“When I dare to be powerful – to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid.”
"Remember, if you ever need a helping hand, you'll find one at the end of your arm... As you grow older you will discover that you have two hands. One for helping yourself, the other for helping others."
-Audre Lord
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118 comments:
I like that quote. It reminds me of something Nelson Mandela said in his inaugural address. I don't remember his exact words, but it was to the effect that the thing we fear most is our own power.
The question of helping others has been particularly on my mind lately. I am not sure it is possible to help myself without helping others and vice-versa.
I think that one of the things we were all meant to feel is that Sharon and Robert are powerful beings and that we are weak and imperfect and we cannot "do" anything at all - especially without their help. The help of those who know us better than we know ourselves...
It is really the opposite that is true and they are the ones who are deathly afraid of being "found out." We have, unfortunately, given up all of our own personal power to them and now it is time to reclaim it!!! We are amazingly powerful and that is exactly what they wanted us to forget.
They trained us to be those sheep who are jumping over the side of the cliff at the behest of the "powerful" Magician who has convinced "us" that it is for "our" own good (to become food for them.)
Our own good is really about finding our own personal power again. Our own good is for helping others. Our own good for living our own lives and we are the ONLY ones who can really say what is best for ourselves when we are in our right minds and can see clearly!
Well, it may be time for me to
say goodbye to the world of
blogging. But I have one more
Sharon Gans story.
One night, her royal highness was
angry at her group. She yelled,
"I am going to leave you! I will
become a therapist and make
some REAL money!"
Diogenes, Liked very much reading your comments. Hope you continue to blog and enter your thoughts and memories from time to time. There is some comfort in knowing that there are others out there working to digest their experiences with "the group" also. Interesting about what the women did to AH on retreat. You were right about his intellect being the greatest asset. I also was very fond of him and knew he loved money and finally feel under feminine influence. There is nothing more interesting than seeing things unfold the way they do/have. Janice and the other older gals are puppets for big moma. I can see better now and remember when I was one. And now we must go on and remember how weak we are under strong influence, to be completly dictated to and lose oneself in the most dangerous of games.
Dear Anon.,
I am so glad that you are no longer
under Sharon's wretched reign.
But please forgive me--not to mince
words--it is not about "strong"
influence. It is "heartless,
shifty, selfish, weaselish (is that
a word?)" influence. It is influence that takes what is best
in you and hurts you for it.
Sharon's is the psychology of
the abusive parent--self-justifying, greedy, needy, crafty,
entitled, dishonest.
Dear Anon.,
I am so glad that you are no longer
under Sharon's wretched reign.
But please forgive me--not to mince
words--it is not about "strong"
influence. It is "heartless,
shifty, selfish, weaselish (is that
a word?)" influence. It is influence that takes what is best
in you and hurts you for it.
Sharon's is the psychology of
the abusive parent--self-justifying, greedy, needy, crafty,
entitled, dishonest.
It's been a little over a year since I stopped going to 'class' and not quite a year since I made the firm decision that I was no longer working towards going back. It's been a freeing year, but like many here, I want back what was taken from me and I ache for those still under the spell.
I have gone back and forth about whether and how to come forward to speak the truth. I don't claim to have ideas on the subject but I am willing. Speaking with some of you and with others who have left has been an eye opening experience.
I do believe that we have some responsibility to speak up. Yet I hear how carefully constructed the protections around Sharon et al are.
Sometimes I tell myself that I did benefit - because though the ideas were co-opted, corrupted and ill-used, they also have truth in them. And somehow that truth did come out at times, and for a while, that was useful. The fact that it was a carefully constructed prelude to a life of servitude is sickening - literally sickening to me. I am so grateful that, even if my head was too enthralled to object, something stronger in me pushed back and got me the hell out of Dodge.
I sign Cassandra - cousin in truth to Diogenes!
Going by some of the recent posts here, it seems that there may be a number of people who are ready to take some action against the group. I am another.
Cassandra, Diogenes and anyone else who is interested in working to get others out of the group, please contact me at Kipling567@yahoo.com. I have a plan that I think will be effective. I would like to get a group of people to work on it.
PART I
The Gans/Klein cult's "teachings" include many contradictions and glaring inconsistencies which it punishes its followers for noticing and forbids them from questioning.
Have you ever noticed the contradictions inherent in the notion of "the search of the miraculous"? "Life is miraculous enough as it is, only we don't notice it," you are told.
You don't have to go to a mountaintop in Tibet or live in the Holy Land or even go on a
seven-day vision quest in the mountains around Sedona. No, the miraculous is all around you, and the "teaching" will instruct you in how to contact it right here, in the wonderful daily life you live in Boston or New York. Various misquotations and
oversimplifications from Emerson and others are marshalled in evidence. (Actual searches
for the miraculous were apparently good enough for, if not admirable in, the likes of Tolstoy, Ouspensky, and Gurdjieff -- but you are not Tolstoy, Ouspensky, or Gurdjieff.) The problem isn't that the miraculous is remote and difficult to reach. Instead, the problem is that your faculties for engaging the miraculous are insufficiently developed, and what faculties you do possess (weak as they are) have been compromised or disabled by your "first education" -- that is, by pretty much everything you ever heard up until the day you started on your "experiment in school."
Very well, you may say. But doesn't "school" teach some version of "creation by design"? Aren't all those charts and diagrams in Ouspensky and Collin meant to show the extraordinary, economical design of the universe, and of the human being's integral functioning within it? It seems odd that a being would be designed in a such a way as to apprehend the miraculous, but then not be given the wherewithal to do so.
"School" answers, You are designed as a self-evolving organism. Your connection with the miraculous is designed to be potential only, and part of the big cosmic deal is that you have the ability to realize that potential only if you work really, really hard in the right way.
OK, you say, if I'm truly SELF-evolving, then it sounds like it's something I have to do myself. Why do I need a teaching and teachers and and the whole apparatus of "school" if it's a question of SELF-evolution?
"School" answers, you can't SELF-evolve without an enormous amount of help. You need a real teaching connected with real centers of knowledge. Which this school is. (Or maybe it isn't; maybe it's just a preparatory school with the POSSIBILITY of being connected to a real center of knowledge . . . Gans/Klein are very cagey and slippery on this point, because as a matter of fact it's fairly easy to demonstrate that neither Gans nor Klein nor Horn nor anyone who's ever been in a teaching position in "school" has ever had any sort of connection with any "esoteric center," nor with the lineage of Gurdjieff or Ouspensky, who may or may not have been connected themselves . . . and this is all to assume, for the sake of argument, that there even IS anything like an "inner circle of humanity," for which there is not the slightest shred of evidence, and which is one of those assertions that cannot be verified and which therefore conveniently needs no evidence to assert and reiterate.) Anyway, nothing's guaranteed. Only a few can evolve, everybody else is just food or waste. You know -- the way a maple tree produces and broadcasts thousands of seeds each fall in the hope that one or two of them will take root and grow.
From Amazed&Grateful
Though I'm happy to leave this experience behind, the psychological strings are still attached, and a lot of healing for me has happened through these blog pages.
It would be wonderful to know of any recent escapees that found their way out through these pages. IF THAT'S YOU - I would have been in terrible shape had I not found the Esoteric Freedom site. You have friends out here -many, including me, who have tried to contact you to get out. Many who continue to wish for you to get the message and get strength from us to continue on your journey away from this terrible group.
The internet could very well lead to the downfall of this group -- they can't convince everyone to stay away from the web, can they?
Amazed&Grateful
PS - yippee! It's October and no looming dread of endless hours and lies to prepare for the "Christmas" party - Happy New Year, Sharon, you gluttonous psycho!
Amazed&Grateful...now the real work begins as you sort the real from the unreal. The ideas are pure but the transmission was not. Sometimes I think that it was all preparation for my real life or something like that...Yes the blog is a good thing,I'm glad I found it too. What put you over the edge and how did you finally exit? thanks and good luck!
Yepee I am still glad I am not working for the Christmas class...and I left almost 10 years ago... After all the labor and the presentation of the elaborate gifts to all the teachers I had nothing left for my own family. Then there was the treat of fines for not bringing in new students. Agress with the previous blogger...the transmission was broken. Somehow some of the ideas reached me and are still with me and I suppose that is the best part. Good luck Amazed&Grateful!
From Amazed & Grateful...
Anonymous,
Thank you for "...preparation for my real life or something like that..." A good way to look at it.
What finally pushed me over the edge? Frustration, desperation, and a relentless feeling of failure. Desperately needing help as a result of the commitment to this group -- no money, socially isolated, plagued with self-doubt about the most basic life events. I was slipping for a long time, but kept hanging on by threads - waiting, hoping, yearning for something to "click" and offer relief that I'd found a guided way on my journey -- but life was getting worse and worse, the pain and feeling of failure nearly unbearable. I actually apologized for not being able to "keep up," to "understand" - essentially apologizing for needing to leave. They tried to coax me, told me to "get help" (as in, maybe you need therapy), and asked me to set an aim to return in 6 months -- like granting me the privilege of taking a leave of absence.
It got worse before it got better, and it's still bad, but its much better in the head games department - which is what I desperately needed the most. This site, and the former students who I've met through it, carried me though very dark and angry times.
I've tossed out a lot of the "group" language from my vocabulary, and still find myself cringing when a particular "idea" creeps in and finds me. I do find, however, that sometimes a bit of faith also creeps in if I consider an idea from its source (ie Buddhism, common sense, 12 steps) separate from the school. I can sense an innate feeling of "yes" that I couldn't before because my head was too much in the way. My instincts are returning, I guess you'd say.
Some of the "Work" language has been very useful to me...I have to separate from the "group think" and the mob attached to them. For example to "separate" and see it all and say "not I" has kept me sane and safe. Remember baby with the bath water... The feelings of aloneness went from terrifying to a kind of excileration and wonder. Went recently to an Ashram with my daughter who likes Buddism as I do. It was a peaceful and beautiful community. I realized very sincerely that way of the Yogi was not my preference or my way and that the Fourth way was. I am drawn to it and not to other ways. That is very clear to me...now one had to tell me this. Clearly there has been damage done to many of us but the Ideas are still food for me.
If you are still interested in the ideas then you should check out the real and "legitimate" Gurdjieff Society.
There is a branch in NY and in Boston. It is VERY different from "school". I went and spoke to them when I left school and was really quite shocked at the differences. I know there are some other people who were formerly in the group who participate in those groups now - not a lot of money, no pressure, no mind games...
Just in case anyone doesn't know:
I can put you in touch with people (your old friends) who are out of school. There are a lot of people who were formerly in school who are informally connected to each other. (THERE IS NO FORMAL CONNECTION OR NEW SCHOOL!!) If I don't know them, chances are that someone else is in touch with them. If you have just left school or even if you left awhile ago and still have not talked to anyone from school, it is a powerful part of the healing process to be able to speak with people (especially people you knew and were close to)who know EXACTLY what you are going through.
By keeping the rule of silence and never speaking to anyone about school, you are still keeping school rules and are not free from them. They are still in control of your life.
You can email me at: esotericfreedom@safe-mail.net,
Friday, November 19th Gurdjieff foundation is having a lecture in B'klyn calling it "An Ongoing Study" at 7pm. 104 Berry Street (718) 512-8616. Check the web, they suggest making reservations.
A little bit of gossip here:
Neil Dale and Jane Demott got married last week!
Congratulations Sharon on another arranged marriage!
Amazed and Grateful says...
Are Neil and Jane from the Boston group? I had two Boston people come to mind when I read this. I suppose it is gossip. Nonetheless, if they are who I think they are...I really, really, liked them and hope for them that this marriage doesn't further cement them in this madness.
From Amazed and Grateful:
Ashiata,
Is there a way on this blog to have a notification sent when a new entry has been posted? I used to have it this way with my old email address, but when I changed to my new email address, I couldn't remember how I did it.
Thanks
On the first page at the VERY BOTTOM there is a note that says:
Subscribe.
When I read the news that Jane and Neil got married last week, I was decidedly not happy. It’s not that I dislike them, but rather the contrary. I sincerely like them and wish them well and hope they find happiness. I just don’t think School marriages are a vehicle that ultimately leads to joyous and happy futures. The ordering is all wrong, School comes first and the marriage is a distant second. School marriages are more like a form of bondage; they keep the both partners tied to School. It’s hard enough for a long term member to decide to leave the group on their own, and even more difficult to leave the group knowing they’ll have to give up on their marriage, too. You become so emotionally and financially intertwined with your spouse, it makes it even harder to imagine leaving and establishing a new and independent life.
I am fairly sure that both Neal and Jane are in their 60’s now, and I would imagine they found the dating world difficult. It’s hard to be in a relationship with someone when you can’t fully explain where you go or what you do until the wee hours of the morning on each and every Tuesday and Thursday night. The alternative is to date and eventually marry someone within the group. The large number of School marriages in the Boston older group seemed slightly bizarre to me. It seemed too insular to me, like an ingrown toenail that festers, or Robert’s joke about the Italian army changing underwear.
A School marriage is not a happy event. It almost seems like a bouquet of dead flowers are in order. Too extreme to give someone, I know. But I find them symbolically appropriate. The time of a wedding is so full of hopes and dreams and excitement for the new life ahead. But in a School marriage, the union eventually is overtaken the pressures to meet all the School demands, duties and obligations. The marriage becomes a distant second and School is first. The promise of love eventually dies.
I sincerely wish Jane well; I believe she’s getting married for the first time in her 60’s. And Neal, too, although it’s not the first School marriage for him. It’s so sad and tragic that so many good people are caught in the psychological web called School. And Sharon, of course, is the spider at the center of it all.
The marriages were one of the first things that started to make me squeamish about staying. When I was in the 'younger' class, there were things that deeply bothered me. But there were also things that I thought at the time were for my benefit. I now see, of course, that the 'younger class' time is the time to reel you in and make you believe that you need them.
By the time I moved to the 'older class' I was very involved and felt that life without 'school' would be meaningless. After a few months in the 'older class' I was miserable. I blamed myself for a long time. I thought it was my deficiencies that prevented me from really being happy there.
It wasn't until after I left that I realized the part of me that they wanted me to believe I had to kill was the part of me that was trying to save me - that DID save me. The most insidious thing, to me, is that they target the very thing that any real personal development work should be nurturing - our intuition and our own inner wisdom. All of this is written off as one's 'lower self' and is blamed for everything that is wrong in one's life.
I remember feeling for a brief time like the only way I could really expect to have a relationship was if I found someone in school, because how could I manage it otherwise? The thought was enough to scare me and to make me take stock. The couples in my class did not seem happy. Their marriages were a distant second to their slavery and the folks that had been there the longest seems the most paralyzed and dead. Thank God, I started to question, before I ended up like these poor people.
I also want to say that this blog is one of the first things I found on the day I decided to buck the system and try to look things up on the Internet. It is very important, and we must keep it up, because the next person on his or her way out needs it. Reading these posts was both freeing and horrifying. It was devastating to realize the truth of the place - to suddenly have the veil lifted and see that the Emperor really does not have any clothes - and oh, boy... He really should put something on! ;)
On the other hand, it was freeing and a relief to realize that the part of me that was objecting with all its might was NOT crazy, nor was it trying to destroy me. It was, in fact, what is real. Talk about the Allegory of the Cave!
Cassandra, what you wrote echoes my own experiences:
You wrote: “the 'younger class' time is the time to reel you in and make you believe that you need them.”
YES, SO TRUE!
Younger class time is a time of indoctrination. New students are gradually eased into the notion that teachers are wise and all knowing; and then if you want to evolve, you need to submit your will to a higher level (them, of course!)
You wrote: “It wasn't until after I left that I realized the part of me that they wanted me to believe I had to kill was the part of me that was trying to save me - that DID save me. The most insidious thing, to me, is that they target the very thing that any real personal development work should be nurturing - our intuition and our own inner wisdom. All of this is written off as one's 'lower self' and is blamed for everything that is wrong in one's life.”
YES, SO TRUE FOR ME, TOO!
Every day for the first 7 years of School I would say to myself, “I want to leave School, I want to leave School” But because we were taught to doubt this voice and call it denying force, or the voice of my lower self, I would always dismiss it. Now I see this voice as my truest voice, the voice of my Real Self, the voice of wisdom and inner knowing. Yes, insidious is good word to describe their methods.
You wrote: “the folks that had been there the longest seem the most paralyzed and dead. Thank God, I started to question, before I ended up like these poor people.”
YES, SO TRUE FOR ME, TOO!
I had the same perceptions just before I left, particularly about the Good Students, the ones that always made their aims and brought the most new students. The scariest were some of the women who seemed more like Stepford Wives than real people. I asked myself if I wanted to be more like them, and of course the answer was no way!
I just came across a very interesting blog by Robin Shapiro.
Check it out at: http://traumatherapy.typepad.com/trauma_attachment_therapy/
It was this comment about evil that got me:
"M. Scott Peck defines "evil" as something possible only when one human doesn't see another human as a human being. I'd like to add that for evil to occur, one human has to have power over another and see that other as an object, a means to an end....
The single most distressing thought that stuck with me is that the worse the torture, the more the victim becomes attached to the perpetrator."
-Robin Shapiro
So I looked up the whole quote about evil:
"There really are people and institutions made up of people, who respond with hatred in the presence of goodness and would destroy the good insofar as it is in their power to do so. They do this not with conscious malice but blindly, lacking awareness of their own evil -- indeed, seeking to avoid any such awareness. As has been described of the devil in religious literature, they hate the light and instinctively will do anything to avoid it, including attempting to extinguish it. They will destroy the light in their own children and in all other beings subject to their power.
Evil people hate the light because it reveals themselves to themselves. They hate goodness because it reveals their badness; they hate love because it reveals their laziness. They will destroy the light, the goodness, the love in order to avoid the pain of such self-awareness. My second conclusion, then, is that evil is laziness carried to its ultimate, extraordinary extreme. As I have defined it, love is the antithesis of laziness. Ordinary laziness is a passive failure to love. Some ordinarily lazy people may not lift a finger to extend themselves unless they are compelled to do so. Their being is a manifestation of nonlove; still, they are not evil.
Truly evil people, on the other hand, actively rather than passively avoid extending themselves. They will take any action in their power to protect their own laziness, to preserve the integrity of their sick self. Rather than nurturing others, they will actually destroy others in this cause. If necessary, they will even kill to escape the pain of their own spiritual growth. As the integrity of their sick self is threatened by the spiritual health of those around them, they will seek by all manner of means to crush and demolish the spiritual health that may exist near them.
I define evil, then, as the exercise of political power -- that is, the imposition of one’s will upon others by overt or covert coercion -- in order to avoid extending one’s self for the purpose of nurturing spiritual growth. Ordinary laziness is nonlove; evil is antilove."
-M. Scott Peck, Psychiatrist & author
Cassandras' experience brought me back to my days and years spent in the group also. As i began to remember the awful states I found myself in when I was trying to be considered awake by the elders. My question today is, what is it about me that I wanted so badly to be in the "in crowd".? My herd mentality...wanting to be part of something real. I gave time and lots of money for the experience. If I can learn something about myself I can have some satisfaction.
Anonymous,
That's really a great question to consider because that is the thing groups like this prey on - our desire for acceptance. Also I think they go to great trouble to find people who have a sincere yearning for meaning in our lives. When they can prick that in us, we can easily become victims to this horrible cult, because the indoctrination is slowly and systematically set up to make you lose faith in yourself.
Every question we have can be shot down by some aspect of this false 'teaching' - I always wondered: how is it that I can reconcile the fact that lying is one of the principal things that keeps me from evolving, but I'm supposed to lie to everyone in my life about everything I'm doing here, and that will help me evolve?
Answer: I was being a smart ass, and I was a know it all. This was a "feature" of mine that was stopping me from growing my being. I needed to learn about clever insincerity. Also, I wasn't yet conscious enough to understand these distinctions and unless I trusted my betters to lead me there, I would be lost. But if I didn't CARE about growing my being, well... that was my choice - no one was FORCING me into anything. No one was putting pressure on me...
Okay...
I wanted to be in that 'in crowd' because I was slowly and carefully taught to believe that they knew things I didn't. The secrecy and well constructed protections around Sharon and her minions fooled us. That's just the fact. We got fooled. So we lost faith in the very parts of ourselves we needed to listen to, and ended up looking outside ourselves for something that can only be found inside.
We wanted so badly to believe that this regimen was going to bring us meaning that we followed it, most of us for years. The 'in crowd' appealed to us because with them came hopes of finding 'the promised land.' Without them, we had nothing but the longing that we started with when we came to 'school.' And for most of us, that longing was painful, and we wanted to assuage it at all costs.
They also did their best to ensure that we all had watershed experiences in those first 'younger class' years that helped cement our faith in the process they were selling. I was well cared for during those years. I was helped through hard times and I was supported in getting things I wanted in my life. I learned how to make and attain an aim and how to persevere through obstacles. Even the secrecy had its place, because I was someone who felt obligated to explain my life and my choices and my priorities to everyone, and having to keep it all secret was initially a good thing for me: it made me realize that I didn't owe everyone an explanation for everything. All of the training was set up to make my life better, so that I would be a believer. It worked.
Once all those things were in me, it was 'safe' to bring me to 'older class' where I was ripped apart and told that I was worthless and needed to do more for school and put lesser things like my family, my friends, my life's work and my passions into their 'proper order.' (Well behind School.) I had a couple of things they thought they wanted, so I was cared for tenderly at first, but when I began to question, I learned that they only TELL you they want you to question. They don't. They want you to follow.
Anonymous,
That's really a great question to consider because that is the thing groups like this prey on - our desire for acceptance. Also I think they go to great trouble to find people who have a sincere yearning for meaning in our lives. When they can prick that in us, we can easily become victims to this horrible cult, because the indoctrination is slowly and systematically set up to make you lose faith in yourself.
Every question we have can be shot down by some aspect of this false 'teaching' - I always wondered: how is it that I can reconcile the fact that lying is one of the principal things that keeps me from evolving, but I'm supposed to lie to everyone in my life about everything I'm doing here, and that will help me evolve?
Answer: I was being a smart ass, and I was a know it all. This was a "feature" of mine that was stopping me from growing my being. I needed to learn about clever insincerity. Also, I wasn't yet conscious enough to understand these distinctions and unless I trusted my betters to lead me there, I would be lost. But if I didn't CARE about growing my being, well... that was my choice - no one was FORCING me into anything. No one was putting pressure on me...
Okay...
I wanted to be in that 'in crowd' because I was slowly and carefully taught to believe that they knew things I didn't. The secrecy and well constructed protections around Sharon and her minions fooled us. That's just the fact. We got fooled. So we lost faith in the very parts of ourselves we needed to listen to, and ended up looking outside ourselves for something that can only be found inside.
We wanted so badly to believe that this regimen was going to bring us meaning that we followed it, most of us for years. The 'in crowd' appealed to us because with them came hopes of finding 'the promised land.' Without them, we had nothing but the longing that we started with when we came to 'school.' And for most of us, that longing was painful, and we wanted to assuage it at all costs.
Continued...
They also did their best to ensure that we all had watershed experiences in those first 'younger class' years that helped cement our faith in the process they were selling. I was well cared for during those years. I was helped through hard times and I was supported in getting things I wanted in my life. I learned how to make and attain an aim and how to persevere through obstacles. Even the secrecy had its place, because I was someone who felt obligated to explain my life and my choices and my priorities to everyone, and having to keep it all secret was initially a good thing for me: it made me realize that I didn't owe everyone an explanation for everything. All of the training was set up to make my life better, so that I would be a believer. It worked.
Once all those things were in me, it was 'safe' to bring me to 'older class' where I was ripped apart and told that I was worthless and needed to do more for school and put lesser things like my family, my friends, my life's work and my passions into their 'proper order.' (Well behind School.) I had a couple of things they thought they wanted, so I was cared for tenderly at first, but when I began to question, I learned that they only TELL you they want you to question. They don't. They want you to follow.
What I have learned about myself is that my answers are inside. I think that discussions about great thinkers and great books are useful, and I wouldn't mind having that again. But I have no interest in submitting myself to anyone who teaches me that I have to lie to my family or who tries to convince me that I need them in order to grow. I think that is the gift that I take from 'School' - I have learned that I need to actually look within, not outside. And I have learned to trust myself.
I try to hold onto that, and to the parts of ideas that are useful for getting what I want. Otherwise, I end up focusing on the lies and the abuse, and I am just angry. I don't want my life to be made of anger. So I try to remind myself of these things, and I try to live for the things I love and want. I try to take back my inner autonomy and I pray for those who are still mesmerized by the lies and treachery. I also thank God that something in me resisted, much as I refused to trust it at the time.
Sorry - had trouble posted my super long comment, and ended up posting the first part twice. Oops...
Cassandra--you have written the
best explanation I have read
for the success of the Ganscult.
Yes, they do provied "watershed"
experinces for "young students"
and then, after a year or two,
like a HORROR MOVIE--they start
to turn you into a zombie.
It is really SICK that they have the ability to give you some good stuff--and like the devil in a
folk tale, they want everything
in return. The awful thing is that
they are not ignorant. If they were
just crooks, they wd only take your
money. But they actually know a
little bit-and they know that they
know a little bit--so Klein and
Gans feel endlessly justified.
I am so happy that Rick Ross
prevented Gans from getting
her Academy Award for her fake
documentary. It really was the
chickens coming home to roost
for Gans. A fitting commuppance.
But it hardly pays for the death
of Joe Duell, or the ruin of the
live of women who will never have
kids, or the theft or the sexual
abuse of female students and all
the rest.
Diogenes,
The Devil in a folktale! That's it isn't it? It's archetypal. Except that the Devil in Dr. Faustus says at the beginning what payment he expects.
What you say about their knowledge of what they are doing is really salient, I think. I don't know if all the outer tier teachers are guilty of that - I think a lot of them are just as victimized as we were.
But there is no doubt in my mind that Sharon knows what she's doing and systematically does it to chilling effect. I never liked the woman, from the day I met her I remember thinking, "Can I really stay in a place led by her? I don't trust her and I don't like her." But I made myself doubt that voice, as always under this influence, and kept trying to please her. Until I didn't. And that was a happy, happy day.
I think for a lot of the teachers, if they did ever see the truth it would kill them. They have invested so much and led so many others into the deceit and treachery. How could you live with that, if there were any sincerity in you? And I do think there is sincerity in some of these people. I think they are deeply delusional, but at least somewhat sincere. But I wonder if they ever have a moment of clarity where they realize that what they are doing is profoundly criminal? Or are they totally duped? Or are they just as evil as she is? I just have a hard time believing that.
Maybe in some cases, they are given enough 'treats' to feel that what is best in their lives came from being in Sharon's clutches, and so they really do think it's the right path.
Whatever the truth, they are sad, and I still have pangs of regret for those still in thrall.
Who was Joe Duell? One of the hooks for us fish...is the idea that one needs to surrender self will to the will of a teacher...in order to change/grow being. I wanted to grow my being...so I followed along for many years denying my own impulses and wanting to stay at all costs. Now I stay away from any kind of group thinking as I fear being taken in again. I guess I'm on my own..which we all ultimately are.
As I begin to prepare for the Thanksgiving holiday ahead, I want to thank Ashiata Shiemash and all the other courageous men and women who established the Esoteric Freedom website and this blog. I am so, so grateful for their inner and outer work to speak up and reach out to all the current and former students of Alex Horn, Sharon Gans, and Robert Klein. The stories and text on the Esoteric Freedom website confirmed my own doubts about the validity of the group and gave me the impetus to leave. I send a resounding “THANK YOU!" to the founders of the website. I also want to thank all the contributors to this blog - the varied voices help me make sense out of the crazy jumbled experience of School.
I am so grateful to be out of School and away from all the lies, bullying and manipulation that went along with it. I feel lighter, happier and freer; more true to myself. I’m healing from the emotional and financial damage inflicted by this False School, and I’m feeling stronger every day. And every day I thank God I escaped. Thank You God, I say, Thank You God, I am so grateful. There is so much in my life to be grateful for, and I feel blessed in many ways.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
From Amazed and Grateful:
Thank you, thank you.
Happy Thanksgiving!
I would also like to thank Ashieata
Sheimash for the wonderful
work she has done in creating this
blog. I think I have been a little hard on her when I have disagreed
with her. These memories stir
up a lot of emotion.
To Anon--look up the 166 comment
link (the previous one) on this
blog, and details of Joe's
death are there, from Diogenes,
who knew him.
To Cassandra and River of Joy--
you two are very aware and have helped me a lot.
Alex, Sharon, and Robert dig deep
into very early needs with a
sinister knowingness. It is hard to
get rid of them, but they can
fade away. I insist that they
are not "powerful." They are
clever and sleazy.
I wish you all the best for the holiday.
River of Joy - Hear! Hear! I owe a big debt of gratitude to Ashiata Shiemash, as well as all of those who came forward before I did to share their stories.
I will never forget the day I found this site and Rick Ross. I think I spent about 10 straight hours pouring through all the posts as my blood turned to ice water. At one point I actually had to vomit. It was a very emotional day, and almost exactly one year ago.
Diogenes - thank you for your acknowledgment. It warmed my heart to read that I have been helpful too, because I have received so much from the efforts of those on this site. Your passion has helped me to see things in a new light, and I'm grateful for you as well.
Have a wonderful, school-free holiday, everyone. Spend your money and your time and your heart on those you love and on what matters to you.
I'm sending warmest thoughts and wishes to you all, and to those who are feeling a call to leave but haven't found a way yet. I pray that they, like I did, will see this site and find the strength to get out.
I have told Ashieta Shiemash, and I'll reiterate here - I am happy to meet or speak with anyone who is trying to get out or who has gotten out and needs to talk.
Best to everyone,
Cassandra...
Yes, Janis, I’m sure he had a heart attack then, and he must be having another one now. Did you see the other thread where Ashiata Shiemash announced that Jane and Neil had gotten married a week earlier? (link: https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=3279117262052869671&postID=8797547925432382901)
The only way for her to know is by someone in School telling her. That’s got to be one of Robert and Sharon’s biggest fears, that the rules around secrecy get broken, and current students start talking with ex-students. It’s a sign that the tight control exerted by Sharon and Robert is weakening and the walls around School are more porous.
Perhaps the ex-students will have a Christmas party this year, and some of the current students will join us?
Sorry to confuse the issue, I posted the comment above to the wrong thread.
Dear River of Joy
Why is this the wrong thread?
You have interesting things to say
Cassandra,
I want to respond to the end of your Nov. 20 post, about the allure of "treats." There's a clinical psychology term -- "fostered dependence" -- a process through which someone is convinced, in effect, that "receiving a fish and eating for a day" is as good as (or better than) "learning to fish and eating for a lifetime."
Ajax,
Fostered dependence. That describes it well. I would add that we were also falsely told that we WERE being taught how to fish. That is part of the evil genius aspect of all this. It seems to me that we were told we were being taught how to listen to ourselves, trust ourselves, think for ourselves, "fish" for ourselves, when the sleight of hand was actually stripping us of those skills and that trust and convincing us that we couldn't function without the Queen Bee and her drones. I know that in my case, there was a definite attempt made to kill my confidence, my relationships and my trust in my inner voice. I can pinpoint the tactics and the perpetrators. Yet the verbal message was that I was being taught to evolve and develop all those things. It's clever and sinister. Take away everything I need to be independent while telling me you are helping me be more independent.
EXCERPT from My life in the “work”
EXCERPT from My life in the “work”
Students – then and now
I really have not talked to you, my reader, about the student population in school or how they came to be there. You might have a similar reaction as my friend Clare, who was mortified by my admission, and description of being a student. You might wonder who the hell would get sucked into this organization - and then …stay there?
It starts with an invitation. There are different ways of getting potential students to a meeting, and it has changed and been refined over the years. One thing that certainly hasn’t changed is the intentional deception. The introduction is planned meticulously –tag team style. Usually it is two people who “facilitate” a future meeting if the mark qualifies. With improvisational aplomb, and as natural as talcum powder, a conversation takes place …at a coffee shop; a bus stop; a lecture. There are many requirements that need to be met to then take this potential student of consciousness to the next level – the interview for further assessment, by a member who is higher up on the “wake up” ladder.
At this meeting; one is not told it is a school. One is not told it has to do with Gurdieff. One is not told it’s a cult (duh). The only thing you can be sure of is that you want to be like the men and women you see at this recruitment gathering. They are bright and shiny, and they have a winking connection that looks like friendship. They “call you on” small lies and quarter truths. The women are voluptuous and the men hold the chair. You do not know it is a recruitment meeting. You think your wish may have been heard.
The teachers who are behind these charades are studied in archetypes. Sometimes when teachers are better prepared, (meaning they have slept for a change) they put together the right “3rd line of work” tag team combinations to do the scouting.
Some things teachers get very right. They are committed to capture, store, and reuse insightful perceptions of their potential and active students. Yearnings are extracted, personal fears exploited; the grip slowly deepens, as a student’s life becomes more enmeshed with other students albeit through marriage, children, work, or in other ways that impact a person’s economic and emotional underpinnings. From a student’s point of view, there appears to be a plaintive recognition of these yearnings.
MBR, You have really given an insightful explanation the 3rd line of work that many of us were involved with. I remember the idea that people come to the work for the wrong reasons...not sure how that fits in. I personally hated having to search for people and act out those roles. But the group was built this way and I could not imagine finding anyone and just giving it to them straight...no one would have come that's for sure. I thought it was because of false personality therefore the trickery. I fell big time...I liked the people and wanted to be in with the "in crowd". So many sides this strange story...you have to have gone thru it to understand it. Can never really explain that chapter of my life to anyone except maybe those who has passed this way.
From Amazed & Grateful:
This year is coming to a close. A new one is about to begin. Another opportunity to refresh our hopes and dreams, and reinvigorate our steps toward them.
Also an opportunity to reflect and be grateful.
Ashiata Shiemash - thank you so much for this site! It's now coming up to a year since I left the GansKlein Cult. A year of much pain, much discovery, and much more healing and growth. I look ahead with excitement and willingness for what the future holds now that the chains are gone...and it's you that enabled so much of that to happen.
Happy New Year to you and your loved ones.
Keep on keepin' on. You're touching many lives out here.
XO
Has anyone seen Sharon's Wikipedia page recently? It's cut way down. It only including her "acting" credits, and all the stuff about "accused of running a cult" has been deleted.
The grand illusion continues!
I think that anyone who wants to can alter a Wikkipedia page. Sharon's page seems to go back and forth. You can go look at the edits over time. They probably have someone working on her Wikki page full time -what a great line of work for someone!
Also, don't be fooled by her age on Wikkipedia. She is at LEAST 10 years older. She has had three or four face lifts and a nose job as well to keep up her illusion of youth.
Yes, the illusion is hers!
Think they aren't watching? Note who the followers are on THE SHARON GANS BLOG...
http://thesharonganscult.blogspot.com/2011/01/turning-point.html
Fred, Terry, Lorraine...
Just a little clarification on the Oscar thing -
Rick Ross did NOT "stop" Sharon from getting her Oscar. Although Rick was helpful, and provided some website space, he benefited from the publicity, which is fine, Quid pro Quo.
Sharon's 'Movie' was outed indeed by some of the millenial exiles. Someone in that crew with lots of press experience authored a letter to the academy and more importantly managed to use the Rosie O'Donnell angle (she was big then)to get Jeannette Walls and Michael Musto to cover the story - once Rosie responded, the game was afoot. HOWEVER - the actual movie had been voted on by academy members way before any breath of publicity about the movie's true background hit anywhere. No, sadly, (Tee Hee), the movie was just plain bad. Even though they removed the bizarre scenes of having the children give thanks to a picture of Sharon and other fawning inserts, you can't turn a "rotten" apple into a sow, can you, Sharon ducks? So sorry Lianne, Sharon -the movie was not only a poorly cinematographed, dull, hypocritical slug, I bet you lost a pile of change on it, which you probably recoupled from your students wiht another bogus "orphanage donation". You do know that we checked out whether any of your organizations or corporate fronts had given any money to that orphanage and you know they've never heard of you, right? That the money you pull out of your student's children's mouths goes into your fat moist little trembling hand to pay for your indulgences and power trips?
Why is it that any any any legitimate organization, no matter how 'sacred', will give you a receipt for tuition or a donation, and skool won't, when students could get a tax deduction? Unless they don't want to red flag the IRS, that is.
While we are on the topic of where all the money goes, I would like to know the extent of Sharon's gambling habits. She seemed to be a regular at a casino in Montana. Perhaps someone who was once in the inner circle could fill us in.
To Jan 3 Anonymous re Sharon Gans blog followers: Do you think that's really them? I assumed it was a techno-trick of the blogger - a tongue-in-cheek joke. It seems strange to me that those people, who treasure secrecy, would openly Tweet, Blog, or post their pictures like that.
From Amazed & Grateful:
I'm wondering if anyone from the Boston area groups would like to get together (a pot luck meal? meet in a restaurant? or just a coffee?).
I thoroughly enjoyed the Holiday experience of being with my children and having to tell no lies to no one. Hell - it would have been a nightmare to pull that off this year!
I also find I'm hitting a wall with blog readings. I need to share a knowing smile of triumph with people who've been there and gotten out.
This year - in the 12 months since I left - I had 2 experiences of meeting a group of people who'd gotten out after many, many years. And I've met one-on-one with 3 different people. I think I'm still looking for some kind of closure...wanting to hear some happy endings/happy stories of post-Ganscult freedom.
Perhaps it's post-holiday loneliness. I need a hug. I need to give one.
Putting it out there. I hope something can come together.
Amazed and Grateful:
Write to me at
esotericfreedom@safe-mail.net
and we will put something together.
Part 1
My name is Don Raskopf 917-658-4492 donr@remodelingcoach.net. I post ALL of my personal information here & RR because I have NOTHING to fear from vampires & leeches. I use full names of those I have known personally for over 2 decades because LIGHT is a disinfectant - an antidote to secrecy & mind-control. I was recruited into this cult - THIS IS A CULT NOT A SCHOOL - by my then girlfriend Julie Hodson (co-founder of Taylor-Hodson). I was manipulated into paying thousands of dollars and thousands of hours of slave labor annually for years. I was seduced into building (with many friends)FOR FREE the following homes & businesses - many sold at huge profit to Gans (I have many photo's I would love to post - AS let me know how):
Taylor-Hodson's first office in Waterside Plaza
Fred Mindel's house in Lake Hopatcong
Terry Christgau's house near Mindel's
Fred Mindel & Minerva Taylor's illegally joined adjacent apartment's in Waterside Plaza
Mindel's "doctor's" office Suite 505, 133 East 58th Street
Gans & Horn's previous apartment 59 West 12th Street, Apt. 11A/G, New York, NY
Montana - Falls Creek Ranch, Kauffman Road, Condon, Montana
Ilsa (Gan's daughter) Kaye's brownstone - 6 East 10th Street, New York, New York
Pawling - see details under real estate link on Esoteric Freedom main page
dozens of other projects
Part 2
It is my opinion that the only way to kill a snake is to cut off it's head. Rick Ross has years of experience trying free cult members with very mixed results. No one will leave while hypnotized - we need to destroy the hypnotist.
This is spiritual rape and abuse - call it by it's real name. Gans has stolen millions and destroyed hundred's of lives. I will join anyone who wishes to prevent further enslavement by ANY non-violent means - pickets, lawsuits, publicity, civil disobedience, etc.
"I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented."
Elie Wiesel
Right on, Don. There is at least one person in the Boston group who is on the verge of leaving because they found this site. Even if it's one-by-one, people can be helped and can be educated about this group by people like you who leave their honest posts.
Dear Don,
I do not think that storming
the barricades will have a useful
result. People like Greg Koch
and Fred Mindel have a lot of
experience with handling trouble.
I think you may get a calm,
Jeffersonian response about
freedom of speech which will
make the intruders look like
malcontents, and the phonies
in front of the class look like
stalwart defenders of civil
liberties. The fact that Gans
hired a lawyer to try to close this
site down has nothing to do with
it. Cults are as American as
apple pie. This country was founded
by religious cults. You cannot
close down Ganscult any more than
you can close down Scientology--
or AA, for that matter. (Ganscult
gets some of its better ideas
from AA, in fact.)
The best attack on Ganscult was the
Rosie ODonnel incedent. It was perfect because it was based
on pure truth--Sharon and expecially Alex Horn, her husband,
espoused an explicit and vehement
anti-gay ideology. As I have written on this site, this philosophy contributed to a suicide. The best we can do is make people aware of the facts
about human carnage.
One woman has written about Horn's
prediliction for forced sex with his female students--and she has
claimed that Sharon knew about this.
I wish that this woman would write
about this in more detail, because
this is the sort of thing that the
captives of Ganscult need to be informed of.
It is awful that Ganscult steals
the ideas of Gurdieff. It took me
a long time to shake the rubble
out of my head and start working
with people who have a sense of what the ideas are all about.
If someone in the Boston or
NY group is reading this--please
know that Sharon has no knowlege
of the Gurdjieff ideas--
SHE DOES NOT KNOW THE EXCERSIZES--
they are NOT IN THE BOOKS!
SHE DOES NOT EVEN HAVE THAT TO
OFFER! Her husband approached
a very great man in the Work,
who started the groups in
NY and California after WWII.
He said you can study with me--but
you must end your false school.
Alex Horn, true godfather of Ganscult, would never give up his
cashcow. I have this from people
close to the originator of the Work in post-war USA.
It would be very useful if David
Kulko, Sharon's son, would make
an explicit statement on this
blog, and maybe the Rick Ross
site, about why his mother is a
false teacher and why he left.
Dear Don,
I do not think that storming
the barricades will have a useful
result. People like Greg Koch
and Fred Mindel have a lot of
experience with handling trouble.
I think you may get a calm,
Jeffersonian response about
freedom of speech which will
make the intruders look like
malcontents, and the phonies
in front of the class look like
stalwart defenders of civil
liberties. The fact that Gans
hired a lawyer to try to close this
site down has nothing to do with
it. Cults are as American as
apple pie. This country was founded
by religious cults. You cannot
close down Ganscult any more than
you can close down Scientology--
or AA, for that matter. (Ganscult
gets some of its better ideas
from AA, in fact.)
The best attack on Ganscult was the
Rosie ODonnel incedent. It was perfect because it was based
on pure truth--Sharon and expecially Alex Horn, her husband,
espoused an explicit and vehement
anti-gay ideology. As I have written on this site, this philosophy contributed to a suicide. The best we can do is make people aware of the facts
about human carnage.
One woman has written about Horn's
prediliction for forced sex with his female students--and she has
claimed that Sharon knew about this.
I wish that this woman would write
about this in more detail, because
this is the sort of thing that the
captives of Ganscult need to be informed of.
It is awful that Ganscult steals
the ideas of Gurdieff. It took me
a long time to shake the rubble
out of my head and start working
with people who have a sense of what the ideas are all about.
If someone in the Boston or
NY group is reading this--please
know that Sharon has no knowlege
of the Gurdjieff ideas--
SHE DOES NOT KNOW THE EXCERSIZES--
they are NOT IN THE BOOKS!
SHE DOES NOT EVEN HAVE THAT TO
OFFER! Her husband approached
a very great man in the Work,
who started the groups in
NY and California after WWII.
He said you can study with me--but
you must end your false school.
Alex Horn, true godfather of Ganscult, would never give up his
cashcow. I have this from people
close to the originator of the Work in post-war USA.
It would be very useful if David
Kulko, Sharon's son, would make
an explicit statement on this
blog, and maybe the Rick Ross
site, about why his mother is a
false teacher and why he left.
I've been away for a while but it's been interesting to catch up with all the posts.
Don, it's good to hear from you. I admire your honestly and openness, as well as your desire to help others still trapped by this cult. I was particularly struck by your words, "No one will leave while hypnotized." That is so true, and that is what makes it challenging to think of the best way to try to help.
Much as I admit I'm tempted to reach for the emotional satisfaction of standing in front of the building and screaming to the high heavens about the cult, I think Diogenes has the truth of it. The answers to any dissent are so smoothly given at this point, and the victims so completely indoctrinated, that those who were trying to help would only be further maligned, while Mindel, Christgau, Koch and the rest would come off looking like "Men of the Work" in their calm response. And the sheep will do what the sheep are told. I certainly always did. As you say, Don, no one will leave while hypnotized. So how to help break the chains?
I have tried to get in touch with a few people with whom I was particularly close. They have all walked the cult-company line and refused to respond. I feel I have to respect that. I've made myself available. And while I certainly believe that they are being abused, sold a bill of goods, lied to and sometimes worse, Ganscult is very careful about walking the line so they can escape another prosecutorial event like San Francisco.
If the victims are so indoctrinated that they ignore the approaches of someone who was a 'best friend' in the cult, how will they react if we show up at class? It might shake a few up, but I fear we'll just come off the worse for it, and the 'teachers' will have more fuel to decry former students as ingrates, out to harm Perfect, Conscious Sharon... and to warn their flock further off being influenced by the likes of evil, lost people like us. Hm.
Remember how little we were able to truly think for ourselves there? How would we have reacted if someone had done something like this? I've tried to ponder it. Maybe, maybe... towards the end of my time there, I might have listed a little, but it's doubtful. And before that... such an approach would have scared me, but I would have turned to the people I trusted to handle it, and felt lucky to be in the protection of such strong people. Sharon's lieutenants are put on pedestals only slightly lower than hers. Those who are fully submerged in Ganscult venerate them. Sadly, they will do what they are told.
I think our honest reflections and concern here on this blog do help. It helped me when I was finally ready to hear. But approaching those who aren't ready to hear may only chase them further into the clutches of the very people who are harming them.
Publicity, as Don suggests, seems to be the thing they fear the most. But how to approach that?
It's a confusing problem. I'm not sure what is the right thing to do, but I think we should proceed with care.
Just wasting time internet surfing and came across this article - couldn't help myself from snickering...
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/07/nyregion/07divorce.html
I'll highlight the paragraph that caught my attention:
"...five justices heard lawyers argue the appeal in Kaye v. Kaye, a bitter and hard-fought divorce and custody case. Well-known lawyers involved in custody cases filled some observers' chairs; OTHERS WERE FILLED BY SUPPORTERS OF THE MOTHER WHO FILED THE THE APPEAL, ILSA KAYE."
The mother of Ilsa Kaye is Sharon Gans. The chairs were filled with her supporters. Hmmm- I wonder who they were? And I wonder if they all came of their own initiative?
Snicker.
@ Anonymous 1/20/11 - Did you notice that Ilsa Kaye's lawyer was named Scott HORN? Does anyone know if HE is a relation?
Yes, I saw that too. Funny, eh?
Dear previous anonymouses:
While I appreciate any effort to throw Gans' psychopathic behavior into sharp relief, let's not stoop to sloppy misreadings of newspaper articles and misguided conjectures. The article says that other chairs were "filled by supporters of the mother who filed the appeal, Ilsa Kaye," not supporters of the mother of the mother who filed the appeal. There are enough actual examples of Gans' criminal and deplorable behavior that it isn't necessary to make stuff up.
For instance, I remember once, out at "the Ranch," Sharon absolutely lighting into and banishing some fairly new well-meaning student -- a really very sweet young woman with a serious case of low self-esteem. Sharon flatly stated that this young woman had "bad being" and therefore no possibilities. Not "flaws," not "weaknesses": bad being. i.e., no hope. I thought it was incredibly cruel at the time, and the "ideas" that Sharon invoked to obliterate this poor young woman didn't come from any "workbooks" I had read. But you know, you're conditioned to take everything on faith. A lower level can't see a higher level etc. Maybe so, but this idea becomes incredibly dangerous when the so-called "higher level" is nothing of the kind. It makes people go against their conscience, among other things.
And by the way, current students who may be reading this, that's HOW YOU CAN TELL that Gans is not the representative of a higher level. A higher level would NEVER make you go against your conscience. Think about it.
Dear Don,
I have to agree with Diogenes that storming the barricades will not stop Sharon and Robert, etc. It will, as Diogenes said, only serve to make the "intruders look like malcontents, and the phonies in front of the class look like stalwart defenders of civil liberties." As has been stated before here on this blog, those of us who are out of school and are actively trying to protest against Sharon are portrayed as "sour grapes" to those still in school.
Storming the barricades, in reality, probably gives them more fuel to use against us than it does for us to do anything constructive to help people.
Don't get me wrong, I would be as happy as anyone to see Sharon put out of business but given human nature as it is, I am not sure that is totally possible.
I have tried instead to concentrate on helping those people who are still imprisoned within school; our friends who being damaged, hurt and preyed upon.
For me, if there is such a thing as karma (and I believe there is), Sharon will get hers. What goes around comes around. I have the feeling that even now with all her money and power, she is a very miserable and unhappy human being. I do believe that Judgement (and Vengeance) belongs to God.
If I could figure out more ways to help people get out of school, that would be very satisfying for me. I would also like to be able to reach others who have been out of school for a long time and are still bound over to silence and not able to talk about it - they are still operating under "school" rules and still bound to Sharon by their silence.
There are so many people who have been hurt: psychologically, physically, financially, emotionally by Sharon who need help.
As we all know from our experience in school, you can't win an argument with a psychopath - so why even bother?
Ultimately, Sharon will drown in her own malevolence and hatred and she will do that all my herself. I want to find more ways to lend a hand to the others who are innocent so they don't go down with her...
Thank you anon for the perfect Sharon Gans story. I did not ever see her say something quite so
soul destroying to anyone. She must
have become progressively more evil
after I left.
Interestingly--Alex kept her in line. Once, in Montana, Sharon
claimed that the Lord's Prayer
was magical because the words
themselves picked up "magnetic"
power over the years--as if the words were supernatural entities.
Alex told her--in front of an entire
room of people--that this was the
stupidest thing he had ever heard,
and that it was irresponsible for
her to spout such nonsense.
He may have been a rapist and a
thief, but at least he kept his wife in line.
Yeah, the good old days died
with bloody bloody Alex Horn.
Has anyone ever tried "storming the barricades" since San Francisco? I sent copies of my post to Mindel & Taylor-Hodson - I hope to eventually hurt these businesses with the truth about the creeps who run them. I don't care about the "ideas", what happened in "classes" or anecdotes about Gans. I was part of most of the leveraged real estate deals built by slave labor from '91 to '98. I know of at least one 6 figure inheritance Gans conned a friend out of that went to the HVAF in Pawling.
Koch & Mindel are drunken empty shells. They have never dealt with an organized methodical campaign to out this cult to "students" in all the "cells" and Mindel/Taylor's clients.
Don--I have taken in all of what
you have to say.
I do not understand something.
Ganscult is not protected
by religious legal status
like Scientology.
If the issue is money--then it seems that Ganscult cannot hide as
a faith or a non-profit organization. Why can they not be sued? I think I know the fellow with the inheritance. Why doesn't
he sue to get his money back? If you are owed back wages--why don't you sue? Certainly this happens
often enough in ordinary business
deals. The Odonnel incedent proves
that Gans is a liar and a bigot.
That is public record. At this
point, there are enough people who
have been taken. A pattern of deception can be demonstrated.
You have people like Rick Ross to
testify in court about how
organizations like Ganscult rope
people in and takes them for what they are worth.
Unfortunately, I cannot help you there. I put in a lot of free time
for Alex on his plays--but I enjoyed it. I had some positive
experiences. I understand that the
group is a money-scam--and that it
fell to new lows under Sharon Gans
since the early 90's. Power corrupts and absolute power
corrupts absolutely. You can
depose David Kulko--who knows
everything. You can depose
Robert Klein--a businessman
who does not want trouble with the IRS. You can depose Joe Stillwell.
God knows what he has gotten his
hands dirty with. You need a good,
greedy lawyer.
The exodus continues. According to reliable sources, 29 individuals have left the two older NYC groups during the past three years -- 12 from the Monday/Wednesday group, and 17 from the Tuesday/Thursday group.
Any comments here about whether it would aid or harm anyone to list out the departed ones by FIRST NAME ONLY?
truth to power--
I don't know if I need to know any
names--I would like to know
what helped people to make
their decisions--
I was thrown out. I would like to know more from people who left
what their process was--
and, for example, did this
or some other blog help?
was there some event that was
so awful that the person just
had to leave?
are the ganscult people still
recruiting the young, or are they
dwindling down to the last
hangers-on?
According to reliable sources, the Copenhagen group was dissolved approximately three years ago.
Before that, Jan Morgensen had led the group for years. At Gans' instruction, he was displaced by Terry Christgau and Cynthia May, who flew from New York to Denmark to teach approximately 20 students on a regular basis.
A number of new mandates were laid down during the Chrisgau/May period: 1) That the group learn English and conduct their discussions in English, so that Gans could teach them. 2) That the group grow to 30 students through recruitment, before Gans would consider teaching there.
The Danish group had come to the US as a group on a number of occasions. During one such visit, they were hosted at the retreat complex in Pawling, NY. After that, individual Danish students visited the New York groups from time to time, and one (other than Morgensen) was invited to Montana for a number of years.
According to one of the Danish students, individuals in the Copenhagen group were forbidden to speak to each other after the dissolution. At least two took steps to emigrate to the US to join the New York groups.
According to reliable sources and public documents, the Hudson Valley Artists Foundation (HVAF) was established as a New York State not-for-profit corporation in April 1997 and dissolved in December 2009.
HVAF was set up as the "outward form" entity for the New York groups' upstate retreat activities. During its history, HVAF was nominally run by a rubber-stamp board of directors, but took its actual direction from Gans and her lieutenants.
According to tax returns, HVAF's major assets from 1997 until 2003 consisted of a 19-acre property in Pawling, NY that was purchased with student donations. Substantial building and improvements took place on the property until 2001, when general negative publicity about the Gans groups forced its abandonment as an active retreat facility. HVAF's efforts to use its not-for-profit status in order to win property-tax exemptions from the town of Pawling were a source of ongoing tension with the local authorities, and were unsuccessful.
According to public documents, the Pawling property was sold for $1.46 million in May 2003. From that point onward until its dissolution, HVAF's principal assets consisted of the funds remaining from this sale.
According to tax filings, the monetary assets remained intact until 2006, when annual HVAF grants were made to Kaatsbaan Dance Company and the Rhinebeck Center for the Performing Arts. (Foundations are subject to IRS and NYS rules that set percentages of their assets be distributed each year.) In 2008, HVAF filed for dissolution with New York State authorities, and four large grants were made to Hudson valley area arts organizations (MacDowell Colony, Arts Student League of New York, Kaatsbaan Dance, and Rhinebeck Center for the Performing Arts) under a court-approved dissolution plan.
According to reliable sources, the New York groups eventually followed the example set by their Boston counterparts, in using a private property for retreat functions. A former hunting preserve in Putnam County called "The Farm" was purchased by a student in 2005 or 2006, and redeveloped for use as both a country residence and a facility for monthly retreats.
I am so happy to hear that more and more people are getting out. I was in the Monday/Wednesday group. I would love to know who is out, but I don't think it's right to put names up here without permission. However, I would like to say to anyone who has left:
I was in M/W from late 2007 until summer of 2009 and in the 'younger class' before that. If you want to talk, Ashiata Shiemash knows how to contact me. I would love to hear from you.
I have been away for a while and have missed a lot of these posts. I think the question of how to reach our friends in a positive and helpful way is tricky, but an important conversation to have. I know that when I was hypnotized, I couldn't have heard anyone, no matter how much sense they made.
Truth2Power, thank you for your posts. It's very heartening news to hear that so many are finding their way out.
I’m curious to know how many students are left in the Boston and New York groups, and how they’re doing at recruiting and retaining new students.
When I was in the Boston group, it seemed like the peak of enrollment was approximately 80 in the older class and 40 in the younger class. Robert didn’t have the being to maintain an older class of 80 students and that number shrunk to the mid 50’s before I left about 4 years ago. I’m sure those numbers have dwindled considerably since then. There was a mass exodus of students around the time I left, and I hear it’s harder to attract new students, too.
It seems to me that School is a dying proposition, and it’s being propped up by diehard older students that are so indoctrinated that they can’t imagine living their lives without it. When School eventually falls, I wonder what will happen to them? It seems like they will be like lost sheep with no sense of direction or purpose. I hope they feel they can reach out to us, that all of us former students can relate to what they’ve been through and want to help and support them.
Best wishes to everyone, may you honor the divine within you ~
Truth2PowerI,
You can only list the "departed" here if you have their permission.
I suspect that if people want to make their name public, they would do it themselves...
Thanks to all who participate in this ongoing conversation. Without judgment or personal criticism I would like to note that the ongoing use of the terms "School", "teachers" and "students" by posters is a evidence of the depth and persistence of the hypnosis. It took me years to realize I was in a textbook definition cult lead by a psychopath. I was a cult member from 1989 until November 1998 when I was ejected for being nuttier than the cult leaders!
I stopped drinking in January of 1990, intermittently attended a 12 step fellowship while in the cult & have been an active member of this fellowship since leaving. One of the fundamental tenants of this program is "principles before personalities". Every cult - Gans' even some misguided 12 step groups - is based on "personalities misusing principles".
Publicity about abuse of cult members (and their children) forced Gans, Mindel and others to flee like rats from California. See Rick Ross:
http://www.rickross.com/reference/theater/theater1.html
Gans has so much stolen cash that she probably won't run this time - but her lackeys like Mindel and Taylor might.
Don--
I agree that the continued use
of words like "teacher" and
"school" with respect to Ganscult
and its hired thugs shows
residual effects of indoctrination.
On the other hand, many people
stay in cults because they like
being part of a community, no matter what the cost. I think that
this, rather than "hypnotism"
is the draw for Ganscult.
Like Scientology and Seventh Day
Adventisism, you have a ready-made
belief system and a group of
friends--who can often become
bedtime companions. More fun than
dating on the internet!
People have to want freedom more
than the comforts of a cult--
just like, in AA, they have to want to be
sober and healthy more than they desire
the pleasures of drink.
I think it is more a question
of conscience and wishing to
break through self-deception
rather than hypnotism.
I think that people have a right
to sit around a room and spout
nonsense at each other if they wish to.
I have no doubt that your labor
was stolen by Ganscult. That is
what they do. They have been
publicly discredited several
times. Why don't you sue?
Don,
I agree with you that the terms “school”, “teacher” and “student” are problematic. But, I think that the cure may be worse than the disease. For better or worse, those are the terms we all know. What would you like to replace them with?
Instead of “teacher” - perhaps thief, brainwasher or spiritual rapist?
Instead of “school” - perhaps cult, herd of sheep or group?
Instead of “student” - perhaps dupe, mark or victim?
All of these would be accurate in varying degrees, but most seem both awkward and unnecessarily hurtful. In addition, speaking plainly might lay someone open to lawsuits for libel. While we all know the truth about the things of which we speak, let us not kid ourselves that we could prove that truth in a court of law.
Personally, I think that it is simpler and possibly best to keep using the old terms, while putting them in quotation marks to indicate that we know what we really mean. The only exception I might make is to use the word “cult”, although even that is not quite accurate. A perhaps better term that is in use among people who study this phenomenon is “High Demand Group”, but again, that is awkward to use in a conversation, so I think “cult” is simplest.
It is a cult, and that is what I call it. To call it a school continues to keep me in the false and destructive place I was held for over 6 years. Calling it what it is is both difficult and healing. Difficult because no one wants to believe we were members of a cult, and healing because we WERE. Also, like Don, I cannot continue to use the words 'teacher' or 'student' unless they are in quotes in a situation where there is nothing else to use without being cruel to other victims of the travesty. Words matter. While I don't think it's helpful to be abusive or cruel, it's also not helpful to perpetuate the lie. For me, it has to be a cult.
Samwise Gamgee--
Why so delicate about the Sharon
Gans cult? It differs from other
cults only in its eclecticism.
It borrows indoctrination techniques from Scientology and
the evangelicals. It gets ideology
from Ouspensky. It gets methods of
group cohesion from AA. It models
its cult of personality on Jim
Jones and others. It gets a
unique personal flavor from the
swinging sixties. It appeals to
brainy New Yorkers and bookish
Bostonians by wielding every other
text in the spiritual supermarket.
All mysteries can be explained by
the accumulation of cash and real
estate. Human carnage is ignored.
The people who sit in front of
Ganscult and take money from
its members are public figures
and fair game. Who are they going
to sue? Lawsuits will blow up in their faces. What if people came
forward and testified about racism
and personal manipulation and
the laundering of cash money?
The cult has already been publicly
exposed at least twice--San Francisco and Rosie O'Donnel.
Maybe Sharon's silence about
her knowledge of Horn's sexual
abuses will be exposed. Maybe she
would be in a situation of having
to perjure herslef--in fact, all
off the cult-group leaders would
be in that position. Why do you think they are so paranoid?
They know about rape and money
laundering.
Don,
I share this memory affectionately: I remember you as having developed a repertory of humor about the forced-labor situation. In one instance,you called yourself a charter member of the "Thank God It's Monday" club!
Thank you for the feedback, Diogenes, Cassandra and anonymous. I will not list first names of departees. My sources correct my numbers, however. It's a total of 12 individuals who've left the Monday/Wednesday group (two returned, and one of those two left again), and 20 who have left the Tuesday/Thursday New York group. All during the past three years.
I think it’s important to remember that the people contributing to this forum have a broad range of perspectives. Some people were in the group for a year, several years, even several decades; and some have been out for a week, a year, several years, even longer. Everyone is at a different stage in their healing process, and that is why the language used varies so much, and it’s a good thing.
More significantly, I think we need to consider who’s reading this forum. Again, it’s the same diverse audience as those who contribute to it, plus the important addition of many current “students” who check out this blog now and then. I consider this to be the primary audience that I’m writing for, and I think words like “cult”, “brainwashing”, “psychopath”, etc. are off-putting to these current “students”. When I was still in the group and occasionally looking at the Rick Ross website, words like “cult” came off as too extreme and hard to believe. For me, they strengthened the “sour grapes” argument that’s put forth by Robert and Sharon to counteract and undermine the effects that this website and others.
My story is that I was in the group for 20 plus years, since my mid 20’s. I feel I lost two or three decades of my life, thanks to the so-called “help” of “School”. I would have made different choices along the way, and in retrospect I think they would have been better choices than what I was “helped” into. School had a detrimental impact on my life emotionally, spiritually, and financially. I see clearly the many psychologically manipulative tactics the “teachers” use to control and people, the enormous amount of lying and deceit that goes on from Day 1 of one’s involvement in School. I have done the math on how much money I have handed over to them, and I am acutely aware of the many hours of time and energy I invested in this faux “school of inner development”. Like Don, I also have a former spouse who’s still in the group, which means I went through a School divorce just like he did. I‘ve been out of the group for 4 years now, and I am still recovering, successfully I must add! At this point, there’s ABSOLUTELY NO DOUBT in my mind that the group is a cult.
Yet, when I write, I still use the words “School”, “teachers”, and “students”. I do this because I am writing primarily to my former spouse and my friends that are still caught up in School. I want to appeal to them in a language that they can understand and take in. I try to encourage them to think for themselves, to start to question what they see going on in class every Tuesday and Thursday night, to begin to listen to their own inner voices. If words like “School” or “teacher” offend some of the former students reading this forum, too bad. In my mind, the former students are in the sweeter place, they’ve escaped the grip of “School” and they can deal with words that seem loaded to them. The language that I write in is a deliberate choice on my part.
And I think Don and others should write in the best language for themselves, there’s a place in mix of voices on this blog for everyone. They're all legitimate voices and points of view. We are all trying to make sense of the “School” experience, and each voice matters. The biggest strength of this blog is this diversity of voices, which stands in sharp contrast to the party line of School.
To the various anonymi -PLEASE at least use a friggin' alias for dialogues sake. Anyhoo thanks for the reminder re TGIM.
Diogenes - the "comforts" of the cult are a bait & switch - once the hook is set there is very little freedom of choice. I feel that "suing" would be a waste of time & money - this may be cynical but Gans' pockets are much deeper than mine. I believe that a small group of escapees publicly disseminating information - to "classes" & clients of Taylor & Mindel - will have an impact. What do we have to lose but a few hours?
attn. moderator: I have tried to subscribe to this thread to no avail - Help!
River of Joy:
Thank you for your perspective. I think you have really articulated well the facts about this sort of forum. We are all at different points in our own recovery, and we are concerned about those whom we left behind.
I'm always trying to balance respecting where people are if they don't want to leave and also trying to help break the spell that we all remember - the spell that holds us while we are 'in.'
I struggle with language. The jargon of 'school' is something we all still recognize on this forum, and so is easy to fall into - yet I also resist it as something that keeps me tied to what I consider a destructive organization that touts itself as something it is not.
Your post reminded me - this blog is not only for my own recovery, but to serve those who are still in - many confused and perhaps feeling a pull to leave, but afraid to take the leap. Language that helps anyone break the bonds of servitude to a false, cruel and destructive organization is worth the discomfort it causes me.
I am happy to hear of some people out of the NYC classes. I was in M/W and welcome anyone who has left or is considering leaving.
Breaking this tie was the best thing I've done. While recovering from what was a harmful influence on my life hasn't been easy, the effort has been worth it.
I send the warmest thoughts to everyone who is on a like journey or who is contemplating leaving. I have yet to speak to one person who has left and regretted it.
Amazed & Grateful says:
Why did I choose this name? Amazed that the Ganscult is the f-ed up con game that it is, that I spent 10 years fearfully attached, that I got out naively -- I actually felt I just "couldn't keep up." I didn't realize the extent of the corruption until I was long gone.
Grateful that I didn't marry into it, give a child away, hand over every last dime....although I gave all extra and still have no financial security and am struggling to survive every day with 2 children. Grateful that I didn't completely lose my mind trying to understand "growing my being", trying to please or even understand what the criteria was for evolving. There were many times then and since that if someone asked me to sign on the bottom line of a mental hospital, I would have done it. There have been many fantasies of "permanently escaping" the blame and shame for the damage done, the mess I'm in, the deprivation that my children now have.
So I could also add: Bitter. I could easily call myself Amazed, Grateful, and Still Bitter. Because it's not easy out here at all. What's gone, though, is the fantasy that "school" will take care of you somehow. That's a false security, but keeps you hopeful.
It's frightening to have that fantasy shattered. So it hurts, but it's closer to the truth -- no one will take care of us -- really -- we have to look out for ourselves.
I should send the grocery, diaper, and daycare bills to Sharon and Robert see what happens.
A-holes.
Amazed and greatful--
thank you for your comment.
we get drawn in because we think
somebody cares--then we find out
that nobody cares. it hurts
in a way that cannot be
described.
there are people who do not leave
because they do not want to face
this
Amazed & Grateful,
I feel the pain of your situation. I share many of your feelings, not the least of which is a sense of shame for having allowed myself to be so used, so sucked in and held fast by wicked charlatans. The shame runs deep, and mingles with the anger and bitterness - and the gratitude for being out. It's a tumultuous place to be, and Diogenes states it well: we wanted to believe someone cares.
I think there are people caught in the lies who actually do care. Not the 'inner circle' so-called teachers, but some of the other victims. I know when I was there, I cared - truly cared - for many of the people I met there.
I still do. I ache for what is being bled from them now - the ones who have money or skills and talents to be exploited. The ones who just linger, year after year, lost and afraid to let go.
I think it's important what you say: to realize that the idea of 'school' taking care of us really was a fantasy. We felt part of a privileged, connected group that looked out for us and helped us make our lives and the world better. It was the other way around - we were supporting 'school' and keeping it alive. And to realize that, and not be a part of it anymore, is indeed something for which to be grateful.
But that doesn't change your struggles, and I think you would have to be super human not to be bitter. I wish you only the best, and I wish there were a way for all of us to get back what we lost: our time, our money and our trust.
It's particularly corrupt, what Sharon, Robert, Fred, Terry, Mary and the others do, because they capitalize on what is best in us: our desire to be better than we are and our willingness to take a leap of faith and trust in order to achieve that. They take that wish, and use it for personal gain. It's hideous. Where are their consciences?
I can't get the years back. But the thousands of dollars would certainly help. Anyone know a good lawyer?
I think its criminal how Alex and Sharon exploited our deepest spiritual aspirations, the truest and most sincere parts of ourselves. Even more disturbing is to see the effect of their actions over time. For instance, students who came to School the same time I did are now teachers. Over time, they too were used for their money, time and energy and were systematically taught to stop listening to their true inner voices, which essentially cuts them off from Conscience. Over time, they, too, became bullies and manipulators, all in the name of “the Work”. It’s a systematical form of corruption. It’s really quite hideous, when you think of the damage it does to their souls. Over time, they become so disconnected from their real hearts and souls that it makes sense in their distorted reasoning to “help” someone give up a class, or a job, or a girlfriend, or even a child that might prevent a trusting student from full involvement in School. The teachers started out as sincere and trusting students, and end up as exploiters themselves with a big streak of arrogance and superiority thrown in. Their beings have changed, but not for the better; they certainly haven’t grown their love or compassion or wisdom.
Cassandra, I think you are right; many students are sincere and care about each other. I think School systematically twists our longings for connection and community to be used for their own objectives. One objective is to keep students in class no matter what, even if it’s detrimental to their own careers, lives, or lives of their loved ones. How many times have you seen students pressured to forgo Graduate School, night classes, job promotions that would take you out of state, outside boyfriends, girlfriends, spouses who “don’t support your evolution”? Extreme pressure is put on those who spend too much time out of state with a dying parent, or too much time with their young children instead of School classes and activities. If you’re still in School, please, please question the motives of any “help” from teachers!
I think it’s all the lying and deceit that goes on in School that disconnects us from the truest parts of our Selves. That and how we were taught to discount our doubts and misgivings about School because School cleverly lumps them into the category “Denying Force, something to be struggled with” But what if all those doubts, concerns and fears were actually your truest perceptions and highest wisdom? What then? What if you’re 60 or 70 and alone, and you look back and realize you broke up with the Love of Your Life based on “help” from a "teacher" instead of your own deepest emotions, or passed on the job or schooling would have catapulted your career, or neglected your young children so much they can’t function as responsible adults? What if you have to work until you’re 80 because you didn’t save for retirement? At that age, you can’t undo what’s already been done.
And what if you’ve risen up the ranks and you’ve become a so called “teacher”, how do you live with what you have done, the harm you’ve inflicted on so many people’s lives? Maybe daughters needed to be with the mothers dying of cancer, or the children needed more time with their parents and less time with babysitters and nannies. Maybe students needed more time devoted to careers and relationships and less time on recruiting, lecture series, contruction projects, and Christmas parties. And then there’s the money side of things - the lack of savings, the preponderance of debt among students, did it ever occur to you money problems may have nothing to do with “being weaknesses” and more to students monthly expenditure of time and money to Gans & Co?
Teachers and students alike are some of the most brilliant and talented people I know. It’s such an enormous shame that they have lost the ability to perceive, reason and feel for themselves. It’s my sincere wish that they find their way and reconnect with their truest and sweetest Selves.
Somewhere--Nicoll in his Commentaries says that the desire
to be a monarch on a throne surrounded with slaves
suggests the MOST PRIMITIVE
form of human psychology.
Can someone find the quote?
I think that Tom Cruise and
Sharon Gans should stop
fooling around and get it
over with.
Free labor for Tom Cruise's
motorcycle repairs! And why not?
Doesn't he deserve it? After all,
Jesus was only a low-level-clear,
according to Scientology.
Tom Cruise has advanced beyond that
stage. And so, no doubt has
Sharon Gans. Free labor for
Sharon's renovations? Of course!
After all, she's in no shape to
ride a motorcycle.
The recent NEW YORKER article reveals a host of techniques for
mind control in which Sharon
Gans and Scientology are completely
similar. No wonder she hired
Eric Lieberman--Scientology's
lawyer--to try to close down
this blog and the Rick Ross site.
And yet--it was over 30 years ago
that the famous author William
Burroughs exposed Scientology
in an article in ROLLING STONE.
He claimed that he had been
harrassed and threatened after
he broke ties with the cult.
He was not some crank--he was one
of the most respected writers of
the 20th Century. He had as much
or more credibility than
the NEW YORKER. And yet Scientology
endures. And so does Gans--even after her son, David Kulko,
renounced her in front of a class.
Even after she was shown the door
by her celebrity friend, Rosie
O'Donnel.
Interestingly--the exposure of
Scientology in the NEW YORKER
also begins over gay issues.
A successful writer leaves
Scientology because of the treatment of his gay daughter.
He had more humanity than Sharon--
who rejected her son and accused
him of being crazy.
David Kulko--why don't you write
a bestseller--it will have everything--forced labor, rape,
suicide, celebrities, Broadway,
all-American spiritualism,
alcoholism, child abuse, cash
laundering, bigotry, secret societies...in the movie, Nicholas
Cage could play David, George Clooney could play Robert Klein,
Jeff Bridges could play Alex
and Meryl Streep could play Sharon.
Or, maybe Kathy Bates.
Oh Kathy Bates, definitely. Perfect, especially with that violent streak from the character she played in Misery.
I highly recommend the article on Scientology in this week's New Yorker. Our "high demand group" was not so large, public, or well-organized, but many things ring true. The free reference to Scientology's special vocabulary made me realize how odd "our" special vocabulary must sound to outsiders.
Truth2Power-
I like your idea of at least listing the numbers of people who have left school. I think the names might be an invasion of privacy but I will say that of the people who I know who have left school in the past few years (I know there are others that I have not been in contact with):
There are 30 from the "Older" class in Boston and 16 from the "Younger" class.
I know that students who are currently in school think we have just "disappeared" but we haven't !!
We have no interst in shunning you as you have shunned us.
Thank you DefenseAgainstEvil for your point about posting the number of individuals who have left.
I have not heard of a case where the decision to leave was easy. (In my own case, it took 27 months from first seriously considering an exit to the actual departure.) So knowing that others who I respect and care for have made a similar decision eases the self-doubt and lessens the impact of those "Am-I-crazy-for-even-thinking-about-this?" moments.
So, to recap, in Boston, 30 have left the "older" group, and 16 have left the "younger" group. In New York, 12 have left the Mon/Wed group, and 19 have left the Tues/Thurs group, within the past three years.
After deliberate consultation with some people who contribute to this site, I have decided to post a list of the individuals who have left the New York groups in the past three years.
In my conversations with people since leaving, one of the things people are most interested in what has become of their friends. Someone, for example, who they helped join the group. Or someone who moved to another group. Or someone with whom they shared a line of work for a period of time. Or simply someone who they were deeply connected with, and whose status -- actively involved or departed -- is unknown.
It seems to me that such a list sheds a different kind of "light" on the entity of which we were once a part. First names are ONLY meaningful to those who already know who these individuals are. That is, to individuals once in school or currently in school. "Jack" is a fairly common first name, for example, and if people are concerned about their names being Googled and thus associated with this group, a first-name only keyword search is going to produce a very wide net.
So, departed from the Mon/Wed New York group, in the past three years (alpha order): Casey (came back and left again), Charles, Chris (came back), Colette, Enid, Greg, Helene, Jill, Lanie, Lili, Richard, Ron, Terry.
From the Tues/Thurs group (alpha order): Adam, Al, Cheryl, Christine, Dara, David, Eric, Faith, Jay, Josh, Katie, Kevin, Leslie, Linda, Matthew, Michael, Spencer, Steve, Suzanne.
Truth2Power,
I was one who was reticent to suggest posting names without people's permission. However, as I look at this list I admit my heart is warmed to see some that have made it out (and I'm on there - and I find myself not bothered by it). I'm sad to see things like people going BACK after being out, but hoping for the best for them and all our other friends.
I admit to also feeling sadness that some names I would hope would be on there are not. And surprise at some that are. Some of these were very deeply involved and it's a surprise - and a happy one - to see them break their ties.
I wish everyone the best in our individual journeys through the morass of making sense of this experience, and I hope that our other friends soon find their way out of this destructive organization.
On the other post, anon lists
a Time Out NY article WOULD
YOU DRINK THE KOOLAID?
June 14, 2006. It names Sharon
Gans and Alex Horn right up
there in a short list of
dangerous loonies. Very hip little
article. Ganscult's worst nightmare.
And yet, did it do that much damage? I hope that it caused at
least someone to listen to their
second thoughts.
At this point, everything anyone
needs to know about Gans is
on this site, the Rick Ross site,
or the well-done new blog with
its concise essay about the Ganscult technique. The only thing that would add to it would be new specific testimony of manipulation
and abuse and theft--naming names.
There is very good post by a relative newcomer to the blog at the very bottom of the oldest estoricfreedom post on the home page, about daycare and being "claimed" by an older student, and the seductive power of feeling "close" to Sharon.
From our "Power-of-Paranoia" corespondent:
Today, the accidental mis-typing of the url for this blog (blogPOT instead of blogSPOT)produced a whole new web experience, about travel to the Holy Land, leading this correspondent to believe that the "esotericfreedom" blogspot site had been hijacked!
Thanks for posting the folks that have left recently...finally and thank goodness I say for some of the ones I recognize. One man in particular hopefully will reconnect with his children who are now grown but it's never too late. He has been too busy to see them for 20 some odd years. Neglecting his own children while under some ilusion that they are low priority with what HE is doing...like the Christmas class or being out most nights or when at home sleeping and zoning out to keep up. I count on the Work and it's justice for us all in the long run!
Responding to the posts about Alex and his having sex with women in "school." When I was a "student" in San Francsico in the mid 70s, Sharon left town one period. She came to me and said that Alex would arrange to have sex with some of the women while she was away. If he did, she did not want us to tell her about it. I was one of those whom Alex visited. In the most unapetizing way he climbed into bed and offered his dick. I found him totally unappealing (he had a big fat hairy belly too). At which point he explained to me that I was clearly cold and unable to function sexually (or some such). In other words, the fact that he didn't interest me was because of my sexual failings. I can't remember my specific reaction to that at the time, but it certainly did not help me. All throughout my time in school I was surpressing rather than celebrating my variable location on the spectrum of sexual expression. Any sort of deviation from heteronormative sexuality was severely quashed. Gay women had to go straight and I don't remember gay men being in school at all. This more than anything else from that time has had a deep effect upon me. Only 30 years later, and in the past few months, have I totally come out to myself and to some others as queer.
Just to be clear about my earlier comment - when I said "gay women had to go straight", I meant that in order to stay in school, gay women were complelled to surpress expression of their honest sexuality.
Really interesting comment from Corboy on the Rick Ross site about Gurdjieff's use of hypnotism:
http://forum.rickross.com/read.php?6,27083,98053#msg-98053
Excerpt:
"Oupsenksy may have been on to something--partly--when he said in despair at the end of his life that there was no Fourth Way 'system'.
But what Ouspensky may have failed to pick up on was that the ideas, the notions about ray of creation, magnetic center, man one through seven, Sarmoun, the Yezdis, were not the point.
The so called system was packing material, something to occupy people's attention, while the confusion and erratic behavior of the teacher was inducing trance.
And if the students were living in trance, that may well account for why each person described Gurdjieff in different ways and why it was seemingly impossible to get a fix on him."
I have twice tried to post a comment in response to the posts about Alex and his having sex with women in "school." It appears that the comment is being surpressed but I'm not sure why. In any event it is not showing up on the blog comment. Ashiata, can you see if it got stuck in the spam filter?
sanfrancisco,
I'm so sorry about that...
Thank you so much for the courage to speak up about Alex's and Sharon's predatory sexual nature. You were not the only one...
No problem, Ashiata. Thank you!
I will add that the teaching about male/female polarity which was promulgated stuck in my psyche even 20 years after I left "school." (Note: I was in/out of school for 20 years before I left - so it's been 40 years since I first encounterd Gancult). I have had to reeducate myself and reintroduce myself to myself and others. The process is not complete, but I'm happily working at it.
Thank you sanfrancisco
Horn's behavior is one side of the
story. But what about Sharon's
complicity? Sharon held the
women in her groups in complete
contempt, without regard for
their lives or their well-being.
She stayed with him because, for a while, he was a good cash-draw.
The Ganscult causes the most damage
to women--and Sharon is the fountain of pain.
how are people recruited for this cult in NY ? I want to be on the lookout...!
Anonymous of March 9,
Typically "older" students (those who have been in the cult for a while) are sent out to befriend unsuspecting targets. Sometimes, they are asked to bring their own friends, and sometimes they are asked to go out and try to meet people for the sole purpose of bringing them to the cult, which they call "School." They will not mention "School" to a potential recruit, ever. They will approach you as though they are just chatting you up about something they are interested in and passionate about, or a perceived shared interest. Then they will spin the conversation in the direction of the spiritual and question you a lot about your perceptions and life.
They go to parks, bars, museums, lectures, or just talk to people in elevators, food carts and banks. They have "aims" to speak to so many people per week when this "work" is going on.
They will throw odd questions at their target or strike up a conversation and then spin the subject to things like how one finds meaning in life, or what is your biggest aspiration or talk about religion, spirituality or philosophy, etc.
They will quickly try to ensure that the target isn't involved with or does not work for the media, police, or other organizations that might be a threat to the secrecy and corruption in the group. So they may ask about your work, where you live, etc, to try to find answers to these questions.
They will go back to the group and discuss people they have met, whether they have managed to get follow up contact information, etc. Sometimes, a target is invited to a "talk," "presentation," "lecture" or "event." The subject matter might be something about sacred architecture, the great cathedrals, Egypt, transfiguration, alchemy, etc. They will go with the target to the event, where others will attempt to collect contact information.
Other times, if the target is a promising recruit, they are eventually brought to "meet a friend" of the recruiting student, where they will be asked questions about what they wish for, what their life is like, whether they feel like something is missing, etc. There will be an attempt to assess whether they are in a relationship or married, whether they have children, where they work and how much money they make. ($60K is the minimum unless there are extenuating circumstances, i.e., something else the recruit has that the cult can use - like a skill or connection. Remember, this cult has to support the very lavish lifestyle of its leader, though students aren't to know that.)
If the recruit is deemed a good candidate, they are brought to a four week experiment at a "book club," "study group," or some other name.
They will be treated kindly, supported, encouraged to get out into life, make aims for their lives and expand their world. They will be taught how to make useful efforts towards things they want, and they will study works that are inspiring and clothed in secrecy. They will eventually be led to believe that they are a part of an Esoteric School with ties back to the great schools of antiquity. (This is a lie.)
In most cases, their lives will get significantly more meaningful, successful and joyful. For a while. Then the sort of abuses you have read about here begin.
If you wish to avoid all this, I would say that if someone approaches you in the above manner, maybe you can look them in the eye and say, "I'm very interested in __________ (whatever you are talking about). I just want to make sure that I don't get mixed up in a dangerous cult I've heard about, run by a woman called Sharon Gans. This doesn't have anything to do with her, does it?" I assure you that if you watch them carefully, they won't be able to prevent the moment of shock and sputtering before they come up with a pithy reply.
Cassandra ~
PERFECT! I love your discription of the recruiting process and the suggested reply for potential new recruits.
Are the "teachers" getting money out of this or does it all just funnel up to Gans ? Why hasn't anybody notified the authorities of the money laundering, potential tax evasion issues etc?
It's all cash....remember no checks.
They took some checks. I wrote checks and have the bank account proof. Checks were written to OSG in my time. I don't know the process of who handles bank accounts, etc. I was not in that "inner circle." I did give cash sometimes, but tuition was usually a check.
They take cash and checks. They take,stocks, bonds, securities, whatever you want to give them really.
The teachers get a cut but it's not a big cut - maybe a couple of hundred a month and then they are also asked to give so it kind of wipes away any profit they might get.
Sharon also gets a cut on all of the businesses associated with school: Taylor Hodson, Kathleen's kleenex box business, Dial-A-Mattress, most likely also Joe's corporate takeovers, etc.
PLEASE, if you know where any of the skeletons are buried (or even if you don't) call and write the IRS, write your local congress person and senator, call the Better Business Bureau, call the NY Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe, the National Enquirer, call or write the CIA, the FBI, the KGB...
To arms comrades!
Don't just say: "Why hasn't anybody notified the authorities of the money laundering, potential tax evasion issues etc?" DO IT!
If everybody calls and writes and protests then maybe we will get somewhere. I have written to the IRS but one letter is not enough.
I think also that compared to groups like Scientology or the Moonies, Sharon is just small potatoes, a Mom and Pop operation that is just not big enough. They like keeping themselves off the radar. They don't like publicity but we should give it to them.
Fight back!
Viva la Revolution!
ps I always copy my comment before I try to submit because I always seem to loose it in the process...
(originally posted 3/1/11, 6:39pm)
Responding to "SanFrancisco":
The same was also true for gay men, only more harshly. There could be no open expression, of either action or wish.
I am now an openly homosexual man who was affiliated with the Gans/Klein group for many years. When I met 'school,' I longed to be heterosexual, and not purely from some reflexive self-hatred. I believed in my heart that I was being deprived, not by genetics but rather by upbringing, of my birthright as a man: the glories of more than half the human race (i.e. women).
To me, the subtle and sophisticated ideas about human sexuality, manhood, womanhood, and the eternal polarity of the sexes -- as expressed in the Gurdjieff system, were powerful and deeply moving.
I was under no illusion that there could be any "quick fixes," nor did any teacher in the Gans/Klein group (most of whom knew of my "issue") ever suggest that to me. Instead, the idea that certain things "could not be approached directly" (such as sexuality) made great sense to me. And so the hours of physical labor, the non-sexualized company of other men, the general emphasis on traditional male and female "roles," and the usually-upheld standards of "non-expression of negative emotions" (meaning, say, expressions such as "faggot") were, I thought, nearly ideal conditions in which to "work on myself."
Importantly, I very much wanted to evolve, and if "this" was in the way of that evolution, then it was worth contending with. So I thought for many years.
I was intuitively aware of several other men (and one woman) in both the Boston and New York groups who struggled with the same questions; we NEVER discussed it with each other, and classwork on the subject was out of the question. So it was a private path to hoe, one made somewhat easier when taken under the idea of "conscious labor and intentional suffering."
Many of these men I refer to got married; some had children; some got married and got divorced. Others, such as myself, eventually left school and "came out." Even now, though I am much happier, I in no way feel that I was in some sort of quasi-religious "ex-gay" camp of the kind that sends many gay men and women into a fury.
This is a subject that doesn't get discussed much, so I'd welcome any other thoughtful contributions on the subject.
(originally posted 3/1/11. 6:48 pm)
Responding to "SanFrancisco" (3/1/11, 8:21 am):
The subject you raise -- of institutionalized sexual predation in the Gans/Klein groups -- is an important one, confirmed for me partly by personal experience but also by many conversations with individuals who have left the Gans/Klein group. So keep posting.
(originally posted 1/12/11, 4:01pm)
Part 1
My name is Don Raskopf 917-658-4492 donr@remodelingcoach.net. I post ALL of my personal information here & RR because I have NOTHING to fear from vampires & leeches. I use full names of those I have known personally for over 2 decades because LIGHT is a disinfectant - an antidote to secrecy & mind-control. I was recruited into this cult - THIS IS A CULT NOT A SCHOOL - by my then girlfriend Julie Hodson (co-founder of Taylor-Hodson). I was manipulated into paying thousands of dollars and thousands of hours of slave labor annually for years. I was seduced into building (with many friends)FOR FREE the following homes & businesses - many sold at huge profit to Gans (I have many photo's I would love to post - AS let me know how):
Taylor-Hodson's first office in Waterside Plaza
Fred Mindel's house in Lake Hopatcong
Terry Christgau's house near Mindel's
Fred Mindel & Minerva Taylor's illegally joined adjacent apartment's in Waterside Plaza
Mindel's "doctor's" office Suite 505, 133 East 58th Street
Gans & Horn's previous apartment 59 West 12th Street, Apt. 11A/G, New York, NY
Montana - Falls Creek Ranch, Kauffman Road, Condon, Montana
Ilsa (Gan's daughter) Kaye's brownstone - 6 East 10th Street, New York, New York
Pawling - see details under real estate link on Esoteric Freedom main page
dozens of other projects.
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