Someone Like You by Adele

Comment now » // March 6th, 2011

Sage advice

Comment now » // March 3rd, 2011

“Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never–in nothing, great or small, large or petty–never give in, except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”

Winston Churchill, to the boys of his alma matter Harrow, delivered October 29, 1941. (Commonly misquoted as “Never never never give up.”)

How do you treat yourself? Like The Wind or The Sun?

Comment now » // February 26th, 2011

“Spirituality based on self-hatred can never sustain itself.” Sharon Salzberg, Lovingkindness (p 26)

There was a bizarre and confusing double-bind that existed in the cult I was involved with. We were taught by our cult leader that we were “God’s chosen people”; we were tremendously special because God had selected us – the few and the pure – to lead the world into The Light and therefore we were better than everyone else on the planet (for more about this “us vs. them” technique that all cult leaders use to manipulate their followers please see this blog post or this link to Robert Lifton’s Eight Criteria for Thought Reform).

And at the same time, our guru, the cult leader, covertly taught us a practice of self-hatred. We were never good enough. The spiritual goals we were aiming for were constantly moving so whenever any of us felt and voiced that we believed we had achieved something important in our spiritual growth, we were told that either a) that piece of learning didn’t matter any more or b) there was a much more important milestone to be achieved or c) both of these things. This was not a spirituality of openness, lovingkindness, gentleness and warmth. It was a spirituality of self-flagellation, self-doubt, inner and outer condemnation, fear and worry. And yet, we believed that we were the best and the brightest of God’s people and that everyone else should look to us as an example of the exalted spiritual life.

What a joke.

The endless quest for the impossible goal of self-perfection lead me to feel like a constant and colossal failure. Which was the cult leader’s purpose (although I didn’t know it at the time). She ensured that I felt like a worthless failure, which led me to seek my salvation through her. I grew to believe that without her I would not be able to be in a relationship with God. Without her guidance I would be entirely enslaved to my ego. If I was a worthless failure inside her group, and under her tutelage, then outside the group (if I left her) I would be not only a failure but a quitter and someone who had deliberately and consciously turned my back on God. This diabolical pack of lies is the cornerstone of every cult leader’s repertoire of manipulations because, sadly, it works. It keeps people tied to the cult even through the worst types of control, manipulation and soul-eroding abuse.

**
Now, with eleven years of freedom and healing under my belt, and a lot of practice thinking and feeling for myself, I can see the cult leader’s lies for what they are. And I am learning, with the help of practices like lovingkindness, that anything that we loathe or condemn about ourselves will simply persist. Our bodies, our minds, our thoughts, respond best and most willingly when we love them. When we love those things about ourselves that we are inclined to hate (“I’m fat”, “I smoke”, “I watch too much TV”) and lean into them with love and a gentle acceptance, only then do they begin to shift.

When I think of this topic lately, I am reminded of the classic Aesop’s fable, The Wind and The Sun. The wind and the sun are arguing one day about who is stronger, so they make a wager about who can get a man to remove his coat more quickly. The wind blows and batters the man, trying to force his coat off. The result is that the man pulls the coat around himself tighter and tighter and no matter how hard the wind blows, the coat won’t come off. The sun then has his turn and shines brightly down, creating a gloriously warm day. And of course you know what happens next….the man eagerly and happily takes off his coat.

Battering ourselves and feeling bad about ourselves achieve nothing, no matter how noble the cause. The truth is that love really is the answer. But a cult leader will keep this information from you because she is The Wind. Her only goal in life is to prove how strong, powerful and important she is and to keep you convinced that she is the answer and your only salvation. In order for her to achieve this, you must pay the price with your bruised soul and broken heart.

–

(photo courtesy of Filomena Scalise and FreeDigitalPhotos.net)

Wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving by Rumi

Comment now » // February 19th, 2011

Come, come, whoever you are.
Wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving. It doesn’t matter.
Ours is not a caravan of despair.
Come, even if you have broken your vows a thousand times.
Come, yet again, come, come.

Thanks to my friend G for submitting another beautiful poem by Rumi.

Isolation

3 Comments » // February 18th, 2011

I was reflecting the other day that one of the most strategically effective tools a cult leader uses to manipulate and control her followers is isolation. Isolation permeates every aspect of a cult member’s life. Here’s a brief outline about some of the ways cult leaders use this tactic to such great effect, and why:

Physical Isolation: This is such a classic symptom of cults that it’s almost become cliche. People who are physically isolated from others in society are much more likely to turn toward the cult during times of trouble, than to turn away from it. If a cult member lives hundreds of miles from the closest town and has no means of transport, he is more likely to second-guess himself if he ever considers leaving the group. Physical isolation also means that cult members are not under the influence of those not in the cult.

Emotional Isolation Part 1: Cult leaders always create an atmosphere of “us vs. them” in the cult. “Us” consists of those in the group; “them” is a very large group indeed – it encompasses everyone else on the planet who is not in the group. By creating this antagonism toward “them” the cult leader can very easily cut a disciple off from her family and friends. As a result, cult members become increasingly dependent on the cult for any and all means of emotional support. Once a cult member really believes that her family is part of “them” then her loyalty is cemented to the cult and the cult leader, which was the objective for creating the “us vs. them” dogma in the first place. As well, by cutting a cult member off from her family, she is less likely to leave the group – especially if the estrangement has gone on for years or decades – because she will not feel that she has anywhere to go or anyone to turn to should she decide to leave. Sadly, this is very often not the case – families that I’ve seen will accept their loved one back into the family without reservation. (When this doesn’t happen, as my friend G pointed out to me the other day, the risk is always there that the cult member will return to the cult because the pull of “us” (the cult) is too strong to resist without the counter-balance of a loving family.)

Emotional Isolation Part 2: When we are discouraged to be in touch with our feelings, and are told that emotions are “bad” or “wrong”, what is created is an inner landscape that is divorced from our emotions. When we become isolated from how we feel about anything it hampers our ability to know ourselves and to know what is true for us. We then replace our judgment and feeling with the rules and rhetoric that the cult leader has insisted we adopt. This is another part of the paradigm of mind control that causes those to belong to a cult to seem zombie-like or cautiously reserved. When members of the cult we aren’t allowed to be in touch with how we really feel about a situation or a person, then we are simply waiting to be told how to feel by the authority in our lives – the cult leader.

Intellectual Isolation: The cult leader’s word matters more than anything. In the cult I belonged to for over a decade, our leader made a point of undermining any and all other authorities on spiritual matters, life style choices, psychological health, physical health, politics and everything else under the sun. Her word was God’s word (according to her) and no issue was too trivial, too large, too well-known or obscure for her to tell us what The Truth was about it. The Truth, capital T-R-U-T-H, was her most powerful weapon; with it she could defeat any argument, any attempt at critical thinking, any objection to her methods of ‘teaching’, and contradict every author, teacher, poet, and saint who was not her. We stopped thinking and simply obeyed, refusing to expose ourselves to any kind of intellectual exploration (new ideas, new philosophies, alternate views of the world etc.) (Sadly, every major religion uses this strategy as well. ‘The only “true religion” or “true word of God” is this one – i.e. the one you’re in now. The others are all false.’)

Community Isolation: This type of isolation connects to the strategy of “us vs. them” as well. Think for a moment of how many communities you belong to and what a rich diversity of experiences, personalities and support these communities bring to your life. I’m a fairly (well…very) introverted person (meaning I recharge my batteries by being alone) and still I have any number of valuable and life-giving communities in my life: co-workers, friends, family, ex-clients, class mates, writing partners, friends-of-friends who I see regularly at parties, neighbors, ex-co-workers, fellow yoga students, parents of my friends, children of my friends, the baristas in Starbucks who know my regular drink, people who have read my book, my Facebook friends….I could go on. Almost, and eventually all, of these communities or connections are eliminated when one belongs to a cult. The cult member’s world shrinks to one community – the cult – and he moves through the world in a bubble of isolation bereft of the many connections that bring such joy to life. He tells himself that he belongs to the only community that matters, but in his authentic heart he knows (though he may never admit this to himself consciously) that he is missing out and that there is a huge void where all that diversity of community should be.

Thought Isolation: It almost goes without saying that first and foremost a cult member is isolated from her thoughts. (That’s why it’s called thought reform.) Every cult leader (and abusive spouse) knows that if you control the thoughts, you control the person. The bars in a cult are not made of steel; they are made of thoughts. Those in a cult are taught to be afraid to think. Thinking for oneself is portrayed by the cult leader as “egotism” or “the work of the devil”. One is encouraged only to think thoughts the cult leader approves of lest one draw in “negative energy”. And so the cult member becomes isolated from her thoughts because they feel dangerous. Techniques are applied (such as chanting, excessive meditating, etc.) to stop thoughts from occurring. I remember that when I left the cult I was involved with I had to consciously practice thinking for myself about practically everything.

Intimacy Isolation: This category goes along with Emotional Isolation Part 1. There is a peculiar but effective maneuver that all cult leaders use. I explain this more fully in my book but here’s the short explanation: In order for cult leaders to have the most control possible over each disciple in their group they will perpetually be strengthening the vertical relationship from each group member to themselves. To do this, the cult leader will make every effort to weaken the horizontal relationships between group members. They do this by breaking up marriages, breaking up friendships, creating and then destroying marriages and relationships, creating estrangement between parents and children, and generally undermining any intimacy that exists between group members. (All the while, the cult leader is simultaneously creating the atmosphere of “us vs. them” – it’s quite the parlour trick!) The result of all this is that each member feels a type of (distorted) intimacy with the cult leader, but no intimacy with anyone else. (How can you be fully intimate with your spouse when the cult leader could declare that the relationship will be terminated ten minutes from now?) This means that the most intimate relationship in each cult member’s life is the one with his/her guru (cult leader). But it is a false intimacy because the cult leader never fully opens up to anyone. The guru-disciple relationship is a very poor substitute for real intimacy but it is all the cult member has.

Spiritual Isolation: And this, my friends, brings us to the most devastating type of isolation of all. Isolation from God / spirit / the universe / one’s higher power / self / whatever term you want to use. Over time and inch by precious inch the cult leader weaves her way into the hearts, minds and souls of her followers as a God replacement. In my case, she said she spoke for God and I believed her. For a human being to step in between another person’s relationship with God is one of the worst kind of atrocities I can think of. For me, when I look back, it was like having my soul violated every day for 10 years. No one, ever, has any right to tell anyone what the truth of their heart is. Or what “God” says they should or should not do. My relationship with God became distorted and twisted and deeply unhappy and dysfunctional. After I left the cult it took me almost a decade to repair that relationship. I was isolated from God when I was in the group because what I was being told was God most certainly was not. And then I was isolated from God after I left the cult because I felt deeply betrayed and embarrassed and thirsted for God but didn’t know how to find Him among all the bullshit I had been sold about who God was. I had to sift through all that crap, handful by handful, until I found what felt right in my heart. It was a very worthwhile journey, to say the least, but very painful.

**
As I write this I am reminded that in the early days of my cult recovery my first therapist shared with me that human beings are social animals. We thrive on contact with other creatures from our species. Cult leaders take that away from their followers; they teach us – wrongly – that we cannot trust one another and that we should not live with open hearts. Connection is so important and cult leaders know this. That is specifically why they use all the above tactics (and more) to isolate us from our friends and family, from our selves, and from God.

To anyone who is recovering from an encounter, be it short or long, with a cult leader I say, be kind to yourself, be gentle, and know that not everyone, in fact probably no one, will ever again treat you as badly as you have been treated by your guru. Love matters. You matter. I know from intimate experience that it is challenging to break the habit of isolation, but approached in safe and conscious ways, connection is a balm to the isolated soul.

One of my all time favorite quotes is this one, the first line from EM Forester’s book Howard’s End: “Only connect.”

The Guest House by Rumi

2 Comments » // February 15th, 2011

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

Why we can’t leave cults, sometimes

1 Comment » // December 30th, 2010

Today, December 30, 2010, is the 11th anniversary of what was the beginning of the end for me in the cult I was involved with. Consequently, as I always am at this time of year, I am feeling a little bit reflective about that time in my life and what it was like for me to leave.

**

Leaving a cult is possibly the most courageous act a cult member will ever commit in his or her lifetime. I know that to those who have never been on the inside of a cult, that seems like a preposterous statement, but it is true. To the outside observer, the cult looks like a toxic, crazy, frightening, abusive, possibly dangerous place to be.

It is.

It should be an easy situation to leave.

It is not.

On the inside, when someone has devoted years of their life to believing the rhetoric their leader is selling, and has given up their home, their family, their job, and their life, essentially, to put that rhetoric into daily action and follow that leader wherever s/he goes on the crazy train, it actually seems like the safest place in the world. It is the place where the morality is completely black and white. (In the group – good. Outside the group – bad.) It is the place where everyone you know follows the same rules, speaks the same language, and believes in the same things. Uncertainty doesn’t exist. You are there to fulfill a clear and well-defined purpose (be it to save the world from evil or whatever). And you are surrounded by people who are on the same path; the only people in the world who you believe really understand you. (And, strange though it may sound, you never think the group is a cult. That word applies only to other groups.)

This is a powerful, powerful recipe and cult leaders have mastered its use for centuries, all over the world, in order to manipulate and control those who follow them.

When I think of those who continue to stay in the cult I left, I think of them with love, and not a little regret. Regret because when I left the group there was really nothing I could do to save them and take them with me. The skills needed to combat this mix of community, purpose and moral certainty were unknown to me at the time and will always be unavailable to me. Even the most seasoned cult interventionists cannot guarantee that they can get through to someone who is under the influence of a cult leader.

At the beginning of this year, 2010, I was elated because someone from the cult I was involved with had found the courage to leave the group. We reconnected and I was so happy for her. I knew she had a long road of healing ahead of her, but I was thrilled for her nonetheless. Though she might temporarily feel adrift, she was free.

Unfortunately, she returned to the cult mid-way through this year. I sometimes catch myself asking why, when she had so much going for her in her life outside the cult; she was running an extraordinarily successful business, she had friends and a boyfriend, she had her own apartment and had recovered her physical health, which had been damaged while she was in the cult. But in spite of all this, she went back. The siren song of the cult leader was just too much for her to resist.

Then I remember that I understand. I was a part of the cult myself, and for a decade experienced the magnetic attraction of the ideas the cult leader was espousing.

But I am still very sad for my friend. And for all those, everywhere, in every cult, who are just not able to permanently break free.

Take care, my friend. I miss you and love you. I will always be available if you, or anyone else in the group, needs help.

**

(image courtesy of Salvatore Vuono and FreeDigitalPhotos.net)

Swallowing Our Words and Ourselves

Comment now » // September 19th, 2010

Eight years after I’d left the cult I was involved with I had a dream that involved some of the members of the group. In the dream I was arguing with one woman whom I felt particularly betrayed by. At one point I had to leave the room where I was arguing with her in order to both compose myself and to pull my tongue out of my throat.

I had swallowed my tongue.

At this point in the dream I woke up agitated and upset and feeling like I was choking. The next morning as I wrote about the dream in my journal the metaphor was certainly not lost on me.

Belonging to a cult or high demand group requires that we “swallow our tongues”, swallow our words, our truth and eventually ourselves. We cannot remain in a cult and continue to be our most authentic selves. Mostly this is because the only qualities of ourselves that matter to the cult leader are the ones that serve the cult. It is our obedience that he/she values, not our independence or our individuality.

This is one of the brain-twisting paradoxes of life in a cult. On the one had we have a powerfully cohesive community and such a strong sense of purpose. On the other had we have the gradual silencing of our individuality and our authenticity.

The good news is that the flame of our authentic selves is never, NEVER extinguished. No matter how long we were involved in a cult or how horrifying the circumstances were, that unique, central part of each one of us resides so deep, and is completely impervious to destruction. It is always there, even if it has been temporarily silenced while we swallow our tongues.

ICSA conference

2 Comments » // September 11th, 2010

As I mentioned earlier I traveled to New York City in July to attend the International Cultic Studies Association conference and give an author reading from Cult, A Love Story. What a great experience the whole weekend was!

First, I spent one day exploring the Grand Apple. Of course, that wasn’t enough time to even dip my little toe in, but I did my best, walking south from Central Park and taking lots of photos on the way. I was in awe to even be in that great city, and I’m sure I looked like such a tourist with my floppy sun hat and walking shoes. Ah well. I had a GREAT day.

The thing that struck me the most about NYC is that it is mythical. It’s like Oz or Narnia, a magical, awe-inspiring place that I’ve heard about and read about and seen on TV and in the movies. But the difference with New York is that you can actually go there and see it and touch it and hear it. Amazing.

So after my day in the big city, it was off to three days of the ICSA conference. It was my first and I was not disappointed. I saw some great speakers talk about topics ranging from optimism to critical thinking to forgiveness. I attended a one-day workshop exclusively for ex cult members. There I learned more about Robert Lifton’s 8 Criteria for Thought Reform. And then throughout the weekend I connected again and again with the amazing ex-members at the conference.

The sense of community and understanding that resulted from those connections was the highlight of the weekend for me. I was, at times, in a hotel ballroom surrounded by 250 other people who knew exactly what my cult experience was like. Because they’d been there too.

And, of course, another highlight was giving an author reading from Cult, A Love Story. (That’s a photo of me giving the reading above.) There were some courageous and very talented authors at the reading that night as well, including Gordon Neufeld (a fellow Canadian) and publisher / writer David Cole.

I have more to say about the topic of the ICSA conference, so I’ll write another post soon with more detail about my feelings about the experience.

The God Factor

Comment now » // June 22nd, 2010

I’ve been reflecting lately that of all the craziness that goes on in a spiritual cult, it is the cult leader’s ability to convince us that she speaks for God (or, in more extreme cases, that she is God) that is the cornerstone of keeping disciples in line.

When I left the cult I was involved in, that was the question I wrestled with the most. Did our cult leader really have an exclusive, high-speed, wireless connection to the almighty? Because if she did, then I was screwed.

I’d chosen to leave the group and the leader after recognizing that I couldn’t reconcile a number of things:

1. That the guru talked about how essential love was to God but acted in a very unloving and abusive way toward those who followed her.
2. That she used God’s name to do this.
3. That she touted “The Truth” as one of the most holy and essential principles required to serve God, yet she herself lied. I’d seen her do it with my own eyes and I’d further seen her teach others that lying was permissible under certain circumstances.
4. That she said that God would “turn His back” on those who left the guru’s service. (I couldn’t imagine God, the essence of love, turning His back on anyone, ever.)

So when I left the cult I wrestled with these questions for quite a while. Years probably. Until I was finally able to conclude for myself, with my own heart and mind and without influence from anyone, that I did not believe God would ever, under any circumstances or for any reason, have anything to do with abuse, cruelty, lies and coercion.

I realized recently that this dilemma that the cult member faces about God is the cornerstone of why we are willing to put up with so much abuse and cruelty and control. When we fully believe that it is actually God, our holy Father, the guy who created us and knows us better than anyone, who is directing the words and actions of our guru, then how could we argue with what she says? How could we think that she doesn’t have our best interests at heart? How could we leave that God who we love so much?

This is the dreadful paradox of the spiritual cult. The cult leader uses God’s name to ensnare us. And as soon as she has us believing that she speaks for God, we’re sunk. Sadly, it is our love for God that keeps us chained to the guru through health crises, marriage break-down, child abandonment, job loss, loss of freedom and worse.

As long as we believe she is God, we are not free.