I waited to go on a mission till I was 21. I did not want to go and my Mormon parents did not want me to go. The church just made me feel guilty till I went.
I was one of the youngest in my family, and heard how wonderful every moment was, so I couldn't wait to go. My first day in the MTC was one of the worst of my life. I didn't want to admit it to myself, but I remember asking in my head "what did I just get myself into? Two more years of this??" It was terrible...
You don't know how good this makes me feel to hear that I wasn't the only person who had the same feeling on day 1 at the MTC. Everything was good up until my family walked out one door and I walked through another. I thought, I my gosh what have I gotten myself into???? First day in the field was worse.
I wanted to see new places and people. I wasn't much interested in missionary work. I was less interested in getting drafted and going to Vietnam. I would get a 2 year minesterial deferfent from the draft if I went on a mission. I wanted my mother to be able to hold her head up at RS. So I went.
a mission becomes a very, very good idea. That's one thing that would get me going. One thing women in the Mormon church don't suffer from, thank goodness, is the heavy threat of the mission at 19. Sure, the marriage/kids thing is dreadfully pressed, but at least there isn't a set date. I wouldn't have cared myself, since everyone knew I was a nonbeliever before I left home, but I still feel for everyone feeling that pressure, that deadline at such a young age.
I didn't want to go. I think all the pressure and guilt and mind games messed with me to the point that I had a "spiritual" experience. I took that as a sign that I was supposed to go. I then went out at age 20. Later I realized that it was a psychological experience/reaction to all that I had been through.
The mission years clearly did NOT strengthen my testimony.
The bishop called you in as you had been chosen.....right after you served your military service as you had been drafted. That is how it went for hubby. Military service to a mission with some short time, maybe some college, in between.
It was not the same kind of pressure there is now.
Missions were very different. Travel was by car or train, not usually by plane in the US.
I was very unhappy about the social pressure to serve a Mormon mission. I put it off until I was almost 21 and then on a whim submitted my papers. I had a friend who served in South America and has lifelong health problems from the experience, and I was simply going to turn down the call if it wasn't to an industrialized nation. My call was to Ireland, and I really wanted to see that country so I went. Living among the Irish people was an experience that I'm glad I had, but the whole time I was moments from calling the whole thing off. Even when I look back on it, I wonder about the experience and what I would have done if I had it to do over again.
...I succumbed to peer pressure from all of the Morons around me.
My mission was the beginning of the end of my testimony of Moronism...that's the only thing I can thank my lucky stars for wasting 2 whole years of my one-and-only life for.
Prophet SWK if there's a hell...I can only hope that you are roasting your ass off there with all of the other compassionless so-called Moron leaders before and after you!
But I felt that I was suppossed to. It was a very strong feeling that to this day I can't quite fully describe or understand. It Seemed much more than just cultural pressure.
I went because that was what all my friends were doing and what was expected of me. I didn't particularly want to go. I was having a great time in college and had great friends and a blossoming romance.
Being called to the UK helped. I actually wanted to go there so I felt like it was meant to be and I was a little more excited to go.
Of course, after the reality hit me that the mission was run like a high pressure door to door sales machine and not at all like I had thought it would be started me thinking it was all alot of BS. I had a very sterile mission president. It wasn't long until I was counting the days - literally.
No! I had no desire to serve a mission. Unfortunantly, my childhood was all focused on going on a mission. That was the plan and nothing else held any importance. Got educational opportunities awaiting you after high school? Got a girlfriend? Tough! Those things were not part of the mission plan as those things were to be forfeited for the mission. Your mission is your only focus.
All throughout my childhood I was taught over and over again that serving a mission would be this wonderful spiritual experience serving with my fellow young brethren while having the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost guiding you and your companion to honest seekers of the gospel and testifying daily to you that the gospel was true. It would be an experience that, once you returned home, you would be like a saturated sponge dripping with spiritual experiences and with wisdom beyond your years preparing you for a dedicated life to the Morg collective. The very first day and every subsequent day of my missionary experience showed me that this was all a lie. A lie spoon fed to me from the time I first could form sentient thoughts.
At 18 my parents and grandparents were always saying to me how a mission would be the next thing to accomplish on the Mormon conveyer belt. I don’t recall them ever asking me whether I want to go or not. It seemed like any dreams or aspirations I had was a thing of naught and had no value. All the focus was mission-mission-mission.
I had graduated early from high school before I was 18 and was fully into college. I was so happy to be out of the ‘day-care’ environment of high school and to be in the college environment where I could call my own shots on what classes I wanted, when to take them, and I no longer needed to have a hall pass to use the can. It was so refreshing to be treated like an adult for once. I had my own car and an interesting Gas-price marketing survey job to supply me with enough spending money. However, the expectation from everyone that I would be serving a mission at 19 hung around my neck like a millstone. I had no desire to go whatsoever. I was on a good college path with my education in electrical engineering and I really did not want to interrupt it.
Around this time I also had fallen in love with a beautiful Japanese Mormon girl convert named Kathy that I met at a multi-area youth conference in Monterey. She was not the typical Mormon girl I was used to and I enjoyed being with her more than any girl I had ever been with. I fell in love with her as deeply as one could at 18 and I couldn’t imagine myself leaving her for 2 long years. The thought of doing so made me sick inside. I felt trapped on this Mormon conveyer belt speeding me toward a mission and I could see no way to get off.
PREPARING FOR THE MISSION I spent a week with a full time Elder at the request of the Bishop to give me a taste of the mission experience. I lived the restricted missionary life for that week and I detested it. I learned first-hand how much I hated knocking on doors but at least was able to use my car and not some damn bicycle. The moment that week was done, I drove to the nearest A&W for some decent food after eating the same crap this missionary ate for a week while ripping off my tie and suit coat. That Papa Burger combo never tasted so good. I should have put my foot down after that fiasco and told everyone I was not going to do that for 2 years but the social & family pressures was too great for me to overcome at the time.
The Mormon conveyer belt moved on with me on it and my papers were sent in. I took the church’s intelligent tests to see if I had the aptitude for learning languages. I guess I failed because the call came in January of 1977 that I would be serving in the Virginia Roanoke Mission and I was to report to the Salt Lake mission home on April 23, 1977. The prophet’s auto-pen signature machine had spoken.
Everyone was so happy for me but I wasn’t. I looked upon that April date with dread and foreboding. It was the date that my life as I knew it would end and that I would end up forfeiting everything that made my life worth living. I say forfeited and not sacrificed because to sacrifice means to give up something good for something better. But to forfeit means to give up something good for nothing. That April date felt like a death sentence. Little did I know that this date would mark the beginning of the end of any belief I had in the divinity of the Mormon Church, the end of my belief in the Church leaders inspiration, and the end in any belief that the Lord loved for me.
As a Mormon male, my life came to a dead end at 19.
Because I had at this point acknowleged to myself that I was indeed GAY! Oh the horrors!
I actually believed the morg lies and thought that the leaders at the Monkey Trauma Center would be able to see right through my soul. I had heard of the shock therapy at BYU and was scared to death of being called out!
I never went to the local mormon leader to ask to go, one day after "church" I passed him in the hall and he pushed some papers in my direction and said "go home and fill these out". Oh well.
I can honestly say that I went under duress and pressure - and protest I might add. The only saving grace was that I was going to be living in Japan for a while - one can only imagine the events that would have transpired had I been sent to Virginia Roanoke! Good god, Flash! Your stories make me feel like I really dodged a bullet.
But it was a long time ago (1969), "back in the day," as they say. Back in the day of mission farewells and church programs with your picture on them, and people singing "I'll Go Where You Want Me to Go, Dear Lord." Everyone cried at the end, then there were refreshments somewhere. In my interview I was asked where I wanted to go. I said, "Italy." "Well," the SP said, "I'll put that down and we'll see what happens."
Sure you funded the thing yourself, but you got to keep all your money (and pride) and pay all your expenses and all. It didn't seem so nutty. Monson would come visit us in Italy, but it was always pleasant in that all he did was bore us. My mission president was a dolt, but a pleasant one. And I was happy to be in a new "field" at the time, Italy, fairly soon after it opened. My first city was Lugano, Switzerland, in Italian-speaking Ticino. We had a little Fiat 500 "topolino" that we drove around, the only one in the whole church.
Good times (relatively). I wouldn't allow one of my kids to go on a mission knowing what I know now.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/10/2010 07:09PM by cludgie.
I was first generation LDS so the idea seemed interesting. I will say, as a mixed Native American, I enjoyed my mission to a REZ, the Navajo in New Mexico. It was largely a service mission, so that made it fun. I loved the people. I would have hated NY or Chicago. Give me sagebrush and rattlesnakes anytime. I did get real sick a few times.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/10/2010 06:53PM by george.
I was a doubting teen but realized that I would at some point have to decide whether I believed in the Church or not. I felt compelled to go to some degree. The connection to my family and LDS friends was tied to the Church and feared that a choice to move away from the Church was a choice to move away from them.
I actually saw my mission as a test for the Church. What better way to figure it out then by serving a mission?
Ha! I was pretty naive to think that I would be able to see the truth clearly when engage in such an indoctrination program. Some of the things I learned proved later to be the seeds of my apostasy so it's all good..
Yes. That is right my parents did not want me to go. I do not know why. My parents went to church and had callings, but I do not think they were real strong. I grew up in Oregon.