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lanajae

Well, my initial post is over 2-1/2 years old. We've seen glimmers of the person we once knew less than a handful of times, and as far as we know, he hasn't attended any Landmark classes in more than a year, maybe much longer. I don't think he'll ever be himself again.

There's a reason Conway and Siegelman called it "America's Sudden Epidemic of Personality Change" in their 1976 book "Snapping." Landmark, and all the other LGATs, are designed to alter people's personalities at a very deep or primitive level, far away from conscious awareness or voluntary control. They really just want loyal, "branded" fans who will recruit lots of new customers but they are willing to implant nasty bits of "code" that do much more destructive things to people's basic operating assumptions, core beliefs, deeply held convictions, and the foundations of their personalities. You can see how different someone might think and act if he believes, say, that most people are honest and decent from how he might behave in a different world if he is persuaded that it's a dog-eat-dog world and every man is only looking out for himself.

Sorry to hear what has happened to your friend. It's like a disease, only one which the patient doesn't even know he has and the ones who suffer most are his friends and family.


Ellen

There a couple of things you need to "get" about [b:ab697f57da]Werner Rosenberg von FrostSavage... [/color:ab697f57da][/b:ab697f57da]
The first is his [b:ab697f57da]near total lack of originality[/b:ab697f57da][/color:ab697f57da]..... Werner was (and still is ?) an astoundingly derivative "thinker" to use that term loosely.... Werner did have a gift, and that gift was for [b:ab697f57da]pastiche[/b:ab697f57da][/color:ab697f57da], which means glomming together a bunch of not-too-well understood concepts from just about anything that sounded sellable and workable...

The second, and here is the key to the whole shebang, is his equally astounding skill at [b:ab697f57da]evading any real discussion[/b:ab697f57da][/color:ab697f57da], or confrontation, regarding the meanings of his favorite buzzwords and crapola conceptualizations...

If Werner said something portentious.... and Werner never only said, he portended, he intoned, he harangued ( the Harangue was Werer's favorite mode of address, followed by the Diatribe, the the Lecture, punctuated with the requisite Ass Kissing...)...

Well, Bloviated then... Weren was always the gold standard when it came to Bloviation.... and boy did he love to Bloviate, probably as much as he loved mirrors, flunkies, cuban cigars, and pretty women....

Naturally, none of his faithful droids and bots had the nerve to ummmm.... confront [b:ab697f57da]Source [/b:ab697f57da][/color:ab697f57da](that's what Werner was privately called, for those who gagged on the idea of dropping all self respect and calling him God) Werer and ask him what the hell was he talking about with these er..... "distinctions" like Authentic, Impeccable, or.... It.

It appears that the expression Impeccable was lifted from an equally questionable figure (actually a degenerate sociopath, if his biographers are reliable) named [b:ab697f57da]Carlos Casteneda[/color:ab697f57da][/b:ab697f57da].... Casteneda wrote about a fictional Yaqui brujo or sorcerer who supposedly did all kinds of magical things in the Sonoran desert and was dearly fond of this idea of being.....you guessed it.... Impeccable....

So you had this weird synergy between New Age plagerists, Casteneda is reported to have taken his stories from anthropological writings as far away as Tibet, Erhard (via his shadow mentor [b:ab697f57da]Fernando Flores[/color:ab697f57da][/b:ab697f57da]) taking great undigested shovel loads of the philosopher Heidegger... so from the Continental philosophers you get this sort of creamy smooth fascist idea reworked for the New Age..... [b:ab697f57da]Authenticity[/b:ab697f57da][/color:ab697f57da].... Oh, but what was Authenticity ? Where could you look up the Werner definition of Authenticity ? Problem was... you couldn't... and asking hard questions was interpreted as.... righto.... Inauthentic.... interesting thought loop, no ? The only way to be truly Authentic was to NOT question what was meant by Authentic... because then you were Inauthentic... which in Werner-worldview is about the same evolutionary position as [b:ab697f57da]Leper[/size:ab697f57da][/b:ab697f57da][/color:ab697f57da].... like, you want to be seen as a Leper ?

So, something like Authenic happened to the concept of Impeccable... if you have to ask, if you insist on knowing, well, you must not get It, you must be Inauthentic... because, you see, an Authentic Being who Gets It doesn't have to ask....

And why not, pray tell ?

Because... at an even deeper level of confusion, they seem to hold to the attitude that there is [b:ab697f57da]A Truth[/b:ab697f57da][/color:ab697f57da].... In a hard to articulate (and little wonder, that) understanding, there is a plane or dimension, somewhere, where [b:ab697f57da]The Truth [/b:ab697f57da][/color:ab697f57da]is to be found, and an Authentic being will intuitively comprehend this
[b:ab697f57da] Truth[/b:ab697f57da][/color:ab697f57da]...


Now, you must apreciate that one can only be Authentic by being Impeccable, but one can only be Impeccable by being Authentic... or something... and this all depends on this clear sighted truth-getting... which in turn depends on Getting Off It.... sadly, no one can define what Getting Off It means either, except that it as something to do with being Authentic, which has something to do with being Impeccable, which has something to do with Getting..... what that "something" is that connects the dots is left to the imagination, and thus far no individual in their organization has shown any enthusiasm for offering the public a further explanation....

Which seems to come close to their other favorite epithet, "Asshole"...

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nutrino
Oh, but what was Authenticity ? Where could you look up the Werner definition of Authenticity ? Problem was... you couldn't... and asking hard questions was interpreted as.... righto.... Inauthentic.... interesting thought loop, no ? The only way to be truly Authentic was to NOT question what was meant by Authentic... because then you were Inauthentic... which in Werner-worldview is about the same evolutionary position as [b:d5a450fd19]Leper[/size:d5a450fd19][/b:d5a450fd19][/color:d5a450fd19].... like, you want to be seen as a Leper ?

Excellent encapsulation of the crazy lgat loop!!

Re ellen's post, damn, it sickens me now to remember all the implanted nonsensical, but cool-sounding I thought, new-age/lgat jargon I loaded my language with, for years! I am still purging those words. I have to intentionally substitute and avoid using them. I HATE THEM. They are so phoney, haughty and sickening.

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nutrino
There a couple of things you need to "get"

LOL...

And I thought it had something to do with his nit-picky fixation on perfectly lined-up pencils and exactly-spaced chairs. (Not to mention the stripe of squeezed toothpaste, geometric arrangement of toilet articles, and amount of pulp in his orange juice.)

Now that you point it out, I do recall the "impeccable" bit in one of Castenada's books and how the concept factored into the whole ~power~ thingie. Funny how much of this stuff gets absorbed into the stew with no real examination or evaluation. Too bad for them there are still enough of us around who recognize the "derivations." It cracks me up that so many of these groups are still dependent on the silly cultural detritus and "magic" buzzwords. They just can't wean themselves from ~transformation,~ ~breakthrough,~ or ~create/complete/clear.~ It is using Mary Baker Eddy, Napoleon Hill, Glenn Turner, and L. Ron Hubbard as your anchor points. These guys might as well still be dancing to Lawrence Welk.


Ellen

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skeptic

Re ellen's post, damn, it sickens me now to remember all the implanted nonsensical, but cool-sounding I thought, new-age/lgat jargon I loaded my language with, for years! I am still purging those words. I have to intentionally substitute and avoid using them. I HATE THEM. They are so phoney, haughty and sickening.

Yes, they ruined some perfectly good words.

Any others you can think of that are particularly pesky?


Ellen

Thanks elena, it's very sad. If you had ever met this guy before, you would never dream this could happen to him. He was the most pig-headed stubborn skeptical person I ever knew.

Hi nutrino, I am going to look up Fernando Flores. It's been awhile since I visited these boards. Do you have a family member who got into this mess?

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lanajae
Thanks elena, it's very sad. If you had ever met this guy before, you would never dream this could happen to him. He was the most pig-headed stubborn skeptical person I ever knew.

Lana,

A good friend of mine who I tried for a few years to recruit ended up in the lgat, on someone else's dime (my sister's). I met him at the airport upon his return, very curious to see what he thought, because he was stubborn and skeptical too and had had NO interest when I had tried recruiting him. I was [i:95e44d7933]astounded[/i:95e44d7933] that he LOVED the "course". I marvelled at the ability of the lgat to capture someone like [i:95e44d7933]him[/i:95e44d7933], yet I was also confident that it could be done, if ONLY he'd go through it. I knew there was some special "power" in that lgat and I wish that would have been a red flag for me. Now I know: the power of psychological manipulation.

And, no surprise, he became even more of an asshole-narcissist; he was one already but the lgat made him much, much worse. UGH.

skeptic

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lanajae
Well, my initial post is over 2-1/2 years old. We've seen glimmers of the person we once knew less than a handful of times, and as far as we know, he hasn't attended any Landmark classes in more than a year, maybe much longer. I don't think he'll ever be himself again.

If you believe what you wrote, I hope that you can eventually see that you are reciting a script - there are many posts like yours, nearly word-for-word. I appreciate the kind tone, do you realize that you are telling me that in order for me to "think about where he's at," I would need to attend Landmark? This is recruiting, that is pretty hardcore to me.

Softening your approach doesn't work on those who have seen how destructive Landmark is, but I would much rather you spend time here because it means to me that you might have doubts about what Landmark has done to your thought process.

I encourage you to read posts from those who've never attended Landmark, because they are the people who are objective about what they've witnessed in people who have attended Landmark.

You didn't join a secret society where others "just don't get it." We get it. We're only here because we get it.

I am not saying you should do Landmark. For what I wanted to say, I should have written "One can do Landmark..." instead of "You can do Landmark....".

I believe that you get it. I'm suggesting that a better understanding of his perspective will allow you to communicate better with him, and to do that, you need to understand view of people who like Landmark (not fanatics, but just like it). That's about it.

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skeptic
A good friend of mine who I tried for a few years to recruit ended up in the lgat, on someone else's dime (my sister's). I met him at the airport upon his return, very curious to see what he thought, because he was stubborn and skeptical too and had had NO interest when I had tried recruiting him. I was [i:472ff4bd4d]astounded[/i:472ff4bd4d] that he LOVED the "course". I marvelled at the ability of the lgat to capture someone like [i:472ff4bd4d]him[/i:472ff4bd4d], yet I was also confident that it could be done, if ONLY he'd go through it. I knew there was some special "power" in that lgat and I wish that would have been a red flag for me. Now I know: the power of psychological manipulation.

And, no surprise, he became even more of an asshole-narcissist; he was one already but the lgat made him much, much worse. UGH.

skeptic

That's sad! How long have you been out? Is it hard, is your sister still involved?

The guy I know went through that bigger asshole phase, but now he seems depressed, but not how I'd normally think of depression, more like empty but functioning as far as working, etc. He's become secretive and business-like, but once in a while we see a little bit of the old him. I'm hoping that eventually he'll be able to talk about it like some of the people here. If only to acknowledge that he was harmed and it wasn't his fault.

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skeptic
And, no surprise, he became even more of an asshole-narcissist; he was one already but the lgat made him much, much worse. UGH.

When a participant buys hook line and sinker the line that he can remove the negative in his life by removing the people that are negative from their environment.

What else is it going to create?

The level and degree of a person being an A-hole after participating in LGAT seminars will be in direct correlation to what kind of A-hole they where prior to attending a LGAT seminar.

As I look back over my being sucked into this philosophy for almost 2 years myself. I can even see where I became an A-Hole in how I dealt with people at times.

My desire to not be one is very much the part of my personality that finally openned me up to what was being created within myself with LGAT mentality.

It took my wife refusing to accept her being an A-Hole relationally and using the LGAT terminology to avoid being responsible for this relational behavior with Klemmer staff telling me that my wife can choose how she applies what is taught in their seminars.

If you look at this from this angle. Yes she is. What I am looking at is the overall relational interaction between the two of us trying to use Klemmers tools and having it fail in producing what was promised by company between us.

Then having Klemmer step back and refuse to be held accountable for their powerful influence on what is, and is not happening in our relationship.

As I read the many posts on this website. My situation is not an isolated one, and there is definitely a consistent and predictable pattern that takes place within emotionally unhealthy relationships coming into LGAT seminars.

This is exactly where emotional malpractice is being done by LGAT's. They are taking on a psychiatrist role in seminars, while having participants sign legal waivers releasing from psychological damage before a participant can even participate in seminar.

Yet, in the same breath. They will not reveal what they deal with in seminars stating you must experience it to understand and see it.

The human psyche is not a toy. It varies in its ability to withstand mind control, manipulation, and brainwashing with each and every individual.

As I am dealing with a professional psychiatrist to unravel the mess from my experience with Klemmer and its philosphy.

I am able to see that I was, and still am very emotionally damaged from past psychical and emotional abuse in my life. I have extreme codependent tendencies that have not given me healthy internal boundaries to stay away from abusive people and environments in my life.

I was a ripe apple waiting to be picked and manipulated by Klemmer & Associates and their seminars that is an LGAT program.

Now its the hard part. No more short cuts emotionally for me.

I am in professional counseling learning how to have proper and healthy internal boundaries which would have kept me from being sucked into Klemmer as I failed to avoid not having them in my life.