May 4, 2007
The Fellowship of Friends SketchBook
Posted by the Esoteric Sheik of Inner Confusion under Fellowship of FriendsFor those who while participating in the FoF discussion felt the need to move elsewhere and concentrate on other projects.
May 4, 2007
For those who while participating in the FoF discussion felt the need to move elsewhere and concentrate on other projects.
May 5, 2007 at 6:22 pm
Reflections on The Fellowship of Friends No. 1
I wish to spend sometime simply trying to write out a list of titles that seem relevant to reflect on. I would appreciate it if others suggest titles or areas that I have not looked at that also seem relevant. Participation is appreciated. I will slowly fill in under each title things that seem relevant that have been posted in other blogs or are part of Fellowship published material.
During this first month I will probably renew the presentation of titles every week, then, as we settle into a structure that seems comprehensible enough, maybe it will get corrected once a month.
If you wish to participate in this reflection on the Fellowship of friends, it would be appreciated if you could choose one of the following subjects as title of your input so that the rest of us can be more clear about the area you are trying to address. You may also suggest the addition of other areas not presented here that you find relevant.
It is assumed that everything presented here is the subjective view of the people writing in it. Each one takes responsibility for what he/she says. It would be appreciated if people would use at least half their name.
1. The Fellowship of Friends
History
The Arc
Other aims
Art
Legitimacy
Relevant information by other authors
1a. Money in the Fellowship of Friends
Relevant information by other authors
2. The Teacher
“Known” biography
The Man, the King, the Priest.
Relevant information by other authors
2a. The Ministers
Relevant information by other authors
3. The Inner Circle
a. At Isis
b. In Centers
Relevant information by other authors
4. The Students
a. At Isis
b. In Centers
Relevant information by other authors
c. Ex-students
5. Theory and Practice
Three lines of work
“Biological” families
Consciousness without functions
The lower Self, the king of Clubs, False personality
Feminine Dominance
The King of Hearts
The exercises
Living in Renaissance, Apollo, Isis.
Living in Centers
Self Remembering, Presence.
Sexuality
Good householder
Relevant information by other authors
6. History of legal conflicts
7. The Human or Inhuman aspects of the Fellowship of Friends (Different cases)
Health.
Indoctrination
Idolatry
Coercion of speech.
Control and omission of information
Mental and emotional “programming”
Exploitation of human resources.
Use and abuse of individuals
Inconsiderateness
Control of participation
Privileges of a few.
Relevant information by other authors
8. Personal testimonies.
9. Rough Statistics
Total number of students
Students in the Fellowship as of may, 2007
Ex-students as of May, 2007
Suicides
People that had to look for “Professional” help to overcome the traumatic experience of being a student of the Fellowship of Friends.
Relevant information by other authors
May 7, 2007 at 10:59 pm
This deeply moving letter appeared in the Fellowship of Friends Discussion of Animam Recro.
WhaleRider Says:
May 5th, 2007 at 9:52 pm
Reading this blog has been a very visceral and emotional experience for me, which I am grateful to transform into presence, for I live the work every day of my existence. When reading it I perspire heavily. In the past week since I was informed of it and dived in, I have had many instances of energy shooting down my sides, and I am moved to tears several times a day when I reflect upon what I experienced in the FOF. Yet the sheer energy contained in this blog, both raw and refined is quite impressive as I am sure the venerable sheik and knight will agree, and I cannot stop reading it. I find myself hoping of recognize my story, only to realize that it is not there because I have not told it.
I want to be clear that I do not wish to be part of any lawsuit against RB or the FOF. I am not motivated by any hope of financial gain, nor am I willing to join a crusade to end the FOF. It will undoubtedly collapse under its own excesses, or not, I could care less. Each person, in or out, must choose for themselves, which I believe is one of the reasons this blog is so valuable. I have built a comfortable, happy life and successful business post-FOF for myself and my family which I wish to protect. I ask anyone whom may recognize my identity to please respect my privacy and keep my name anonymous. Although current FOF members may wish to argue that in divulging my story I have violated the personal privacy of RB, that his public life is distinctly separate from his private life. My response is this: when a teacher brings his student into his private life and uses “work” language in his seduction, that distinction is gone. For each of us, no matter how long we have contact with the FOF; it is and will be a deeply moving and personal experience, not because of the man, but of the possibilites of growth within each of us.
To Golb:
Now that your tail is out of your mouth, you glibly strike at this blog-my air, at the children, and at me? You have no idea who I am and what I have been through, Golb, whatever the heck that name is supposed to mean. I am WhaleRider. I have ridden the BIG FISH into the deepest, darkest, coldest depths until my lungs have screamed for air, my soul choking in my throat, and I have survived. I let myself be swallowed whole, have kept myself intact, had my semen drained nightly by a sex maniac who gave the most wondrous, intentional, conscious blowjobs, had my essence gouged open as I lay resting on the Goethe Academy floor as a human shield for the precious artwork, the lights left on the LeBrun all night to keep my exhausted body in first-state deprivation, my king of clubs bound and gagged, unable to protect me from this terrible angel who would rouse me and lead me secretly, stealthily into the dark of his gilded bed-chamber to service his need for the good of us all, in this school of “shut up and be present”, this silk-lined labyrinth of luxury complete with the matching salt and pepper shakers, where I puke out his semen in the imported porcelain toilet along with the fine wine and pepper steak from the teaching dinner earlier that night and wipe my face on the Egyptian cotton towel just before I’d retire until dawn cracks open another day and he slumbers peacefully until lunch dreaming of sugar plums because they remind him of testicles…while the rest of us toiled in the searing hot sun the next day still weary from our lunatic efforts the day and night before…not once was I told that I was loved in this school of love, but he loved when I returned the favor-only to have to excrete myself one year later, quietly leaving in a gentleman-like fashion, not making a splash, barely a ripple, so as not to disturb anyone else who might be sleeping…to remain alive, and carry out my prophesized soul death sentence as a life-person-oh yeah, that’s right, there was no gun to my head…but thankfully his predictions don’t come true either, do they?
And Howard, Girard, Golden Fleecer, the brave-new-man and miscellaneous moon angels…with your eloquent tongues and trite, text-book explanations for our suffering…I have seen 50 like you dis-“membered” by the insatiable Minotaur at the center of this perpetual labyrinth you call haven, home, Isis… do you have the balls to hear the truth?…the graphic truth?… the painful truth? The truth I paid for with my own hydrogen 12? Do know why he calls himself a goddess? You think an angel told him. Did you know the prostrate gland is the male G-spot? He would orgasm from anal sex without any penal stimulus, and think he had awakened his female side, just as a woman does during anal sex without ever touching the clitoris… He taught me that, he’s such an elevated and exalted teacher! Look it up on the internet, or better yet, try it for yourself sometime…
And can you even FATHOM the nauseating, soul imploding disgust I felt the night he did “rimming” on me, without my consent, and then brought his fecal coated lips to mine and kissed me? Try separating from that. The Darvons he used to hand out were not enough to quench the pain, for this pain is exquisite and it leaves no visible marks! Think of me the next time he kisses your forehead…once those lips had been planted firmly on my asshole and probably countless others from all corners of the planet. And that’s the ultimate of all ironies; he kisses your third eye with those lips, coating the seat of your very soul with fecal matter from the seat of his inner circle.
Please, by all means, stay in the Fellowship as long as you like! Stand by him! Support him! Bring him fresh new, exotic meat, he’s HUNGRY! Or if you like, have a look down the escape hatch he had installed in his closet just in case C-influence happened to be on vacation and he read the tea leaves wrong. Then you will know the darkness that resides under that silk suit. You might want to have your own plan B just in case the Earl has run out of man number five party hats that you have been so patiently waiting for him to bestow upon you…
WhaleRider
1979-1985
May 7, 2007 at 11:03 pm
WhaleRider Says:
May 7th, 2007 at 7:36 am
Whew, more tears, more sweat…I tossed and turned all last night…In the spirit of sharing and completely divesting myself of the FOF brand of personal improvement, cuz’ I’m feeing a distinct Hawaiian vibe here, thanks Arthur, Charles R (I remember you well), Jeannette, Vena, and everyone else for your kind thoughts…what made up my mind to take Morpheus’s little truth pill and flush myself from the Matrix 22 years ago was this: (for which I paid dearly) being close to RB afforded me the chance to see and understand first hand that his relationship and use of the concept “C-influence” was actually in fact ‘magical thinking’ (angels are hovering over the table right now) and ‘ideas of reference’ (the number 44 appearing somewhere just for you), which are two neuroses that function as defense mechanisms for individuals with ego deficits. I am deeply thankful to Miles Barth, who introduced these to me when he followed his conscience out of the school; it awakened mine. I left the FOF five months later.
An easy way to understand how ‘ideas of reference’ works is to assign strong personal meaning to a number other than 44, which I did, and voila, there are just as many shocks out there for those willing shed their FOF blinders and look for them. Don’t take my word for it, do it yourself.
When I began the work, I understood that Gurdjieff’s original definition of C-influence was this: it originates from the lips of a living, breathing, conscious teacher to the student, directed specifically to them, for furthering the student’s evolution. B-Influence was whatever the conscious being produced and left behind when they pass over. (After all that effort, who’d want to hang around on this plane, anyway?) Everything else was A-Influence. Ergo, you do whatever you can to be close to a conscious being to get what you need to evolve. But that was not RB’s brand of “C-Influence”, and it irked me.
My direct experience was that RB was not intellectually sophisticated enough for the task of focusing that much attention (and love) on any one student, he likes to play the field so to speak. So he merely projected his own defense mechanisms into the group to mask his inadequacies. (If shit happens, it is God’s will, not mine.) He diverted our ingrained religious beliefs to the 44, and we bought it. He’s a master of spin.
After posing the question at a meeting in Renaissance, “how does one prolong a higher state?” after much silence and one helpful angle, I received a photograph for vanity feature from Belinda and the subject was changed. Undaunted, I asked Robert the same question during a discrete lunch, with only two others attending so as not to put him too much pressure on him. His answer was to place a wine cork under his French sleeve cuff and to show me how a person in his position could create a memorable state in others who look up to him, but that would not be enough for awakening, the rest is left up to the individual. In other words, he didn’t have the answer. (The thought of doing the sequence 24/7 doesn’t seem to be the answer either.) It then became clear to me that Robert’s self-assigned role as teacher was how he kept himself dialed in and relatively present, but not fully awake in his higher intellect. He wasn’t one for “long thoughts”. All the emphasis on being present seem to inhibit critical thinking, lofty or not. We students were his reminders to pay attention, and he was feeding on us because he had a role to play.
A good example of “ideas of reference” is RB claiming the detention at the airport being a grand play designed by higher forces specifically for him and his entourage to transform into a higher state. (Jeeze, I get that friction every day just riding the bus!) The detention at the airport was a indirect result of his actions, in that he created and maintains the FOF, and it’s always been an odd bunch, to say the least. They raised the suspicions of the airline workers. That’s pretty understandable post-911. “C-Influence” providing friction just for him…I don’t believe so, that’s the snake biting his own tail, he doesn’t know himself. Robert caused this friction on himself and the others by virtue of surrounding himself with a “school” of entitled odd ducks that behave strangely. The idea of not losing your temper and going off at some underpaid, over-zealous republican homeland security dude with an attitude because you have ballet tickets… well, that’s common sense, unless you are looking for a full body cavity search or something.
True C-influence is designed for you (customization- 5/318-innernaut) based on direct observation and means you actually get to evolve, eventually becoming equal or surpassing your teacher (which I don’t claim to be)…but wait…evolving students? That presents a dilemma for the teacher who happens to have developed narcissistic personality disorder (not a disorder that would meet the legal definition of insanity, by the way). Here’s the rub, the nature of that disorder would instinctively compel that teacher to undermine anyone’s evolution if they were to get anywhere close to his level because that teacher always has to be top of the heap, maintaining an unreachable status. (First people RB clears from the playing field, women, no WOMAN will awaken in HIS school, by God. He personally prefers men.)
In groupthink the commonly held myths (i.e. beliefs that cannot be verified) function as an adhesive, binding the group together. Most of us have the need to belong, to feel part of a bigger identity than our small subjective one (a school is for those who know they need one) and the fear of abandonment (shunning) is so strong it keeps the members in line, censoring themselves and putting up with more and more cognitive dissonance. Fear manipulates the members into making excuses for any shortcomings or glossing over the glaring contradictions in order to maintain the status quo and retain membership. And by fear, what could be more frightening than losing your most prized possession, your soul? (In other less materialistic times, it was the fear of everlasting pain.)
So how can you debate the belief that “C-influence” had its hand in creating this school and will determine its fate? (Howard espouses Robert’s beliefs the best.) Or angels guard the gates? Or that God made the world in a matter of days? Or that Allah is the ONE and ONLY prophet. You cannot. Religion is not subject to debate, it is based on faith. You either buy into because you need the eggs, or you don’t.
Discussing these realities to others within a groupthink structure though, would be the equivalent of attempting to describe water to a fish. Besides, I was in my mid-twenties when this was happening, who would listen to me? I’d just get the boot on the spot. Given all I had experienced with RB and that at the very core I disagreed with his definition of “C-Influence” but could buffer that no longer, there was no choice but for me to walk. I did it on my terms, without fanfare. I went out, made a life for myself, and created a family with someone who had no relationship with the FOF. I love them deeply. I am eternally grateful to have accomplished this and worked hard not implode.
I still do believe in synchronicity IN MODERATION. Would I stake my children’s life on it? Hell, no! I use for personal validation purposes only, not to divine the future for others. Remember, the house always wins, as long as you choose to play.
Now I can have some peace.
WhaleRider
1979-1985
May 8, 2007 at 6:45 pm
The following appeared in the FoF discussion in AnimamRecro, page 8.
Ames Gilbert Says:
May 8th, 2007 at 4:48 pm
On the subject of ‘awakening’ in the FOF
I agree with John (#331) and Rabbi Burns, that many practices in the FOF lead to deeper sleep, not awakening. A German woman student shared an exercise to help ‘self-remember’ that could be used for long periods, far longer than the ‘twenty minutes’ that O. claimed would lead to breakthrough. The exercise consists of deepening presence while clenching first one buttock, then the other, very slowly. For some reason, one can do this and not go into imagination for quite long periods; I was able to do it for as long as half an hour. Imagine my disappointment when I didn’t break through!
Another practice that leads to greater, not lesser, sleep are meetings. They are especially dangerous, because this is where the group comes to get inoculated with the latest groupthink. I gather the format of meetings has changed since I left, so some of the details of this letter I sent to Girard Haven on this very subject have changed. But, not the gist. I’m sure these observations contributed to my downfall!
For those interested, here goes:
Either I’m nuts or nearly everyone else is!
Sunday, November 7, 1994
Dear Girard,
Thank you for leading the meeting on Saturday night. I’m sharing some observations and opinions about what went on then for two reasons; I hope they will be useful for you, and I want also to clarify my own thoughts.
There are several areas I wish to write about.
To start with, I assume that to some degree you were intentional when you chose the people who supported you on the podium. It was certainly an imposing array of the ‘old guard’, and had its intended effect. When you and those who you associate with are up on the podium, have you considered what is happening? You are transmitting borrowed power (which comes from Robert, who get all of this particular kind from us). It may make you feel good, but it is not real. And all those in the meeting receive the radiations and also feel good, aligned with you, aligned with the organization, facing the sun—Robert. And we mistake this energy for spiritual energy, and say “If it feels good, I must be more awake!” But, not so! I say this because it relates to what follows.
It is only at a few special periods, such as the one presently unfolding, that an amazing process becomes clear to me, and on Saturday night there was crystal clarity. What I saw was the phenomenon of using the work angles to send ourselves to sleep. A strong statement indeed! Yet, consider this. What were we after when we joined the Fellowship? For me it was an environment that would allow me to wake up as soon as possible. And what does that mean? It means waking up my conscience and learning to distinguish its voice from the surrounding rubbish. Why wake up conscience? So I can listen to it and act on it, making it my internal master, the only valid and real master. If this happens, and it is the only reason to me for living, there becomes no need for an external master. There is only one valid objective for temporarily hiring an external master and borrowing his will, and that is to speed the waking and learn to serve one’s own Ideal the quicker. If I dedicate the perceptions and fruits of my Self to an external master and to an external ideal, no matter how noble, then all I am is a noble slave. This is for me one of the few absolutes.
So, what I saw was that whenever our consciences stir against slavery to Robert’s ideals (which may be noble, but are outside ourselves, and so are just enticing mazes where we lose our individuality), we use the work angles to squash the discomfort. During this extraordinary period of possibilities, the consciences of many students are stirring. But you, I hope unwittingly, used the dead, misused, abused, now lifeless work tools to squeeze the messy struggle of life, and encouraged us to do the same. When you demanded that the angles be objective, you enlarged intellectual center was mistaking dryness and impersonality for objectivity. You set the rhythm for the hypnotic, sleep-inducing delivery of the angles. And so again we simply stopped daring to ask personal questions, or give personal answers, the kind that are bursting with blood, and anguish and caring. If only you had looked, you would have seen from the sappy looks on the faces of those supposed to be your friends the familiar hypnosis of students at meetings, the weird mixture of mild comfort and mild guilt. The same look was on your face, and on the faces of your companions. I only heard two angles that dealt with transformation on a level accessible to us—the ones that used the word ‘love’. That is how difficult the subject is, how mysterious, how out of control and far from our intellectual understanding. The first beautiful angle of the evening, from Ivy, could and should have set the tone for the rest of the conversation. But instead we decided to use the work against ourselves. Any decent emotion has to be “transformed”, not lived. Any questionable attitude has to be euthanized. Any genuine feeling has to be stifled. Any sense of wonder has to be squeezed to death. All this is “transformation”. And this is good because Robert seems to want it. We can support this with dozens of angles that he has passed on, or hundreds of suitable quotations from the work books, or any number of testimonials to Robert’s consciousness.
The second time the word love was used was in your quotation at the end, and I thank you for that. You seemed to come to life, and we responded by coming to life a bit. And we even changed the energy in the room to something higher than comfortable self-congratulation. How can things be wrong when the meetings feel so good? Did you mean it when you called for us to put off childish things, become men? None of us so far seems to be able to. We are satisfied by being told that we are all men number four, that everything is fine, that the gods are on our side. And you are told you are a man number five, or whatever! I hope you don’t believe it. Girard, when we begin to listen to our consciences, and swear loyalty to our internal Ideal over all other ideals, then we will become men number four. When we make our verifications more important than anyone else’s, then we may become men number four. Only then will the shackles that we voluntarily put on ourselves fall away, and the words you quoted start to come true.
Girard, you seem driven by your intellectual center. I’m dominated by my moving center. We can’t solve the real problems by using our centers of gravity alone. If we try, then when we can’t find the answer through them, we just go back to sleep. You told us you are attracting something new when you start skipping. So, why don’t we try ‘skipping’ at meetings? We could try to move in the opposite direction—no poppycock, no unverifiable angles (for example, talking for five minutes about Robert’s consciousness). We can intentionally make them more personal. If we can’t, let us abandon large meetings and try smaller and smaller ones until we reach a size where we can give and receive personal energy among ourselves. The form of our meetings hasn’t changed for twenty-five years! Not very successful results when our watchword is supposed to be to change patterns! My conscience is stirring and making me uncomfortable. It needs room to stretch. Our consciences need exercise. Our job in the school is to exercise our consciences and learn to trust what they tell us. We cannot make any real mistakes if we do this.
To end, I’d like to share some words by Kabir Helminski that another student sent me recently.
“In this time when spiritual fellowships are confused with cults, leadership with tyranny, and submission with the abandonment of conscience, I want to speak for the unpopular and easily misunderstood values of spiritual leadership and the group process… A saying has it that one log will not burn by itself, but with a little kindling a number of logs leaning against each other will make a good fire. A group, any group, generates energy, but the quality of energy and the use to which it is put will determine whether that group becomes a mob, a cult, or a circle of lovers… The power of love is waiting to do its work, and if we independent and isolated people would allow ourselves to overcome our separateness, our suspicion, and our pride, the miracle of unity and affection is still possible. According to a Sufi saying, “Grapes ripen in the sun smiling at one another.”
Sincerely,
Ames Gilbert
P.S. I enclose a copy of a letter I sent to Steven Dambeck after he led the last meeting. I think there is a strong correspondence between the contents of that letter and this.
My illusions fall with the leaves.
The wind—it doesn’t care!
Phew! Just finished keying all that in because the original file is lost. As I mentioned above, this letter, and other letters and activities, surely led to the Big Boot a short while later. Although the format of the meetings may have ‘changed’ superficially, I’d guess that the combined effect of the Big Kahuna pontificating and the distribution word-wide of the subsequent video (a known hypnotic medium in itself) would make the sleep even deeper. I did not receive a reply to this letter, or any others. To be fair, Girard did try to corral me outside the Lodge soon after this one, but I was too angry to stick around to hear what he had to say. I had just been watching him and a couple of flunkies go through the letter boxes, removing what he judged to be subversive material from all the slots. The fact that he took this task upon himself showed me something important about the FOF, and I hadn’t had time to digest it.
The haiku is my own.
With love to you all, ‘in’ or ‘out’,
Ames
May 8, 2007 at 7:09 pm
To the Sheik,
Thank you for the “sketchbook” change and thank you again for having us in your site.
I am wondering to what extent it is possible to keep this “sketchbook” site free of discussion. Basically the aim here is that students or non students write their story and it is fine if in their story they wish to support the Fellowship or question it but posts like Plains, No. 4 are simply detracting from other posts without supporting their statement with their own experience.
I can understand that this may not be possible if it gives you a greater amount of work than you are willing to put in and have no judgement against you for that but if you can think of a way I or others might help and see the reasoning behind my wish, you might consider it.
Basically, many students or others are not willing to read the blog because they are not interested in our personal small or big struggles with each other on the blog and I can very well relate to that. While that has a purpose of its own that I find very useful to keep one’s self in constant questioning, my aim in the sketchbook is to inform, not to discuss. From one angle, anyone wishing to inform about their experience is welcome but posts simply detracting others are not and if I could, I would not post them on the sketchbook, so that it can collect a material that goes very much to the point. Positive or negative but to the point.
The sketchbook as I see it is not about freedom of speech in any of its forms, it is about freedom of expression with an aim. The aim to tell your story, your experience in the Fellowship wether it was very positive or very questionnable of the Fellowship itself.
On the other hand it is not that this insubstantial angles like Plains, do not show the level of mindlessness of the Fellowship responses and that will show itself for what it is and it actually allows for a certain dynamic that is not all uninteresting.
I guess I just wish to share this thoughts with you and am willing to abide by your conditions but would also enjoy hearing your position.
Thank you again
May 8, 2007 at 7:26 pm
To Plain No. 4.
Dear Person behind Plain,
While I appreciate your participation in this site, the aim here is not to have a discussion, to reject or question each other’s statements but to allow for each one of us to tell his story as he/she has experienced it.
The discussion is a much better place for posts like the one you’ve submitted where we measure each other’s oil without compassion. The aim of this site is different. Here we accept each other’s experience and thoughts on the many different aspects suggested to reflect on about the Fellowship, and will not argue or detract from your statement even if it is different to how I or others experienced it. It does not matter wether other’s think it is right, wrong, subjective or objective, it is what each one of us thinks it is and that is enough to be accepted here.
If you wish to support the Fellowship, the best way you can do it is by telling us your own story, what about your life in it has made you love it, grow, live. Surely we have all been in that place and will understand you.
Perhaps you can try to understand where others are, having experienced what they experienced, without undermining them, labelling them or judging them.
Thank you.
Elena
May 9, 2007 at 6:58 am
Appeared in FOF discusion of Animam Recro. Page 8/38
Lady B Says:
April 29th, 2007 at 10:57 pm
I am still in the school but I am not a student anymore.
I joined the school 20 years ago with all my heart.
I survived several of the school’s big intervals, when Influence C was “shaking the tree.”
When other students left, I never wanted to know the reason. Each time, some “good student” or center director would act as a filter, saying that the student left because their instinctive center didn’t want to pay any more or because their American puritanical morality made Robert’s sex life into an excuse for leaving.
After a year in the school, a friend of mine left, and before she did she told me that her friend had a relationship with Robert. It was a bad experience, and he left in shock. I was actually relieved to hear that Robert was gay. I’d already been in a group where the teacher was gay. In a second group, where the teacher was straight, and very interested in women, his “wife” had me kicked out because she imagined I was having an affair with him.
In the FOF, I lost a husband, a house, and a lot of money that I didn’t have and don’t have, but none of that bothered me enough to make me leave. Robert has never spoken to me directly — I don’t have money, I’m not rich, I’m a woman. I’m not an artist or actor. I don’t have blue blood or a name of noble origin. So, my role in the school — according to other students — is to pay. That’s my role and for many years I’ve been paying my teaching payment.
I began reading this blog and the letters sent to me by ex-students. I told myself that I’ve been in the school so long that I wouldn’t hear anything bad enough to change my mind, my desire, or my love for Robert.
It didn’t take long to realize that I hadn’t been aware of the level of suffering that many students endured. When Elena wrote, it was as if she read my heart. Now I understand why friends who became Robert’s lovers are so depressed and unable to have a full emotional life. I’ve seen mothers who are happy that their sons were chosen to be Robert’s lovers, and encouraged them not to lose the opportunity to experience higher levels with an angel.
At Isis, children are the last concern. In fact, a friend who doesn’t have children told me, “I think that Isis needs an orphanage.” I was shocked and offended.
I believed that I was helping to build a new civilization, not supporting and paying for all this suffering. I can’t be an accomplice any more. This isn’t the school I was looking for. I’ve learned a lot, but at a very high price. I have a conscience — someone might call it feminine dominance, but I don’t care. All those years I’ve pushed down that inner screaming voice, and had — as many others have — health consequences.
I want to leave the school without a fuss, the way I came, but I want to give a warning to potential students so they have an idea of what they’re getting into. If this blog was available to me 20 years ago, I probably would have made a different decision.
Someone said — I wish I could remember who — that you can see the level of civilization in a country by looking at the way they treat children and old people. Elena, you’re right: I don’t recognize the same Ark that I boarded 20 years old.
During these 20 years, I’ve met some wonderful people, and leaving those friends is going to be a much bigger payment than I’ve ever made. I’m sorry, and I love you.
May 9, 2007 at 7:03 am
Appeared in Page 8/70 of FoF discussion of Animam Recro.
butterfly Says:
April 30th, 2007 at 10:43 am
I am a student as I mentioned in a previous post, but I enjoy the ability to make observations and to make criticisms constructive or otherwise that this blog gives the freedom to do.
Two things I have observed from living at Apollo/Isis is that if you want a job done properly do not hire a student ( with a few exceptions). ‘Life’ people are more reliable.
The second is that, has anyone else ever thought that the Galleria, from the outside, just looks like a Mc Donalds?
May 9, 2007 at 7:30 am
From FoF discussion at AR Page 8/134
To: Clara Helena Haven (#124)
Please get a lawyer to give you general advice before you make any threats to the FOF, however subtle or unsubtle. You need to protect yourself in the visible world as well as the invisible world. Do not make the mistake of thinking Abraham Goldman is the mild, gentle man he projects himself as to so many. When it comes to protecting the Fellowship, he is to Burton as Karl Rove is to Bush—utterly and completely ruthless, and completely without conscience. For him, ANY means justifies the end. He has huge resources behind him, and can easily tie you up in expensive litigation; you might ‘win’ in the end, but you may also be bankrupt. Remember, this country may have quite a different legal system to the one you are used to. For example, in most cases, parties to litigation usually pay their own fees. That means, even if you ‘win’, you are unlikely to get back the costs of defending yourself, at $200 or more an hour, court costs, deposition fees, and innumerable more expenses, not to mention your own time.
I’m not trying to frighten you. I’m not a lawyer, I’m advising you to talk to one before you go too far on your own. I personally know how Goldman works. For example, he sent an employee of the Church of Scientology, an ‘investigator’ called Ingram, to threaten me and my family with harm if I did not help the FOF by withdrawing my help for Troy Buzbee. The sleazy Ingram at that time was wanted in two states for his abusive investigations. Ingram also went to Troy Buzbee’s mother (who knew nothing of the case) and revealed what was going on—not to obtain information (she had none), but to use her horror and dismay as a weapon against Troy. That is the kind of person Abraham Goldman is, behind the soft smile and the ‘harmless’ act.
Another piece of ‘non-lawyerly’ advice: document everything, from now on. Make copies of everything you have that is pertinent to your aims, and put them in the hands of people you trust (and at least one copy abroad, beyond the jurisdiction of a United States court). Do not let Goldman defeat you with a ‘gag order’.
I wish you well.
Regards,
Ames Gilbert
May 9, 2007 at 7:32 am
From FoF discussion in AR P.8
alice in wonderlust Says:
May 2nd, 2007 at 1:45 am
Greetings.
I was in ‘the group’ late 70’s and early 80’s, lived at a center and then at Renaissance. I left for several reasons: there was a pervading sense of superiority, separateness, fear and desperation. There was just so much that was about escape and I began to get tired of the desperate desire to escape (the machine, the ‘I’s, ‘life’, and life….etc.) For all the talk of RB being conscious he was not very observant, was way into himself and lacked compassion. I did not want to become dependent on the emotional group thing and it just seemed so small and rather petty wrapped up in big talk.
I wasn’t aware of RB’s predatory behavior - just thought he was gay. Being a predator is different.
What I have found post-fof has been very wonderful. I am very involved in community (more fluid than a small rigid group) and have been able to continue my spiritual interests. My life has not been easy, but the struggle has been alive. I didn’t feel isolated till I moved to another state, but with effort, that has completely changed.
I’m a very private person and I’ve just not mentioned the fof much since then. I guess I’ve felt somewhat embarrassed because of the creepy, sleazy, deluded dark side of this school is very apparent to most everyone except current students. As great and godlike RB and his followers think the fof is - it has that great a shadow which, it seems, they are still unconscious of. For me the process of leaving the group was one of facing shadow material - mine and fof’s of which I partook. Facing shadow is painful - accepting responsibility is worse. I knew that if I stayed longer and bought in any deeper I would not be able to face it - disavowing and running from shadow is deeply ingrained fof behavior. Its interesting…such a tiny group with such delusions of grandeur and light and no recognition of shadow– but the perception of the group my most people (and some former students) is that it is all shadow. (a parallel is the rigid Mormon communities in Utah and their ‘lost boys’.)
The released thoughts of Mr. O (#7-352 ) have been my findings too. My heart and mind are much cleaner and richer cleared of the superiority, rigid rules, desire to escape. Being present is for no reason other than it is its own reward. It is not a bargaining chip, or points accrued for a more ’saved’ status.
I had a lot of good, simple fun in the group and loved California (I was rather young at the time too). I didn’t keep the rules very well and mostly flew beneath the radar - never wanting to become a power position parrot student. Met some very cool, odd, fascinating people some of whom have remained friends and I’ve watched them mature. I don’t miss my ‘in the group’ fof friends since they became extremely negative and dogmatic. Besides, my involvement was very long ago and I’ve made and rekindled some wonderful friendships. Generally, the experience honed my BS-o-meter which has been very useful. Fof is life in tiny miniature- fundamentalists, power plays, control, secrets, politics…politics. Nevertheless, I think we are connected somehow and I have really enjoyed hearing the voices here!
May 9, 2007 at 7:36 am
From FoF discussion of AR. P.8/67
Cake please Says:
April 30th, 2007 at 9:09 am
Dear Siddiq
The school - we all seem to have created our own reality of this. In this instance yours, mine, Lady B’s.
In regard to Lady B, you say “ I am very sorry for you..” What about compassion, do you not feel the suffering?
“ children appear to me healthy and well adjusted, not mistreated, not in any danger.”
Did you read the posts 7/254 of Ms. Reality Check and 7/255 of Heather a daughter of students. Maybe will learn more of what our children actually experience as more of them are now accessing the blog.
Again to Lady B “…parents (of which I am one and I assume you are too, which makes me wonder why we have never connected…”
Not sure if Lady B is a parent but I am. And I guess I could pose the same question to you. But real no matter, there are worlds within worlds here.
And being a parent is not the only criteria for caring about children. Some have given up that opportunity to follow the will of the Teacher. Some far more than that.
As the terra firma now shakes beneath my feet, more and more of my thoughts turn to my children. Fellowship born and bred. Wonderful and magical, constant source of joy.
But also, my thoughts turn to the payment they have made for me to follow my path. Uprooted from centre to centre, city to city, country to country in my pursuit of the good student.
My solace was the students that formed a major part of their life.
Then we moved to Mecca.
Hey mama, your emperor wears no clothes.
This is a real school, real school. Wonderful students, wonderful students. I chanted.
Still love you ma, but really no clothes, no clothes.
Best to you Siqqid, may your children have the love and care of fellow students as mine have had, but have no illusions that this is a school with a heart for children… or women for that matter.
Cake
May 9, 2007 at 7:42 am
From FoF Discussion in AR. P8/144
NoName Says:
May 2nd, 2007 at 7:14 am
I guess it is easy for me to think about lawsuits or class actions lawsuits around someone like Robert Burton.
The man has been so greedy and ruthless, he definitively exploited almost all the members who gave money and time and energy in many forms.
Many ex members here mentioned legal action is a futile route…. Majority will win!
I personally do not have money, or knowledge, or leadership abilities to even initiate such thing.
I would have to know in advance if such effort could be rewarded after all. Someone was joking sarcastically about paying me back with Chinese pottery or some other valuable objects from RB’s collection I suppose…. but realistically I do not think about getting my money back. It would be nice perhaps, but it would not happen.
It is also true that not everyone gets on their feet after leaving the Fof, it has been a few years now and I am still paying personally the consequences for having invested in the fof…
This is hard to forgive.
I am sure someone here could come out and tell me that I should not blame any external circumstances, that it was my choice, etc., I was fully adult and was not “forced” into anything with coercion.
Ok, Ok, I can take responsibility for my foolish choices and can even thank the fate that overall brought me here and also past the fof, after all I have learned a lesson , a huge one and am still learning!
But what I would really like is to make RB’s great lie widely PUBLIC, it has already harmed and continues to harm many people.
There are many nice fellows in the fof among the less so, but even these decent human beings how can they not know of the horrible stories behind the great façade of the teacher? This is what bugs me the most: people continue to fall and to follow a very sick man.
The price in the end is really too big, is a loss of soul for sure, not a gain, unless one eventually realizes the illusion and wakes up, claiming back what is personal and real.
May 9, 2007 at 7:47 am
Excerpts from post 8/149 of FoF discussion in AR
Yesri Baba Says:
May 2nd, 2007 at 10:46 am
I was expelled from the fof in 1980 and it was one of the most painful experiences of my life (that it was much my own responsibilty and fault for giving myself too much to it does not change the pain it caused me).
Most of my evolution has occurred in the 27 years since through my own studies, meditation and just living. Most of my work has been in construction related fields and i can relate to your conversation with the biker.
May 9, 2007 at 7:50 am
From FoF discussion in AR 8/153
butterfly Says:
May 2nd, 2007 at 3:53 pm
#8/70, Butterfly
“The second is that, has anyone else ever thought that the Galleria, from the outside, just looks like a Mc Donalds?”
Anonymous Says:
“I had not quite noticed the similarity. The amusement park for kids is missing. You are right to only point to the outside though, because most people would find the interior decor more attractive and the food more interesting.”
Thank you Anonymous and I would like to use this as an example of a deeper malaise within the fof. You are allowed to have your opinion on what you think attractive or not as does everyone but there are many areas in the fof which as Kiran mentions above are “unquestionable”.
The architecture of the Galleria is of the same style as a Mc Donalds and thats fine, if thats all we could do at the time in terms of budget, but don’t fool ourselves that its beautiful just because someone says so.
I personally find the interior fussy, ornate and camp, and as i often feel after a concert, when everyone is saying how beautiful it was, I wonder what is happening. Yes, we do have some gifted musicians, the lady flutist was one example but she just left the fof. We also have a lot of amateurs and those concerts are not always good.
There is a lot of peer pressure to toe the line though and for everyone to forget to mention all the bum notes.
The Russian students who, incidentally, have a higher understanding of music and other arts from their education, do recognise the workings of the old communist party in the style of our own ‘benevolent’ dictatorship.
A piece of plastic is of a low ‘alchemy’, no matter how much gold paint you add on top.
The Galleria is a meeting place for the fof, you do not, however, have to check your critical faculties at the door.
yours, butterfly
May 9, 2007 at 7:57 am
From FoF discussion in AR. 8/158
Whale Rider Says:
May 2nd, 2007 at 7:05 pm
The newer branch of Science called behavioral evolutionism offers this explanation for promiscuity in humans: it is likely a character trait buried deep in our reptilian (instinctive) brains that all men and women, gay, straight or bisexual share with the animal kingdom for survival. The majorities of creatures, big and small are naturally promiscuous, seeking to spread their genes among as many others as possible within their species. This insures the survival of their particular genetic lineage. The alpha male establishes and vigorously defends a hierarchical social structure (pyramid) through intimidation and brute force when necessary, fending off other usurping males, sometimes even seriously injuring himself in the process. This sends the would-be suitors to the margins of the herd as the alpha male engages in unrestricted sex with as many females (partners) as possible within his harem. Thus the sex drive among earth dwellers is, at its core insatiable. Sound familiar?
This would characterize RB as having transformed (evolved?) into more of a “man-beast” (satyr, Minotaur) than an angel or goddess. (Yes, he personally said to me, “Don’t worry, you are with an angel right now”.) Could a satyr give you a higher state if you met one? You bet. Is that why RB was so inspired by the cave paintings of the couple engaged in “doggie-style” sex (probably an early sex manual)? Did he recognize something in himself and buffer it with school language? And the sexual preoccupation with peepee and poohpooh, sounds fairly regressed to me!
May 9, 2007 at 8:01 am
“On saturday May 12th we shall celebrate our teachers 68th birthday on this auspicious year of our first anniversary of the sequence- six - and the - eight - wordless breaths.
if you want to wish our teacher a happy birthday, you may send him a card with a personal note. if you wish to give robert a birthday gift, you may enclose a cheque, made out to Robert Burton
if you are mailing a card and gift send to : Robert Burton, Galleria, Post Office Box 100, Oregon House. CA 95962″
May 9, 2007 at 8:09 am
From FoF discussion in AR. 8/164
A word to the wise… Says:
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:13 pm
Good Advice to Elena from Ames G.
Elena, you may well be risking everything you own. You may not care today, but this can change rapidly when you get sued.
The potential for lawsuits for defamation for both invasion of privacy and the careless and libelous comments you have made about Robert, Girard, and many others now, could undoubtedly lead to successful lawsuits against you by any of a number of people.
To top it off, you are getting ready to launch another project dedicated to repeating your “facts”–with your uncontrolled outbursts of emotion, it is simply a recipe for your personal disaster.
A word to the wise!
May 9, 2007 at 8:13 am
From FoF discussion in AR. P 8/168
Ludger Kreilos Says:
May 3rd, 2007 at 12:56 am
Dear Ladies & Gentleman,
it´s now two days ago that a very good friend of mine and also a former student of the FOF, found this blog and we are still amazed about the amount of articles written in the last month. So first of all a very big “Thank You”! for the founder & moderator of the blog. We all think that You must be the one who must be shaken to the bone of the huge tidal wave that You started without knowing it!
In Robert Burtons words “A joke of the gods” and we think if this blog is still going on, it might be the end of the FOF.
If I would be Robert Burton or the board I couldn’t sleep anymore, ´cause this blog extremely diminishes the amount of new students! Good work!
So first of all a brief summary of my FOF career: My name is Ludger Kreilos, I have been a member of the FOF for seven years, You see I completed my octave. I joined in Sept.1986 and left in Sept.1993,
maybe some remember me, I was part of the so called “Bochum Bunch”. At our peak we were 22 students all coming from Bochum, Germany.
I started in the Cologne Centre, my center directors were “Rolf Disselhoff & Cheryl Disselhoff !
The first two years in the FOF were the most outrageous years I´ve ever experienced, ´cause they gave me a lesson that I´ll never forget my whole life.
The ideas and thoughts of Gurdijeff & Ouspensky were part of my whole being as we mentioned in school language, and being born and raised as a cold war kid. I wouldn´t ever dreamt of becoming a “Hitlerjunge”.
My whole education and socialisation was totally directed to the opposite,
not to become a follower of a cult, strictly guided by very obscure rules!
But the ideas and stories of Gurdijeff & Ouspensky that I heard, read and experienced were so strong, that the FOF seemed to be the one and only “Emergency Exit” out of my unstructured life, even of the weird rules, I was ready and desperately seeking for the guy to come and take me by the hand!
Robert Burton!
A very good lesson to learn. To find my self totally under control of a weird, self mixed theory by ignoring my needs, believes and moral structures. What I learned of it?! That no one as clever or intellectually structured is free from getting trapped. Every party, group, cult or movement works with the same emotional idea:
”You can decide, whether You are one of us or one of them! The sleeping machines with no souls!” And I wanted to be part of the saviour side!
I was the ideal German follower, I would have sold everything or do anything for the school, but fortunately the teacher never asked me to, otherwise I would have gone to “Stalingrad” and fight for the FOF.
I’m still gratefully for experiencing me, myself & the many I´s that everything is possible. For everyone here there is the right cult there outside!
So nearly everyone of my friends joined in the recent years, and we became a more or less stabile group in the FOF, in the end we were the whole Berlin Centre around 20 members the rest located in Renaissance.
Only one was left on our mission to awakening: Andreas Jewers he seems to be still in the FOF! Hey, guy we often think of You !
Strangely enough I must admit that the seven years in the FOF were great, they made me to the man I am!
The FOF was a great opportunity to learn , it was a cultural mind blowing experience. It is still the foundation of my thinking and cultural expression and profession! Thanks for that!
But also I must admit , I had luck, fortunately I never lived in Renaissance except harvest holidays, I wasn´t alone in the FOF , I had my friends with me and we had our doubts and a lot of discussion too, believe it or not the FOF is still a topic of interest for us. Nearly everyone of my friends from Bochum who joined in the mid 80´s and left in the mid 90´s is now living here in Berlin again. Even me, recently moved again in the apartment that was once called the Berlin Centre, funny isn´t it!? Everyone survived the FOF with his or her personal scars, but to be honest if we would have the chance of informing us about the FOF on the internet in the 80´s, we wouldn’t join it! So this forum is a big help for esoterically seekers!
Don´t sell Your soul, to the FOF, ´cause You have One;
The FOF is a degenerated 4th- Way School.
And don´t be naïve, most of all the ex-students didn´t have such luck and stabile social contacts as we all have! Most of them struggle with severe psychic problems after leaving it! Have that in mind!!
So playing with fire is the right picture, some have and will be Burtoned!
I was never abused or raped by Robert Burton, and as far as I know, only one of my friends had to go this way. Sadly enough, but that seemed to be the price of being in the inner circle! Getting a high status in Renaissance, Apollo or now Isis, you have to pay that certain price. And than You will be used and thrown away if You aren´t of any interest of the “Teacher” anymore, as many others experienced before.
Of course we all know Troy Buzzbee and the hundreds before and his followers. This is and was sick, unfair and extremely cruel!
But excuse me Mister Burton, this is Your price; You have to pay; the long ever lasting minute in the moment of Your death when Your little soul is chopped into pieces and every second comes back to Your mind;
where You abused all the people who put their trust in You!
You sold Your soul!
Not the little sheep’s, who gave life time, spirit, money and nearly the best of what they had to serve You!
In the end You´ll recognise it and You even know it !
You can fool some people some time, but You cannot fool all the people all the time!
So You got the best men & women, it was all in Your hands.
You have chosen! You are on the dark side of the moon!
P.S.: Feel free to contact me ,if You wish.
lkreilos@aol.com
May 9, 2007 at 8:18 am
From FoF Discussion 8/180 of AR.
Fellow Traveller Says:
May 3rd, 2007 at 1:46 pm
The criteria for a genuine spiritual teaching according to Selim Aissel:
(taken from the website http://www.epag.org)
flee those who demand unconditional obedience to themselves or to their representatives or assistants.
flee those who require you to cut yourself off from your family or social relationships.
flee those who prohibit you from seeing the people you want.
flee organisations that demand large sums of money.
flee organisations that display their luxury and wealth.
flee those who deprecate other ways.
flee those who acknowledge their own teaching alone as valid.
flee those who teach you to neglect your family, professional, or social life in order to benefit their organisation.
flee those who make a rule out of limiting sleep and restricting your diet, and teach you all kinds of methods that make you physically weaker.
flee those who judge and condemn.
flee those who require you to believe instead of to understand and verify.
flee those who require you to confess.
flee those who make you believe you are guilty.
flee those who lack a sense of humor.
flee those who employ threats or fear.
flee those who only talk about spirituality without really practicing it.
flee those who promise Heaven after death (especially if you pay them!).
flee those who promise Hell if you don’t convert.
flee those who divide principles and people into good and bad.
flee those who adopt stereotyped attitudes, ways of talking, sitting, dressing, and moving.
flee those who take themselves to be prophets or messiahs.
flee those who often change teachings and teachers.
flee those who envy each other.
flee those who compete with each other or with other organisations.
flee those who only practice within their organisation and not outside of it.
flee those who claim that they understand everything and have nothing left to learn.
May 9, 2007 at 5:50 pm
Ask yourself Says:
May 9th, 2007 at 8:42 am
To Siddiq (#361)
I agree with you, that the new form of the meetings at isis has been more effective than the meetings that were student lead. The latter were filled with anecdotes and quips, but what did you expect- the teacher had stopped teaching (or, stopped leading meetings). I also agree with you that the time and research that goes into preparing the meeting does produce some very fine quotes from a varity of sources and they are inspiring. However, it’s Robert’s comments or interpretations that trouble me.
The quotes from the various disciplines do seem to penetrate something “higher” in myself, but Roberts comments additions seem to create confusion and doubt.
Once, at a Christmas dinner, he mentioned how he had been visited by Jesus Christ the night before. What am I supposed to do with that info? Should I be impressed? Can I verify it?
At another dinner he mentioned how when he cups his hand to his ear, it’s not because he’s hard of hearing, it’s because it slows down his higher centers which operate at an extremely high speed. Again, what do I do with that info, regard him as a superman?
He stopped attending many of the Apollo Arts events because from the surface, it looked like he’d rather stay home and make a bunch of cash serving 150.00 dinners- where you can’t take a bite of food unless Robert takes a bite of food.
The “higher state” we all swear we have at dinners and meetings is most likely produced by being with 50-300 people that are making an effort to stay in Kings of centers. When in life are you EVER in a room with 50-300 people trying to stay in the kings? The answer is NEVER. That’s why we love the fellowship. It creates an environment you can’t find anywhere else. But at what price and with what long term result?
By the way, here’s a quote from the Theory of Conscious Harmony (pg 154). “Someone said to Ouspensky in 1947: ‘I know I am a machine and that I cannot work by myself.’ He answered:’who told you that? Do not believe anyone that tells you that.’”
May 9, 2007 at 6:15 pm
From FoF Discussion in AR. 8/360
Joseph G Says:
May 9th, 2007 at 2:21 am
WhaleRider, I can vouch for your story, as it mirrors my own in many details. And of course we knew each other well. I was 23 in 1978 when Robert came on to me. Not as many times nor as intensely as you describe, but otherwise the same story. Some historic context: in those days many people slept on floors in sleeping bags. For some of us the Blake Cottage was simply an upgrade from sleeping at the Lodge under a dining table. When I moved in there I had no idea that Robert would do what he did. I think it happened less than ten times to me altogether. This covert sex life was emotionally stressful for me, but not unbearable. During my time in Robert’s entourage I received only three gifts that I can remember: a rosewood pen & pencil set, a special-press edition of the Rubaiyat, and an Hermes cashmere jacket. The jacket had actually been purchased for another student but didn’t fit him, so someone had the idea it might fit me. I was married in that jacket less than a year later. Not difficult to do the math in hindsight. There were no orgies back then, at least that I am aware of. There were no Russian students hoping to get green cards, or sex for vouchers either. I worked with a chain saw clearing land in advance of the vineyard landscaping and planting. Lots of poison oak. I remember distinctly that I did not want undue gifts for what I did. The pervasive sense of service, shared conviction and shared affection was very satisfying, probably addictive. We would work hard during the day and take turns serving each other at night. My evening job was providing wine, which strangely has remained my profession to this day. It’s hard to say exactly when I realized that I was not the one and only lover Robert had, but at whatever point I did realize this fact, I also assumed there were probably no more than a few others. I also had no awareness of people getting hurt at the time. I never talked about it, nor did my housemates. In hindsight this seems incredibly naive, even at 20-something. What needs to be understood is that the men close to Robert were envied by many in the community, and continue to be today. Not because of the sex or the gifts, but because they were allowed to be close to the teacher. This is important to understand because when you envy someone it is extremely difficult to think of that person as a victim. And when you are envied by others it is also difficult to think of yourself as a victim. This dynamic has become even more acute lately, as Robert has substantially withdrawn himself from personal contact with most of this run of the mill students.
The big difference in my story from WhaleRider’s is that I stayed in. It has only been one month since I left the FOF, and 31 years since I joined. Consequently I have many friends in the FOF today. Some are probably reading this. If I had known what Ames or Charles or Miles knew, I may have left earlier. But I did not know everything they knew. Even now I think many FOF members do not know, and some absolutely do not want to know. Although no longer an FOF student, some of the revelations of this Blog have been shameful and horrifying to me, and I agree with the many comments regarding conscience as a glaring weak spot, both within myself and in the FOF. In my own case it was not the sex or the abuse of power that provoked me to leave the FOF. I left because I lost all respect for the teaching. It has no integrity for me now. The “real school” I thought I joined in 1976, the practical school that urged me to verify everything and remember myself always and everywhere, that valued being over knowledge, has been turned into a weird circus of revisionism, numerology and inane ritual. With four children at home I simply could not justify paying $15K to $20K per year merely to attend concerts, community markets and potager lunches. Going to a meeting or dinner with Robert had become a dreaded experience for me; and yet I tended to blame myself for no longer being able to connect with my teacher or with his obtuse and increasingly delusional teaching. Being free is an unexpected relief. I am happy and grateful to find myself in the role of a beginner once again.
With love,
Joseph G.
1976-2007
As a postscript: A few months ago I received a letter from my high school regarding a Jesuit priest who had been institutionalized for having sex with students. His name was Father Bradley. He had been a disciplinarian at my school when I was a junior and senior. It was a strange shock. I realized that in hindsight several of my Jesuit teachers had clearly been homosexuals, and that the scandal in the Catholic Church had come uncomfortably close to touching my own play. What would I have done if that man had forced himself on me as a 17-year-old? Could I have avoided it? Would he have thought it was consensual? How different was it that Robert took advantage of my youth and inexperience a few years later? In point of fact there was one huge difference: Father Bradley was an unpopular sadistic-looking priest in a religion I had already turned away from, while Robert was my spiritual teacher, and the man who brought me the magic gift of self-remembering. For the record I still believe self-remembering is a great gift, despite all the interesting counterpoints within this Blog. And I am prepared to allow for an ongoing glimmer of karmic gratitude to Robert, in spite of what I now know about him. Just don’t mistake this for condonation or support.
May 9, 2007 at 6:19 pm
Most posts are being taken from the FoF discussion of Animam Recro, so I will avoid continuing to make that refference on each post and will rather state it if it does not come from that discussion.
May 9, 2007 at 6:19 pm
SandraC Says:
May 9th, 2007 at 10:38 am
I want to voice my appreciation for the posts by WhaleRider #262 and Joseph G #360 and #304 Dick Moron (and many others I have not noted) and share my sadness as others have done that you have had such traumatic experiences at so impressionable an age with someone you trusted and believed in. Your courage in coming forth with your stories inspires me.
As I have mentioned, I left FoF in 1992 after 20 years, 10 years of which I played a ‘leadership’ role, and I am JUST NOW actually beginning to come to terms with the personal impact of RB’s sexual behavior.
It has taken this long, I believe, to have the strength to bear it. And these heart-rending stories are helping. As I read them, I feel a heavy sadness and wonderment at the lingering power of ‘the trance’ to protect from unwanted truths.
I have been surprised also by how much has been stirred in me by the humanity coming through this exchange. I have been gripped with an achey grief about it all, something I thought I had thoroughly worked through long ago, but now it goes deeper.
I have been away awhile here, catching up, I want to share with you a few things that have happened in the past two weeks since I first encountered this site.
1) For the first time, I actually felt the kick-in-the-gut wrenching of having been lied to the first ten years. Not that I haven’t known about the lies, not that I haven’t been furious with myself and raged at Robert –in group, in therapy, to myself about so many things, especially in the early days after leaving — not that others here haven’t stated the same things I am about to say with more passion and eloquence, but after the way it has hit me this time, I just want to express my outrage to Robert here for this record:
How dare you lie to us? I believed you, I trusted you, I listened to you, I worked for you, I supported you, I influenced others on your behalf — I represented you to my shame, you, the celibate, heterosexual, loving, conscious being.
How dare you lie to me and other mere children in the name of ‘God’. Why? to have your way, to satisfy your appetites — mostly, I am afraid, to fuel your delusions. I have a 21-year old daughter now, and know how young, how green, how impressionable we are in the early 20’s.
2) With this has also come a wave of intense self-hatred: The voice goes: How could I be so blind, so naive, so susceptible to narcissistic manipulation? How could I waste my life, throw away the most productive years and misuse my talents and gifts? How could I let myself be used for a corrupt, even criminal enterprise, supporting addictive, harmful behavior and helping to keep the whole thing going with my energy, my money and my work, how could I not have noticed what was going on, how could I have unknowingly continued to procure new student victims with a smile on my face (any Portland, Paris, NY students who are still in FoF, it pains me to hear your names mentioned and to realize you are still there), all along imagining myself to be something special, evolved, turning away from whisperings of sexual misconduct, continuing to look only at the ‘work’, and never, never at Robert, allowing myself to be enthralled to the charisma, the thrill of contact and attention from ‘the teacher’.
3) I have also felt more deeply, as reconnections are made here with old familiar names and voices, the extent of the loss involved in having been ex-communicated from people I had known for 20 years of my life, how stiffling it has been to a huge part of myself to be involved in a gag-order of the first degree, to have a small army of old friends holding me as ‘fallen, moon food’. The cruelty involved hits me more fully now.
4) Meanwhile, I have recalled some things that have helped me make sense of it all along the way. Things that have helped me to forgive myself and other victims, even to experience compassion for the predator side of RB, to realize I have both predator and victim in myself, and so on.
I pulled out “Trauma and Recovery” by Judith Herman again. While published in 1992, I still find it helpful in understanding how the experience in FoF was an experience of psychological captivity (See Cpt 6 and the chapter on child/domestic abuse, the similarities to closed religious environments are striking. The sections on rape I believe could be helpful to those who were/are involved with him). Peter Levine’s “Waking the Tiger” also may be helpful in understanding and resolving the mental/ neurological/emotional aftermath of long-term FoF membership.
The explanation of symptoms concomitant with complex chronic trauma (denial, numbing/ dissociation,and intrusion of traumatic memory) have helped me understand the state of mind that allowed me and so many others to remain in this scarey environment for as long as we did and still not be able to SEE what are now the most obvious things.
5) I also have found myself asking again: what was my part? Soul-searching, asking, who in me attracted Robert Burton? And as of today here is what I come up with: an innocent, trusting, dependent, child-like part of myself, a powerless someone who is afraid of the big world, insecure in herself, someone who wants to believe somebody out there knows the answers, is powerful and can shelter me.
I don’t recall who said it, (and not that I believe in ‘evil’), but the saying makes a point that I begin to understand: Innocence attracts evil, perhaps needs evil to grow into maturity, into wisdom. The ignorance of naivite seems to me now only a part human state, for which we cannot absolve ourselves of responsibility. Apparently some of us need the RBs of the world to shake us out of this innocence into a fuller humanity. (In no way does this possibility absolve him of his responsibility, of course).
___________________________________
Thank you to Susan K (hello, Susan!) for #192 and your suggestion there for anyone leaving now, and I would say any long-time members, to get help in dealing with the trauma aspects of FoF. The effects do linger.
Bruce, your postings make me laugh, they contain what I always have enjoyed about you — a blunt certainty, saying it like it is, that seems completely congruent with who you are, special appreciation for
#344.
To whomever is the PAIN BODY proponent, I think that the idea (explicated in “Power of Now”) is one of the most amazingly useful I have ever encountered, so helpful for disempoweing an entire range of habitual, draining emotional states. I LOVE the idea, pure genius, I believe.
Thank you for reading.
Sandra
May 9, 2007 at 6:26 pm
Cake please Says:
May 9th, 2007 at 10:13 am
my mystical experience
It was a dinner, outside, heavy, full bodied September. I think the table was glass by then. Facing the rose garden, a small party, maybe twelve. Those who I remember were two prominent American students, a wonderful French student who kept apologizing because he was involved in munition manufacture, a beautiful solar maybe with saturn from Berlin. I still remember his name after all these years.
During the dinner, we talked about salmon in some esoteric sense. Which was of great interest to me, coming from a place where they (salmon) are a part of our psyche, In fact, this shy girl even commented.
The two American students recounted a ice cream eating contest they had taken part in that involved the teacher. Doesn’t sound quite right, I remember thinking. Oh well.
The dinner ended. My dress had pockets, I slipped my hands inside, maybe out of nervousness. It was a no-no at the time, the no hands in pockets exercise. I felt Robert touch my hand, was it a gentle photograph or what seemed a gesture of affection? No matter. A kiss to the forehead. We were on our way.
We walked back to the Lodge / now Apollo D’Oro. We three, the French student, the solar from Berlin and myself. It was dark by then and the stars were collapsing upon us. The German student talked about how bourgeois the best of the best American students were.
But words started to have no meaning, It was already happening. This state. I think but cannot know, was happening to all three of us.
This magical state of not wanting. Euphoric. Perfection had found us. The moment, this moment was all and everything. So full it brought you to your knees.
To be on this gravel road, in the dark and so cold with these two strangers was all you ever wanted or needed.
We wandered about the Lodge like masts. Wanting neither food nor drink. It was what it was and it was good, so good. Eventually we were scooped up by our respective countrymen.
It has reverberated within me ever since. I have no doubt (emphasis no doubt) it was because of Robert. It shocks me how indebted to him I feel for those few mystical hours. Never duplicated after excruciating effort or suffering for that matter.
II also know how far I would have gone to experience that again. Nothing to do with consent or guns. Only magic. Virtue here by lack of opportunity.
But now, not connected to my teacher by either proximity, gender or a myriad of other things must I finally be responsible for my own spirituality, states and life, finding my own magic.
Kind of glorious isn’t it.
Siddiq, referencing a post early on here, feeling sorry for someone and having compassion are definitely not the same thing, One is a wall the other a door.
Best to all
Cake
May 9, 2007 at 6:57 pm
Fellow Traveller Says:
May 3rd, 2007 at 1:46 pm
The criteria for a genuine spiritual teaching according to Selim Aissel:
(taken from the website http://www.epag.org)
flee those who demand unconditional obedience to themselves or to their representatives or assistants.
There is no such demand in FoF
flee those who require you to cut yourself off from your family or social relationships.
There is no such demand in FoF
flee those who prohibit you from seeing the people you want.
There is no such demand in FoF
flee organisations that demand large sums of money.
There is no such demand in FoF
flee organisations that display their luxury and wealth.
There is no such display in FoF
flee those who deprecate other ways.
There is no such deprecation in FoF
flee those who acknowledge their own teaching alone as valid.
There is no such acknowledgement in FoF
flee those who teach you to neglect your family, professional, or social life in order to benefit their organisation.
There is no such teaching in FoF
flee those who make a rule out of limiting sleep and restricting your diet, and teach you all kinds of methods that make you physically weaker.
There is no such rule or teaching in FoF
flee those who judge and condemn.
Avoiding judgment is a central part of FoF teaching (plenty of judgement on this blog, however)
flee those who require you to believe instead of to understand and verify.
There is no such requirement in FoF; quite the opposite actually.
flee those who require you to confess.
There is no such requirement in FoF.
flee those who make you believe you are guilty.
FoF works hard to free students of guilt.
flee those who lack a sense of humor.
There is no such lack in FoF
flee those who employ threats or fear.
In 25 years in FoF I’ve never been threatened by anyone or intimidated by anyone in FoF
flee those who only talk about spirituality without really practicing it.
FoF is all about practice.
flee those who promise Heaven after death (especially if you pay them!).
There is no promise of Heaven after death in FoF. And if there was, it is not verifiable during life, so irrelevant.
flee those who promise Hell if you don’t convert.
There is no such promise or “conversion” in FoF
flee those who divide principles and people into good and bad.
There is no such division in FoF. Quite a lot on this blog, however.
flee those who adopt stereotyped attitudes, ways of talking, sitting, dressing, and moving.
Imitation is an inescapable part of life inside and outside FoF.
flee those who take themselves to be prophets or messiahs.
RB has never claimed to be either a prophet or messiah.
flee those who often change teachings and teachers.
Like many on this blog?
flee those who envy each other.
I’m not too bothered by them myself. Are they that important that they have to be fled?
flee those who compete with each other or with other organisations.
There is no such competition in FoF. Competition is a tactic of the king of clubs and FoF doesn’t hold much truck with that card, as you know.
flee those who only practice within their organisation and not outside of it.
You mean ex-students?
flee those who claim that they understand everything and have nothing left to learn.
As longtime appreciators of Socrates, FoF students don’t suffer from this one.
May 9, 2007 at 7:23 pm
She didn’t just play the flute but when she played, she knew her music. There was a time in which I could see her volunteering to work in every potager and event. She’d run around tirelessly as if imbued with divine enegy and I stared with envy. She had something I had long lost and if I could find it again I would try to copy her but I couldn’t find it, not even in her divinity, obvious as it was.
How many years had I not spent working with similar impulse to not know that it was energy for its own sake. Not that her effort wouldn’t be returned but not by the Fellowship. I knew that too well.
“One is not to work with expectations of return” said the echo of fellowship dogma; “effort, more effort,” that they’d stolen from Ouspensky; give all your being in exchange for nothing; “have no expectations”; why would you “when we are all beggers?”
Plant but never expect to eat from the crop. There’s only one mouth here. An insatiable void.
In every one’s willingness to give themselves up for the whole, we are denied from receiving back from the whole. The greatness of the crop is mutilated from our possibilities and our hope, our love, our integrity……dries up.
May 10, 2007 at 6:38 am
(3/53) FoF Discussion
Inner Jewels Says:
March 13th, 2007 at 6:41 am
Once more into the fray!
When I left the school (the second time) a student asked me, “so, how does it feel to fall back into sleep?” Then she smiled haughtily at me. I was stunned into silence. How can one respond to such arrogance coming from someone you once considered a friend? Surely even the die-hard FOFers can admit that awakening has nothing to do with flagrantly putting oneself above others and yet, and yet, isn’t that what the dogma of the FOF is built upon?: We are the chosen ones. This is the only conscious school, etc. etc. We all know the lines and some of us, on the inside and on the outside, say we never believed it. I experienced the untruth of that statement for myself when, after the first time I left, at 19, I had to confront the fears that tore at me from the edges of my consciousness, like some horrible Bosche painting, whispering that perhaps I had, in fact, lost my soul. And I had lost so much. I had lost the ability to be as close to my mother as I wished. I had lost so many fine friends who shared a passion for evolving. I had lost the theater, the concerts, the fine dinners, the orchard. But after the dust settled and the fears dissipated, I came to realize I had gained the most important thing: my own upward beating heart; my own capacity to meet these momentary days and joyfully add myself to the count. You see, I left the first time because my “work I’s’ had run amuck—I had become a talking head, sounding quite nice and spouting work ideas but disconnected from my heart, my body, my dreams. “Life” had mistakenly been discarded in place of my very real desire to grow internally. It took my many years, going back in and back out to come to realize that awakening is not inner vs. outer nor is it a solitary effort; That spiritual work isn’t necessarily contrary to “material” existence. I believe in my heart that when any of us raise our awareness, raise our conscious desire to speak/look/feel love in and for this moment and everything it contains, we lift the entire world with us, closer to the heart of God. I know too, the good of the FOF– I feel it in my dear mama’s heart and in her kind and strong husband. I’ve tasted the beauty of it, and I will always feel the sadness of exclusion, of being on the outside (as long as the FOF keeps the walls up;). But I was excited and even thrilled when I learned that this forum had erupted into existence. Not because I wanted to see anyone hurt or taken down –or out, but because I truly believe that we can all help each other, that we do help each other, every time we open our eyes, open our hearts and speak our truths with an intention to evolve. My truth isn’t the same as anyone else’s, and that’s the beauty of it. We are all on our own adventure, together—what joy! —and we can learn so much, if we truly allow the “other” in.
I’m sorry to say, though, that the tone here has changed. What happened? From my cursory scanning it seems a big bad cry baby heaved a cannon ball of negativity in here and lot’s of people (not toeing the line that is) scrambled. Sure I’m for the expression of differing truths but those are truths with a small “t”–not THE ALMIGHTY TRUTH WHICH I WILL BANG OVER YOUR HEAD TILL YOU ACKNOWLEDGE IT. Reading CB’s post reproduced that sickening feeling that I discovered when I tried to explain the FOF to a friend around the second time I left. I had to ask myself: How could I be a part of something that made me feel sick to my stomach when describing the behavior of the teacher? (And don’t tell me I don’t know by personal experience a little about the suffering RB is causing; I dated some of his boys and I heard first-hand about their struggle to confront him, provoking a powerful negativity when they dared to refuse RB’s demands). I apologize for commenting on CBs post as everyone is, no doubt, a bit weary of the back and forth. But I wanted it to be pointed out simply and clearly: CB’s post reeks of precisely what is so wrong with the FOF. No, not everyone in it feels that way but if you don’t, and you’re still in it, I hope you have the courage to confront that kinds of ugliness, wherever and whenever it appears. I didn’t join the school for RB but I definitely left it because of him. And even if, as has been implied, his behavior acts as a kind of filter ensuring only the really serious ones get in and stay in, well then that is quite a dangerous little truth to build one’s life upon…Personally, I don’t want to close my eyes to what sickens me, I want to look clearly at myself and what surrounds me and do my part to lift it up and in. I have my own sexual deviancies, but thank god don’t have a budget! and RB has provided a powerful lesson of where NOT TO GO.
Another student recently wrote me that if I ever get disappointed enough in “life,” she hopes I’ll return to the FOF. How subtly that sentence evoked a sickening feeling in me again—I have not been able to respond to her so perhaps I am as spineless as CB accused. But I think, rather, it is that I don’t care to respond. I am content to find my own touchstone, deep inside my own true life experience. I have come to trust my body, my heart, and my mind, to guide me where I can continue to evolve. (I had a barely English speaking Latino busboy remind me to be present in LA; clearly, the FOF has no monopoly on that!) I have found a wonderful dance work (5Rhythms, there’s a class in GV/NC if you want to dance yourself free) to practice being present IN my body, through my feelings, not by splitting off from them. I have several wonderful friends who I feel are evolving, I can see it in their eyes, I can feel it in their loving presence. And who knows, maybe someday I will rejoin the Fellowship, but that day could only come if and when RB lays down his instrument of pleasure/torture and admits he’s got a problem (hey, don’t we all?) or at least stops making his students pay royally for it, when all the spiritual tyrants like CB go bury themselves somewhere else in steaming piles of their own negativity…and I’m optimistic –or is it naïve?– enough to hope for that day…a day when I can walk freely with my mama again, through the orchards and the vines, around the ponds and the gravestones… and hold her hand as she holds mine, laughing and free (not that the FOF could EVER take that away from us, we have our ways—once a merc, always a…well you know)….
And so I leave you all with this wish, for the FOF, and for every city in this troubled nation and every town across the globe:
I dream’d in a dream I saw a city invincible to the attacks of the whole
of the rest of the earth,
I dream’d that was the new city of Friends
Nothing was greater there than the quality of robust love, it led the rest,
It was seen every hour in the actions of the men [and women] of that city,
And in all their looks and words.
Walt Whitman
May 10, 2007 at 6:40 am
Aspects of Indoctrination
Excerpts from
George Orwell says on 3/50
His words reflect a current mood or feeling – they don’t reflect the way things really are. To deal with the contradictions, students had to change their relationship to language and truth.
Another example: Great prophecies were intoned and failed. Most students say they ‘didn’t care’. But it did have the effect of teaching them again not to expect the truth, not to expect that words mean anything. Words are used as a mood-enhancer, or background — like Muzak, or wallpaper.
After all, as one of the organization’s foremost professional angle-givers says, ‘We cannot know the truth at our level.’ But surely, since Ouspensky defines the work as ‘the study of lying’, they ought to try. And certainly they might begin by photographing lying, for starters.
One way to observe lying is to watch what a man says, and how he lives. But no! That’s his ‘private life’, his ‘own stuff’, and therefore exempt, they say. But that is nevertheless his being. Without looking at his being, they are left examining his knowledge – usually that means his words. The words from which, paradoxically, they have come to expect nothing anyway. Hence, they have created an inescapable mobius loop and, as an unfortunate by-product, a class of professional angle-givers – people whose lives in no way reflect the elevated words that they speak so prolifically, but whose words continue to ‘inspire’, whatever they might mean (they are, after all, only a pick-me-up). Some of these angle-givers circle the globe, talking, talking, talking.
They no longer how to look at words attentively and critically. Hence, as others have pointed out, the Fellowship organization can send out emails calmly promising to protect their privacy while setting about to violate it. As I pointed out in my landmark essay, words are not selected for meaning, but used in prefabricated phrases and clichés (‘precious teaching,’ ‘beloved teacher,’ ‘willoftheteacher,’ ‘formoftheschool,’ ‘task has ended,’ ‘we thank thee’) meant to convey an ambiance rather than express a thought or feeling as clearly as possible. In some cases, words are used to hide meaning, or convey the opposite of what they mean – ‘opportunity’ means ‘job’ or ‘friction’.
And so people here are trying to discern truth when they have lost all standards for truth and any taste for fact – the truth that we can know, the simple facts that are knowable
“The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink.”
“But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.”
May 10, 2007 at 6:42 am
Keith Says:
March 11th, 2007 at 9:47 pm
When we give up the right to live from the dictates of our hearts by separating from those feelings of shame and remorse as if they were just ordinary negative emotions, we give up the chance to act and live from what is good in us, the highest parts of ourselves. We need to become ordinary before we can become anything else.
“In comparison with sleeping people dead people are very strong, because they have no conscience and no shame. What makes ordinary people weak? Conscience and shame.” The Fourth Way pg. 435
“the deliberate and often official killing of individual judgement and conscience constitutes crime on such a large scale that it becomes invisible, and men cannot even imagine living under any other conditions.”
“it is human sleep and sleep only-the wish not to see things as they are-which makes men ignore the clear warnings of corruption before its work begins.” The Theory of Celestial Influence pg. 192-193
In order for the process of healing to begin a person must recognize the process of corruption occuring and say no to it.
Thanks to Vena, Innernaught, Reality Check, devoted reader, Simon, Rita, Traveler, Truth is where, Kid Shelleen, Having Been There, Inconvenient Truth, Inner Jewels. BBB, Anonymous, Medusa, Cathie, Voice of One and all the rest for insightful, painful, humorous and thought provoking postings. It is amazing to find so many like minded people in one place.
keith.46@hotmail.com
May 10, 2007 at 6:43 am
3/12
Anonymous Says:
March 11th, 2007 at 6:22 pm
Little Lamb in Post #336:
I know a woman who casually described Robert’s relationship with her husband as “date rape.” She isn’t disaffected; she’s close to Robert.
I know another woman whose husband was “with” Robert. She said: “To take a man from one off the poorest countries in the world, offer him a green card if he’ll submit, or else you’ll throw him back into the poverty from which he sprang, to call that a ‘free choice’ is cynical in the extreme.”
I know some stories as wild or wilder than some of the stories told here.
The mark of mature and loving sexuality is the wish for free and full of consent from your partner. Not someone who is tricked, deceived, drunk or paid for.
May 10, 2007 at 6:46 am
In the six processes Rodney Collin writes: “A man must speak and act as he thinks to stay mentally healthy…if not expressed can make terrible inroads on the whole physical and moral- well being of a man….”
“When we regard ourselves in the many situations life brings, we find that from first breath to last we are conditioned by external factors. Yet is that highest freedom left to us–to perfect ourselves within, so as that we shall come into harmony with the moral world order and attain peace with ourselves, no matter what obstacles may emerge. This is easily said and written, yet it is no more than a goal before us, to the achievement of which we must thouroughly dedicate ourselves. Every day challenges us to do what is to be done and expect whatever is possible.”
Johann Goethe
May 10, 2007 at 7:18 pm
It is in the intimacy of a marriage that a man and a woman can know where they are in relation to their own self, for a marriage is the reflection of two inner worlds, just as a community is the reflection of the couples’ relation to each other. An individual’s integrity reflects on the integrity of his/her marriage and the integrity of his/her marriage, reflects on the integrity of his/her community.
In the way of life, the aim for the community as much as for the individual is to balance the inner life with the external life, and marriage, work and play
express the state of that balance.
The consciousness of an individual is expressed in his capacity to extend his hand out to the last child, animal or tree in his community and the consciousness of the community is expressed in the community’s capacity to embrace everything living within its boundaries, as much as each object that belongs to it.
Where ever there is neglect, the state of consciousness will reveal itself. On objects or people. There is no consciousness in neglect.
The aim of each human life is to expand this all embracing consciousness. Sleep or unconsciousness, expresses itself where each and all individuals are called to work. Work, all kinds of work, are the attempt of each human life to expand consciousness.
Play is the expression of an individual’s and a community’s state of conscious health. Love intertwines itself in both play and work, within the marriage and the community.
Life, “living,” is the game and the work of tuning the inner and the outer world. The individual’s balance between himself and his community, through his marriage. The inner relationship with himself balanced with his personal relationship in his marriage balanced with his objective relationship with his community. Where ever there is neglect there is inbalance. The harmony between them is what creates music. Noise shows the disharmony. This is the same idea of the three lines of work in experiential language.
Social orders express the state of mankind’s being and the most retrograde and pervasive idea ever presented by the Fellowship of Friends is that humanity is not in an ongoing upward and spiritual development. With that, it justifies all the horrors within and without itself.
A monarchy is an expression of mankind’s being and a democracy, a very different expression of that same being. The “kingdom” expresses the state in which the majority of individuals are not mature enough to assume responsibility for their surrounding and require the guidance of the priest king, who gives up his will to the people. The monarchy, is a further expression of that same struggle but where the priest has disappeared the individual human being, has appeared. In a democracy, even the king has disappeared and the individual has matured enough to assume responsibility for its mistakes and continue struggling for self determination without external impositions by any other authority different to his own self.
The Fellowship of Friends is an experiment in this struggle and its failures and achievements can be seen when looked through this prism.
At the beginning Robert was one with the rest and did not impose exercises. As soon as he started imposing exercises, he became the priest-teacher and continued descending to become the priest- dictator of every possible action within the fellowship, suffocating the student’s free will.
The difference between a king and a dictator is that the King is the expression of the community’s will, while the dictator is the expression of the community’s submission. In human societies, the dictator imposes his will in the body of the individuals. In cults, the priest-dictator imposes his will both on the body and the soul of the individual, thwarting the possibility of their inner development as much as the development of a conscious community. This is spiritual crime.
There is no place for self determination of the soul or the body of a human being in a cult and it can survive only for as long as idolatry can hold it in place. Both the soul and the body of the participants are submitted to the will of the dictator through idolatry, which is the phenomenon in which an individual gives up his own sense of worth to anothers, submitting willingly to his dictates.
While in the original kingdom structures, the king-priest submitted his self to the people, and hence the “nobility” of the form, in the dictatorship the people submit themselves to the dictator and give up their will or possibility of self determination both in the inner and external world, hence the “humiliation” of the form. As long as people are willing to humiliate themselves before another man, idolatry and cults will continue to exist.
People confuse “humbling” themselves to another for “humiliating” themselves before another. While there is a noble gesture in humbleness, humiliation is the degradation that comes with idolatry.
In the Fellowship of Friends students are consistently humiliated by Robert by each and every form that the cult has adopted.
By his neglect to address students individually, to “communicate,” to use the “verb”, the “word”, with which individuals acknowledge each other’s being, and allow themselves to grow in love, Robert submits students to humiliation and conditions them to idolatry en mass as the only form of interaction between them.
Nothing can show more neglect of another person’s being than the unwillingness to communicate verbally. It is the negative expression of “indifference” and what it is saying is “you are not good enough to even consider you, to address you, you are lower than I am, you are not worth my time, my being. You are not worth sharing with as an individual and you must submit to being addressed as a lower person with the rest, “en mass”.”
People can only bear with this humiliation when they justify it with idolatry but it is spiritual crime in as much as it is not willing to acknowledge another person’s being, which is the most elementary form of respect.
Other forms of humiliation or spiritual crime are extensively practiced in the Fellowship of Friends.
While differences in hierarchy are not established through “titles” amongst the generality of students, the difference in status is established amongst other ways, by the use of clothing. Psychologically, Robert maintains students “lower” status, with the ‘court’ that he surrounds himself with, that is served with special attention where ever it appears reminding the rest of students that they have less rights than he himself and the court around him has and the “court” are a poor bunch of young men who are sexually abused and as submitted as the rest of the students with the exception of an Asaf or a Girard to make it look legitimate but who, in the long run are willing to adopt the same acts that Robert adopts.
The dress code, in which only he and his court can afford to dress like kings, reinforces the humiliation
of the mass of students and establishes that it is not your spiritual being that is significant in the Fellowship but your monetary income that can prove your worth. The students with high income of the Fellowship show that if you have enough money you can be addressed by the teacher, not your heart but your pocked that is welcome for a more intimate work relationship. The young people are used to make it look legitimate and because in Robert’s weird deviation, he cannot bear older, uglier people, his “alchemy” is a form of his slavery to his personal conditioning.
The humiliating forms within the Fellowship continues to act in the determination by the cult dictator of the way people must run their lives. The imposition on the kind of work that people can do within the Fellowship, the kind of activities that are allowed for them to practice and the way in which they are to interact with each other are each and all, forms of coercion to the will of its participants.
While this is justified with the idea that it is a School with the guidance of a teacher, the inconsistencies in the multiple inner and external aspects of the lives of the teacher as much as the students, and the denigrating relationship between them, reveals the Cult and the lack of School. The humiliating neglect of individuals; the denigrating incapacity of the School to assume responsibility for its children and old people or for that matter, anyone but Robert; the practice of sexual abuse; of consistent failures of marriages, friendships, the inexistence of spontaneous joy or play; the suicides amongst students and student’s children as much as the multiple forms of illnesses, show the lack of consciousness of anything that could come even close to calling itself a “School of consciousness.”
A Cult or a spiritual Dictatorship is the expression of Spiritual Crime.
CS”.
May 10, 2007 at 8:42 pm
dick moron Says:
May 8th, 2007 at 9:22 pm
to Whalerider re #231:
You do not need to produce physical evidence to be believed. Blake said: “Truth can never be told so as to be understood, and not be believed”
GOlb and others who have responded to your stories with doubt, are probably professional defenders and lackies of RB, who have built their status and pathetic careers within FOF by eloquently denying or justifying any “funny business”. They know the truth of your story–they probably were in the same position(s) as you in their younger days.
Many of those who submitted, even just once or twice, to RB’s “desires” and then acted like it was a wonderful thing, or, more often, simply kept quiet and continued in their devotion and service to the FOF, were “taken care of” by RB from then on. This ususally took the form of perks and gifts. Fully paid “Traveling preacher” trips to Europe or other exotic centers. Golf trips to Palm Springs. Some were set up with “important” roles within the FOF hierarchy, drawing salaries(while still paltry by “life” standards) that were many times greater than the standard FOF salary. Some have been probably been assisted in setting up businesses, art studios and little wineries around Oregon House. One method was to have expenses and purchases deducted from teaching payments. Others, had businesses and never had to make teaching payments. There were many creative approaches to rewarding the loyal.
Those who chose not to stay around Oregon House, still were rewarded with attention, expensive dinners at fine restaurants with RB and more gifts.
I know this, because, I was one of this group. I was basically silent at meetings and stopped attending them entirely 5 years before I left. I was never a center director and generally scorned the directors in the centers where I lived when I left Oregon House. I had no need for them as I had a direct line to the teacher himself. He would always answer my phone calls. I was RB’s loyal friend, who would usually be invited to dinner etc. when he was in town. I would run errands for him in NY and call him if I found a particularly exotic big bottle of wine for him to purchase. I monitored the auctions of some of the bland old master painting collected at the time. My one-bedroom apartment was always available for entourage members to stay at. One of RB’s secretaries actually made a set of keys to my place without telling me, so he could let himself in.
At Oregon House (I use the town name because I cannot keep up with all the name changes of “The Farm”) there were the gatherings to watch football and basketball games, where RB would often invite one of his new “projects”. I now realize that my being there with a couple of other “old-timers” helped create a relaxed and normal appearing environment, where the “guys” rooted for the home team, drank lots of beer and actually casually conversed and made jokes with RB. So, while there was no intent by me, I was no doubt a part of the scheme of manipulation that eventually ended up in the bedroom for some of the naive new guests. I participated, mainly because I liked the attention and had developed a taste for the finer things in life like wine, good food and comfort. Basically I was taking care of my instinctive center like all the rest.
Since I left FOF about 10 years ago, I have heard the excuse of some of my friends who remain in FOF, that they stay mainly for the social structure of friends and community and that deep down inside they feel RB is full of it. They have no where to go if they left, or no financial security. Again, the instinctive center ruling one’s life.
Some advice to any of those old friends who might read this: Your simply remaining a member who still looks RB in the eye and smiles around him, makes you an accessory to his lie. Get up off your asses and make some real effort to live in truth.
So, Whalerider, I apologize to you if we knew each other back then and I anyway supported an environment that led to your painful experiences. Truthfully, my conscience WAS telling me to speak up or just run, but my ego and lazy instinctive center managed to rule until I finally found strength.
I hope that writing and sharing your terrifying experiences with others on this Blog is helpful. I never thought that it would have been as cleansing for me as it has.
I hope you can continue to find peace with your past and use it to become stronger and wiser in the present.
May 10, 2007 at 8:47 pm
Ames Gilbert Says:
May 8th, 2007 at 10:36 pm
‘Catching up’ with the blog after a few days…
To Innernaught (# 264), thanks for reading. But, I was speaking 4th Wayspeak, another language, just like French, to 4th Wayers. I was referring to thoughts recorded in 1993-96. I certainly do not claim this is my ‘native’ language. Regardless, I try to separate the message from the messenger. And to this day, the 4th way explains some things (especially natural law) better than any other pattern I have met. Since my DNA makes me helplessly curious about so much, I enjoy myself immensely solving perceived riddles! And I reckon that if I don’t enjoy myself (as an interesting stranger and in every other way) and life itself, I’m simply chucking away my birthright.
To Shaman (# 272). I assume you are asking the questions in good faith, and I will answer likewise. I think a practical way of looking at what makes a rich and satisfying life might be: eight hours of the day is spent sleeping (first state). Ten hours is spent grooming, earning a living, recharging, resting, and so on. The other six hours can be set aside as follows, the proportions depending on the individual person, but for me: 2 hours working on things that please myself. Two hours on raising my own food or otherwise in contact with nature, including being a steward of ‘my’ land. Two hours on things that benefit my community. These are just averages. This way of looking at the lines of work I got from the Nearings, but they were able to devote four hours each to the last three, since they were ‘self-sufficient’ and didn’t have to go outside their farmstead to earn a living. So, this is a bare minimum. If you can extend the ‘lines’ into the “earning a living” segment, meaning you are doing worthwhile work that suits you and dignifies you, whatever that means to you, you are in the minority—be grateful! If you are not, look for such a living if possible. But I’ve found some of the jobs in my career have depended on my attitude; a few were unbearable, but most could be changed for the better by adjusting my internal state, looking for opportunities to learn, to make friends, make common cause, make light.
Whether this affects ‘evolution’, I don’t know. I no longer think in those terms. But I do know, for myself, that the ideas of balance are true for me if I am to enjoy my life and live it more fully. There has to be time for oneself beyond food and sleep, developing one’s interests and talents, whether it is ‘philosophizing’ or anything else. There has to be time to ‘give back’ to the community in which we are in, and engaging with other people always brings unexpected rewards. There has to be time to be with nature—we are her creatures—and exchange energies, from feeling the rich soil our bodies are soon to return to, to trimming the woodlot (supplying intelligence where the fecundity of nature threatens to overwhelm). All these lines can be done with mindfulness, gratitude and wonder.
I’m grateful for the work of all kinds I did in the FOF, but I felt that the ‘selfish’ turn of second and third line of work was unhealthy—for me. That is, most third line was developing the FOF property and possessions, most second line was just with other students (and rather limited at that), and so on. In a Parallel Universe (#332) has pointed this out beautifully in his post. The FOF as an organism cutting itself off from essential energies of the outside world has bred stagnancy. Engaging with the whole world brings continual refreshment and health.
With warm regards,
Ames
May 10, 2007 at 8:48 pm
John Says:
May 8th, 2007 at 11:24 pm
On “brainwashing”
Looking at Robert Jay Lifton’s study on “brainwashing” I would like to make some parallels with the Fellowship that others might find useful.
In his idea of Milieu control, it says:
“The basic feature of the thought reform environment, the psychological current upon which all else depends, is the control of human communication”.
In the Fellowship this is done by institutionalizing what one must think, read or talk about as much as with whom, where and when.
The control of communication in the separation from “life” or the outside world couldn’t be more aggressive with statements like “life being the six million dead people outside of the fellowship”.
Students have been given the exercise to not read newspapers and many life books, influence b, books and it is suggested that we read only what the teacher is publishing and researching on.
The aim is not so much to enlighten students, as to keep them from reading, thinking and talking about their own inner life because their own inner life is labelled the ‘lower self’. It is very smart programming because it disguises itself with being a noble enterprise between students and while there is nothing wrong in these readings, what is extremely harmful is that the