it's freaking me out. I'm still going through stuff. And um yeah, so no, but I never I never like was a counsel to anyone. You know, nobody reached out to me and I wasn't going to try to pull anyone away obviously. You know, it's their own choice. It's kind of wild. It sounds like what was happening was that you not only had to like end your relationship with this group, but you also had to like dissolve a marriage and a family. It's all happening like all at once. One pow. Yeah. Yep. All at once. Light it on fire. Like I said, you got to light it on fire because you just know that um you it to you have to start from scratch. But at that point, I just didn't care anymore. I didn't know how I was going to do it. I just went, "Well, I don't know how I'm going to do this, but I'm going to figure this out." And the kicker was is my mom when I told her I was leaving and I was divorcing, you know, my my ex-husband, she was she she was like, "Okay, I I'll still support you." She's still supporting me. And I was like, "What? You know, what are you I went through all this and you're still going to support me?" So, she still spoke to me and talked to me. And then the kicker was about a two years after I left, she decided to leave. And oh man, was I mad. Oh, yeah. That took like years to try to like not be angry about that. I was even more mad because we went through 30 years of all that and then she decides, you know, oh yeah, I guess you're right, Les. I'm going to leave. And I was like, oh my god. But what if you were what if you were her inspiration? I it could I could have been, but at the time I didn't view I I didn't view that, you know, but I'm sure that's how she she viewed it, you know, as as wow, you know, like I guess Leslie, you know, I was pointing out things that I saw like we had conversations, so I I could view it like that, but I was at the time, you know, you're you're just angry. I was just angry about it, you know, and that took that took some therapy to get through. And And your brother had been your brother had been out for how long at that point when you were out? Oh. Uh, 15 years. Were you in contact with him that whole time? Not really. Very little. Very, very little. We had very little contact. Um, but once I was out, even after that, I think it just took us time, you know. There was a lot of there was a lot of forgiveness that needed to happen and a lot of um layers that needed to be worked through of feelings, you know. um and to sit down and have some conversations and you know you know now we're we have a wonderful relationship but it took some time to get there. One of the things that I've heard about like people leaving, you know, these kinds of situations because we've been researching this a little bit was like there's a a lot of times what will happen for people, there'll be someone else, you know, like what happened between you and your mom? All of a sudden, you're the person going, "Hey, you know, what about this or what about that?" And they can feel the questioning and they can also feel like there's a social bonding there and then, you know, the attachment things don't feel so bad because I have other people to attach to. But it almost sounds like were you doing this solo or did you have other people that were kind of like I don't know like uh compatriots for whatever better word with that maybe I said that wrong but other people that or did you run that more solo when you left? Were you just doing that more? Oh I was solo. I was solo where apparently Lesie Yeah. Yeah. I was solo. I did not have um I did not have any help. In fact, I remember um I after I left uh I made one friend. I made a friend. I met I met this woman. I made a friend and I was like, "Oh my god, I have a friend." You know, and um you had like a worldly friend. Yes, she was a worldly person. A whirly friend. And and fun fun fact story is um she was great. Actually, she was great. Um, and the reason why she was so great is, you know, after the kids wanted I left and I remember it was August and October came and my kids wanted to celebrate Halloween and I was at Target and they wanted to go down the Halloween aisle and I was like, you know, I literally couldn't breathe because 30 years of tapes are in my head, you know, and I was like frozen. And I called my friend, my one friend, and um she goes, "Which Target are you at?" And I told her, and she said, "I'm coming. I'll come." And she came to Target and walked down the, you know, the um aisles with the Halloween costumes with my kids and helped them pick out a outfit. And you know, I was like, it was crazy. And they wanted to do all the stuff that we, you know, hadn't been doing. And so I wanted to give them that experience. And it was fine. But man, it was it was a lot to take, you know? I was like shaking in my boots just at a stinking Target just to go down the aisle of Halloween. What was uh what was the first costume that you ever wore in your life for Halloween? Well, I was six when I came in. So, I I did have a couple Halloweens prior to that. So, But were you Were you choosing what you wanted to be? I guess so. Right. 5-year-old. Yeah. When I was little. Yeah. I was Casper one year. What about when you got out? After 30 years of no after 30 years of no Halloweens, what I didn't do. You know, that's one thing I never did is really dress up for Halloween. For some reason, that wasn't like the big thing to me. The big thing to me was like birthdays and like uh b a birthday to be able to celebrate a birthday was a big deal. Um and Christmas, I didn't know really how to do it. So my friend was like, "What do you mean you don't know how to do it?" I go, "I don't know how to do this. like do I get, you know, like I mean I knew the gift thing and the all that but I'm like I don't know how to I don't know how to do this. So she like helped me like navigate you know how to rebuild like and and learn things because I was very sheltered like I didn't know how to do all the worldly things and my kids were like you know and I remember uh my kid my daughter was like we were doing all the holidays and she goes it's flag day on Monday. Do we do anything for Flag Day? I remember going, "Oh, man." You know, I created this monster. But yeah, so it was um yeah, so I remember it was just a rebuilding of that because I you know, I had so many years of tapes in my head of what was wrong and you know, it was but yeah, I did it myself. I was just like, "Okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna do this." And I was scared. I was scared shitless in a lot of levels. I was really scared and um super bold. Yeah, very impressive. And I've been paying attention with this and most people I mean props give you the real like hands together like Yeah, because uh like from what I've been hearing you I've been doing some research with this Dan and I both have been doing it. It's so hard for people to do that because Yeah. It takes a real boldness. Wow. It's amazing. Yeah. I mean I was I was lucky too. My dad uh was wonderful. My dad and I were very close and I had him and you know I had a lot of like resentment with my mother for the whole thing but I think my dad I really fell into him. So at least I had that support right there. Um and my extended family really I didn't was not close to them because my mom ostracized us growing up not attending the family holidays and and and stuff like that and the parties. So, I wasn't as close to my extended family like cousins and aunts and uncles at all because we were, you know, ostracized from everything. And um um so yeah, I really just kind of fell into my dad and you know, and I I hadn't worked in 10 years either. So guess what? I hadn't I hadn't worked in 10 years. I had to leave that. Had to figure it out, you know. So, in one month I got divorced, had to move, find a job. Like, it was all just, you know, um and and I'm not going to lie, I think I drank for like two months every night, you know? I did. I turned to I turned to alcohol for like two months and then I was like, "Okay, like what are we doing here?" Like, you got to stop. But yeah, I did. I needed something to cope. I didn't know how to cope. That's just impressive as hell, actually, to be honest. It's an impressive story, you know. Oh, thank you. Most people don't have the spiritual wherewithal to do that. So, yeah, mad props. Well, thank you very much. Yeah, it was it was a long time, too, to to differentiate the difference between religion and spirituality. I didn't want anything to do um I I I combined them in my head. And so, I had a hard time understanding that you can be spiritual, that that's a different aspect than religion. So, I I didn't want any part of anything forever. Like I just was like, I don't want to hear it. I don't want anything. Um, and then as uh time went on and I unwound from everything, I started taking pieces of of maybe different teachings or thoughts and that resonated with me. And you know, I think to Daniel, I described it once as threads. I took little threads from things and made it into my own spirituality that I could I could have um you know I cannot be part of anything organized to this day. I don't want to be part of anything organized but doesn't mean that I can't find um a spiritual path again for myself. um which has just taken some time and some grace and you know just being patient with myself on it and realize that hey you went through a lot it's okay but I'll hear certain you know I'll listen to certain podcasts or certain thoughts and I I'll hear I'm like oh that's no that's a good spiritual thought I I like that I can incorporate that into something that resonates for me and that's kind of what I've woven together for myself it's kind of interesting I don't know if it makes Like I'd love to hear a little bit about this Daniel because what's a little bit fascinating was it almost seems like the real breaking points were more like they weren't intellectual exactly though they're they're part of that but it was more like wow man I can't have my kids in this and like do I really believe this the same way and this relationship isn't working. So I guess the other part that's kind of fascinating to me you know would be like uh what of because there's this whole doctrine involved in these things right. So if you don't I mean if we have the time to do it like would you describe a little bit about like what the doctrine was take you a while to like go because there's something about 1914 Yeah. Yeah. There's something about 144,000 people. Yeah. There's heaven and earth and the 144,000 are going to be in heaven. The other people are going to be on earth and there's some Armageddon stuff. Yes, that's a lot. Um yeah, so they uh 1914 they deemed the year that Christ uh went into power to um uh they were going to choose the 144,000 that were going to go to heaven permanently. So these this group of people were chosen to be up in heaven and the rest of us have an earthly hope as they put and uh we they believe that there's going to be an Armageddon uh where God destroys the um unrighteous versus the righteous. However, they put it as if you're a witness, you'll be saved. Okay? And if you're a non-witness or if you know of the teachings of the organization and the truth as they always called it the truth. So if you know of the truth and you still didn't decide to uh practice it or stay in it or be in it then and you die on the outside of the organization then you have forever destruction. So, and then after a thousand-year reign, uh there will be a resurrection of the people who died prior to Armageddon. And they have a chance to prove themselves as to whether or not they're going to live on this earth where it's it's become a paradise. So, they always talked about it becoming a a paradise where everything turns back into perfect perfection and you live on this this paradise on earth. And the the scary thing is I remember specifically being 8 years old and lying in bed at night petrified, scared half to death that I wasn't going to make it and fearful. And I remember praying to God that if he could just let me see what I look like as an adult. I'm eight years old, you know. I just wanted to see what I was going to be like as an adult, I could just make it till I was 18. That was like something big for me. And but I was scared half to death. And you know I and I was scared of upsetting my mother or upsetting the apple cart because then my life was at stake. That's how I viewed it. And listen, no eight-year-old should lay in a bed worrying about whether or not if they're good or bad they're going to live or not. And and and and that's what I grew up with. That's what I thought. And so that is that is what they teach. So you have the doomsday, you know, that's going to be coming and you have to be in compliance and, you know, be a practicing witness to be able to survive this. And if you're not, then you're going to have forever destruction. And so you're laying in bed at eight thinking, "Wow, man, I'm going to get forever destructed potentially." Yep. Eight years old. Yeah. I was I was scared. And they had a lot of books and illustrations. So you you know you you had it was called my book of Bible stories and it was for kids. Well heck they have like fire coming down from the sky and people dying and you know and then the next page is this paradise you know. So it was it was scary. It was scary stuff that they, you know, that they were instilling in you and it was this whole fear-based. Everything was fear-based and, you know, so I was I was scared half half to death to do anything wrong as, you know, so I, like I said, I I conformed and and and that was me personally. Some people don't take it that way, you know. They're they're more like like my brother was like, I'll see you. I'm out. I'll take my chances, you know. And I mean, props to him for doing that, you know. I didn't have the guts at that point to do it. I had the guts later, but not at that point. So, my brother did it much younger, but you know, I just it's it's it's definitely um all fear-based. He was almost in a different place in psychological development when the stuff was kind of put on him, too. A lot younger, you know, almost like in the adolescent phase where you're like, "Wait a minute." Yeah. Well, there's also there's a a case for evolutionary psychology here too, Eric, where as you are threatened with being on the outside, you know, and from a anthropological you evolutionary psychological perspective, being on the outside meant you being on the outside of the tribe meant you were a not likely to survive and b definitely not likely to reproduce. So in addition to the outside being scary, it it is also uh a mechanism of survival. And if you have to rely on like you Leslie, you have to rely on your parents for you know sustenance literally that losing that would mean losing your ability to feed yourself, you know, and at first it's physical with food, but then as it go as you grow later on it's it's emotional with love and everything else. So like this is part of the conditioning of not only this um you know what do you want to call it organization religion whatever cult you know but it's that way in society as a whole you know if you want to buck the trend then you might find yourself doing it alone and so the question that you know we've sort of been asking in all these like you know cult episodes is like individuality you know is a is the fallacy because you still you find yourself in another layer of it. As soon as you step out, you're in another ring of something else. You know, it's a very um Oh, sure. kind of thing. It's very easy to slide into all those. You know, you have to be careful. Um you know, I got into after I was divorced, I got into a relationship, a long-term relationship, and it ended up just being another controlling relationship. But I just a different face, you know, on the person cuz I hadn't that again, like I talked about in the very beginning with my mother, it was familiar. So to me, it was familiar. And so that's, you know, but then even though I knew it wasn't great, it was just familiar. And I had to learn again there was it was a long period of figuring out, oh wow, this that is not how love looks. That is not how that's supposed to be. I had a very distorted sense of of love of how that, you know, how that was. And it took me a while. I, you know, I I don't know. It just took a long time to get there. I mean, I finally feel like I've I've crossed that and I've made that, but it it took a long time. And and relationships were very very difficult after after that. Even worldly worldly relationships because I I didn't know how to navigate those. I didn't know what real love and partnerships look like. It's almost like a psychological and emotional part of like taking apart the things that you learned and sort of finding control or something. I was curious about the intellectual part of it because there's a emotional part to it and also like with these ideas like did they dissolve over time? You're like, well, you know what? I don't believe in the 144,000 and the this and the that. I think yeah I think it just just like they just dissolved over over a period of time. Um that's still that's still hard for me. I I I don't know what I can say I believe out of it and what I don't believe or what I resonate. I know there's things I don't believe out of it and I know there's things that I'm like that could you know I wouldn't say like everything they thought or everything they taught was wrong. you know, it it has always like a little thread of something in it, but um I would say the majority of it, yeah, I would I would say I I don't agree with the doctrine obviously anymore, but there's still like maybe some threads there that are, you know, still left over that I I still question in myself like, hey, do I, you know, do I really feel like that still resonates with me or not? And it's just it's a it's a layering. That's all I can tell you. you know, like one thing sheds away and maybe replace it with a new thought or a new idea and it's it's just a peeling of layers and that includes the doctrine, you know, because that's been in you when you know as a child that's a long time to to figure that out. Yeah. There's this scholar of rel religion I kind of like, Bartman, and he was like uh became born again like evangelical Christian in his like I guess his teens or something. And it's interesting to hear him talk about it because for him it was I guess kind of intellectual. He you know eventually got to this point where was like you know he tells this story of like writing a paper where he was trying to defend biblical infallibility and he wrote it for this like a biblical scholar class he was taking. He was already in in uh grad school maybe at that point. And then his professor read the whole thing and in the end he just said like well maybe like Ma whoever wrote Matthew just got this wrong and that was the comments of like the whole essay and he just went crack and everything crack maybe they did just get it wrong you know maybe they just got it wrong. Yeah. And I think it's all interpretation like there's so much interpretation different interpretation of the same. You can go to different religions and see the same scripture and they all have different interpretations of it. So it's like which which one do you feel is right on that? Not even in its original language. I mean you know totally so you can't go ahead. No for him it was very like intellectual but he didn't have kids. He was a younger guy. Yeah. You like started to say like wait a minute I can't have my kids in my life. What am I doing with this? It's different for different people. Like one of the ex-witnesses I I speak to, it was definitely for him it was more intellectual. Like he's like the facts just didn't line up to him. And I I viewed it more of just uh it was more of an emotional issue with me. Um and now I think I look at um religion or I I hear um um I I I've told this to Daniel. I have a hard time I had a hard time walking into churches or anything like that. Um I would literally break out in hives for a long time. So if I had to go to a wedding or a funeral, you know, I knew I was going to I was going to have red blotches on me. It just was a a reaction. And um you know, just recently I had an experience with my son. My son has kind of like looked for his own faith and religion in his own way. And you know, I I guess I wanted it stirred a lot with me, you know, and I knew it was me, not necessarily him. And I just am like, hey, listen, like I'm I'm all about supporting you, whatever you He's in the middle of searching right now. And so I just went to see him at college and he asked me to go to church with him. And I was like, that's a big one. Antihistamines. Yeah, I mean, you know, I I told him I said, you know, I'll go with you because basically I want to see what my son's listening to and what he he was interested in. Um, but I I gave myself the out. I said, "If it gets too much for me, I'm going to go to the car." And he said, "Yeah, no problem." But, you know, I sat there and I listened and I was okay. I didn't break out in hives. Nothing happened. But I all I could see up there was to me it was just a salesman. That's how I viewed it. It's just a salesman. That's it's I just see it up there and I see I saw it and I'm like, man, this is just they're just selling. And that and that's how I view it, you know, now. I I I just can't see it any other way. And you know, Well, you have the choice of whether you want to buy it or not. Yeah. And that's what And it was interesting. I I told Daniel, I was like, you know, I had a moment where it was all coming up and I was feeling very um overwhelmed for a second. And I actually talked to myself as like being an adult to a little kid and said, "Hey, you're safe. You're safe and you have a choice here. You have freedom and you have a choice. So, you can walk out, you know, or you can stay here and see what's going on." And um, you know, I and after I did that for myself and kind of went into the parent, you know, child mode and did that, I was like, "All right, I'm I'm okay." And then I was fine for the rest of the time. I didn't have that overwhelming feeling once I told myself, "Hey, you're safe, Les. Like, it's okay. You're safe. Um but yeah, my kids are kind of finding their own path in their own way and you know I'm I I let them kind of with guidance maybe you know I try to still continue to guide them but they also have to have their own freedoms and beliefs and you know I might not resonate with them and you know and I told my son I go hey this is not for me. He said I know and we we had a long talk about about it afterwards. So you know it's it's okay. Maybe the thing in the end though, like what you were saying though, if you're sitting there going, "What is this person selling?" That might be a good question that everyone should ask. Yeah. What are you selling? What are you selling? Like a lot of times in life, we should be asking that question. So I think there's a wisdom in that. That's from experience of like, you know, if more people maybe would ask like, "Wait a minute, what the [...] are they trying to sell here?" Maybe you get more less less chicannery going on. Well, they get based up everybody gets built up in the emotion of it, right? So that's that's the biggest thing is they take emotion of where you are and they build on that and they build on that and that and that's where I I see a lot of it happen. You know it's it's based on emotion. Um but you know I I have no problem like I'm I'm cool with anyone. They can hey you do you know I I I don't think that way at all. That took a long time too for me to not see things black and white and me to see the the gray and and and realize that hey people just are people. They're just trying to make their way through life and you know find out what's what's right for them and hey you want to you want to you know be my guest. That's really how I am. Do you do you might not agree with them and they might not agree with me but I'm cool with that. You know I'm just like hey we can agree to disagree and and still have a good conversation and it's fine. That's another thing that's very hard for people now. Lesie. Mhm. Yeah. Yeah. But I think it's important. Hey, like we may not see it, but it's okay that we don't have to like Yeah. But that's okay. You know, like I think it's important. It's important to do that. I think it's important to be able to see somebody's other their own viewpoint and point of view and, you know, their own experiences are shaping why they have that point of view just like mine are. And I I that's how I view it. I just view it like, you know, everybody is going to do their own thing and you know, we're what is this? We're all just here in life trying to get by and get through the human experience and enjoy it. You know, maybe enjoy it as we go and you know, but we have it's people have that freedom to do if I want freedom. How who am I to not give it to somebody else and not allow somebody? That's wise, too. That is Yeah. And that Yeah. And I think that's a good that's a good place to call it right there. I think that's a Yeah, that's a high note. So, um, you know, Leslie, I want to give you the opportunity for, you know, the 5% of people who are still listening to the very end. Um, because that that number is small. You know what I'm saying? Attention spans are short. Thank you, Tik Tok. And thank you advertisers over the last, I don't know, 40 years or so doing commercials and whatnot. Um but if there's uh something that you would like to leave with people who are you know who are maybe find themselves questioning the the confines of the conditioning that they have been given whether it be directly in a cult or religion or even from society political ideology um whatever scholastic what you know it doesn't matter familial um cultural there's there's many different uh boxes that we find ourselves in. But you know, you having made the conscious choice as an adult. Yes. Motivated by uh a poor relationship and not wanting to repeat the same mistakes that were done to you to your children. You still made a conscious choice. One that you said I'm going to change the trajectory of my life. And in order to do that, I am willing to give everything up in order to do that. Right? That's that is the responsibility. Sometimes that is the responsibility of freedom. That is individuality in its essence and to say I am going to do this as an individual right and and I'm taking the responsibilities and the consequences and the rewards of all of these choices. So, um, as somebody who has done that, and I don't think a lot of people have in this lifetime really, um, which is a unique, you know, you don't get to, you don't get any badges, uh, that you get to wear on your, you know, lapel, but it's a, it's a unique place to be in. What would you say to somebody who's listening to this who might find themselves in a similar position in their own way? Pick your pain. Either way, it's going to be painful. You have to make the choice to stay in it and deal with that pain or have the temporary fire destruction that you're going to blow it up and deal with that pain, but then come on out on the other side being with it with your new your new life and your new self and freedom. And I would say pick your pain because either way you're going to go through it either way. Yeah, that is not where I thought you were going to go, but I like that. That was good. You might be a follower of like Shakti or Kie if you ever go to India. We're burning this [...] to the ground. Yeah. [...] That's the way Indian goddesses. Oh, sorry. What? Pick your pain, dude. That's how I view it. Like either way, you're going to go through it. So, I mean, I guess, you know, if you want me to say, "Hey, there'll be, you know, there's I could do the flowery approach." No, you do you. You know, you do you. You're free. You're a free. It was Yeah, that that's that's what I would tell people. You got to pick it. Like, you know, choose one way or the other. I'm very bottom line. You know that about me, Daniel. And I'm just like, man, you got to choose it either way. Like, you're gonna go through it this way or That's all right. I think your first Halloween costume, Leslie, might be the goddess Kie. They're just like, "Yeah, I'm burning this [...] to the ground. We're burning this [...] to the We're starting over probably." I mean, that's how I view it. I was like, "Well, I'm just gonna light it on fire and walk away. I mean, there's no other way." So, yeah. I guess, you know, I mean, I would say if somebody is going to leave or they want to leave, definitely get into um a therapist that maybe would uh be specialized in religious trauma would be a big one. Um because that would that would be definitely a help. And that was I definitely needed to go through therapy and different um aspects of you know um managing mental health because it was it it was quite a mess you know after I left I was I was quite a mess. But um I would yeah I would definitely say you know find somebody who specializes in that in that field and um you know that would be a good a good starting point. You know that's where you're going to go with that is good to a therapist who specializes in religious trauma. That is help you out. Very good advice. Um well Leslie thank you. Thank you so much for coming on. No thank you. Thank you. I appreciate it. Great. was incredibly like articulate presentation of something. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Well, I had a great time. Thank you guys. You know, this is good for my healing, too. And that's how I view it. You know, this is all good to talk about. And, you know, and if you can help one person to, you know, make a decision to help them have freedom and and live their life the way that they want to choose to lead it, then hey, man, that's that's the way to do it and go. Yeah. So, thanks thanks again for coming on. This is this was really appreciate it. A lot of a lot of wisdom there. No problem. Um Eric, as always, thank you for uh for co-piling the ship with me. You know, audience, thank you so much for tuning in. Uh if you have a question or comment or that's about it, you can leave it in the YouTube section. Uh or I guess on Spotify has place for questions, comments, whatever. Uh, if for some reason you, you know, have something specific for Leslie or you have somebody who might be, you know, looking to kind of get their way out and you think that she might be a good resource or whatnot, email us at jyn andtraaggmail.com. That's jin andtragmail.com. Or hit us up on the gram, the Jin and Tantra podcast. Uh, we'll put you in contact with her if it feels like the right fit. Uh, or if you have something else for us. Uh, no dickpicks. Uh, we've had uh Oh, man. No thank you. Um, right. Uh, but yeah, so that's about it. So, uh, you know, if you like what we're doing, share our work, like, subscribe, do all that kind of [...] You know, it helps us out in the algorithm and, uh, it gets our message out to a larger audience. And we appreciate everybody for tuning in. For Leslie and Eric, this is Daniel. Leslie, thanks for coming on. Audience, thanks for tuning in. We'll catch you guys in the next one. Peace. [Music]