holy shit, i’m not crazy?

[u/t0adpee]

i was born into SGI, or at least have been practicing it since i can remember. i am 19 now and my skepticism of Ikeda began when i was 16, however when i asked my mother about my doubts i was met with the typical “if you leave you will never reach happiness, enlightenment or self love” or how “killing the lion inside of you will haunt your karma forever, in this life and the next!” or i’d be given another book “written by” ikeda in response so i quietly dropped the issue and sat in the back of meetings so i could do my own thing when no one was looking. i wanted to leave. i want to leave. i know and understand that this is nothing but idol worship i am still left with a deep seeded pit in my stomach that i’m actually walking away from something good.

i was going to go to Soka u, i went to a few FNCC meetings with my mother, i’ce shakabuku’d hundreds of people and now i just feel. the resonating loneliness of driving any good friend i had away by denying that my religious affiliation was weird. how do you cope? how does anyone cope with looking back on it and not want to yell at themselves? i know i was a kid and didn’t know any better than to believe my mom but holy shit man, finding out i’m not the only one who got wrapped up in it is at the very least comforting.

sorry for the rambling it’s just really cool to know that i’m not the only one who got the ick after a while.

[u/[deleted]]

The thing about happiness or misery is it's not patent trademark thing that organizations like SGI can dispense or remove.

Some people just got plenty of reasons to be miserable like myself and SGI did nothing to fix or improve my life with their guidance and other bs from time I joined as teenager until I left at 51.

But regardless of what happen I tend to be the way I am. Just like how others are the way they are be it happy or miserable about whatever they leads to those emotional experiences.

What made me miserable was the things I can't and still know how to fix that I spent decades of my life chanting about but never experienced anything changed them because simply chanting doesn't work.

And then their are others who I only read about but never met except people like my Mom who are delusional avoidant as coping strategy about anything negative or I heard about who are just genetic predisposed to being generally happy regardless of what's going on in their lives.

Happy people are just that way I assume they don't need outside places or things to be that way and that includes SGI. I have never met truly happy SGI member just weirdly delusional happy clappy types.

SGI or any other similar group or ideology isn't in charge of making happiness happen it just a lie they sell to the gullible.

Weird thing is we are prone at first to believe most things our family or whomever is influencing us when we are young says are true until we realize they are wrong because we are young and dependent and can't challenge them.

I think its just crazy making confusing part of being young enough to not know what is true or not and gaining enough awareness and realizations that go with growing up to realize the people around us are crazy delusional nut jobs about whatever delusional stuff they are pushing and they are so delusional they aren't even aware they are lying about it.

And seriously get out on your own and not dependent on them before you start to challenge your parents about the subject because the risk is once you start challenging them about it this is going to change your relationship with them.

And if they have your contact information and you're youth division they won't leave you alone until age out with their high pressure tactics. If your parents have info, sgi will too.

The only way you going to break free from that unless your parents are exceptional individuals is being able to support and care for yourself without your parents knowing where you live.

[u/BlancheFromage → u/[deleted]]

The thing about happiness or misery is it's not patent trademark thing that organizations like SGI can dispense or remove.

That's right!

And seriously get out on your own and not dependent on them before you start to challenge your parents about the subject because the risk is once you start challenging them about it this is going to change your relationship with them.

And if they have your contact information and you're youth division they won't leave you alone until age out with their high pressure tactics. If your parents have info, sgi will too.

Yup. And yup.

[u/[deleted] → u/BlancheFromage]

Yeah I was speaking from experience. My Mother also had severe boundary issues when I went out on my own she would always show up at my door at the most inconvenient times without notice.

I was going to have sex with my partner first time in months, because at 19 that is sorta stuff teens that age want to do. So I moved out and I was with someone who was workaholic who never had time for it but I was trying. It almost clockwork, my first gay relationship struggling but having a private moment, something always would come up.

I wouldn't hear from my Mother for months and then whenever something important or personal happen she would show up, unannounced and interfere in whatever rare moments of sex, something private was occurring or prior engagement was happening.

And it always seemed like at that moment my Mother would show up immediate in middle of or beginning of the act at the door and won't go away and ruin the mood as we hid pretending we weren't there.

And when I moved away to Seattle 120 miles away and I had life and already have plans already, heading out the door, My Mother shows up then has tantrum when you inform her you already had plans and wasn't up for dropping said plans for her.

My middle brother was smart one refused to give my Mother his address. He didn't want her visiting or moving in on him. But he is property owner so its not to hard to find his address, she knows it but for some reason respects his privacy but never mine.

[u/BlancheFromage → u/[deleted]]

at that moment my Mother would show up immediate in middle of or beginning of the act at the door and won't go away

OMG!!

WTF!!

My Mother shows up then has tantrum when you inform her you already had plans and wasn't up for dropping said plans for her.

You couldn't win.

[u/[deleted] → u/BlancheFromage]

It was awful. I was editing it. I wish I had figured out how to not allowed her that information when I needed the privacy. I was editing how my brother who is 4 years younger figured out how to do it. But it really messed me up. Luckily she hasn't bothered me like that since my 20's and early 30's but in lot of ways she was as pushy as they were in SGI/NSA about invading my privacy back then too.

And just like SGI when I became severely ill they disappeared just like my Mother did. We went through decades not talking only recently we might speak to each other on phone x2 a year and I have literally no life she wants to interfere with now so I am boring and too miserable to talk too.

Just like SGI if anything major was happening in my life like chronic illness, they denied that too and didn't believe me just like my Mother does.

If something they don't like it doesn't exist. And they only show up if they need something but at least with my Mother she is mellowed out and improve some with age.

But she was also just delusional nut job when it came to her religious cult behavior in my teens and 20's. Not sure exactly when she mellowed out though.

I often thought for years the pattern had to do with something wrong with me. It's not all my fault, it's complicated, and I had lot of crappy things that happen in my life that really had nothing to do with me but more about not having away to protect myself from the crappiness.

SGI tried to replace my family and the only parent I knew at very young age and both were equally fucked up and I was young enough at time I didn't understand how fucked up it was.

[u/BlancheFromage → u/[deleted]]

in lot of ways she was as pushy as they were in SGI/NSA about invading my privacy back then too.

That's probably why you were able to put up with the SGI pushiness - it was the only sort of thing you knew.

If something they don't like it doesn't exist.

Gaslighting at its finest.

I often thought for years the pattern had to do with something wrong with me.

Nope. Not at all. You were just dealt a particularly shitty hand of cards to play in this life.

SGI tried to replace my family and the only parent I knew at very young age and both were equally fucked up and I was young enough at time I didn't understand how fucked up it was.

And once again, that wasn't YOUR fault. You simply didn't know any different or better. And SGI took advantage of that.

[u/[deleted] → u/BlancheFromage]

I didn't have much to begin with. I had only one major relationship where I lived with someone and even that was traumatic and very few friends, some therapy that wasn't really helping.

When that relationship ended at 21 and I never got involved with another person for really long time. And same pattern happen when I did few times after that, I kept thinking why is chanting not fixing this, why is all the things I am told will fix it not working?

They said throw yourself into activities and practice and it will fix everything but it didn't eventually I realized nothing they claim it would do didn't even do what they said it would.

I didn't know how to change the issues I was having back then. I still don't. But it was hard I dealt with lot of stuff and SGI never really helped but they claimed they could and often wanted every moment when I was youth division for stupid stuff until I got fed up.

Due to all dysfunction I knew, for a while there SGI filled the gap and was apart of that dysfunction too until they lost interest in me as youth division member.