Embedded Files
Critique: Empowerment as Related to Training in Power
The following relates directly to Training in Power with personal examples. It offers a degree of reality checking as to what contributes to the process of empowerment and what does not. The areas discussed have to do with major issues in Training in Power:
Dependency
Emotional Manipulation
Authoritarianism
Sacred Trust
Accountability
Healthy Spiritual Development
Summary
Dependency
It is vital for teachers and leaders to be aware of the following well known levels of emotional dependency. A teaching system would recognize these stages and design a structure to encourage independence and emotional growth.
Those who are the most emotionally dependent absorb information unquestionably and may adopt other’s beliefs as their own, as their truth. They follow the rules of these beliefs when dealing with any situation and are very susceptible to the basic emotional manipulations of guilt, fear and pride. They are child like, trusting and loyal to authoritarian control. If they are under malevolent authoritarian control, they will enact acts of violence in the name of their belief or leader. Ego is easily hurt and can be very well defended. Harsh treatment here creates more dependence.
There are those who are more aware but in their attempts at autonomy they are likely to override their own feelings if challenged by authority. They may dare to speak their truth, but can be convinced they are not correct by emotional manipulation and blame themselves. Their ego is still vulnerable to guilt, fear and pride. They are influenced by flattery, approval/disapproval and the need to belong. They are loyal and work hard for the group and will take on the personality of a trusted authoritarian leader, in words and actions, but are more aware of their actions and responsibility to others. Again, harsh treatment or use of emotional guilt or fear creates continued dependence.
Those who are fairly independent and intellectual are more aware in their emotional health and their quest for correctness. They have more self trust, their ability to be effective still depends on their level of need for approval and belonging. Their decision making process includes more universal principles and they are likely to speak up and try to be diplomatic in effecting change.
Their intellectual nature combines with the emotional to create a vulnerability to belief systems and causes. As long as they believe, they are loyal. They can be fickle, thus more likely to draw a line if things don’t go according to their beliefs. Pride and flattery work best to control here. Harsh treatment will drive them away.
The next phase of awareness involves people who speak freely, trust themselves and are not influenced by emotional appeal. They are humanitarian in nature, seek truth and will support others to do the same. They quickly tune in to emotional control and will not tolerate or have an interest in participating in any structure that is not egalitarian in nature.
In working with people in the training I experienced many in the first two categories, as could be expected in a training to take people to their power. What I realized is that although there are several in the third category, there are none in the fourth. This fits with my experience in the last few years that those who could not be controlled, manipulated and submissive to leadership have left. If this system is meant to train people to their power, one would expect that with the many years this training has been in operations there would be more participating from the 3rd and 4th category.
Emotional dependence is trusting that leadership knows best even if you feel differently. It is allowing yourself to be shamed or raged at, and rationalizing that it is somehow good for you. It is saying the truth to your friend but being in fear to speak up to leadership about it, knowing that you will be at risk of attack. The ego develops rationalizations as a coping response to manipulative behavior, and these rationalizations keep denial alive. The difference between ego and true power is critical to understand for every student, leader and humanitarian. But the huge dilemma is that emotionally wounded people cannot see this difference.
Emotional Manipulation
Students have asked me if they will lose vibration if they do not go to Level Vl. An even higher level asked me recently if the “battles” were real. I was told twice that I would lose my soul if I left. At first I accepted this as a teaching technique, albeit poor, and was willing to go along with it until other information came to light. Actually, I cannot lose 12 years of my spiritual journey because only self importance can be lost, not spiritual advancement. If I can lose it, then what I was taught all these years must have been of the ego. The point is that by at least Level Vl students could easily be free from feeling they are going to lose vibration (or fall)if they do not attend a function.
To rage, admonish or in any way blame students for not teaching, not attracting students, not stepping up into leadership roles, not doing enough to support their embattled leaders is guilt. This is a technique used by an authoritarian. It is said that one must separate the founder’s behavior from the training. It is not her behavior that is of concern. I believe that a spiritual leader like anyone else should not have to be perfect, but wounding can excuse behavior only so long in an organization of healing. What is of concern is that this authoritarian model, this victimhood, has been passed on to leadership, who pass it on to the next generation of students. It cannot be seen that this is an ‘abuse is good for you’ behavior they are trained to recognize and clear. Students are again put into an unconscious double bind; they are not to be victims but they must be victimized in order to learn power. When they become leaders, the same double bind exists, they are not to be victims but must victimize to uphold the rules of power. This split lowers vibration and compromises the immune system.
I watched a five minute rage at someone who asked for clarification of physics in Lev Vll. The teacher said that by this level she should know the god damn fucking physics and who was she to be in that class and not know. This went on for a few minutes. People were paralyzed. The fact is, the answers to the questions the teacher asks are known only by the teacher, who then agrees or disagrees with a student’s answer. The teacher’s reaction is how you know what is right and what is wrong. Guilt and fear are induced for not knowing, and most students try even harder to please. There are many students who have been shamed in way and they are now the most compliant and obedient.
At the beginning of a teacher’s meeting in Canada the founder was visibly angry that there were so few Americans at a Canadian Solstice party the month before. She admonished US people for not supporting the training. She then proceeded to have everyone stand from the US that didn’t go to the party and shamed and raged another few minutes. A friend of mine was furious because she attended her son’s graduation that day. But no one spoke or protested. Party attendance increased.
Students are volunteered for various reasons instead of raising their hands. This would be ok if they were not shamed or humiliated because they do not know the answer. Fear is being given a 200 page lecture and being asked what was on page 175 and being shamed for not knowing. No one really has clarity to begin with about the obscure mystical energetic material itself and no one admits it. They learn by trial and error.
To show any reaction to this treatment in any form is seen as defensive and not acceptable. One could say this tactic is justified in order for people to lose self importance or defensiveness, but the people it is done to do not learn to speak up in their truth, they learn emotional compliance. Iinstead of desensitizing them, this treatment drives them into their ego to adopt a superior positioning that gives license to do the same to others.
There are many views of the founder’s emotional outbursts: she is doing it for our own good; she is in pain as part of the suffering she has as she forges this new consciousness; she holds this new consciousness for us; they or we deserve it; she is using tough love. Some have seen it as an honest, vulnerable place that shows us her inner process. To continue to combine emotional outbursts with spiritual ecstasy is abuse. I have emails and many stories about leaders who uphold this tactic, sometimes if more subtle but equally devastating ways.
Emotional abuse causes trauma. When the combined methods of love and anger are used by an authority figure it creates trauma/dependency in emotionally wounded children or adult students. It is well documented that this sets up dependency, fear, and closes down true learning. It creates a child or student who will become obedient to the “rules” and dependent on the highs. Until these underlying energies are addressed in the construct material, not only will people continue to be hurt and hurt others in the name of “power”, but the organization cannot and will not keep emotionally independent people.
As can be seen in the Power vs. Force material, people do need help out of emotional dependency below a 200 vibration, and Level 1-Vl could take them to this important place. There are many things that could be done in the younger levels to foster Self realization, and by the time they went on to Vll, if they choose that tract, they would have their ego problems addressed, they would lead with their heart not a rulebook in their head, and they would inspire trust and true leadership qualities.
To separate the good from the seduction of such a magnetic system is only difficult when you are emotionally wrapped in it. One must be out of this programmed belief to really feel and see how one person’s actions have come to control so many people’s time, intellect, loyalty and emotions. The tragedy is that this teacher creates such alliance that students are very much seduced into thinking that her story is their own story.
Trainers say they are doing their own journey and are not affected by all this, that they do not have to buy into the parts they don’t agree with privately, that they might speak up on issues in the future. That they stand by and allow these abuses to go on is very telling about their level of dependency and ethical character.
Authoritarianism
As a parent I wanted to be aware of the results of authoritarian power and emotional control from my own childhood and from my culture. I was determined not to pass this on to my children. Authoritarian control does not allow children or people to internalize their own sense of responsibility, it externalizes them into other’s beliefs rather than into their own clear emotional responsiveness. When a parent’s beliefs are strict and controlled it sets up a power struggle that creates rebellion, conformity or dependence, in all or any combination. It is a symptom of severe control if the parent insists the child be like them, for no matter how well meaning the parent claims to be, they are forcing conformity in the child rather than guiding the child’s unfoldment. The child or student who tries to conform to this control is often blamed and belittled for not living up to expectations, making them try harder, thus the disempowering dependency cycle is continued.
What I tried offer the training in various forms was a structure of authority that promotes Self realization in students not obedience or emotional dependency. Students could be encouraged, just as I learned to encourage my children, to deepen into themselves and their own unfolding stories. Within my family structure, a few firm guidelines and plenty of conversation created a space for my kids to explore and develop themselves from the inside out. I was there to guide them into thinking for themselves, not to cajole them into blindly follow rules, which we are all recovering from at various levels from our own childhood and our culture. I feel this is why so many in the training saw me with integrity and love.
This stance does not have to conflict and should not conflict with “being in position”, an often used phrase in the training meaning you are in “power” and doing everything right. Caring for other’s empowerment in this way was very twisted in the training in that if you ‘cared’ it was seen as coddling students, as nave or Pollyanna . But it is not nave, and it is not necessarily conflict free with no squabbles, issues to work out or areas of denial to uncover. But it is not accusatory. It enacts an honorable respect for all voices and encourages all dissent to be aired and discussed, so that truth bubbles up from the inside out, in a child, a student or an organization. Often it means that all parties learn something.
Children have an innate sense of good and cooperative growth, unless they are taught differently. It is critical to know that whether you are working with healthy or abused children, healthy or abused adults/students, it has been shown that ‘tough love’ works, while guilt, shame, anger, fear, manipulation, my story over yours, ‘for your own good’, ‘the end justifies the means’ methods prevent true growth.
In spiritual leadership, the degree of control can be seen by the degree of willingness to self examine, accept feedback and learn from others. Authoritarian people build authoritarian structures that prevent feedback and corral emotionally dependent people into their own beliefs. The severity of a leader’s emotional wounding can be seen by the degree they emotionally enforce loyalty, trust, compliance and agreement to their own beliefs over their student’s welfare. Students many times cannot see the leader’s manipulation of them because they would have to step out of their wounding to see any violation of their boundaries, which is very difficult for most to do. They just don’t know that they are being mistreated because they don’t know the difference.
A man said of his TIP leadership wife, "she has lost her heart, she acts like she thinks power to be".
This is ego not power; the informed heart is our true power. It is critical to know the difference between healthy ego and controlling ego. The ego that allows one to invade emotional boundaries without heart is woven into the very construct of the training itself. This system then favors leaders who will uphold this error at the very root of dependency!
In the training we understood that we were here to assist people to come to truth. Sometimes in our relationships this means to address underlying dynamics. This does not need to exclude courtesy and boundaries. Being trained to be ˜psychic” does not mean you are right or that you have the right to impose your "sight" on others, especially if you have not addressed ego positioning. By not being aware of this, this assumptive position is trained into leadership. It gives license that by virtue of belonging to a spiritual group, being an upper level, being in ‘power” more than another, or having perceptive awareness one is justified to take a superior position of knowing what is best for students. This creates an aura of mystical powers, which externalizes and disempowers students.
I believe that sometimes in a ‘warrior’ position anything goes; we can be pushed to perform and learn beyond our self-imposed limits. The big difference here is in the dependency these tactics create. Miguel Ruiz turns his apprentices loose after a period of training; they leave him to do their work in the world. Their work could be apprenticing others and continuing in his footsteps, or just being the best they can be in their chosen profession. But he does not tell them they will never get to power unless they continue to train. He does not tell them they will lose their soul, get sick, or fat if they leave his organization. Any teacher can feel their own way is the best way, but to hold students hostage in this way to serve their spiritual cause is spiritual abuse.
Few adults, let alone children, will risk the anger, shame or belittlement that can result from questioning the founder or her structure; there is no safe accountability in the training. A “Listening Committee” was established within the training, but it is not safe and it is not independent. This authoritarian style is different with different leaders in the organization, but its underlying style is adopted in the training as part of the desire to be (the founder).
I have often witnessed those in the training who interact with outsiders have an open or hidden assumptive role that our way is the best way for others. There is an incongruent double bind message given in the training which sets up a double bind within each student. This double bind is that even though you might say you would not impose your belief on someone and that free will is a law of the universe, the fact is you very much want to align them to “the true power”. This is felt by healthier people as the aggression (authoritarian power) it really is and healthy people take a polite step back.
But the dependent personality responds emotionally to this feeling of ‘power’ by believing you have the power to help them. This may be important in the beginning of training, but if this stage of a students development is encouraged rather than evolved, as I believe it is from Level 1, then empowerment never happens.
Sacred Trust
Free will is stated as a universal law in Level l. Free will establishes the right to choose, but there are times when we give others the responsibility to choose for us. A Sacred Trust (an often used concept in the training ) is when one is responsible for someone who is not in a position to make choices, or when one is responsible to make choices for those who have placed them in trust to do so. The teacher/student position is one of Sacred Trust.
Sacred Trust in the highest sense is the obligation of anyone put in this position to work for the health and well being of their charges. A parent is responsible for the greater good of a child. A leader works for the greater good of a country or a corporation. This is well and good, but within the training this concept is combined with rigid and strict authoritarian guidance. It is on the shoulders of authority figures to not take advantage or unduly gain the service of emotionally vulnerable people. This is ethics. When students are still dependent after years of training, and can’t see that this is so (See “The Guru Papers”) this Sacred Trust has been violated. The very hardest thing to watch about this in the training is that those who hear this think they are in power; they have worked hard to get where they are and feel they are in charge of their lives.
What they can’t realize is that without the training structure, they have nothing to be in charge of. It would be too painful to see the truth of this. Denial is easier and that is why many ‘choose’ to continue in the training in spite of what they see and in spite of the information available to them. I’ve heard some say they wouldn’t consider reading this material. The training has conditioned them successfully to see it as just “attack”.
Accountability
If a leader is questioned, it is up to that leader to be impeccable in the ability to self examine. This sacred trust position depends on self accountability by allowing the right of others to hold the sacred trust accountable. This is what democracy was meant to do. It creates an open feedback system that insures accountability, falling far short in our culture but nevertheless an attempt.
A true structure of authority would give a feedback loop for input, growth, reality checking and honoring of the co-creator position all humans participating within it. The higher the consciousness of the system or leader the more open the feedback loop. All are honored and valued as co-creators, no matter how large or small their role. An authoritarian system does not accept that a feedback system is necessary.
Accountability of any leader can be assessed in the questions, are they open to the free exchange of information necessary for healthy change and growth, are they willing to discuss and try new things, to change their beliefs, do they have an ability to hold the most critical information safe while still being open to change, do they really listen when presented with information. Are they willing to see error when it is repeatedly presented to them and do they make people feel valued in presenting information.
We as leaders in the spiritual arena have the obligation to self examine, listen to input, consider new information and discover where our beliefs divide, control, usurp or in any way divide our students from the unity consciousness that brings healing from the inside out. In no way can the training model world healing with such a closed system.
Healthy Spiritual Development vs. TIP
Universal guidelines and concepts about spiritual development are readily available on the internet for research. These guidelines are summarized nicely in the "Power vs. Force" material, where a model is presented in which there is a progression of awareness with the end result of enlightenment, or unity consciousness, or ascension if you will. In this model, although an A to Z style is used for our linear perception, in truth, full enlightenment is a self generated feeling inside of us that encompasses an awareness of all of A-Z, which is unity consciousness. The scale goes from divisive low vibration emotions, battle, toward unity consciousness, win/win. The beginning of the scale covers divisiveness in all its forms. Guilt for example, in its many expressions, is a feeling that will divide us from our unity, our oneness, our peace. It is from this scale of awareness that we can assess for ourselves what contributes to our feeling of unity, or what contributes to our feeling of divisiveness and suffering. It can offer a view that can be applied within ourselves, within our community or within our nation.
We know that this training has helped a lot of people get to their courage. People sometimes need help to get to this point and really need to believe that something or someone can help them. The training accomplishes this to a point. The problem is that compliance is set up from Level 1, and if the student buys into Level Vl (the ‘teacher’s’ level), they will be fully brainwashed and readily devoted and compliant to the training system.
When a teacher, in the name of love, continues to train people into her own beliefs, that teacher is really stealing their connection with God. The ability to convince others that you alone have the right answer is a plague in all our systems, from political to advertising to personal relationships. Three things would be seriously necessary to address this error in the training: (Note: when I wrote this in 2004 I still had hope it could change)
One necessary change: Leadership must become aware of certain elements of ‘force’ when they are examining class information, structure or learned behavior. A structure of empowerment offers knowledge; free will requires that a Sacred Trust authority will choose what is right for them without force, manipulation or threats.
Second is to address material in younger levels to include more current healing and vibrational techniques that have students addressing dependency issues much earlier. By Level Vl release them back to the world to freely choose their path. Most people just need to be connected to courage and God to be able to become powerhouses in their lives and chosen professions. Many however will be attracted to a teaching path or higher levels of awareness and can choose to continue with the training. Releasing them takes the emotionally draining “do or fail†energy out of the training which repels healthier people, who are usually very talented. It offers anyone from execs and professionals to housewives an effective empowering course while not separating them from their families, their lives and their purpose. This type of program would draw large classes and give the teachers a rightful living.
Third is to restructure the teaching system so that those who do decide to teach or volunteer countless hours are rewarded somehow for their efforts. To be convinced that to volunteer almost every day of the week and most weekends in training business, classes or ‘service’, to have family and friend activity squeezed out of your life because they are not one of ‘us’, is blatantly divisive and controlling. This is what Carlos Castaneda did, demanded everyone’s full time and attention, only he was more overt and told his students to just get rid of family and friends, all ties to the human world. If there are those who would devote their lives to this training, there must be compensation. One simple fix would be to have teachers tithed to by their students who begin teaching. It was often said that people could earn income if they want to by teaching more. This has not been a real solution, for there are few students, which leads one again to the incessant cycle of addressing the underlying problems that drive students away.
A Gifted Leader
The gift of a master story teller is to take you out of the story in your head and into another story. A master magician can trick you beyond your senses. A master NLP practitioner works outside your awareness and can align your belief system so as to block the sight of a truth in front of you. A master salesperson can reach into your belief system and convince you of your wisdom in buying their product. A master hypnotist can use the power of suggestion to convince you of a different reality. The ego of a brilliant manipulator will use all of the above to hold you in their reality. It is a very sad fact when we discover that the truth of ourselves has been supplanted by a convincing story, and that we were convinced that that story was our truth. If the training will survive, it will be restructured to follow the laws of attraction to take out the emotional conditioning to one story and bring true choice back, and the founder's gift can be used for the good.
Refusal to Change
The charismatic founder of this structure of empowerment has claimed to be the only one who has the knowledge of true empowerment on this planet. As such, she has never-ending arbitrary control over her students, because no one else knows their next step or what they are ready to learn but her. She uses her power to create exalted states of consciousness, then uses anger, guilt, shame, humiliation, praise and flattering in her coursework and personal contact with students to get them to do what she needs done, in the name of empowering them. Ex-members must recover from intense programming they didn't realize they had until they left her influence. The damage done to trauma and abuse survivors over the years has been documented by many counselors, who are beginning to network and recognize the fallout symptoms of Training in Power, and by the personal submissions on this site by ex-members.
Over the years she has been alerted in many ways by many people to look at her actions and she has refused. Many times her anger is inflicted on those who attempt to address issues of importance to them, who most often are upper levels who have been with the organization for years. At this confrontational point students have no choice but to submit or leave. This double bind, being made to feel like a failure and an attacker of the founder, but not wanting to submit to abuse, is very painful and causes trauma in most students who are forced to leave.
The founder rallies her troops around many battles, like the current 'evil' the ex-members are creating by speaking out. The last story is that several of us ex-members are out to kill her. If you knew us gentle folk, you would understand why this is so incredible. But the rationale is that we are not our good selves now, we are 'possessed' by attack and are trying to take her or the training out. This is how we lived our lives in the training and this basic life-draining preoccupation has not changed. I'm sorry for this, but all I can do is support those who wish to leave and give warning on this site to those who can find it.
Submitted by Diane
Vibrational Psychology
A current tipper muses about whether vibrational psychology could be measured; could (the founder)'s system be compared and measured? The implication is that there is something trainers are feeling, what is it and can it be measured? That people feel better is one reason they stay, in spite of all they see wrong. Yes, trainers do feel something, and it can be measured, but it is not vibration.
In order to compare and measure vibrational systems, one would have to have results to compare. It is generally agreed upon that with an increase in vibration there is more awareness, openness, respectful right relations and the modeling of such qualities. There is freedom to speak openly and from the heart, and encouragement of others to do the same. There is increasing neutrality (less attachment to one’s own way) and desire for the common good of all; there is increasing co-creation and bridge building, without loss of structure or curriculum.
The result of high vibration is identifiable as a soul deepens into heart based action in the world, showing others the way without ridicule, shame, guilt, fear or humiliation. If a vibrational system is successful, would you not expect to see some of these qualities demonstrated in people who have been in the system for over 10 years, as well as upheld as qualities to be demonstrated in the operating system of the training itself? The symptoms of upper levels show that they have not been taught to value these qualities, which are the basis of all successful egalitarian leadership and humanitarian behavior.
(the founder)’s version of vibration is confusing, arbitrary and does not value basic humanitarian qualities. She does not disclose in any level how or why she makes the vibrational decisions she makes. She may proclaim right or wrong, but not why. Upper levels are left to grock it, thus I have watched them learn to follow her model and make arbitrary pronouncements based on their mood and ego, as she does. I have not seen that older levels, in their constant focus on battle, pain, suffering, and being shamed, guilted and humiliated, (masked and suppressed by their buoyant power positions) can assess another's vibration with anything other than their own personal measure, or (the founder)'s personal views. These views are based on arbitrary ‘energetics’, and have misled and hurt many people who have to submitted to them, trusting they are the truth of vibration and power.
With “power transfer” people do feel something. They feel good, elated. The fact that people spend years in the training yet show severe lack of high vibrational qualities, that they are still in victim consciousness and conformity to abuse dynamics, can only be accounted for by the fact that their vibration is not rising. But they are told it is and they believe.
They return again and again to meetings and classes, to feel the vibs, to get a lift, to feel better. Year after year, students are led to believe their vibration is elevating by their progression through the levels, by their position. As only one example, trainers do not feel free to speak up when they see abuse happen to innocent people. Maybe they think it's just none of their business, and they themselves are out of the line of fire. That the highest levels still believe that this treatment is for someone’s own good and stifle their feelings is a symptom of brainwashing and conformity to an abusive system; this is not high vibration.
It is said that those who leave the training will be assessed for vibration if they return. I received an email a few years ago from a now senior minister who proposed that anyone who left the training could not have vibration (would fall to pre level 1) and therefore should be required to start from Level 1. This does not sound like someone who knows what vibration is, it sounds more like a punishment. If the training must measure vibration based on staying in the training, then what the training taught was not true vibration, which is awareness, which cannot be lost.
This kind of arbitrary assessment is not only illogical but destructive in that when one begins to question, to find areas that are incongruent with vibrational elevation, they are forced to submit to the construct as is, or leave. Bottom line, if someone brings information to the table that is meant to contribute to the good of all and they are put down, ignored, deflected or accused of attack, what is this saying about the vibration of the group?
From these observations, (the founder)’s vibrational psychology is her own; it has not produced physically or emotionally healthy, self-realized beings, and it is not open to improvement. What she is teaching is not vibration, but something else. Looking at all the “fallen” souls left in the wake of the training, it is neither healthy or empowering. What this vibrational system has done is taught students to conform to its construct or awakened them to get out of it, taking with them hard earned lessons in thought control and power over. It has been demonstrated repeatedly that students who leave actually get healthier, in mind, body and spirit. What is this saying about the “vibration†of what they left behind? That trainers will drop friends because they feel attacked by criticism of the training is not high vibration.
That they refuse to read or associate with anything or any one critical of the organization is not high vibration. (the founder) told me several times, “I just want what I wantâ€. Laying the blame (low vibration) on others for attacking her humanity has been used to justify her right to do whatever she does and wants to do, and it has been used for years to deflect the serious issues that plague the training. Those who are manipulated by this deflection repeat that we should separate the person from the teaching. They have been trained to enable bad behavior, in the name of power, and thus it is held in place throughout the training. This has nothing to do with (the founder)’s human behavior or with what she does in her personal life. Critical analysis of the training has been equated with attack, period. Leadership blames others in leadership, blames critics and fallen souls who leave, for attacking, and this continued focus on battle and attack is low vibration.
(the founder) has often said publicly that she is either a genius or a mad woman. In all the years of upheaval she has refused to adapt her construct to release the guilt ridden, fear based controls of her own mind: loss of soul is only one religious threat that is perpetrated on trusting believers, creating the low vibration of fear. In refusing to address such serious issues, she continues to try to build the training on the backs of sincere people; she continues to kill canaries and blame them for their own demise. (the founder) has an opportunity to learn by these losses and evolve her genius to serve humanity. If she will not address these serious issues, if she insists she is right and everyone else wrong, this unnecessary battle of her own making may just well drive her mad.
Submitted by Diane
Correspondence with Diane - A Current Trainer’s Questions
2006
A current tip student finds both value and problems in the training, and wants to sort out what needs to be changed. This student raises many questions and my responses show how very complicated this task is of sorting abuse from truth. A most admirable task for a trainer to take on; this student is hopeful things will change. I post these here for all sides to review and work with. I encourage everyone to continue to ask questions and do research themselves. Diane
Ex-member: Your questions were ones I asked myself. I thought I could help sort out the good from the abuse too. I'll just say that Faye has been told many times, and by many people, of problem areas and ways to change the training. I hope continuing dialog helps.
The value you feel is in your belief. Many other trainings are just as effective, but they do not take years and years by binding you to them forever with promises of further power, until level whatever. Upper levels are no healthier for all their years, nor are they accurately psychic, but they have learned a belief system to rely on. It is a complicated task you take on, and if you wish to try to separate the good from the abuse, there are many clues in “Lessons in Awareness”, as well as many other places. Each one of us must go through this process of inner and outer evaluation ourselves so we can first know what is ok and what is not, what needs to change and what does not. If you become aware of the symptoms of group abuse and thought control, then you’ll be able to see when abuse is happening and speak out when something needs to change.
I highly recommend David Hawkins’ books which give many clues to true power. Also excellent is ”The Power of Now” by Eckhart Tolle. You will begin to see for yourself, in the class material and in meetings, where the truth is mixed with power over, where help is not accurate, appropriate or helpful but defended training rhetoric, and when fear, guilt or anger are used to control. So far, identification and trying to change these things hasn’t worked, but you never know. I personally, after all these years, will no longer give energy to fixing a system that doesn’t want to be fixed.
I cannot give you many answers but I give my own and others experiences and will support your process of discovery and your efforts toward exposure. I will be interested to hear your own observations and thoughts from a level 'n' perspective (which is a less brainwashed place) once you read this material. You may not have had some of the experiences of this information yet, but I can only trust you will be more prepared to evaluate your own experiences by having it. Again, this info is not to be taken as truth for yourself without your own research.
I know you feel value in the training, we all did until we came up against the place where the abuse was protected. This is the tragedy of the whole process, that a structure of healing causes such unnecessary pain and suffering. It is said that those who leave do not want to change, which is blatantly not true. There are now 41 members on the ex-member's site. I wish you could read the posts on this site as people come out of the fear and secrecy instilled in the training. Stories of false accusations of child abuse, splitting people from their spouses, dangerous medical advice, people who had serious illnesses who were dismissed by Faye as unwilling to heal.
Men and women accused of sexual abuse of their children, secret meetings with family members where Faye turned one against the other. Soldier-gathering against good people, reputations and careers ruined. The list goes on. No referrals ever given for outside help, no counseling was given to repair and rebuild relationships. So you see it is not only the structure in itself, it is the people who are trained into false positions of power, unskilled and unprepared to deal with the issues of mental and physical health they are faced with in a purported 'healing' structure.
Level xxx: What was the highest level you taught?
Ex-member: I taught Level 2 in the US and in Germany, and the next step was to begin training to teach Lev 3. I was a teacher trainer for Lev 1, supervisor, outreach teacher, minister, and for several years was in the highest level taught.
LEVEL xxx: I am working with the notion that we must rise above the us/them attitude.
Ex-member: The us/them is deeply embedded in the structure of the training. It is very hard to eradicate when it is felt it is the best way to true 'power', when those outside the training are not considered 'in power' or to have vibration. Assessment of true vibration is so very off in the training.
LEVEL xxx: You mentioned others with actual skill in these areas who have left (leaving untrained students being led by students). I'd like to get in touch with those you respect.
Ex-member: Yes, psychotherapists, professional counselors, newspaper writers; all people who were healthy enough to say no to abuse. Most I have not had contact with recently, but if they can be contacted I will tell them of your request.
LEVEL xxx: And though I feel for those who were traumatized by the battles, I am less interested to focus on the negative aspects of TIP than to discuss what really does work: to heal, to grow, and to enable others to do so also.
Ex-member: You will have to untangle the good from the abuse in order to focus on effective methods; first of which is to ID the behavior, power rhetoric and lecture material that creates believers and followers vs. healthy, independent self realized beings. For example, upper levels can arbitrarily dismiss people who disagree with them by relying on training rhetoric. They cite rote power language and power rules of behavior, which younger levels are expected to adopt as the rules of the road. Disagreement is mostly considered resistance, a non-willingness on the part of the student to face the truth or to heal; the student is in denial or nave.
With no system of accountability and outside seeking of perspectives discouraged, vulnerable people have submitted to this closed system of leadership for years, in spite of the destruction it has caused in their life. One woman didn’t talk to her daughter for a long period because Faye told her she sexually abused her as a baby and she needed to leave her daughter alone. She then told the daughter that her mother was healing something and not to contact her. Years went by before they told their story to each other; the daughter told her mother she was never sexual with the, but then the daughter (still heavily involved in the training) defended Faye by saying she is just wounded. These actions continue to be excused and even justified. Upper levels have not become emotionally healthy from this kind of treatment, but they have adopted a learned protective and enabling stance regarding their own or Faye’s behavior.
LEVEL xxx: Is there architecture of enlightenment?
Ex-member: Yes, very well traveled paths that transform and rise above being driven by fear, guilt, pride, anger etc. and that practice no harm to others. There are many paths to this end, and many people who exemplify it: Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King are good examples of those who have practiced true humanitarian activism in the world.
LEVEL xxx: Is there an abstract, overall "the way" which is in clean, and in common to all working systems?
.. Where you reduce risks of re-traumatizing yourself and others?
.. Where it's not about cloning a personal belief system?
Ex-member: There is a way, and the way is in every path that leads a person to their humanitarian heart. It is with any teacher or counselor who leads people to self empowerment.
Healing does not have to be traumatic if true acceptance, compassion and self love are the containers for growth and are actually practiced by the teachers involved. The work I have done with Miguel Ruiz’ apprentices and T. Harv Ecker is clean, non-judgmental and thoroughly effective. That is how I first began to know the difference between Faye’s work and more effective healing work. Her work relies on students learning rules of 'power', which misses the heart that is necessary to train people into their own hearts. There is so much talk in the training about self-love, but self-love is not true self love in the training, which is why so many upper levels are still in pain and emotional suffering. It is a sad loss to the community of training in power that so many of the 'hearts' who tried to bring this awareness to the training have had to leave in order to maintain their integrity and heart path.
LEVEL xxx: I have often questioned if any of this is real.
Ex-member: If you were questioning if it was real, then look at that as a severe warning that you were not being trained to connect with yourself and your own development. Ask yourself what is real for you. Are you becoming more solid or are you feeling increasingly off balance? Is it truly yourself you are connecting to or the relief in finding answers from someone else? Enlightenment brings you to a place where you learn what is real for yourself; it cannot and does not give you a story to learn or reward you for only the behavior that is “in power” in someone else’s arbitrary story.
Faye convinces people she has ‘the way’, but it is her way, from her mind, which is why there is so much trauma. The pathology built into the training is her pathology, projected out upon the world. This needs to be addressed before the training can take people to their own power. This projection keeps her, thus students, battling ‘out there’, and in denial and unhealed in their own lives. This is why healthier people begin to feel that they are not being encouraged into their own knowing, but into the training’s rules.
LEVEL xxx: I feel unbalanced, like my perspective keeps flipping upside down, questioning, "which way is up?" What truly are the laws of power?
Ex-member: This feeling is because you are being nudged out of your reality, and it leaves you unsure, uncertain as to what is real. (In Castaneda's work, it is called the nagual's blow). This can be useful. You will be led further out of your reality in this way, but instead of re-creating the reality you choose, (self realization) and rising above negative emotions, you will be led further into Faye’s story, which consists of emotional drama and battles of evil. This story will fill your mind and your time, and do nothing to solidify or deepen you into your own truth, creativity or life, which is self realization, or true power. The training could be effective in getting people out of their negative realities, but it must then trust them and enable them to create their own.
Faye's laws of power? If you want to know Faye's laws, you will have to figure them out for yourself. She mystically alludes to a myriad of laws of power and power bands, but the whole story is never revealed, at least at level 12 after 12 years. True laws of power? There are many models of true power, which is self realization. There are no laws necessary for a heartfelt life. An exuberant child has true power. An old man plowing his field has true power. To learn, love and contribute to uplifting humanity is powerful. To give a child self esteem to make their own choices is to give them power.
Mysticism can be useful but not if it just keeps people confused and trying to learn to follow rules. Being told you must go to the next level (forever) for your power keeps you off balance, unsure, and keeps you yearning and learning her story of power. This is the insidious conditioning that ex-members have taken years to recover from; getting their own story back. Those who need Faye’s dramatic but reassuring story are innocent people who have no idea that their personalities have been slowly replaced. I have watched ex-trainers make amazing progress when they leave the training; they re-connect to family and the outside world, make more money and are very thankful they are free. They are sad and sometimes angry that so much of their time and energy was stolen from creating their own lives by the negative focus on pathology, by the battles, the endless volunteer time, and the focus that they forever need to dig at themselves for healing something. This constant focus manifests sickness and more pathology; what you focus on manifests.
LEVEL xxx: Because I could feel something...was I delusional?
Ex-member: The power of our belief is incredible. You feel something because you are told you will and are emotionally conditioned in classes and meetings to come to rely on this, as well as the tools and the story for your power. This emotional manipulation is real and feels powerful; most feel very relieved when a strong authoritarian energy wraps them up and gives them the ‘truth’. People want the security of finally knowing the answers, and it is this security that Faye relies on to keep people hooked on her system. When in upper levels you finally realize that independent thought is not welcome, that you are only accepted and valued for your agreement with the training's robotic system of beliefs of ‘power’ (upheld by those remaining in ‘leadership’), it is a hard wake up call.
LEVEL xxx: when is stalking/exposing a petty tyrant correct? And when is it better to take a cooperative stance and reserve admonitions to private discourse?
Ex-member: The power animal is meant to give you courage, but (in the training) it is a only a self courage that leaves out the other person! Learning to stalk does nothing to understand how to build bridges or develop communication skills needed to fix incorrect energy at work or in relationships, which our world highly needs.
Stalking incorporates the self righteousness and us/them power rules of the training which manipulates others instead of honestly working with them. Nothing works better than honesty and communication, even if you must walk away knowing the other party is not willing to change or co-create with you. Without communication how can problems be solved? This is the gist of the problem in the training. My way or the highway. A hidden agenda.
LEVEL xxx: There is some discussion on the (Lessons) site on TIP being based on broken physics. Where does it go off the rails?
Ex-member: An incredible book about physics is "Consilience, The Unity of Knowledge." On the cover it is said "A dazzling journey across the sciences and humanities in search of deep laws to unite them."
I've heard so many stories from those familiar with true physics who cringe with the way Faye uses this concept. If she knew physics in any way other than to justify her own beliefs, she would see that forcing people to learn her system will not produce self realized independent beings. Look at the physics of force for just one example: if you force an object, force needs to be constantly applied or the object will go back to its natural state. If you surround the object with opportunity of transformation (a free will nurturing environment), it will do the work itself and change its properties.
How this concept of force plays out in one area of the training: Faye lamented more than once about how dependent people were. The result of this was that either she or her upper levels thrashed them further to get them to take responsibility! I told her (and Jan) that they will remain childlike as long as they are treated like children with authoritarian control; wrist slapped, humiliated and shamed into taking responsibility. I said that a hierarchy of authoritarian control is very different that a structure of learning that has a correct sequencing of information.
Good parenting follows the same principle: give a child guided responsibility in decisions that affect them and you will teach independence; teach them to follow your rules and you will have a dependent rule follower.
So, long story short, Faye must constantly apply force (manipulation) within her system to keep people within the guardrails of her system. By assuming students must be forced and manipulated for their own good, you steal from them their responsibility to create their own healing. This creates dependency in emotionally vulnerable people. If people are forced, like children, to adopt without question the teacher’s beliefs, they will only be free when they confront this control: if the teacher will not participate in finding solutions, in co-creating what is best for both, healthy people will walk away.
This is why so many of us, who had devoted years to the training, had to leave, with added trauma of the door slamming painfully shut behind us.
LEVEL xxx: Is there enough value in levels 1 to 3 to want to keep them?
Ex-member: Again, truth is woven into power over. There is no way to sort it out other than to go through each lecture and take out the power over.
LEVEL xxx: Does my intuition deceive me?
Ex-member: Convincing you of the value of this work while hooking you into it forever is a very brilliant system for a controller (or a vampire) to create. I think what you are feeling is the part that is truth, which Faye has woven into her system. It covers up severe control however: she says that people can “fall” from any level, meaning if you leave you are falling. This is blatant bunk, for anything you have learned of value will stay with you forever. One must ask then, what could be her purpose in threatening a 'fall' if you leave? I can only say that this is just one of the ways force is used: the instillation of fear of falling, losing your soul, of not getting the ‘truth’, of being left out of this exclusive knowledge.
LEVEL xxx: Is it possible to focus oneself just on the truth?
Ex-member: If you mean can you remain intact and grow within the training in spite of the abuse dynamics, I would say it's very hard in upper levels to remain doing your own thing within this system unless changes occur to foster independent thought. Upper levels are expected to conform to the language and group think; i.e. if you have a cold and someone asks, heh, clearing huh? And you say no, I just have a cold, will you be in denial forever, in resistance? If the only way to teach this work is to use accepted power over tactics, can you submit? If you see no need for battle, will you pretend you do rather than be called naive? If you disagree with a senior minister will you submit rather than risk being prevented from teaching? Will you accept being told you will lose vibration if you do not attend Level 6 because you wish to attend your friends wedding? If you do not buy in and uphold this protected rhetoric, you will not be considered 'in power'. This is robotic thought control that over-shadows the heart.
LEVEL xxx: In cleaning this up, would Level (n) be the crossover point where people must bring their own work forward for critical review?
Ex-member: I want to distinquish something. There is precision skill learning in many arenas of life. Learning a skill and being asked to give up your individuality in order to conform to an abusive system is something entirely different. In specific skill building, sometimes your own work will not apply. If you are referring to bringing forth suggestions for changing any part of the abuse in Training in Power, this is not allowed because the abuse is built into the structure, which would interfere with the rote story that has been created in upper levels. No messing with the story is allowed, no personal deviation from the material or the 'construct' is welcome. Power is defined by Faye and only Faye and is black and white (as she says); you learn her system or you aren’t in power. She says openly that she will not allow any license with her material or training, it is too dangerous. This is a fear based threat, another example of force. Cloning is precise
LEVEL xxx: What parts worked for you?
Ex-member: I learned some things in psychological areas and have found the information in some of the focuses useful. I do not use the 20 shields I was given or the healings or many of the more mystical focuses that applied more to the training than to life.
I found that most of the training material just fragments and clutters the mind and serves no purpose toward life outside the training. The more than 15 healings I learned are useless outside of the training unless I want to take a superior role and take the responsibility for healing out of someone's hands. I understand the reasoning for 'training' people to be healers, but this system just doesn't work in the way it could because of the power over dynamics.
There are many other ways to develop intuition without having to learn one person's system. Students are told in Level l they are developing a way to know their own information, yet they are trained into a tightly controlled system of rules and 'right' ways to be psychic. This is a glaring contradiction.
If people are being trained into their own knowing, there is another problem with such a closed system of healing: educating oneself for years in this system has left people with no concrete skills to use outside of the training. Training language and rhetoric make no sense to people outside the training; the training serves only the training, only if one stays and teaches is it useful. This serves the founder though: teachers are expected to tithe to the founder for as long as they teach the training, forever. Thus a whole new problem arises, the pyramid structure that benefits only the founder.
LEVEL xxx: I've read through the stuff on consciousness calibration. Is it worth looking into that in more depth? Is there value in re-calibrating the courses?
Ex-member: Have someone independently muscle test these questions with you! We calibrated several times, double blind with several people, with the same result. Watch for problems with the testing methods, which can be corrected by determining good base values and double blind testing,
LEVEL xxx: At the time of your leaving, was there anyone but Faye who could train teachers?
Ex-member: (…..) was training level 2 teachers, I and a few others were training level l teachers. Many quit teaching however because it just didn’t feel right anymore. Most of us even changed the lecture material to take out the power over stuff (we could do that in the old days because no one monitored our classes like they do now!) Most people who left have heartbreaking stories, including myself, about how Jan manipulated and undermined their success in the training. Some even began to tape conversations with her to prevent her denial and lies from hurting them later. At the time they had no recourse, because Jan was the only teacher trainer.
There are also many stories of how (……)also ruled with an iron hand, in a different way that is as much mixed with control and defensiveness as the training itself. I have nothing but love for these peers who were my level mates, but I do not like their behavior. What all this boils down to is the group revolving around (the founder)’s inner circle who support power over dynamics because they have not been able to get to ego issues of their own, and because they model their behavior after (the founder) and what they think she means by power.
(the founder) is very skillful in how she prevents disagreement, rewards those who avoid issues, and carefully cultivates enablers. She is a strong one, and sadly for her, this keeps the pathology in place with no system of accountability, no recourse to solve problems. (the founder) has set this up by her example. No matter how many committees think that progress is being made, this lack of accountability by leadership is so protected and positioned in such a misguided, rote use of 'power' that it has not come close to being dealt with.
LEVEL xxx: What changes would enable a rescue mission for all?
Ex-member: Good question, I don’t think the training wants to be rescued though. Those of us who tried to make changes, after years of loving involvement, were dismissed and are now enemies of the state! Can this change?
I would rather ask, what needs to happen in order for all parties to heal, members and ex-members? Is reconciliation possible? Well, leadership in the training would have to initiate a process by which open dialog could happen and all parties allowed full examination of all areas of concern.
I hope some day that (the founder) specifically will be able to acknowledge the oneness of us all and see ex-members not as attackers but as heartfelt truth Sayers who cared enough to speak up for healthy co-creation. I hope (the founder) will come to see that open free discourse is the life blood, the creative growth and health of any group. I hope (the founder) will someday be able to receive and co-create life with others which is the true purpose of life on this planet. I hope she can begin to know that co-creation is the path to true intimacy, instead of isolating herself as an egoic savior, which is the ultimate illusion of protection from the abuser. Until (the founder) is able to see this, she will continue to project the battle onto 'them', continue to be the only one who has true power, continue to clone herself to uphold obscure laws for the sake of humanity. For Us. But it's not her job. It's ours.
LEVEL xxx: So many questions. I'm sure to have lots more.
(submitted by Diane)
Critical Analysis Applied to the Training in Power Power Structure; A Cult Dynamic
The importance, power and significance given to the training system is based in superstition and fear. It exists in secrecy vows and oaths of silence. Discussing any of the teaching or practices challenges this aggrandizement, importance, preciousness, and places it in light for what it really is: a means to control perception, behavior and thought.
The threat of breaking the secrecy and allowing public critique of the teaching itself, threatens the power structure of those who benefit from this secrecy and repression. The only power this teaching and practice has is its group agreed perception of power, importance, and preciousness; WE have the only version of the real truth about existence and power, only those properly elevated in vibration can understand the knowledge of the teaching, can even withstand it without losing their soul’s journey or dieing (as is told to people when they train they are strictly told not to talk about the teaching with the untrained).
The real function of keeping this information secret is to further indoctrinate people into this alternative perception of reality and split them from the other caring people in their life with a secret language system. Obedience starts early in the way this secrecy is set up, it is said initially as "don't spoil the learning for those coming after you", and later with more severe consequences of death, karmic 'reverberations' or losing your soul to those that affect another’s journey by talking about the upper level course content or church beliefs. This is why it is important to analyze the courses starting at the beginning in Level one, to see how the long term set up and indoctrination is carried out.
This split reality and perception is constantly enforced in the language use, social conformity of the group by peer behavior monitoring and arbitrary "addressments" (this means I tell you what your “issues†are at any opportunity, in or out of a structured or safe setting, whether or not you ask for my opinion or help). This behavior modification control is constantly monitored and you are judged and mostly found wanting for not being able to "hold" your energetic position. Reproaches are often harsh, uncalled for, and patronizing, placing people in a child role with the supposed elders of the community. You never fully graduate from the child role no matter how much training you do or how much service you give. You are always spiritually inferior to the one ultimate spiritual authority and dependent on her every gesture for knowledge of how to be in power, this hierarchal power structure then trickles down from the upper levels.
This system herds people and eliminates those from the group who question or do not conform or agree with the training in all of its precepts and claims of spiritual knowledge. If they are a perceived threat to the structure of the system by their behaviors they will be isolated socially, privately and publicly with humiliations and reproaches meant to get the person to leave or lose their mind. This lynch mob type of social denunciation by the group is best analogized by a sort of scapegoat type ritual where the group singularly focuses on the person they are threatened by. It is also done within the circles of gossip and slander that perpetuate whatever untruth about a person the community needs in order to reject them. One simple and surprisingly sinister way is by saying that the person is evil, this rallies the community against a perceived foe and draws attention away from what may have been legitimate concerns that are being brought to attention.
If you begin to attend less meetings and events, people will express concern and ask you if you are ok, they may even phone you and ask you, and say we (the group) are concerned that you haven’t been doing: classes, church, master warrior, community healings, level healings, meetings, events ect.
If you are brave enough to question, after witnessing others who experienced humiliation for questioning, any response you might get will be so riddled and avoidant of your question, your head will be spinning.
You have just been the victim of the effective, intentional silencing and manipulation tactics taught called “stalkingâ€, in reality any art of the practice is lost and it looks more like passive aggressive, poor, immature, childish, divisive communication.
I have witnessed this sabotage in practice on numerous occasions, it has been used to divide people and shows an inability to be assertive, or direct in communication, or even adult. It has caused excessive damage to peoples psyche and to their lives and relationships; it is by far in my opinion the most insidious part of the training insularity. Talking behind peoples back and setting them up by contriving how they are viewed in the community is the two faced lie that has gone on unchecked for years. The negative view that is perpetuated by this community to those who speak out and openly share their healing process is a character assassination and slander.
I would never recommend anyone assume those level meetings are strictly confidential. I would never recommend group work like this to severe trauma survivors. I would recommend going to get professional confidential help, spare your self psychic abuse and spiritual degradation, believe me. You would not believe the bullshit and saboteur behavior some people have experienced. I quote them in saying by far, the Training has been the most negative experience of their lives and has almost killed them.
If no one can talk openly and discuss any of the Training In Power: A Spiritual Journey of Service practices and teachings, if in fact to do so is professed by the organization and its members as evil; then I will honestly tell you, that this statement is a conscious misuse of power and denotes the tactics of a cult.
(Name withheld by request)
Ethics
"You shall know them by their assertion of truth, their contempt for considered reflection and their fear of debateâ€
As a professional in the organization Training In Power: A Spiritual Journey of Service, you are ethically obliged to take seriously the matters brought forward by members and ex- members alike. In your professional life these obligations extend into legal as well as ethical areas. If you promote the training organization as an educational body and certified discipline yet fail to add the fact that it is a church, a belief system a religious practice, you are not fulfilling your professional requirements minimally.
If you do not let the public, education body, potential student know the risks of this training and the current scrutiny it is under by ex members, you run the risk of misrepresentation. If you advertise the training as a mental health organization, you had better have the legal papers to back such claims. If you are unwilling to discuss the issues brought forward and outright disregard your peers, who are professionals like you in the Social, Educational, Professional and Health fields, then you are not only showing a lack of professionalism, you are also promoting ignorance and blind submission to an ideology, one that is above and beyond current professional decorum, and is culpable.
To dismiss or disregard stories of abuse and slander as well as severe mental cruelty among other things, or to be unwilling to even read these honest writings of your peers shows a lack of professionalism and outright censorship.
If you were to disregard evidence in this way in your professional lives there would likely be serious consequences for such negligence. Emotionally based belief systems that will not allow questioning or opposition undermines the very fibers of the institutions you work for and study at. This blind negligence further undermines democracy, freedom of speech, and critical analysis, all of which are constitutionally intertwined with your professional status. Opposition is welcome discourse in most educational and professional institutions. You may as well throw your professional credentials out the window when you throw out logical debate.
If under pressure your reaction is to repress rather than open discourse, this fits the scathing, if realistic, definition of ideology in John Ralston Saul's book The Doubters Companion, A Dictionary of Aggressive Common Sense -
"Tendentious arguments which advance a world view as absolute truth in order to win and hold political power....Which is ideology (as opposed to fiction)? Which not? You shall know them by their assertion of truth, their contempt for considered reflection and their fear of debate."
(Name withheld by request)
Dismissal of Ex-Members
You are a beautiful spiritual warrior doing the best you can. Just because you are an individual, doing your own journey and minding your own business, doesn't mean you can ignore what is going on around you, spiritually, emotionally or physically.
Trainers say it is their own journey and that they have not experienced what ex-members have experienced, and to each his or her own. That you have not had a bad experience with a priest, parent, physician, leader or teacher does not mean you can dismiss other’s experiences. What would you do if someone came to you and reported that your incredible doctor was hurting people? If you use Training in Power standard responses, you might defend his character and say to them "you are not allowing this doctor to be human"..
You might say his clinic does much more good than bad, so leave it alone. You might say "I have been helped" or “I have not had that experience†and indicate you don’t want to talk about it any more. These deflective responses stop the real issue from being addressed. You might then avoid the person who brought the subject up. You might even be rallied to battle by your group, with all the people that begin to come forward to speak out.
The many ex-members of Training in Power must be saying something. The number of brave people who have dared to go public with their observations are only a fraction of those who have left; many ex-trainers are either in fear or just want to put it behind them as fast as possible. The fact remains that Trainers themselves don’t want to talk about it. Many don’t return phone calls, emails.
What Trainers believe: It’s been said often that ex-members are angry and misguided and by speaking out they aren’t letting trainers do their own journey in peace. Ex-trainers are even said to be “trying to take them outâ€, the training that is, because they are (sadly) possessed with evil. It is said that what ex-members do is very very bad karma.
All these things have been said to or about ex-members of the training, and they have been said by the founder (in many upper level lectures), who often repeats “they just couldn't take it, this type of training”.
It is a fact, although sad to us ex-members, that trainers, in their camaraderie and united silence, will not discuss issues with ex-trainers. It is a tragedy to close ranks against those who have spoken so freely, yet use the very same critical analysis ex-trainers bring up to then make changes in the organization. Ex-members are dead canaries. It is an insult to good people to cut off dialogue by simply saying it is not your experience, not your job, to each their own.
Trainers, when it does become your experience, when you do begin to feel an incorrectness or realize an error, when you do come to your power to exercise your right to disagree, and when you do this where will you go to be heard? Who will you tell and what will happen to you when you are dismissed? How will you feel then?
Before there is a common good that promotes growth there must be a willingness to listen. There must be an attempt at receptivity, respect, kindness and inquiry. There must be a mutual awareness of humble value, that the teacher can learn from the student, and that the student is a sovereign nation, not to be made over into the rules of another nation, but lifted to their own individual expression of power. Submitted by Diane
Re: Why They Stay
I think it says a lot about the fear of being alone as well as the fear of "Well, I’ve been 'this' for so long, what will I be if I'm not 'this'?" Not knowing what will happen if you stop doing something you've done for so long scares the snot out of most people. Humans, as a general rule, are a pack/herd/social animal. We don't like to be "a lone." There is safety in numbers. This is why it is so hard to stand against a group even when in your secret heart of hearts you don't agree with them. It's like the "group" is in the light (not necessarily the spiritual light ) and anything not in the group is in the dark.
The human eye is drawn to light and movement as is the human spirit/soul/being. Therefore when we are in the dark/"a lone", we want to be in the light/group. Ever walk down the street at night and notice that your eyes are constantly drawn to the lighted windows and you feel a little tug like you want to be inside instead of out in the dark? Same thing. And once you're inside/in the group/in the light, you look out at the darkness and remember what it felt like out there and it scares people to think that they might be out there "a lone" again so they engage in a little cognitive dissonance (Psychology; noun; anxiety that results from simultaneously holding contradictory or otherwise incompatible attitudes, beliefs i.e. knowing smoking is bad for you but doing it anyway) by putting up with what they know is not okay or not good for them in order to have that comfort of not being "a lone."
Add to that the "how to boil a frog" issue. If you put a frog in a pot of boiling water, it will jump out right away to save itself. If you put the frog in a pot of cold water and slowly turn up the heat, allowing the frog to adjust to each new temperature, the frog will eventually boil to death without ever trying to save itself. Hence, if we knew what pain etc. that being involved in TIP would cause, it is exceedingly unlikely that any of us would have been involved. But since that pan of cold water looked really inviting AND we all felt we were "a lone" we stepped right in.
And once in, of course the water got warmer gradually and we adapted our processes so that we could live with the situation because to not adapt would mean that we were once again out in the dark "a lone." Eventually, it becomes a habit to do the TIP thing. Unlike frogs however, we humans have higher thought processes so once the water reached the temperature where we could no longer stand it and the cognitive dissonance became too much too bear, we left. For others, when the cognitive dissonance gets to be too much, they begin to justify why things must be the way they are in TIP; telling themselves all sorts of things; buying into the delusions because that quiets the dissonance in their heads, silences the voice that tells them this is wrong; that it's scarier out there than it is to live in TIP.
But as the old saying goes, "There are none so blind as those who do not wish to see." It's all about choice. Making the choice to "boil" in cognitive dissonance because one is too scared to brave the dark and the "a lone" or not able to see a way to stand against the tide. It's a mob mentality in TIP. People feel safer in a mob. It's easier to do what the group wants because that way they won't turn on us. And we've all experienced our fair share of what it's like to have TIP turn on us. All I feel for people who cannot make that choice to stand against the mob is a sad resignation, understanding and loss. It's certainly not easy. And it hurts.
That may just be what hurts the most...that something that we've given a fair portion of our time, our money, our love and indeed our life to, can turn on us...push us out...damage us...cause us to doubt our very existence... to question our internal knowingness like those who have abused us before. It's the want, the need to belong; to matter; to be part of something great; to leave a lasting impression on the world that drove us to join, the honest belief that we were doing good things. Unfortunately that was perverted by someone else's delusions of grandeur.
Those still in TIP...I am sad for some...there are some truly beautiful, intelligent wonderful people in TIP that are being duped and damaged. There are days I grieve for friends that I probably will never interact with again. This is especially hard for friendships that had been in place for over half of my life, long before getting involved in TIP. Those I miss with almost a soul wrenching sense of loss and sadness.
It all comes down to choice...the choice to remain in the "a lone" or sacrifice and go through the lighted window. Some of us can make that choice and some of us are unable to choose. I'm not angry at them for being unable to choose...unable to see a way out...that the "a lone" is not as dark and scary as it looks. I cannot fault their right to choose. I wholly support their right to choose what works for them. If it works for you great. It wasn't working for me. And I stand waiting for those who reach a hand into the "a lone" looking for something to hold on to as they step across.
Peace,
Dawn
October 2007
Power Transfer claim by (the founder) of Training In Power, A Spiritual Journey of Service
"Ideology is the ass that carried the ark of the covenant"
According to (the founder) there is a hierarchy of knowledge based on the amount of power transferred to the students and that they can only withstand so much without dieing. So this proverbial celestial tit is an unending dependence on the guru, who can literally take you to ascension. By reason however, to pull from previous ideology of the training, if source is unlimited, and we all can have our power, why would I need a power transferor at all?
In some obscurely referred to great "HUNA" or Hawaiian tradition, if there is some significance to this, the only thing we know for sure is that this was an "idea" appropriated by (the founder), of which no one could possibly know anything of. But by some westernized romantic projection of it in fantasy(white westerners continuing the modern colonization of natives world wide, through this "new age" Christianity). Not being aboriginal or raised in that old world view, which may not have even existed or as we seem to think we know it existed. Where that may have had meaning, if in fact it ever did or does exist.
But where the mistake is, of most anthropology, especially the founding fathers of, and moreover most "New Age Cultists" is, in the error of an ethnocentric projection, is telling only of the "observer" (colonialists) themselves and their prejudice in the "observed" (native culture past or present) supposed philosophies or traditions. Note moreover the arrogance and transparent Racist tones here, when we attempt to interpret ancient teaching and present it in a western Capitalist way, as though one can literally buy cultural affiliation, native identity. ( I am seeing middle class white women driving SUV"s with dream catchers and eagle feathers, with crystals dangling from their rear view mirrors, on the way to a training event)
To prop up our own materialistic agendas with projected versions of "Shamanism" or "Tibetan Buddhism", or anything that does not have a direct bearing to one culturally, is rape and stealing, from cultures who have had everything taken, and now this new age leaching of their Spiritual practices, is truly despicable. (the founder) claims that native medicine people are amazed that she can bring so many people to their power animals in the second class of level two. It might be worth noting the great native writers and teachers who are the most critical opponents of the new age, and why that is.
"The arc of the covenant then is the ideology that road the back of the peasants."
Examples of How Trainers Deflect Responsibility
As modeled by the leadership of Training in Power
Submitted Feb 2007, name withheld by request
My observation with this sort of thing with trainers (and particularly those in higher levels) is that all of these accusations are made against someone speaking out or leaving in a desperate attempt by the trainer to avoid any sort of personal responsibility or accountability.
The consistent theme that I have witnessed and been subject to personally is:
1. It does not matter if I hurt you because I am a wounded individual and therefore I have no responsibility to correct the wrong done;
2. It does not matter if I hurt you because evil made me do it and therefore I am not responsible;
3. It does not matter if I hurt you because you must be evil to make me do it and therefore its your fault;
4. It does not matter if I hurt you because the world is simply my mirror so I am really just hurting myself and therefore you should feel sorry for me;
5. I did not really hurt you, your own wounding just simply led you to believe that I did and therefore you should apologize to me;
6. You should be happy that I hurt you because it somehow was better for you, you just need to meditate about it and find out why;
7. I have the right to exploit you and use all of your talents/gifts/training/money for my own benefit without thanks or payment because it is really just a gift from the universe, not a gift from you personally and I deserve that because I am wounded;
8. You should be grateful that I used you since this is in the name of service which is somehow different that 'servitude', which I will explain to you when it is convenient (such as when you are giving someone else what I want and you are in servitude to them but will be in service to me);
9. Your employers use you and they are evil, but I will use you for the same thing only not pay you or even thank you and I am the light....;
10. I don't have to follow man's law (such as building safety codes, professional rules of conduct) because I adhere to a higher spiritual law, however I rely on man's law to sue you if it suits my needs.
What I see is people desperate not to really look at themselves in any capacity because if they did and they assessed the their lives in the training and the stories they have created for themselves, it would all come crashing down. This is not to say that there is not a lot of good and love in some of them, however there is little accountability by most.
There is still one who I consider reporting to her profession for multiple reasons and I do greatly fear the damage that she will do to others as she moves higher up in the ranks of the training.
Just my little addition to this. I appreciate the comments you all make on this site and on the new website - keep it going!
(Name withheld by request)
Discrimination in Training In Power, A Spiritual Journey of Service Founded By Faye Fitzgerald
This post is from the collective contributions of openOcircle members, a yahoo support group for those ex-members of the Training In Power Cult.
I have just looked up some of the words that I would attribute to Training In Power and its leadership. If there is a word to inclusively describe the level of ignorance and malice directed towards marginal groups within the community, I guess I would choose discrimination as a starting point. The word "Hate" also comes to mind as it covers everything, pitting one group against another for any reason is hate.
I know of no word that describes the discrimination of those with mental health issues or those who struggle with addiction, but perhaps they could equally go with the term ableism as both diagnoses are by medical standards considered illness, disease or a disability. Addictions and Mental Health issues are both seen as disabilities under Canadian law. I am fairly certain they would be covered under US laws as well, in the US as the Persons With Disabilities Act.
Racism is generally thought of in an obvious racial hatred, but I would rather enlarge the scope of the term to include prejudice in its definition, as much of the institutionalized racism, and ingrained ignorance, all of which fits within the greater form of racism than just blatant racial superiority and hatred.
The one word that brings all these words together is stupidity which means to me a lack of awareness, education or first hand experience with any of the aforementioned issues, groups or individuals within those groups.
Ignorance is then also the act by which we condemn another in a projection of fear and stupidity that often reinforces social stereotypes.
I could add sexism here as well, which actually is a door that swings both ways and if you were male involved with this organization, I think you would certainly be able to explain your perspective better than myself on what you experienced by way of prejudice and malice.
My primary motivation for writing this is to give a clear picture to those outside of the community and those involved what may be general ignorance on the part of the leadership, but with closer and compiled examination looks more like a zeitgeist of prejudice and arrogance.
Terms found on dictionary.com
Discrimination: treatment or consideration of, or making a distinction in favour of or against, a person or thing based on the group, class, or category to which that person or thing belongs rather than on individual merit: racial and religious intolerance and discrimination.
Racism: a belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one's own race is superior and has the right to rule others.
Ableism: discrimination against disabled people.
Prejudice:
1. an unfavorable opinion or feeling formed beforehand or without knowledge, thought, or reason.
2. any preconceived opinion or feeling, either favorable or unfavorable.
3. unreasonable feelings, opinions, or attitudes, esp. of a hostile nature, regarding a racial, religious, or national group.
4. such attitudes considered collectively: The war against prejudice is never-ending.
5. damage or injury; detriment: a law that operated to the prejudice of the majority.
Ignorance: the state or fact of being ignorant; lack of knowledge, learning, information, etc.
Training In Power founded by Faye Fitzgerald discriminates against persons with disabilities and promotes racist attitudes, here are a few shared and collective responses from ex members:
1. Some people were told by Faye that the reason their children could not get clean was because their children were abusers.
2. A minister said to an alcoholic in AA that she did not need the program and that Faye had cured her own alcoholism using training methods.
3. There was much discrimination against mental health diagnosis and an expectation to get over it, and to stop displaying the symptoms which were called "willful" or "indulgent", with additional comments that medication was a crutch.
4. There was a paranoid projection of mental health issues in the community when the training formed its mental health team and mental health support group. There was no support in the community for these groups or the harm done because of the lack of professionalism or accountability within the training regarding mental health issues and how they were subsequently handled.
5. If you can not walk apparently it is your fault, this was told to more than one person with a physical disability.
6. It was also mentioned to people in recovery or dying from serious illness that it was their fault it had not healed, given accusations of you are willful, or holding onto the illness, and are not able to be cleared by the healing group.
7. If you actually got better, not necessarily as a result of the focus of community healings, it would make you feel indebted and loyal.
8. Integrative consciousness was a special focus group in the community where discrimination based on disability or race was only somewhat tolerant of any disabled person’s participation, by paternalistically saying one person with a physical disability could participate in the background.
9. One woman was told by several people in the community that her disability was the point of them choosing not to do healings with her and avoiding her as though it were contagious.
10. A person with a disability was told rather ungraciously by a Trainer that he could no longer help her, they reminded him of his mother who he had to take care of, just because they took him up on his offer for rides to training events, he only lived a couple of blocks away.
11. Faye was hoping a person who was wheel chair bound would be her miracle and would walk again, the apparent proof of all her work, and she was also told by Faye rather grandly that she would be the healing of equality on the planet. Since her miracle did not work, Faye had to blame the experiment going wrong on the patient, as though some flaw in their spirit was the real reason they could not walk. The shaming, dropping and dismissing of this person were the end result.
12. Similar treatment was then dealt in this regard to being dismissed and rejected, by others in the community who model the leader in all ways; I have witnessed first hand when the Training wants someone out of their way or wants to deny any responsibility.
13. The deaths around classes or the mental health collapses where any degree of responsibility is blamed on the participant, attack, or those 'evil ex trainers in malicious attack'.
14. The discriminatory and racist overtones have been discussed in regards to white middle class women stealing native teaching and passing themselves off as experts in Shamanism and Tibetan Mastery.
15. Another side of the racism in the training was if you were a person of colour you could be sure to be identified as such by Faye repeatedly in any class, and that you would hold a special place in the consciousness for people of your race to get here, wherever “here†was, I believe she meant ascension.
16. I have had alarming things said to me based on race that I was shocked to hear in a community of light.
17. One instance in telling a minister about my bracelet that started in the story of Raven Stealing the Light, the reaction from her was to repeat "STEALING THE LIGHT" so loud that the rest of the people in the room would look to us. I noted her superstitious fear based assumption on those words, (everything in the training had to be worded in positive language or it was seen as negative or attack, in this case I actually think she thought it was a statement of evil). I should have not bothered to explain the meaning behind the story. I later confronted this person about this incident; she said she could not remember.
18. I was also told I was not native by one person and that I had native royalty by another, these assumptions were based on little or no information from me to them.
19. In a class Faye asked me if I had been to a residential school, this was in front of the whole class! I guess she would incorporate me in her statistics if I was.
20. Was the training trying to angle a way in to get contracts to work with residential school survivors with its fleeting interest in Kevin Annette?
21. If you were on the “student to watch list” compiled to monitor students who for whatever reason were considered possibly unsafe (was it because they questioned?), though no real criteria is given for those on the list other than a psychic knowing, you would be monitored and policed at retreats in a way that was blatant discrimination based on prejudice.
(name withheld by request)
When Religion Becomes Evil
Here's an interesting set of distinctions that delineate the difference between healthy and dysfunctional forms of religion, taken from Brother Anansi's customer review of When Religion Becomes Evil by Charles Kimball:
Five warning signs of corruption in religion:
1. Absolute truth claims
2. Blind obedience
3. Establishing the "ideal" time
4. The end justifies any means
5. Declaring holy war
Five signs of integrity and dynamism in religion:
1. Dynamic and relational truth and ongoing learning
2. Critical thinking and honest inquiry
3. Making the best of every time and leaving the determination of the end time to heaven
4. Both means and end are important and linked
5. Declaring holy peace
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