Grappling with existential questions about the origins of her thoughts, the influence of external forces on her autonomy, and her experiences within a religious cult, Ciara reflects on themes of control, deception, and the struggle for personal identity and freedom within a structured belief system. Listen to find out how Ciara finds bursts of inspiration often fueled by a sense of urgency or emotional resonance throughout her daily life.

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Intro & outro by Gerette Buglion; Original Music by Esther Friedman

Editing and production by Vanessa Hennessey

Huge thanks to Living Cult Free’s intern, Nikki Kattamuri, and the Living Cult Free Board of Directors

Music and sound by: Aleksey Chistilin, Alex Grohl, Ashot Danielyan, Daniel Hourtoulle, Geoff Harvey, Joe, Luca Francini, Maksym Dudchyk, Pixabay, UNIVERSFIELD. All music found on Pixabay and used under Pixabay Content License.

The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed are the speaker’s own and do not represent the views, thoughts, and opinions of Living Cult Free. The material and information presented here is for general information purposes only. The Living Cult Free name and all forms and abbreviations are the property of its owner and its use does not imply endorsement of or opposition to any specific organization, product, or service.

Today we explore strategies you can use to get out of a cult or help a loved one get out. To setup the framework for our discussion, we look at numbers and definitions. The numbers are huge. Up to 10,000 cults still exist today in the United States. That number is growing. IGotOut.org suggests that “Millions of people have been affected by undue influence. Many of us have had religions chosen for us or we’ve joined self-help or spiritual groups that became harmful or destructive. We have suffered from coercive control and mind manipulations while bending to narcissists. We’ve given our power of decision making over to an organization and their leadership.”

And language matters. The way we talk about cultic abuse influences how our good intentions are received. Someone who might shy away from what Gerette calls the C-word (cult), could respond better to “Controlling Group,” or “High Demand Group,” or “Spiritual Abuse.”

We discuss Dr. Hassan’s “reality testing,” and Gerette’s escape after 18 years from the Center for Transformational Learning and the strategies that worked for her. We also talk about strategies we can employ when helping others who might be embroiled in a controlling group.

If you have been in ANY culty high-control group or religion, share your story with the hashtag #igotout. Share on your own platform OR if you need to be anonymous and/or would like support, there are resources at www.igotout.org.

To Learn more about Writing to Reckon, visit www.gerettebuglion.com/writingtoreckon.

Learn more about the signs of thought control and other aspects of Dr. Hassan's work by visiting www.freedomofmind.com.

The subject of today’s podcast is Emotion Control. Like it or not, as human beings, we creatures tend to respond emotionally. Comfort, praise, recognition, and a sense of belonging are among our top stimuli. Our yearning for these is manna from heaven to cult leaders. They prey upon exactly this type of vulnerability. They lure us in under the veil of comfort and specialness and then set up an “us” versus “them” dichotomy. While under cultic influence, Dr. Hassan was told that the Moonies were his true family, all others were false – even evil. Vaxxers versus Anti-vaxxers is a similar kind of fault line.

Today we discuss the ways cult leaders disrupt the normal right brain/left brain integration necessary to make rational decisions. By sidestepping reason, cult leaders foment fear and self-doubt. We also explore phobia Indoctrination, the Christian persecution complex, and FreedomofMind.Org’s itemized list of methods cult leaders use to control their followers.

If you have been in ANY culty high-control group or religion, share your story with the hashtag #igotout. Share on your own platform OR if you need to be anonymous and/or would like support, there are resources at www.igotout.org.

Learn more about the signs of thought control and other aspects of Dr. Hassan's work by visiting freedomofmind.com.