Joining a Cult/Group Think

Wednesday and no plans for the day other than continue to battle pockets of chaos that moved over from the office or down from the upstairs - new carpeting forced a purge which is wonderful but means going through bags and bags and stacks and stacks of stuff, looking for that one jewel of a document that God forbid gets thrown away with junk. So, as tempting as it is just to junk the whole lot of it en masse, I'm going through it all with a fine tooth comb. Yesterday saw me stoking a huge fire in the fireplace on a 100 degree day - burning anything remotely sensitive. With each pile that gets relegated to the alley, I'm finding my energy increasing. Wonderful. 


And I almost forgot to write today! Can't remember when that's happened before. I think it's because I'm feeling less like "talking" and more like "doing". As you can imagine sometimes it's really hard to find something to wax poetic about! Today is one of those days so I might cut today's entry a bit short.


Oh, and Friday, no post because I'm joining a cult and I'm almost not kidding. Landmark Forum. Most of you know of it. Some people have told me they, themselves attended one or more Landmark seminars and they got a lot out of it. Other's have said, "Run for the hills!" It is very cult-like, even in how they conduct themselves prior to the seminar. I've been in their cross-hairs since I signed up months ago. Some days I get no less than three phone calls (all unanswered) from them - thinking they want to rope me in and ensure that I really will attend. Finally talked with them yesterday and the women was ecstatic to finally get me live on the phone - as if it had become her life's mission to talk with Sarah Britton. She gushed. I was cool.  Definitely leery. So, you ask, "Why are you doing this if you are so suspicious of them?" Excellent question (do you like how I can dialogue by myself?) There have been a handful of people I admire, who seem to have impressive mastery over their lives, who have gone through the seminar and who say it changed their lives. By now you know that a) I'm a person on a perpetual quest for betterment and b) that there are areas of my life where I'm very stuck no matter what I do to change.  If this seminar can help me more forward and put the past behind me, it will be a Godsend.  


But their tactics! Classic brainwash! They spend a lot of time breaking you down - thinking they're not satisfied until you get up in front of a roomful of strangers and cry like a blubbering baby. Maybe I'll just start practicing now - the whole blubbering thing. I'll think of my beloved Elvis who I nursed from 4 weeks, who slept between my breasts as I cooked - Elvis who got out one day and was decapitated and left dead in the yard. If I think of that day, I will bawl convincingly and then maybe they'll torture some other participant. The seminar goes from 9AM to 10PM three days in a row, Friday-Sunday, and then the full evening on Tuesday. By the end, if they've accomplished their goal, you breathe, preach, dream everything Landmark. You go out into the world like a robot and recruit others to go through the seminar. You sign up for advanced classes and devote your life to them. You volunteer many hours a month to working the phones and recruiting new members.

Kaveh hates them - is trying not to use his influence with me to pull the plug on my attendance. When asked, he said, "I don't like religion in any form."  Interesting. Didn't know Landmark could be described as a religion. He obviously thinks so.  He clarified by saying that anything that results in group think is repellent to him. Me too. I hate group think so what the hell am I doing? Will they break me? If, on Monday, I gush Landmark this and Landmark that, you'll know I've turned Stepford on you. Someone, please, if that happens, kidnap me and de-program me.

Like what the Buddhist daily dharma said today and it jibes with what we're talking about:

Against the Stream

The unflinching light of mindful awareness reveals the extent to which we are tossed along in the stream of past conditioning and habit. The moment we decide to stop and look at what is going on (like a swimmer suddenly changing course to swim upstream instead of downstream), we find ourselves battered by powerful currents we had never even suspected—precisely because until that moment we were largely living at their command.

I'm a salmon fighting her way upstream - against the tide of mindless popular culture. I've always treasured my different-ness (some would say weirdness). I try to get the people I love to question everything, to make enlightened, individual decisions - to create their own code of conduct and living that is uniquely theirs, not something they've been spoon fed and that they follow mindlessly. Thinking this seminar will be interesting for me. They will have no idea when this pleasant, middle aged woman walks in that I will be their biggest challenge. Not sure I want them to know - maybe I should try and extract the goodness while flying under the radar - not make waves like I'm famous for.

Nervous about this - thinking it might be a big mistake.

Peace,
Sarah