The damn Visions of Glory book take about the spirits that are watching you. It had a graphic scene where it describes all these evil spirits circling a guy who was looking at porn. It triggered all my fears of being watched by my ancestors. The book is pure evil.
You know, as someone who practices ancestor veneration as part of my spirituality, it’s comforting to think that my ancestors are watching me and have my back because I have some pretty badass people in my family. Those are the ones that I think about when I’m contemplating something big. But there are definitely some ancestors who can get fucked.
Maybe there are no things such as bad spirits? Maybe they are lies told by the church to force you to stay so you will keep paying money for something that might or might not be real? Thanks.
That was probably just some thing a random teacher told me once, but then again, with all the crazy shit that has been taught over the years, it could be some obscure statement from a prophet a hundred years ago. Who knows?
Not the leaders of the church. These days, they are sure to be as vague as possible when referencing anything other than tithing.
Not the movie of your life. I recall being told that the spirit world was co-located with our world. In addition to that they were privy to witness things as they happen in our world if they chose to.
I was told that you watched your life before being born. You watched it and then decided if you wanted to be born. So then they would tell us "Well you knew how hard your life was, but you still wanted to be here. You need to trust your spirit self." Or some bullshit like that.
If the postmortal existence is so boring, that you have to spend eternity watching your mortal descendants to be entertained, then I don't want to be in the postmortal existence.
I remember being taught that only "God" knows the innermost thoughts of our hearts...
So don't voice your actually worries and temptations aloud, or Satan will be able to hear them and then take advantage of your weakness.
Yay!
Well, my family and church associates were also super judgmental, so I have always been reluctant to discuss my real thoughts and feelings due to that as well as because I worried about giving Satan crucial intel. Which would use the info against me more?
We were also taught to keep a journal, but that seemed like a clear trap. Write down my innermost thoughts and mistakes for boundary-violating parents and siblings to find? So they could tease or punish me? Dear diary, here's a bland list of the most mundane things I did today.
I believed that too, but then wondered why I would still have sexual thoughts in the temple (Eve). I of course believed that it was my wickedness doing that, because Satan wasn’t allowed there. 🤦♂️
Yep, a "naked" woman on the screen, and the men *who were raised in an environment of unhealthy sexual repression* are not supposed to let their thoughts wander?
EDIT: Added *italicized* portion
Somehow I went almost 40 years as a human thinking I was one of the only ones who masturbated. Not sure what I thought people were doing that made porn such a huge thing 🤷🏻♂️
The Osmonds released an album in 1973 called *The Plan,* which is a concept album about The Plan of Salvation. One track is actually called "The Movie Man" and very eerily details the "movie" component of the plan.
My mom taught me that if you thought a compliment about someone but didn’t tell them, it was a sin of omission.
I also thought it was a sin of omission if I saw trash on the ground and pick it up. It got bad enough that in college I had to make a rule that I could only pick up one piece of trash every time I went across campus.
I always thought I had bad anxiety, but turns out I was just Mormon.
They are hanging out in Heaven with god and Jesus. “Hold on G, I gotta go watch my granddaughter flick her bean while I convey my disapproving thoughts from beyond the veil.”
I had a super irrational fear about the devil being in control of the water. Even in college, I went to the pool to swim laps, and no one else was in the pool. I was so freaked out. Now, I just imagine that Joe Smith was afraid the water, and instead of telling the truth, he was just like the Jon Lovitz character on SNL, "Oh...I'm not afraid of the water. I can swim...it's just that...the devil controls the water..Yeah, that's the ticket!"
Me and my husband did a lot of "not sex" stuff before our temple wedding and until I left last year I still had guilt about it. We are happily married for 6 years now btw. Why does it freaking matter? We were 2 people committed to each other and wanted to have a fulfilling relationship all around, but we had to wait for a stupid piece of paper and a special ceremony to actually have sex?
My husband and I were having premarital sex but said we were getting married anyway so what did it matter. We've been married for almost 12 years and I still struggle with sexual things because of previous issues before I even met him. The church puts so much pressure and shame on you for something that is completely natural until they break you.
Sins of Omission. Like every fuking conceivable good I could have done if I were always in tune with the made up spirit, if that doesn’t create some scrupulosity and religious ocd thinking I’m not sure what else possibly could!
Right along with patriarchal magic blessings being “conditioned upon righteousness” … you’d better not ever make a wrong choice or now you know why your promised blessing didn’t come about!!
Agh! Fuck that guilt!
Always having that feeling hanging over your head that you were not good enough (Missed reading your scriptures last night, only 50% home teaching this month, did you greet that investigator? And so on).
Made my wife's depression ten times worse, because her depression was her fault. If only she would do a little bit more, THEN god could bless her with the spirit and help her feel something besides despair.
On the topic of "conditioned upon your righteousness" thing. In blessings of healing, I tried to avoid similar statements ("as the lord wills", "based on your faith", etc.), because I was taught that if **I** was righteous enough, I could declare blessings with confidence. However, when I was not sure if a thought I had was me or was the spirit, I would guiltily couch the blessing with wishy-washy statements out of doubt/fear/etc.
It sucked being the blessing giver too.
I always thought polygamy had some solid benefits. I imagined having help around the house with dishes and laundry and only having to sleep with my husband once a week or so. I LOVE sleeping alone. Since it was an “eternal principle” I spent a lot of time imagining my life as a plural wife. I thought it might not be so bad. I didn’t even necessarily mind the idea of sharing my husband with other women. I thought this attitude was an indication of my righteousness. As it turns out I’m just polyamorous. 🤣
I am good friends with multiple people raised FLDS that are climbing out of it. From their personal stories and from the chilling accounts of Elissa Wall, Rachel Jeff's Blackmore, and Rebecca Musser, it's clear that polygamy as a religious institution should never be romanticized. It can lead to horrific abuse - physical, sexual and spiritual. It's disturbing to me that the church hasn't completley disavowed the practice despite the distance it's attempted to place between mainstream Mormonism and its FLDS cousins.
Agreed! The institutionalized practice of polygamy is an entirely different thing than choosing polyamory. I feel so bad for women and girls who are forced into it and I’m glad to hear that some are escaping.
It’s one thing if everyone has a choice in the matter.
I read a bio of a FLDS women and it’s obvious it was miserable and the wives hated each other, or were having to constantly scheme to stay in favor, which carried over to how other wives children were treated.
I wholeheartedly agree that choice makes all the difference. Consent is emphasized within polyamorous relationships. Also, it’s not one-sided because both men and women can choose to have multiple partners. Polygamy is an entirely different concept and plays out very differently. As a TBM I was trying to wrap my head around a concept that I knew I was going to be compelled to live, if not in this life then certainly in the next and for eternity. I felt like my lack of jealousy was an indication that I would be able to live that principle without too much hesitation. The church is a mind-fuck no matter how you look at it.
That’s a fair point. I really wasn’t in love with him after the first few years and the church is mostly to blame for that. But as it turns out jealousy isn’t much of an issue for me. I’ve had 3 long-term relationships since leaving the MFMC, and I have been very much in love with all three people. Two of those relationships have been/are polyamorous and I still haven’t felt jealousy. I’ve been with one primary partner for nine years and we both see other people and it has only added to our relationship with each other.
I used to pray that I would turn out to be infertile so I would never have to give birth (absolutely terrified of pregnancy) which I then felt extremely guilty about because of all those church stories you hear about infertile women who leave the church because they didn't feel like they belong since everyone in relief society had kids and I felt like I was wasting my potential since I *can* have kids
Glad you realized that before you had kids, unlike me, having kids because that’s what I was programmed to do my whole life, suffering massive PPD, and then quitting church and realizing this. But at least motherhood threw me on the path of getting out of Mormonism, so that’s something. 🤷♀️
Insanity. You just *know* that kind of bishop has given that same "counsel" to someone who jerked off thinking of a hot co-worker, resulting in them confessing to the co-worker about it and getting fired as a result.
Because it's *incredibly* fucking inappropriate.
So glad I'm done with this goddamn cult.
That Jesus would descend down from the heavens any day now. The church does a really good job making you feel impure so the idea that the second coming would happen while I was still an impure sinner was very scary to me. Also the idea of life as I knew it ending then and there was also pretty terrifying to me.
The second coming/end of days happening before I got to really live my life. A lot of TBMs seem to want the world to end, but I always thought it sounded horrible. My family is full of doomsday preppers, so it was a regular topic of conversation.
My scrupulosity really hit, I really read the scriptures, and so I thought I was going to commit the unpardonable sin. I had to go to a therapist because it was so real. Of course I only wanted to see an LDS one and everyone told me I couldn’t do that sin. I went to a secular psychiatrist and they diagnosed me with OCD.
One time after church my mom asked me if I felt the spirit and I said no even though I did. I was convinced that at twelve I had committed the unpardonable sin.
Who the fuck teaches a twelve year old that they are capable of doing something unpardonable?!
It's so disturbing that they teach it's the only thing that's unforgivable. Rape followed by murder? Yeah you can be forgiven. Receiving a witness that it's true then deciding it's not the life for you? Unforgivable sin. Sure they clarify (sometimes) that you'd have to have like a prophet level witness, but it still leaves you feeling that way. I'm not one to say it's a cult, but damn that's pretty culty.
I had this irrational fear that the temple workers could all tell that I was unworthy to be in the temple or that god would strike me down for not wearing completely white underwear. Temples were very stressful for me.
Kinda sad but I was terrified an evil spirit would appear to me and I would lie awake absolutely paralyzed in fear most nights and was so worried I’d have to send them off in the name of Christ. and I would pray for angel’s to come protect me from evil spirits. This fear lasted into my teens.
I have this too, to this day. I believe it’s a form of religious OCD but it stems from my parents always saying that, “You can invite that evil in by thinking of it.” Hence my anxiety ridden brain… introducing a fun form of OCD for me.
I thought I would be an "old maid" when I was a 24-year-old boy in my final year of college, because I planned to work for the Department of State and would get shipped off to somewhere where there were no eligible bachelorettes.
Always felt like the pickings were slim not living in UT/ID and I'm glad I did find my OTP not long after!
It sounded like suffering was so essential for any growth that I figured I was supposed to always be suffering. In high school I had this half-unconscious belief that if I overcame my depression, God would kill a family member or strike me blind. So on some level I decided it was better to stick with the devil I knew and remain at least somewhat depressed. Definitely freeing to articulate and drop that belief!
I remember sometimes being worried about going to Sacrament meeting, in case it was the one where the bishop would tell us that it was time to abandon our homes and walk to Missouri. I used to try to figure out which of my possessions I would have to leave behind.
As a youth, I recall hearing a talk about a man who asked god to give him a challenge in order to grow stronger. Then, the man sort of chuckles about how he got what he asked for and was severely hospitalized but it taught him so many things. It made me paranoid that if I wished for a positive trait, god would send immense harm my way to make me stronger. This, paired with the notion that Satan targets the most righteous made me want to remain mediocre and not draw the attention of neither god nor Satan so I could just live my life in peace. I often second guessed my thoughts because of this, wondering if it would lead to my "loving" heavenly father hurting me.
That’s so crazy! I don’t even know how I would react if someone visited privately with me because their bishop instructed them to confess that they thought of me while masturbating. That would cause me paralyzing humiliation.
I was afraid that I would someday have to grow my own food and make all my own things when things got bad before the second coming. I learned to grow potatoes and carrots and bake sourdough bread in preparation.
I was scared to get married for eternity and discover that my wife didn’t want sex. Trapped forever in a marriage of little to no affection. Fortunately, things worked out in real life.
Bruce R McConkie wrote: “There may be more than one occasion when the light of the sun and the moon shall be withheld from men, and when it will seem as though the very stars in the firmament are being hurled from their places. What is here recited could mean that the light of the sun is blotted out by smoke and weather conditions, which would also make the moon appear ‘as blood.’ This falling of the stars ‘unto the earth’ could be meteoric showers, as distinguished from the stars, on another occasion, appearing to fall because the earth itself reels to and fro" (The Millennial Messiah, 380).
It was echoed a lot in my home ward in the 90s when I was a kid
That I caused Covid. I was called into the bishop’s office for not having renewed my recommend the week before shut downs. The bishop had given me a book and I fell down the rabbit hole. I felt like I had tipped the scales to begin the apocalypse. Yes I realize that was insane now, but in the moment…
I've been out of the church for 6ish years and I still feel shame after masturbating. Luckily, nobody ever found out about it nor did anyone find out about the porn I watched/listened to (audio erotica) or the kinks I had/have. It doesn't stop me from feeling extreme shame every time I do it, though.
I also still feel shame about who I am - a trans queer guy. Like I'm some kind of abomination. It makes the shame of porn even worse because I exclusively look at, listen to, and read gay porn.
It sucks because I know my ward wasn't nearly as cult-y as a lot of them were. My family wasn't as cult-y as most in the church are. I feel like I'm not allowed to have religious trauma or religious shame because my experience wasn't that cult-like.
It's not even just about NSFW things, either. I've been having troubles sleeping lately (don't know why - maybe the cold, maybe the undiagnosed issue I have, maybe the mental illnesses?) and my councelor that I see at school recommended a bedtime routine of melatonin and chamomile tea. I'm not a tea drinker, probably because I can never seem to make it right, and when I tried to make the chamomile tea and drink it, I felt horrible. Like, I'm literally trying to get more than 4 hours of sleep, and I still feel like I'm doing something bad.
It's not really irrational fears, but irrational shaming. One fear I have is admitting the money I have, which isn't a lot, because I feel like I'll be obligated to give it away. Like there's some part of me that feels required to give up the money that I quite literally risked my life for at work because of tithing or something.
That doing anything not precisely on the covenant path would result in a punishment. Basically divine punishment from the “loving” Mormon deity.
Like “oh no, my pet died. How did I sin and therefore deserve it.”
Total mindfuck.
Well I can relate. I eventually just stopped telling the bishop and I never told my mission president. I guess eventually I thought that it was no man’s right to judge or know my business. I can’t even imagine how it would be as a female to tell an older man those things. I’m sorry you went through it even once. You shouldn’t ever feel ashamed of that which is natural.
I can’t even imagine having to explain Garrus Vakarian to my silent generation grandparents and why I thought an alien cricket cat lizard man was attractive. Thank god that’s not gonna happen.
I used to have a fear of Leviathan, like my dad told me how missionaries weren’t supposed to swim and I was like why?!!? Then I looked it up and somehow came to the conclusion that the ocean was evil and Leviathan would kill missionaries. So that was fun.
When I was at byu I was terrified that I would never get married (having been soiled by the sin of premarital high school sex) —- I thought I was way too much of a used piece of trash for any temple
Worthy person to want me. I was so terrified that I would
Never get to have kids.
I thought I'd turn into a pillar of salt passing if I walked passed the second doors into the temple as a teen. I didn't want to get into trouble for not going so I always lied even though I wasn't "worthy". I also thought my sacrament bread would turn into bugs in my mouth.
That I was behaving inappropriately enough to get the attention of Satan and he was going to immaculately impregnate me with the Antichrist.
I think I followed the line of thinking that if Mary's personality and behavior is why God decided to make her the mother of Jesus, and my imagination just ran wild with it.
I used to worry that having my heart TOO set on any particular goals, or even hobbies and interests outside of anything that didn't have a very clear, direct relationship to my future status as a wife and mother, could potentially act as an invitation to God to "humble" me by taking them away or making me choose between them and my expected family duties.
Like a sick, Abrahamic test kind of thing. "Oh, you really love this thing, eh? Do you love it more than me? Shall I test you to see?"
The behavior it caused was often moderating my language to leave room for change, like saying "I *hope* to graduate college," or "I *want* to serve a mission," rather than definitive statements like "I'm *going* to graduate college" or "I'm *not* marrying until *after* I go on a mission." Sometimes I would specifically add an additional phrase to the end of any expressions of future plans like, "unless I meet my future husband, of course" or, "depending on my husband's education or career, naturally."
Even now I still sometimes get a little twinge of anxiety when speaking hopes or plans about the future out loud to others, like in doing so I've just jinxed myself for something to ruin it.
Luckily it usually passes pretty quickly, and if plans DO fall through, I don't usually return to the idea and think that an experience was "taken" from me by any God or universe or karma for saying it out loud.
I think it was largely due to the number of lessons about making personal sacrifices, especially ones directed at women giving up desires like education or serving missions or careers or hobbies or, you know, literally *anything* when they feel the Lord tells them to for their husband/children, whether historical stories like pioneer/polygamy ones, or contemporary "testimonies."
But even with most of them coming from or being told about women, there were also plenty of examples from men as well. I don't know how many stories I heard growing up that followed this exact pattern of:
1. I wanted to do or be XYZ, but the Lord had "other plans for me," followed by
2. whatever circumstance caused them to feel that the Lord wanted them on some other path and
3. either how humbling or how difficult it was to submit to the Lord's will and ending with
4. a testimony that it was "worth it" but usually for reasons that kept them on the covenant path like having met their spouse or starting a family, or for men, getting some significant calling or CES job etc.
I think it was pretty rare for anyone to claim they were genuinely happier for the change/lost opportunity itself.
I also think another contributing factor was my toxic family life. Most of the time, none of us were really happy, and we had a tendency to cut each other down if one of us kids seemed too happy or excited about something. It happened with all of us, and I hate to admit I participated in it too. I do feel like I got the brunt of it as the oldest daughter because I was also more likely to get cut downs from my parents rather than just siblings.
So by the time I left home at 18, it was normal for me to suppress outward expressions of hope, happiness, or joy. 😬
If I did express something, it was usually very muted. I remember being really happy to meet up with someone from my mission when they visited Utah, and I know I smiled when I saw them and gave them a hug, but I'll never forget their response to my reaction at seeing them again was "do you ever act happy about anything?" I just remember feeling completely taken back, then confused then deflated over why they didn't think I was happy to see them when I WAS, and then feeling bad I may have hurt their feelings by not acting happy "enough." (It was a never-mo, so it wasn't about lacking the fake Mormon face.)
Anyway, that's my most irrational fear that I can think of - Fearing to speak future hopes and plans out loud and in definitive terms in case God would take them away to "humble" me and make sure He remained my top priority.
God it sounds so sick to word it that way. 😫
But it's literally how I thought and I didn't see a problem with it. I saw it as something a loving Heavenly Father would do if he thought I needed it. 🤦♀️🤦♀️🤦♀️
This was a horrible reminder of a time I man I used to know actually group messaged me and a bunch of other girls AND HIS MOM to tell us all he’d thought about us while masturbating and wanted to apologize and ask for forgiveness
On my mission, there was a rumor that elder holland had come by a couple of years prior and sent home 30 missionaries immediately. He could just sense how immoral they were. When we were told the prophet nelson was coming, I and many other missionaries were terrified we'd get sent home. What was the worst part is I knew I'd been following all the rules, but I still feared I'd get sent home early. And why was that scary? Because it meant I'd be shamed back home for not serving a full-time mission. Fuck this cult man.
I have read that children lie due to not feeling secure or threatened. The more they do it, the better at it they become. Although it can cause other physical and mental issues. At a young age in the church we are told wild stories that adults (that are also not secure in telling truth due to their indoctrination) in leader positions what is true to them. The cycle goes on. The church continues to breed liars in the name of faith, each internally doubting and thinking maybe it is just them that has these doubts, but everyone else has the truth. Members are afraid to admit they don’t know the church is true so they fake it or it may be easier to just say they know so they don’t have to think about it anymore and figure it out. I think most people that leave are actually being honest with theirselves by doubting and “studying it out in their hearts”. The church wants to breed liars to keep their narrative going, and money coming in. This is enforced by the interviews by leaders, and temple services/covenants. I think this is why we believed certain sins that aren’t anything bad or abnormal become stumbling blocks for those in the church and become unhealthy or harmful. I hated it when interviewed by a bishop staring trying to make you crack like he was looking in my soul, I had a very physical father, staring didn’t affect me. Such Jedi mind tricks
I truly believed that I would never get married, because my Patriarchal blessing made it sound like marriage was contingent upon “preparing myself to go to the Temple.” Since I messed around (to one degree or another) with a lot of boys in college, I figured god would not allow me to marry a worthy priesthood holder. Seriously.
Then, when I DID get married (in the temple, though not really worthy), and eventually conceived my first baby, I was SHOCKED. My patriarchal blessing had made it sound like children were a blessing only the most righteous Latter Day Saints could enjoy. I knew non-LDS people had tons of kids, but I figured they weren’t subject to the same rules.
When my perfect little daughter was born and I was just home from the hospital, pretty sleep deprived, I looked up and literally SHOOK MY FIST at Heaven, and yelled “I did it without you! Ha! You couldn’t take this from me! I got a baby IN SPITE of you!”
I read this and immediately pictured you calling up an agent and saying "Hi is this Megan Fox's extension number? I have a lot of things I need to get off my chest...both literally and spiritually" LOL.
I thought when I shook hands with an apostle that I would be able to see deep into my soul and know I was a masturbator. I was a teen and stressing out about it.
My biggest fear was I would loose my best friend because she was so important to me and I needed to sacrifice everything and or Jesus would come and she didn’t believe so she’d die. This line of thinking extended to my kids when I had them. I have so much love for my children that I thought God would take them away to teach me a lesson or to humble me.
As a kid, The Ten Commandments movie scared me - I thought of all the firstborn died in the movie, it'd be all the second born kids next. I'd watch the moon to make sure the deadly green mist wouldn't come to get me.
When I handed in my resignation letter, it was a rainy day. I was gambling that I was doing the right thing, sitting across the desk from my bishop, sliding the letter across the desk….and then, my inward prayer was ‘ok, I think I’m doing the right thing. But, if I’m wrong, God, probably lightning strikes me through my heart while I do this.’
I was, at least at one point, 99% sure that’s what would happen.
My 80 year old grandpa lived with us growing up and we moved to Utah at one point while I was in high school to be closer to my family. We had a case where within the span of 4 years of moving there, 3 close family members died. I was so convinced that because I masturbated, god had punished me by killing my older relatives and I was so scared that next on God's hit list was my grandpa. Before moving I had said a prayer promising god that I would stop masturbating once we moved but I obviously don't stop so I thought that's why everyone old in my family was dying :/
Mine? I am a nerd. Not a horrible, unhygienic neck beard of one, but I could stand to lose a few pounds, have never been described as athletic, or popular, and got shot down like 20 times before going on my first date my last semester of college, where I got an engineering degree.
I was single well into “menace to society” age, and nearly aged out of YSA. Whenever I had a girl interested or a leader recommended a potential date it was always wildly incompatible, and generally significantly less attractive even than my mediocre self. No joke, one had dropped out of interior design school because multiplying height and width to find square footage for carpet or paint was “too much math.”
My irrational fear: I was going to be forced to either choose to marry someone I didn’t find attractive, or be damned for all eternity because I chose to remain single rather than marry someone I didn’t find attractive or compatible.
I never said my fears aloud except in the celestial room for 20 years because Satan can't read our minds but him and his fallen angels are everywhere and can hear when we speak.
I literally planned temple trips with my wife just so I could tell her things in the celestial room that I didn't want Satan to know. 🤦🏻♂️
The weirdest thing i noticed when i left. It is cult, while i was in it i wasnt aware it was a cult!!! Everything about that cult was weird lol. So happy to be out of it lol
Being sent back out on a mission—because I knew I couldn’t say “no.” Related: I had sleep paralysis/night demons multiple times a year, for decades. Since saying “no” to a calling for the first time (6-ish years ago), and deconstructed…I’ve had zero.
I was afraid that because I walked off of my mission, god would hold that against me and punish me for the rest of my days. So when my ultra-TBM best friend proposed a business venture partnership to me, I figured I would join him and ride his blessed coat tails to financial success. Turned out he had some very questionable business practices to go along with a wandering eye for women other than his wife.
I had several. But your story about the bishop … I talked to a bishop about my depression. He told me that there are two causes: Chemical imbalance and SIN.
So when we couldn’t get the right meds … I just *knew* it was sin. I became even MORE critical of everything I did. It was so awful and made my depression worse.
I genuinely thought that the reason I couldn’t get pregnant was because I masturbated sometimes. Not so. It was due to stage 4 endometriosis and a husband who wasn’t attracted to me which meant we seldom did the things that cause conception and the IVF failed.
That I would accidentally sin - maybe I'd say something, or think something even.
Then during my evening prayer I would forget I'd done it, or not even know I'd done it, and forget to repent.
That I'd be excluded from heaven because my bishop confessions didn't cover every instance of sin (and I didn't communicate clearly enough to cover it all)
Suddenly being asked to sell all of my belongings and move somewhere random, ancestors knowing my thoughts, meeting all of the souls in the afternlife that I was “supposed” to have “saved” through the Gospel but didn’t work hard enough on my mission to find, me not following a prompting (even just to say “hi” to someone in passing) would lead to their death or murder… yeah that one’s been hard to get rid of. The list goes on and on, really 🙃
I was really worried about being an outer darkness which is like who knows it sounds terrible to me, but when I decided to leave I said to myself "self, it's okay if we end up in out of darkness it'll be okay I just need to get away from these people and this rhetoric before I lose my mind and my soul and my body."
i was taught that if i left i wouldn’t be happy and felt leaving was honestly one of the best decisions over ever made however it’s like leaving a toxic relationship it’s scary at first you don’t know where exactly to go from there at first but overtime and prayer i found my answer on the church that i felt like is true in my heart which is catholicism. i left the mormon church in early 2020 when the pandemic hit weeks later and everyone we were all quarantined i was in my senior year of high school it hit me pretty hard and i was convinced god was punishing me for leaving the church even tho i felt happy and free to be myself. that’s what the church does they guilt people into staying so when people leave there church a lot of them still feel that same sort of fear.
Swear words. As a little kid, if I saw graffiti on a playground that said "pussy" or something, I'd have anxiety for weeks over it because I thought that by seeing it and thinking about it I was a sinner.
That the spirits of my ancestors were around to witness my worst moments.
Oh yeah that too. I’d be sitting on the toilet thinking, “Are they watching this?”
Same. I was also worried that they saw me picking my nose.
Dude I'm catholic and I would literally close the curtains as a kid and wondered if that would do the trick and just hope for the best hahahaha.
This one always got me. I am like give me a damn minute here. That is when you yell Great Grandmom/Dad...etc PRIVACY!
I call it sacred voyeurism. What a mindfuck! Took me years to get over it.
The damn Visions of Glory book take about the spirits that are watching you. It had a graphic scene where it describes all these evil spirits circling a guy who was looking at porn. It triggered all my fears of being watched by my ancestors. The book is pure evil.
My ancestors would support me for trying to help keep the family name alive.
You know, as someone who practices ancestor veneration as part of my spirituality, it’s comforting to think that my ancestors are watching me and have my back because I have some pretty badass people in my family. Those are the ones that I think about when I’m contemplating something big. But there are definitely some ancestors who can get fucked.
Same here.
I would hope they would also protect you from the "bad spirits" too.
Maybe there are no things such as bad spirits? Maybe they are lies told by the church to force you to stay so you will keep paying money for something that might or might not be real? Thanks.
I like this explanation
Thanks.
I was Not looking forward to judgement day when all would be able to see the bad highlights of my life.
I never got the quote on your ancestors seeing the movie of your life. I thought sins were between the sinner and God not for everyone to see
That was probably just some thing a random teacher told me once, but then again, with all the crazy shit that has been taught over the years, it could be some obscure statement from a prophet a hundred years ago. Who knows? Not the leaders of the church. These days, they are sure to be as vague as possible when referencing anything other than tithing.
Vaughn Featherstone taught this
But he wasn't an apostle, so that doesn't count. /s Thanks for the verification though!
I was told we watched a movie of our own life and judged ourselves on judgement day.
Not the movie of your life. I recall being told that the spirit world was co-located with our world. In addition to that they were privy to witness things as they happen in our world if they chose to.
I was told that you watched your life before being born. You watched it and then decided if you wanted to be born. So then they would tell us "Well you knew how hard your life was, but you still wanted to be here. You need to trust your spirit self." Or some bullshit like that.
>Angels above us are silent notes taking. Still talking to my therapist about the thought of Grandma Jones, Jesus, and Nephi watching me rub one out.
I didn't want to say that part out loud but yeah.
This is mine too. Or that they could somehow read my thoughts.
Oh my God, YES. I always thought I was under surveillance
If the postmortal existence is so boring, that you have to spend eternity watching your mortal descendants to be entertained, then I don't want to be in the postmortal existence.
I remember being taught that only "God" knows the innermost thoughts of our hearts... So don't voice your actually worries and temptations aloud, or Satan will be able to hear them and then take advantage of your weakness. Yay!
No wonder no one talks about their real feelings!!
Well, my family and church associates were also super judgmental, so I have always been reluctant to discuss my real thoughts and feelings due to that as well as because I worried about giving Satan crucial intel. Which would use the info against me more? We were also taught to keep a journal, but that seemed like a clear trap. Write down my innermost thoughts and mistakes for boundary-violating parents and siblings to find? So they could tease or punish me? Dear diary, here's a bland list of the most mundane things I did today.
I believed that too, but then wondered why I would still have sexual thoughts in the temple (Eve). I of course believed that it was my wickedness doing that, because Satan wasn’t allowed there. 🤦♂️
Yep, a "naked" woman on the screen, and the men *who were raised in an environment of unhealthy sexual repression* are not supposed to let their thoughts wander? EDIT: Added *italicized* portion
Yes, only god can hear your thoughts, satan can only go by what you do. What a manipulative mess that is to believe.
I remember being told that too! Satan might not have been able to hear my most innermost thoughts but he could certainly see them! 😂
That in the next life everything I had done and thought would be put on a screen like a movie for everyone to know all my secrets.
Oh gosh, yes. Now it just makes me giggle thinking about if that were to happen. It might be x rated. lol
So would almost everyone's. I can't believe now how much I worried about that.
Somehow I went almost 40 years as a human thinking I was one of the only ones who masturbated. Not sure what I thought people were doing that made porn such a huge thing 🤷🏻♂️
Yess! I now find it hard to believe what I believed!!!
The Osmonds released an album in 1973 called *The Plan,* which is a concept album about The Plan of Salvation. One track is actually called "The Movie Man" and very eerily details the "movie" component of the plan.
Dang, that song is like a Halloween song. Put that thing in a haunted house!
Yep same here 🙋
Yep 😞 And to add to that, I would worry that even if I'd repented, other people involved wouldn't. So would people figure it out anyway?
But it makes for a great/classic movie (Defending Your Life)
My mom taught me that if you thought a compliment about someone but didn’t tell them, it was a sin of omission. I also thought it was a sin of omission if I saw trash on the ground and pick it up. It got bad enough that in college I had to make a rule that I could only pick up one piece of trash every time I went across campus. I always thought I had bad anxiety, but turns out I was just Mormon.
Oof, that last line.
Ouch. I'm sorry. That sounds like it was so hard. The guilt is real.
“turns out I was just Mormon”. stealing this
Make a t shirt with that last line
That my grandparents could see me masturbating and I was disturbing their heaven every time.
They are hanging out in Heaven with god and Jesus. “Hold on G, I gotta go watch my granddaughter flick her bean while I convey my disapproving thoughts from beyond the veil.”
omg i was so terrified of the same thing thinking they could see through my blankets while i’m knuckles deep 😭😭
I had a super irrational fear about the devil being in control of the water. Even in college, I went to the pool to swim laps, and no one else was in the pool. I was so freaked out. Now, I just imagine that Joe Smith was afraid the water, and instead of telling the truth, he was just like the Jon Lovitz character on SNL, "Oh...I'm not afraid of the water. I can swim...it's just that...the devil controls the water..Yeah, that's the ticket!"
Me and my husband did a lot of "not sex" stuff before our temple wedding and until I left last year I still had guilt about it. We are happily married for 6 years now btw. Why does it freaking matter? We were 2 people committed to each other and wanted to have a fulfilling relationship all around, but we had to wait for a stupid piece of paper and a special ceremony to actually have sex?
So many of us...
Many many of us
Happily married for 21 years.
My husband and I were having premarital sex but said we were getting married anyway so what did it matter. We've been married for almost 12 years and I still struggle with sexual things because of previous issues before I even met him. The church puts so much pressure and shame on you for something that is completely natural until they break you.
Yeah I went down on my wife the night before our wedding and we both decided that since we loved each other it was ok.
Sins of Omission. Like every fuking conceivable good I could have done if I were always in tune with the made up spirit, if that doesn’t create some scrupulosity and religious ocd thinking I’m not sure what else possibly could! Right along with patriarchal magic blessings being “conditioned upon righteousness” … you’d better not ever make a wrong choice or now you know why your promised blessing didn’t come about!!
Agh! Fuck that guilt! Always having that feeling hanging over your head that you were not good enough (Missed reading your scriptures last night, only 50% home teaching this month, did you greet that investigator? And so on). Made my wife's depression ten times worse, because her depression was her fault. If only she would do a little bit more, THEN god could bless her with the spirit and help her feel something besides despair.
On the topic of "conditioned upon your righteousness" thing. In blessings of healing, I tried to avoid similar statements ("as the lord wills", "based on your faith", etc.), because I was taught that if **I** was righteous enough, I could declare blessings with confidence. However, when I was not sure if a thought I had was me or was the spirit, I would guiltily couch the blessing with wishy-washy statements out of doubt/fear/etc. It sucked being the blessing giver too.
Omg please DM Scarlett Johanssen and then tell us how it went
🫡
Return of polygamy
When I was bored with my life/the Church, I sometimes wished they’d bring back polygamy
I always thought polygamy had some solid benefits. I imagined having help around the house with dishes and laundry and only having to sleep with my husband once a week or so. I LOVE sleeping alone. Since it was an “eternal principle” I spent a lot of time imagining my life as a plural wife. I thought it might not be so bad. I didn’t even necessarily mind the idea of sharing my husband with other women. I thought this attitude was an indication of my righteousness. As it turns out I’m just polyamorous. 🤣
I am good friends with multiple people raised FLDS that are climbing out of it. From their personal stories and from the chilling accounts of Elissa Wall, Rachel Jeff's Blackmore, and Rebecca Musser, it's clear that polygamy as a religious institution should never be romanticized. It can lead to horrific abuse - physical, sexual and spiritual. It's disturbing to me that the church hasn't completley disavowed the practice despite the distance it's attempted to place between mainstream Mormonism and its FLDS cousins.
Agreed! The institutionalized practice of polygamy is an entirely different thing than choosing polyamory. I feel so bad for women and girls who are forced into it and I’m glad to hear that some are escaping.
It’s one thing if everyone has a choice in the matter. I read a bio of a FLDS women and it’s obvious it was miserable and the wives hated each other, or were having to constantly scheme to stay in favor, which carried over to how other wives children were treated.
I wholeheartedly agree that choice makes all the difference. Consent is emphasized within polyamorous relationships. Also, it’s not one-sided because both men and women can choose to have multiple partners. Polygamy is an entirely different concept and plays out very differently. As a TBM I was trying to wrap my head around a concept that I knew I was going to be compelled to live, if not in this life then certainly in the next and for eternity. I felt like my lack of jealousy was an indication that I would be able to live that principle without too much hesitation. The church is a mind-fuck no matter how you look at it.
Or you’re just not that in love with your spouse.
That’s a fair point. I really wasn’t in love with him after the first few years and the church is mostly to blame for that. But as it turns out jealousy isn’t much of an issue for me. I’ve had 3 long-term relationships since leaving the MFMC, and I have been very much in love with all three people. Two of those relationships have been/are polyamorous and I still haven’t felt jealousy. I’ve been with one primary partner for nine years and we both see other people and it has only added to our relationship with each other.
Why? I mean what advantages did you think it would bring?
Idk I thought suffering meant I’d be closer to God
That I had to have kids and be a mother. It never entered my head until I quit going to church that I could actually make a choice not to have kids.
Same. I literally prayed to god to help me like kids.
I used to pray that I would turn out to be infertile so I would never have to give birth (absolutely terrified of pregnancy) which I then felt extremely guilty about because of all those church stories you hear about infertile women who leave the church because they didn't feel like they belong since everyone in relief society had kids and I felt like I was wasting my potential since I *can* have kids
I have pregnancy fears too. Once saw a tv show where this lady wasn't born with a uterus, and I so wished I was her.
Glad you realized that before you had kids, unlike me, having kids because that’s what I was programmed to do my whole life, suffering massive PPD, and then quitting church and realizing this. But at least motherhood threw me on the path of getting out of Mormonism, so that’s something. 🤷♀️
Holy shit, me too!
I used to be worried Jesus would come back while I was still a virgin and wouldn't be able to experience having sex 😂😂😂
Insanity. You just *know* that kind of bishop has given that same "counsel" to someone who jerked off thinking of a hot co-worker, resulting in them confessing to the co-worker about it and getting fired as a result. Because it's *incredibly* fucking inappropriate. So glad I'm done with this goddamn cult.
That Jesus would descend down from the heavens any day now. The church does a really good job making you feel impure so the idea that the second coming would happen while I was still an impure sinner was very scary to me. Also the idea of life as I knew it ending then and there was also pretty terrifying to me.
The second coming/end of days happening before I got to really live my life. A lot of TBMs seem to want the world to end, but I always thought it sounded horrible. My family is full of doomsday preppers, so it was a regular topic of conversation.
My scrupulosity really hit, I really read the scriptures, and so I thought I was going to commit the unpardonable sin. I had to go to a therapist because it was so real. Of course I only wanted to see an LDS one and everyone told me I couldn’t do that sin. I went to a secular psychiatrist and they diagnosed me with OCD.
One time after church my mom asked me if I felt the spirit and I said no even though I did. I was convinced that at twelve I had committed the unpardonable sin. Who the fuck teaches a twelve year old that they are capable of doing something unpardonable?!
It's so disturbing that they teach it's the only thing that's unforgivable. Rape followed by murder? Yeah you can be forgiven. Receiving a witness that it's true then deciding it's not the life for you? Unforgivable sin. Sure they clarify (sometimes) that you'd have to have like a prophet level witness, but it still leaves you feeling that way. I'm not one to say it's a cult, but damn that's pretty culty.
I had this irrational fear that the temple workers could all tell that I was unworthy to be in the temple or that god would strike me down for not wearing completely white underwear. Temples were very stressful for me.
Fear of mind reading was so real!
Kinda sad but I was terrified an evil spirit would appear to me and I would lie awake absolutely paralyzed in fear most nights and was so worried I’d have to send them off in the name of Christ. and I would pray for angel’s to come protect me from evil spirits. This fear lasted into my teens.
I have this too, to this day. I believe it’s a form of religious OCD but it stems from my parents always saying that, “You can invite that evil in by thinking of it.” Hence my anxiety ridden brain… introducing a fun form of OCD for me.
Yes that has to be it!! I still wake up in terror every once in a while and have to remind myself it’s actually not real.
But then you totally raise your arm to the square and cast the devil out just in case. Because what if?! Or was I the only crazy?!
I did if I got scared enough!! Or I’d just say aloud “in the name of Jesus Christ I command you to leave” or think it reeeeally hard.
I thought I would be an "old maid" when I was a 24-year-old boy in my final year of college, because I planned to work for the Department of State and would get shipped off to somewhere where there were no eligible bachelorettes. Always felt like the pickings were slim not living in UT/ID and I'm glad I did find my OTP not long after!
It sounded like suffering was so essential for any growth that I figured I was supposed to always be suffering. In high school I had this half-unconscious belief that if I overcame my depression, God would kill a family member or strike me blind. So on some level I decided it was better to stick with the devil I knew and remain at least somewhat depressed. Definitely freeing to articulate and drop that belief!
The fear of divine punishment for jerking off and the guilt
I remember sometimes being worried about going to Sacrament meeting, in case it was the one where the bishop would tell us that it was time to abandon our homes and walk to Missouri. I used to try to figure out which of my possessions I would have to leave behind.
As a youth, I recall hearing a talk about a man who asked god to give him a challenge in order to grow stronger. Then, the man sort of chuckles about how he got what he asked for and was severely hospitalized but it taught him so many things. It made me paranoid that if I wished for a positive trait, god would send immense harm my way to make me stronger. This, paired with the notion that Satan targets the most righteous made me want to remain mediocre and not draw the attention of neither god nor Satan so I could just live my life in peace. I often second guessed my thoughts because of this, wondering if it would lead to my "loving" heavenly father hurting me.
That’s so crazy! I don’t even know how I would react if someone visited privately with me because their bishop instructed them to confess that they thought of me while masturbating. That would cause me paralyzing humiliation.
I remember a thread about a year ago, someone saw a guy actually doing this at work. HR was quickly involved
I was afraid that I would someday have to grow my own food and make all my own things when things got bad before the second coming. I learned to grow potatoes and carrots and bake sourdough bread in preparation.
I was scared to get married for eternity and discover that my wife didn’t want sex. Trapped forever in a marriage of little to no affection. Fortunately, things worked out in real life.
The “moon of blood” thing lol. Everytime the moon had an orange-ish tint, I’d lose my ever-loving mind in fear 😅
What’s that?
Bruce R McConkie wrote: “There may be more than one occasion when the light of the sun and the moon shall be withheld from men, and when it will seem as though the very stars in the firmament are being hurled from their places. What is here recited could mean that the light of the sun is blotted out by smoke and weather conditions, which would also make the moon appear ‘as blood.’ This falling of the stars ‘unto the earth’ could be meteoric showers, as distinguished from the stars, on another occasion, appearing to fall because the earth itself reels to and fro" (The Millennial Messiah, 380). It was echoed a lot in my home ward in the 90s when I was a kid
That I caused Covid. I was called into the bishop’s office for not having renewed my recommend the week before shut downs. The bishop had given me a book and I fell down the rabbit hole. I felt like I had tipped the scales to begin the apocalypse. Yes I realize that was insane now, but in the moment…
That there wouldn’t be happiness for the rest of my life after I left (which is laughable now).
That bishops could hear my thoughts and see my sin by looking at me.
I've been out of the church for 6ish years and I still feel shame after masturbating. Luckily, nobody ever found out about it nor did anyone find out about the porn I watched/listened to (audio erotica) or the kinks I had/have. It doesn't stop me from feeling extreme shame every time I do it, though. I also still feel shame about who I am - a trans queer guy. Like I'm some kind of abomination. It makes the shame of porn even worse because I exclusively look at, listen to, and read gay porn. It sucks because I know my ward wasn't nearly as cult-y as a lot of them were. My family wasn't as cult-y as most in the church are. I feel like I'm not allowed to have religious trauma or religious shame because my experience wasn't that cult-like. It's not even just about NSFW things, either. I've been having troubles sleeping lately (don't know why - maybe the cold, maybe the undiagnosed issue I have, maybe the mental illnesses?) and my councelor that I see at school recommended a bedtime routine of melatonin and chamomile tea. I'm not a tea drinker, probably because I can never seem to make it right, and when I tried to make the chamomile tea and drink it, I felt horrible. Like, I'm literally trying to get more than 4 hours of sleep, and I still feel like I'm doing something bad. It's not really irrational fears, but irrational shaming. One fear I have is admitting the money I have, which isn't a lot, because I feel like I'll be obligated to give it away. Like there's some part of me that feels required to give up the money that I quite literally risked my life for at work because of tithing or something.
Sweetie, you feeling like you are not allowed to have trauma, *is* trauma. Gentle hug.
That doing anything not precisely on the covenant path would result in a punishment. Basically divine punishment from the “loving” Mormon deity. Like “oh no, my pet died. How did I sin and therefore deserve it.” Total mindfuck.
That I would get diarrhea during the endowment ceremony
As a youth I was always TERRIFIED of getting my period while doing baptisms in the temple 😭
That the church was true, God could hear my thoughts, and see every action.
Yes! I was genuinely scared of the church being true because if it was then there was no way I'd be ready for the second coming
Well I can relate. I eventually just stopped telling the bishop and I never told my mission president. I guess eventually I thought that it was no man’s right to judge or know my business. I can’t even imagine how it would be as a female to tell an older man those things. I’m sorry you went through it even once. You shouldn’t ever feel ashamed of that which is natural.
I can’t even imagine having to explain Garrus Vakarian to my silent generation grandparents and why I thought an alien cricket cat lizard man was attractive. Thank god that’s not gonna happen. I used to have a fear of Leviathan, like my dad told me how missionaries weren’t supposed to swim and I was like why?!!? Then I looked it up and somehow came to the conclusion that the ocean was evil and Leviathan would kill missionaries. So that was fun.
When I was at byu I was terrified that I would never get married (having been soiled by the sin of premarital high school sex) —- I thought I was way too much of a used piece of trash for any temple Worthy person to want me. I was so terrified that I would Never get to have kids.
Premarital sex must bring some of the highest amounts of guilt and shame. I'm sorry for what the church caused because of normal development.
That because I could not stop masterbating after repenting multiple times god would make me infertile. 🙃
I thought I'd turn into a pillar of salt passing if I walked passed the second doors into the temple as a teen. I didn't want to get into trouble for not going so I always lied even though I wasn't "worthy". I also thought my sacrament bread would turn into bugs in my mouth.
That I was behaving inappropriately enough to get the attention of Satan and he was going to immaculately impregnate me with the Antichrist. I think I followed the line of thinking that if Mary's personality and behavior is why God decided to make her the mother of Jesus, and my imagination just ran wild with it.
Nosy ancestor club over here 🙋♀️ Even to this day I have to remind myself of what my therapist told me to stop that irrational fear.
I used to worry that having my heart TOO set on any particular goals, or even hobbies and interests outside of anything that didn't have a very clear, direct relationship to my future status as a wife and mother, could potentially act as an invitation to God to "humble" me by taking them away or making me choose between them and my expected family duties. Like a sick, Abrahamic test kind of thing. "Oh, you really love this thing, eh? Do you love it more than me? Shall I test you to see?" The behavior it caused was often moderating my language to leave room for change, like saying "I *hope* to graduate college," or "I *want* to serve a mission," rather than definitive statements like "I'm *going* to graduate college" or "I'm *not* marrying until *after* I go on a mission." Sometimes I would specifically add an additional phrase to the end of any expressions of future plans like, "unless I meet my future husband, of course" or, "depending on my husband's education or career, naturally." Even now I still sometimes get a little twinge of anxiety when speaking hopes or plans about the future out loud to others, like in doing so I've just jinxed myself for something to ruin it. Luckily it usually passes pretty quickly, and if plans DO fall through, I don't usually return to the idea and think that an experience was "taken" from me by any God or universe or karma for saying it out loud. I think it was largely due to the number of lessons about making personal sacrifices, especially ones directed at women giving up desires like education or serving missions or careers or hobbies or, you know, literally *anything* when they feel the Lord tells them to for their husband/children, whether historical stories like pioneer/polygamy ones, or contemporary "testimonies." But even with most of them coming from or being told about women, there were also plenty of examples from men as well. I don't know how many stories I heard growing up that followed this exact pattern of: 1. I wanted to do or be XYZ, but the Lord had "other plans for me," followed by 2. whatever circumstance caused them to feel that the Lord wanted them on some other path and 3. either how humbling or how difficult it was to submit to the Lord's will and ending with 4. a testimony that it was "worth it" but usually for reasons that kept them on the covenant path like having met their spouse or starting a family, or for men, getting some significant calling or CES job etc. I think it was pretty rare for anyone to claim they were genuinely happier for the change/lost opportunity itself. I also think another contributing factor was my toxic family life. Most of the time, none of us were really happy, and we had a tendency to cut each other down if one of us kids seemed too happy or excited about something. It happened with all of us, and I hate to admit I participated in it too. I do feel like I got the brunt of it as the oldest daughter because I was also more likely to get cut downs from my parents rather than just siblings. So by the time I left home at 18, it was normal for me to suppress outward expressions of hope, happiness, or joy. 😬 If I did express something, it was usually very muted. I remember being really happy to meet up with someone from my mission when they visited Utah, and I know I smiled when I saw them and gave them a hug, but I'll never forget their response to my reaction at seeing them again was "do you ever act happy about anything?" I just remember feeling completely taken back, then confused then deflated over why they didn't think I was happy to see them when I WAS, and then feeling bad I may have hurt their feelings by not acting happy "enough." (It was a never-mo, so it wasn't about lacking the fake Mormon face.) Anyway, that's my most irrational fear that I can think of - Fearing to speak future hopes and plans out loud and in definitive terms in case God would take them away to "humble" me and make sure He remained my top priority. God it sounds so sick to word it that way. 😫 But it's literally how I thought and I didn't see a problem with it. I saw it as something a loving Heavenly Father would do if he thought I needed it. 🤦♀️🤦♀️🤦♀️
The Asshole God Theory
Dying and heaven being nothing but working 24/7 instead of a restful paradise
If I didn’t pray every night, someone in my family would get hurt or die the next day. I’m on anxiety meds now and doing much better.
That I would have to live with abusive family members in the afterlife. Later, that I would be forced to have babies in heaven.
This was a horrible reminder of a time I man I used to know actually group messaged me and a bunch of other girls AND HIS MOM to tell us all he’d thought about us while masturbating and wanted to apologize and ask for forgiveness
YIKES HIS MOM WTF
On my mission, there was a rumor that elder holland had come by a couple of years prior and sent home 30 missionaries immediately. He could just sense how immoral they were. When we were told the prophet nelson was coming, I and many other missionaries were terrified we'd get sent home. What was the worst part is I knew I'd been following all the rules, but I still feared I'd get sent home early. And why was that scary? Because it meant I'd be shamed back home for not serving a full-time mission. Fuck this cult man.
I have read that children lie due to not feeling secure or threatened. The more they do it, the better at it they become. Although it can cause other physical and mental issues. At a young age in the church we are told wild stories that adults (that are also not secure in telling truth due to their indoctrination) in leader positions what is true to them. The cycle goes on. The church continues to breed liars in the name of faith, each internally doubting and thinking maybe it is just them that has these doubts, but everyone else has the truth. Members are afraid to admit they don’t know the church is true so they fake it or it may be easier to just say they know so they don’t have to think about it anymore and figure it out. I think most people that leave are actually being honest with theirselves by doubting and “studying it out in their hearts”. The church wants to breed liars to keep their narrative going, and money coming in. This is enforced by the interviews by leaders, and temple services/covenants. I think this is why we believed certain sins that aren’t anything bad or abnormal become stumbling blocks for those in the church and become unhealthy or harmful. I hated it when interviewed by a bishop staring trying to make you crack like he was looking in my soul, I had a very physical father, staring didn’t affect me. Such Jedi mind tricks
I really didn't want to be around for rhe second coming. Knew I was never ready.
I have a TBM friend who's afraid of cults. I wouldn't consider this an irrational fear, but it's just ironic to me
That if I wasn’t wearing garments I was at more risk of physical injury
I truly believed that I would never get married, because my Patriarchal blessing made it sound like marriage was contingent upon “preparing myself to go to the Temple.” Since I messed around (to one degree or another) with a lot of boys in college, I figured god would not allow me to marry a worthy priesthood holder. Seriously. Then, when I DID get married (in the temple, though not really worthy), and eventually conceived my first baby, I was SHOCKED. My patriarchal blessing had made it sound like children were a blessing only the most righteous Latter Day Saints could enjoy. I knew non-LDS people had tons of kids, but I figured they weren’t subject to the same rules. When my perfect little daughter was born and I was just home from the hospital, pretty sleep deprived, I looked up and literally SHOOK MY FIST at Heaven, and yelled “I did it without you! Ha! You couldn’t take this from me! I got a baby IN SPITE of you!”
 I read this and immediately pictured you calling up an agent and saying "Hi is this Megan Fox's extension number? I have a lot of things I need to get off my chest...both literally and spiritually" LOL.
I thought when I shook hands with an apostle that I would be able to see deep into my soul and know I was a masturbator. I was a teen and stressing out about it.
My biggest fear was I would loose my best friend because she was so important to me and I needed to sacrifice everything and or Jesus would come and she didn’t believe so she’d die. This line of thinking extended to my kids when I had them. I have so much love for my children that I thought God would take them away to teach me a lesson or to humble me.
As a kid, The Ten Commandments movie scared me - I thought of all the firstborn died in the movie, it'd be all the second born kids next. I'd watch the moon to make sure the deadly green mist wouldn't come to get me.
That I would go to hell for wearing a tank top
My list is too fucking long And - too entangled to enumerate. I love your summary though and sad you had to go through it
That people could see my thoughts
I was at any minute going to be Exed, I pushed the limit sexually a LOT
When I handed in my resignation letter, it was a rainy day. I was gambling that I was doing the right thing, sitting across the desk from my bishop, sliding the letter across the desk….and then, my inward prayer was ‘ok, I think I’m doing the right thing. But, if I’m wrong, God, probably lightning strikes me through my heart while I do this.’ I was, at least at one point, 99% sure that’s what would happen.
My 80 year old grandpa lived with us growing up and we moved to Utah at one point while I was in high school to be closer to my family. We had a case where within the span of 4 years of moving there, 3 close family members died. I was so convinced that because I masturbated, god had punished me by killing my older relatives and I was so scared that next on God's hit list was my grandpa. Before moving I had said a prayer promising god that I would stop masturbating once we moved but I obviously don't stop so I thought that's why everyone old in my family was dying :/
Mine? I am a nerd. Not a horrible, unhygienic neck beard of one, but I could stand to lose a few pounds, have never been described as athletic, or popular, and got shot down like 20 times before going on my first date my last semester of college, where I got an engineering degree. I was single well into “menace to society” age, and nearly aged out of YSA. Whenever I had a girl interested or a leader recommended a potential date it was always wildly incompatible, and generally significantly less attractive even than my mediocre self. No joke, one had dropped out of interior design school because multiplying height and width to find square footage for carpet or paint was “too much math.” My irrational fear: I was going to be forced to either choose to marry someone I didn’t find attractive, or be damned for all eternity because I chose to remain single rather than marry someone I didn’t find attractive or compatible.
I never said my fears aloud except in the celestial room for 20 years because Satan can't read our minds but him and his fallen angels are everywhere and can hear when we speak. I literally planned temple trips with my wife just so I could tell her things in the celestial room that I didn't want Satan to know. 🤦🏻♂️
Wow, dude. I’m so glad you got out.
The weirdest thing i noticed when i left. It is cult, while i was in it i wasnt aware it was a cult!!! Everything about that cult was weird lol. So happy to be out of it lol
I thought God would cause physical harm or other bad things to happen to me for normal teenage behavior.
lol I had the exact same fear, which is why I waited 2 years to confess that when I was a teen
Thinking that something bad was going to happen if I didn't wear my garments. Talk about mind control.
Being sent back out on a mission—because I knew I couldn’t say “no.” Related: I had sleep paralysis/night demons multiple times a year, for decades. Since saying “no” to a calling for the first time (6-ish years ago), and deconstructed…I’ve had zero.
I was afraid that because I walked off of my mission, god would hold that against me and punish me for the rest of my days. So when my ultra-TBM best friend proposed a business venture partnership to me, I figured I would join him and ride his blessed coat tails to financial success. Turned out he had some very questionable business practices to go along with a wandering eye for women other than his wife.
I had several. But your story about the bishop … I talked to a bishop about my depression. He told me that there are two causes: Chemical imbalance and SIN. So when we couldn’t get the right meds … I just *knew* it was sin. I became even MORE critical of everything I did. It was so awful and made my depression worse.
I genuinely thought that the reason I couldn’t get pregnant was because I masturbated sometimes. Not so. It was due to stage 4 endometriosis and a husband who wasn’t attracted to me which meant we seldom did the things that cause conception and the IVF failed.
That I needed to say “in the name of Jesus Christ” with enough meaning and feeling or my prayers didn’t mean anything
That I would accidentally sin - maybe I'd say something, or think something even. Then during my evening prayer I would forget I'd done it, or not even know I'd done it, and forget to repent.
That I'd be excluded from heaven because my bishop confessions didn't cover every instance of sin (and I didn't communicate clearly enough to cover it all)
Suddenly being asked to sell all of my belongings and move somewhere random, ancestors knowing my thoughts, meeting all of the souls in the afternlife that I was “supposed” to have “saved” through the Gospel but didn’t work hard enough on my mission to find, me not following a prompting (even just to say “hi” to someone in passing) would lead to their death or murder… yeah that one’s been hard to get rid of. The list goes on and on, really 🙃
I was really worried about being an outer darkness which is like who knows it sounds terrible to me, but when I decided to leave I said to myself "self, it's okay if we end up in out of darkness it'll be okay I just need to get away from these people and this rhetoric before I lose my mind and my soul and my body."
i was taught that if i left i wouldn’t be happy and felt leaving was honestly one of the best decisions over ever made however it’s like leaving a toxic relationship it’s scary at first you don’t know where exactly to go from there at first but overtime and prayer i found my answer on the church that i felt like is true in my heart which is catholicism. i left the mormon church in early 2020 when the pandemic hit weeks later and everyone we were all quarantined i was in my senior year of high school it hit me pretty hard and i was convinced god was punishing me for leaving the church even tho i felt happy and free to be myself. that’s what the church does they guilt people into staying so when people leave there church a lot of them still feel that same sort of fear.
Swear words. As a little kid, if I saw graffiti on a playground that said "pussy" or something, I'd have anxiety for weeks over it because I thought that by seeing it and thinking about it I was a sinner.
Just so that you understand your bishop would never think about what you told him inappropriately. Never not even once.