FREE2JustB
You were born with a program installed. This podcast is the override. Join Theresa Marie, Ambassador of Chi, as she exposes her raw and vulnerable journey of spiritual awakening. She’s living proof that shedding old beliefs and finding your authentic self isn't always easy, but it’s the most powerful thing you'll ever do. It's time to delete the old code, embrace your power, and step on the path to being FREE2JustB!
FREE2JustB
Recognizing the 24 Warning Signs of Cult Behavior
Have you ever felt trapped in a situation where something just didn't feel right, but you couldn't quite put your finger on it? After freeing myself from my fifth cult-like experience in thirty years, I'm breaking my silence to share the powerful download I received – a checklist of 24 warning signs that might save you from the same painful journey.
This raw, vulnerable episode exposes the manipulation tactics used by charismatic leaders who promise enlightenment while demonstrating darkness. From the initial attraction ("it grabs you by the poo-poo") to the embellishments, incongruities, and outright lies that follow, I walk you through exactly how these organizations operate. You'll learn to recognize the passive-aggressive behaviors, mind control techniques, and gaslighting that keep followers trapped in cycles of guilt and shame.
Most dangerously, these groups identify your vulnerabilities – whether financial struggles, relationship problems, or desires for spiritual growth – and position themselves as the only solution. They create dependency while simultaneously blaming you for not achieving the promised results. "Have you done everything we said? If you haven't done X, Y, Z, then how can you expect results?" Sound familiar?
The wake-up call can be painful, but freedom awaits on the other side. If you're in a group that makes you question your beliefs, shames you, threatens you, or constantly pushes for money or service, this episode might be the revelation you need. Because the truth is, we don't need external gurus or leaders – all the wisdom we seek is already within us.
Ready to trust your intuition and break free? This episode might be the courageous first step toward reclaiming your authentic power. Listen now and discover what it truly means to be free to just be.
Good morning humanity. I'm going to open today's show with a quote by Abbey Jemez, who said I knew from experience that sometimes, when the wake-up call is big enough, you do in fact wake up. And I want to welcome you to this fantastical Friday morning to Free, to Just Be the podcast empowering humanity to courageously step out of old patterns and programs and give a big old hug to a brand new way of being. And I hope this finds you all in the greatest health, with vibrant energy today, because you have chosen to accept the full responsibility for your body, mind and soul. And here, teresa Marie, I will try to inspire you to truly be who you came here to be. And it starts by being authentic, transparent and honest with yourself, and that brings in freedom, and then we can be aligned with our highest potential. So won't you join me on this transformative journey to rewrite our narratives and live lives of purpose and passion? Wow, I am ready and loaded for bear to finish out my full exposure series today and end the week by ending that chapter in my life and moving on to much higher ground. So today I want to talk to you about a really hard, hard subject that I can't say. It's dear to my heart, it's kind of a thorn in my heart, it's kind of a lesson that I have gone over four times now and it's been really, really tough to recognize to as Abby. Maybe we've had enough, or whatever the catalyst is. You come to that wake up moment and you realize, ping, this one was for me right. And so this is what's happened to Teresa Marie. I had yet another in many, many, many wake-up call series and thus the full exposure series has come out this week and I am very, very much looking forward to closing out this topic and being done, done, done with it. So what I want to talk to you about today is what?
Speaker 1:The day that I was leaving Florida, I had a nine hour drive and I get up from a very. I didn't realize how much my sleep was affected in Florida. I mean, I thought six hours was all I needed. I really didn't want to look at the fact that it was taking me longer to sleep. My sleep was restless and really it wasn't, until I came back to Tennessee and noticed seven, eight, sometimes nine hours of sleep, peaceful sleep, not waking up at all, and waking up refreshed and relaxed and at peace.
Speaker 1:And then you know my wake-up call, that I have really been living. You know four years worth of that call. You know it starts with a little thought and then you push it aside, and then another thought and you just keep pushing those away until you know many, many, many times these thoughts come up and these wake-ups poke you like a bear and you don't want to look at them and you don't want to look at them. And literally for four years I have been battling that wake-up call and I just wanted to stay in denial, I just wanted to remain ignorant. Yes, ignorance is bliss and often we want to stay in that place of ignorance because we cannot allow our ego to be damaged. And oftentimes our knowingness, our spidey sense, our intuition has already spoken the truth and we've already heard it and I can honestly attest that, yes, that was the case for me. I saw the signs, but I ignored them and I kept thinking they were going to go away and things would get better. And no, I didn't intuit what I knew to be true. I didn't see it. Nope, nope, nope. But just like Abby said, sometimes the wake-up call becomes big enough and I couldn't ignore it any longer. So today I want to talk about the download that I got.
Speaker 1:That morning when I woke up and I was getting ready to, I was all packed up and I was ready to head to Tennessee. And you know that moment when your eyes aren't open yet and you're in between consciousness You're not quite awake but you are in between states of consciousness, right there, that's when the Holy Spirit will often drop in or download or give you some words of wisdom. So pay attention to those times. But anyway, before my eyes opened, all of this, this whole list, came into my head and I, immediately upon opening my eyes, got up and immediately went to my journal and I wrote down these 24, it's like a checklist. And what kind of checklist was it? Well, it was a checklist of common denominators of cult-like behaviors, and he gave them to me and they correlated with the four other cults that I've been involved in over the last 30 years. And I was like wow, wow, wow. Because unfortunately, as I'm pulling out of Florida, I recognized that I was pulling away from not my first, second, third or fourth, but my fifth experience with this very, very huge wake-up call, and that is that I was involved once again in cult-like behavior. And so today. I'm going to read to you that download. I'm going to. We're going to discuss those common denominators, so let's go into it. And I want you to know if you hear papers turning, I'm referring back to my journal pages where I wrote these 24 down on that morning.
Speaker 1:So the first one is it grabs you by the poo-poo. That's what I was told to write down and it's true. It's kind of like you get attracted to a certain verbiage. You get attracted to a certain verbiage. Maybe there's a quote or a saying or something piques your interest and generally you know if you're searching for something, that's what's going to come up on your feed. You know in your mind and in your internet feed. So number one it grabs you by the poo-poo.
Speaker 1:Often the leader of such an organization will be very charismatic, be the guru type that you're looking for. So it grabs you. What else does it do? It promises. There's lots of promising. We're going to do this, we're going to go here, we're going to raise this, we're going to create that. So there's lots of promises. There are embellishments. Folks that are involved in this will take one little oh boy and I really recognize this because this is what I did with my life. I would take one little oh boy and I really recognize this because this is what I did with my life I would take one little tiny grain of good, and I didn't want to look at all the bad and I would take that grain and I would puff, puff, puff it up. That's what leaders in these groups do. They embellish things. They make things appear to be so much better and bigger than what reality is.
Speaker 1:The third one is lies. There's a lot of lying. There are things that are said that just don't come to fruition. There are things that are said one day and maybe the next day they're talking about something different. There are outright lies. There are lies where they'll say, well, we have this amount and really they don't. We've raised this amount and they haven't.
Speaker 1:So lies are a big thing with these groups. Incongruities, incongruities. So they may have certain beliefs that they rise up and they bring to the forefront, and then you discover that the very things that they're teaching they're not really exhibiting themselves. So it may be, for example, a line like think for yourself, and then, when you think for yourself, you are told no, or you're told that's not the way we're going to do it or no, follow me and then think for yourself goes out the window. They will claim enlightenment with an inability to see the truth. So they're claiming to be this holy person, this upright righteous person, when, right in their face, they are showing you that they're not loving, that they are mean, that they are very angry, that they speak very different from what they're saying they are. So it's as if they cannot even see past their own lives, their own persona. They will continue to say something, not realizing. Well, you know, back here you were saying this and you know, in today's age it has become much easier to quote unquote, catch this, because now everything can be recorded and everything is on the internet and there's history to look back at. And so these folks that are telling you one thing and then you're like, no, but you said something different the other day. Now you can go back and you can check yourself. And that's when it's really the red pills get really tough, when you can actually see the evidence and you're like, oh my God, wow, how did I do that? How did I do that?
Speaker 1:Again, there's a lot of passive, aggressive behavior. So they will do things like they won't talk to you directly, they will send another messenger. The leaders of these types of organization will pad themselves and they will send out their assistants or their co-workers or whoever that they've put in their inner circle, and that is the person that will deliver the message. Because they're protecting themselves. They are being passively aggressive. In other words, in one hand they're saying everything's great and on the other, they are giving the message that no, that's not the case, and the other person usually delivers the message. So they don't want to be confronted with the truth. So they'll often send somebody else and the other person has to deal with it. So very passive, aggressive behavior.
Speaker 1:One of the things that's very, very common in these groups, especially in leadership, is those that are and I want to blanket this by saying a lot of times the people that begin or lead these types of organizations. Most of them in my experience, and the four in my past that I was involved in, started out very good and pure and they had good intents, and unfortunately, ego left unchecked becomes corrupt, and that's exactly what happened with the other four that I was involved in Some years in. We were doing great work, we were doing things for the Lord and then, all of a sudden, something got on the inside of the inside circle and it began to unravel. And it's very, very true that the people in leadership cannot look you in the eye, and that's something that you really need to be aware of. When somebody cannot look you in the eye, that is very indicative of something hidden, something not wanting to be known. Now, I know that there are people that are more of an introvert, that type of thing. That's not what I'm talking about. I am talking about if there is a continual avoidance of looking you in the eye. That is something very noteworthy. The eyes are the gateway to the heart, and the eyes don't lie and they will say things to you. Like you know, you have to face yourself in a mirror, for example, and then they won't look in the mirror themselves and see that they might have some of the very same. And again, you have to be very cautious and transparent and not say that everybody else needs to do X, y, z and then not be willing to do it yourself. So that is something that's very noteworthy to take note of.
Speaker 1:There's, of course, lots of mind control. Mind control comes in many forms Repeating the same quotes over and over again. It's group speak. Everybody says the same thing, everybody wears the same thing, everybody looks the same way, everybody moves the same way. It's very insidious. You don't even realize it's happening.
Speaker 1:And for me, I had to have somebody on the outside of my world, somebody brand new, come in and at an event say to me what was the deal. I talked to four or five people at this event and they all said the same thing. You know, that was really weird to me. Why would everybody say the same thing and why was everybody wearing the same outfit? And these are noteworthy things. You know, in a world where we're trying to be more and more free to be who we are. Now I, you know, I personally have walked away from a lot of corporate jobs and corporations will do that in a way. That's the same type of thing of cult behavior. They want to. They call it branding and they want to brand you. You know it's not with a hot iron on your ass, but you know, when you're wearing the same clothing and you know some of it is legit and they want you to represent who they are.
Speaker 1:But sometimes it's just a control thing. Do this or don't come in. Do this or else, you know, and I can think of one particular like way back when I was in the Bill Gothard Institute and they had ATI curriculum for homeschoolers, and they had ATI curriculum for homeschoolers and, man, they got me hook, line and sinker because I was so on board with not letting others fill my children's brains, and so when I went to this quote-unquote conference, I came away thinking, oh, you know, he's so right and I need to dress conservatively. And I went into two years of wearing nothing but skirts. And that was when my 12-year-old oldest daughter we literally, you know, we had a pool in our backyard and we literally had a quote-unquote modest bathing suit made for her and it took on a life of its own and it took me a couple of years to realize that. You know, my God is not a God in a box full of legalistic rules and pointing his finger and saying you're not mine if you don't do X, y, z, and so there's a lot of mind control that goes on in these groups. Let's see where am I on my list?
Speaker 1:They will always, always, always add layers and layers of protection around themselves. There's always a justification. If anything goes awry in the organization, then there's always going to be somebody as the fall guy and you begin to see it developing, you begin to see certain individuals will be targeted and you can literally watch, you can predict as I did twice now in two different groups where you're like, oh, that person is going to be the fall guy and, sure enough, in a month or six weeks or however long it takes, suddenly it has nothing to do with the leader or the leadership. It has to do with this person. This person caused the problem, and so there's layers and layers of protection. Also, within organizations that collect money, there's often no transparency, there's no revealing of where the money goes, and if you ask, then it's diverted or you know. Then they'll go into this whole spiel about how you know we have all these checkpoints in place, but then if you dig, there's no such thing, there's no such checkpoints. Nobody's ever seen the actual figures on paper. So that's something to be very, very aware of layers and layers of protection. And yeah, they always have a why to justify it. Right, I knock those out.
Speaker 1:One of the big things that it does is they will say and or teach on one thing, I'm sorry, I didn't turn my phone off, and then they will practice the absolute opposite. They will say we are doing X, y, z for our bodies, can't you see? Look, look how much better I'm doing. And then you, you recognize that well, if you're doing so well, why are you walking so slow? Or if you're doing so well and you're saying, you know you're in better shape than you were a year ago, and why is it that on teachings, on the TV screen, you look like your belly's getting bigger or your skin is in a mess, or you know whatever? It is very aware that what they're telling you is often not anything to do with energy or anything positive. This is where things can get awry or skew, because it will very much look like yes, another thing that they'll do is they, you know they'll.
Speaker 1:They will point their group out as being special, as being, um, the one, um, uh words that I've heard in in my past 30 years um, we are chosen. Uh, we are the uh spiritual leaders, we are, uh, god's special family, we are the elite, we are the pioneers. And for those of us especially and I talked about this a couple of days ago in this exposure, exposure series that that is really what grabs people in, because we all want to be part of being the leaders and lightworkers are especially susceptible because we are looking for our mission, we're looking for our purpose and when somebody says, oh, you know, you're the one, you're it and every one of us has our own purpose. So, instead of pursuing our individuality and our authentic reason for being here, we end up getting sucked in to a group think purpose, and you need to be very, very cautious for that. Another thing that is done is manipulation by way of ego. So what will happen is if you rise up in the organization with an idea, with a truth, with a change that you see needs to happen to move forward, whatever it is, anything that does not come from the leader's mouth, from the leader's head, is going to be manipulated and you're going to be told, no, we don't want to do that. And then you'll find, you know, somewhere down the path they'll take your idea and they'll change it just a little bit and make it their own idea, and you're like wait a minute, that's exactly what I said six weeks ago, but you said no.
Speaker 1:So there's a lot of manipulation and the leaders of these types of groups are feeding on our fear of crossing them. They're feeding on, they're banking on the fact that we know we're hook, line and sinker. They're our leader, we're going to follow and worship and be loyal. And so if we step out of that line, often the passive aggressiveness comes back and they will speak in terms of generality and they'll speak about and you know verbatim that when they're teaching this and they're saying, well, you know, this type of behavior is not godly, but they're talking to that individual, that individual who crossed the line and dared to say something different than the leader. That gets twisted around. It becomes a form of gaslighting, and gaslighting is what I'm going to close on. It's the last one I'm going to talk about. They very much play in guilt and shame.
Speaker 1:Guilt and shaming are very huge in organizations that are cult-like, especially when it comes down to you know, and they'll even go as far as not only guilting and shaming, but they will go far as threatening. Well, you know, tell me who's with me. You know, because if you're not with me then you're against me. And you know, god is not in a box like that. God is omnipresent, omnipotent, he's everywhere, he's all-knowing. And I want to state again to you that have come this far in this podcast, that we do not need dogma, religion, a guru, a teacher, everything. All the knowingness is right inside us and it comes directly from God, our creator. And if you step away, here's another good one. They will say well, you know, test it, test it. If you don't think this is working, then test it and notice the difference. But then, when you step away, then you are dogged because you're not taking full advantage of their teaching. So which is it? Then you begin, you know, and so that comes into the gaslighting.
Speaker 1:Gaslighting is very, very, very insidious. Gaslighting let's talk a little bit about gaslighting. Well, let me make sure I have all the other ones on this list. Yeah, let's talk about gaslighting a little bit. Gaslighters will delete or destroy evidence that anything happened. So, for example let me go back to my list they will oust members for noncompliance.
Speaker 1:So if you notice people disappearing, you know, and the first couple, you might be like, oh yeah, they needed to go, they, you know they were doing something wrong. But if those people are not given a voice, if they're locked out, if they are, you know, if you're told, it's kind of like this insidious way of saying shun, shun, the unbeliever. Right Now they're not saying that, but they will paint an incredibly dirty picture about the people that are suddenly not with your group and they will make you think, oh well, who would do that? Well, the chances are Nobody's done that. But the individual that has suddenly disappeared from your group knew something and therefore they were a liability to the play that was going on. Right, and if the leader of this particular cult group is on to somebody that knows what they're up to See, here's another good one that leaders of groups like this will use.
Speaker 1:They will say things like God sees everything. Or they will even say don't you think I know? Don't you think somebody's going to come and tell me Don't you think my, whatever big gift that they're going to put out there, you know I can see through walls or I can hear from miles or whatever particular gift that they're going to tout that they have. I know this because I've been here for thousands of years. All of those are very suspect and people who do their research and do their homework and don't just follow voices. You have to follow the voice inside you and if there's one iota of question, oh baby, that's what you need to go with. And how do I know this for sure, because for four years I was being told that and I ignored it and I ignored it and it affected my health. It affected everything, because God was trying to tell me all along and I was so sure that my way was the right way. That's all ego, and all of these groups are very, very ego-based. They have.
Speaker 1:We're going to come back to the gaslighting. I'm just going to finish the last here. They have no tolerance for criticism of their group and certainly no tolerance to come against. If you come against the leader, there will be threats, there will be verbal shaming, guilting. Do this and this will happen. If you don't do this, xyz will happen and it's very, very it's ugly to watch.
Speaker 1:You'll feel a knot in your stomach. Sometimes you'll feel like you want to throw up and a lot of childhood trauma will come up. You will feel like whatever trauma as a child that you're experiencing, it will come up and that is very noteworthy. Then that is like your alarm that's sounding. That says this is my trauma being hit? Why is my trauma being hit? Oh, now, in order to do that, you have to step back and you have to look at it and then you will actually begin to see oh, my gosh. That person is literally purposefully hitting my triggers and then they make it all sound good. In other words, they are the savior of your trauma. They are the savior of your problem. They are the savior of change in your life. They are the ones. You need to cling to them, you need to follow them, you need to be in every class, you need to read every book, you need to quote all the teachings. You need to know this like the back of your hand.
Speaker 1:This is all very subject to massive groupthink and mind control, and so be very, very cautious to that. One of the other things they do is they do a lot of pressuring to donate. Donate your service, come and train with us and we'll give you a little crumb and you're going to serve us and you're going to get the personal fulfillment of being in our midst. But it's going to cost you because, see, most of these leaders of groups like this are living very well as their followers are struggling and you are constantly told, oh, but you can do this amount of money. You know, just follow our plan. Any multi-level marketing program will do the same. You know, follow this plan and you know I made this amount of money. Well, the person at the top makes the money, but the followers, the clones, the doers, they're struggling, and that is definitely. And then it takes you back to the lack of transparency. Where is the money going? We thought we were donating for this. Well, this hasn't arrived yet. So see, these are things that you need to look at Lots of pressure for donations, lots of guilting, especially if you are not doing what they've asked you to do, if you're not following their protocol and certainly if you're not giving up to their expectations.
Speaker 1:Well, some of you are at this level and nobody has even tried. Well, open your eyes, folks. Why are they pushing for you to go to the next level? It could be more than your own personal growth. Open your eyes and look. Now, not all groups are like this, but in my experience, four times, okay, four times.
Speaker 1:So the fifth hit was uber hard for me to recognize. All right, and going back to the using of our own vulnerabilities. So they will get you in by seeing a need. You might have a financial need, you might be having a relational issue, you might be having a problem with your children, you might be in a business that's failing, and so they will speak with you and they will find out those weaknesses and they will use them as silent, insidious weapons. They will use your vulnerabilities to milk your energy. That's what they do. They will take your desire for personal, spiritual or even wanting to contribute to humanity, which is all in the realm of personal fulfillment. They recognize that people want to feel fulfilled, so they will tell you if you do my program now, most programs cost this. We're only charging that. Oh my gosh, look at all that you get.
Speaker 1:And so people have that desire for personal growth. But then they'll, they it'll, it'll be turned around and they'll say stuff like well, you know, you didn't finish the program. Have you done everything that we said? Oh well, if you haven't done X, y, z, then how can you expect one, two, three to be in place? See, it's all a play on our emotions and it's and it's quite ugly when it, when it comes right down to it, that they use your own vulnerabilities and they get you to be vulnerable, they get you to open up, and then they will teach, preach and guide you in a way that you think if you leave them, then you're not going to succeed. Now we can go into the last couple and that is the um, the gaslighting, the gaslighting. Oh my goodness. Now my last experience um, you know if, but then they exhibit the fact that they have no idea about something you know.
Speaker 1:If you go to leadership and say I am aware that there is a person in our organization stirring stuff, for example, I believe that there is somebody inside our organization that's a dissonant that is literally playing both sides, and you go to them in all honesty and you tell them that that's the truth and you've had a witness of it. You've seen the proverbial shit stirring. You've seen the gossip. You've seen the proverbial shit stirring. You've seen the gossip. You've seen the double mindedness. You've seen speaking out one side of the mouth and then speaking out the other, and the person in leadership is telling you that you know, do you think? I don't know? And then you look at it and you're like obviously you don't know that the very person that you're lifting up is the one that you need to be worried about.
Speaker 1:And then, if you step back and unfortunately it really does it's just like, for example, my marriage, my husband and I recognized our issues. How did we do that? We stepped away from each other. Well, I stepped away from him and all of a sudden, the blinders. Well, not all of a sudden. It took many, many months, but the blinders come off and he began to recognize his issues. And I recognized that I was pointing my finger at him and I had three chubs pointing back to me.
Speaker 1:Well, these folks, no, no, no, they're going to turn it around. That's what gaslighting is. They're going to say what? That's crazy, this person isn't doing this, and you can clearly see. And so then you have to question yourself and say if this person is all knowing, like they're telling me, they are like they've been saying for X amount of time, then why don't they see this particular truth that I'm bringing to them? And then what do they do? They turn it around. Well, that's crazy. And then they'll spout it out.
Speaker 1:You know, in public sessions, can you believe that somebody thought this? Well, these people are too sensitive, or these people are, you know, not taught enough, or these people are full of ego. You know, it's always something else. It's not so. In other words, there's always a diversion away from the truth. Always, always, always, gas lighters will cover up, destroy, just like when somebody leaves their trail and unfortunately, the trail of tears is very fitting here, because often the people that are ousted had a trail of evidence and all of a sudden that's all wiped, it's gone, it's gone. Oh well, we had to leave that particular building, we had to leave that organization, we had to leave that platform because X, y, z.
Speaker 1:And if you could push a history button and look through, you would be like, oh my God, oh my God, right, because that's what will happen. That's what gaslighters do and gaslighting is very all right. For example, that was the biggie to me. It's like if you knew who I was, then you would know that I lived with a gaslighter for 16 years. Would you not know that I could see gaslighting clear as day? And you don't often see things until you exit. You know what it's like. You're in a relationship, you're in a job. I remember when I worked for a certain company, a promotional product company, and their name ended with pen, and I never really realized that six or seven years of working there I felt like I was in a pen, in a jail, and I didn't really realize that until I walked away from that job and I was like, oh my gosh, I'm free.
Speaker 1:And that's very much what this mind control what this cult-like behavior will do to you. You begin to. Everything becomes convoluted. You cannot even decipher what is true and what isn't anymore. That's what the ultimate gas slider wants. They want you to think that you are crazy. You're the problem. They will deny saying or doing things and then say that you're making it up. Well, I would never say that. You know me better than that. You know. Can you believe that somebody would think that I would say that?
Speaker 1:And then there are people in that person's audience that are going yeah, but you said this or you did that, or you canceled this, and you're saying you never cancel. Or you know you're saying that you're the only one accepting these funds and then the next day you find out that eight or nine people are accepting those funds and you were just completely lied to. When you're being gaslighted, you will feel the need to agree with every. You don't ever want to cross the teaching. You feel like, if you do have a meeting with this person, that you have to walk on eggshells. You have to be very careful because you know this person can read your mind or, you know, knows your heart, and you're like, oh my gosh, you know that is fear mongering, and fear is nothing more than false evidence appearing real.
Speaker 1:And the greatest of gaslighters are so egoic and so narcissistic. Narcissistic people have this inflated sense of self-importance. They are the ones, they are the deity, they are the holy ones. And, dare I say, some of the groups that I belong in, these people literally, because everybody has their own stories. We're writing our own stories, we're creating our own destinies, we're in our play, we are the stars of our play. We are the stars of our play.
Speaker 1:And so narcissistic people have to have self-importance. That's number one. So anybody, be so kind and loving, and they will even give, give, give. But you don't realize that that giving has all sorts of sticky strings and expectations, and then that will be turned around. Well, we gave you this and what did you do with it? You didn't do anything with it, and it's very, very, very much used.
Speaker 1:Gaslighting is used to keep the narcissist on higher ground than anybody else. A narcissist cannot be less than A narcissist cannot have a problem. A narcissist cannot be wrong. So when you're in a group, and generally these groups are led by narcissistic people who will use shaming and guilting and gaslighting to hold you captive. And so today in closing um, you know I've told you before that I will never talk on something that I haven't gone through myself. Please, please, please, be so incredibly careful of what you get yourself into.
Speaker 1:I was really, really, really saddened, not only by myself falling for this, but it's a sad thing to realize that there are dark energies working through people, and we write these people into the scripts. Why? For our very own lessons. So what I want to close on is if you even think one iota that you're in a cult, you probably are, and it's time to step away and give yourself no less than a week. Shut down all the teaching.
Speaker 1:Notice the addiction to whatever it is that you're in. It is an addiction, and, dare I say, you can be addicted to YouTube, podcasts, spiritual leaders, it may be church sermons, and none of these by themselves are bad. We can learn from everything. God uses everything, everybody, that's true, but the truth is there are many, many insidiousious dark energies that attach through people that we think are the real thing. There is only one real thing, and that is God, our creator, and the spark of him inside us. We really are all we need. We are it, and all we need to do is to go back inside. All the answers are there. We don't need anybody else to lead us to do that, because then we become susceptible to cult-like behavior. So let's pray for those that may spitefully misuse us, that may spitefully misuse us.
Speaker 1:Some of these folks begin to believe their own story and they believe that they are these great individuals, and it's such a delusion that literally they begin walking and talking like that. But what you will find is the people in the inner circle are very much like the narcissists, the gaslighter, the cult leaders, because like does attract like, and so I had to go into the inner circle of my last experience and actually witness that Deception loves deception, smack. Talking about people likes smack. Talking about people Saying one thing and doing another attracts people that do the same Pumping things up into something that they aren't. Other people will do the same. People that want to believe so badly will believe. You know, they'll even say, oh, I felt this when they have felt nothing, because they don't want to leave that group thing. They're in the group. Well, why is this person seeing or doing or experiencing this and I'm not. So what do we do? We embellish our own experience.
Speaker 1:So on this Friday. Remember that there are freaky things happening in the world and nobody else is going to point these things out. You have to be awake enough and sometimes the wake up call is so big that you do in fact wake up. And I hope today that if you're involved in any kind of group that makes you question your own beliefs, that makes you question your character, your integrity, that shames you, curses at you, threatens you, that pushes and pushes and pushes for money, for service, then I caution you that you might be in a cult. And on that note, I'm closing the door, the chapter of this section of my life, and I hope to shout that after five rounds I have learned my lesson. I don't want to go through this lesson again. It's painful, it's hard, it takes a lot of healing time.
Speaker 1:But you know what? This time around I could not be silent. I had to share my experiences, because if I can help one person avoid walking into a cult, then that's what I have to do. And I sat for weeks and weeks and thought about it and I knew that. I knew that there are blatant sins and then there are sins of omission. What does that mean If you know to do good and don't do it, then it's sin to you, and I knew that I had to speak. The truth Was I quote unquote scared? Yeah, yeah, because there are hundreds of people that may alienate me. But you know what? I would rather be alienated from people that are just not quite there yet than alienated from the God that created me to be here for a purpose. I don't want to be distracted anymore, and neither do you. Have yourself a glorious weekend and we're going to think and talk about a lot happier things next week. Peace out.