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the program uses ... classic Ericsonian type stories to set triggers to remind them where to get their next fix, and to recruit more victims.
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What and experience!
It was worth attending. I now have a better understanding of why people get hooked into these things.
The best description I can relate is that it was like a high school pep rally. Extremely loud music, running through paper banners, jumping, dancing, and the group taking a person and moving them overhead along the line with the group holding them up.
The paid trainers would them make statements. The statements really rambled and were peppered with emphasized words. Some that come to mind were warm, rain, and cleansing when talking about how the group has changed their lives for the better.
During these speeches people in the crowd would yell out, amen, I hear you… It really reminded me of some old southern churches. The whole event had a very religious tone.
My wife told her group I was attending to support HER not the Discovery program. Most of them were nice and respected my position. A few became pushy trying to get me to attend, but backed off when my tone and body language changed. The trainers looked at me like I was the anti-Christ. I even caught one trainer pointing at me while talking to other trainers. My wife introduced the trainers but they clearly didn’t want to speak with me.
EVEYONE was happy. Some were crying because they were happy (supposedly). There was a lot of holding hands in a circle and singing. That was the point when it hit me. How could 400+ people in a room ALL be so happy? I realized they were all there because of some pain in their life, some worse than others. Ok, some were they to make money, and some to feed a controlling ego.
This group offers endorphin and adrenalin highs they don’t get in their life. That is why so many relationships fail upon re-entry to their life. About 10% of the people in my wife’s group are experiencing relationship problems where spouses did not attend Discovery. When problems are encountered, they run back to the LGAT for the next level of training, or a “free” refocus training to get their next fix. My wife’s mother was instrumental in talking my wife into attending, and was even pressuring her as we were walking out for my wife to sign up for the spiritual training. My wife and I agreed she has completed the 3 trainings and she can now focus on us,using the "tools" she has learned. We will see how this goes.
The trainees are addicted, and the program uses NLP and classic Ericsonian type stories to set triggers to remind them where to get their next fix, and to recruit more victims.
I think there is hope for my marriage. I read up on the techniques used by Landmark, EST… and would tell my wife,“ I’ll bet they will use this method in your next training”, and would then describe one of the exercises, i.e. people in the lifeboat… She was astounded at how I would know what the secret trainings consisted of. I then showed her Discovery was built on the very same methods as the other bad groups.