Hi Everyone-I'm back again. I just checked in to see what was new over here. I thought that I would be getting emails when anyone added anything new, but really I'm glad I stopped in. Just wanted to say that I recently saw the movie "Ticket To Heaven" it's about a non-religious jewish guy who joins a religious christian(?) cult while he's visiting a friend in California. It was pretty interesting. I thought about Direct Centering and the tactics were similar. I was wondering whether any of you had seen it?
Andrea

This is a very interesting thread and I'm glad I stopped by. Some cool reading.


I agree with one of the posters above, that BHA/DC was dangerous, and I had many bad experiences there, as well as a bunch of regrets. I was class 3 for about a year, year and a half and I probably know some of the posters on this board.


I also think it's important to discuss something and not just attack it. If somebody had a good experience, it's OK to say that. I think it's way to easy to just trash things, and it's much better to discuss things. Discuss the good as well as the bad. I don't think "cults" like BHA or Landmark or others would sell if they didn't have good moments in them. It's funny, I don't remember too much about my course itself. I took it when it was "the course", I only remember little bits and pieces.

But I remember what lead up to it, how a family member did it, changed almost overnight and insisted I do it every day for months. I remember when and why I decided to take it, and I remember more of the first time I took it, when I got "expelled", then the 2nd time I took it when I "graduated". I started writing that story but it turned into a novel before I was half done, so I thought it might be too wordy.

The worst parts of it (the course/BHA) for me were the assisting agreements, especially once I went class 3 the salesmanship, the whole "do the course" thing, and perhaps worst of all was the elitest attitude. There was a feeling that "you were right if you did the courses, wrong if you didn't", and that is a very bad way to look at the world, but I bought it completely. As an assistant I was quite rigid in my thinking, and I regret that most of all, that and, the effect my participation had on my parents.


I could write pages and pages just on my experience with DC/BHA.


Also, I just want to add one thing. On Annonimity. It's a very reasonable request, but sometimes, to have discussions about real experiences, maybe a first name is appropriate? If somebody just says "Tim", that's not very revealing and only those who took the course and stuck around a bit will know who that is.

To answer that question, I remember Tim. Tim was quite abusive at times to those who worked under him.



On Adam Savage (Myth Busters) - sorry, but I couldn't resist, and he's a public name so I think it's OK. Adam was never really into Direct Centering/Naexus at all. Several of his friends were, and I think he took it out of pressure (I signed up in a similar pressure from friends situation too), but Adam didn't stick around and I don't think he liked the course. I remember him a little bit, but not well.

There were 2 kinds of graduates, I think. Those who took the course but didn't like it (Adam was one of them), and then, there were ones like me who took it, and decided to stick around. I think it was those of us who stuck around and became long term assistants, or worse yet - full timers, who got the worst of it.


Francis Fisher was another famous person who took DC. Peter Weller took it too, but Peter just took it and left. Francis stuck around for a few months.

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andyb4
Hi Everyone-I'm back again. I just checked in to see what was new over here. I thought that I would be getting emails when anyone added anything new, but really I'm glad I stopped in. Just wanted to say that I recently saw the movie "Ticket To Heaven" it's about a non-religious jewish guy who joins a religious christian(?) cult while he's visiting a friend in California. It was pretty interesting. I thought about Direct Centering and the tactics were similar. I was wondering whether any of you had seen it?
Andrea

Hi Andrea,

I never saw "Ticket to Heaven", but did read the book "Moonwebs", which apparently "Ticket to Heaven" was loosely based on. Another movie which I thought brilliantly tells the story of a person becoming alienated from their normal life (in this case literally sickened by it) and winding up a refugee in a New Age cultish environment is the movie "Safe" by Todd Haynes (starring Julianne Moore). Good to know you're still checking in around here. :-)

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Amhebera
...
On Adam Savage (Myth Busters) - sorry, but I couldn't resist, and he's a public name so I think it's OK. Adam was never really into Direct Centering/Naexus at all. Several of his friends were, and I think he took it out of pressure (I signed up in a similar pressure from friends situation too), but Adam didn't stick around and I don't think he liked the course. I remember him a little bit, but not well.

There were 2 kinds of graduates, I think. Those who took the course but didn't like it (Adam was one of them), and then, there were ones like me who took it, and decided to stick around. I think it was those of us who stuck around and became long term assistants, or worse yet - full timers, who got the worst of it.

Francis Fisher was another famous person who took DC. Peter Weller took it too, but Peter just took it and left. Francis stuck around for a few months.

I remember hearing about Peter Weller (Robo-Cop), and apparently artist Peter Max did the DC course too, and employed some DC grads in his studio. This was c. 1983-1984 I believe.

I guess the way it works with cults like DC/Nexus/Immunics is that only a minority are truly intrigued by the promises of participation in the group beyond its initial offerings--I guess Adam S. wasn't sufficiently bedazzled. I suspect that the key factor is that if a course participant had really experienced the exultation of "letting go"/"discharging"/"manifesting" during the basic course, had a strong emotional release or perhaps even had a spiritual/mystical/paranormal-type experience. I was hooked on the last day of my course in 1977 for the latter reason, because we students did something called back then an "awareness projection", basically a paired exercise where a student did a "psychic" cold reading on their partner's unnamed and undescribed acquaintance. I did rather well on mine and was secretly thrilled, always having wanted to have psychic experiences and develop psychic powers. In retrospect, I can see that such exercises are extremely fudgey and rely on confirmation bias for their seeming effectiveness, a little folly in which the would-be psychic and the partner confirm enough "hits' and ignore enough "misses" so that the exercise has the appearence to both as having worked. I don't for a minute now think that I or anyone else has any psychic capability, but this was 30 years ago. I barely knew back then WTF was real or not, and was dying to have astonishing true experiences like the confabulator Carlos Castaneda claimed to have had in his books. It was just my luck to have met Gavin instead of Don Juan. ;-)

Hi Laarree! I have a funny story to tell about part of the course. For some g-d awful reason I would always get stuck assisting in other courses and would get assigned the astral (awareness?) projection exercise. I thought it was because I was known to have a really good sixth sense about these things. Meaning I once or twice guessed an illness correctly. I was getting pretty tired of the whole thing. One night in front of Gavin I revealed that the last time I had done the exercise at a course I had forgotten to send the healing rays to the subject so I told the participant, "could you take his clothes off again?" Everyone laughed, except Gavin, of course. And that was the last time I ever had to do that exercise at any course. Andrea

Andrea, I forgot what a humorless prick he could be at times. At least he didn't order anyone to chop your head off. :-)

I also had forgotten about the healing rays at the end of the awareness projections. Now that you've reminded me of it, I faintly remember wondering in the early days of doing them whether anyone had actually been healed miraculously at a distance because of those exercises, and puzzling about the utter lack of concern on anyone's part about verifying that.

I do remember being called upon to do awareness projections many times at guest events in New York. I enjoyed them because I too had a flair for doing them, and could get into a deep trance within seconds after closing my eyes. "just say whatever you see, sense or feel"... I once was puzzled when I saw no image of a person during one a.p., and sensed that someone was there but hiding. It turned out that the person in question was autistic. I felt really impressed with myself after that one, and was convinced that I had great latent psychic abilities afterwards. I doubt my healing rays or imaginary beams of white light had any effect on that unfortunate anonymous person.

AFAIK Gavin/Bayard swiped the exercise from the Silva Mind Control courses, but I could be wrong.

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laarree
I remember hearing about Peter Weller (Robo-Cop), and apparently artist Peter Max did the DC course too, and employed some DC grads in his studio. This was c. 1983-1984 I believe.

I guess the way it works with cults like DC/Nexus/Immunics is that only a minority are truly intrigued by the promises of participation in the group beyond its initial offerings--I guess Adam S. wasn't sufficiently bedazzled. I suspect that the key factor is that if a course participant had really experienced the exultation of "letting go"/"discharging"/"manifesting" during the basic course, had a strong emotional release or perhaps even had a spiritual/mystical/paranormal-type experience. I was hooked on the last day of my course in 1977 for the latter reason, because we students did something called back then an "awareness projection", basically a paired exercise where a student did a "psychic" cold reading on their partner's unnamed and undescribed acquaintance. I did rather well on mine and was secretly thrilled, always having wanted to have psychic experiences and develop psychic powers. In retrospect, I can see that such exercises are extremely fudgey and rely on confirmation bias for their seeming effectiveness, a little folly in which the would-be psychic and the partner confirm enough "hits' and ignore enough "misses" so that the exercise has the appearence to both as having worked. I don't for a minute now think that I or anyone else has any psychic capability, but this was 30 years ago. I barely knew back then WTF was real or not, and was dying to have astonishing true experiences like the confabulator Carlos Castaneda claimed to have had in his books. It was just my luck to have met Gavin instead of Don Juan. ;-)

Hi Laarree, I was worried that my message was perhaps unwanted cause I mentioned a few names, so I'm happy you responded to it. I forgot about Peter Max. I think he left just before I got there so I never met him, but I remember his name was tossed around a good bit.

My introduction to the course was kind of odd, I think. My twin (you may remember me now from that alone), did it I think sometime in 1983 and my best friend from highschool also did it, and they (my twin especially) were pushing me to take it. My brother especially to the point where I really started to hate him and everything about the course. I'd actually found out about it before my best friend or bother, through a random guest event invight from another friend, and I thought it was currious but "not right for me", when they started pushing me, my hatred of the course grew exponentially.

But as this was going on, some other things were happening in my life. I was 22, and I'd lived as an overprotected child, so I was still a quite young and innocent 22. I'd also become quite the drinker. I was in pain, I'd flunked out of school, I was a virgin and embarrased about it, and drinking 8-10 beers and hanging out with my friends was one of the few things I really enjoyed. When the 2 people I was closest 2 in teh world both became graduates, I felt like I'd lost them and in addition to my other pain, loosing close friends made my hurting worse.

It's difficult to explain exactly why I eventualy signed up for the course, but in a nutshell, my parents had bought me a week in Cancun at a club med resort. They knew I wasn't happy and they thought this might help. that was very much like my parents. My pain was very much related to my percieved failures and losses in life and the vacation didn't really touch that. Sure, I liked the beach, but my depression didn't really go away.

but one night, on the beach, under a beautiful sky with more stars than I'd ever seen, I prayed a little bit, which I did from time to time back then and I kind of heard or imagined an answer of sorts, that basically told me "the only way is through it", now, since I know a bit more about that kind of answer now than I did then, I look at it differently today, but at the time, that thought or intuition of voice (whatever you want to call it), meant to me that I had to get through the course.

My basic hatred of it, stemmed from a perception of what it was. They were wierd, they were pushing, and they seemed to have something that I didn't have, but it came with some things I didn't want, and they'd taken away my brother and best friend from me.

But in that moment, on that beach, I decided to do the course, which I signed up for that January and took that April over the school break. I did not credit either my brother or my friend for referring me on my application, and everyone who read that interpreted it as a big "Fk you" - one of the big words used all the time back then. I didn't write down any goals, because I didn't really have any goals out of the course, other than to get through it. That was also percieved as something that needed to be "fixed" by the assistants.

Once there, I hated the assistants, and I was afraid to "give in" to the course. Early on, I stood up and I made an aggreement with Karen, who was the first person to stand on the stage that I "would not tell my brother to do the course", Karen said "OK" and this booming voice came down from the sky "No, don't make that agreement with him. Do you feel good about that agreement", then Bayard showed his face and said to me "you do not have that agreement with me, do you understand".

But after that introduction, as a 22 year old youngster, I grew very fond of bayard very quickly. He seemed to know how to reach people, and he'd get through to lots of people when they stood up on the platform. He also seemed genuinly happy which, I later learned he wasn't happy all the time, he was often angry, but at the course, my impression of him was that he was truly happy and spontaneous and good with people and I was, one could almost say "mesmerized".

My actual interactions on the platform were quite limited and uneventful. One time, early on, I stood up and said "I'm scared", which I was, and Bayard and I think everyone in the room got it. Then I sat down. Another time a bit later, Bayard was giving one of his talks and it was an interaction time and I raised my hand, and said, again with full sincerity "I disagree. I'm very religious and I believe . . . " (I don't remember the rest), and Bayard said to me, quite flatly that "what you're doing will work, but that I wasn't letting anybody in". Finally in a moment of frustrated anger I yelled out one time "You're all As holes!!" and even thought it wasn't directed at bayard at all, it was one of those sit in circle conversations when the assistants hovered like vultures, I heard again the booming voice of Bayard "Don't generalize", so I looked at my circle and I told them that I didn't think any of them were as h'les... but I had my doubts about the assistants.

The breaks (LOL - remember those "breaks") were hell for me and the assistants seemed to be interested in digging up emotional things so they could tell me to "let go". I got lobster claws a few times (who remembers those), and I hated the assistants and I hated the breaks.

But the course was, dispite the breaks which were horrible, quite interesting, but I didn't want to "give into it" because I was afraid that I'd become like my brother had become.

On Sunday Morning I was late, and I reached a crossroads. The assistants asked me what statement I'd made and asked me to "let go" of something. Inside me, the choice was clear, let go and make them right or hold my ground, and I don't remember exactly what transpired, but after basically 30 minutes of discussing whether I would let go or not, they asked me to leave.


I caught the next bus to Worcester, MA, where I went to college and not long after I got home, I threw up in the toilet. The words "discharge" kept going through my head as I was vomiting. I felt like I'd made a serious mistake, which, looking back, perhaps I did. I'd made friends in the course (not assistants, but students), and I'd basically chose to not let go of my pain, which I knew had been an option. I didn't realize that the 2 had nothing to do with each other. That, I could have let go without the course, and that I didn't need them to let go, but I was young, and another word they often used which makes me laugh today when I think about it, I was "stuck".

I later learned that a few assistants described me as "the most stuck person they'd ever seen"

But, getting back to the course, while I was still mad at them and my brother, and if anything, the pain in my life had increased, the course had moved me in some ways, and I was very impressed and very fond of Bayard.


Others have pointed out that a common theme in any program like Direct Centering is a charismatic leader, and Bayard had Charisma.


(I didn't realize how long this was going to be). I need to finish it later.

Amhebera, thanks for taking me back all those years. I can't believe how much you remember about Gavin. I've kinda pushed all of that down. He was charismatic. He did seem happy, but I was always afraid of him. You just never knew what he was going to say. One of the things that really freaked me out was how very private his relationship was with Fran. When I was at DC she was never a part of the equation. All of those weekends and all of those courses, where was she? And on top of it they did marry during the course of time that I was at DC. Looking back on that, and being a little bit older and wiser (finally!). I wonder how she managed it or why? Gavin was really busy making it with the other women at DC. At the same time he talked a lot about Fran. It's a puzzle. While I was at DC I became very close friends with Chris N. (don't want to reveal her full name) and I was wondering if anyone on this board knows whatever happened to her? Andrea

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andyb4
Amhebera, thanks for taking me back all those years. I can't believe how much you remember about Gavin. I've kinda pushed all of that down. He was charismatic. He did seem happy, but I was always afraid of him. You just never knew what he was going to say. One of the things that really freaked me out was how very private his relationship was with Fran. When I was at DC she was never a part of the equation. All of those weekends and all of those courses, where was she? And on top of it they did marry during the course of time that I was at DC. Looking back on that, and being a little bit older and wiser (finally!). I wonder how she managed it or why? Gavin was really busy making it with the other women at DC. At the same time he talked a lot about Fran. It's a puzzle. While I was at DC I became very close friends with Chris N. (don't want to reveal her full name) and I was wondering if anyone on this board knows whatever happened to her? Andrea

Hi Andy,


Yes, I remember all that you write about above and you were not the only one who was afraid of Bayard/Gavin. Many people felt that way. Some, like me, were in awe of him, but some were afraid of him too, even all the way up into the full timers.

Looking back, I wonder why it was that so many (me included) stuck around for as long as we did. You were only there for 2 years, I was there till it disolved, though my participation did decrease some over that time period.

and I'm pleased that you think I remember so much. I've forgotten a lot of that time too, but that's why threads like this are nice because we can share what we remember from that crazy and stupid thing we did in the 80s.


On Fran, I don't want to say too much, but I like Fran, and yes, Bayard was cheating on her big time, but she knew that about him all along. It wasn't like he was being covert about it, and she knew that when they moved in together and when they got married, so one could call it an open marriage and not "cheating". You might be pleased to hear that in time, Fran got a boyfriend too, and so they were married, but each was coupled with someone else. Bayard also, eventually, stopped sleeping around as far as I know.

If I was to sum it up, Fran was the voice of reason in the sea of irrational exuberance that was direct centering. Frannie had an invite to go on staff for years, and she finally went on staff in the late 80s sometime. I don't remember when exactly. 87 or 88 maybe. Fran was the one who'd go to the supermarket and buy hamburgers when everyone else was eating raw foods. She was the one who'd remain even when everybody else was "cheering" about having a big course or the first intensive. Her lack of involvement early on was her choice, but she and Bayard were close, so that's why she was often around but rarely involved.

This begins to enter into personal lives so perhaps I've said more than I should have, but I don't think too many people visit this thread so it's probably OK.



and, just for the record, I dislike direct centering and I regret the years I spent there big time. But, when talking about the past, I think it's better to write fairly than just write about the negative. I personally think I got hoodwinked out of my college fund and they got years of free labor from me. It was an awful expeience overall, but in fairness, there were some good moments and a number of good people, and perhaps even, a bunch of good intentions, so, with that in mind, I try to write what I remember fairly.

Hi Ambehera,

I don't care about mentioning names. That only became an issue when prefersprivacy joined this forum and was upset because she unexpectedly found her name mentioned here while Googling herself. She contacted the forum moderators here and had her name redacted from the message that mentioned her. Weirdly enough, I was looking at a couple of Bayard's videos on Youtube and watched one where he mentions prefersprivacy's mother's name and talks about having an affair with her in the early '80s. Go see [www.youtube.com] and skip ahead to 3 minutes 30 seconds into the video and listen to his story about her. I wonder if prefersprivacy knows about this.

I don't remember you or your brother directly, although I do remember your name (from your PM). Although I might be be c. 7 years older than you from the timeline you are mentioning, I did have many qualities that parallel how you describe yourself back at the age of 22. I was a very callow, extremely depressed 24 year old when I stumbled across Direct Centering in 1978. I was in great emotional pain and horribly lonely, out of college yet without a means to make a living, was crippled by self-hatred, in flight from my viciously dysfunctional family and grappling with the issue of my sexual orientation. I also had embraced a new-agey spiritual path and responded to what were essentially "callings" or intuitions, kind of in the way the Richard Dreyfuss character in the Spielberg film "Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind" did with his impulses that led him to get taken up into a shiny pretty UFO. I also harbored secret grandiose fantasies about how I was on a path and had a destiny, and on the other side of all my excruciating suffering and loneliness was a glorious, brilliant and important future. In other words, I was perfect raw meat for getting "called" into the warm embrace of a cultic community like Direct Centering, where the bar was set low for membership. I too was the most "stuck" person in the world in my own way, having had countless humiliating experiences in my life where I'd see other people easily do things when I would be too paralyzed in fear to do the same--I couldn't let go. Weirdly, one of the nicknames my older brother would taunt me with at one point in my childhood was "Stucky". Meeting Gavin/Bayard was a profound experience--I had never met anyone who seemed as utterly sure of himself, sharply perceptive, capable of poking holes in the most guarded person's defenses, and radiating what I assumed was enlightenment and, well, centeredness. If I could be more like him and less like myself, that would be a good deal. Ah, youthful folly!

I could go on and on about this stuff. Luckily for me, my life is much more pleasant now than it was back then, and I have learned much from my misadventures, Direct Centering being one of the major ones.

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Amhebera
Hi Laarree, I was worried that my message was perhaps unwanted cause I mentioned a few names, so I'm happy you responded to it. ....

(I didn't realize how long this was going to be). I need to finish it later.