I Escaped a Cult - Monastic Academy for the Preservation of Life on Earth Review

[zurew]

6 minutes ago, Wilhelm44 said:

and you didn't respond

Yes I have with the murder scene analogy and you havent addressed it (you havent shown that the bit that you picked out is  false, you just said that that one bit being true in and of itself doesnt make something a cult).

But even if you could show that that bit is false and isn't applicable to actualized.org (which again you havent done yet) - Cult is a cluster concept and this is not the kind of concept where you can just find all the necessary conditions and if you manage to shot down one of those, then the thing is not a cult anymore.

There are many different configuration of facts that can make something a cult. This is why you need to analyze this in clusters of facts and not just bit by bit.

[Natasha Tori Maru]

16 minutes ago, Wilhelm44 said:

I grant you that, Leo is rough around the edges, when it comes to responding to people with different realizations than him. But think about it, what does he have to gain by doing so. He'll probably just piss some people off who end up leaving. 

This can be explained by egoic attachment to the teacher role, narcissism. Inflated ego. 

Could be many motivations behind it. 

It could be a mechanism to funnel out those who would not follow, and keep narcissistic supply close via adoration from students.

Just some possibilities - I don't have a dog in this fight.

[Wilhelm44]

17 minutes ago, zurew said:

Yes I have with the murder scene analogy and you havent addressed it (you havent shown that the bit that you picked out is  false, you just said that that one bit being true in and of itself doesnt make something a cult).

But even if you could show that that bit is false and isn't applicable to actualized.org (which again you havent done yet) - Cult is a cluster concept and this is not the kind of concept where you can just find all the necessary conditions and if you manage to shot down one of those, then the thing is not a cult anymore.

There are many different configuration of facts that can make something a cult. This is why you need to analyze this in clusters of facts and not just bit by bit.

I hear you, it's a complicated matter, and I'm sure I don't have all the info.

I'm a simple man, and I feel there is also some value in being direct and to the point.

Can you honestly say that you feel unsafe, or manipulated for nefarious purposes, here in any way ?

Edited 2 hours ago by Wilhelm44

[Wilhelm44]

9 minutes ago, Natasha Tori Maru said:

This can be explained by egoic attachment to the teacher role, narcissism. Inflated ego. 

Could be many motivations behind it. 

It could be a mechanism to funnel out those who would not follow, and keep narcissistic supply close via adoration from students.

Just some possibilities - I don't have a dog in this fight.

I didn't think of that. You're already planning your own breakaway cult, aren't you ?

[Natasha Tori Maru]

@Wilhelm44 profiling the vulnerability and suggestibility of the members ... 😇

[zurew]

18 minutes ago, Wilhelm44 said:

Can you honestly say that you feel unsafe, or manipulated for nefarious purposes, here in any way ?

Unsafe? No. Manipulated ? Yes. (disagreement means you are dumb or you are self-deceived or you are disrespectful).

Read some of the links that I gave you (it specifically leads you to my posts in those threads).

Leo has a bunch of plausible deniability moves which he uses so that he doesnt need to take responsbility and if you manage to corner him on that then he will admit that he was wrong, but not for the thing that he supposed to give an apology or acknowledgement for (he will give you apology for using bad words , but he wont acknowledge the deeper underlying judgemental and behavioral problems that consistently and systematically come up over and over again and cant be simply explained away by being unhinged sometimes).

The other interesting thing is that once you manage to corner him , he might acknowledge that thing, but he will pivot back to the exact same tactic that he was cornered for in the past  if that tactic becomes convenient for him to use given a new context(he will try to redo that tactic given the new waters up until the point that he is cornered for that same thing again).

Edited 2 hours ago by zurew

[Mellowmarsh]

 

AI says…Psychology and sociology heavily support the idea that most humans are shaped by cultural conditioning. From birth, we internalize beliefs, values, and behaviors through repetition and social rewards or punishments. This process seamlessly aligns with our innate evolutionary drive to belong to a group.

———-

My personal opinion on this matter is ….
Cult is just a shortened version of Culture, which in general is just human programmed conditioned shared beliefs from birth. . . But I see no evidence that the subject topics discussed here on Leo’s forum is of a cult mentality. Quite the opposite is true in fact. It’s more to do with deconstructing belief systems, not artificially creating them via manipulation and control. That’s not what I see happening here.

No one participating here or following is ever forced or obligated to believe anything that’s being said or written here. The topics here at actualised.org is more about doing away with All BELIEF systems, rather than just blindly believing anything you read or hear as gospel truth, it’s about making your own mind up, and not having your mind made up by someone else.

 

 

 

Edited 1 hour ago by Mellowmarsh

[Wilhelm44]

28 minutes ago, zurew said:

Unsafe? No. Manipulated ? Yes. (disagreement means you are dumb or you are self-deceived or you are disrespectful).

Read some of the links that I gave you (it specifically leads you to my posts in those threads).

Leo has a bunch of plausible deniability moves which he uses so that he doesnt need to take responsbility and if you manage to corner him on that then he will admit that he was wrong, but not for the thing that he supposed to give an apology or acknowledgement for (he will give you apology for using bad words , but he wont acknowledge the deeper underlying judgemental and behavioral problems that consistently and systematically come up over and over again and cant be simply explained away by being unhinged sometimes).

The other interesting thing is that once you manage to corner him , he might acknowledge that thing, but he will pivot back to the exact same tactic that he was cornered for in the past  if that tactic becomes convenient for him to use given a new context(he will try to redo that tactic given the new waters up until the point that he is cornered for that same thing again).

Thank you, I am busy reading through the links you shared.

I don't think you answered my full question though.

I acknowledge that you felt manipulated.

And I'm sure Leo has some blind spots in the way he goes about things.

But my question was, did you feel manipulated "for nefarious purposes" ?

ie to be financially, sexually or otherwise literally exploited in some way.

Or was it ultimately just Leo defending his position in a not so enlightened way. 

Edited 1 hour ago by Wilhelm44

[Mellowmarsh]

Also when you deeply think about where beliefs actually come from. Including all our bits of knowledge we’ve accumulated and archived away for future reference, o when the demand for such is required. You’ll discover that all our bits of knowledge and beliefs come from the exact same place. So there’s actually no one who has got a more superior monopoly over knowledge.

 

There’s simply no author of this universe, except as an imaginary character. Fiction then is very much a fact.

[Wilhelm44]

36 minutes ago, Mellowmarsh said:

 

AI says…Psychology and sociology heavily support the idea that most humans are shaped by cultural conditioning. From birth, we internalize beliefs, values, and behaviors through repetition and social rewards or punishments. This process seamlessly aligns with our innate evolutionary drive to belong to a group.

———-

My personal opinion on this matter is ….
Cult is just a shortened version of Culture, which in general is just human programmed conditioned shared beliefs from birth. . . But I see no evidence that the subject topics discussed here on Leo’s forum is of a cult mentality. Quite the opposite is true in fact. It’s more to do with deconstructing belief systems, not artificially creating them via manipulation and control. That’s not what I see happening here.

No one participating here or following is ever forced or obligated to believe anything that’s being said or written here. The topics here at actualised.org is more about doing away with All BELIEF systems, rather than just blindly believing anything you read or hear as gospel truth, it’s about making your own mind up, and not having your mind made up by someone else.

 

 

 

Spot on.

[Wilhelm44]

I don't think people realize how unique this forum actually is.

Do you think at a Tolle or Spira or Adyashanti etc meeting you'll be allowed to full on challenge them on their realizations ?

You'll probably just be redirected by the organizer to ask a question.

There's a whole bunch of people here with different flavors of realizations and I honestly don't feel pressured to agree with Leo on everything.

If you find yourself constantly challenging the teacher in some way, then maybe the time has come to be a teacher yourself, or maybe not, who knows.

 

[Leo Gura]

20 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

Without using mind control on me (i.e. answer plainly without redirecting, without accusing me of not understanding or being purportedly disrespectful for having a different opinion), what is mind control?

Carl-Richard: Walks into a math classroom at Harvard. "Hey! Isn't this a cult?"

Professor: "Umm... No. This is a math class on Differential Calculus."

Carl-Richard: "Looks awfully similar to a cult in here. Look at this mind control you're doing here."

Professor: "We are learning advanced math."

Carl-Richard: "Isn't this homework you're giving your cult members mind control? Explain to me without using mind control how this is not mind control."

Professor: "Get the fuck out of my classroom!!!"

Carl-Richard: "AH! So you're a cult leader after all! I knew it!"

Edited 52 minutes ago by Leo Gura

[zurew]

1 hour ago, Wilhelm44 said:

But my question was, did you feel manipulated "for nefarious purposes" ?

ie to be financially, sexually or otherwise literally exploited in some way.

I personally dont think that Leo is nefariously planning these things, but I dont think that is necessary for actualized.org to be considered  a cult.

I think that he genuinely thinks and has a belief that he is doing good by what he does, but thats part of the issue.

Its enough if you have a couple of delusional beliefs and a self image that makes it so that you genuinely think that you are doing good and that all your actions contributes to the greater good.

And this is going to be true for a lot of other instances that most actualized.org members would consider to be cults, where the leader dont necessarily have any specific nefarious intention behind his actions and  where the leader wont consider his actions to be exploitative or bad in any meaningful way.

For instance - for you to start a sex cult, you dont need to have any nefarious or explicit bad intention to start one -  its enough for you just to start with  the delusional premise that by having sex with women you will provide them spirtual knowledge and or certain spiritual abilities and or awakening.

 

Relating that back to actualized.org - if you genuinely think that all other people except you are cognitively and spiritually impaired, and that you are the most conscious being in the universe and that no one even comes slightly close to your understanding - then of course you are going to use his rhetoric and some of the tactics that Leo use.

Aside from the issue that he has no indepedent justification to demonstrate those things to be true and he has no indepedent justification to justify for himself that he isn't self-deceived about those things (that btw he just inferred to be the case), the effects that comes from him taking that starting premise as true is that he undermines the sovereignty of all other people the moment they disagree with him on spiritual matters and he will use language and rhetoric that will continously and consistently undermine their confidence and their sovereignty.

Actualized.org is selecting for people who are open-minded and that is used as a crack and as an attack vector to completely and consistently undermine the confidence of people who disagree with Leo on spiritual matters.

You are consistently presented with a false dichotomy, where you are either closed minded and self deceived or you are open minded and agree with Leo on all spiritual matters.

All the norms that can help help you to judge whether you are self-deceived or not, necessarily come back to him and to what he takes to be true and there is no room for him to be wrong about any of those things (he might claim that there is room for him to be wrong when is cornered,  but again he will immediately pivot back to a behavior where demonstrates the exact opposite).

 

From a non-cult I would expect there to be self-correcting norms (that are applicable both to the members and to the leader) that can be independently judged and evaluated from the subjective evaluation of that leader and where the leader dont have an explicit authority on those norms.

And I would also expect there to be norms that can be used to hold the leader accountable for his actions that are again indepedent from the subjective evaluation and opinion of the leader and where he doesnt have an authority on what those norms ought to be.

Edited 41 minutes ago by zurew

[Wilhelm44]

7 minutes ago, zurew said:

I personally dont think that Leo is nefariously planning these things, but I dont think that is necessary for actualized.org to be considered  a cult.

I think that he genuinely thinks and has a belief that he is doing good by what he does, but thats part of the issue.

Its enough if you have a couple of delusional beliefs and a self image that makes it so that you genuinely think that you are doing what you are doing for the greater good.

And this is going to be true for a lot of other instances that most actualized.org members would consider to be a cult, where the leader dont necessarily have any specific nefarious intention behind his actions and  where the leader wont consider his actions to be exploitative but as something helpful.

For you to start a sex cult, you dont need to have any nefarious or explicit intention to start one -  its enough for you just to start from the delusional premise that by having sex with women you will provide them spirtual knowledge and or certain spiritual abilities and or awakening.

 

For instance, if you genuinely think that all other people except you are cognitively and spiritually impaired, and that you are the most conscious being in the universe and that no one even comes slightly close to your understanding - then of course you are going to use his rhetoric and some of the tactics that Leo use.

Aside from the issue that he has no indepedent justification to demonstrate those things to be true and he has no indepedent justification to justify for himself that he isn't self-deceived about those things (that btw he just inferred to be the case), the effects that comes from him taking that starting premise as true is that he undermines the sovereignty of all other people the moment they disagree with him on spiritual matters and he will use language and rhetoric that will continously and consistently undermine their confidence.

Actualized.org is selecting for people who are open-minded and that is used as a crack and as an attack vector to completely and consistently undermine the confidence of people who disagree with Leo on spiritual matters.

You are consistently presented with a false dichotomy, where you are either closed minded and self deceived or you are open minded and agree with Leo on all spiritual matters.

All the norms related that can help help you judge whether you are self-deceived or not always necessarily come back to him and to what he takes to be true and there is no room for him to be wrong about any of those things (he might claim that there is room for him to be wrong when is cornered,  but again he will immediately pivot back to a behavior where demonstrates the exact opposite).

 

From a non-cult I would expect there to be self-correcting norms (that are applicable both to the members and to the leader) that can be independently judged and evaluated from the subjective evaluation of that leader and where the leader dont have an explicit authority on those norms.

Aha, I hear you.

Would be curious to hear @Leo Gura's response to this ?

[Thought Art]

“Actualized.org is selecting for people who are open-minded and that is used as a crack and as an attack vector to completely and consistently undermine the confidence of people who disagree with Leo on spiritual matters.

You are consistently presented with a false dichotomy, where you are either closed minded and self deceived or you are open minded and agree with Leo on all spiritual matters”
 

Like God and Infinity?  Should Leo Back down on his views to appease someone else? It’s his “school and teachings”. 
 

I see people disagree with Leo a lot here and have for years. I disagree with Leo too. Leo has expressed that spirituality is a mountain range with many peaks and styles. Explore them..
 

But, as I understand it he was to teach his realization of God, and his ontology and metaphysics he is teaching. 
 

Leo would like it if people did their own study. Don’t believe him. 
 

I recall Leo even teaching that their are degrees of awakening, different kinds of spirituality, and different degrees of Open Mindedness and that truth is up to YOU not him. 
 

“From a non-cult I would expect there to be self-correcting norms (that are applicable both to the members and to the leader) that can be independently judged and evaluated from the subjective evaluation of that leader and where the leader dont have an explicit authority on those norms.”

This is present in the vast majority of Leo’s teachings unless you’re just ignoring them or are unfamiliar. Leo’s work from the life purpose course the vast majority of his self help and personal development materials encourage users ti discover their own unique path. 

Edited 32 minutes ago by Thought Art

[Leo Gura]

I am not going to engage with people who call Actualized.org a cult. If you feel that way, leave. It's that simple. But I am not going to explain myself to you because you clearly have no understanding of what I am doing.

To call me a cult leader is the most disrespectful thing you can say to me! Get that through your head. When you say that to me, I will not even speak with you. You are dead to me when you say that.

To call me a cult leader is like walking into your local university classroom and calling the professor a pedophile. The only people who would do that are those who have no idea what they are doing.

Edited 23 minutes ago by Leo Gura

[Thought Art]

If you think you ask Leo what is True to know what’s True you are retard like my brother Billow. 
 

The scary truth is… Truth can only be reconciled with you. No one else. Also you could always be self deceived, potentially your entire life no matter what you do. It’s a terrifying thing. Who do I believe? Fuck!!! Who?!?!!?

You can’t… 
 

You have to get to a point that you transcend Leo, Buddha, Christ, or any one else or any specific system or potential dogma. You have to be cult proof. 
 

Listening to Leo as a source of pure authority is lazy. But, doing contemplation and philosophy, psychedelics, getting direct experience with life and  with many sources as your aid is smart. —- this is what I learned from Leo and life over the years. 

Edited 22 minutes ago by Thought Art

[zurew]

6 minutes ago, Thought Art said:

Like God and Infinity?

Like he is the most conscious being in the universe and that there is no one else who actually knows what God is and how deep it goes and what are the aspects of God.

8 minutes ago, Thought Art said:

Leo would like it if people did their own study. Don’t believe him.

Yeah, the claim is to not believe him and to do the work, but if you do the work and the study and you happen to disagree with him, then you suppose to do more work and more study up until the point that you actually agree with him.

Again the norm that decides what kind of work and how much more work and study you need to do is judged by him and disagreement means that you are wrong and that you need to self correct and that he is right.

10 minutes ago, Thought Art said:

This is present in the vast majority of Leo’s teachings unless you’re just ignoring them or are unfamiliar.

Okay, so give me the norms that he provided that arent directly dependent on his subjective judgements (that I can use to indepdently judge whether I am or him self-deceived about things and that I can use to indepedently judge who is more developed).

[Wilhelm44]

2 minutes ago, zurew said:

Like he is the most conscious being in the universe and that there is no one else who actually knows what God is and how deep it goes and what are the aspects of God.

Yeah, the claim is to not believe him and to do the work, but if you do the work and the study and you happen to disagree with him, then you suppose to do more work and more study up until the point that you actually agree with him.

Again the norm that decides what kind of work and how much more work and study you need to do is judged by him and disagreement means that you are wrong and that you need to self correct and that he is right.

Okay, so give me the norms that he provided that arent directly dependent on his subjective judgements (that I can use to indepdently judge whether I am or him self-deceived about things and that I can use to indepedently judge who is more developed).

I think the point is that if you disagree with the teacher, why even try to get the teacher to verify your position, it's probably not going to happen, is it ?

If you have a realization that's different, then so it is, it's fine.

 

[Thought Art]

@zurew Well, this is the water we swim in. You have to find out what is true for yourself. 
 

I mean, there are world leading experts on math, taking a shit, sports science, finance… there are the best athletes in the world in their respective area. Name anyone else with Leo’s body of work and articulation and orientation towards doing what he does? I personally have never come across anyone else on earth like him.  If you know of anyone else alive doing what he does show me. But, he does not demand you give him authority. I can see that as a red flag. But, idk. 
 

We have a world of cults, people looking for mind control over others. You need your own discernment if Leo is seeking mind control. 
 

You need backbone in yourself to ultimately admit “I don’t know what is true or who to trust”. Because you don’t know what is true, and you don’t know who to trust. This is the existentially bind for all humans. But, so many of us think we are right. 
 

For your last point I’ve listed the orientation toward reality Leo generally teaches. 
 

You being God, is the one thing he isn’t gonna budge on. But, how you life life is up to you as the Creator of your own life. That’s my take. 
 

Any school or philosophy has the exact traps you point to. Good luck getting out of it with any other system…
 

 

Edited 8 minutes ago by Thought Art