A little background I am 18 and have my associates degree and am working towards a bachelors in finance and also in economics. I was talking to my cousin the other day who is a girl. She is a return missionary and is 23. She asked me if I was going to go on a mission and I said no. She then proceeded to tell me that she had a friend who didn't go on a mission and he is a drug dealer. I am 5 years younger than her and already the same year as her in school. Where does she get the nerve to try to put me in the same category as a drug dealer.

I am sorry I love my cousin, but this has been a common theme. I am constantly being told that I will be a failure if I don't go on a mission. I have been offered multiple full tuition scholarships and I am an extremely hard worker. I love how people try to use the fear tactic in order to try to get people out on a mission.....

It seems Mormons think that if you don't go on a mission, it's because you want to be evil or do something evil.

Get your degree, get a great job, and be prepared for all the gossip and backstabbing you'll (unfortunately) receive from your cousin and other family members. As the old saying goes, "The best revenge is to live well" or something like that. Be the best you that you can be.

Oh, and if you need virtual support, stay here and you'll get it. A lot of the people here can empathize, either having gone through something similar or having seen it happen.

I'm a nevermo who has friends who are Mormon and a Jack Mormon brother-in-law. Welcome to the madhouse!

You'll know you are recovering when you can just laugh at the absurdity of this sort of inane comment.

I take it she never studied logic.

You lucky stinker! You see it for what it is and your only 18? Dag nabit, I wish I could be you and know what I know now.

In the Ensign some months ago some schmuck wrote an article bout young women having a choice as to what to become in life.
They falsely portrayed only two choices. One, become a crack whore rock star. Two, a celestial bound homemaker and baby provider to a celestial bound priesthood holder and god in the making.

Wow, what a choice huh? Inside the bubble of mormonism there is only one choice if you believe that these are your true choices.

The problem is there are a hundred thousand other moral, ethical, humanitarian, and socially uplifting careers for women. But the schmuck left all those out. Now I wonder why he left the hundred thousand great things that women can become out?

You have been shown this same choice. Go on a mission or become a drug dealing crackhead.

If you take all the things you can be other than these two options and blindfold yourself then throw a dart at the hundred thousand "others" you will certainly far surpass anything you would gain by the tiny and pitiful options that are falsely portrayed by people who supposedly know whats best for you.

My advice, take the full tuition scholarship at the most prestigious institution on the list in the field you want.

Live life you lucky little stinker!

p.s as for the the pressure you will get from the believers be they friends or family I just say this. Like water off ducks back, just like water off a ducks back.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/27/2010 10:47PM by AmIDarkNow?.

Even if you went to school, got a Ph.D, became a pharmacist and worked at a drug store, you would still be a drug dealer. It's inevitable. If you don't go on a mission, you will become a drug dealer one way or another.

and portary yourself as a "great and powerful wizard" of Mormon OZ.

Female here, got my PHD at 27, in a stable relationship, getting married soon now that we can afford to provide for kids, travelled all over the world in the meantime, fluent in three languages and functional in two more- never done drugs in my life, wouldn't even know how to get a hold of them, let alone deal.

Ten years ago, I had no idea I could have my cake and eat it, I just gave it a shot and wound up right where I wanted to be. Point being, don't let your cousin distract you, you can make your own way. The woman doesn't know what she's talking about.

Do you know how I know you're in a cult, "because you think @#$%& like that?"

Look at all the bad stuff that happens while being on a mission.
How dose the church explain that.

In Africa, the young men have to "prove" themselves by killing a lion...in Native American cultures they had to climb the mountain and fast and come home with a totem animal that had chosen them...in American Mormonism no upstanding young women will have a man who has not brought back the pelts of investigators.

The social stigma that follows the young men who fail the initiation rite can mar them for life....

The masonic ritual initially involved cutting of marks into flesh, for the proof of bravery, or sincerity or ?

So that's why they don't care if it's bad. It's supposed to be bad.

Anagrammy

. . . (or however long women go now)--and she needs those two years to get ahead of you! Of course it's way more complicated than that, and I'm sure she believes what she threatens wholeheartedly and fearfully. Thank goodness there's a place to vent, eh?

Limit the time you spend with people like her.

I am glad to hear the female cousin is at least in school anyway. Maybe she will see through the BS when she has a BS. Returning to college as a wee mommy morgbot certainly opened my eyes to the reality around me and I was able to leave the cult. (And the college I went to was BYU!)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/28/2010 07:20AM by msmom.

I chose not to go on a mission and was condescended consistently. Close to my departure from the Sham, I remember not even being acknowledged when me and a well known return missionary did home teaching.

I know she's your cousin and you love her... But if it were my cousin, I would give her the most "Oh pu--LEEEZ" look I could manage, and say,

"Are you kidding me? Did you really just say that? I can't even tell you how disappointed I am. I would have expected more rational judgement from someone like you..."

You gotta throw ice water on those air-head ideas when people have them, and put those notions down in there place, right along side Wiley Coyote with his "chair strapped to a rocket".

You do what is best for you. Yes, your cousin thinks one person's troubles will be your troubles if you don't go. She is so brainwahsed. You sound like a very mature person who has a plan for their life. Good luck to you and just ignore stupid people.

Our relationship never recovered from that and other fallout from me announcing my disbelief. Maybe it's just me, but it's hard to have love for someone who desperately wants to see you fail. And that's no exaggeration. She would rather I had failed and been humbled than to have her children watch their heretic father be a success.

If tithing is a true principle, you HAVE TO DO IT if you want to be happy. Black and white.

You've already figured out that the world is mostly gray. You're an adult and you're making decisions that only people in a mind controlled state would argue are "mistakes". Sounds like you're on a great path. Good luck to you.

I wish I had been smart enough to figure things out at your age. My mission is my single greatest source of regret, and has cast a long shadow over my life. At age 30, I'm still trying to crawl out from under that shadow.

Nobody tells you how big a sacrifice a mission really is. It's 2 years of actual service, plus however much time you spend earning money for the mission beforehand, plus however much time you spend trying to restart your education and career afterward. Only the kids with rich parents get to come home and jump straight back into school. I came home to no car, no connections, no job, broke parents, and about $30 to my name, which I spent on a pair of steel-toe boots so I could work a low-paying and miserable manual labor job. I spent 2 years trying to put the pieces in place and save enough money to continue my education.

As a result, I'm 4 years behind in my career. When I started grad school, I learned about certain entry-level opportunities for experience and networking that are unique to my career field. Unfortunately, due to my mission, I was already past the age limit for those opportunities. I've paid for college, including a Masters degree, entirely through my own efforts, while concurrently working my ass off to to bootstrap my career.

I've just had what is for me a very good year financially. My client base has grown, and I've already doubled what I made last year. Even so, the fact remains that what I'm making at age 30 is what I would have been making at age 26 if I hadn't served a mission.

A mission does not make a person more successful, and is in fact a hindrance. There is no benefit to serving a mission that cannot be obtained more efficiently some other way. Any success an RM achieves in life will be in spite of, not because of, his or her mission.

The missionary is the drug dealer. The missionary is pushing a mental drug that takes over the lives and the brains of the ones who take the Mormon drug.

One person's street drug is similar to another person's religion, IMO. They serve the same purpose in a way: an escape from reality, dependence, and an organized network of pushers.

My reply would have been, "Well, then it was good that you went on your mission, so you didn't end up like that!"

another guy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My reply would have been, "Well, then it was good
> that you went on your mission, so you didn't end
> up like that!"


actually, drug dealer is for the guy, the cousin is female, so any woman that does not go on a mission, or marries a returned missionary may actually become a whore or slut. I am sure of that.

They will really mess with your head if given the chance.

i went on a mission and i now have a medical marijuana [scoliosis] i'm gainfully employed and am a happy, functioning, member of society, what does that make me

If you no longer believe in the Mormon cult, why not simply stop going to meetings and break off all contact with Mormons? Then you will not have to clutter your mind with all their horse-crap. That is what I did by my 18th birthday.

I honestly don't know how anyone else save the mormoms actually get anything done in this life. Imagine, a whole world of non-mormons out there, and so few drug dealers?

According to a former good friend of mine, when my husband and I left the church together (we were married late by lds standards at 34, and in the temple), our marriage was doomed to failure and cheating. Funny thing is, we remain strongly married, but her TBM hubby left her and the children for the woman he was having an affair with. Then 3 years later, they reconciled.
Then I went through 7 years of IVF, and she told me God was not going to give me any children, because I left the church, and He was not going to send spiritual children in a home without the gospel. I never spoke with her again after that. I did get my beautiful twins, and just found out her husband left her again (due to cheating -,with a different woman). I remain happily married, have my children, and like you, got a good education and job before even getting married and now am financially secure.
I wish no one any harm, but Karma is a bitch.
Trust me, if not your mission, then it will be something else that you failed to do that will drive you straight to hell in the LDS eyes. At 18 and you already have your head straight, you are so far ahead of the game. Keep walking the path you are on, you got it right. One day when my kids turn 18 and have your drive, hard work and sense of self, I will sure be proud.

...President Monson never went on a mission, and that you are inspired by his example. (For that matter, neither did Boyd K. Packer nor many of the other muckety-mucks at the COB. To be fair, many did not go due to World War II, but the war has been over for a very long time, has it not?)