That's an awsome post Laarree, and many things you wrote ring true for me too. There was a feeling of "enlightenment" and "we are doing something impotant/spiritual" that I think a lot of us believed or "bought into" or "wanted to believe" - I'm not sure which of those is the more accurate description.

- -

Some of the things I experienced there were wierd, and perhaps, symptoms of working long hours as a class III assistant.



On the video, wow. I was amused by the "59 views" bit, but I also had a direct centering flashback when he said "I manifested Youtube" about 3 minutes in (might not have gotten the quote exact). It's like, the world disolves, and everything is created because we "manifested it" - that kind of wierd DC energy that I've never experienced anywhere else.

That kind of philosophy might be loosly based on hinduism - I'm not sure, but it did have a wierd effect on me, the way it was frequently used in DC. It's a powerful way to get somebody to give up their time & money, somebody saying something like "you're manifesting not having any assistants, manifest something else, and in the mean time, get lunch made for 45 people by yourself." - ah, the abuse we assistants took. It's almost funny looking back at it.

It's very funny looking back, I agree. Luckily we were able to put the pieces back together and put DC in it's rightful place (on the shelf). I can't say that I do a lot of discharging. Over the years, people have picked up on my ability to take a breath during stressful situations. And truth be told, I do have an ability now to take a more "enlightened approach" to situations. I'm certain that the tools I picked up at DC did not mean I owed Gavin a karmic debt.

I went back and viewed the youtube video of Gavin (thanks Laaree). My husband was watching with me, having recently been into The Secret (and I have to laugh when he talks about the secret since so much of that stuff was out there at DC). He never took any of those enlightenment courses. But anyway, it was really funny when we heard Gavin say that he manifested youtube (sort of like Al Gore inventing the internet [although I know he was instrumental in getting the www up and running]). The youtube statement really took my breath away (the absurdity of it), back then whatever he said was listened to, believed, internalized and accepted.

Remembering how some of what I internalized at DC and EST is really interesting. There was this whole thing about being at the center of the universe and all the discussions about ultimate responsibility. I remember the talk Gavin gave at the end of the course. "You were never born and you never died, it has always been you just looking out." There was something comforting about it. I asked, "but my mom remembers my birth???" answer, "you manifested her remembering your birth."
Andrea

Quote
andyb4
It's very funny looking back, I agree. Luckily we were able to put the pieces back together and put DC in it's rightful place (on the shelf). I can't say that I do a lot of discharging. Over the years, people have picked up on my ability to take a breath during stressful situations. And truth be told, I do have an ability now to take a more "enlightened approach" to situations. I'm certain that the tools I picked up at DC did not mean I owed Gavin a karmic debt.

I went back and viewed the youtube video of Gavin (thanks Laaree). My husband was watching with me, having recently been into The Secret (and I have to laugh when he talks about the secret since so much of that stuff was out there at DC). He never took any of those enlightenment courses. But anyway, it was really funny when we heard Gavin say that he manifested youtube (sort of like Al Gore inventing the internet [although I know he was instrumental in getting the www up and running]). The youtube statement really took my breath away (the absurdity of it), back then whatever he said was listened to, believed, internalized and accepted.

Remembering how some of what I internalized at DC and EST is really interesting. There was this whole thing about being at the center of the universe and all the discussions about ultimate responsibility. I remember the talk Gavin gave at the end of the course. "You were never born and you never died, it has always been you just looking out." There was something comforting about it. I asked, "but my mom remembers my birth???" answer, "you manifested her remembering your birth."
Andrea

This is an interesting subject area for me because it's something that I still remember, that at the time, was very confusing for me.

As you quoted him "you were never born and you never died / will never die" - I've heard other teachers say that, or similar things, but I have never heard anyone repeat that kind of idea with the frequency that Bayard did. I think, it becomes harmful with the repetition.


I actualy still kind of like Bayard, but some of the stuff he says is absolutly wacko.


Were either of you around, or do you remember when he put somebody's head through a wall during the course? - in the old days he was sometimes violent, but the violence mostly started to go away by the late 80s.

On the whole Bayard "manifesting" Youtube thing-- that was pretty absurd.

And re: "I remember the talk Gavin gave at the end of the course. 'You were never born and you never died, it has always been you just looking out.' There was something comforting about it. I asked, "but my mom remembers my birth???" answer, "you manifested her remembering your birth." ", and "That kind of philosophy might be loosly based on hinduism - I'm not sure, but it did have a wierd effect on me, the way it was frequently used in DC. It's a powerful way to get somebody to give up their time & money, somebody saying something like "you're manifesting not having any assistants, manifest something else, and in the mean time, get lunch made for 45 people by yourself.""

At some point after I left DC, I learned that there was a word in philosophy for this way of viewing the world--solipsism. Wikipedia has some good info on solipsism [en.wikipedia.org] and how it related to Hinduism (see the section on that page about Advaita Vedanta). Here's a quote: "In the Hindu model, the ultimate reality, Brahman, plays a game of hide and seek with itself. In this game, called Lila, Brahman plays individual people, birds, rocks, forests, etc. all separately and together, while completely forgetting that the game is being played. At the end of each Kalpa, Brahman ceases the game, wakes up, applauds himself, and resumes it. So one of the main points in "waking up" and being enlightened, is knowing one is simply playing a game, currently acting as a human being, having an illusion of being locked within a bag of skin and separated from the whole of the cosmos."

Another tangent from this is also on Wikipedia, something called solipsism syndrome: [en.wikipedia.org]

"Solipsism syndrome is a state of mind in which a person begins to feel that everything is a dream and is not real.
Solipsism is a philosophical theory that all activity takes place within the mind, and therefore there is no reality outside one's own mind. As a philosophical theory it is interesting because it is said to be internally consistent and, therefore, cannot be disproven. But as a psychological state, it is highly uncomfortable. The whole of life is perceived to be a long dream from which an individual can never wake up. This individual may feel very lonely and detached, and eventually become apathetic and indifferent."

I definitely was deep in a state of solipsism syndrome in my later years at DC. It's a small step from that state to realizing one is living in the Matrix. ;-)

One of the best portrayals of a solipsistic point of view IMHO is found at the end of Mark Twain's unfinished novella "The Mysterious Stranger", which takes place in the Middle Ages in an Austrian village, and revolves around the interactions between a teenage boy and a mysterious stranger who shows up one day, either called Satan or No. 44, depending on which version you read. Here is one online version: [www.shsu.edu] and here is the bulk of its dramatic last chapter:

"...
"And you are going away, and will not come back any more?"

"Yes," he said. "We have comraded long together, and it has been pleasant - pleasant for both; but I must go now, and we shall not see each other any more."

"In this life, Satan, but in another? We shall meet in another, surely?"

Then, all tranquilly and soberly, he made the strange answer, "There is no other."

A subtle influence blew upon my spirit from his, bringing with it a vague, dim, but blessed and hopeful feeling that the incredible words might be true - even must be true.

"Have you never suspected this, Theodor?"

"No. How could I? But if it can only be true -"

"It is true."

A gust of thankfulness rose in my breast, but a doubt checked it before it could issue in words, and I said, "But - but - we have seen that future life - seen it in its actuality, and so -"

"It was a vision - it had no existence."

I could hardly breathe for the great hope that was struggling in me. "A vision? - a vi -"

"Life itself is only a vision, a dream."

It was electrical. By God! I had had that very thought a thousand times in my musings!

"Nothing exists; all is a dream. God - man - the world - the sun, the moon, the wilderness of stars - a dream, all a dream; they have no existence. Nothing exists save empty space - and you!"

"I!"

"And you are not you - you have no body, no blood, no bones, you are but a thought. I myself have no existence; I am but a dream - your dream, creature of your imagination. In a moment you will have realized this, then you will banish me from your visions and I shall dissolve into the nothingness out of which you made me . . .

"I am perishing already - I am failing - I am passing away. In a little while you will be alone in shoreless space, to wander its limitless solitudes without friend or comrade forever - for you will remain a thought, the only existent thought, and by your nature inextinguishable, indestructible. But I, your poor servant, have revealed you to yourself and set you free. Dream other dreams, and better!

"Strange! that you should not have suspected years ago - centuries, ages, eons, ago! - for you have existed, companionless, through all the eternities.

Strange, indeed, that you should not have suspected that your universe and its contents were only dreams, visions, fiction! Strange, because they are so frankly and hysterically insane - like all dreams: a God who could make good children as easily as bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave his angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice and invented hell - mouths mercy and invented hell - mouths Golden Rules, and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites this poor, abused slave to worship him! . . .

"You perceive, now, that these things are all impossible except in a dream. You perceive that they are pure and puerile insanities, the silly creations of an imagination that is not conscious of its freaks - in a word, that they are a dream, and you the maker of it. The dream-marks are all present; you should have recognized them earlier.

"It is true, that which I have revealed to you; there is no God, no universe, no human race, no earthly life, no heaven, no hell. It is all a dream - a grotesque and foolish dream. Nothing exists but you. And you are but a thought - a vagrant thought, a useless thought, a homeless thought, wandering forlorn among the empty eternities!"

He vanished, and left me appalled; for I knew, and realized, that all he had said was true."

Interesting post Laarree.


I came across this discussion and I wanted to link it here because I found this discussion to be very much related to my early assisting experiences. The unpaid servent / sleep deprevation and yelling situations.

[forum.culteducation.com]



I regret being an assistant at DC more than anything. The course itself wasn't bad, it was head trippy in places, intense at times too, but the assisting was awful. It was painful and manipulative. I hated assisting, and I have to wonder why I did so much of it.

A-I know what you mean about the assisting part of the whole DC experience. I was so angry with myself for agreeing to be an assistant. I knew from the get go that I was screwed. I wanted so much for the course to be the spring board from which I lived my life post c.1981 but I couldn't take the course then bail on the assisting agreement I made. It would mean that the whole experience was meaningless if I reniged or bailed after making the agreement. How silly in retrospect. I was really pissed and then I just went for it and got really entangled. As Laarree said above, the bar was set pretty low for assistants.

When I watch the Immuics videos on youtube I want to jump in there and tell those unsuspecting people to run like the wind. One in particular, a girl is shown "clearing" another participant. Why else do you want to tell everyone you know about the blah blah blah?" "Got It" Why else. It is all so depressingly familiar.

What was it like to be around DC when it closed? How did that happen? Andrea

I too wonder about what it was like at the end of Direct Centering, or to be more precise, I wonder was going on with Bayard and his full-timers that caused Direct Centering to become Nexus. I really don't have any idea what Nexus was about and how it differed from DC. I've found it interesting that there seems to be no mention of or reference to either Direct Centering or Nexus on the immunics website or in Bayard's Youtube videos. He certainly alludes to DC, but not by name.

I also find it curious that on the immunics site and in his videos, I see and hear mentions of things like God, Jesus, higher bodies, spiral bodies, spirit guides, etc. He seems to have assimilated many fanciful New Age mystical and religious ideas into his current teachings that weren't part of his worldview back during the DC era.

It’s a lot to try to sum up, and some of it I may not remember that well.

Andy, I very much relate to what you're saying. I also felt trapped as an assistant. It was made more difficult for me because Bayard seemed to care more about assistants than non assistants. He said to me once "if you were still class 3, I'd coach you on this and that". I hated assisting, but I wanted Bayard to like me, and for related reasons, I stayed, even though I didn't like it. Part of it was pressure, part of it was the agreement, and a lot of it, for me was this feeling that I "should", that I was selfish when I wasn’t there. Looking back now, that was brainwashing, but at the time, it drove me to assist more than I wanted to.

As far as the "end of DC" the "start of Naexus" and "immunics". That’s a long answer.

Direct centering did mellow over time and it seemed to "get better" for lack of a better way to describe it. At the same time, year in, year out, attendance at the course and the ability to keep the business running was inconsistent. Into 87, 88, etc, attendance in general seemed to drop, but with more people doing the intensive and later, business courses or expensive courses like power, the company was able to stay in business with significantly lower attendance.

I was never on the inside of the finances, but from what I picked up, the business was close to folding more than once. In the early years, as some of you may remember, they moved the Philly center into Bill Pelle's house because they couldn't pay their rent. A few years later, an assistant named Teddy R. loaned the organization $40,000, which Jerry R. (who paid the bills, or, sometimes, didn't pay them), said he'd return $30 grand to Teddy right away, but that money was never returned. Part of it may have been bad management, but nobody was getting rich. Some money was put towards expensive dinners, student loan payments for full timers and dental work, but zero money was ever saved as far as I know. The business was always run on a paycheck to paycheck basis.

But I seem to have gotten on a tangent that wasn’t what you asked.

Anyway, what generally happened with Direct Centering to Naexus was a general mellowing of the course. From Bayard’s point of view, I’m sure he felt that it was a redesign.

Somebody said earlier in this thread that the name changes were for tax reasons. I can’t say yes or no to that, but it’s the first I’d heard of it. If Bayard did change the name for tax reasons, he did an excellent job selling the changes as design changes, because Bayard was in love with his ability to design courses. I believe that Bayard thought it was a genuine change, though in truth, not that much was different. I’m sure that many of the lectures were altered, but I don’t really remember what was changed. To me, the essence of the course, the “letting go” the “breaks” – lol, the “platform” and the “enrollment” were all fully part of Naexus, so no matter how much the talks may have changed, the courses were quite similar as far as I could tell.

One of the great bonuses of having a "naexus" course was that old graduates could audit it, and you had courses where almost half the students were audits.

What did eventually start happening was that you had courses that ended at 7:00 PM, not 10:00 PM and you even had assistants going out to dinner at the Chinese restaurant across the street after assisting. It was much more relaxed and in my opinion, it was improved from an assisting point of view because effort was removed and a lot of the aggressiveness was replaced by friendliness.

Bayard started giving very expensive courses like Power and Rainbows (5 grand a shot), and my honest impression was that all the courses were good (I took Power, not Rainbows), but there was also, a sameness to them. Were they worth 5 grand? Probably not, but was it a good experience? I'd say, yes, I enjoyed taking many of the courses.

Over time, Bayard hit people less, and in time, he stopped sleeping around too, so on a few levels there was a sense of things getting better, but I think part of that was arrogance on my part. I wanted to believe I was doing something important, so it was easier for me to believe it was improving because that was what I wanted to see.

Other things happened, like, there was a massive full timer exodus, sometime around 86-87. Half the staff left - poof. Overnight. It was quite something.

They took their computers and a few other things, but it wasn't a big deal what they took, and the truth is, there was barely a blip in the effectiveness or attendance of the organization. DC / Naexus was overstaffed so losing half the staff just made the housing that much more comfortable. Having less management may have improved the energy, not made it less well run.

At the time of Neaxus, it felt “new” to me, but looking back it all seemed quite similar, even the expensive courses.

The only really big change happened when Naexus started to incorporate muscle testing. That started when Bayard was getting a session from a chiropractor who had taken a bunch of courses. This chiropractor suggested to Bayard that they try some muscle testing, or Kinesiology [en.wikipedia.org] and mostly they did it for food allergies, but then one time they started asking questions about other people and using the muscle testing for answers, and, as Bayard put it "the tapped into the Akashic records [en.wikipedia.org]

It wasn’t long after that, when it changed from Naexus and courses to Muscle Testing and when that change happened, they essentially got rid of the platform, which to me, changed the course completely. it was all about what the muscle testing told you, not as much about letting go.

Some people missed the old direct centering and Larry Kaplowitz and 2 others actually used the direct centering/Naexus model and started giving courses in Canada I think, but Bayard loved change and he loved pulling people into the fringe, so he was all into the new muscle testing thing.

It quickly went from arms/shoulder muscle to finger testing like you see on the videos, but it's the same principal.

Back in the old says, Bayard would say that every other course was damaging (the “damage” phase may have come after you both left, but not long after). For a while, bayard talked about how people were “damaged” and what “damaged them”.

Now, Bayard says everything is good. He even praises Scientology and many other organizations. He does this without much knowledge about Scientology, he's just praising them in general.

The approach behind the website is small payments from lots of people. But he also asks for donations, so he may hit a few people up more significantly. What I do know is that one of the staff members put his entire IRA into making the website business work, so I actually have some wish that they succeed, because I know that they put a lot into it out of pocket, but I also wish that there are no more people like me who spend their college fund for the “privilege” of moping Bayard’s floors and washing his windows.

The muscle testing however was radically different, because we started asking questions about stuff that happened to us in past lives, in the womb, or about decisions like “should I take this job” Some people were better at getting answers than other people and it didn’t take long for a whole new terminology to appear. You had dimensions that people were on (used like the scale it was a means of measuring somebody’s energy level). There were 144 dimensions and a variety of categories and other things like Shakra Spin or Witchyness or "switched / unswitched". It wasn’t as ominous as it might sound, it was kind of interesting and new, but it was occasionally dark or used in mean or manipulative ways, but, mostly, I think the intentions were good.

For me, at first, I had some very interesting experiences with the muscle testing, but over time, I lost interest.

What happened when you introduced muscle testing was that you had people, not just bayard, but other people, introducing new ideas (Bayard would say "discovering" stuff) - so it wasn't just Bayard anymore at this point. Two women come to mind who were very eager muscle testers, and one of them would test things for hours. At some point, Bayard said she was " addicted to testing", but a lot of this higher body stuff, shakras, etc, came from students. It didn’t all come from Bayard.

When you can ask any question and test for answers using kinesiology, you can see that the volume of information (and perhaps disinformation) grows rather quickly.

Before setting up the website, Bayard began to focus on healing medical conditions using the muscle testing, which was about the point where he lost me. I think, I was addicted to the power and thrill of discovery and the energy letting go, and that's why I stuck around so long, but the focus on medical conditions didn't interest me.

On the other stuff the "jesus" "shakras" "higher bodies", whatnot. It all came from questions and answers that came up in testing. There's no reason why Kinesiology has to go in such exotic directions, but if you believe in muscle testing, you can use it practically or, to explore past lives. That's the only explanation I have for that. I personally think a more grounded approach would work better, but I'm long since out of the picture.

It's difficult to sum up 10 years of an entire program in a handful paragraphs. Ultimately I left the muscle testing because I felt it wasn't accurate enough and it seemed too "heady", I had to think about everything, then test on what I was thinking about. It seemed like a lot of work to me.

- - -

When I took Neaxus (essentially auditing the course in a sense), I cried my eyes out and I loved it, but my experience assisting, while significantly better in 1988 and 89 than in 1985, was still lots of work, no pay and a pain in the but, and still occasionally abusive. Mostly, people were nicer about it, but it was still a mistake. I lost a couple job opportunities because of assisting agreements, and given how broke I was back then, that was pretty stupid.

I think it started around 1986 or 87 when the pressure started to let up and there was an effort to make assisting and the course nicer. The agreements were still there, but less yelling and intensity.

A key turning point was when a full timer (don’t want to give a name) left staff. She got pregnant and didn't realize it for a couple months and when it came out, nobody was sure what to do.

DC wasn’t set up to have a staffer who had a kid, and they were discussing what to do in a meeting when Bayard walked into the meeting and he said "I'll tell you want to do. Expell her". Now, reading this, it may sound overly harsh, like firing an employee for getting pregnant, but people on staff had their rent and food handled, but they were basically unpaid and they worked 60-70 hours a week. It wouldn’t have worked for the organization to keep her on staff, either for her or for the organization.

So, back to the story, she was expelled and about a week later, at a typical staff meeting over lunch I think, Bayard walked in, with one of his clever ideas and he said to everyone (just staffers there). "Who here has talked to (so and so) since she was expelled?" and the room got silent. Nobody had called her.

Then Bayard asked “who wanted to call her”, and pretty much everyone in the room said they’d wanted to call her, but felt that they shouldn’t. It was a pretty effective message to everyone on staff that they should do what they wanted and what they thought was right, not what they thought was expected of them, and from that moment, things really did start to loosen up in the organization.

Now, I don’t know if it ever got to the place be where I’d call it “good”. I personally found most of the courses enjoyable, but very expensive and I found the assisting to be a huge distraction. I also think there was a lot of manipulation and meanness that remained even after the organization made an effort to be more mellow, but, I think everyone’s experience is different.

One question I wonder about, even today, is “was there any benefit to doing the course” – I think, learning to let go was beneficial and there were certainly cool moments, but I really struggle with the question of what counts as being useful or helpful and what does not. I certainly think there was harm there. The harmful aspects like coercion, expense, wasted time, manipulation, and brainwashing – all that is pretty clear. I’m less certain about any benefit, and I’m oddly curious about what the benefits were or may have been.


Hope that wasn't too long. It's the writer in me. I can just keep typing and typing.

Hey Ambehera, that's a big bunch of history to absorb. I'm at work now and can't devote much time to to replying at this second, but here are a few stray thoughts:

Quote
Amhebera
Somebody said earlier in this thread that the name changes were for tax reasons. I can’t say yes or no to that, but it’s the first I’d heard of it. If Bayard did change the name for tax reasons, he did an excellent job selling the changes as design changes, because Bayard was in love with his ability to design courses.

I suggested earlier in this thread that Immunics, otherwise known as the World Harmonic Unified Ministers, refers to itself on the web as a ministry [www.immunics.org] and other pages as a church or even as a mystical religion. Direct Centering in its original form was a single proprietorship business. WHUM also states on its website that all contributions to it are tax-deductible (see "Ways To Donate $
" at [www.immunics.org] ), undoubtedly a by-product of its status as a church/ministry, which are not taxed here in the United States. AFAIK many cults have sought status as a religious group in order to avoid paying taxes. But I'm extremely cynical about WHUM and Bayard in general, and find it plausible that he would redefine his work as a religion to have the same privileged status as, say, the Church of Scientology.

Quote
Amhebera
....
Over time, Bayard hit people less,....

Now that was nice of him. ;-)

Quote
Amhebera
...Other things happened, like, there was a massive full timer exodus, sometime around 86-87. Half the staff left - poof. Overnight. It was quite something....

Do you know why? What was the word of mouth about this??

Quote
Amhebera
...
Some people missed the old direct centering and Larry Kaplowitz and 2 others actually used the direct centering/Naexus model and started giving courses in Canada I think, but Bayard loved change and he loved pulling people into the fringe, so he was all into the new muscle testing thing...

While googling a couple of years ago, I did find out that Larry K. had started with a couple of other people something called Naka Ima--I was looking at descriptions of what exactly this is, and on one webpage it mentions "letting go of wanting or not wanting", pretty much exactly what Direct Centering was. Googling Larry K and Direct Centering does produce links to pages where his background as a Direct Centering teacher is explicitly mentioned.

Got to go, I'll babble on about this stuff later. Also, Ambehera, I'm sending you a Private Message. Look for it soon. :-)

A- thanks so much for filling us in about DC-->Nexus --> WHUM. I had heard that DC's name had changed to Nexus, but I thought it was a pretty insignificant change. It's so interesting to hear about Gavin/Bayard and how he moved towards immunics. I guess it was his destiny to become a church or ministry. It makes sense. Andrea