The Gospel of The Cockroach is quite fascinating on several levels.

Humans primary emotions are sad, mad, glad, scared, disgust, guilt.
(take note how Katie uses all those, especially guilt).

But the cockroach is about DISGUST.
How many humans would NOT react to a cockroach on them? Almost zero.
Even Byron Katie, if someone put a cockroach on her arm or dinner plate without her awareness, and she glanced down at it, she would SHRIEK, just like anyone else.
Those kind of bugs trigger DISGUST in human's on a biological level.

So the image of a cockroach crawling over her, triggers disgust in her mainly female readers.
This becomes a "hook" or a Trigger, or Anchor, where she then hangs her other stories. That is a hypnotic stake in the ground, like the yellow brick road to Oz, or Alice In Wonderland, which leads people into her Katieland.

Again, its a very common technique to use that kind of WEIRD story, something that sticks in the mind.
They all have their "Enlightenment Myth" and she thought up that one, and it works well.
Weird is good, weird works, when it comes to this type of hypnotic work. (like a weird dream).


Also, not only the 4 Questions stuff, but all of the LGAT social engineering? She copied "Modeled" that from other LGAT seminars, of course. They hire LGAT and NLP type consultants to come in a teach them about all the social engineering. They also read and study for themselves, and experiment.

So it would be great if some Byron Katie fans could forget about the 4 Questions for a while, and just learn about LGAT's. Once they see the same Tech being used...how can they explain that?
Its almost the exact same patterns as many other LGAT's, just with some different content. but the same overall structure.

I'd like to say for anyone visiting here who is a very nice type person and doesn't like harshness and criticism....

It can be very necessary to be blunt and even harsh regarding someone like Byron Katie. At least for some of us. It's a way to counteract all that love-bombing.

"Sweetheart, is that true?"

I think a big reason I got sucked in so easily was that I was such a nice type person most of the time. A nice person with a big need for emotional healing.

I am now appreciating that there is a time and place for toughness.

I happen to have a brother who was a detective in a major city for many years. He was so good at what he did, he was featured on one of those "true crime" type shows.

It was so cool to hear my brother talk about putting away a guy for life. In a very matter-of-fact tone, almost like he was ordering his lunch, he said something to the effect of, "If you sell drugs and you murder people, we're coming after you and you're going to jail."

I wish he were investigating BK!

Some excellent points.
As mentioned before, the Byron Katie "head-cock" or her tilting of her head at times, is not just a random thing, believe it or not. Sure, it may have evolved organically, but its a technique too.
In hypnosis, they establish "signals" and triggers and anchors.
It may be a hand gesture, or a look, or a head-tilt, Voice-Cue, anything.

You see, over time, they are able to set up a signal system with the subjects..(you), and your unconscious knows that right after the head-tilt, some powerful Suggestions are coming.
You will see Byron Katie talk...then pause, think...tilt her head in a head-cock, and then deliver some powerful suggestions.
Milton Erickson did Voice-Cues, and there are many methods like this. NLP has Anchoring, similar thing.

Yes, these are very skilled and talented people, its how they use those skills is what counts. Ethics.
Hiding their technique to such an extreme like Byron Katie, is deception, and is profoundly unethical.

Also, the NLP books, The Structure of Magic I-II, are interesting books, have them right here, and there are up on the torrent networks too.
[www.amazon.com]
Book I is a careful analysis of Therapy, and the Language patterns of some great therapists, like Virginia Satir, Milton Erickson, etc. Its great stuff, but not an easy read.
They took the invisible MAGIC of what those folks were doing, and explained its STRUCTURE.
(same thing we are doing with Byron Katie...its not BK Magic, its Technique)

Its clear this is woven into the fabric of what Byron Katie does. She is doing a type of therapy on people, certainly not cognitive, but a type of hypnotherapy and psychotherapy, which is being misused on people without their awareness of what is happening to them.
On top of all that are the dozens of LGAT and sales techniques of social engineering.
Its abusive and people are being exploited financially and emotionally.

Quote
corboy
...

In this modern world of cost and profit, there may be a compensatory and yearning for magic, for instant transformation, for some Magic Parent who will come along, and who, with a charming smile, gives a charming sparkle of the eyes, an ever so charming tilt of the head, and with makes that pain instantly go away.
...

It is noteworthy (Anticult can help us here) that one of the early NLP books was entitled The Structure of Magic.

The only time I like being called "sweetheart" by a stranger, is when I order the blue plate special at a greasy spoon at 5am..."sweetheart will that be with gravy or fries...". (don't order the gravy!).

The Byron Katie use of language with all the Sweetheart LoveBombing, and how everyone on the Byron Katie messageboards writes LOVE after every single post...

One could build a little database of all of the Byron Katie phrases, and then watch them.
You see her followers use the exact same language patterns.

So its true, really nice, kind, decent, loving people are going to get lured into that type of thing.
It really is another abuse of Language...Byron Katie is an expert in the use of Language.

When a STRANGER starts using the "love" word with you, in a commercial or therapy transaction, get the hell out of there. That is luring and seduction.

also, just want to drop into this a reminder...that virtually all of this research can be applied to almost ANY of these New Agey type antiguru Gurus who are out there today.

They use very similar methods, as they all learn from a similar playbook.
They're CONTENT may be different, it may even be aliens, Christ Consciousness, Hinduism, alleged Buddhism, Astrology, Atman, Psychics, or anything at all.
The content is the Belief System.

Its the structure around all of that, which can be generalized, as its a system.

So all of these learnings about Byron Katie can be applied to other people in her same game, male or female. There are large differences, but many similarities.

Its about stepping outside of the "experience" and looking at the meta-process. Like being a camera on the wall at the LGAT seminar, where you watch what Katie is DOING to the people. You carefully study her methods, which you would see anyway after 10 seminars, when you see her doing the exact same thing, over and over.
You also look at the contracts, fees, staffing.

So you do the opposite of what they tell you. They tell you to NOT THINK and just FEEL the EXPERIENCE.
Nope.
Do the opposite.
Step out of the experience, and then analyze the process, to see if its legit, FIRST.
You don't let a car mechanic rip your car apart before you know if he is legit or not.

So basically, if you do the opposite of what they tell you to do, then you will be fine!
Unless of course they are using reverse psychology on you, which is also possible!
But once you understand the LGAT, it has about as much mystery to it as a stock Vegas show...same old stuff, different costumes.

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The Anticult
One could build a little database of all of the Byron Katie phrases, and then watch them.
You see her followers use the exact same language patterns.

I noticed that CultCity said in a post, "I hear that."

Byron Katie says "I hear that" and "I get that" A LOT.

I also remember feeling a sort of weird BK-like boundary-diminishing thing when CC said, on p. 78 of this thread, "I am just beginning to look. Will you look with me?"

yes, one could build a Katie lexicon, with her words and phrases that get used often.
This is part of the private language of any group, which grows over time. Its a form of language control. If you were at a BK event, and did NOT use the BK words and phrases, you get shunned, like at any of these types of LGAT events.

Another huge Byron Katie word is INVITE.
INVITE INVITE
I Invite you to ______.

That is from the softer side of permissive hypnotherapy. Commands do not work as well as an invitation. Then its all Voluntary. The best thought reform, of course, is overtly voluntary, that has been known since the 1950's. (that is why saying ITS ALL VOLUNTARY has to be one of the most inane responses ever).
One Byron Katie CD of pain, used the word INVITE at least a few hundred times, over and over.

That works great on women too, how many "too nice" women are going to say no to an "INVITE" to the face of the person giving the INVITE? Don't people write books on that problem?!

It all seems pretty dang obvious.

Quote
helpme2times

Quote
The Anticult
One could build a little database of all of the Byron Katie phrases, and then watch them.
You see her followers use the exact same language patterns.

I noticed that CultCity said in a post, "I hear that."

Byron Katie says "I hear that" and "I get that" A LOT.

I also remember feeling a sort of weird BK-like boundary-diminishing thing when CC said, on p. 78 of this thread, "I am just beginning to look. Will you look with me?"

Quote
The Anticult
Another huge Byron Katie word is INVITE.
INVITE INVITE
I Invite you to ______.

Quite similar to CC saying: ""Will you look with me?"

Welcome to ByronKatieSpeak. These are words/phrases I've repeatedly heard and/or read BK say...

Angel
Honey
Sweetheart
Hopeless!
I am a lover of what is.
I get that.
I hear that.
I invite you to...
If you really want to be free, have the work for breakfast. Have it for lunch. Have it for dinner.
Is it true? [and the rest of the "four questions"]
It should have happened because it did. That's the way of it.
Mind says...
Not possible.
The body says...
There are only three kinds of business in the universe: mine, yours, and God's.
There's nothing negative in the world.
Welcome to the work.
When I argue with reality, I lose. But only absolutely.
Who would you be without your story?

Oh, yeah, the 'volunteer' thing, don't get me started on how insidiously my group used that one!

We would all fall over ourselves to 'volunteer' to work seminars. We would all write these cloying, sickly sweet letters to the Guru, telling him that as lowly, worthless students we didn't really deserve to work for him but we would do the very best we could to serve to the best of our 'small capacity'.

Then we would work these hellish seminars; long, miserable 12 or 13 hour days completely for free. Instead of our tireless help being welcomed and appreciated, we would be yelled at ruthlessly. At certain times various of us would be humiliated in front of the other staff for even the smallest mistakes.

We were never angry about the way we were treated. Instead we were deeply grateful to have been 'given the opportunity' to volunteer. This is how these groups get you; they make it seem like some incredible honor to work your ass off for free and be abused while doing it! Oh, and then of course there were some people who were always scapegoated and refused the chance to work. Those were usually the people who had not behaved submissive enough while working previous seminars. Maybe they goofed around a little for example, or gone home early to pick up the kids from school. So in fact most of us probably felt some kind of weird 'humble' superiority over those who had not been chosen. There was also that fear driving us that we would be excluded in the same way. So we would be on our bestest disciple behavior.

We were happy to be chastised because it was 'burning off our karma' and getting rid of the ego (and even as I type this I think that I might be building more karma by admitting this in public! These thoughts are very insidious and you don't get rid of them overnight if you've believed it for ten years, lemme tell you!)

In the mindset we were in, any one of us would have gladly paid to work. We were just worthless ants or worker bees in our own minds. Our personal wishes (to be treated with compassion and respect for example) or any personal emotion was simply a distraction to be brushed aside. My friend who had just had her first baby, put the child under the desk we were working at in one of those carrying seats and worked like that with the baby at her feet for more than 12 hours.

This is what having a Guru, any Guru means, whether dressed in a Buddhist monk's robe or a nice Chanel suit. It means thinking of yourself as a nobody in comparison to the Guru. It means being grateful to that person if s/he kicks you in the shins, takes your most prized possession or tells you to stop spending so much time with your husband or kid.

If you are following a charismatic leader who you think has all the answers and may even be Enlightened, you gotta ask yourself how much bs you will be willing to take from that person.

It means that nothing in your own personal life; your family relationships, your own interests, talents, creative abilities are of any value. The only person/thing of value is the Guru and the 'Work' and Byron Katie is not the only one who uses that terminology by any stretch. It's all the 'Work' whatever group you are in, it seems; the 'Work' of saving humanity ... and make no bones about it, Byron Katie does talk about 'The Work' saving humanity. All those groups think that every single person on the planet must learn the particular techniques of their Guru. Usually in order for the planet to progress to its next stage of evolution or something like that.

The Guru always says that when the Work is complete, s/he'll 'drop the body'. They usually also set it up so that if the work isn't complete when they die then it's the disciples fault. That leads to a lot more confusion, guilt and fear.

If there is nothing more important to you in the world than 'The Work' of Byron Katie then you can bet your bottom dollar that you participating in a cult mentality.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/26/2008 08:36PM by solea13.