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corboy
This notion of freeing people from past conditioning is very 'Sixties'. No one on the planet has the wisdom to know what we should be deconditoned from and what can be put in its place. To declare that humans need deconditioning and that you or your organization are wise enough to know how we need to be re programmed is the height of arrogance.

it surprises me that you say this given your experience with Buddhism. Zen relies very much on this. (perhaps the '60's idea of deconditioning comes from Zen.)

I have devoted myself to deconditioning of myself. to going unsane.

far as belief systems we grow up in prison, live in prison, often will never know that we do. I have chosen (or not chosen) to reduce the number of conditioning influences on myself.

I do not use the word cults because all human insitutions use to make people sane or insane rather than unsane.

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People who are interested in 'deconditioning' and 're-conditioning' are often power hungry and control freaks.

yes.

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They are also out of step with real mental health professionals.

I do not trust these guys either as a class. individually no more or less than any other people.

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Landmark has re-written its own history too many times. At least with an entity like the Catholic church, you can easily research the downside along with the good stuff.

oh yes you can! you can learn so much so easily about Landmark they wouldn't like you to know.

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Hope
Another Forum topic was drama. Participants who shared were reprimanded and asked to lose the drama if they expressed themselves with any kind of inflection, anger, sadness, humor, sarcasm, etc. It didn't take long before zombies were sharing their life experiences - all kinds of horrific stuff -straight faced, with no emotion.

I got a look at the day-to-day notes taken to me during my stay in a psychiatic institution and the aides would cite my mother for "use of drama" for asking when they would release me.

Corboy, would like to say that I agree totally with the first two of your numbered observations. the third one not so. certain isolated situations may violate the third every once in a while. like the family in the book called [i:bfcf8e2f27]The Siege[/i:bfcf8e2f27] who decided to break down the defenses of their autistic child. or in Zen or other spiritual schools for example. monasteries and nunneries work on authoritarian lines too.

So glad you escaped with your mind intact, Acid Reindeer.
"Drama is the spice of life..."

-Val

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Acid Reindeer


I got a look at the day-to-day notes taken to me during my stay in a psychiatic institution and the aides would cite my mother for "use of drama" for asking when they would release me.

Stay Free! magazine might correct the formatting...I was too lazy to look up the Chicago Manual of Style's endnote formatting. (Damn! I'm so out of date, I don't have one that references website citations.)

Thanks for all your input...Some of you will see you names multiple times in the endnotes.

-Val (pathetically working on this at 2am-better get to bed before I lose my day job, kinehora)

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Landmark's slogans and jargon encourage a sense of unity and insider/outsider dynamics. (If five or more of these phrases occur in a conversation, either you or the person you're speaking to may be a Landmark convert.)

Acknowledging – Applause that follows a person's sharing a realization or declaration. Landmark people are planted within groups to trigger clapping. (1)

"Already always listening" – The little voices in your head that never quit.(2) People think they're listening but really aren't because they're filtering information through pre-existing beliefs. (Ex: "Stop already always listening and be in the conversation" - drop your preconceived ideas and listen to what I'm saying.)

Being a Cause –Actively working to transform yourself. (3)

Being authentic – Taking complete responsibility for your actions; being truthful; your best self. "The Landmark Self-Expression and Leadership Program is designed to empower participants in the authentic expression of themselves."

Breakthroughs/Paradigm shifts - Life-transforming realizations.These phrases are selected because they resonate with white-collar professionals. (4)

Being "coachable" – Being able to let go of your questions and accepting everything that the leader of the session says without inquiry. (5)

Contributing to your life – Graduates sharing their Forum experiences and pressuring you into enrolling in a Landmark course.

"Commit to the possibility of being"– Agree to do whatever it takes to make a transformation in your life.

commitment /being committed to being committed. Commitment to other people, being authentic, spreading the transformations of the Forum; testifying to the changes.

Completing - Speaking to people you have "unfinished business" with and accepting responsibility for any problems that occurred in the relationship (being argumentative, having been raped or abused, etc.). Ex: "I'm looking forward to completing with my ex-fiancee and creating the possibility of a unique friendship." (6)

Forum participants are instructed to begin with the words: 'I've been making you wrong for...', 'I've been resenting...' or 'I regret that...'. and end it 'I love you.' (7)

Power of Declaration- A "distinction" taught in Landmark. By making a declaration, you encourage yourself to fulfill it and reach your goal. (8)

"Do you want to make a difference in your life?" –Typical intro to a conversation about the Forum.

drama- Negative- Expressing yourself with any kind of inflection, anger, sadness, humor, sarcasm, etc. (9)

"Enroll in the possibility of being" –Sign up for a Landmark course / Act as if your possibilities are only limited by your mind.

Be Enrolling: share your new possibilities in such a way that others are touched, moved and inspired. "Be actively enrolling people in Landmark." (10)

Fear of Risk- reason why people may take the Intro Forum but not sign up for advanced courses (11)

Filters- Beliefs that cause you to judge people by the past. "If you don’t want others to judge you, stop judging others" (12)

Forum rules - NO talking without permission, NO taking notes, NO food or drinks other than water in the room, NO tardiness, NO drugs (including prescription drugs, alcohol or aspirin) or booze during the weekend, etc. Any deviation from these rules risks out your entire Forum experience. They keep you from "fully participating in and receiving all the value available to you." (13)

"generating myself as the possibility of freedom and generosity"–creating yourself daily as the result of your possibilities. (14)

Getting it – Accepting the Forum teachings as truth. (Key Landmark concept.) There is no meaning in life except what you give it.

"Graduation" night – The Tuesday following the 3-day Introduction to the Forum (Fri-Sun), or the 4-day Advanced Course (Thurs-Sun) is when "graduation" or "completion" takes place. Enrollees invite their friends and family, typically with the phrase "It would mean so much to me if you came to this Tuesday night to my graduation."

The evening has two phases; the first, where Forum graduates share their "breakthroughs" with the large group. In the second half, the visitors are divided into small groups and taken to small seminar rooms to get a "taste" of the Forum, after which they are invited to sign up for the Forum. Meanwhile, the inviters finish their course with the leader at the same time.

Integrity – being your word. The worst accusation is "You're not being your word." Signing a registratration form and putting down a deposit is making a commitment to take a course. Cancelling is not being your word. Even standing up to sign up to take a course is considered a commitment.

Forum slogans:
"It's not about what you know, but about letting go of what you know."
"The Forum helps you learn about what you don't know you don't know."
"Words are meaningless" (15)

Looking good –Posited as the only reason why people do good deeds. Forum leaders have cited this as Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr.'s motivations for their work not because they believe in them, but because they want to "look good."

Making up a story –way of interpreting a story that explains your worldview.

Meaning-making machines – Humans (16)

Learning to not judge anything -to be right, wrong, good or bad, wondering if other people are merely trying to look good, etc. (17)

racket - believing someone is a certain fixed way; people do the same actions again and again for the safety or comfort. Rackets are not reality, not the truth but patterns of thought and behavior that pay off (complaints with a payoff). This concept also existed in Transactional Analysis, whose founder says some (or all?) women who get raped get raped as at a racket. (18)

Reasons why the Forum didn't work for people-
"Well, actually, there were people who weren’t satisfied. But that’s just because they didn’t really want to get something from the Forum"
"The Forum only gives you what you want to take from it." (19)


RULES -Intro Course; 3 15-hour days +4 hour Tuesday night meeting; Advanced Course -4 15-hour days + Tues night meeting, with only 1 90-minute meal break. Participants are informed, that the slightest deviation from the rules might result in failure. Discipline is strict. You can't go to the bathroom when you want, you take meals in groups, there are strict rules about talking and conduct, and the leader won't hesitate to shame you into compliance. (20)

Giving up all drugs, even aspirin and coffee, will make most of us subliminally uncomfortable, perhaps our neurotransmitters plunge, and then we are likely to respond to the engineered intensity of the Landmark seminars--and perhaps respond with some gratitude because we are distracted from our withdrawal symptoms. This unconscious process can be readily exploited. (21)

Gambits:
"Aren't you open to life's possibilities?"
"I had such a powerful breakthrough"
"How much is the rest of your life worth?" Common question to people equivocating about signing up for the Forum. (22)

"Did you accomplish everything you wanted to accomplish?"
Potential enrollee: No I haven't
VOLUNTEER: Well, you need the advanced course.
If you say the course hasn't helped they ask:
Why not? What's holding you back? Lack of money, lack of interest?
If the answer is lack of interest they'll sit with you. They close in on your insecurities and tell you that you need the Forum to overcome these things. (23)

Sharing – Often occurs in large groups in front of microphones creating a bond of instant intimacy among the participants. (24) The "oversharing" encourages/pressures others to do the same.
Staffers - unpaid volunteers at Landmark events. (25) Known as "People Who Assist" in India. (26) Sad example (27)

"stop running your racket" - Face your past, examine your reactions, and finally let them go. Give up being right. (28)

Taking a stand for you – I'm committed to your making your goal. Ex: "I'm taking a stand for you having everything you've ever dreamed of." (29) "In creating a future, we discover in The Landmark Forum how powerful taking a stand can be in having possibilities be brought into reality." -Landmark Forum Website.

"There are no words to describe the Forum" –There are no textbooks, notetaking, or recording allowed in the Introductory Forum. There are catch-phrases and it's described as something that must be experienced to be understood.

"There's something wrong" –Interpretation of your past and your life that you give up. Things happened and they were not good or bad (getting a job you liked, being raped, etc.)

Technology –Landmark's technique of using marathon-training sessions to open enrollees to the beliefs that there is no inherent meaning in life; humans are meaning-making machines, and one's potential is limitless if old thought patterns are broken. Ex: "This technology is all about empowering people to have a choice about how they live so they aren't the powerless victims of their past."

Things being just "what happened" – Humans assign meanings, interpretations and explanations to them instead of accepting the past as a non-meaningful collection of events.
Transformation - After transformation, according to the theory, people put their past behind and became more effective in achieving their life goals.

"trust the process"- Answer if you say "I'm not interested in Landmark." (30)

What runs your life, what you do – rackets with payoffs. Ex: "_____ is what obviously runs your life" "is this what you do. do you do this?"(31)

Winning Formulas -tricks people rely on as tools for survival in the world, like good looks.

"your stories" – explanations you've made up to explain your past.

For more Landmark verbiage, visit
Ilovepossibility.info
Landmarkdating.com

Endnotes
(1) "Shadowlands." [www.geocities.com]
(2) K.Truitt. [www.ktruitt.com]

(3) Karl Ericson. [www.primechoice.com]
(4) Shadowlands.
(5) Landmark Graduate and Advanced Course drop out, July 1999. [www.culteducation.com]

(6) Mark, Feb. 25, 2001. [www.satori.org]
(7) Amelia Hill, The Observer. "I thought I'd be brainwashed. But how wrong could I be...". December 14, 2003
(8) Dr. Mukesh Bavishi. [www.ilovepossibility.info]
(9) Hope. culteducation.com message boards.
(10) Amelia Hill.
(11) Acid reindeer. culteducation.com message boards.
(12) Shadowlands.
(13) Bob Carp. [www.angstrom.net]
(14) Verbomaniac, October 7, 2003. [www.livejournal.com]
(15) Funny, since words are conveying the Forum philosophies to you. –Shadowlands.
(16) Jana Martin, November 1998. The Con-Forumists Swing Generation [www.culteducation.com]
(17) Hope. Rickross.com message boards.
(18) Acid reindeer. culteducation.com message boards)
(19) another_ga@hotmail.com. [www.geocities.com]
(20) Andy Testa. [www.caic.org.au]
(21) Corboy. culteducation.com message boards.
(22) Testa.
(23) Karl Ericson. [www.primechoice.com]
(24) Stephen Peace. "LANDMARK FORUM And The Red Flags"
[www.stephenpeace.homestead.com]
(25) Liz. culteducation.com message boards.
(26) Bavishi.
(27) Wyera. Sept. 3, 2003. "Tomorrow, I will be assisting at Landmark for the first time. I'm running the AV equipment for the Advanced Course this weekend. When I did the Advanced Course last June it was one of the single most profound experiences in my life. This year, because I volunteered, I have the chance to take it again. And while I'm nervous and scared about how good a job I'll do running the AV equipment, I know in the end, it's ok. I'm going to learn a lot from this weekend. And, I already know that even if I'm scared/nervous, it's ok to admit that and be with it. In fact, it makes it easier to cope with. I'm looking forward to more breakthroughs, especially as this summer has been particularly trying for me."
(28) Amelia Hill.
(29) Francie, Sept. 16, 2003. [www.mix-up.org]
(30) Liz. Rickross.com message boards.
(31) Two Forum Participants. "Out of Control"? December 23, 2000. [www.culteducation.com]

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kittypaw
So glad you escaped with your mind intact, Acid Reindeer.

I did not come out with my mind intact. mother put me in there twice, once for a longer time, the second for a shorter time. revenge had a large part in her putting me in the second time. the second time traumatized me to the point where as soon as I could act like a wreck I did. (you cannot act like a wreck inside an institution or you go to a state institution.) college expelled me and I went to jail twice in the next few years. my mother had by this time taken LEC by this time BTW. do not blame LEC for her actions. I do mention this towards dispelling the myth that LEC helps you manage your relationships. (as far as what she told me LEC seems not to have any effect on her good or bad. I did not even know she took until she mentioned it a short while ago.)

much of my understanding of what goes in LGAT's comes form the thought reform exerted in mental institutions. the mental institution staff did a lot of "that's your interpretation" and "who got you into this mess? you did".

applied these as inflexible axioms to us (in many cases, it depended on the staff members) and absolved themselves of the same criticism.

apart from the other thought reform tricks they used.

Corboy,

you make good points.

no way did I mean to sound or come across as an LEC apologist.

of course I did not need to use the Zen analogy, my argument had to do that other spiritual ways have demanded obedience. such as the school set up by Gurdjieff within his lifetime. Gurdjieff called his students idiots, berated, teased them and challenged them all the time and used intimidation tactics to exert control and yet he did not tip over into the extremes that you get with a Jim Jones and his "work" has value, says the consenus on the western esoteric tradition.

glad that an article will appear in [i:6f1dbf8649]Stay Free![/i:6f1dbf8649] and that you took the time to put in those citations. thinking that a large part of the target audience for LEC would read the 'zine.

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Acid Reindeer
glad that an article will appear in [i:cf620849a7]Stay Free![/i:cf620849a7] and that you took the time to put in those citations. thinking that a large part of the target audience for LEC would read the 'zine.

Thanks to everyone on the site who was so helpful in providing definitions and orienting me...

-val