It seems PSI has pissed off someone else in the efforts to rip people off from their money and to screw up marriages. Check out this site and comments made.

[psi-seminars.pissedconsumer.com]

Is PSI Seminars a cult?

Easy answer: Yes, in the sense that most people think of a cult. When your invited to the graduation to the basic to show support for that “friend” who just graduated what are we serving outside the ballroom? KOOL-AID. Don’t you remember what they were drinking at Jones Town and Heaven’s Gate? We conduct brainwashing and service events. We brainwash you to service us and give us your money.

We bring people together for a common purpose: to give us your money. And the common shared life-changing experience does create a strong bond between graduates that may be difficult for those who haven’t attended it; because it’s a CULT. those who attended but didn’t have a positive experience found out it’s a CULT and want no part of it.

PSI Seminars puts on powerful events that dramatically change people’s lives, and shared experience creates a strong bond with others who have shared that experience. Does that make us a cult? Yes it does.

1. Written by CE3 on July 4, 2011

I still had no idea what to expect from the "seminar." Some of my co-workers had been involved with the seminars before I had, and they called them "P.S.I. Seminars," pronounced "sigh seminars." All they would say to me when I asked them what it was about or what the purpose of it was is vague *** like "it is a really special experience," or, "I think you will really enjoy it, but I can't tell you anything about it."

Being the techno-phile that I am, I went straight to the internet. The website was almost as vague as my co-workers had been. I was able to find some other sites though where people had reviewed the "PSI Seminar" experience. I recall some people saying that it was a scam, while some people said that it was the best thing that ever happened to them. One guy wrote about how his wife had maxed out several credit cards and basically sold everything that they had owned in order to do more "PSI Seminars," and that he was going to divorce her.

I began to feel less and less like I was going to one of these: a professional business training seminar ... and more and more afraid that I was going to be forced to drink some of this... a kool-aid drinking cult!

All the while my Blackberry was still blowin' up with texts from Courtney, or Alice, or whatever-the-*** her name was, indicating how excited she was to see me and "blah blah blah."

I'm still not trying to be a total *** here. I was just frustrated with that part of the situation. I had told her not to come. I was not good at like, rejecting girls that were that clingy. I was starting to feel like ol' horse-tooth was a little crazy. The other thing I was concerned about was that my employer and his wife seemed very insistent that I take this whole seminar thing very seriously. They indicated that at the end of the seminar on Friday, I would need to really be alone and quiet for a while so I could let the seminar "sink in" through some deep contemplation.

I was flabbergasted to hear my boss talking this way, because normally he was a relatively straight-shooting guy as far as logic went. It seemed very strange, but I knew by the way they were talking that it would be inappropriate (to my boss and his wife) for me to have the girl from Nebraska at the hotel with me all weekend. At the very least, it would be a distraction from something that could possibly be life changing for me.

This was going to be a stressful weekend. And so it started. I left work early on Thursday, picked up the female from her parents house (I had half expected her Craigslist ride-share to kill her somewhere in the middle of Nebraska and to bury her in a corn field, but that didn't happen), and headed down to Denver, to this Holiday Inn on Colorado Blvd.

The drive down was nearly silent. I think that the chick kept trying to like, kiss me and ***. I should have said: "don't kiss me, you deranged ***," but instead I think I just averted my lips and cried on the inside while she kissed my cheek and held my hand. She didn't talk much. She seemed really awkward, which I am sure is because I was deliberately acting really awkward.

Let me try to explain that a little better. You know how when you really know someone well, and you are mad at them, so you just ignore them and pretend they aren't there? But, it doesn't seem totally weird because you know them, and they know why you are ignoring them, presumably...? It's just, silence for silence sake?

Well, that is almost what I was doing with Courtney, only she didn't know a *** thing about me. She was too thick-headed to realize through all of my pleading that I didn't want to see her and that I had wished she wouldn't come to Colorado. So now, silent in the car, who knows what she thought? I was just dead silent, and she was awkward and fidgety, and after a while, silent herself. She may have thought I was nervous, pre-occupied, scared or anything else. Who knows? I just know that she didn't realize I was just trying to pretend that she wasn't even there.
We arrived, checked into the room, and I found the check in area for the seminar. They told me to wait for a little bit and that we would all be going into this big conference room to see the beginning of the seminar. I had left Courtney in the hotel room and told her that I would see her in a while. What else could I do?

I milled around awkwardly outside of the conference room with a bunch of other folks, mostly older than me, who were also waiting for the seminar to begin. The people that seemed to be "in the know" were calling the seminar the "Basic," which meant nothing to me. I asked some other people whether they knew what to expect from this. A couple of them seemed like they were the type of people who did this thing regularly. I was only vaguely aware of it at the time, but these seminars and motivational guru meetings are actually a pretty big industry. Many of the people there at the "Basic" had been to many other types of Seminars before, I found out through idle chit-chat.

I kept wondering to myself: "if you have been to multiple other personal growth weekend events, and you haven't experienced any personal growth yet... isn't it time to try something else?"

I didn't ask that though. Suddenly, loud music started booming from inside the conference room and people started filing up the short flight of stairs into the room. All I could see, roughly, was this: speakers and a small stage and some ***-head dancin' around behind a podium.

So I followed everyone in. There were many rows of chairs, and the music was peppy and upbeat and had some kind of motivational, repetitive lyric scheme. Something like:

"Keep on reachin' You can do it

Your dreams are here

Get into it"
... or some f*ckin' thing.

It took a while for everyone to get inside to get seated, and I couldn't tell for sure, but it seemed that this *** *** music was designed to loop without sounding as though it had restarted. You could just play it and play it and play it forever, seamlessly. Like some kind of auditory brainwashing machine.

I calculated my seating arrangement risk and chose to sit near the back row, but not quite all the way in the back. As the music played, there were men and women dressed in cheap "dress" clothes who had name-tags on that indicated that they were staff members with PSI, or at least somehow involved in organizing the seminar. They were embarrassing themselves by dancing around the room and attempting to get the new people to get up and dance with them to the music.
One of them approached me:
"Hi! What's your name?" she said. She was middle aged, had a paunch and crow’s feet on her face, and had to shout to be heard over the music.

"Charles," I said. I'm quite certain the look I gave her was one of disgust. She kept clapping her hands and shifting her weight from left to right in front of me.
"Come on, get up and dance!" she said, reaching down to grab my hands. I yanked them away from her. "No. I'm cool." I shouted.

She tried again, reaching down to me, visibly perturbed that I wouldn't dance. I had to think quick.

I shouted: "I just had a hip replacement!"

She stopped clapping to the beat of the music for a moment and looked at me.

"But you are so young!" she said.
"I know!" I said.

I think she knew I was lying, but I didn't give a ***, and wasn't going to dance.

Thank god this drone started clapping again and wandered off to find some other *** to bother.

The music stopped finally and this greasy car-salesman lookin' mother f*cker with a microphone goes to the front of the room and starts talkin’ to us. He looked a little like Jack Rosenberg in a cheap plaid polyester jacket, but only greasier and shystier.
First thing, he starts insinuating that all of us newcomers must be absolutely miserable in our lives, because we don't know how to live like he does. He keeps asking us sh*t like: "what if I told you I could help you end your loneliness forever?" or "I know how to help you realize your true potential as a human being!" or "what would you say if I told you that you could have all the money that you could ever want?" All the money I could ever want? What the *** was this guy talking about?! If he knew the secret to having all the money I could ever want, why in f*cks name wouldn't he use the secret so that he wouldn't have to do this lame seminar job?! There seemed to be a logical disconnect. Until he told us this: Because of the PSI seminars program, he claimed, he had realized his true potential as a human being. He claimed to own "five businesses" (he never got any more specific, but simply kept repeating that he owned "five businesses"). He claimed to have multiple houses around the world. He claimed that he had three Corvettes at one of his homes here in Colorado, and that the Corvettes were colored "red, white and blue," because he hadn't been able to decide which patriotic color to get, so he had just paid cash for them all so he wouldn't have to choose.

He said that despite the fact that he owned these houses, cars and companies, he still led PSI seminars because he wanted to "give back" to the organization that had given him all of those things.

I wish I was joking you guys, but I am not. This guy's story was the very worst piece of fiction I had heard since Star Wars: Episodes 1, 2 and 3.
I glanced around to make sure that everyone else in the room was feeling like I was: that this guy was an *** and a liar and that, by association, this whole PSI thing had to be juvenile bull-***. Surely you would have to have some kind of severe mental handicap to be able to buy this sh*t. But when I looked around the room, I didn't see any real thinkers with critical thinking skills.
I was disgusted to see only this: gullible star-struck people amazed that he had three Corvettes. I knew for sure, now, that I was in for a long weekend. I turned around and looked for the door. I saw that there was only the one exit door, and two of the PSI staff members were standing to either side of it. I got up and walked toward it. As I went to open it, one of them held me back physically and asked: "Can I ask where you're going?"

This person is lucky I didn't push his head through the thick wooden door. What business of theirs was it where I was "going?"

"Bathroom," I replied, glaring at them both, "why?"

"Oh, we just like to kind of keep track of everyone here," said the second one, a younger woman. They opened the door for me quietly and let me out.

I peed, and realized I had no choice but to do this thing. My employers had paid, like, $600 (at least) for me to be there that weekend. I felt like I owed it to them to stay, no matter how crazy these people were. Also, I was afraid that they would find out somehow if I left. I liked my job and wanted to be a team player as much as I could.

I went back into the conference room, and the guy kept rambling on, like he would all f*ckin' weekend.

That first night, he made us partner up with someone in the room, and we all moved our chairs into groups of two, facing one another. I ended up with some middle-aged burly lookin' man with a beard.

"Good," I thought, "this guy is too manly to buy into this *** sh*t."

WRONG! Minutes later, with the lights in the room dimmed down to "sex-lighting," the greasy car-salesman is leading us through some kind of guided therapy in which we are to pretend that the person sitting in front of us is first our mom, and then our dad. We were to close our eyes and say to the stranger before us what we really wanted to tell our parents, deep down.

People throughout the room were crying. Staff members were walking around with boxes of Kleenex. My partner went first, and started crying too. When I was his stand-in mother, he had nice things to say to me. Apparently I was a pretty good mom to this guy when he was growing up. But ***, once I was his dad, he wasn't nearly as happy.

He accused me of "not being there," of "not being supportive," of "hitting him," and of "drinking too much." Then, through baby-wet sobs, he admitted that he still loved me, and he missed me greatly.

I wanted to tell him: "listen dude, I wouldn't have hit you if you wouldn't have been such a little ***." I couldn't believe this manly lookin' guy was crying like a little girl to me.

Then it came to be my turn. I had to pretend this guy was my mother, and then my father.

I will tell you this: neither my mother nor my father are *** enough to be caught dead at a place like that, and there was no way that I would besmirch the dignity of my parents be saying anything relevant about them at a cult-meeting such as that.

I told the guy that I really enjoyed the childhood he had provided for me, and thanked him for putting up with me when I was a little ***. I opened my eyes before I was supposed to, and the guy looked really hurt or cheated. I guess he felt bad that he had opened up to me when I hadn't. I cry at Disney movies. I was closer to laughing my *** off, though, at that moment.

Oh well. The whole PSI thing would prove to be like this. That first night, I went back to the hotel room, ordered a couple of Silvermine Subs, and tried to go to sleep. (I wasn't going to be intimate with the girl that night, but the least I could do was feed her.)

The reason I classify PSI as a cult is that it is designed merely to take your money in exchange for some reward that is endlessly delayed. The first level of PSI, the "Basic," is supposed to cost like $600 or something, but the levels become increasingly expensive as you sign up for more and more.

While at the Basic, they kind of start out by telling you that you are going to learn something great that weekend, but every time they say they are going to teach you how to "maximize your potential," they end up just telling you that "you can learn more later, on a different phase."

I kept getting these feelings of intense sympathy for the people there who spent their own money on this deal. At least my employer had paid my way.

Every time we had a break (which was just barely long enough for me to smoke two cigarettes), we would walk back into the room where people would be dancing around like headless chickens to that same sh*tty song about "flying high and pushing into the now" or what-the-***-ever.

I couldn't believe I was there. I could have spent that weekend doing... well... anything else. Worse, I couldn't believe that out of the eighty or one-hundred people there, I seemed to be the only one who thought that the whole thing was bullshit. I kept asking anyone who seemed younger and more savvy if they were "buying this," and without fail their response was "oh yeah, I think this is really going to help me turn things around in my life," or something like that. This was unbelievable. Did they realize that we weren't supposed to leave the room without telling absolute strangers why we were leaving? Did they hear the droning repetition to the music, and the pressure to cave in and become part of the group by dancing with everyone? They had even told everyone that they shouldn't drink any alcohol all weekend. That wasn't a problem for me, because I was sober, but telling normal American's not to drink all weekend just seems like a cult move. Right?

Guided meditation. Leading questions like "wouldn't you be happier if you were earning all the money you could," or "can you imagine being truly fulfilled?"

This is pretty close to what PSI seemed like to me .... a mindless cult where the drones willingly hand over their souls and money.
*** it, though. I had been through a lot in my life. I mean, I'd spent a weekend or five in jail. I had been to Marine Corps boot camp. I had even listened to more than a couple full episodes of the Rush Limbaugh show. I was certain I could survive this. The only other thing I had to survive was this: Horse Tooth! a.k.a . . . My date for the weekend.

On Friday night, I could tell that Courtney wanted to have some sexual action with me. I was able to avoid that by taking her to the Old Spaghetti Factory, an Italian restaurant in Denver. I happen to love their spaghetti with browned butter and mizithra cheese.

I deliberately took the long way. And then I deliberately got lost. I meandered all around Denver on the way to the place. I got lost again on the way back to the hotel, and by the time we got back, it was so late that there was nothing for us to do but to quietly and awkwardly fall asleep. I think I let her give me a peck on the lips, but only so I could avoid her getting too weird or unpleasant. On Saturday, at the cult, they put the hard sell on all of us. This was the most serious and important part of the Seminar to these blood-thirsty vultures, I could tell, because there were extra staff there, and more than one shysty guy addressed us that day. They showed us a slide show of how much fun people had at the higher-levels of PSI. Apparently, as you got up in the levels, eventually you could visit their rustic compound somewhere in Northern California. I imagined it looked a little like the Waco TX compound ... only, you know, before the ATF decided to set it on fire deliberately burning alive many men women and children.
Then they told us that we would get a slight discount (I think $400 off of the $6200 list price) of the next level of seminar if we signed up right then and there. They continued with their leading questions, and they asked the questions with a microphone in front of everyone. They told us that they had affordable payment plans and that we could use our credit cards.
To my utter f*cking amazement, people began to get up and file toward the back of the room like zombies to sign up for the next level. I was dumbfounded. After someone would sign up, they would be ushered to the front of the room and applauded (for giving away money for nothing). I have been around people who had legitimate full-blown methamphetamine-induced psychosis who behaved more intelligently and autonomously than the people there.
"Why did you decide to sign up for the next level?" they would ask.

"Well, I'm just really tired of not knowing who I am. I want to do something with my life!" they would reply, and everyone would clap.

One staff member came over and talked to me in a hushed voice.

"Do you think you're going to be able to sign up for the next level?" "No, man. I'm poor. My boss paid for this one, but I couldn't have even afforded this otherwise."
He looked sad, but then said: "well, do you have any credit cards?"

I wanted to chop this f*cker in the throat like a ninja.

"My credit cards are maxed out," I replied dismissively, hoping he’d quit pressuring me to buy!

"Well, maybe you could get a loan somehow..." he said. I remembered the story on the internet about the marriage that was ended because the wife had spent all the money on this. That wife's ruined marriage had began in a situation just like this.

I still couldn't believe that I was the only one there who seemed to think this was all stinky, stinky horse-sh*t. That weekend, I lost a part of what little respect I had left for the American public, seeing how gullible and easily duped people really were. How easily people could be wrangled into a mob mentality. How easily people would throw away money for a quick fix bull-sh*t lie.

I'd like to take this opportunity to interrupt and remind you that Charles' Drops is the ultimate homeopathic remedy that will cure anything you have wrong with you and, most likely, make you live forever.
I had respect for whoever had created PSI, though. Whoever was at the top of this thing was keen and smart and was making a lot of f*cking money off of a lot of *** people. Not only were they sapping money from people, but even labor, as I discovered. I found out at some point that more than half of the PSI staff members there that weekend were "volunteer staff members." They were people who were involved in PSI and had previously attended the Basic seminar. They encouraged us all to come back and volunteer our free labor to the money making scheme. They called this "auditing." What a bunch of suckers.

I voted “black” at every turn during the “red-black” game and got castigated for not “playing fair” and not being duped.

The guy at the top of PSI is an amoral, rich genius.

That night, I found myself smothered by two of the biggest *** I have ever personally encountered. I thought I was going to suffocate under these bad boys, and I was terrified, but horse-tooth was determined this time to get some sexual action going.

I just wanted to sleep. So I had to do what I had to do. I yelled out, “I’m excited!”

The rest of this story just gets sadder, not funnier. The next day, at the conclusion of the seminar thing, there was more crying. People really thought that they had embarked on a life-changing journey that was going to bring them love and money and respect. I could see the phony reflections of red, white and blue Corvettes in the eyes of all of those people and I felt really bad for all of them. Checkout at the hotel on Sunday was at noon, and I had been led to believe that the seminar was only going to last a couple of hours longer after that. I told Courtney to go walk around town for a while and to meet me back at the hotel around 2 pm.

Turns out, though, that there was some more tear jerking and hard-selling that the PSI people had to do, even after 2 pm. I figured it couldn't be too much longer.
"Here's the key to my car. You can go wait in there, or whatever you want. Sorry this is taking so long," I told her at break time. I told her I would only be a tiny bit longer.

How was I supposed to know I wouldn't be done for several more hours? I finally freed myself from the illiterate-convention and made my way back down to the parking garage.

Now, for the first time, I really did feel genuinely bad. The girl was sitting in my car sobbing. Hard.

I guess the wait had been too much for her. If I were her, I would have, like, not stayed in the car. I would have done something else. But she had sat right there in the car like a lost puppy for hours, just crying. I didn't know what to say. At that point, I was genuinely drained and miserable. I hugged her and told her I was sorry and that everything would be ok. It was getting dark, and I drove back toward Greeley as fast as I could. At some point, she stopped crying, and wanted to hold my hand. I let her.

I had never met a girl more awkward or needy. I was starting to realize that she didn't like me or care about me in any way. She was a perfect candidate for the PSI Basic. She had driven to Colorado with the exclusive goal of getting laid and experiencing physical closeness. This was one of the weirder situations I had found myself in with a girl. I was still all weirded out from all the trippy guided meditation and trust building activities at PSI. And now horse-tooth had stopped being awkward and annoying and had now become simply creepy.

I tried to distract her with other talk as long as I could. Then, as we finally approached my apartment, I told her: "I don't want to *** with you." She looked shocked.

"I am going to sleep on my couch and you can sleep in my bed. I will take you home in the morning, ok?" She wanted to know why.

"I just don't want to."

I didn't know what else to say. She started crying hysterically again, and didn't stop crying before I fell asleep alone on the couch.

The next day, I took her to her parents’ house before I went to work.

My boss wanted to know what I thought of the PSI experience.

"It was really awesome. I learned a lot about myself," I said, with a straight face.

It was done. I had joined a cult for a weekend and faked an ***. I had survived.

What do you guys think? Have any of you been to PSI or something like it? Have any of you guys ever faked an ***? Did you even make it all the way through this long-*** post?

Oh, and one more thing: the next time that Courtney came to Colorado, she texted me repeatedly asking me if she could come see me at the place where I worked. I told her repeatedly no. She was just not getting the hint. Then, suddenly, I looked out the window from my desk and I see her walking across the f*ckin' parking lot toward the building. I ran outside to intercept her there. She had brought me an iced Americano (how the *** did she know my favorite coffee drink?) and she wanted to kiss and hug me. STILL!

I wish my boss would have paid for horse-tooth to attend the seminar too so she could have hooked up with the slick salesman facilitator instead of hanging around waiting for me to get out of class.
Psycho! I don't know what I said, but whatever it was, I made her cry again and I finally got my point across because I never heard from her again. Horse-tooth, if you are reading this... you were just a little too forward. And your teeth weirded me out. You’re a perfect volunteer for PSI Seminars with your undying persistence!

Thanks for reading everyone.
Love and Light.C

2. Written by Thanks Mike on July 3, 2011

No, they don't ever take any responsibility whatsoever for the harm they do to people. As a matter of fact, they deliberately deny ALL responsibility for anything that goes wrong.
For example, as an experiment to find out what is really going on, a person who did experience a psychosis from this type of LGAT seminar could attempt to inform those who run the LGAT on their public message board or in email to the company. What will happen? The email will be ignored, and be kept on file in for "future reference" in case they need to use it against the person in the future. The message board posts probably would not be posted, or they will try to play mind-games with it.

All of these PSI/LGAT seminars have these terrible types of side-effects for some people, and the PSI money machine just don't care. They know it happens, but they are making Thousands in a weekend. They probably rationalize it in their minds somehow; by blaming the victim, etc. But in reality, it's the typical stance of the Narcissist seminar leader, who only cares about themselves.

Many people have manic and hypo manic episodes at these seminars. They WANT people to go into that manic mental state, which is why they keep pushing people into those high-energy states 18 hrs a day, while not sleeping and not eating, while being so physically active, jumping around, yelling, etc. Why? Because when people go "hypo manic" they will buy everything. They will spend thousands and sign up for the entire the string of seminars; that you can't get a refund from, etc.

The reality of PSI seminars is very ugly and very harsh, and it does not match the marketing about saving the world. Sometimes people have to find this out the hard way, as so many people won't listen to the warnings about these seminars, as they believe the marketing, until it's too late.

Its profoundly wrong and even evil, what they do to "regular people" at these seminars. The seminar attended is one of the most advanced in the world, and the average person without training, has no idea of what is being done to them. If they "play full out" they are literally risking everything.

People trained in the advanced methods used by these LGAT seminar leaders, will sit near the back, and very carefully analyze everything being done to people at the seminar, and remain as detached as possible. As they work on many levels at once. It's the regular everyday folks who don't have training in these areas, who go up to the front of the room, and "play full out", and many of them do flip-out and get hysterical, in one way or another. Some go hypo manic, and buy every PSI Seminar that is for sale; such as this woman:
“Heather wrote at 3:44pm on March 4th, 2009. Hey Everyone! I am so driven in life now that I have graduated WLS. I did the Basic Seminar Jan 29th, four days later went to PSI 7, and then five days later went to WLS. I see the vision. I have felt the urgency needed to make changes in my life and my true vision came to me at WLS. My vision and purpose in life is to be of service to those all over the world. I will create and cause some kind of change in this world. PSI Seminars has a great vision, but it needs to be taken a step further or the vision will die. I will be a part of creating the first of many expansions of PSI all over the world. The first step for me is getting to principia so that I may also become a facilitator. With that being said, I am asking for support from my fellow PSI graduates. I exhausted my credit cards and bank account just doing what it took to get through Basic to WLS this last month. I need to raise $3800 to go to principia by March 6th, this Friday (to get the discounted price anyway).They have been pushed into that hysterical mental state by the seminar leader.”

But others are pushed right over the edge. The ones who ruin their lives and destroy their families, their finances and their minds. They are collateral damage for the greater good of the bank accounts of the PSI seminar owner and promoters. Be very careful of going to these same seminar people with the negative results, as they will try to encourage the victim to go to MORE seminars, believe it. They will be telling you that you didn't “get it” and sign you up for the next seminar for thousands of dollars.

What is the ultimate insight, at the end of all of the seminars sold? Many people who have gone through all the seminars have said what it is. The supreme insight is that if you have the right techniques, you can sell anyone anything, for any price. People learn at the end of all these seminars, that they have been sold an illusion for more than 40K; any actual info into the seminars can be acquired from a few books.

The people who attend these seminars usually "get it" and then go and try to use the techniques on others. But the shocking insight at the end of the seminar rainbow is that the person has been sold an illusion. Its' just an illusion!!!! The seminar leader probably tries to massage her conscience by telling herself that she is teaching people how not to get scammed in society, by teaching them a lesson in getting scammed they will never forget.

But that is the insight that many pay 20K-40K to learn. Werner Erhard did the same thing, at the end of his seminars, you learn it's all about "nothing.” You see, these professional salespeople found it easier to sell "nothing" than to sell "something".

They are selling complete illusions.

Mike
Las Vegas, Nevada

I was a child when my mom joined PSI. She became very involved in the organization from the beginning. At the age of 10 she forced me to go to the "child seminars." I always thought they were weird and creepy, I didn't like the people there. At the time I didn't understand what they were doing to us. Most of the memories of PSI have been blocked up until recently. I went to visit my mother last week, and had a sudden memory recall of PSI. I went online to see if it was still around, or if it was even real, and I started finding all kinds of information about people who had gone through the program and came out with ruined lives. Suddenly everything made perfect sense.

My mom's involvement with PSI began right around the time she left my dad. Now the timing on this seems strange to me, since many of the people who have written about their experiences say that it is common for new PSI grads to leave their spouse. Whether or not her involvement with PSI began before or after her divorce, I am not sure. I was made to go to the "seminars" and participate, my mom urging me that it was very important for me and how much these people were going to help me and make my life better. The seminars were long, i remember, long hours which when you are a child seem endless. I don't remember food being a big part of my experience there. I remember bursts of physical activity followed by lying on the floor in a darkened room being led on guided visualizations. They would tell us to imagine bad, terrible things happening to us, then turn the vision into something positive that made us feel good. We were forced to reveal traumatic experiences and many kids went in and out of crying. They pounded us with their jargon and their buzzwords and did everything they could to get us synched up with their way of speaking and thinking.

Even as a child I was never the highly suggestible type. Looking back they probably viewed me as a problem case, a tough candidate. I resisted. I remember having to leave the group and be led one-on-one by certain facilitators there. At one point, I remember I was upset and scared, I wanted to leave so badly. I began to cry and ran out of the room we were in, into a smaller room where they followed me and tried to coax me back in. I cried and BEGGED them to call my mom, I wanted to leave, PLEASE CALL MY MOM. Of course, they wouldn't, and they told me no. Looking back, she was so deep into it that she wouldn't have come for me anyway. She would have told me how important it was for me to stay there and listen to them, they were only trying to help me. Now also, seeing the price tag for all this, there's no way she would have rescued me.

I don't remember everything that went on at these "seminars." Maybe as time goes on I will recall more, but I'm not sure I want to. Certain parts are vividly clear in my mind, but what hasn't become clear to me yet is the outcome... I don't remember much about leaving, just a feeling of defeat and acceptance that I had to go along with it, if nothing else than for my mom's sake because it was so important to her and it was all she cared about at that time. Did they brainwash me?? I can't tell. Maybe they did, at the time. Did I believe in PSI? In a way maybe I did. I don't remember.

My mom was an ardent supporter. She went on all the "retreats" to the ranch. She would come back and talk endlessly about her experiences on "the pole" and "the ledge" with her PSI buddies. She got rid of our mini-van and bought herself a silver convertible. We would ride around in it blasting her PSI music, a bunch of garbage songs about loving yourself, on a continuous loop. When she would go away to the retreats, she would leave me with some PSI buddy or another. Looking back, these were people she hardly knew, and she entrusted her child to near strangers while she went away to the ranch and hooted it up with all the other weirdos there. I never knew what went on there, but reading some of the stuff on here about what they do it makes me uncomfortable to think of my mom as being a part of that.

I suppose the worst part of my experience during this time period was when my mom and I went to meet up with one of her "buddies" at a ceremony that was taking place in the evening. We drove to where the meeting was being held, but it wasn't time for us to go in yet, so we went to a coffee shop next door. I ordered hot tea, and it was served boiling hot. The cup spilled on me, all down the front of my dress, burning me badly on my chest and stomach. I remember crying, the pain was so intense, and everyone in the cafe staring at me which only made it worse ( I was a very shy kid ). The employees at the cafe gave us some ice in a towel. We left promptly so that we could make it to the ceremony in time. My mom had me wait in the hallway outside the doors to the event space clutching the ice to myself and sobbing in pain. She went in, and was gone for some time, I don't remember how long. After the ceremony ended and everyone was leaving she came out and then drove me to the ER, where I spent the night in the burn ward. I tell this story not because I want anyone to feel sorry for me but because I believe it shows the level to which PSI manipulates people and changes their priorities, so that a mother will let her child suffer when they need obvious and immediate medical attention, so that they can continue their "high." PSI came first. Everything else was second, even me.

We ended up losing our house, my mom's car was repossessed, and we had to move out of state. From that time on, we were very poor. We moved around a lot, my mom would spend money we didn't have and then we'd have our car taken again. This cycle repeated in my mom's life a lot. She went through a rash of bad relationships, abusive men, depression, and finally a series of severe illnesses. She was emotionally unstable after PSI, she would lash out at me constantly. Anything that went wrong in her life she began to blame on me. Now, it makes sense to me why all these things happened, at the time I had no idea. I wasn't aware of what PSI had done to us, and how it had left my mom an emotional and financial wreck.

I don't remember ever leaving PSI, but it seems now like my mom bled herself dry and spent all our money to the point where there wasn't any left, and she couldn't continue her seminars anymore. I feel sorry for my mom, she must have viewed this as an epic failure on her part. This probably contributed a great deal to her subsequent depression and emotional problems.

Before PSI, my memories of my mom are nothing but positive. She was kind, loving, compassionate. She cared about me so much, and we were so close. She was fun-loving, she would help anybody in need, and she never yelled at me. After PSI, my mom was like a child. She was mean, selfish, she lost all her friends, she blamed me for everything wrong in her life. After PSI my mom couldn't cope with her reality. She had been severely abused as a child, and could have benefited from some genuine professional help, instead she got swindled and brainwashed and tore open like an old carcass. She was never the same, and our relationship went from being healthy and loving to being a burden to me. I began to resent my mom, and hate her for her cruelty and selfishness.

It's been 20 years since I was in PSI. My mom and I never speak about it. Not once has it come up as a subject in all this time. I don't know what she feels about it now. I DO know that her life was never the same, and her situation only got worse. I got a job at 16 and left home. She was never able to care for herself or get her life back on track. Eventually she met someone and got remarried. He's a kind elderly man, who cares for my mom deeply and treats her well, but I know she doesn't love him. She needs someone to take care of her and that's what it is. I see my mom a few times a year, but it gives me anxiety and I feel guilty because I have to keep my distance from her.

I hope anyone out there who is considering attending one of these "seminars" reads this and thinks twice. It was never my choice to attend, but it affected my childhood profoundly and left me wondering what might have been if my mom had never heard of PSI. Even now as I write this I can't stop the tears from flowing. It is not good for anyone, ESPECIALLY CHILDREN, to be subjected to these types of psychological disturbances in the brain. The people leading these "seminars" are NOT certified or qualified to lead these types of exercises. It's taken me 20 years to even realize that I was damaged by these people. How many more years will it take to undo the damage? I don't know. At least now I recognized what happened to my mom and me.

Thank you everyone for posting your stories on here. It helps so much to know I'm not the only one affected negatively by these experiences. I don't feel that I can talk about this with my friends because they can't understand. Even my husband dismisses it. The few people I've brought it up to just laugh at me. They think it's hilarious that my mom was such a "kook." I guess because it was so long ago I am supposed to be over it. I am trying in my own way to process everything and deal with it. I'm so grateful to have a place where I can tell my story and have people maybe understand it. Thank you.

P.S. I found an old packet in a box of my childhood things that was filled with worksheets and exercises from PSI, along with some drawings. The paper is yellowed from the last 20 years, and I don't know why I've kept it so long. I think I saved them because the experience was so surreal I almost didn't believe it, and this is proof that it actually really happened. I am torn what to do... maybe I should save it as a constant reminder to always be vigilant and never allow people to try and manipulate you..... or maybe I should burn it as a symbol of my release from their grip. Have they really been controlling me all these years?? What happened to me?? Why am I so upset?? I don't have the answers yet but I hope I can find them.

I'd burn them and be free of it. Good luck to you MM.

I got this from a friend. Someone posted this on another blog and her disappointment with PSI. For anyone who is thinking of attending PSI, as an ex-grad of PSI, please stay away from this.

“A good friend of mine was once really into this thing called "PSI Seminars" and was always ranting about how great and life changing they were. She was constantly trying to get me to go to their "basic" meeting which was 3 days long and about $600. I was interested, but 600 bucks was a hell of a lot of money so I always blew it off.

For my 18th birthday she, being now on the board of directors for our city, bought me the basic course, save for $50 which she said would ensure I "had something invested in it". Like many other 18 year old's I was filled with philosophical curiosity, and I gotta tell you, I went and was blown away. It was a 3 day emotional roller coaster which put into words many ideas I had. It also tore me down and built me back up and at the end of it all I was riding a high like never before.

Naturally I didn't want the high to end, and they had plenty of more courses for those who didn't. The next on the list was the "PSI 7". A 7 day course held on their ranch out in CA. Even though it sounded a little sketch, I really wanted to go... Only problem was that it cost around $4500. I absolutely had no way of coming up with that amount of money, so I said "fuck it" and told my friend that if there was ever any great discount or something to let me know. Well, a few months later I get a call from some gal at their headquarters in my city who says that she has a ticket to the thing that some other guy bought, but who was no longer able to because of a car accident. She said he was willing to sell it half price at about $2000. We eventually agreed that I could pay her directly $100 a month for the ticket and that she would pass the money onto the guy who was selling it.
So a month later I'm out in CA on this ranch doing this course. It consisted of a lot of group and team building exercises, along with a lot more emotional wall tearing down and building up exercises. Very skeevy "we're playing with your emotions to get a rise out of you" kind of stuff, but I was eating it up. Toward the end of the thing they kept suggesting we go to the next level, which was the Men's or Woman's leadership courses, each about $5100. I remember at one point they separated out those who had "absolute dedication to improving their life" by signing up for the extra class, and those who were either unsure or didn't want to, by making the one's who didn't stand against a wall with our mouths shut and not being allowed to spread or negative influence to others. I felt really pressured, and the guy trying to sign us up was really "bad car sales-man" in tactic.
Anyway, after the whole thing I was still riding the "PSI High" and felt great about the world. My friends today still tell me this was the most annoying I've ever been (lol). Anyway, that next semester in community college I decided to take philosophy, psychology and marketing all at the same time. After just two weeks I was so enraged with PSI I was ready to kill. Psychology taught me about the emotionally manipulative tactics they used, Philosophy taught me the great and original "Ideas" they had were really shallow and very little of the whole story, and my marketing class sealed the deal. I was livid. But I still had a debt to pay, so I continued to make my $100 a month payments to this gal at their headquarters.
Well, after a few months I got to the office a day late to make my payment to this gal. I informed the office sectary that I was late on a payment and just gave the $100 to her. She seemed a little confused, but wrote me a receipt and took the money. I don't know why, but it suddenly occurred to me that the entire thing was a little suspicious. I gave a call to the director of PSI operations for my area and told him what was going on. He told me he would get back to me in a little while. A month later I got a call from him telling me that the gal who had set up the deal for me was found to be embezzling lots of money from them, and he would like me to give him copies of e-mails and receipts between us. I did and was later contacted by an attorney who was pressing charges against her. I never called him back and since then PSI has never contacted me about any debt owed.
I ended up walking away from the whole thing with what I consider an amazing lesson in life and for a very small price. I wouldn't trade that experience for anything.

TLDR: I got roped into a self help seminar in which I would have paid over $5K, got out paying only ~$350, found someone inside the company embezzling money and got an amazing life lesson from it all.

PSI relied very heavily on Idealism. "The world is what you make of it". That wouldn't be too bad in of itself, but they kept pressing "proof of the truth" in examples and stories. These examples they preached were good, but they were only half of the story. Why would you ever think that the complete opposite of idealism, namely materialism, would have absolute proofs as well? In that sense, everyone in these seminars just bought and ate it all up because it's hard for us to imagine two opposing things to both be right. The kicker is that they structured all of their lectures in such a way to lead you to believe that they were the only one's out there with this information. So if you wanted to keep "riding the PSI high" you kept going to these lectures. Many people have lost their entire lives in PSI. Not only monetarily, but by volunteering all their time to PSI for free and alienating all their friends and family by demanding they all attend PSI lectures as well. It's really horrible and tragic when you start reading the stories of those who got wise too late.

Edit: I forgot to mention that PSI is never, ever, ever wrong. Their lectures are akin to Scientology in that there is always an answer to everything, and it's always right. Those who've gone the whole 9 yards and and devoted their lives to PSI are naturally very hesitant to question anything that a lecturer may say or do. This leads to any questions you may raise in class which oppose what is being taught being shot down rather quickly.
If you can't tell I'm still a little mad at them. Not because of what happened to me, but because I know they are still extorting many, many people out of lots of time, money and sanity.”

I've heard recently PSI is having some major issues. Anybody hear anything about this?

The following is a post by a PSI grad, Dan. He posted the following comment of another site:

"PSI seminars is a *** good thing. I would have never thought I'd have said that while I experienced the basic seminar, and questioned it in the immediate days that followed. In the months that have followed, the concepts taught there have broke through. Self-accontabilty, self-respect, self-worth, and self fulfillment have solidified themselves back in my consciousness. Spending time with the wonderful people who have positively changed their lives through the advanced courses has made me want to utilize those tools. Thank You, PSI for helping a man clear away his bullshit, and find himself again. 1114887"

This was a couple of the responses:

"Written by Dan Billcollector on March 19, 2012 from -, -, UK
Message from Dan Burns, Cult Promoter to ALL those who are LOST and need to FIND themselves, spend $10K and become another CULT PROMOTER, Dan Burns from Stanton, CA. Doom on your business now you are AWARE of YOUR FEELINGS and RESPONSIBLE for your FORECOLOSURE. Arent you happier now?? Thats what PSI Seminars do.....AWARENESS TRAINING for LOW self esteem people!!!!!!!!!!!!! LOL

9. Written by Newt on March 19, 2012 from -, -, NL
Dan Burns is a perfect example of a PSI seminar candidate, cult promoter or zombie.!! His quote..helps "me find myself again and clear away his bullshit"!! Bet he spent some money buying bullshit plaques...did you go collect some"*** from the bulls" on behalf of Jane and shirley at MLS..the men's leadership ( LOL ) seminar? You got th ebullshit, and Shirley Hunt ( man hater )has your money...SUCKA !!! Never gonna get some again...you have been de-balled....and you are smiling...now thats slick!! Learn that LOL"

Than Dan saw the light:
"Written by Dan Burns on March 29, 2012 from indio, california, US
Just to set the record straight again. I took the PSI basic class. I didn't like it at first, but I got something out of it. I spent time with a wonderful woman, who I no longer see, who had positively changed her life through the advance courses. The other people that I interacted with from that class were good to me. I saw this pissed consumer thing, and expressed my opinion. After all these comments, and thank you for them, I've done my research, and have interacted with others that didn't have a good experience, and, in my opinion were negatively affected by their PSI experience. One told me way to much about PSI 7. What he told me disturbs the *** out of me. I won't be going, and wish I could retract my original comment. I don't want to promote PSI. Now, I'm a big boy, and again, personally have used some of what I learned at PSI for my own good. I am 'thankful' for my own experience. Not long before I went to the basic, I had attempted suicide. At the end of the class, I was at peace with myself and my 'demons'. That's what I got out of the class. That's why I put my two cents in about it.

And frankly, after reading all the additional comments, and that long weird quoting barrage (most of that I sure don't remember from the basic, and would have thought of it as a cult if I had heard it and ran out the door)

I can't figure out who's more twisted, PSI or the INSANE SELF RIGHTEOUS

FOLKS who have posted some of the comments, and personal attacks. Really WTF? You get a life! Who's acting like a victim? Iand that crap about me wanting to have mindless sex with vulnerable women, oh Freaked Out? Where the heck did you pull that from? Those few of you that made a bit of sense, and made me legitimately question, please don't include yourself. ***, I guess I can be thankful for the insane ones too, makes me not want."

Hi, Five years ago, I came to this site to do personal research on PSI after someone suggested it to me. I don't forward emails to people if they are even slightly suspicious or use scare tactics. So, I'm glad I never did get involved. Having more free time these days, I was curious yesterday and started reading up on PSI and the posts here.
These are just some thoughts I've had over the last 24 hours or so:
I'm happy that the young woman whose education opened her eyes in such a brief time. The fact that she is open minded and came out of PSI open-minded says a lot of her will and I think is a rare instance indeed.
What I'm sad to learn is that they are still around. Also I think it is very disturbing that they are offering 1 day free Basic Intros.
I went to their website today (PSI Seminars) and saw they have a new store. Yet another racket for these people. If you look at the JCW tab, it is a link to books recommended by the founder I assume. The authors are other racketeers such as Deepak Chopra and Bob Procter; but Shirely McClaine? I couldn't find evidence of her involvement except for her two books being listed.
Charismatic speakers (one in particular) started the Holocaust. I'm just saying...
Why are the locations of the Seminars hidden until registration is paid? This is a particularly effective tool cults use to ensure there would be no intervention by the non-believers or the negative people. I wouldn't mind joining a protest in front of the hotel just to get people to stop. There are far too many people ruined by this organization. For the 500,000 people that have attended these seminars, multiply that by 20 for each person whose co-workers, friends, and family have been hurt or ruined. It bothers me that companies pressure their employees into this by paying for it and other methods. Specifically, an open minded person who wants to keep their job would go. Someone more willing to know what they are getting into, not really knowing who their boss is, maybe even the boss doesn't know what he/she is getting into.
Everyone has a weakness. I think PSI's use of psychological tactics covets this fact and uses it. These methods of breaking you down and bringing you up seem to be a consistency in cults and other Large Group Awareness Training organizations. You're there in the first place to better yourself. So, already you go there with the assumption that there is something wrong with you or that something is missing in your life. Everyone wants it better, they want more cars, more money and better relationships. There's a point where wiser people realize that life is what it is. You can only try to change how you react and look at each moment, each event in your life. You can't imagine yourself (I'm referring to "The Secret" DVD which I've suffered through and is recommend by JCW) with more money, then go out and get a $50,000 car loan, attend seminars that cost over $7-8,000, and expect your family to "go with it." I mean, things coming to you because you visualize it or meditate on it? Really, so the rich men (ALL 3) on the east coast who won the lottery last year visualized it too?
People need to realize that the sooner that they let go of their desires, they will find that they have what they need. Do I need to buy a t-shirt right now? No, I have twenty. I'd like to, but it won't make me happy. What makes me happy is seeing my friends and family happy. Vacations make me happy because my husband/family and I get to spend so much time together just seeing the world and experiencing life and yummy food. Getting brainwashed won't make anyone happy. Think for yourself people, please.

Today a lot of people are on Facebook, Linkedin, other social media and use twitter.

What this means is that it is easy to do background research on people.

And unscrupulous types can do this to learn what a person's triggers are.

People who move, have had tough times in the family, all too often they post this on Facebook.

Comments made under your own name on various venues can be searched.

All this is rather scary.

In the old days when LGATs were first launched, it was no where so easy to do background research of this kind.

Now it can easily be done.

Quote
corboy
Today a lot of people are on Facebook, Linkedin, other social media and use twitter.
What this means is that it is easy to do background research on people.
And unscrupulous types can do this to learn what a person's triggers are.
People who move, have had tough times in the family, all too often they post this on Facebook.
Comments made under your own name on various venues can be searched.
All this is rather scary.
In the old days when LGATs were first launched, it was no where so easy to do background research of this kind.
Now it can easily be done.

Couldn't agree more.