Other threads about New Era Tranings are in the culteducation.com forum. This one entitled "Concord California LGAT" looks very informative.
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forum.culteducation.com]
Here are a few good points, it rings true. I wish I had read it all.
"I hope your friend is'nt in the LP (ACT) program. If so he is in deep. Hell be taken away from his job with phone calls all day long from either his buddy or his group or his "senior" its impossible to get work done when they wont leave you alone. The phonecalls wont stop at normal hours they continue on all hours becasue you need to be able to stand for your group always!"
"A lot of Thought Reform methods goes on in the first two the "trainers" play good cop bad cop. The last part is more rigorous Thought Reform + Group Think...if you snap out of it all you gonna be dealing with some cognitive dissonance to get your mind back. Critical thinking is unacceptable. Grey ares of life are overlooked, everything is simplified to "BLACK" or "RED". They sell you the idea that justifications are made by the self righteous, but they make justifications for those who leave saying the person was not willing to own up to their experience, or they didn't "Show up" to begin with etc...when you see a different "possibility" it suggested away as "selling your self short" or "not setting yourself up to win". GRHHHHHHHH!!! Save your time and money (spend it well), see a licensed therapist, get frank and honest feedback from trusted friends, love ones, coworkers, bosses etc...if you feel you need to look at your unconscious behavior!!!"
"I will say that although I felt, and do feel that are benefits to some if the curriculum, I don't advocate it to anyone. It was obvious after the 1st weekend of "ACT" that main objective is to recruit more people, for the program. This in my mind negates all of the benefits. They will admonish you as being week and self serving if you protest the recruitment portion, which is involved in all phases of the training, but very important in the last piece, They premise the recruitment part as "giving back" but it is clearly promotional and serving the interests of the owners. Incidentally a major requirement for successfully completing the program is recruiting a minimum number of new people ( you will excluded from attending the final weekend retreat which is part the cost of the program and is not refundable).
Somethings that really went against my grain were...
1. They expect you to put the program first and foremost over even your family, I personally went hoping to be a better Husband and Parent. Putting anything before that is contrary to my objective.
2. They are an elitist group, telling us to forget trying to enlist anybody that doesn't have 2 nickels to rub together. They are clearly looking to recruit folks in the higher middle to upper economic demographic.
3. The female Instructor "Lynne" was extremely verbally abusive to individuals in her efforts to silence any decent, or questioning minds. (You are basically directed to give up higher thought and embrace the group directives).
4. I believe that this program could be risky for people already dealing with deep psychological problems, they say that the screening process minimizes this risk, they have a few questions relating to your mental health, but this screening assumes everyone is honest or aware of their current mental state. There is no screening performed by any mental health or medical professionals, the questionnaire is really just for their protection from liability if there is a problem."
"Also interesting... they claimed to be a struggling startup and they themselves (Jim, Lynn and her boyfriend) are making huge personal sacrifices to bring this to the people, and that we could make it possible for others to receive their great gift to the world via enrolling as they called it.
A quick internet search, and I see they are actually part of "Life Spring" which boasts of 40 centers, "New Era" in Concord included."
"Its been 3 years since they infected my life and I escaped not so unharmed. I lost friends, some because I stopped going to endless trainings meetings, weekends, and never ending phone calls, and started thinking for my self again, and others because I hounded them to no end til they enrolled themselves or cut me out of their life for some peace. I lost my self own respect for some time."
wamback