Brainwashing has an uncanny way of isolating you from the world even if the cult is an outer housed group. Many times cult members are physically isolated as well. Isolated in the way that they only relate to other cult members and everything in their lives revolves around the teacher or the teaching. This is indeed isolating even though the human appears to be “free” externally. The isolation is an internalized system of control. It is in your thinking. It is in your self view and world view that is installed by the doctrine. The cage that modern day cults put you in , is in the prison of your own perception of reality. You become caged by the doctrine and you view the world through their new lenses that is usually called by some beneficiate name. Cults call enslavement pretty words like; freedom. Their work in the world of darkness involves deceiving you, amongst many other things, and is reframed to be the work of light or illumination. The workings of a cult is to get people to pour their energy, time, money into the system created by the leaders they intern alone live off of. They are there to hijack your energy away from you in order to feed off of it. Its that simple. Cults are vampirism personified.
It is extremely difficult for people to break themselves free of psychological processes that are subconscious. Since cult leaders are masters of installing subconscious control and dominance within the submissive psyche of the students, people have to really want to be free of mind control in order to be successful. You have to actively fight it internally in order to become free.
When there is so much invested in a doctrine, group, family, community ....on the fundamental level of "who one is" (personal and spiritual) to cut oneself free means... loss. There is no way around it. It is a good loss, but it can be a huge upheaval none the less. It takes courage, resolve, and power to do it fully. To be free is to cut ties with everything the group installed in you. There are endless tools to help in this process...and would take an entire article to address those. Essentially you are rejecting all cult doctrine as it arises in the conscious mind and turning your attention on ones soul..and taking root there. Uprooting all the power you were giving over to the authority (that was successfully internalized) and putting that power back into yourself on every level . To be free of cultic thought you have to reconnect with the creative source of the universe that is unmitigated by any authority or prior concept of reality.
Its extremely empowering and spiritually strengthening to do this. It actually brings deeper enlightenment, which is sooo utterly ironic! Because the fear they install IS that the process of exiting a cult or religion will bring the exact opposite of this. The fear is that ....without the religion one is turning away from god. Often times this fear is completely unknown to the conscious mind but it is there waiting in the shadow of the subconscious. People who are in cults do not consciously know this is why they remain in the religions and spiritual teachings that they do. If still brainwashed, naturally, it is called by some devotional name. You do not need the spiritual authority the fraction that they need you. All exploitative culture is built on the backs of those underneath. It is built by those who are subservient to the powers in control.
Also good to note is that the thought of cutting oneself free of a group like this is frightening to many who are in them....not only because of the unknowns of everything that is not the doctrine...but also because the process of negating everything known can be very painful as one has to deal with loss on so many levels. In the spiritual arena the abuses and losses go deep into ones fundamental connection to oneself and to god.
The cult actually attempts to interchange your experience of god with their own version of reality. Cult abuse is like spiritual rape. When you identify yourself spiritually with something and that very thing is used to do heinous harm to you...that is spiritual rape. Anyone who has exited a cult feels this. It is deep harm even if the abuses are not externally severe.
Many gurus, spiritual teachers and people who put themselves in positions of spiritual authority enforce fear, control, guilt, shame, and blame very consciously into the minds of the congregation. It is very intentional and it is done in teaching styles. It is being done through their own dark unresolved shadow content of their soul....but it consciously gets displayed in their very conscious choice of words and actions. The leaders tone gets manifest in the group behavior of what is acceptable or not.
People do not want to rock the boat of belonging..... because human beings have a deep need to feel a part of a family or community especially if that family/community promotes a promise of a higher good to the world...that makes the allure and control of a cult very strong because now we have two vital human needs that cult exploits. 1. The need for connection and communion with family/community i.e. the need for belonging 2. The need to have a sense that one is contributing to society.
These are basic human needs of which human beings have many! But the cult exploits these needs as well as many many other basic needs......by offering to fulfill these needs in humans. Its an empty promise. It is empty because you do not have that “family” if you go against the doctrine or dissent against what the teacher is fundamentally saying. The leader is always right and you come back to the authority of the teacher/doctrine or you leave. And it is empty because cults give “value” if it pertains to something that directly promotes the workings of the cult or enriches the leaders lives. Therefore....reinforcing only the leader or teaching has value.
They reframe everything with soft language...as all control does. Using language as a mode of control and dominance is used widely in the world all around us. It is powerful, it works, and every cult does it. They also use this sense of belonging to create deeper divides in “us vs. them” mentality. They may do this subtly, and often times not-so-subtly, demonizing everyone who have left the group. Continuously reinforcing how “special” the new recruits are and how fallen the old ones are now that they are not in the group. And It is always to the flaw of the devotee....as everything is always the flaw of the devotee in groups like this. How ironic that “spiritual teachers” and gurus can be some of the most un evolved people on the planet. How ironic that people who profess to be doing the work of the light have a vast expanse of shadow they themselves are unwilling to take responsibility for.
They can control your mind therefore the actions of your body with sweet sugary language as do most new age groups or they can do this with violence in their voice as many established religious offshoots do. Either way it is violent! One has a socially acceptable mask and one is more direct style of control.
Because of all this and more....the loss, abuse, and injury reaches the most profound level in the psyche. Often times instead of leaving and dealing with the totality of loss....the people just stick with their investments of energy, time, money, community...(the list is endless of what people are required to give) and of course giving to the group is reframed as some sort of service to humanity at large. Instead of leaving and experiencing this level of loss people stay with their investment. We can see this is human relationships as well. The process in the human psyche is the same regardless if you are leaving a cult.
Instead, people allow the subconscious mechanism of cognitive dissonance to do its thing. Cognitive dissonances one and only job is of making everything make sense in your mind in a way that does not conflict with our prior constructs of who the leader is or what the doctrine professes to be. All this is done by subconscious cognitive dissonance regardless of the truth in the situation. In order to get at the truth you have to stop this process happening in the psyche and demand you see into the truth. All former christians who have a problem with the stories in the bible that make zero sense have had to grapple with cognitive dissonance in order to break free of their religion. They had to get very friendly with the word NO and stop their minds of the habitual making sense out of nonsense.... and call a spade a spade.
If you want to be free you have to make a vow to yourself to know yourself fully. Deprogramming tends to go quickly if you respect yourself enough to now allow doctrine to be infested in your mind any longer.
You can not view the world through the lence of the programming while simultaneously trying to become free. You have to notice how you are being controlled through programming and stop giving it your energy. Reject the dogmas and root yourself back to YOU. Loving yourself is not allowing things to run in your mind unchecked. Doing this gently is a process of being vigilant while honoring your losses, reminding yourself how courageous you are to even do this, and using your discernment in separating what is true for you about spirituality and what is an implant that is toxic. There might very well be positive aspects to your old religion...but if you do not bother to look at the bad the good can never be reclaimed as the totality of the doctrine will be interwoven in fabric of the subconscious mind....and falsely identified with..... as you.
For those who choose to not do the real work of shadow (subconscious) integration and purification it is truly a missed opportunity because in every wounding, every horror, every pain we go through....it has as much LIGHT to offer us as there is pain. if we stay close to ourselves.... close to our spirit, while deconstructing the cultic thought in the mind, people will be successful and free of it. The power was always in your own spirit. It was simply given over to the imposed authority.
The real work of someone who wants to know themselves fully is to take a deep look into ones shadow content and see how you were abused and exploited. What was there in the psyche that allowed these abuses to continue therefore reinforcing original root of the trauma. You can not blame yourself or guilt yourself along this process as it feeds into the negative energy of brainwashing itself.
You have to be gentle and loving with yourself in this process.
If you want to be free you have to make a vow to yourself to know yourself fully. Deprogramming tends to go quickly if you respect yourself enough to now allow doctrine to be infested in your mind any longer.
You can not view the world through the lence of the programming while simultaneously trying to become free. You have to notice how you are being controlled through programming and stop giving it your energy. Reject the dogmas and root yourself back to YOU. Loving yourself is not allowing things to run in your mind unchecked. Doing this gently is a process of being vigilant while honoring your losses, reminding yourself how courageous you are to even do this, and using your discernment in separating what is true for you about spirituality and what is an implant that is toxic. There might very well be positive aspects to your old religion...but if you do not bother to look at the bad the good can never be reclaimed as the totality of the doctrine will be interwoven in fabric of the subconscious mind....and falsely identified with..... as you.
For those who choose to not do the real work of shadow (subconscious) integration and purification it is truly a missed opportunity because in every wounding, every horror, every pain we go through....it has as much LIGHT to offer us as there is pain. if we stay close to ourselves.... close to our spirit, while deconstructing the cultic thought in the mind, people will be successful and free of it. The power was always in your own spirit. It was simply given over to the imposed authority.
The real work of someone who wants to know themselves fully is to take a deep look into ones shadow content and see how you were abused and exploited. What was there in the psyche that allowed these abuses to continue therefore reinforcing original root of the trauma. You can not blame yourself or guilt yourself along this process as it feeds into the negative energy of brainwashing itself.
You have to be gentle and loving with yourself in this process.
Place the guilt and shame back to were it came from: your abuser. And move forward with cleaning house. Remember: the thing that drags out receiving clarity is guilt. People who leave cults notoriously blame themselves for the abuse. This goes into the psychology of abusive relationships in the psyche were the victim feels responsible for being hit in the face. The “don't make me hit you” mentality gets internalized and the victim thinks if they did this different or that different the abuser wouldn't of done what they did. Its not your fault. There are reasons that made you susceptible to participating in a sadomasochistic relationship that far too often is the guru/devotee relationship. For now....clean house. True healing on that level begins when your free of the doctrine.
Godspeed all strength, love and courage to you in this process.
