Nothing from knowledge lasted for me either, in fact even the daily dose of meditation it was like a stop gap measure that just kept things at bay if i was lucky, but any sudden bliss or peace never took root or lasted ( more than 30 years of it) and I can tell anyone now, it doesn't work! maybe for a minute, but after that minute? just another illusion. You will enjoy reading here, all the journeys and the posts and I will enjoy ( and I'm sure not the only one) reading your stories and how you came to ex, what were the moments that led to the veil lifting ? excited to get to know you

Suzy 

To put it in a nutshell, I cannot say I never experienced bliss or happiness during my practicing knowledge or being attached to PR.

In fact meditation was often a source of intense " pleasure ". And the rest of it exciting on many occasions.

But funnily enough, the conclusion is...maybe pleasure is not really the gauge of value.

It surprises me even to write this..then again drug addiction ( which was/is not my thing ) is of that order too?

I never thought that the terribly trying periods which led to my leaving PR and the whole deal was intentionally put there by him for my own good. I read you did and do understand though. I too did deify him for a long time like a kid worshiping god.

Yet at that point even while still in Malibu something in me started to rebell internally as far as what the hell was happening.

I hosted lots of premies coming from all over the world who came to serve " up there" 

Some telling me how lucky I was to be where I was. Right....I thought to myself...life is a constant hardship. Rough beyond rough. 

I do believe PR misled me, mislead us as far as life choices. Because if you listened sincerely it led to a crazy lifestyle of un-remurated service, of insane traveling after him. Pretty stupid things to do when you got a family to raise and feed!

Plus this crazy stance of looking at the whole world as less than we were...which is insanity.

The world may be wacko but we were not any better! In fact definitively we belonged to the most wacko fringes of it.

I dont mean to insult anyone here. I also feel very sad right now to admit to this. Shit ...this was my life! What I did around my kids!

Belonging to a stupid cult. And not being aware of it.

Ok ok...got out of it too. So lets cheer up right. 

We made it out!

There was a selfishness that we adopted that was somehow justified, yet didn't sit well and in turn caused a lot of strife in the family situations and in general a massive block from communicating with integrity with people who genuinely cared about me but weren't brainwashed cult members. 

I am embarrassed to think that my kids had to put up with the antics and the abandonment for something 'more important' (?) wtf

That's silly. But take some consolation from the fact that it wasn't just is in our particular cult pursuing truth through self-centred pleasure. The self indulgence promoted in the 60's didn't stop in the 70's...

If you're going to judge by eye, if you're going to judge by feel then feeling happy is the indicator of accuracy.

when it comes to artwork it's knowing that moment when it's holding it's own - spent but feeling satisfied, it doesn't matter it's not perfect, you're happy and it's time to put down tools.

So there is this nugget of truth in the promise that makes it easy, well almost sensible to swallow but then it is taken in a false direction that you have to be happy all the time - feeling unhappy matters too.

Of course getting some craft right gives a deep sense of satisfaction, and I can be as indulgent as the next fellow. 

I just think the happiness following Rawat was supposed to bring was trivial and unrealistic, a fantasy. And happiness as an isolated aim and a measure of success is a shallow aspiration.

Being sad is like pruning a rose bush, it has to happen.  

Inside that premie idea of constant bliss that was so toxic we were stressed out with believing we should always be happy, is the nugget of something real - the love you feel is the blanket that cushions you through it all.

At heart it was a reasonable expectation, Rawat was certainly no answer.

Perhaps the pearl in the oyster makes a more acceptable metaphor for the bit of something real around which accretes a lot of bs in a back to front kind of way.

how on earth did you find that!

I've always been swayed by the idea that you need some sort of nervous system, maybe a brain or so but it is such a common idea that you come across - people talking to rocks as well as trees and now that I think about it, why couldn't a rock have a sense of place, a network in it's materialness and what happens when a bit chips off or weathers down - it's very hard to make sense of!

Welcome Inis

Loved your post, I'm so glad you found your way here.  It was the guttural reaction that I get from the shock of seeing a picture of him...I call him the guru (only because I refuse to change with him)...that led me here too.  I, like you, found this site years ago but wasn't ready to let all the painful experiences seep into me and didn't join the conversation, didn't want him on the other side of my coin either...and though I appreciate the beauty of immaculate timing, I do wish I'd joined way before I did.  This site is AWESOME because of the glorious and free voices you'll find.  The variation is so cool...a sentence or paragraph will be interpreted in as many ways as it's read, and the compassion, humor, and mind expansion that happens when you see your words through the eyes of others has been the greatest healing source of my life.

The amazing souls of EPO have a very high tolerance for rambling , lots of good stuff comes of it...and you might find that a tiny little seemingly insignificant thought you had can spark a massive response, and you'll see things in yourself you never knew about until a voice from across the globe points it out.  

Seems to me from your few words, that your kids have a thoughtful and present dad now, and maybe you'll want to consider forgiving yourself for a weird childhood.

I'm your go to girl for hating the guru.  When you need to process rage for what he did to you I'll back you 100%.  Everyone here let's me have it...my rage that is.  There have been a few times that I regretted the drama of my posts as soon as I hit that post button that makes it real...feeling stupid and extreme...but then somehow the wiser voices from around the world will tell me it's ok...we get you...

And I have been continually graced by the emotional intelligence that seems to be born from ex ing....not just quitting, but sharing the thought processes that got you there.  It must have been really hard on you to not talk with others going thru the same thing.  That's what happened to my dad...kinda.  With no 'peers' or the internet to connect him to others in the same boat, re entering society on his own as an abandoned devotee (1980) was impossible for him and he didn't make it.  More than anything, I wish he was here to let lesley and AJW shock his funny bone, and to argue with Steve with his dry wit, let the support and 'keeping it real' ness of 13 and DCcultmember and Howardyang feed his mind, get into crazy mind trips with auggie55, and let SuzyQ's heart reach his with her beautiful and compassionate posts, and get soul hugs from karenl and lexy and Susan...and to connect to the deep healing philosophies of lakeshore and la-ex and Manincar...and to thank JHB and Marianne and Cynthia and so many others for their tenacity, calm cool voices of reason, and devotion to never letting that fuck face forget his wicked existence...to name a very few!  If my dad would have had these voices in his head instead of the guru's, or no one's, he might have been ok.

There I go rambling!  Anyway...glad you're here to share your stories, I hope your connections with EPO are as healing as mine have been.

It's a lovely rainy day here in the desert today...I'm loving the clouds and cool breezes, soaking up every minute in anticipation of the 120 degree days in my near future!

Be well

Genny

Yes...so many actual relationships destroyed for the hope of mystical one...I get so mad that he took such advantage of spiritually hungry and innocent souls, and encouraged the severing of ties instead of bridge building.  My dad and his dad were never the same again either.

Too bad that mental and spiritual damage aren't as illegal as physical damage...here on earth anyway.  I'm sure there's a price for him to pay on the other side, I'd just love to see him pay one here too.

And then of course I get to feel guilty for vindictiveness...back and forth...righteous or vindictive?...back and forth.

I stick with righteous, he should pay as dearly as we have.

His arrogance forms a kind of block that just seems to keep him out of trouble just enough to start the next round. 

I have said here before -I refuse to give him the power over my state of mind and being. 

I'm not ending the story there where I left him.

I left him, that felt good to write!!!! really, like a huge smile as i acknowledged exactly that, lots of shit went down but actually in the end I LEFT HIM

I made a self validating decision, yay for me and 10 pats from myself on the back!

Anyway back to the crimes against humanity...

To me it's a given that the entire planet, universe and multiverse is vibrational in nature. There is nothing preventing you from communing with your father Jasper, even though he has departed this particular physical plane. Sounds wacky but it's true.

Prayers for our departed loved ones and for our ancestors are pretty common practises among human beings. 

In my personal experience, they work.

 They work, what on earth would that mean?

 I mean there is a shift in the energy, a lightening of the load, a progress in the process, often a message received or a message given, a blockage released and more often than not a feeling of resolve.

We are this body yes and yet we are so much more.

I have had a few meaningful encounters with those who have departed already, enough to know that they are definitely there.... I have had conversations with my Dad, gone more than 30 years as recently as 2 nights ago.

Not very often I must say, but sometimes I feel him there, bringing me love and acceptance, comfort and most certainly forgiveness.

We understood the realm of the unseen, the fact that there IS an inner being- enough to fall for Rawat, that was the half of truth that he drew us in with, then he twisted it around and leached our energy, instead of empowering us.

Yet it remains that the part of me looking for a relationship with God, looking to understand my identity in the context of eternity in an approximately infinite universe, wasn't really wrong. 

He was, he's a liar and a fraud.

 At first all spirituality sat a bit skewed with me, I didn't know what to put down, what to pick up, I was really mistrusting of anything new age and some days thats still true, usually with good reason, haha

But the thing that I always knew, that I am a vibrational force, I along with every other thing I can see or otherwise feel and sense. 

That somehow i interact with it all.

 There are seen and the unseen forces, I can choose to see and feel what is there or not- and I often found i turned down my psychic/intuitive abilities in order to fit in better and also at one time I seemed to only receive bad news for people. I decided i didn't want that anymore , refused to accept any info coming in regarding friends and family, warnings and stuff. In that period the things i saw and heard from what i can only call the spirit realm, for want of a label, was most often a warning or prediction of something really not good for a friend or family and I was the messenger. They inevitable happened, I was a bit freaked out, I didn't like it, neither did anyone that the message was intended for.

 I demanded it to stop, told them i didn't want to know anymore. Straight away i got sick.In bed for a few days. It seemed i couldn't stop it altogether without suffering some ill health, a blockage of energy showing up in the physical.

 Over the years I had to find the balance between sensing what is 'here' and what is to some people so far away it may as well be the opposite end of the infinite universe, but in my experience is also 'here'.

 Now that I'm a whole lot older it is normal for me to speak with deceased loved ones and actually feel like communication took place, this happened quite naturally when I was young too. 

In between young and old there were a number of disempowering , self sabotaging moves, Rawat was the main one. But he's a twit and not worth my consideration or interest, especially compared to my desire to convey to you again, there is nothing, (lots of nothing) stopping you from communing with your father

Then, I want him to be proud of me. I'm not sure about anyone else, but I always wanted to please my Father. That probably had an effect on my relationship with Rawat where I displaced my feelings for my Father to Rawat instead. I hold Rawat responsible for most of this because displaced affection and love were one of his techniques for emotionally kidnapping us. 

I had lost my cherished Dad not long before I joined the cult and I'm aware that my displaced affection and love, as you so aptly put it, was the primary way into my heart and mind and yes, I was emotionally kidnapped! 

Alarming sometimes to see that we all were....

Of all the negative impacts that Rawat had on us, the denial and subjugation of our natural emotions may have been the worst. Rawat taught us how to suppress and subvert or redirect our feelings and impulses with the primary goal of supplanting those feelings with unwavering devotion to him. And it worked. I became an emotional vacuum while under his spell. In fact, my entire being was saturated and reprogrammed into a shell that reflected only what Rawat wanted from me; complete obedience.....

Its also amazing how resilient we can be in our quest to return to our natural state of being. The last 10 years after exing have been quite a ride as I've struggled to find the pieces of my shattered existence, and then cobble them back together. Despite all my efforts as a premie to destroy my true character, I've found that the template of myself remained just beneath the surface, so there is a lot of hope.

I can't say at this point, what would have become of me, if I had a chance to relive those 34 years in the cult. I'm not even sure if I'd honestly do that if I could. I just sort of go blank thinking about that; the what if question? Obviously I've got a lot more to process but it helps to write about it. 

Thanks for this exchange SQ. There is so much common ground here at the forum and I very much appreciate everyone's thoughtful words. 

Anyway, people here are very supportive re this particular issue.  I would also suggest you check out "cults" in general.  I discovered that a cult is a cult is a cult.  Also, I discovered that politicians run the same marketing scam based on emotions.

I am sure glad you made it out.

It takes courage indeed to make it out of a lifetime involvement. 

Writing has also been a major help for me.

At some point I found myself "exiled" pretty far away from Malibu, the rez, and all I had known for many consecutive years.

Mauritius island. Far away in the middle of some ocean. And yes there were premies there. Playing outdated videos. Small group really. I was on my own...

At first my writing were desperate letters to this guy I still called and thought of as Maharaji.

Eventually though, I did let myself go into free journaling. It was not the first time. Yet a rebellious inner voice started picking up. Who doubted. Questioned. The whole damn thing. This voice scared me at first. I even tried taming it. It picked up strength, taking me along into new reflection. After so many years, I dared to think for myself!

The ultimate forbidden activity...

Yesterday I did write you a fairly detailed response. Which got lost when I went to post....

Today: I just walked off a table where a woman was going on about her Tibetan Buddhist conditioning.

Could not take it.

So yes we were brainwashed and conditioned heavily.

If this can be a solace, we' re not the only ones. At least this is my opinion.

Yet it is not a solace at all. It is mostly irritating.

I guess life is somewhat scary and difficult that so many give their souls away to all encompassing systems and masters.

And so many who dont do that, give theirs to money or whatever.

I know it is necessary to keep to the subject here. So here I stop the rambling.

But anyway this reflection helps me to start forgiving myself for the bind I submitted to when I joined this cult.

One positive thing I can say...ouf! there is one...joining this forum is actually quite powerful. Stirring a lot.

I do feel something like vague compassion, or pity, for people who end up surrendering themselves to some system. Even though they are highly irritating while they are in it. I most likely was too.

Remembering clearly when I first started hanging out with premies. This occasion when we were several in a car. And all of a sudden, it was forbidden to have a normal conversation.

One by one they started "giving satsang" ...and I thought ...let me out of this loony bin..

Till later when I started on it too.

What is happening right now is kind of funny.

I had not thought of all this in any substantial prolongated way in a really long time. 

But this picture...followed by my joining this nice forum, have me plunged deep into memories. Bringing along with it a new light on how I treat myself. 

You mentioned forgiving oneself. Guess I have not done much of that. 

Seeing it is a step uh?

Other than that, I also feel plenty of disgust for Rawat. And surroundings.

The super pampered wife and kids.

Yes she may have gone thru lots of crap also. But...I guess maybe in the end she is not as lucky as we all are here. We left. Were able to leave. She would have too much to loose. And that is not easy when you' ve lived all your life vampirizing people.

The emphasis of this family on extreme luxury and comfort was just, guess still is, insane.

Even the last one, I remember, and god knows I loved him and thought he was so cute, was already addicted to that at hardly 5 years old.

Amar was very aloof, dis-connected. At pre-school, I was working there some, he would never play with anyone. One day I sat with him to talk a bit.

See what was the matter. He said....I just want to be with my dad. He got a new Lamborghini, or whatever it was...am not into cars...he said I want to be in the new car.

The school director clearly thought he had problems and did not like him. Which at the time, broke my heart because I did like him.

I so distinctly remember him saying he would get a new toy, want a new toy so bad and then once he had it, after that first day, the satisfaction wore off and he wanted more.

He was of course talking about himself as a child and of course he's the perfect master so i never questioned that. When I think about it I would have worried for my child had they shown those attributes

But when I look back, that was not my experience as a child, I had the most enormous repeat satisfaction from the simplest of toys that I can still recall with an almost visceral pleasure. The mere thought of them brings it back, the fun lives on

This discourse of his which he drummed in until it couldn't be drummed in any more had me feeling that nothing was really worth wanting or having or playing with. 

The enjoyment will end and the emphasis is on that end, he has painted it to be an immediate end almost as soon as you start to enjoy it. 

But life needn't be that way. Although it obviously is for him. I guess he doesn't want any one else having more fun than him.

The gratitude he harped on about is enough to bring far more pleasant experiences or more pleasure from the mundane, but he was only referring to gratitude to him for 'this gift', and hint, hint hopefully repayment in the form of $$$

Amar probably knew that the first few rides in that car were going to be the only fun to be had in it, after that it was going to be on to the next thing. 

M plied me with this idea, along with many others, until I thought it was mine, but it isn't and it's not how I live or how I want to experience life either. he's a first class twit, I hope his kids rebel

I also played with simple things and went on and on playing. On my own or with siblings and neighbours. 

Seems to me that most children have great capacity to plug into a world of imagination and marveling. Independant of the material value or newness of the toy.

We froze our tongues into the discourse he wanted us to have.

Our brains were pretty frozen also.

Yep, that's exactly it! So succinct. 

We were marking time, not marching forward. What a dick really, when I look back on it I can see that even his story about how he was as a child dissatisfied immediately with the thing he had recently obsessed over, could have told me if I'd been able to see, that this guy is a full blown narcissist. Now that I see that about him, everything about him screams it. 

 I've turned my  heel and started marching in the opposite direction, I just want to spit on the ground he walks on and hold my head up to the truth and light that he masquerades as and rejoice in the fact that I never actually needed him. He's a poisonous dwarf

We were impoverished, you're right, in so many ways. Thus the feeling to spit, but I can't help feeling that the unknown future is a load more exciting and real and beautiful in it's integrity than the past which holds those regrets. I've seen him for who he is now, and that seeing gets clearer and clearer, THAT has got to be a very good thing indeed