I have just found another newspaper article about Paul Bennett. In this article he seems to want to be known as 'Heswall-based meditation and Qigong guru'. It sounds quite disturbing to me. He is definitely the one that I knew years ago in Liverpool Lifewave. In the 1980s. He was a second initiate and he was 'looking after me'. I had him round to my flat once. The arti
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families

I have thought for a long time that latihan is like the Pentecostal 'speaking in tongues'. You may not be able to control the process.
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families

Freedomfighters9 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Hi, > > Yes Lifewave was a cult full stop without a doubt. > Now this cult still existing as > 1meditation.com,run by John Yarr, Darkness and > Evil masquerading as Light. Another Cult sprung > out of 1meditation Cult, now identified as the > Zaretti Pendulum Cult Swingers run by Pa
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families

The moderators don't like cult leaders so it's not surprising. If it means that people don't leave their children alone with John Yarr then that's a good thing. It wasn't just "inappropriate behaviour", he is an abuser. I got criticism for likening him to Jimmy Savile on another forum. I stand by that, although Savile was clever enough not to get caught. P
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families

I have had more thoughts about the Lifewave cult. When I was part of it in the 1980s, there were things that I hadn't heard about in other spiritual movements. Now that I have become more widely read, I can see that they are found in other movements. Take 'Second Initiation' for example, also known as 'going beyond form'. It's exactly the same as what the Buddhist
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families

That's an interesting analogy. There are other analogies that people could use. If you had a relative who went to university and he said 'It was terrible; I worked for years with a low standard of living, I can't get a job and I've got a massive debt' then you might try to persuade people not to go to university. If someone in my family asked me if they should go to
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families

I like to hear about people's experiences within different spiritual groups. Also it's interesting to find out what different leaders taught. I don't think anyone is going to understand the phenomenon of cults unless they look at these two aspects. iamthat was talking about his experience and what the beliefs of the teacher were. I don't think he was trying to teach anyone bel
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families

It seems that second intitation was a recognizable stage that people went through to get to enlightenment. The way I tried to explain it is that there are different levels of the inner light and sound. It's the lowest level that you can perceive first, which is quite close to this physical level. When you have meditated on this lowest level of the inner light and sound you can become awar
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families

The Theosophists talked about different planes of existence. The Sant Mat tradition also talked about these different planes. For example, Sach Khand was the highest plane of all in the Sant Mat tradition, union with God. When you were meditating were you aware of different levels of the inner light and sound? Something similar to planes of existence? Did you perhaps realize that you were medi
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families

In the 1980s I was part of a cult called Lifewave. It seemed to derive most of its beliefs from Hinduism. They taught meditation, and the leader John Yarr, who called himself Ishvara, thought that he was enlightened. There were quite a few in the cult who thought that they were enlightened too. The cult split up after his behavior was exposed. What worries me is that he still seems to be teach
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families

Andrew you said that the results depend upon expectations. Did I expect too much or too little? What I expected was that there would be spontaneous movement and vocalizations, perhaps accompanied by a change in consciousness. None of that happened though. Nobody mentioned anything about expectations in all the years I was in Subud. I wish that I had read this thread through from the beginning.
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families

There was an interesting Radio 4 programme about meditation and some of the unpleasant side effects. It was made my Jolyon Jenkins. He starts talking about 10 day retreats and people suffering panic attacks and other psychological problems. He doesn't mention Goenka but I think that's what he's talking about. I'm not sure about the 'boot camp' approach to meditati
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

I was involved in Subud for a few years in the early 1980s when I was in my 20s. I was intrigued by it so I thought I would try it. However, thought I attended latihan many times over years I never felt anything. I'm sure I'm not the only one who was like that. More than once I saw someone new join but not have the spontaneous movements or sounds and then drop out. I don't think th
Forum: Former Cult Members and Affected Families