Following up with Anne Peterson, Author of "Is This a Cult"

[00:00:00] At Seek Safely, it's our mission to empower seekers to have a safe and meaningful self-improvement journey.

[00:00:07] Why do we care? Seeking to be your best self is an amazing, beautiful human impulse that has led us to create art, invent technology, tell amazing stories, and reach the moon.

[00:00:20] But we saw the dark side of self-help in 2009, when a recklessly run self-improvement retreat led to the death of three people, including my sister, Kirby Brown.

[00:00:30] We want people to seek, to dream their big dreams and chase their beautiful goals. But we want to make sure they're safe along the way.

[00:00:39] This podcast is about education and empowerment, and getting real about the promises and problems of self-help.

[00:00:46] We talk with people who understand and care about the self-help industry, and everyone it touches.

[00:00:52] I'm Jean Brown.

[00:00:53] I'm Dr. Glenn Patrick Doyle.

[00:00:55] And this is the Seek Safely Podcast.

[00:01:00] Hello and welcome to the Seek Safely Podcast. I'm Jean Brown with my co-host Dr. Glenn Patrick Doyle.

[00:01:12] That's me. Not to be confused with Glennon.

[00:01:16] Nope.

[00:01:17] Not me.

[00:01:18] Not me.

[00:01:19] But we do have a special guest with us. We have Anne L. Peterson.

[00:01:24] You might remember, we had Anne on the podcast pretty recently actually because she just launched her book detailing her time with the group Landmark Forum, Landmark Education, Landmark Worldwide, known by many different names but Landmark.

[00:01:39] Wasn't Landmark Luggage like a store in the mall? Do you guys remember Landmark Luggage?

[00:01:47] It was like a sharper image thing in the mall when I was growing up in West Des Moines, Iowa. Go on.

[00:01:52] No, haven't heard that one.

[00:01:54] Google it.

[00:01:56] I don't remember that one, sorry.

[00:01:58] Google it. It's a thing. Anyway.

[00:02:00] So Anne, you released your book, Is This A Cult? Confronting The Line Between Transformation and Exploitation. You released it?

[00:02:09] March 8th.

[00:02:10] March 8th.

[00:02:11] March 8th, okay. And how has the response been? Now we're two months later.

[00:02:17] Yeah.

[00:02:18] How's it going?

[00:02:19] Wow. Well I've only called your mom crying a couple of times.

[00:02:25] She's used to that. I call Jenny Brown crying a couple times a week.

[00:02:31] I don't want to burn her out.

[00:02:33] You guys, I never call her crying.

[00:02:34] That's okay. We'll cover it for you.

[00:02:36] She's my mom. I never call her crying.

[00:02:38] She's such an angel. I really am so grateful for the Seek Safely message because it really has been like a bit of something to hang on to.

[00:02:49] So, you know, I was writing the book, publishing the book was very risky. That's why I know March 8th at 4 p.m. is literally when I hit the first post that would go live on my Facebook, which is full of...

[00:03:02] That's when I knew the Landmark community would find out about it because, you know, my Facebook, that's who follow...

[00:03:08] You know, I have 2,500 followers and they're mostly Landmark graduates and teachers and leaders and all that.

[00:03:13] So I literally remember that moment like I was shaking as I hit the return on my computer.

[00:03:19] Yeah. Sorry. I was just going to say I remember like in the weeks leading up to it, we were helping you with the launch.

[00:03:25] We were talking about it and kind of strategizing with you because we were kind of gearing up for a fight, right?

[00:03:31] Exactly. We were kind of prepared for the worst. Yeah.

[00:03:35] Yeah, completely. We had done a private book launch the night before.

[00:03:39] Ginny was on, you know, you guys really helped. Our last interview was actually recorded before that launch.

[00:03:45] So I expected and was completely ready to be hated, to be kind of vilified in the community.

[00:03:54] That's been a large part of my community for most of my adult life, which are Landmark leaders and program leaders and staff.

[00:04:00] And, you know, that's a big part of what keeps you in groups like that is it becomes your whole family.

[00:04:06] And especially somebody like me who didn't really have a strong family of origin, that's a really vital part.

[00:04:12] And that was a big part in deciding to write the book was really knowing that I was going to probably...

[00:04:16] I mean, where my mind was at the time, I was going to lose that family forever.

[00:04:21] Like, you know, and mostly it had evolved to Facebook friends and a handful of few good friends.

[00:04:27] But still, so I was just really ready, you know, to cut the tie completely and be, you know, gone.

[00:04:35] I was ready to be sued. I was ready to be threatened.

[00:04:39] You know, like we prepared, my husband and I prepared in every way for every outcome we could imagine

[00:04:46] because this is a notoriously very litigious group and particularly with graduates and program leaders that leave for all kinds of reasons.

[00:04:52] So we were like as ready as we could be.

[00:04:55] What I was not ready for was almost 600 people downloaded the book that first weekend.

[00:05:01] Most all of them, because it went out on my Facebook and it went out via SeekSafely, but most of them were Landmark people.

[00:05:09] You know, Landmark forum leaders like that.

[00:05:13] And what has happened since then is I have heard from hundreds saying essentially me too.

[00:05:20] We're trying to come up with our own cool hashtag if you guys have any good ideas, but it's like hundreds of people have reached out to me to go, thank you.

[00:05:30] Hashtag.

[00:05:31] You got one?

[00:05:32] Same here. Hashtag same here.

[00:05:34] Oh, that's good.

[00:05:36] Oh my God. See, he's the social media.

[00:05:38] Hashtag same dog.

[00:05:41] Same here. I like that actually.

[00:05:43] I might even pitch that.

[00:05:44] So, but that's it.

[00:05:46] Like I've heard from so many people.

[00:05:48] The other thing I've heard is just thank you.

[00:05:50] Thank you.

[00:05:51] Thank you.

[00:05:52] I literally can count on my fingers still the number of people I have heard from that have given kind of trolley responses or pushback responses.

[00:06:00] And a couple of them are even good friends who are now reading the book.

[00:06:05] And anyway, we're going to have a conversation next week.

[00:06:08] This one good friend of mine that was pretty darn upset and I get it.

[00:06:12] You know, that's been that person's life for almost 50 years.

[00:06:16] They did the S training in the 70s.

[00:06:18] And so hearing me outing while I give no detail on the book, but actually saying out loud in a public forum that Warner is abusive to his staff physically, emotionally, verbally, spiritually, every way you can be really.

[00:06:34] That was really threatening.

[00:06:36] And, you know, there's people who built their businesses on Warner's reputation as they've been able to maintain it, which is mostly the icing on the mud pie, which is a big saying in the landmark world.

[00:06:49] So, yeah, so I've literally heard from hundreds of people saying thank you.

[00:06:53] Thank you.

[00:06:54] Thank you.

[00:06:55] It's about time we've needed this conversation for so long.

[00:06:59] You know, like that.

[00:07:01] Yeah, I did.

[00:07:02] I did hear from Harry.

[00:07:03] I haven't been sued.

[00:07:05] Peter Skolnick, our favorite defense attorney, First Amendment rights attorney, cult guard attorney.

[00:07:12] He saw that the response from Harry was actually a very nice and cordial letter just reminding me, reminding me that I have proprietary materials agreements and employment agreements that say I cannot disseminate the distinctions that I learned to lead their kind of thing.

[00:07:30] And Peter was like, wow, if this is the response you got, you did a really good job.

[00:07:35] So yeah, no, I think you were very careful in the book to, you know, not not claim anything that you didn't have direct knowledge of or complete backup.

[00:07:47] Just really focused it on your.

[00:07:49] Yeah, exactly.

[00:07:50] And just just focused it on your experience and then your, you know, your experience of stepping back and reflecting, which I think is all we can really do in circumstances like this is just kind of take a pause to reflect.

[00:08:06] So the title of your book is this a cult?

[00:08:10] Has your feeling and answering that question changed at all?

[00:08:14] How do you feel?

[00:08:15] How would you answer that question now about Landmark?

[00:08:18] I would say on the inside.

[00:08:21] Yes, I mean, I said that in the book, probably a little lighter than I would say it now.

[00:08:26] I've definitely had days where I'm like, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, I really was in a cult, like as I've heard more and more and more lies, misdirections and honestly the abuse.

[00:08:39] It's for me, given what Landmark's content is about that the kind of employment abuse and by abuse, I mean people being physically manhandled.

[00:08:51] There was somebody who's now told me a story about this is mostly at the staff level.

[00:08:57] So staff or employees, they have a whole staff employee weird distinction thing.

[00:09:03] But for the world, its employees really take a lot of abuse, a lot of verbal abuse.

[00:09:09] I've heard of people being sat in front of Joan Rosenberg's desk in child chairs and being screamed at and humiliated.

[00:09:16] I've heard of registration manager being choked when he didn't make the target.

[00:09:21] I've heard of let's see what others I can only tell you the stories that people have agreed to give me witness statements about for any lawyers listening out there.

[00:09:28] But Anne, who was that staff member being that he needed to be choked?

[00:09:36] It's so funny you mention that because, oh Glenn, it's so great because and Eva, I've had a lot of people who are commenting on Facebook.

[00:09:45] I have hundreds of people talking and commenting on my Facebook and a lot of these staff are not willing to tell these stories publicly yet or be identified.

[00:09:54] They're willing for me to tell them, but they're not yet at the place where they can tell them.

[00:09:57] And people are like, but why didn't you take it to somebody who could do something about it?

[00:10:01] And I've heard that Harry's what's been told to me by people on different leader calls and staff calls.

[00:10:07] Harry Rosenberg, the CEO, has been lamenting that I didn't just come to him with my concerns.

[00:10:15] Well, you know, that person who experienced being choked, they went all the way up the line to Joan Rosenberg, Harry's sister,

[00:10:21] also the person who runs the main operations.

[00:10:24] And the report was that's exactly what she said.

[00:10:28] Well, who are you being that he felt the need to choke you?

[00:10:31] And that I wish I could tell you like that's the most extreme, salacious one I've heard.

[00:10:37] But I can assure you for any landmark folks listening out there that have that thought, hey, what about taking it to the person who can do something about it?

[00:10:46] For 40 years, complaint after complaint has been taken to someone who could do something about it.

[00:10:52] And so often those are the responses in the more egregious cases.

[00:10:56] I've now found dozens of dozens and dozens of lawsuits settled payoffs made for sexual assault for here's another big one.

[00:11:05] Glenn, somebody told me today they used to sit out in the World Headquarters office and that Harry would get calls every day.

[00:11:14] This is hearsay. I don't have the direct from the person who heard it.

[00:11:18] I have it one away.

[00:11:20] But Harry would get calls about people committing suicide after doing the forum and all kinds of stuff.

[00:11:26] And what you're describing of, you know, like so there's the question on the one hand of what why don't people just go and take their concerns to the next level or somebody who could do something about it.

[00:11:39] It really echoes a lot of what I hear almost every day working with trauma survivors who very often, as you can imagine, like they very often go, well, why didn't you tell somebody?

[00:11:50] Why didn't you leave that marriage? Why didn't you tell somebody that your coach was being abusive, et cetera, et cetera?

[00:11:56] And what that conversation misses and what I hear you saying is that very often they have.

[00:12:04] They've tried.

[00:12:06] Lots and lots and lots of people try to leave abusive relationships, try to tell somebody and get either get ignored on the one hand or punished and rejected on the other hand.

[00:12:19] And it sounds like there's a very parallel thing that you have both saw and have heard described that happens in landmark.

[00:12:27] Yeah, it's something that we've seen with other groups too, like Nexium.

[00:12:31] And like the way that they build their response into the whole kind of belief system of the organization.

[00:12:39] So having these types of ideas like who were you being that you brought this upon you?

[00:12:45] It's something we see in so many of these different kinds of groups.

[00:12:48] And I think one thing that happens too is sometimes people when that switch flips and the light goes on and you realize that the group is abusive, that the teachings are maybe protecting the group itself.

[00:13:02] And I think there's a sort of understanding that people have that you can't take this anywhere.

[00:13:10] There's nothing that you can say. There's nobody that you can tell about this who's going to do anything about it.

[00:13:15] You realize that it's part of the whole realization is that it's built into the organization.

[00:13:21] And that's when people just leave because they're like, there's nothing I can do.

[00:13:25] Exactly. And you can even say that was part of why I left.

[00:13:28] Now, when I left and then I went on and did this project, I spent the next nine years hosting Werner.

[00:13:32] So I didn't exactly I left that organization, which I still at that point believe the Werner and Lam are kind of separate, which is the story that existed when I came in in the 90s.

[00:13:43] But which I would come to find out. And I've now since found out that's even less true than I knew when I wrote the book.

[00:13:50] He has been deeply involved in the organization since day one.

[00:13:54] In fact, there's a bunch of really great myths I could bust right here for you.

[00:13:59] One was one of the stories about he sold the organization to employees for a dollar so that it would live.

[00:14:06] So the work would live. No, he sold it for fifteen million dollars.

[00:14:12] He sold it specifically for was two million dollars of the gross revenue and 50 percent of the net pre-tax revenue for 18 years or fifteen million dollars, whatever came sooner.

[00:14:26] And then there's some debate in some legal documents that talks about an initial payoff of a few million dollars also in addition to all that.

[00:14:35] So all the employees that were there working for literally starvation wages, that's what they were supporting.

[00:14:40] But the narrative they were told was, no, we're saving the world or transforming the world.

[00:14:45] And that's the other thing, Jean, like you just nailed it so perfectly in terms of you do you talk to the you talk to your registration manager and then you talk to your center manager and then you talk to the center's division director.

[00:14:57] And then you talk to the maybe the HR department.

[00:15:00] And if you get all the way up to a Rosenberg, God help you.

[00:15:05] But then along the way, you're told that if you tell like if you take this outside, you're going to destroy transformation.

[00:15:15] You're going to destroy. And that's what I'm hearing that from people on Facebook.

[00:15:18] I had one gal plead with me.

[00:15:21] Of course, you should, you know, get what you're saying is important and da da da da da.

[00:15:27] But don't you know, like people are not going to do the forum because you're telling what's going on in the organization.

[00:15:35] I'm like, no, people are going to not do the forum because of what's going on in the organization, not because I'm telling it, but because of as it gets the truth about what's going on in the organization.

[00:15:49] And, you know, and the nature of the programs as we learn more and more about Elgats and coercive persuasion and thought reform and all this stuff.

[00:15:59] That's people might not do those programs.

[00:16:03] That's that's right. And maybe they will. I don't know.

[00:16:06] But I think people should have all the information.

[00:16:10] And I think people should definitely before they think about being a program leader or they don't have assisting anymore, they ended that program, but they have something worse now.

[00:16:19] We really want you guys to talk to a whole episode about this thing where everybody's turning everything into an academy or a training program.

[00:16:29] And now they're literally charging people for to do those programs, which they used to you volunteered and what you got in exchange was training.

[00:16:38] Well, now you get to pay for the training.

[00:16:42] And a lot of the training is still wrapped around doing, you know, their business operations as from what I've been told.

[00:16:49] And for sure enrolling people in their programs.

[00:16:54] It tends to be a mark of really successful, whether you want to call it brainwashing or conditioning when when exposing abuse is considered the problem as opposed to the abuse.

[00:17:09] Like I've seen this a setting that I've seen this frequently in.

[00:17:14] So I work with survivors of clergy abuse.

[00:17:18] And so but as many people listen to this now, I'm also a practicing Catholic.

[00:17:23] And I've gotten feedback to the tune of like, well, man, if you talk as publicly as you tend to do about abuses in the church, people are not going to go to the church.

[00:17:32] And I'm like, yeah, right, right. That's what I'm saying. Right.

[00:17:37] But the fact that that it can be framed as well, no, the whistleblowers, the problem as opposed to the abuse is from car.

[00:17:45] We see this in religion. We see this in industry. Right.

[00:17:48] Like like every story we see in politics, like every story we ever see of somebody taking a stand against abusive work conditions and industry.

[00:17:57] It's like, wow, those whistleblowers are the problem.

[00:18:01] So we see it everywhere.

[00:18:03] I've read a lot about, you know, a particular political figure who's been fairly prominent the last few years.

[00:18:11] You know, people people will say especially like religious people tend to really support this person.

[00:18:17] And some people will go out like this doesn't make any sense.

[00:18:20] He's not a not living a very moral life and his personal life.

[00:18:25] And the kind of conclusion that, you know, people who who will study this these types of phenomenon in politics is that there is a point where the bigger mission, the higher mission, the greater mission.

[00:18:40] That's always more important than the person who's going to carry out the mission.

[00:18:45] So if the mission itself is big enough, then you might have people who are imperfect that are putting forward this mission.

[00:18:54] But as long as they're still advancing it, then it you know, you can forgive all kinds of sins for that's in service.

[00:19:01] That's the other thing. Right. Well, that's Werner.

[00:19:04] Right. And that's what I thought. That's what I thought the day I published the book.

[00:19:09] I'm like, well, that's Werner. And I knew that, you know, the hours were too long.

[00:19:15] The pay was too little. Like, obviously, I knew about exploitation.

[00:19:19] Right. I wrote about it in the book. What I've learned since is like times a hundred.

[00:19:25] And I do think that they have attempted.

[00:19:28] I hear tell that their new HR director is a more professional HR person and has done Melanie is her name, has done a lot to try and elevate the HR practices.

[00:19:39] But I would bet just about my life that Melanie does not know what I know about the abuses and certainly about the Werner link and all of that.

[00:19:48] So one of the things inside the organization, two things are very, very siloed.

[00:19:52] Wouldn't even surprise me if Mick Levitt, the president, doesn't know about the stuff going on with Werner and his aides that are trying to get the abuse over there to stop and to get restitution and so forth.

[00:20:07] And because things are very siloed. Right.

[00:20:09] Like and I bet that's probably true in the Catholic Church, too.

[00:20:12] I'm like in those models, but I think they have made attempts, but they're not dealing with the core issue with the core.

[00:20:21] Or like I said, my book, it's like you can you can build a new house on the same foundation, but the house is going to look pretty same to the house you built before.

[00:20:30] And you can try to put in new drapes and new furniture and all this kind of stuff.

[00:20:34] But if it's on the same foundation, you're going to have the same problems.

[00:20:38] And as long as the Rosenbergs are the family in charge of that operation and then all the people that have they have recreated themselves, they have a whole thing about recreating source.

[00:20:51] And if you even go back and you read outrageous Petrenio, they talk about in Werner's early days in the S days, the S trainer's job was to become Werner, like to become a Werner.

[00:21:02] And there are people in the landmark organization that have become Werner.

[00:21:06] That includes the extreme, the abuse.

[00:21:11] I think his physical abuse is particularly.

[00:21:15] I've heard of a couple others doing similar things, but it's more the OCD, the screaming at people, calling them names, verbally assaulting them, humiliating them, diminishing them.

[00:21:27] I've heard of forum leaders made to be on their knees for like hours while they're screamed at.

[00:21:33] I've heard of people being told to basically renounce their identity.

[00:21:38] I don't know where this fits in Lifton's things, you know, of cult thought reform and culture control.

[00:21:44] But, you know, I'm not a gay man.

[00:21:46] I'm not a white woman who I am is the enterprise who I am is seminar leader that is built into the system.

[00:21:56] It's been there since the S days and it's still going on, still going on today.

[00:22:03] Well, and it's it begs such interesting questions that we'll talk about here in a minute.

[00:22:09] And then we'll just keep talking about on our podcast.

[00:22:11] But it begs such interesting questions about, OK, so we have competing hypotheses as to what the rot is, like what the problem is.

[00:22:20] Like one hypothesis is bad guy, bad guy, handful of bad people, whatever.

[00:22:28] There's a hypothesis that, OK, bad org, right?

[00:22:32] Like maybe the guy wasn't that bad, but the org he built was pretty bad.

[00:22:35] Right. Bad church, whatever.

[00:22:37] Then there's the hypothesis that I kind of tend to favor is that there's something about the L GATT format that can't end well.

[00:22:50] And what I'm reminded of is and you can tell me what you think about this.

[00:22:53] And what I'm reminded of is the Stanford prison experiment.

[00:22:58] You remember this?

[00:23:00] Where they took a course.

[00:23:03] Yeah, I want to say what it is.

[00:23:06] Yeah, yeah, but I heard about it there.

[00:23:09] They always do this.

[00:23:11] So the Stanford prison experiment and it's not an uncontroversial piece of psych research.

[00:23:16] They took a bunch of undergrads and they divided them up into prisoners and guards.

[00:23:23] And they essentially had everyone role play a prison for like I it's been a while since I know the specifics, but it was a ended up.

[00:23:32] Yeah, I think it only went a week or something.

[00:23:35] They ended up ending.

[00:23:37] Yeah, they ended up ending the experiment early because what was happening was the guards were getting really sadistic.

[00:23:45] And the bottom line is like these these college kids were sinking into the roles like they were identifying with these roles.

[00:23:54] And it was a feature of the environment that the structure that had been erected around them.

[00:23:59] And what I wonder is, is there something about the large group awareness training format that is like the Stanford prison experiment?

[00:24:06] Does it turn facilitators and the sadist?

[00:24:08] Does it turn participants into kind of these hapless prisoners in the Stanford experiment?

[00:24:15] Because what you're describing, you see it in Scientology like the stuff that you were just describing about how Werner would get really would get to just really confrontational and humiliating.

[00:24:27] That could be straight from David Miscavige in Scientology.

[00:24:31] You saw it with James Arthur Ray, right?

[00:24:34] So I wonder if there's not something about the the LGAT format.

[00:24:37] So anyway, I think the real answer is it's combination thereof.

[00:24:40] It's like there's something about the guy.

[00:24:42] There's something about the organ.

[00:24:43] There's probably something about the LGAT format as well that all feeds into this phenomenon.

[00:24:48] Yeah, I think there's something about the goal and the promise that all of these types of groups are selling and that I mean, I think that self help sells this idea that you know, this goal of transformation.

[00:25:03] I know Landmark definitely talks about transformation, but a lot of you know, most self help is sort of about this idea of self improvement and transformation.

[00:25:12] And the idea that it's completely up to you, but then that you need to, you know, buy this, go there, listen to this person do these things that they tell you to do in order to achieve that transformation.

[00:25:27] It's like there's this constant tension of you have to do it in order.

[00:25:33] It looks like you're in control of this change, but you need us to be the catalyst for this change and you have to just kind of give yourself over to us that these this is a tension that seems to always exist in these types of self help environments, whether or not they're exactly LGATs or something a little bit different.

[00:25:55] But I think there's something about that goal that is also problematic and that always leads to this.

[00:26:01] These situations that are really fertile grounds for abuse.

[00:26:05] Well, I think there's a couple of things in what you guys will said that in just in my now ongoing, you know, just study and learning and talking to I've now limited to only talk to two people for two people a day four times a week just some advice I got from your mom actually like I can only kind of take in so much.

[00:26:23] Myself and put a couple of things in there.

[00:26:26] I think the LGAT format is a problem because it's just like you know you hear about people in these concert environments right and then all of a sudden their people are being crushed people being like there's like a mood.

[00:26:38] There's a fervor that takes over and I do think while there's some there's some real power in the large group as well.

[00:26:45] Like you can sit there and you can hear somebody else sharing and you'll get all kinds of insights like that's it's powerful and I do think it has a quality of accelerating like what I could do in one to one therapy.

[00:26:56] That's what I used to say as a landmark leader.

[00:26:58] I'm like, oh, and in fact, somebody told me this was said in the landmark forum not four weeks ago.

[00:27:02] Yes, you can handle that in 30 years of therapy or you can handle that in a four days.

[00:27:06] That is the advanced course.

[00:27:08] So, but that speaks to the other thing which is this whole thing of ecology.

[00:27:13] I was speaking with a good friend the other day and Henaire if you're when you listen I apologize for not getting this saying this as eloquently as he did.

[00:27:20] But he was talking about ecology.

[00:27:22] You know, you don't put a seed in the ground and go tree that it grows over time.

[00:27:28] Right.

[00:27:29] It takes the right soil.

[00:27:31] It takes nurturing.

[00:27:32] It takes water.

[00:27:33] And I think a lot of these L.

[00:27:35] And I know we promised it for sure in landmark because it's a group and the group dynamic we never call it they don't I don't think they still recognize themselves as an L.

[00:27:42] They would say they are large that they are have a group dynamic and the group dynamic accelerates your transformation like right.

[00:27:50] That's their being.

[00:27:52] I mean, that's what I was.

[00:27:53] That's what I said.

[00:27:54] I'm sure they're still saying it right.

[00:27:56] Like that's why you can get you can move through so much in your life and three days in an evening because you have this large group and you're going to see yourself in others.

[00:28:05] And but there's also a mood right like you're going to you're going to hear somebody sharing an intimate detail and then you're going to be pulled to do that.

[00:28:12] And there is a catharsis.

[00:28:14] There is something that happens in those in those things and it feels good and study say for about seven to ten days.

[00:28:22] It feels really good.

[00:28:24] But to me, if I were to tell somebody today to do the forum, I would say look, it's going to open up things for you.

[00:28:31] You're going to see things that have literally this is landmark language been hidden from your view and there's a real opening.

[00:28:38] There's if you do something with that, if you like take that and go back, take that back to your therapy or you continue other work, especially landmark in conjunction with other work, I think is probably the most powerful that it is, you know, when it is.

[00:28:51] But so the Elgat thing for sure, ecology like this promise of you can put a seed in the ground and get a tree.

[00:28:58] But there's a real problem with that.

[00:29:00] It's just not the way human beings work.

[00:29:03] But you can be convinced that it worked that way for about seven to ten days.

[00:29:08] So you'll walk out of the forum and you'll be like, oh, my God, I transformed my life.

[00:29:13] But I know hundreds of graduates and they're grappling with the same stuff that they grappled with in courses I led for them.

[00:29:21] Like, you know, they're still grappling with the same issues because those are issues that need to be addressed in a more psychologically based setting, not in a personal development course.

[00:29:32] The other thing just back to something you said, Glenn, and I think I've really, really seen a lot.

[00:29:38] I think to a certain extent, Werner's a product of his times.

[00:29:42] He's 88 years old.

[00:29:44] He was a part of the L Ron Hubbard, S Lon, S Lon early 70s.

[00:29:51] Nineteen seventy one is when the first training happened.

[00:29:54] And so there was a whole culture that was happening.

[00:29:57] He was deeply a part of that.

[00:30:00] And then and then there's also this strong as you look through the 70s, 80s, 90s in our society, we base everything on a military model.

[00:30:08] And so the military model, that's why he showed us the full metal jacket video.

[00:30:13] Right? Like I'm going to scream at you this whole idea of ruthless compassion.

[00:30:19] But there are still huge fans out there.

[00:30:21] I bet if we started a podcast called Ruthless Compassion, we would have hundreds of millions of followers.

[00:30:27] I've been looking for my book title.

[00:30:30] It is a catchy title.

[00:30:32] That's amazing.

[00:30:33] That's a great one.

[00:30:34] Ruthless Compassion.

[00:30:36] It's like it's like leveling up tough love.

[00:30:39] Yes, like it's just the next level.

[00:30:41] Right.

[00:30:42] And the thing is, we're not.

[00:30:44] And we're learning it doesn't work.

[00:30:47] Like how many times you're seeing, I was just watching that docu-series, The Program, you know, where they people would ship their problem teenagers off to basically be abused and imprisoned.

[00:30:56] And under the name of like teaching them, you know, to be deference, deference, to have deference for authority and the name of like.

[00:31:04] And I drove by my son's house the other day.

[00:31:07] There's a sign in the ground.

[00:31:08] They're building a Goddard school.

[00:31:10] Shiny happy people, Goddard.

[00:31:12] Like I told my son, I said, if you ever think about putting my grandchildren in that, you will find a side of your mother you didn't know existed.

[00:31:21] Like, but I think that idea is still around.

[00:31:27] That idea of of intervening on people.

[00:31:32] I mean, it's I think it's waning.

[00:31:34] It's it's waning.

[00:31:35] It's going off with toxic masculinity and then all that kind of stuff like it's starting to kind of wane like because we're we understand that when you freeze somebody's brain, when you throw them into fight or flight.

[00:31:48] They can't function.

[00:31:50] Now, when I have to teach somebody a soldier to go onto a field and shoot another human.

[00:31:55] Yeah, I got to teach them how to turn off that response.

[00:31:59] But to register somebody in a personal development program, I don't kind of teach him that response.

[00:32:06] It's not a business tactic.

[00:32:08] Yeah, there's a lot of businesses that think it is right.

[00:32:12] And I also I do.

[00:32:14] I agree.

[00:32:15] I think at one point it was waning, but I feel like it's kind of coming back.

[00:32:18] It's fighting hard because, you know, there's all this concern that we're all too soft.

[00:32:23] Right.

[00:32:24] Like the the participation trophy culture pushback kind of thing.

[00:32:30] I think I think there's a pushback against it.

[00:32:33] I'm afraid that you're right.

[00:32:36] Well, and I think that that the entire field gets distorted by the leaders of the field.

[00:32:45] So, for example, as long as Tony Robbins is around, Elgat will not die.

[00:32:50] Like like like the big seminar.

[00:32:52] Well, Joe dispenses liquid dispenses doing you bet.

[00:32:56] And and even my gal, Teal Swan, like as long as but here's the thing.

[00:33:00] They're really good at it.

[00:33:02] And I say good kind of in quotes.

[00:33:04] I mean, they are really skilled at this.

[00:33:06] And I think there's an entire generation.

[00:33:08] Look, I think this is what happened with James Arthur Ray.

[00:33:10] Someone marked down the point in the podcast where I mentioned James Arthur Ray.

[00:33:14] We have to mention him every podcast per contract.

[00:33:17] Now, I think this is what happened with James.

[00:33:19] James took a look at Tony Robbins.

[00:33:21] He even says this.

[00:33:22] He took a look at Tony Robbins.

[00:33:23] He went to a Tony Robbins event and he's like, I can do that.

[00:33:27] Well, as it turns out, it's not actually that easy to do.

[00:33:30] And that and that's how James got in over his head with with what he was trying to do.

[00:33:35] And I think there are lots of wannabe Tony Robbins is out there who try to do the same thing.

[00:33:41] And they look at they look at Tony Robbins.

[00:33:43] They look at Teal Swan.

[00:33:44] They look at it.

[00:33:45] They're like, I can do that.

[00:33:46] Right.

[00:33:47] So I think it becomes like it won't die because there are enough up and comers who are like, come on, how hard can it be?

[00:33:54] Right.

[00:33:56] Well, I'm going to wrap myself out here.

[00:33:58] I mean, I say it a little bit in the book, but to be very clear, that's what I was training yoga man to do.

[00:34:03] I was training yoga man to be a more effective large group awareness leader.

[00:34:07] In fact, that was when I discovered large group awareness because I was coaching him.

[00:34:11] I was remodeling content for him and creating content for a portion of his teacher trainings.

[00:34:17] And I was started, you know, I was studying and researching a lot and I came across Elgad and I started reading about it.

[00:34:23] And I remember going to him one time and saying, do you know what an Elgad is?

[00:34:27] You're leading Elgads.

[00:34:28] We've been leading Elgads like it was a whole awakening.

[00:34:31] I was like, whoa.

[00:34:33] And so then I started reading a little bit about Elgads, but I still had all the indoctrination in large group, you know, group, the group dynamic.

[00:34:41] I keep so in landmark it's called the group dynamic, not large group.

[00:34:44] So the group dynamic and there's things possible in the group dynamic that just simply would not be possible in a one to one or even a small group.

[00:34:53] And small groups are different than large groups.

[00:34:56] And by the way, in training, I was a trainer.

[00:34:58] I trained trainers on how to be very effective and exactly what you said, Glenn.

[00:35:03] You know, how do you how do you have interactions that, you know, come to a release, a transformation?

[00:35:12] You know, how do you work with people like that and then manage the listening of the group at the same time and all that?

[00:35:18] I mean, I'm an expert at that.

[00:35:20] And I was good at it and I'm still good at it actually.

[00:35:23] But that whole.

[00:35:26] Yeah, so I don't think it's going to go anywhere soon, which is why I was so happy to find the Seek Safely thing.

[00:35:33] And my quest has been like, can we do this safely?

[00:35:37] Can we do this ethically?

[00:35:40] Because I have seen the value it produces as well.

[00:35:43] And while I don't agree with it's the value that most of these groups advertise,

[00:35:48] the way they advertise it particularly like that it's a panacea.

[00:35:52] It's like that your life is transformed.

[00:35:54] No, you have some awakenings.

[00:35:56] You see some things that have been hidden from your view, which gives you put you on a growth path.

[00:36:01] That's valuable.

[00:36:02] Well, and sure.

[00:36:04] And that becomes so complicated when you factor in the price tag of these events.

[00:36:10] Like I'm here thinking specifically, I mean, look, I'm here thinking specifically of the leaders of the field,

[00:36:15] folks like Tony Robbins.

[00:36:17] Could he market date with destiny under like, yeah, come pay me 10 grand for however long and yeah,

[00:36:28] you'll get a few footholds.

[00:36:30] Would that really sell?

[00:36:31] Like probably not to the tune of 10 grand.

[00:36:34] But then again, you know what would sell to the tune of 10 grand.

[00:36:40] I'm always really interested in the fact that the customers tend to be there like they tend to like again.

[00:36:49] I always think, look, there's got to be some point at which either the market is saturated or look,

[00:36:55] you just can't sell a product at this price point and get real people to pay for it.

[00:36:59] And I'm always amazed that it continues to happen.

[00:37:03] So look, maybe my math is off.

[00:37:05] But and what I hear you saying is that, boy, if awareness trainings, large group or otherwise,

[00:37:12] were really marketed as what they can do because I agree with you.

[00:37:16] Look, I'm a self-help guy.

[00:37:17] Like I'm not entirely down on the LGAT.

[00:37:20] I mean, for crying out loud, I'm a psychologist.

[00:37:22] I'm not down on group therapy either.

[00:37:25] There is power in the group dynamic.

[00:37:28] But if it's marketed as what it could actually do, I think the problem that would be run into is like,

[00:37:36] well, then could you charge the prices that you can charge if you say this is a life changing experience?

[00:37:43] Right.

[00:37:44] Well, the forum.

[00:37:46] So the price point thing I do think is a thing.

[00:37:49] The forum, I don't know what it is now.

[00:37:52] Probably around $500, $550 something.

[00:37:54] And since they've gone online, I haven't looked.

[00:37:56] It was $495 when I sold it, however many years ago.

[00:38:00] But and then the advanced course was somewhere between $800 and $600 depending on when you bought it.

[00:38:07] So I actually do think that Landmark could sell its product if it was honest.

[00:38:12] I think they would actually sell more.

[00:38:14] Mick Leavitt should give me a call if he wants some ideas like how they could sell it because it is a lower price point.

[00:38:21] And you do see something.

[00:38:23] The thing is it's a snapshot in time.

[00:38:25] It's just like when I go get my blood test, I have $950 I just paid to go get this blood panel done that I get to do tomorrow.

[00:38:31] I know that that blood panel is going to be a snapshot.

[00:38:34] It's going to allow me, my doctor, to adjust my hormones and do some stuff.

[00:38:38] And then next year I'll go get another blood panel for another $950, $1000, whatever it's going to cost.

[00:38:44] And then that will tell me where I'm at then.

[00:38:48] To me, that's the product that the forum actually is.

[00:38:51] It's not the answer to my relationships.

[00:38:54] It's not relationship coaching.

[00:38:56] It's not communications coaching.

[00:38:58] It's not any of that.

[00:38:59] It's a wake up for that moment in time in your life.

[00:39:02] And what are you dealing with and how are you dealing with it?

[00:39:04] Okay, great.

[00:39:05] That's really valuable.

[00:39:07] And then also if you said things like, hey, people open up big traumas in the forum.

[00:39:13] This woman literally called me three weeks ago.

[00:39:16] She read my book and then did the forum.

[00:39:18] And I said, wow.

[00:39:20] She called me to thank me because she said, God, I was so glad I read your book because I went in prepared and I feel like I got good stuff but I didn't get entrapped, blah, blah, blah.

[00:39:29] And I said to her, I said, what did you think of the forum?

[00:39:32] This woman's had trauma and stuff in her past.

[00:39:34] Am I allowed to swear on this podcast or should I truncate it?

[00:39:37] Because I'll tell you exactly what she said.

[00:39:39] She said, I think that the packaging is good, that the way they package certain ideas and long held psychological principles and stuff is useful and good.

[00:39:50] She goes, and I think it's dangerous as fuck.

[00:39:53] And I was like, whoa, what has you say that?

[00:39:56] And she said, well, this young girl in my forum opened up this big trauma.

[00:40:01] And she was fine in the course.

[00:40:05] She didn't have a psychological break or whatnot, but they kind of talked her through.

[00:40:08] And I've seen that 100 million times, like over and over and over.

[00:40:11] She said, but then I wanted to recommend to her, I was waiting for them to recommend that she then continue the work with a therapist because this particular woman had experience with childhood trauma.

[00:40:23] And she knew that that's not something that you handle in their moment of awakening, that as soon as you wake up to that trauma, then there's probably years of work to integrate that, to recover from that.

[00:40:34] Then she and she went to somebody in the forum and said, hey, you know, can I tell this young girl?

[00:40:40] She was 18. Can I tell this young girl about her getting like just from my own personal experience?

[00:40:47] Can I share with her and tell about getting therapy?

[00:40:49] And they're like, no.

[00:40:53] You know, and then I said, well, did they poo poo therapy?

[00:40:55] And she said, no.

[00:40:56] But, you know, on the whatever final day, they're like, well, yeah, you can handle that whole line about 30 years.

[00:41:02] You know, you can take 30 years to handle that in therapy or you can handle it in the advanced course.

[00:41:06] Like those are equivalent choices.

[00:41:08] Those aren't equivalent to each other at all.

[00:41:11] Right.

[00:41:12] And I know many therapists that actually use the Landmark Forum as part of their therapy because in their experience they can send somebody to the forum, they can open up a bunch of stuff that they can then be worked in therapy.

[00:41:24] That's the healthy way to do it.

[00:41:27] They're not doing it that way.

[00:41:29] They're not doing it that way.

[00:41:30] They also don't mind the appropriate mental health controls, but that's a whole other story.

[00:41:38] What kind of therapist would ever use self-help ideas or methodology in their therapy?

[00:41:43] That sounds crazy, Jean.

[00:41:45] Who would ever do that?

[00:41:48] Sounds nuts.

[00:41:52] But it's interesting though, Anne, what you're saying.

[00:41:55] I like this idea where you're like, there's value in what they do and if they could just not oversell it.

[00:42:03] And I feel like, yeah, if I was to become a self-help leader, I think my pitch based on I don't think I'd be very successful because like you said, I'm not my personal kind of life philosophy.

[00:42:18] What I've learned in my life is that it is all a constant effort.

[00:42:22] There's never like you transform and then it's done.

[00:42:27] And now you're perfect.

[00:42:29] I know we all want that.

[00:42:30] And I know that we kind of hold on to stories of people who have done that, like Buddha or whatever.

[00:42:35] But like, that's just not really the reality for most people.

[00:42:39] We talk about that very openly with things like recovery, that every day is a choice.

[00:42:45] Right?

[00:42:46] Yeah.

[00:42:47] But I don't think we really talk about that in terms of personal growth.

[00:42:52] But I believe that to be true.

[00:42:54] Every day is a choice.

[00:42:56] You have choices that put you in one direction or in another direction.

[00:43:00] And even though we often know the right thing to do or the better thing to do, it's for whatever reason, we don't always make that choice.

[00:43:07] Well, Jean, that's why you need the 10 session seminar series that goes with the forum.

[00:43:13] And then you have to do the advanced course.

[00:43:15] So when the forum starts to wane and then self-expression and leadership so you can take it to your community and you can learn how those skills.

[00:43:22] And then, of course, you want to maintain that.

[00:43:24] So we recommend more seminars.

[00:43:25] And then if you're really good and you bring lots of guests, we definitely want to put you in the leadership training academy.

[00:43:31] Now I guess it is.

[00:43:32] I don't know whether that's the other problem.

[00:43:36] But I think there is something.

[00:43:38] There's something OK in the idea that like you're going to make a decision to do this work on a sort of constant basis.

[00:43:45] Now I'm saying that everybody should just be in self-help forever, which is not really what I want to say.

[00:43:50] But there is something about that.

[00:43:52] I think instead of instead of selling the idea that you can do a program and you're done, the idea that whatever you're going to do needs needs constant work, I think, is.

[00:44:05] Well, I think you can be in growth.

[00:44:07] I mean, what's that saying that you're either, you know, you're either expanding or contracting, which, by the way, has been used as a sales ploy many times.

[00:44:14] You're either expanding or contracting.

[00:44:15] Do the next course.

[00:44:16] But there is some there is something accurate about that, you know, that we're either kind of evolving and growing or, you know, moving like we have the kind of brain.

[00:44:26] I'm questioning.

[00:44:27] I plan to be in some kind of growth and development for the rest of my life.

[00:44:31] Like I don't ever see.

[00:44:32] I think I just got delivered two new books today.

[00:44:35] I mean, come on.

[00:44:37] And I do my spiritual work with the Ridwan School and, you know, I've got a coach that I work with.

[00:44:44] I've got a therapist that I work with.

[00:44:46] Like, I'm one of those people that's I see growth and development as a life choice.

[00:44:51] I really do.

[00:44:52] And I'm going to learn lots of different things and I'm going to try lots of different things and mostly based on what's interesting to me or what seems applicable in my life at that moment.

[00:45:01] And I don't know if that means if I were to stop, I'm suddenly going to become a less person.

[00:45:07] I don't believe that.

[00:45:08] I think there's people who never do growth and development.

[00:45:10] They're fabulous.

[00:45:11] You know, I was just at wine club with neighborhood ladies last night and they're fabulous.

[00:45:18] I mean, they're fabulous.

[00:45:19] And they're not one of them is a therapist.

[00:45:22] You know, and they're growing and developing in different ways, you know, through their spiritual or church community or through, you know, their profession.

[00:45:30] Or I just I think that's part of being a human being, that we're kind of always seeking, questing, learning how in whatever modes.

[00:45:40] And I think that they can all be respected and they could all be, you know, vilified.

[00:45:46] But, I mean, isn't that one of ours?

[00:45:48] Yeah.

[00:45:49] I mean, in the safe practitioner workshop, which I know we're going to talk about here a little bit, but that's one of the things I plan on saying is like stay in your lane.

[00:45:57] Stop trying to be everything to everybody because most coaches, most practitioners, most trainers see that's what happens with the with the Warners of the world.

[00:46:06] I had a reporter ask me today this really great question.

[00:46:09] He said, hang on, I have my answers here.

[00:46:12] It was so great. His question.

[00:46:14] He says, Why does so many wellness and personal growth organizations turn out to be quite ethically dubious?

[00:46:20] I love this question.

[00:46:21] It was great.

[00:46:22] I said, simple answer money and fame, which results in more money then layer in the egoic element.

[00:46:29] Who doesn't want to be the next Jesus Christ?

[00:46:31] Werner has been called that by many.

[00:46:34] I quoted in my book what his response to that was in his younger years.

[00:46:37] In his older years, he got smarter and he would kind of poo poo that off.

[00:46:40] But my girlfriend said, well, that's probably because they figured out they crucified Jesus.

[00:46:44] So we didn't want to be that anymore.

[00:46:45] But in his younger years, hell yeah.

[00:46:49] And I know yoga man that they're all like, that's what they're going for.

[00:46:54] They want to be the Tony Robbins.

[00:46:56] They want to be a friend of mine was talking to me about Joe Dispenza.

[00:47:00] You are the placebo.

[00:47:01] Great value in there.

[00:47:02] Right?

[00:47:03] And then a few years back or sometime recently, Joe, instead of calling people back from

[00:47:08] meditation back into themselves, he started calling them back to him.

[00:47:13] A switch flipped and what the teaching that he'd been gifted that he was providing

[00:47:21] became about him and not about you.

[00:47:25] That that as soon as you hear that, get up and walk out of a room.

[00:47:30] In my view, that's when I would be out of a room.

[00:47:33] And because that kind of ego twist is when things literally start to get twisted.

[00:47:40] Didn't didn't diamond Joe dispense start out as a romp the guy?

[00:47:48] He was a romp the guy.

[00:47:50] I don't know a lot about his history.

[00:47:52] Yeah, I don't I don't know much about him.

[00:47:54] I just I know some people who were kind of worked closely with him and then he sort of

[00:47:59] ejected them from the spaceship.

[00:48:01] That's my favorite line from these organizations.

[00:48:03] Like that's what happened.

[00:48:04] I got ejected in 2020.

[00:48:05] I got ejected from the spaceship and you know, it takes you a while to find your way

[00:48:09] back to Earth.

[00:48:10] And it's not a very flattering journey.

[00:48:13] So but yeah, he's not a not a soft landing.

[00:48:17] Not at all.

[00:48:18] Yeah.

[00:48:19] Yeah.

[00:48:20] But yeah, so I've heard that he you know that he's and I've seen that, you

[00:48:25] know, I've seen that with leaders and teachers that I've coached and you know,

[00:48:30] yoga man being the most obvious.

[00:48:32] I don't name him because he does randomly sue people for defamation for no reason

[00:48:36] whatsoever.

[00:48:37] I already had my lawsuit with him.

[00:48:39] So yeah, I'll pass on that.

[00:48:40] Thanks.

[00:48:41] That's OK.

[00:48:42] I get to every time you say yoga man, I get to imagine like like a like a superhero

[00:48:48] was like he's wearing a cape.

[00:48:50] He's wearing like a yoga mat.

[00:48:51] It's a cape.

[00:48:52] Yoga man.

[00:48:53] Amazing.

[00:48:54] He'd like that.

[00:48:55] He's actually a great major.

[00:48:57] He's a great but you know, he went sideways.

[00:49:01] It's it's you know, we talk about the with the whole Elgata thing, the experience

[00:49:07] for the participants within the group being really heady.

[00:49:10] But then of course, there's the person at the front of the room and that's a

[00:49:14] heady thing for them to write.

[00:49:16] And I think that's what has happened for a lot of these a lot of these people

[00:49:20] who start out with good intentions, but the kind of wielding that sort of power

[00:49:25] is really it's hard not to get carried away with it.

[00:49:29] It's part of why I stepped down when I did.

[00:49:31] I felt myself getting weird.

[00:49:33] I had somebody tell me the other day they called me and she said, and I just

[00:49:36] have to tell you, you know, in the center, it was one of the centers I led

[00:49:39] the wisdom course in a lot.

[00:49:40] She said, and our center, you were the cult leader like everybody went on

[00:49:44] about you.

[00:49:45] And I'm like, oh, my God, I was so embarrassed.

[00:49:46] Like, oh, my God.

[00:49:47] I'm like, please tell me I did not abuse any of that.

[00:49:50] You know, no, no, no.

[00:49:52] And that's thank you to all the people who have reached out to me to let me

[00:49:55] know that I didn't I never did any damage to them.

[00:49:58] I appreciate that.

[00:50:00] And I'm open if I ever did, you know, to to clean that up and sort

[00:50:04] that out.

[00:50:05] But but the whole yeah, it's it is heady.

[00:50:08] You have a lot of power when you're on the front of that room.

[00:50:12] A lot of people are giving themselves their psychology, their autonomy,

[00:50:16] over to you.

[00:50:17] And, you know, to me, if you don't hold that with reverence and you

[00:50:22] and I was taught that the man who trained me, Brian Reignier, I was the

[00:50:26] closest to my love.

[00:50:28] You know, like he was my dude.

[00:50:30] I loved Brian Reignier.

[00:50:31] He taught me so much.

[00:50:32] But one of the biggest things he taught me was that I'm never the

[00:50:35] source of other people's transformation and don't ever take the credit

[00:50:38] for it.

[00:50:39] He used to tell us we were not the tip of the tail of the dog.

[00:50:42] We were the fuzz on the tip of the tail of the dog.

[00:50:45] That people did their own transformation.

[00:50:47] And that was like a gift for us to get to be in the room.

[00:50:50] I mean, he ego busted us so much.

[00:50:53] It was and I'm so grateful for that.

[00:50:55] There is a not small subset of psychotherapists who could really

[00:51:00] take that message to to heart.

[00:51:03] I have I know of I don't really know them.

[00:51:08] I know of so many therapists who truly think that they are like the

[00:51:12] instrument of their patients progress and transformations.

[00:51:17] So I had this whole shtick that I that I do that I know you know about

[00:51:20] that like, look, it's not about therapy.

[00:51:22] It's about recovery.

[00:51:23] Right.

[00:51:24] And like the time we are outside of the therapy room is way more

[00:51:27] important than any time in the therapy room.

[00:51:29] There's a subset of therapists or just yeah, man, it's all about the

[00:51:32] therapy relationship.

[00:51:33] That's what changed.

[00:51:34] Like we change these people.

[00:51:36] Like you don't you don't you happen to be in the room.

[00:51:40] Right.

[00:51:41] Did they call themselves the catalyst?

[00:51:42] Okay, hey, you back off.

[00:51:44] You back off.

[00:51:48] But this is what I'm interested in that, you know, all these kind of

[00:51:51] like practices like I I don't think we're ever going to get rid of all

[00:51:55] the sociopathic narcissists that want to be the next Jesus Christ.

[00:51:59] Like but we can learn to recognize what they look like, what they

[00:52:02] sound like.

[00:52:03] We can stop feeding them so much oxygen, which in their world is

[00:52:06] attention, you know, like starve the attention.

[00:52:09] You're going to starve the narcissist.

[00:52:11] But all of that is important.

[00:52:13] But I think it's also really important that we learn to see these

[00:52:16] subtleties like that.

[00:52:18] I love I think my book would now say the thin, thin, thin line between

[00:52:22] exploitation and transformation.

[00:52:26] You know, there's just all these little nuances and they're worth

[00:52:29] learning about because they're making their way into every aspect of our

[00:52:33] culture, our politics, our retail, you know, our economy are like it's

[00:52:41] everywhere as everybody tries to become that next cultic brand, that

[00:52:46] next, you know, cultic personality.

[00:52:49] And why are they doing that for the power and the money?

[00:52:53] I mean, that's and that's intoxicated stuff.

[00:52:57] So and then you have people like me and Eugene that we're too scared

[00:53:01] of becoming that. So then we are over here trying to make enough money to pay

[00:53:05] the bills because we're scared, you know, to fall into that.

[00:53:13] Oh, yep, yep.

[00:53:16] I've talked to many of those as well.

[00:53:18] So people who left landmark and they're they're scared.

[00:53:21] They're like hiding under rocks because they don't want to be that.

[00:53:24] But more than that, well, with landmark specifically, they just

[00:53:27] landmark is threatens everybody who leaves pretty much constantly if you try to use

[00:53:33] even some of their same words.

[00:53:35] And it's just they have a very generous to their side view of copyright and

[00:53:43] intellectual property. So they threaten a lot of people.

[00:53:47] Yeah, yeah.

[00:53:49] Well, for sure.

[00:53:50] So one of the things that we often talk about with you, Anne, is so we

[00:53:56] we know what we have our vision for the industry and we kind of know what we'd

[00:54:01] like to see change.

[00:54:02] And we're always kind of up against the question of like, so how do we actualize

[00:54:06] this? How do we operationalize this and actualize this?

[00:54:09] And you had an idea that you have actualized into a course that will be

[00:54:16] beginning here in just a few just a few weeks.

[00:54:20] Yes, I'm so excited because I mean, since I met you guys a couple years at

[00:54:26] Kirby Jam and and just got to know you and got to know Jenny like I have a

[00:54:30] gazillion ideas for Jenny.

[00:54:31] She's like when you talk, she I just get overwhelmed because I have a

[00:54:34] million ideas.

[00:54:35] I'm an entrepreneur at heart, right?

[00:54:37] So but yes, I'm super excited.

[00:54:39] We're going to be launching the safe practitioners workshop.

[00:54:41] Not an overly sexy name, but you get the point, right?

[00:54:44] It's it's for people who who maybe they're a coach or a

[00:54:50] coach, maybe they do have a workshop or program or they have some bit of

[00:54:53] wisdom that they want to put out in the world.

[00:54:55] And how do you do that in ways that protect your safety and the safety of

[00:54:59] others and our ethical business practices?

[00:55:01] And so we're going to using the seek safely practitioners promise as the

[00:55:05] architecture.

[00:55:06] We're going to dive into that and really look and and look not just

[00:55:10] from the perspective of keeping our guests and participants safe, but

[00:55:13] also us as practitioners because that's a I've seen so many

[00:55:18] practitioners and coaches get lost also in all kinds of different things,

[00:55:22] whether it's to the kind of like, oh my gosh, I'm changing lives.

[00:55:26] And then that goes sideways or just lots of things.

[00:55:30] Or I do know of one gal who got completely canceled when somebody

[00:55:34] wrote a lie story about her.

[00:55:37] And I keep waiting for somebody whose business name starts with an L.

[00:55:43] That's what Werner used to always say.

[00:55:45] Somebody whose name starts with G.

[00:55:47] Anyway, it's an L to like, you know, trying to put out something negative

[00:55:52] about me or whatever and get me canceled.

[00:55:54] But, you know, how do we navigate through all that?

[00:55:57] And how do we what does it really look like to practice self-help safely

[00:56:02] and ethically?

[00:56:03] And I think even people who maybe don't want to coach or lead but

[00:56:08] really want to know what to look for in their coaches and leaders could

[00:56:10] also be jump into this workshop and just see like, oh, oh, that's what a

[00:56:15] safe and ethical practitioner looks like.

[00:56:18] When I say looks like, I mean it's like when you're reading, like I was

[00:56:22] reading somebody's pricing thing the other day and I'm like, oh, I'm

[00:56:25] going to use this as an example of exactly what not to do because

[00:56:28] it's kind of deceptive.

[00:56:30] Yeah, like so we're going to just really look at that and we're going

[00:56:34] to take on one tenant of the promise in each session and hopefully

[00:56:39] some of the Browns and whatnot might come be guest presenters and inquires

[00:56:44] with me.

[00:56:45] And but yeah, we're going to really that's where I'm starting.

[00:56:48] And then we're actually working also on some consumer, some stuff just

[00:56:51] straight for consumers.

[00:56:52] How do I recognize red flags?

[00:56:54] What do I do?

[00:56:55] You know, those kind of things.

[00:56:56] It's pretty much becoming my obsession is the safe and ethical practice

[00:57:00] of self-help.

[00:57:01] No, and I think it's I think it's great.

[00:57:03] We've had, you know, hundreds of people at this point over the years

[00:57:06] sign on to the promise.

[00:57:07] So this idea of turning it into something that can give, you know,

[00:57:11] practitioners some really practical advice on how to how to run a

[00:57:15] business but do it in an ethical way.

[00:57:17] Yeah, we're excited to see that happen.

[00:57:19] So yeah, we'll put out more information about that as it becomes

[00:57:23] available.

[00:57:24] Yeah.

[00:57:25] And the other thing that I've seen too about that is, you know,

[00:57:29] a lot of us do something like landmark.

[00:57:31] We don't maybe we don't experience that.

[00:57:33] I knew I cleared.

[00:57:34] That's the word.

[00:57:35] And I guess I found out later it was a Scientology word.

[00:57:38] But anyway, landmark.

[00:57:39] But I would clear staff and program leaders from abuse that they

[00:57:44] experienced.

[00:57:45] I don't know why I never connected that it was systemic, but I didn't.

[00:57:49] I just kind of thought, like you said, Glenn,

[00:57:51] it was some bad actors, some bad managers,

[00:57:54] and I would report them to H.R.

[00:57:55] and move on.

[00:57:56] So I think that's a great idea.

[00:57:58] I think that's a great idea.

[00:57:59] And we would hear of hinky stuff from time to time,

[00:58:02] but it just had no idea it was as systemic as it is.

[00:58:05] I also had no idea it was as bad as it is.

[00:58:07] But you know, we would clear them and stuff.

[00:58:11] And then, you know,

[00:58:13] a lot of leaders will leave and then they'll go create their thing.

[00:58:16] What are the chances of them bringing some of those bad practices

[00:58:19] into the next thing?

[00:58:21] Lynn landmark has and Werner have single-handedly,

[00:58:24] you know,

[00:58:25] And if the practitioners don't know what it looks like to be culty

[00:58:30] in their practices,

[00:58:32] if they don't know what it looks like to be unsafe,

[00:58:35] you know, we can't elevate the practice.

[00:58:37] I had a woman who wanted to teach at one of my goddess events and she

[00:58:40] wanted to put people up in front of the room and have the whole room,

[00:58:43] tell them what they loved about them.

[00:58:45] And I said,

[00:58:46] hell no.

[00:58:47] I'm not going to tell you what I love about them.

[00:58:49] I'm not going to tell you what I love about them.

[00:58:51] I'm not going to tell you what I love about them.

[00:58:53] And she said, hell no.

[00:58:55] And she goes, why?

[00:58:56] She goes, it happened to me once in this landmark car accident.

[00:58:58] It felt so good.

[00:58:59] She was grappling with something and she was all stuck.

[00:59:01] And then the leader had people start acknowledging her.

[00:59:04] And then people were, okay, group love bombing,

[00:59:08] hot seat, like let me just,

[00:59:10] there's at least 20 things wrong with that.

[00:59:13] And this is a good person.

[00:59:17] She's a great coach.

[00:59:20] She just, it happened to her.

[00:59:22] She had a good experience 20 years ago.

[00:59:25] She doesn't realize,

[00:59:27] and she has no trauma informed training.

[00:59:30] She has no like,

[00:59:31] I said, you have no idea what you're dealing with in that exercise.

[00:59:35] So that's another piece.

[00:59:36] It probably won't all happen to the safe practitioner workshop,

[00:59:38] but I can see some other structures where we really bring

[00:59:41] practitioners together so we can learn and grow and talk about,

[00:59:44] wait,

[00:59:45] what are these things that we kind of all grew up in self-help?

[00:59:47] Like this is a cool thing,

[00:59:50] but we're living in these times.

[00:59:52] There's a lot more trauma.

[00:59:53] There's a lot, a lot of mental illness and we don't even know what

[00:59:56] we're looking at.

[00:59:58] So one of the things that we think a lot about at Seek is kind

[01:00:03] of what I laid out a few minutes ago about how,

[01:00:06] look,

[01:00:07] there's that toxic combination of bad actors,

[01:00:12] bad organizations,

[01:00:14] and the LGAT format itself.

[01:00:19] And something that we really struggle with is the idea that,

[01:00:22] look,

[01:00:23] we're never going to be able to root out all the bad actors.

[01:00:25] It's just not going to happen.

[01:00:27] As long as there are people that will be bad actors.

[01:00:30] We're probably never going to be able to identify all the bad

[01:00:33] organizations simply because most organizations are real mishmash

[01:00:39] of good stuff and toxic stuff and whatever.

[01:00:42] Again, I say this as a practicing Catholic.

[01:00:45] We know from organizations that are a real mishmash of good stuff

[01:00:48] and toxic stuff.

[01:00:50] But the one piece that we can make a dent in,

[01:00:53] and this is kind of what I hear you talking about,

[01:00:55] like this is what the Safe Practitioner Workshop is for,

[01:00:58] is we can educate folks about how this format itself,

[01:01:02] about how the LGAT format itself lends itself to some not great

[01:01:07] stuff.

[01:01:08] We can educate both consumers.

[01:01:11] And I know you've got some stuff kind of in the hopper for consumers

[01:01:16] as well, not just practitioners.

[01:01:18] But we can educate consumers and we can educate practitioners

[01:01:21] about how, look, while this format can be powerful,

[01:01:25] undeniably powerful, that's why it exists at all.

[01:01:28] That's why it persists, that it can be undeniably powerful.

[01:01:31] We can educate you how to use this tool in a relatively safer,

[01:01:36] not a risk-free, but a relatively safer manner.

[01:01:39] So not only do you not run the risk of becoming a cult,

[01:01:43] or you lessen the risk of becoming a cult,

[01:01:46] but you also get better results for your participants.

[01:01:51] This is something that I've said for years,

[01:01:53] like taking the Seek Safely Promise and integrating that into how you

[01:01:59] work.

[01:02:00] We have to sell this, and because it's true,

[01:02:03] we have to sell this as it's not just a matter of risk

[01:02:06] management.

[01:02:07] It's also a matter of you get better self-help.

[01:02:10] Like I think we need to communicate to consumers that,

[01:02:13] look, safe practitioners are not less fun.

[01:02:16] They're actually more effective than these practitioners who are

[01:02:20] out there taking unreasonable risks.

[01:02:22] Exactly.

[01:02:23] And I've seen it.

[01:02:25] You know, I've done workshops and things with people I would

[01:02:29] consider safe practitioners.

[01:02:31] And it's fabulous.

[01:02:33] It's very impactful.

[01:02:35] It's very insightful.

[01:02:37] And here's the good news, people.

[01:02:39] There's like more than enough human beings on this planet that

[01:02:43] want to be lifelong learners, that want to grow and develop,

[01:02:46] that have problems to solve, to go around.

[01:02:49] Nobody has to claim them all.

[01:02:52] You know?

[01:02:53] Like there's, Gene, you were at our summit that we

[01:02:57] introduced a while ago, but one of my favorite sections from

[01:03:00] there, we talked about enoughness.

[01:03:02] What if I actually, what if my aim instead of more all the time

[01:03:06] was enough?

[01:03:07] What's enough?

[01:03:08] You know, and when you talk to solopreneurs, they're better

[01:03:11] at this because they really do have limits.

[01:03:13] They could only take so many clients.

[01:03:15] You know, Dr. Glenn over there, he can only take so many

[01:03:18] patients, which, and hey, the therapy realm is every

[01:03:22] therapist I know is booked with a mile long waiting list.

[01:03:26] So it's not like there's not enough business to go around.

[01:03:32] And, you know, what if we could be more collaborative?

[01:03:35] What if we could be, you know, I think that alone would be safer.

[01:03:38] You know, if Landmark said like, oh my gosh, you just

[01:03:41] opened that thing up in here, that is so great.

[01:03:43] Now we want to make, please go to so-and-so in the back.

[01:03:46] We want to make sure that you are set up with ongoing

[01:03:49] support for that kind of thing that you just opened up.

[01:03:52] They really think that's going to cost them more customers?

[01:03:55] No, but they have to give up their belief.

[01:03:58] This is where it's cultic in the inside.

[01:04:00] So, you know, to your first question, Jean, the inside,

[01:04:03] that upper echelon, absolutely a cult.

[01:04:06] The general participation, not so much.

[01:04:09] But when you get to the inside, because they believe

[01:04:12] to their core that Warner is a god, that his ideas are

[01:04:17] unquestionably the best, you know, like the most profound.

[01:04:22] Like there is that kind of worship quality.

[01:04:25] And they think that their work is the answer.

[01:04:28] And you know what? These are good people.

[01:04:30] Harry Rosenberg, I have some doubts about him now,

[01:04:33] but my experience always liked Harry.

[01:04:35] Harry seemed like a good guy.

[01:04:37] I don't think that Harry thinks he's harming people.

[01:04:40] Now how he thinks that given he gets calls every day

[01:04:43] about people committing suicide and stuff, I don't know.

[01:04:45] But I've met him and I know that he doesn't...

[01:04:48] It's not conscious and willful in the way that we think.

[01:04:54] They're negligence.

[01:04:56] They're in a cult.

[01:04:58] They're in the cult of personality of Warner.

[01:05:00] And, you know, somebody told me, Warner said,

[01:05:03] I actually heard this from two people last week,

[01:05:05] made me cringe, that there is no stress.

[01:05:07] Stress doesn't exist.

[01:05:09] Somebody told me about Warner being at a staff conference

[01:05:11] a couple years ago, a few years back.

[01:05:13] Had to have been like 2018 or so,

[01:05:15] and telling the staff that there's no such thing as stress.

[01:05:19] And then I had a health practitioner say that on a call

[01:05:22] that I hosted last week.

[01:05:24] And I was like, whoa!

[01:05:26] And I happened to know the study they're referencing.

[01:05:28] And basically what the study says is that Gene and I

[01:05:31] can be in the same situation and perceive it differently.

[01:05:34] And one of us will experience stress and one of us,

[01:05:36] physiological stress, and one of us will not.

[01:05:38] So it's not that there isn't stress.

[01:05:42] It's that the body experiences physiological symptoms

[01:05:46] that we call stress.

[01:05:48] And those over time degrade the body's ability to perform.

[01:05:52] So to now come out and say, oh, there's no stress,

[01:05:54] that's really dangerous.

[01:05:56] But to say, hey, you can actually learn techniques

[01:06:00] in ways my daughter does DBT therapy and stuff.

[01:06:03] She's learned all kinds of techniques to lower her stress

[01:06:06] level in response to certain stimuli.

[01:06:09] That's pretty dang cool.

[01:06:12] I now use them.

[01:06:13] One of my favorite, rubbing my fingers,

[01:06:15] feeling the ridges on my fingers, lowers

[01:06:20] when I feel I'm in a threat.

[01:06:21] So it's just as nuanced.

[01:06:24] And I think there's room for the nuance.

[01:06:27] We can get big enough to hold the nuance.

[01:06:29] Yeah, for sure.

[01:06:31] Well, awesome.

[01:06:32] Like I said, we'll definitely share details about that

[01:06:36] when you have them out for that.

[01:06:39] And now you want to get it.

[01:06:40] Yeah, starts June 5th.

[01:06:42] And people can join it even after it starts.

[01:06:45] If we're doing $99, we made it as inexpensive

[01:06:49] as we can survive on.

[01:06:51] And at least 10% of that will go right to seek like that.

[01:06:55] So honestly, probably a percentage of everything

[01:06:58] I do from here that will go to seek.

[01:07:01] I'm a fan.

[01:07:03] We will happily enable that particular obsession of yours.

[01:07:09] It's so vital what you guys are doing.

[01:07:11] It's so vital, so important.

[01:07:13] I've told Jean too, I'll go talk to any congress people

[01:07:17] anywhere.

[01:07:22] And something that we really appreciate about you

[01:07:25] becoming involved in our org and indeed in our movement,

[01:07:30] I like to think of it as the seek safely movement,

[01:07:34] is the fact that it's never been the point of the org

[01:07:39] to just demonize self-help.

[01:07:42] That's never been the point.

[01:07:44] In fact, the point of the org has been, look,

[01:07:47] self-help is always going to be around.

[01:07:49] And there's always going to be a market for it.

[01:07:52] There's always going to be an appetite for it.

[01:07:54] So there needs to be a voice in the field

[01:07:58] that speaks to best practices.

[01:08:01] And that's really what we've all been about.

[01:08:03] I mean, the ease and seek are all about education

[01:08:08] and empowerment.

[01:08:10] So the fact that you've been really interested in taking

[01:08:14] your skill set and your experience base,

[01:08:18] and again, not just leaving the personal empowerment

[01:08:22] self-help world behind, but really making some

[01:08:25] meaningful changes.

[01:08:27] That's really put you on our wavelength

[01:08:30] from the beginning.

[01:08:31] So we're so glad that you found us.

[01:08:33] We're so glad that we've been able to connect now

[01:08:36] in several ways.

[01:08:37] And we're so interested and excited to be a part

[01:08:40] of your practitioners workshop and your other projects.

[01:08:44] This is awesome.

[01:08:45] So thank you so much.

[01:08:48] Yeah, my pleasure.

[01:08:49] It was one of the things Jenny told me when I called her

[01:08:51] crying one or two times.

[01:08:53] I was like, Jenny, well, the first time I was just

[01:08:56] completely freaked because I had so many people

[01:08:59] coming to me, telling me about just really yucky

[01:09:05] stuff that I didn't know was going on.

[01:09:07] And so I was kind of right back in the dilemma

[01:09:10] I talked about in my book of like, what have I

[01:09:12] been complicit in?

[01:09:13] What have I been a part of?

[01:09:14] Oh my God, it was so much worse.

[01:09:15] How could I have not known?

[01:09:17] Am I really this naive?

[01:09:19] I kind of like being naive, but I want to be

[01:09:21] that naive.

[01:09:22] And you know, it's like all this stuff.

[01:09:24] And she talked me through that.

[01:09:26] And then she did share about, you know, when Kirby

[01:09:29] passed and then you get through the trial and you

[01:09:32] get through all this stuff and you kind of want a

[01:09:34] place to put all that you've learned.

[01:09:36] Like you want a place to forward the action.

[01:09:39] And so for me, seek has been that.

[01:09:41] And it's so, so, so, so important.

[01:09:44] And we can't just win, you know, look, we could

[01:09:47] pass legislation, make laws, fine people, like

[01:09:50] whatever.

[01:09:51] But a good friend of mine said this about the

[01:09:53] women's movement.

[01:09:54] She marched in the seventies and she went to

[01:09:56] jail and Cincinnati and, you know, and all these

[01:10:00] protests and this and that.

[01:10:02] And she said, you know what?

[01:10:03] She said we won over some of the laws, but we

[01:10:06] didn't win them hearts.

[01:10:08] We won minds, but we didn't win hearts.

[01:10:10] And she says that that's part of why we're

[01:10:13] back, you know, we're going backwards with

[01:10:15] women's rights because we didn't win the hearts

[01:10:18] and, you know, making those issues kind of

[01:10:23] every how connecting to how it's everybody's

[01:10:26] issue, you know, like what women do with

[01:10:28] their bodies and the freedom to make those

[01:10:30] choices as an individual.

[01:10:32] And so to me, it's the same thing.

[01:10:34] We got to educate and win hearts.

[01:10:37] Yeah.

[01:10:38] You bet.

[01:10:39] You bet.

[01:10:40] Well, something, Anne, that occurs to me

[01:10:41] as you describe that, especially as you

[01:10:43] describe, we go through something we want to

[01:10:46] put our what we've learned somewhere, why do

[01:10:49] something with it.

[01:10:51] So in my world, the trauma recovery world, we

[01:10:54] look at recovery from trauma broadly in three

[01:10:57] stages like that first stage of the work is

[01:11:00] all about safety and stabilization.

[01:11:02] And that second stage of the work is all

[01:11:04] about processing the trauma.

[01:11:06] And then that third step is that third

[01:11:08] stage of trauma recovery work is something we

[01:11:11] call life reintegration.

[01:11:13] And that's really what you're talking about.

[01:11:14] Like you're talking about taking what you've

[01:11:16] learned and what you've processed and whatnot

[01:11:19] and creating something new and different kind

[01:11:22] of carrying on into your life.

[01:11:24] And I think so often when we find

[01:11:27] ourselves kind of on the other side of a

[01:11:29] movement that we used to believe in or

[01:11:33] teacher we used to believe in, like say

[01:11:35] you were far more involved with Werner and

[01:11:40] Landmark than I ever was with James Arthur

[01:11:43] Ray.

[01:11:44] But I started out, I mean it's well known.

[01:11:46] I mean I started out he was he was my buddy.

[01:11:48] You know we were we were Facebook friends

[01:11:50] like like he was you know and and and it

[01:11:54] was funny because I had my my mind had really

[01:11:57] changed about him long before he figured it

[01:12:00] out and blocked me on Facebook.

[01:12:02] But I had kind of the same thought.

[01:12:04] I'm like oh no because I defended James

[01:12:06] for years.

[01:12:07] I defended James dude when James got out of

[01:12:10] got out of prison.

[01:12:12] I was there for him.

[01:12:14] I was I just been licensed as a psychologist

[01:12:17] and I had I had messaged him.

[01:12:19] This is actually how he and I like

[01:12:21] personally met or met via via the internet

[01:12:23] anyway that that I had messaged him

[01:12:25] privately.

[01:12:26] I said hey I've I've been a fan of yours

[01:12:29] and and I just I've been in graduate school

[01:12:31] I just got licensed as a psychologist.

[01:12:33] If there's anything I can do to help you

[01:12:35] rebuild your reputation let me know bro.

[01:12:39] I will I will be there for you.

[01:12:41] Now luckily James being James didn't recognize

[01:12:45] the opportunity for like friendship.

[01:12:47] He's like well the best thing you can do

[01:12:49] is sign up for my course.

[01:12:53] Well narcissists don't they don't they

[01:12:55] wouldn't take something from other people

[01:12:57] you know.

[01:12:58] OK but I have a question for you Glen.

[01:13:00] Was that before or after he killed people?

[01:13:03] Oh that was that was much after he killed

[01:13:05] people.

[01:13:06] Much much after he killed people.

[01:13:08] But here's the thing that that's

[01:13:11] my response something the odor of

[01:13:13] did you miss the part where I said I'm

[01:13:15] just new to the field like I have no

[01:13:17] money to buy your and once he figured

[01:13:19] out I had no money for him he was

[01:13:21] gone.

[01:13:22] He was gone like that was that was how

[01:13:24] that that worked but my point is that

[01:13:26] I didn't become friendly with the

[01:13:28] Brown family until a while after that

[01:13:32] and and the way that I actually

[01:13:33] contacted Jenny like it like I

[01:13:36] emailed seek out of nowhere out of the

[01:13:38] blue.

[01:13:39] I was like hey I don't know if you guys

[01:13:41] know what James is up to these days

[01:13:43] but he is trying hard to rebuild his

[01:13:46] brand and and he's you know he's

[01:13:48] he's going hard on it.

[01:13:50] But the point is that that I like you

[01:13:52] had had a similar feeling of like oh

[01:13:54] no like what have I been a part of

[01:13:56] you know what what have I supported

[01:13:57] with my reputation with you know with

[01:13:59] my labor you know etc etc.

[01:14:02] I think it's not dissimilar to grief

[01:14:05] right there's there's a grieving that

[01:14:07] happens when something falls apart for

[01:14:09] you and I really believe in that sixth

[01:14:13] stage of grief and finding meaning

[01:14:16] where you know you go through all the

[01:14:18] stages of learning about what happened

[01:14:20] and integrating everything and trying to

[01:14:23] kind of reconstruct your your worldview

[01:14:25] and then like you said you learn all

[01:14:27] these things you need to direct it

[01:14:29] somewhere and I think that's this idea

[01:14:31] of meaning.

[01:14:32] And so yeah I think that's what

[01:14:34] you're doing and yeah.

[01:14:36] And thanks for those three stages

[01:14:37] Glenn because I can see you know as

[01:14:39] people can keep calling and tell me

[01:14:41] the stories I kind of get keep going

[01:14:42] back one I keep going back to the

[01:14:45] like oh my god you know and having

[01:14:48] to really digest and process at a

[01:14:52] whole kind of other level what I've

[01:14:55] really been a part of and that's been

[01:14:56] challenging honestly for the last eight

[01:14:58] weeks and I'm just so grateful for

[01:15:01] Sarah Edmondson and Nippy Ames

[01:15:03] like Sarah called me a couple times

[01:15:05] the first few weeks how are you you

[01:15:07] know are you taking your bath she

[01:15:09] taught me the art of taking a bath I've

[01:15:11] taken more baths in the last eight

[01:15:12] weeks and last eight years because

[01:15:14] you do bounce back and forth too as

[01:15:17] you un-conceal more information I

[01:15:19] mean this morning I found out that you

[01:15:21] know the CFO COO nobody knows

[01:15:23] exactly what he is and Lamarck was

[01:15:25] convicted of you know spent three

[01:15:28] and a half years in jail for

[01:15:29] financial crimes and that's you know

[01:15:32] look and I'm all for forgiveness and

[01:15:34] for moving on and whatnot but I've met

[01:15:36] the guy trust me I don't think he's I

[01:15:38] don't know if he's committing financial

[01:15:40] crimes anymore but there there's other

[01:15:42] problems right like so like but just

[01:15:44] finding that out this morning and then

[01:15:46] I I'm gonna be tomorrow on doing an

[01:15:48] interview with a large landmark grad

[01:15:50] community and they sent me over the

[01:15:52] questions and I was like I can't

[01:15:54] answer these questions because I just

[01:15:55] want to get on the phone and

[01:15:56] scream for everybody to run right

[01:15:57] now because of what I found out this

[01:15:59] morning you know and then but by this

[01:16:02] evening this is I'm just going faster

[01:16:03] and faster through it right so then

[01:16:05] you know I I've got tools now for

[01:16:08] whoo calming down the amygdala you

[01:16:11] know and moving through it and then

[01:16:13] I'm immediately right there like okay

[01:16:14] wait how can we use this to make

[01:16:17] this a better industry and you know

[01:16:20] mm-hmm yeah yeah thank you for the

[01:16:23] opportunity and for the partnership I

[01:16:25] love it

[01:16:26] you bet so where can folks go to learn

[01:16:30] more about all things and Peterson well

[01:16:34] we I'll send you guys a thing because

[01:16:35] the website name is spelled funny but

[01:16:38] illuminate.life in the safe practitioner

[01:16:40] workshop is on there and then also my

[01:16:42] book website is this a cult book.com

[01:16:45] is now I've got a lot of I'm putting

[01:16:48] a lot of resources on there as well and

[01:16:50] I'll put a link to the safe

[01:16:51] practitioner workshop there so is this

[01:16:53] a cult book.com and or illuminate

[01:16:56] spelled funny I L U M 8 the number eight

[01:17:00] dot life I had an artist design the

[01:17:02] name you can tell but life and it will

[01:17:07] make sure that it's that it's in the

[01:17:09] show notes and available awesome yeah

[01:17:13] exactly I'll put all of that in the

[01:17:14] notes for people and and thank you

[01:17:17] so much is is this a cult oh yeah

[01:17:20] it's available available everywhere

[01:17:22] right on Amazon on Amazon and yeah

[01:17:26] that's the main one there's another

[01:17:27] Ingram spark but I think that's mostly

[01:17:29] book stores buy from there but Amazon

[01:17:32] and we're working hard if we can raise

[01:17:34] the money anybody want some producer

[01:17:35] credit we're trying to raise the money

[01:17:37] to do an audible Sarah Edmondson is

[01:17:40] dying to read it she's like I want

[01:17:41] to read it I want to read it but

[01:17:44] anyway so we're trying to put the

[01:17:46] funds together to make that happen

[01:17:48] we could do like a whole radio play

[01:17:51] so we can have Sarah we can and we

[01:17:54] could do like a whole radio play

[01:17:56] since we're like mentioned in the

[01:17:57] book like we could just come in and

[01:17:59] like speak our lines so guys I can

[01:18:03] I can tell her audience I endorse

[01:18:05] this book because as I said a few

[01:18:06] episodes ago and correctly

[01:18:08] identifies me as an expert in

[01:18:10] trauma in the book so I can

[01:18:13] expert

[01:18:18] see I would have remembered that but

[01:18:21] anyway all right thank you and so much

[01:18:24] yours you were always so nice when we

[01:18:26] want to have you on our podcast

[01:18:28] you're always so nice to come on and

[01:18:30] and jab a job with us for for I love

[01:18:34] it we appreciate it I've learned so

[01:18:36] much are you kidding it's so great

[01:18:37] and we have at least like 90 more

[01:18:39] subjects we could get into so I

[01:18:41] absolutely

[01:18:46] thank you

[01:18:48] thank you everybody for listening to

[01:18:50] the seek safely podcast if you liked

[01:18:52] it please go leave us a five star

[01:18:55] review wherever you get your podcasts

[01:18:58] if you didn't like it just just forget

[01:19:01] I said anything you can find us on

[01:19:04] all the social things at seek safely

[01:19:07] you can find me on the social things

[01:19:08] at dr. Doyle says this was a great

[01:19:11] episode gene yeah I think so good job

[01:19:15] good job you best all right thanks

[01:19:19] for listening

[01:19:21] you can learn more about seek safely

[01:19:32] mission and values or get involved

[01:19:35] yourself at seek safely.org you can

[01:19:38] follow and connect with seek safely

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[01:19:44] can follow me dr. Glenn Patrick Doyle

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