I am a former tm-er from the 70's when I was Mahesh's personal secretary as well as course leader in La Antilla.

I wanted to share something which fits in with the article [i:d6053f5795]All you need is funds[/i:d6053f5795] that Rick posted at [www.culteducation.com] .

I sent Rick the pdf of Mahesh's "proposal" for $1billion which he [Mahesh] posted in 3 prominent papers between 23rd and 25th September 2001.

While Mahesh wasted little time, HH the Dalai Lama wasted far less time and sent (I am a bit foggy on the details now) the Mayor of the City of New York a cheque for $30,000 [considering his limited resources, that's impressive].

I have a lot to say about Mahesh and his "transcendental" meditation.

Is anyone else out there who was involved and possibly turned off by either bad experiences or the lunacy of Mahesh and his Oganization. I'd be happy to hear from you/talk with you.

Martin

Hi Martin:

Yup, it's all about the money, honey!

I doubt we'd ever met, but probably have old friends in common.

I'm one of the first Children of the Age of Enlightenment. Childhood initiate in the Olsen's house in '66.. oh, such status I once had because of my great honor to have been born to such a nobel calling. And then my children were a THIRD generation (oh.. jeez!...)

LOL

And your exalted status as the personal secretary. I can only imagine.
I stay as far away as possible. Unfortunately, my parents still are loco.

Isn't it great to be in the 'real world'!

t :D

I posted a detailed reply and it disappeared when I clicked Preview, [i:66f61b97e4]sigh[/i:66f61b97e4].

I'll wait, maybe the cyber gods will do something.

M

Apparently the cyber fairies aren't resurrecting things today. No worries. I have a funny Olsen story I shared which is funny enough (to me, anyway) to repeat.

When the circus moved to Switzerland, we moved into the grand hotels Kulm and Sonnenberg. Sonnenberg was old and had had such guests as Brahms and Wagner. Mrs. Olsen and the girls set about exploring and found some old crockery which they cleaned up and used to serve food. Trouble was, what were they thinking, the old crockery was actually old chamber pots. Granted, they were beautifully decorated. I (and probably others) raised a fuss and the old crockery vanished by next meal. Exactlyl what is it about a chamber pot full of marmalade that was so offensive. (no, I actually have a good idea)

Not sure just why that's so funny. Maybe you had to be there. Maybe you were!
--
Rick's books have been helpful, but haven't helped me with one thing: why believers become true believers in the face of evidence quite to the contrary. What is it, what psychological blip on the ego-scene, brings about such conversion of thinking? William James didn't exactly have an answer, although I read him way before Mahesh. Reading him again is probably a good suggestion.

M

still exploring the forum - maybe I am way off the mark, but I seem to be dectecting that there is a tendency to hold on to past bad experience, to constantly relive it, to continue to live in it, rather than to let go and move forward? what could be more terrifying than moving forward after a nasty cult experience? just cannot get my head around this and not sure why

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Martin
-- What is it, what psychological blip on the ego-scene, brings about such conversion of thinking?
still exploring the forum - maybe I am way off the mark, but I seem to be dectecting that there is a tendency to hold on to past bad experience, to constantly relive it, to continue to live in it, rather than to let go and move forward?

Hi again Martin :

Yes, the stories. Tks for sharing a funny 'family story'
Some sweet memories of shared devotions, working as a group 'family' toward a common laudable goal, in our little protected social bubble. And, or course, the psychological manipulation and life screw ups. I got three great kids from the TM movement. They are now adults, college grads and doing their lives w/o a cult! As am I. whew!

Yes, it may look as though folks are repeatedly hanging onto old pains and manipulations here.

Can write only about my experience, but reading & discussing is about answering your first questions. What caused us to fall into the rabbit hole (ala Alice in Wonderland). Unlike you, I was raised in it, along w/ the Olsen gals, and had to climb my way out. Understanding the rabbit hole is the way to climb out, and leave it behind once and for all.

Yes, have released it and moved forward. I left nearly 2 decades ago. Still have a few old friends from those days.

Writing here helps to "pay it forward". Those of us who were in cults, usually had some idealized values of helping others.. whether for enlightenment, Jesus, political values, psychological strength.... By sharing our experiences and recovery, we help the next defectors who are waking up to how they were conned.

I don't know about your circle of old friends, but many former TMers that I know are still guru-hopping. Those are the folks that I no longer spend time with. It's sad.. the looking for a mystical answer/ path/ leader/ emotional parent / spiritual 'high'. My personal vulnerability came not from joining another cult, but from invovlement w/ someone in a different 'spiritual group'. The cultic-blind spot was my disastrous achilles heel.

Glad you are here. I have to run.. back to my REAL job. Keep clicking around on this website, and the other links to the major cult information organizations. You will learn a lot!

yes, moving forward and totally enjoying life. But remembering my origins w/ humility.

t :D

Quote

I don't know about your circle of old friends, but many former TMers that I know are still guru-hopping. Those are the folks that I no longer spend time with. It's sad.. the looking for a mystical answer/ path/ leader/ emotional parent / spiritual 'high'. My personal vulnerability came not from joining another cult, but from invovlement w/ someone in a different 'spiritual group'. The cultic-blind spot was my disastrous achilles heel.

Thanks, Toni - this bit makes a lot of sense and is helpful. I have some very distant hoppers [as you meant it above and those who still think that hopping like a frog will lead to something other than arthritis] whom I rarely keep in contact with. For the sake of some of the old days/good times, we sometims talk. But we are on different wavelengths and not really listening, at least not to each other. Maybe that's the saddest part.

I did my fair share of guru-hopping [of both kinds, above]. I finally settled in to study the Buddhadhamma. Curiously, this works well for me, isn't cultic and keeps me happy (and sane). Have many friends now who are really nice, not cultic, very sane (well, there are always a couple of exceptions or at least questions there, at least to some extent), sensible and interested, like myself, in spiritual things ... .

Happy to be here. Happy, always, to share insights I have had along the way and am still having.

M

Quote

still exploring the forum - maybe I am way off the mark, but I seem to be dectecting that there is a tendency to hold on to past bad experience, to constantly relive it, to continue to live in it, rather than to let go and move forward? what could be more terrifying than moving forward after a nasty cult experience? just cannot get my head around this and not sure why

Some thoughts on this: because our focus is on destructive groups and our experiences, our stories and sharing of course tend to be about this theme, and may seem concentrated, as if we are holding on. Yet it is worthwhile to take this all in context. Most of us don't live this way [b:f98461e87d]all[/b:f98461e87d] the time, meaning we aren't holding on to anything, we aren't constantly reliving.

Naturally, this all varies according to our individual make up, how much time has passed, how disabled we are if we are, many other factors also.

There is value in holding a memory and examining it from all sides, compare notes with others, read and research, discover what is true for us. We can learn and grow and make better choices next time. There is also value eventually in doing something else.

I for one cycle in and out with interest in destructive groups, tends to always be somewhere on my radar screen, but sometimes I just take a break from it all. And at other times I dive in for research and focus. All depends on what works for at the time.

Grieving, healing, learning.......all has a pace of it's own.

And I very much agree with Toni:

Quote

Writing here helps to "pay it forward". Those of us who were in cults, usually had some idealized values of helping others.. whether for enlightenment, Jesus, political values, psychological strength.... By sharing our experiences and recovery, we help the next defectors who are waking up to how they were conned.

I've been helped immensely by reading posts and articles here. And perhaps now I can help continue to open that window of understanding for others.

Hi SarahL - Your point is well-made and I do see the sense in it. It is something that would no doubt be quite obvious were we speaking, but here in cyber-space so much nuance is lost that I missed the very important point you make.

I will try to keep it in mind and will also try not to come across so judgmental in future. -- I am not new to groups of this nature and I 100% concur that these groups are immensely helpful.

M

Martin :

Look at this!

[www.culteducation.com]

We're missing so much!

BTW, no, I was not w/ you & circus ring in Switzerland. My mother was in Switzerland though, including at the memorial service of "Mother Olsen", where those with vision could see Mother Olsen's spirit leading the choir at her own memorial service.... :roll:

I was part of the Santa Barbara to Fairfield circus. I was a minor living w/ the group, no one had legal guardianship of me... and off I went, along for the ride.

:shock:

Hi, Toni - I probably knew your mother! One of my closest friends from those days lives in Fairfield with his wife and son. He tried to run for the US Senate and a couple of years ago told me he gave Mahesh $130

Here it is, 24 March, a week after I wrote this and I just now caught my interesting error. The above should read ... he gave Mahesh $130 [/color:9276ce2b5d][b:9276ce2b5d]MILLION [/b:9276ce2b5d][/color:9276ce2b5d]in stock options ... [/size:9276ce2b5d]

in stock options (not sure what stock options are). Another Fairfield newsgroup I belonged to for a while reported on Mahesh's Millionaire's Course. People actually paid $1million each to attend a course in Vlodrop. The course was conducted by video link only, but people did get individual personal video time with Mahesh. And, this seems to trump everything, they claimed to be satisfied.

There's no believer like a true believer.

My friend in Fairfield mentioned that it was a shame that I had dropped out (me, an old git with 2 university degrees, a drop-out), because I had missed so many of Mahesh's accomplishments! Well, I was there when he was setting his own stage. I learned the "age of enlightenment" techniques from him and years later discovered that they were very, very similar to techniques Yogananda taught.

Everything Mahesh did was his own take on someone else's material. But I do give him credit for the checking procedure. That's brilliant. Most of the vast amount of material is contribution from teacher training course after teacher training course; but the core of it seems to be his one and, actually, only original thought.

I hope your years of living with a flaky tm group were not destructive for you. I can't imagine what it was like. You seem to have recovered brilliantly. There is so much to debunk Mahesh and his circus for, but he himself seems to just naturally do that by being positively crackers, as one of my more recent teachers put it.

Mahesh is not a helpful cult-leader model. He doesn't fit in very well anywhere in the literature I have read. Perhaps that's what makes him so difficult for some of us. Many are either instantly turned off totally and completely or hooked for life. I came close to the latter, but simply could not resolve the conflict I saw: he simply was not what he appeared. Why I saw this and others didn't is still a mystery: we sat in the same room with him and heard him say and do what he said and did.

I watched women follow him out of the hall late at night, as did everyone else. Years later the Fairfield group I mentioned began to turn up those women and their stories of being bedded by Mahesh (just as Joyce Collins-Smith [Call No Man Master] had suspected in the very early 60's). I must say I was shocked, sort of; and then, not particularly surprised.

I have a very funny story about how the "sidhi" program got it's start; but, if you are interested, I will save it for another time.

M