(quote)Quote: The Anticult Another BK supporter, asked many of her BK associates what happened at the BK School seminar, NONE of them would tell her. How sick is that, for one BK supporter, to not tell another BK supporter, what goes on in the seminars? Its almost like a type of sandbagging of your own friends, or setting them up. She had to find out from a recent post. The irony is that thos
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Instead of fool factor, I'd call it deception. Deception doenst just mean you've been fooled. It means someone you trusted failed to live up to their promises. You find yourself questioning your own intelligence, your own take on reality. And you are led to question the good faith of someone you thought was your friend, who led you into a mess. Here is something told me
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

QuoteswampseerI wonder if the message comes across (elsewhere on the board, in other posts) with a firehose effect that drowns the victims you're trying to save. Hi swampseer, I do sometimes feel concerned about that. When I first arrived at this forum, I could not imagine that BK was anything but sincere and on top of that could barely take in TAC's discussions of hypnotic and NLP t
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

AC and Helpme2times, Actually, these last two posts were very helpful responses to my last. I especially appreciated the "I Got Schooled" blog and the comment, AC, about BK "getting on the phone" with apostates. Do you think that's something that her organization USUALLY does when they find a "schooled" member (how do we define "insider"?) bloggin
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

swampseer, Do you have any good ideas to create more discussion, and keep it going? Part of the problem are the BK "trolls" as well, who tried to disrupt this thread when it first started, and would still be doing so if allowed. They would turn it into a fog of confusion. But also, I think its due to the demographics of who Byron Katie targets, and due to the Byron Katie sys
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Found something else... a discussion by members of a group called "The Work of Byron and Unschooling". Mostly pro-Work, but in the thread there's a link to this board's reports from BK event participants and several mentions of Janaki's blog. [The Work of Byron Katie and Unschooling] (Note: comments are ordered with the most recent one appearing first.)
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Here are two excerpts from Janaki's lengthy behind-the-scenes-with-Byron-Katie story (Byron Katie & Janaki): 33 - The End of Suffering ‘The end of suffering’ brings me to my own personal loyalty conflict that I have been experiencing towards Katie for several years. I would hold back when addressing this, because I didn’t want to contradict her publicly. I find it highly misle
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

I've read Janaki's story. In her place, I wouldn't touch Gisela's comment with a ten foot pole; there's something fishy there. And something has certainly brought THIS thread to a screeching halt. Wonder what that could be?
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Heh! I went to the wrong forum. Well, it was an eventful detour. I'm not sure what bogus BK certification is. Marelin Thorton (aka Madame Snakeoil) does offer The Work and mentions Byron Katie seperately on her site. Is she not a facilitator? Why do you think she runs a BK forum? Could it be she was a facilitator and was deleted like Janaki and so (jumping ahead here) she runs a forum to
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Thanks to Anticults summary, I have a reply to make when anyone tries to get me to try 'The Work': All one has to do is reply, 'I dont want to support the BK industry.' Thats what this is. It is not spiritual. It is not an end to suffering. Its an industry, or to be yet more precise, a marketing empire, presenting itself as spirituality. Trade secrets, squabb
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

oh yeah, you pay BK forever, for life. She has total control. Its only a one-year renewable bogus "certification" from BK, and she can revoke it at any time, for any reason, or no reason. There is a small yearly fee they pay, but that is a bait-switch. As there are constant ongoing seminars they have to take, work for free, and also would take "voluntarily" to stay in the BK
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

That is about the best darn summary of what's wrong with bk I've seen yet! I was looking for more posts on Janakis blog from people and re-read the text from the letter or e-mail she got from Katie about why she was taken off her website etc. It kind of read like bk was pretty threatened by Janaki's popularity as a purveyor of that cognitive parlour trick aka the work... The
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

I just found this story by clicking on the the comments link on janaki's blog. I'm including the link to the comment. I am reposting this here to give it wider distribution and also to prompt more people to come forward. Just the few stories we've come across have done so much good! Telling your story matters-- not just to you but to others around the world. I'm also tr
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

QuoteswampseerNew here. Coupla questions, not meant to be critical, just wondering how things work. Looks like most of this thread is quotes from other message boards, is that right? Why not just post a link and be done? Do these people quoted here contribute to this message board? Someone in the big thread on Byron Katie (Byron Katie (the Work) and Eckhart Tolle Legit??) suggested starting a
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

If you are not sure, e-mail Mr Ross via the homepage of this website and he will explain it. For a very lively discussion, interested readers can go here: and Janaki's descriptions of copyright issues, both for her material and music composed by her husband is of the utmost interest.
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

BK, as far back as 1995/6 or so, seemed to like using music. This is from Janaki's description of the first European tour Quote06 - The First European Tour The tour was a great experience. Katie had brought along American friends, as well as her daughter and grandson. And we all fitted in the van, together with our luggage and traveling bookstore. She called it ‘Havanna White’. On the
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Folks, here is something from Chapter 34 of Janaki's blog. It is worth looking at. Quote34 - The Rules & a New Religion The Rules and a new Religion Katie has often called The Work ‘check mate’. Check mate means ‘no way out’, it is the end of the road. I can see why it is said that The Work would lead to this. Nowhere to go, no one to blame, nothing to point your finger at
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

And we have another report from a former School participant, also from the Guruphiliac forum. Note: this person feels they were helped by The Work, but still has criticisms of the school. And I shall bold one part because it corroborates something a member here was sure happened. Looks like it did. From "sandyfeet": hello - first timer here. I attended the school for the work
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

This thread is an excellent idea! Although for me, I find that reading all the exposing stuff on how BK operates, as well as the participant reports, helps me a lot. For some reason, when TAC did a little analysis of Janaki's new guru, Tony Parsons, that really turned a lightbulb on for me. Now when I come across any of these alleged healers' info, I look for what their SALES P
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

There are more posts from "arienariadne" at the Guruphiliac forum. Here's the next one. Keira, I love The Work, too. I applaud any intervention or technique that helps us interrupt an uncomfortable story long enough to think about what's happening rather than being what's happening. There are lots of great techniques for this. Stepping out of a miserable story to ga
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

yes, thanks for that summary of how BK recruited a key member of her mainly "volunteer" workforce. Notice that its quite similar in basic form to what Carol Skolnick described before, except that the intial communications were by email, I believe. (that document Going To Work Naked, has since been taken down). And then right after that, I described the specific persuasion process that
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Recruitment Yesterday, at 6:15, Anticult wrote referring to Janakis description of meeting BK Anticult wrote: QuoteFor example, in the Janaki blog, she had a chapter talking about how she first met BK. First, she was contacted for recruitment by a BK insider from connections with Muktananda, who strongly pushed her to go to a BK Workshop, and Janaki said she did NOT want to go.
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

by this way, this method of using deception, goes back a long way for Byron Katie. For example, in the Janaki blog, she had a chapter talking about how she first met BK. First, she was contacted for recruitment by a BK insider from connections with Muktananda, and strongly influenced to go to a BK Workshop, and she said she did NOT want to go. But they persisted, and got her to phone BK, u
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

It may not just that the person felt massively burned and needed that much time (a decade!) before bearing witness. Until now, no safe venues (sanctuaries) have been available for people who felt harmed. Until now, people may have feared (and with reason) that they would be shamed, invalidated, and rejected by their friendship networks in the seekers scene if they dared to say anything nega
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

For starters: Do an author search (all dates) of the Rickross.com message board for all input from 'JJ52' Helpme2times said that reading JJ's information led H'2t not to attend the 9 day program. Two, do the author search only this time, look for 'Garden of Even' who kindly supplied copies of the release form. Three, read the newly supplied information from
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

From Janakis story, chapter 9 on Feedback "I started to say something and she (Katie) said, ‘Janaki, you don’t have to say anything, because I already know everything you are thinking’. "
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Former insider to Byron Katie and The Work, Janaki van den Brink Bussum, has posted a lengthy account of her experiences. [Byron Katie & Janaki]
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Here is something to look at. Note how 'A' stated in her report on Jodys forum that BK actually seemed to WELCOME persons who arrived showing signs of mental instablity. QuoteI'd have thought Katie would have screened more carefully to reduce her liability in these cases, but she actually seemed to welcome the more severely disturbed. I was aware that no deliberate or caref
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

PROLONGED EYE-GAZING TECHNIQUE another very self-conscious technique that Byron Katie uses, is the prolonged Eye-Gazing technique. There are many examples of her using that technique, seen in the conversion story by Carol Skolnick, blogs about the Byron Katie Eyes by the disgraced Neale Donald Walsch, advertising blogs by Stephen Mitchell and the initial induction by Byron Katie described i
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

You dont have to read books if you hang out with people who have both read books and have written them. So...even if BK hasnt read books, or at least has not read many books(as hubby Mitchell claimed in his interview with Scott London...she had the good taste to associate with people who have read the books. BTW Mitchell in that interview sounds like Archie Bunker, from All in the Family.
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"