The International School of Temple Arts - ISTA - The Cult Vault

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 2 (01:16):
Hello and welcome to the Cult Vault podcast, your dedicated
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I'm your host, Casey, and I want to start by
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Before we get started, a word of caution. Today's episode

(01:38):
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Hello listeners, and welcome back to another episode of the
Cult Vault podcast. Are your host Casey's the second interview

(03:01):
of the day, but both are going to be very different.
I'm really looking forward to introducing our new guest on
the show, who was a new friend of the Cult
Vault Podcast, introduced to me by our other friend uncle Ricta.
Hello and welcome to the show. Kara.

Speaker 3 (03:16):
Hello, thank you for having me Casey.

Speaker 2 (03:20):
Thank you so much for joining me today. It's the
afternoon for me, it's the morning for you. We've got
a whole host of questions to get through, and I
usually start by asking each guest to just to introduce
themselves to the listeners.

Speaker 3 (03:33):
No, my name is Caara Cordoni. I'm from San Francisco.
I currently live up in Northern California. I'm a leadership coach,
mom of two teens and a cult Hopper and activist.

Speaker 2 (03:52):
I like that cult Hopper made it in there, because
without that sort of accolade, we wouldn't be having this
conversation today. It's like you wear it as a badge
of Bondy next to your activism, and I think that's
really important when we come to talk about some of
the activism work you're involved in later on. But to
start off with, we're going to be going back to

(04:14):
April twenty twenty one, when you attended your first ISTA retreat.
I hadn't heard of Ister until I started reading some
of the publications that came out and subsequently your work
on this group. So what is Ister? Is it an acronym?
And what happened in April twenty one?

Speaker 3 (04:38):
Yeah? So I had a difficult COVID lockdown relationship and
that ended right at the beginning of twenty one, and
so I was kind of embarking on a healing journey.
I took an online intimacy class and someone in the chat,

(05:00):
probably from the Bay area, mentioned the International School of
Temple Arts, which goes also by the acronym ISTA, and
I looked up their website and it was these beautiful,
happy people dancing and this retreat called the Sexual Shamanic

(05:23):
Spiritual Experience seven days, and it really offered transformation connection.
They talked about tribe and community and especially coming out
of COVID, it was really exciting to think about gathering

(05:46):
with people.

Speaker 2 (05:49):
You were in this intimacy workshop and somebody wrote in
the chat do you think at this point that this
was like an ISTA member that was deployed into these
types of areas to potentially recruit or was it just
somebody spreading like word of mouth? I did this, It
was great.

Speaker 4 (06:08):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (06:09):
I really think it was someone that had probably attended
and friends and it's you know, very much word of
mouth that ISTA has grown by.

Speaker 2 (06:19):
Okay, And when you say cult hopper, would you include
sort of the potentially coercive relationship during COVID as part
of that cult hopping experience.

Speaker 3 (06:34):
Yeah, I would say, you know, I got married or
got involved around age twenty four with a spiritual leader
cult type and ended up with him for a number
of years. I would say that was a very coercive,
harmful You had a lot of narcissistic traits the COVID relationship,

(06:56):
you know, as a dude struggling with alcoholism and you'd
on my codependence. And yes, I think alcoholism people do
use a lot of harmful, coercive language and behaviors, But
I really think of it a little differently from the
addiction perspective, right.

Speaker 2 (07:15):
I'm just interesting to hear all these different all these
different insights into different people's experiences. Oh, thank you, thank
you for sharing that the sexual shamanic retreat experience. Is
that what you called it?

Speaker 3 (07:30):
Uh? And I'm not sure if I'm getting them in
the right order. Sexual shamanic spiritual experience.

Speaker 2 (07:37):
Spiritual experience, So really playing on that a little, that's
satisfying alliteration there, sexual shamanic spiritual experience. Do you think
this is something that would appeal more to people that
are looking to learn more about their sexuality or become

(07:58):
more comfortable in their own bodies. We're kind of repressed,
I think as a race, especially women, So it's kind
of I'm in the first interview on somebody from one
taste that I didn't really know how to talk about
the glitter of stroking, So I don't know the best
way to approach just talking about, you know, sexual shamanic
spiritual experience. Did you have an idea of what to

(08:21):
expect from that title.

Speaker 3 (08:24):
Oh, I mean, I think it set me up just
to be really excited. I was like, Oh, it's gonna
be uh wild, I guess in terms of shamanism, and
so that would implied altered states. They did say there'd
be breath work and so yeah, I mean, I've worked

(08:49):
with shaman in the past one on one. I've been
really interested in a lot of New Age self development
spiritual seeking, like a lot of folks, and it's led
me down these paths and I just thought, you know,

(09:10):
here's a group that is going around reducing sexual shame.
Here's a group that is helping us giving us tools
to heal around our sexuality, like you said, especially as women,
and to expand it. And I think the history with
this was a lot of very sex positive people that

(09:31):
got involved. If you go back to the very beginning
with Dez who founded it and the Sedona Temple, that
there was a lot of sex workers and they were
busted for prostitution back in the odds.

Speaker 2 (09:57):
When you attended this initial retreat, do you remember the
experience of like arriving like by bus or did you
drive and what was your first impression of the location
of the first retreat.

Speaker 3 (10:12):
So I went with my best friend and we drove
and it's a beautiful location called Lake County, and the
retreat center is like an old carriage house. It was
been a stop in California for a long time. People

(10:33):
have gathered there, beautiful land. We pulled up, there's like
a little welcome table. People were very bright and shiny.
Like a lot of these experiences, or at least ones
I've talked about, they'll say, you know, the journey begins
as soon as you sign up, and so kind of
primes you and creates this ethos and attention, I think.

(10:59):
And so I just showed up pretty excited and wired
and nervous because here was this group of people, especially
during COVID, where it was just really like weird together.

Speaker 2 (11:17):
There's not really many other ways to describe it. It
was just a really weird period in history.

Speaker 3 (11:23):
Wasn't it.

Speaker 2 (11:26):
So it's a beautiful location. It's a bit strange because
we haven't really been around people. What were the first
sort of activities that you participated in? Did you like,
did you get shown to your room first, or was
it like all systems go, We're going to go do

(11:48):
breathing work We're going to go and do a yoga class.
How did it all kind of play out?

Speaker 3 (11:53):
Yeah, so the beginning, everyone arrived and then we were
uh yeah, directed to our room. I was sharing a
bunk room with a bunch of people, so it was like,
go upstairs, find a bunk. There were private bungalows that
other people were in, so there was a variety of options.
People were camping and you know, car camping and stuff,

(12:15):
so there was a variety. We gathered in the Heart Lodge,
so usually there's going to be a huge, you know,
gathering space, beautiful structure in kind of a heart shape
or a big circle, and it was a large crop,
I would say, because of the pent up demand from COVID.

(12:39):
So there were about seventy of us in a circle,
and at one end of the circle was a couch
set up with beautiful pillows and draperies, and the three
facilitators were sitting on the couch. And it all began
with reviewing the agreements, which's like nineteen or twenty agreements. Okay,

(13:05):
I believe they had been sent out in advance and
I probably read over them rather quickly, but they take
a lot of time to read each of them discuss,
each of them read it again, and then we would
all agree with like, yes, hands voice right, so you
really opt in. And I had a couple of thoughts.

(13:29):
One that was funny as I looked at the circle
and then I thought, oh, yeah, this isn't a cult
because there's three facilitators and they're women. It's two women
and one guy. And so I had this little justification
where I was like, oh, you can relax, right, this
is different the agreements. The one that was really shocking

(13:55):
at the time and that has since changed, at least
for level one, was that facilitators assistants could interact sexually
with participants, and there was this explanation that a it
would be shared with the other facilitators, like it's under

(14:18):
the group gaze. The idea being that in the world,
we know teachers are having sex with students and they
do it in the shadows, that they do it in
the dark. However, here we're bringing it out into the
light so it can be conscious. And the idea being
that by multiple people knowing and that they're have your
best interest at heart, that somehow that that's going to

(14:42):
work out okay. And I marked that it was weird,
but I didn't fight it right like, you're there to,
you've paid the money, you're in the circle. They explain
it rather rationally, and so you're like, huh, okay, we'll

(15:03):
go along. Some of the other problematic agreements are the
one hundred percent responsibility from my experience, which I'm sure
other people have brought out. Gosh in cult dynamics, Oh
show landmark different.

Speaker 2 (15:20):
Yeah, yeah, unless it's a positive experience, in which case
leadership may take responsibility for that. You know, any negative
experience is one hundred percent on you. Any miracles or
prosperity you experience was actually us, is the way I
tend to hear it be said by court survivors. But
of course that in itself is a big red flag statement.

(15:43):
But I'm curious to know if you think the social
proofing was already at play when you were agreeing out
loud in kind of like an almost conformity inducing state
with a group of seventy people for the first time
being around people in however long that when people read
out these statements, if everybody is saying yes, like a big,

(16:07):
zealous like yes, are you going to actually psychologically fight
it at that point? I'm not sure.

Speaker 3 (16:14):
Based on the research I've done since when we look
at social science, probably not. It's very few of us,
given that they've proven you can show people different length
lines and if twenty people say that the little line
is longer and it comes to you, very few of us,

(16:37):
less than one in five. I mean, look up the statistics.
But it's the idea that oh, you're sovereign, you're independent,
you can consent and ignoring what's been proven about how
social and influence and it's like instinctual. It's not a
critical thinking choice. It's like, uh, a current that we

(17:01):
don't really talk about. And I think it really brings
into question consent. What what am I truly consenting? What
am I consenting to? Is it informed consent? All of
those come up in these situations.

Speaker 2 (17:18):
So this agreement, this sort of totalistic agreement to these
rules is the is the is the consent? I assume
that that's kind of that they've taken that activity and
they've said, well, you consented to this during that activity
in the in the heart tent, heart center, the heart

(17:39):
lodge lodge.

Speaker 3 (17:41):
Yeah, I mean, I think they really do do more
around consent. So we dip into definitions of consent and
Betty Martin's Wheel of Consent, and we do some practice
exercises and I really like them. I thought they were great.

(18:03):
In retrospect, I would say it's not enough for the
level of intensity of play or of risk that is
set up in that space. I would have loved if
we had done three days on consent. You know, like
there's a lot of cultural influence that we have to

(18:24):
navigate around consent. But on the other hand, I think
we're all also in myself like fiery and in a
hurry to get to really exciting and intense and edgy activities.
So there's a real tension there within even the participants
showing up. But I think as a trustworthy ethical leader

(18:51):
and facilitator, we need to update our models around you know,
these trainings and especially large awareness trainings. Like anyone that
really wants to be an ethical in service of the participants,
I think is going to stay away from a lot
of these dynamics or should.

Speaker 2 (19:12):
That leads me perfectly into asking you about the leadership
of ISTA and the history of ISTA sort of where
it came from in regards to this small sort of
footnote about how facilitators and leaders and people that are
kind of what I would say, are in those positions

(19:35):
of power during these retreats are allowed to have sexual
contact with you or you give them permission to touch
you sexually. I wonder where that footnote came from. If
it's sort of like a teaching or part of the
whole ISTA brand that came from the implementation at Leadership

(19:57):
and kind of filtered down to you'll fast retreat in
twenty twenty one.

Speaker 3 (20:03):
Yeah, I mean, in a nutshell, does Nichols who is
the founder of ISTA. I've heard him. I don't know
him personally, but based on his film, I want to
call it Chasing Maya, but I don't think that's the
right name, but it could be called that. There's a Yeah,

(20:26):
the film that he has about himself, and from speaking
with numbers of people now who have interacted with him
directly and reading Maya Maya Luna's book Mud Lotus from
the Mud Mud in the Lotus. I'm sorry, I'm getting

(20:47):
all my titles wrong today. You know a Maya Yanica.
He's a sex addict and he's been on a dry
I have to probably have sex with most women that
he interacted with, and you know, I don't know if

(21:09):
that's still the case. I'm not up to date on
his mental health or his behavior, but since the aughts,
since all of this started, that has been a consistent
message that feedback. You know, I don't know that he
would own that he wants to fuck every woman wants,
but that's how it went, and so is the as

(21:32):
a temple arts and place around sex, positivity, sex and spirituality.
It really served him and he was able to do
that and you know, have those quote unquote needs met.
And then I think because it's in his imprint. Of course,

(21:54):
the people that came in the lot of women and
men facilitators that showed up in the beginning, they adopted that
that that was condoned, it was passed on. And watching
here many years later, people I've known that go multiple
times or move into apprenticeship facilitator ship, it's like watching

(22:21):
that spreads. It's like watching narcissistic traits spread. Or as
we've found now, how power really does reduce in our
brains our capacity for empathy. And I think that we
see that or I've seen that.

Speaker 2 (22:39):
It's kind of making me think of David Berg and
the children of God who had as far as you know,
sort of these twisted sexual preferences and preached free love,
open love in a time where people were very conservative,

(23:04):
you know, reaching out to young people in the counterculture,
like free love, open love. Everybody is going to have
sex with everybody, and we're going to explore ourselves. And
now the women have to go out and sleep with
non members and bring back money and things for the group.
And now everybody's actually gonna also have sex with the
children because we're all about open love and free love.

(23:26):
So it starts off as like this really radical, interesting
idea with the man at the top having sort of
an idea of where he really would like things to
go for his own twisted sexual pleasure. I don't know
if it's the same case here, but it's kind of
given me the same sort of, I don't know, same

(23:49):
sort of vibes.

Speaker 3 (23:50):
Yeah, I don't think Dez is in the category of
a burg as far as the just I mean, what
a horror, horrible, horrible individual, right, I mean, the child
abuse is just outrageous and stunning and horrific. I think

(24:10):
he's more of like a like the playboy, you know,
and he's compelled. I think it is like possibly you know, unhealthy,
but to my knowledge, you know, it's I don't know,
I can't really defend it. But we're dealing with adults.

(24:33):
I guess I have an issue with just to jump
to it, that Ista has a fund called the Lea
Fund that is named after a woman who committed suicide
in New Zealand, and that fund is targeted at bringing
in other young women or young people ends up being women,

(24:53):
and so part of there is this angle where I
feel like is to target it's vulnerable people. They have
the Veterans Fund, bring in vets who would be really
vulnerable to retraumatization, and then bringing in these you know,
really young women and then some of them end up

(25:16):
you know, dating or hooked up with facilitators. And yeah,
that I find that really grows.

Speaker 2 (25:25):
Yeah, yeah, I see, Yeah, kind of not on the

(25:48):
same level as Burg. I just always want to I
think this is one of the age old questions that
people ask all the time. Did they start this group
kind of like with an idea of what they were
trying to achieve for their own sexual gains? And I'm
not sure if that's the case here, but I think
it might have played a part if he was a

(26:09):
sex or is a sex addict.

Speaker 3 (26:11):
I agree. I think it did create it for his
gains under the wise of making the world better and
empowering women, though I think that that ends up being
upside down. I think there's you were being freed by
letting yourself be the goddess of the temple, which means

(26:34):
you'll fuck everybody because everything's love and you don't need
to have any personal preferences because you're channeling divine femininity.
And those are not exactly their words, but that's kind
of where it lands in us.

Speaker 2 (26:47):
That's so nefarious, isn't it. You know, as women, we
spend our whole lives. I mean, speaking for myself as
a woman, I mean maybe not all ways we feel
this way, but I are a woman feel like you
spend your life waiting for liberation, for safety, for autonomy,

(27:09):
and that you know, I'm in a happy and healthy
and loved household, but that doesn't mean, you know, if
I go to a workplace, I'm going to feel that
same way, or if I go and join a sports club,
I'm going to feel the same way, or even in
the gym for example, or going for a run on
the streets and I'm like, well, now I feel a
bit unsafe. Even though I'm out in public and there's

(27:30):
loads of cars going past me, I'm still feeling like
I feel like, as women, we wait for that day
where we feel that that's and to be to be
offered that, you know, sexual freedom and autonomy and safety.
We're going to learn about consent. Oh that's like that's
like double double evil.

Speaker 3 (27:50):
Well, and there's these like beautiful rituals and I'm kind
of a ritualist or I enjoy you know, group rituals,
whether it's singing together, other dancing. Of course, there was
the breath work, but as the retreat went on, there
was like the brotherhood circle where the men and the

(28:12):
women separated and the men came back and the women
were witnesses and we were brothers in sisters bodies. Was
the idea, and that we're holding that masculine and men
were incredibly vulnerable and very I mean it was It
was really compelling for me to see them in their

(28:36):
articulating the shaming, the harms, the abuse, the neglect, the burdens,
expectations of manhood, boyhood through manhood, and so it created
a real intimacy and hope. And then the women were
in the center, you know, another day or in the afternoon,

(28:58):
and the men were sisters in men's bodies, and just
even that concept that I was like, Oh, these men are,
you know, really trying on our bodies. They are feeling
into what it is to be feminine, and they're witnessing us,
they're shutting up and seeing what we have to share.

(29:22):
And I put so much into that. And you know,
part of what I've recognized about myself is a tendency
towards zelotry. I guess where I like to go all in.
I want to believe, I want to amplify and mostly

(29:43):
you know, in the world, I kind of have a
good measure on that. But when I'm putting myself into
these containers where we're doing a bunch of cathartic emotional release,
being a baby again and doing like reparenting with people,

(30:04):
and I'm really earnest I want to I'm kind of
like the a student in this way that I'm like, oh,
I want to succeed and I want to probably prove
myself and and so I you know what I see
in myself where that probably as an adult I'm accept

(30:26):
within myself or maybe my family. I just probably don't
get to feel like that. There isn't really anything in
the adult world where I get to think I'm that
safe and and that's really a think part of maturing.
And yeah, it's it's it's a bittersweet insight.

Speaker 2 (30:50):
Is that I'm acting as well being a mom of
two teens. That it makes it even more bittersweet because
you're having these revelations in understanding that you're children might
also feel like they can never truly be safe or
truly express themselves in that same way. And I mean,
I'm an optimist, I'm an ever optimist, So I hope

(31:11):
that you know there's a there's a day where where
that that can be the experience of young people. But
also I am definitely the type of person that like
wants everybody to like me. And if somebody is like
called towards me, I take that personally, I'm like, what
did I do? How can I change their opinion? And
even if it's somebody that I don't particularly like, I'll

(31:34):
go above and beyond to try and you know, match
their energy or try and make myself fit around them.
And it's usually to my detriment. But for some reason,
I don't know if it's like a childhood thing that
I've brought forward, But in those types of situations that
you've described at this first retreat, that would not serve

(31:56):
me well in this type of environment. I would be
like people would be looking at me saying that one there,
she's vulnerable and we can get her hook line and sinker.

Speaker 3 (32:07):
Yeah. Yeah, I appreciate you saying that, And I do
think it is a lot of how we're encultuated as
women to be bridgemakers, to make the peace, to keep
things from escalating. I mean, there's just a lot of
messages about our role.

Speaker 2 (32:26):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm just curious to know whether
some of these experiences that you had at the first
retreat that perhaps maybe didn't feel as safe as some
of the other experiences, did they feel familiar from past
cul tick experiences or did you not realize perhaps the

(32:49):
similarities at the time between previous experiences and this first retreat.

Speaker 3 (32:57):
Yeah, it wasn't until probably after the third retreat and
finding the Facebook group, of which is what turned me
into the activist. I don't think I made the connections,
and I think that's part of what I was really
devastating when I did, because I was like, oh no,

(33:20):
not only is this dream actually a nightmare, but I've
done this over and over and so that was just
really psychologically painful.

Speaker 2 (33:38):
Was the second retreat or the third retreat particularly different
from the first?

Speaker 3 (33:43):
Absolutely?

Speaker 2 (33:45):
So.

Speaker 3 (33:45):
In the first, of course, it was my first retreat
and I was a participant, And for my second retreat
it was also level one, but I went as an assistant,
and so part of the path to become a facilitator,
Let's say, maybe I thought it would be pretty cool
to sit on the couch and teach people and make

(34:07):
a lot of money and travel the world and have
sex with who I wanted to. So I inquired and
it was like, well, you would do some assisting and
then a facilitator would take you as an apprentice. And
so I'm like, all right, let's start assisting.

Speaker 2 (34:24):
And as they tell you there's no sick pace, You're like, oh, well,
in that case, yeah, I don't know if it's for me.

Speaker 3 (34:32):
Well, I was obviously not looking for a conventional job time,
and so you know, it's one of the situations where
assistants actually pay to go even though you're working pretty hard.
It's a slight reduction in cost, a major increase in labor.

(34:57):
And so you go and and you were the anchors
for like the small groups that meet every day. So
every morning we'd have a small group meeting and it's
led by a pod leader, and so the assistants are
the pod leaders. And they told us, you know, you
were the real carriers of the culture. You're the ones

(35:19):
that really anchor that. And there's a bunch of rooms
setting up time keeping the pod management team meetings where
you're talking about how are people in your group doing?
Are there any red flags? And then you're also participating

(35:41):
in a lot of the activities, so it's really intense
and there was a sense of urgency all the time,
like we don't have enough time to do it, and
you better do it fast, but take care of yourself,
but be on top of it. And one of the
facilitators snapped at me during a ritual when I caught

(36:08):
them on their phone during like this peak activity of
pretty intense shamanic sexual engagement, and I was like I
looked over and all the facilitators were on their phones
and it was like so blase and to me, the
narrative I was was like, this is super sacred and

(36:29):
we're in temple and this is like magical, and you know,
fuck your phones. And I went and asked a question
that kind of interrupted and I got snapped at. And
I also did one of the demonstrations that was they
would have the facilitators or assistants do a transmission before

(36:53):
each activity, which was a demonstration, right, and so I
had done this demonstration and then the facility had really
not followed up with me, and I'd asked for support
afterwards and they forgot didn't have time. And so at
the end of the retreat, we had a debrief session

(37:15):
where all the assistants and facilitators get together and you're
invited under five minutes to give feedback and or ask
for feedback. And there was this sense of or they
said quite specifically, the sooner we do this, the sooner
we can get out of here. But also we want
to give you time and space. And it was really

(37:38):
funny because I hadn't known it was going to happen.
And I started sweating and my pulse was racing, and
I realized I was questioning, am I willing? Am I
going to just be an ass kisser. Am I actually
going to bring up my concerns? And the whole thing
is about being sovereign and responsible? And I was like, oh,
I'm going to challenge myself. I'm gonna say, hey, you guys,

(38:02):
we're on your phones and let me down. And then
you get to decide what level of feedback do you
want back? Are you feeling tender and you only want
a one? Or are you feeling really brave and powerful
and you want a ten. So the asshole, of course
is like, I'm here, I paid good money, it's been

(38:22):
a week. I'm going to take a ten. Like, give
it to me, So I share my feedback. The room
goes silent. The lead facilitator turns around and says, I
call bullshit. Do you see how you're making it our
responsibility to take care of you when you're a full
grown adult and you could have asked for your needs
to be met at any time. Do you see how

(38:42):
you're making us the offender and yourself a victim when
really it's the other way around. And which is darvo
right defend attack and reverse victim and offender? And like
so many of us, I totally took it in, like
taking a punch and was like, oh my god, you're right.

(39:02):
It is all my fault. I am responsible for everything.
And it got even a little you know, pettier, uh
you know where it's like, you should go home and
look at your life in any places that you're not succeeding,
this is probably the cause. And weren't you the temple
priestess That last altar was ugly? Why did it have
dead flowers on it? So it's just so, but I

(39:29):
left saying, oh my god, thank you for being oh
and you're bringing me the dark feedback and fawning right,
basically fawning.

Speaker 2 (39:58):
Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. And so many times in my
head I'm like, I'm going to tell you now that
I'm not happy about this, and in my head I'm
having a conversation, and then the moment passes and I
don't say anything, and then I'll lay in bed and
I'll have the argument with myself later on that night
when I'm trying to get to sleep, And this is
how it would have gone, and I would have told
you and you would have heard me. But the phone thing.

(40:24):
Do you think this is like a I'd rather doom
scroll on my phone and look at social media, or
is it that the leaders are also under so much
pressure to have all of this work done and reach
out to contact and organize things that they actually can't
be present because they have that pressure those deadlines. I

(40:45):
don't I always try and think about the coercive nature
of all people, apart from the you know, real bad
guy at the tippy top of the pyramid. Don't have
much empathy for that person a lot of the time,
but anybody kind of filtering down in that hierarchy. I
always try and to take a look and think what

(41:05):
what's happened to them in that moment? Keeps me compassionate.
Otherwise I'm far too quick to say what an asshole?

Speaker 3 (41:13):
Hmmm, that's interesting. I My sense was that you know
that that that it was kind of old hat, right,
you know, like it's going, well, we've done this a
million times, we travel around the world, you know, we

(41:34):
don't have to be that present, and this moment is
that accurate. I don't know were they were they actually
at work on things, or responding to urgent needs, or
you know, dealing with pressure to prepare for the next thing.
I don't know, but that wasn't the impression I got. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (41:57):
I also wonder when this person and gave you the
level ten feedback if he'd been on the receiving end
of that before after going through the same processes that
you were then going through.

Speaker 3 (42:09):
So was a she sorry, yes, all right, no, no, no,
I just think it's interesting, you know.

Speaker 2 (42:15):
Justin that I'm like, well, come, but if they're talking
to you like that, must be a guy.

Speaker 3 (42:20):
Right, exactly. Absolutely. I mean this is coming out of
the sixties and encounter groups, I think in terms of
tough love, dark feedback, you know, shadow work, all of
these languages for basically being really unkind to someone in

(42:45):
their best interest or based on you know, but it
shuts you down, it makes you small. It absolutely undermines
the thing that there is the opposite of the thing
they're saying it's doing. And that's and that's endemic. I mean,
that's show. That's yeah, you know signed yeah, all over.

Speaker 2 (43:06):
The kind of a public humiliation, uh, ritualistic humiliation aspect
of kind of keeping keeping you. Uh, it's like a
it's a control tactic, isn't it. You know, the fear, fear,
intimidation and humiliation are combined, compounded and then you're like, okay,

(43:27):
well you're you're in charge, and it's under loaded language
of the word transmission. I mean that there must be
a lot of language in this where if I went
and walked into a session, I'd be like, wow, I
don't understand what you're talking about.

Speaker 3 (43:42):
WHOA look at that?

Speaker 2 (43:44):
Oh my gosh, you'll have to send me a picture.

Speaker 3 (43:46):
Of that, and you a photo.

Speaker 5 (43:48):
It's probably backwards on your screen. But this is my
mind map of ISTA and hiding from like what brought
us in searching for love and freedom and hope over
there to yeah, coercive harms.

Speaker 3 (44:07):
Uh, you know, all all the things. So yeah, there's
a lot of special language. Sorry, there's a lot of
special language, insider language that comes out slowly over time,
and it gets more intense when you go to level

(44:29):
two or as you become an assistant or an organizer,
because I think, like so many coercive groups or high
pressure groups, the outer offering is the tip of the iceberg, right,
it's it's and so so many people go through ISTA.

(44:51):
One might even say I think the statistics like sixty
percent seventy percent only do one and they're good and
they move on. Landmark has a fifty percent return rate
that I think that was like the highest from John
Hunter his work, and so I think has a thirty

(45:14):
percent return rate. What I don't know is how many
of those people don't just go one more time, but
go three more times. People on the internet are like
I've been seven times, I've been fourteen times, and so
that's where you know, and those are the folks that
are more in inside. But I would say that that

(45:35):
it's the first level retreat. There's not. It's it's a
much more subtle rather and it's when you get inside
that it gets more over and more pressured, and the
right facilitator, more harsh feedback, more pressure.

Speaker 2 (45:54):
Yeah. Yeah, so kind of like the fun into the funnel,
you know, the love bombing aspect, and then once you hooked,
it then turns into well, we've done all of this
for you, so now you needed to do this for us.

Speaker 3 (46:06):
I think really it's the getting hooked on, getting high
and the peak experience and then you're you know, because
you're using breath work. So I'm someone who's really sensitive
to that, and I get super high. Whatever the dopamine
release processes, I'm seeing visions, I feel great, I'm full
of energy because I'm probably hypomanic. I'm like an energizer bunny.

(46:33):
And you know, that's what John Hunter's research research showed
is that by the end of your three to five
to seven day retreat where you've had pressure, all this
deep psychological work, that you have a dopamine defense mechanism.
And it is part of trying to keep yourself safe.

(46:55):
And part of that is getting grandiose and being really
big and being really confident and you know things that
we love to feel that way. I love to feel
that way, and so I was like, I'll keep going,
I'll get to feel that way. I can help other
people feel that way. Let's feel this way all the time.

(47:16):
It's a little addictive.

Speaker 2 (47:18):
I yeah, yeah, I mean that's how people describe taking drugs.
If I have too much coffee, my eyeballs start vibrating,
that kind of thing. But then obviously when the coffee
wears off, it is it's worse than it was before.
The fatigue is worse than it was before the coffee.
So that leads me into my next question, which does

(47:42):
kind of link in to doctor John Hunter's work. What
were the gaps like in between Was there a come
down period. Was there like a sense of urgency and
getting on the next retreat and did it differ between
the first, second, and third.

Speaker 3 (47:57):
Yeah, so I was super excited on I signed up
to assist and then I was good. I went back
six months later to do level two sexual Shalmanic spiritual initiation.
So it's the initiation versus the experience, and I hit

(48:20):
the peak between. I think I kind of held on
to it's going to come, and I stayed connected to
some of the people. We created a chat group, so
there was still a sense of kind of connection and
growing friendships and yeah, being part of it, and that

(48:41):
you know, the more I did it, the more I'd
be in the in group and that desire to be
there after level two, which we can go into. But
it was after level two that the hide didn't last
as long and I was signed up to go again

(49:06):
in six months. And the reason I did every six
months was that's when they came to my location, so
I wasn't traveling around the world to Peru or Columbia
or New Zealand or they're all over the world.

Speaker 2 (49:21):
Well shamanic hotspots, it sounds like almost.

Speaker 3 (49:25):
Well, and then they're breaking into some other like sntates
that are you would think more conservative, and of course
I think that they're really popular though in those because
of the repression and the excitement. We had a young
man who's getting out of the Mormon church show up
at our first one. I mean, you just think about

(49:46):
how mind blowing that that was. There's nudity and there's yeah,
just a lot of practices that would really be overwhelming.
So the depression or the big drop was the facilitator

(50:09):
who darvoed me posted on Facebook and they she was
writing about I know there's you know, some feedback and
you know, things are difficult, and then this Facebook group
formed and her message was rather unclear, but it mentioned
that this Facebook group, and I went and looked and

(50:29):
it was called issues with Ista and Heiden. We haven't
talked about Heiden yet, and I was an early person
to find it, and I said, hey, I'm you know,
happy with Ista, but I really want to learn about
the harms because maybe I can be a bridge to
make things better. And so, very optimistically and naively got

(50:52):
in the group and was horrified by the accounts of
harm that people were sharing that went back decade or more,
and you know, In some cases it was horrifying because
it would be a woman saying like, I take responsibility
for that, I consented to this, and I still feel hurt.

(51:16):
Can we work on it? And being shut down even
from being like, I'm not even trying to blame you,
but I still have feelings. Can we process them? And
by one lead facilitator, the response, you know, was like, well,
I don't have time for this. I'm teaching, but don't
bring it up because it'll harm my reputation. And you know,

(51:38):
just a lot of victim blaming and not being available
for repair and making people wrong for having been hurt
for feeling hurt and denial right, just all of that.
And it was so was coming up in these accounts
of that people had had and I at first was like, well,

(51:59):
I wasn't harmed, and then I thought, oh, I had
that weird experience with the facilitator, and so I wrote
it out and said hey, And it was funny because
I reread it and I was like, I feel like
I'm breaking the rule of no gossip and maybe I
shouldn't talk about it, and if you think I'm being inappropriate,
please give me feedback. I was still obviously so inside

(52:21):
the mindset, and I shared it and someone wrote back like, hey,
you didn't deserve it. That's not great behavior by leaders
of an organization, and in fact it's called darvo. And
I think reading the description of DARVO that was kind
of like the straw that broke the camel's back. I

(52:41):
was like just devastated and depressed and ashamed and angry,
and I became very disregulated, obsessive, dropped out of coaching school. Yeah.

(53:04):
So I did take care of myself by getting a therapist,
you know, and doing my best to to to keep going,
which led into the activist work, which I think was
a way of really funnel the weird and disregulated energy

(53:25):
that I did have. I was pretty obsessive on researching
the history of the organization the players. I was, you know,
very hyper sensitive and yeah, overwhelmed at the time. But

(53:47):
through writing and the issues with ISTA group, I got
invited to meet with the admins of the Facebook group
and then said, hey, we're working on a strategy of
how to engage with THISTA as a survivor. Would you
like to join us? And I said yes, speaking specifically

(54:07):
with Lalita Diaz, who was anchoring that group, but I
was like, also, just like I don't have the capacity
to do a lot of critical thinking, like I can
show up here, but I'm in an emotional state. And
you know, it was Lalita who really set the direction

(54:31):
of can we engage with this from a transformative justice perspective,
And that was informed by the fact that we collected
reports through the issues with ista Facebook group and a
Google form that we put out to survivors, and we
received about fifty four reports. A couple of them were

(54:56):
we had to throw out for various reasons, but we
you know, had over forty some reports that we analyzed,
and in there there was only one account initially that
you know, people wrote narratives, so it's hard sometimes to
really get the information. We didn't have like a great

(55:17):
categorization was like analyzing their narratives, and so most of
them were not a sexual assault. They were coercion, high
pressure group behaviors, and different kinds of consent violations, whether
it's you know, being told you can't leave the room
for high pressure or trauma inducing or reactivating activities was

(55:44):
the other one. And I think because we didn't have
data in there that really was going to allow us
go to the police with any kind of a truly criminal,
especially in a sex positive perspective, right, that becomes very
nuanced and complicated to work.

Speaker 2 (56:07):
Though.

Speaker 3 (56:08):
We are seeing changes now with how Nicole day Doon's
been handled by the US court system and the fact
that she's in jail and probably going to face multiple years,
so we are seeing a shift that there is still
the sex positive and they didn't turn on the victims
in that case, so that's hopeful. But at the time,

(56:29):
we really didn't have the kinds of things that a
lawyer was going to be able to work with, and
so we thought, how do we you know, Wilita and
the team was like, how do we take this information
and leverage it to cause transformation, change, reduction of harms
with an Ista and I was like, you know, that's

(56:53):
where my heart is. You know, I had a lot
of hope as people before me and had that like, oh,
this is the time that we can turn the ship around.
If we could just present the data get to the
right people, they will see the error of their ways
and of course wish to make corrections. And that's like

(57:13):
the optimist and maybe projecting my own goodness onto people
who aren't there. But I also felt it was really
important to give them the opportunity because I can't really
say you weren't willing to change if we didn't gauge
in a process where you where we had that conversation
and you did or didn't change, And just to cut

(57:34):
to the end, is it did not change enough. The
cultic bubble of a beliefs has not changed, even though
some actions were.

Speaker 2 (57:44):
Taken awesome language has been altered so that it doesn't sound,
you know, like you mentioned that taking out facilitators can
touch people or participants in a sexual way.

Speaker 3 (57:59):
Right, that one, at least for Level one verbally but
not in writing, is confirmed that facilitators and assistants won't
interact in Level one sexually with participants.

Speaker 2 (58:17):
That is such a rollercoaster. It sounds as well like
you've experienced a lot of grief in finding out that
this was really not what you believed and hoped that
it would be the devastation of finding a community and
a sense of freedom and a sense of safety and

(58:40):
then finding out that that was not the case. It
must just break your heart and you have to mourn that.
In some ways you have to be like, well, that's
not in my life anymore. It's it's dead and gone.
And that's hard.

Speaker 3 (58:55):
Yeah, it was. Yeah, it just took me all the
way down, like nothing's really crushed me the way that did.
Where my spiritual beliefs, my belief in myself, my sense
of self trust, my trust of others. The shame, I mean,
just incredible, excruciating experience of shame beyond anything I could

(59:20):
have imagined in the past. And then working through listening
to cult Faults and listening to other podcasts and reading
the books and following the experts. You know, I've been
listening obsessively and watching all the films, you know, since

(59:40):
that happened. And I actually my therapist at one point
was like, you have to cut yourself off because you're
really just reactivating yourself every time. And there was you know,
I'm luckily past that point, but there was a place
where ironically it was almost the same kind of dysregulation
that I got, because it's a really intense emotional state.

(01:00:02):
And so I was like, oh, this is me needing
to have a different relationship with my own you know,
emotional process.

Speaker 2 (01:00:30):
Yeah, it's so tricky that finding the bands between you know,
the race to get to the end of the healing journey.
Guess let's just do it all an hour and one go.
I'm going to read all these books and one day
and I'm going to be healed. That's it done. There's
there's that that to kind of reconcile with that. There's
also the element of the the psycho education.

Speaker 3 (01:00:52):
Right.

Speaker 2 (01:00:52):
The more you learn, the more you understand, like hearing
the term Davo described to you and realizing in that moment, Wow,
that's what happened to me. It is dysregulating, but it's
so empowering at the same time. And that kind of
fluctuation between understanding through language what happened to you, but
also needing to cut back on that because it's really,

(01:01:14):
you know again devastating to go and understand that those
processes were put onto you and it's hard to find.
It's hard to find that, bazz, It's impossible, right, That's
why everybody talks about how different their healing journeys are.

Speaker 3 (01:01:30):
Yeah, I mean, and the thing I would say is,
you know, whatever shortcut I was looking for with Isna,
I didn't get the shortcut. You know, It's I feel
more healed now. Though I still have, you know, moments
of PTSD and overwhelm and and just needing to take

(01:01:51):
a lot of time and space even from the activist
perspective or you know, engaging with parts, because I just
have realized that I'm a little more tender, yeah, and
sensitive and rebuilding, and that there isn't a shortcut to that.

(01:02:15):
It's you know, there's just not a shortcuts.

Speaker 2 (01:02:21):
Has marketed itself as a path to spiritual sexual healing,
but now has some serious and substantiated through survivor testimonies
allegations against them of sexual harm, sexual misconduct. And this
website that you forwarded me Save for Sex Positive and
Spiritual Communities or three SC, which I'll put a link

(01:02:46):
to in the episode description is something that is being
used as a platform to try and hold ISTA accountable.
So it says here on the website say the sex
positive and Spiritual communities, and then it starts it says

(01:03:07):
starting with IST. So first of all, it is their
plans to look into other groups like One Taste, for example,
that market themselves as a path of spiritual sexual healing
or female empowerment but actually turn out to be doing
the opposite of that, and what else can you tell

(01:03:31):
us about this particular platform in regards to I mean,
you've just talked there about trying to work with ISSTA
and it wasn't successful. They didn't change, so I'm guessing
that that all came through this website as well.

Speaker 3 (01:03:48):
Yeah, so from the issues with IST and heightend Facebook group.
You know, it's not a great name, it's a mouthful,
so we adopted the name Yeah three sc and the
website was like, how do we have a public place
to document our journey? And of course the fantasy is

(01:04:08):
that things will go well and this could be a
roadmap for other organizations in terms of saying, hey, let's
try this other approach. In some it's had to do
with being transparent and not being limited to Facebook. And
so there's a timeline on there that I think is
a great place to start for people who are interested

(01:04:31):
in the journey, and it really tracks our communications decision making.
It's very worthy for those of you who don't you know,
want really long posts. But there was a feeling of
really wanting to be duanced and be articulate and specific

(01:04:56):
and name you know, what we were up to. And
I do think it still can be a roadmap for
you know, why some of these things may not work.
I felt really comforted when I met with Carol Murchison,
the lawyer, you know Carol and.

Speaker 2 (01:05:18):
Big love for Carol, big love which just send a
little heart out to Carol into the universe.

Speaker 3 (01:05:25):
And she said, you know, and I was like, well,
I spent two years trying to change it, and she
was like, I spent four. And then I talked to
you know, Chris Shelton or John a Tech and They're like, yeah,
I spent two, or I've spent ten or if you
think about it, and I'm like, oh, yeah, a lot
of people like myself who are very caring and we're

(01:05:47):
really excited about the mission or the possibility we will
turn around and try to make it better. And in
all those cases, I don't think any of us have
actually succeeded, not.

Speaker 2 (01:06:03):
With the group that you're trying to work with explicitly,
but in networking and working with survivors. You know, when
I think about when I think about John John Aytak,
I think about you know, he's definitely impacted scientology in
a way that's positive for us and perhaps not so

(01:06:24):
positive for scientology themselves. But the amount of people that
he's helped with that ripple effect is incredible. I mean,
we'll never really know the reach of John's work, or
Chris's or John's you know, John Hunter. There's all these amazing,
incredible people that you've mentioned in this episode, and so

(01:06:45):
you know, we might not be able to take scientology down,
but some other networks in groups and exploitative individuals will
crumble because of the work that all of you are
doing collectively, or all of us, I should say are
doing collectively. Yeah, there's there's just so much admiration from
me to all of these people and you know, including yourself,

(01:07:08):
for all of the work. It's it's incredible, and it
helps when the work can get overwhelming and depressing and
and you can feel like you don't want to do
this anymore, and then you take a little bit of
time away, then you chat with somebody like John and
you're like, oh my gosh, I'm inspired again. Let's go.

Speaker 3 (01:07:29):
And I think that loops back to your pointing out
on our mission starting with Ista. I need to update
that because I think we're thinking of this as more
of either a project of having worked with Ista in
a case study, as of small volunteer team. Uh don't

(01:07:54):
have the capacity to invest this kind of time, energy, care,
heartbreak into engaging with other organizations, and so it making
it more of an educational site. And that that's why
it really matters. And then also for those people who
might think they want to go to ISTA and someone

(01:08:16):
directs them to the site and they can say, wow,
these people are not just you know, being reactive and angry.
They spent two years in face to face talks with
a mediator, They created documents, they did really heavy lifting
to you know, we could have been paid as consultants

(01:08:38):
for thousands of dollars for the work that we did
for free to try to reduce arms and to have
survivors needs met. And those are places that have failed.
They're requiring NDAs of survivors that have non disparagement agreements.
That comes up in the New York magazine piece that

(01:09:01):
I think you alluded to and you know, which we
should basically say, has an account of rape and a
ritual that's to went on in their response to you know,
deny it as as rape and to make excuses that
there was some kind of a consent that superseded this
This woman's experience, so I think we need to name

(01:09:24):
that that's that's how bad right it is, and that
one of the facilitators, whether at ist or not, has
been accused multiple times of dragging young women in Israel
and having sex with them. He's no longer in the organization,
but there's still huge ties between between them. I mean,

(01:09:47):
I think we have had an impact on ISTA collectively.
There are other activists at work, which I think is
also interesting to mention. You know, we chose a particular
path that a lot of people said was doomed for failure,
and it made them very upset, and some of some
of them are just our critics, and then others have

(01:10:10):
been like, hey, we want to take a different approach,
and they've done things like letter writing campaigns and reaching
out to potential participants and trying to warn them and
trying to get venues to shut them down rite or
hold the venue accountable for holding a group that's going
to cause harm. And we said we weren't going to

(01:10:31):
take those tactics. But I will tell you that part
of getting us to the table was the fact that
other activists were acting in other ways. And I just
want to do a shout out for activism as an ecosystem,
and instead of turning on each other and criticizing each
other when we're trying to make things better, if we
could say, wow, you're playing a different role and you're

(01:10:52):
taking a different approach, And it makes me really clear
that this is the role I want to take, because
I'm tired of being attacked about it from people who,
assuming we're on the same side, we were calling about,
you know, as harmful.

Speaker 2 (01:11:07):
I just yeah, yeah, it's I call it the survivor
community minefield. It's so tricky to navigate. You have to
be like almost two different people depending on who you're
talking with in terms of like, you know, some people
don't like Steve Hassen's work, for example, So if I

(01:11:29):
have a talk with Steve Hassen, I can't then go
and tell certain survivor community groups that I've had a
talk with Steve Hassen because that would really upset them
and then they don't want to work with me anymore.
So it's like you have to really work out how
to become a neutral space almost. It's so political and
there's so much gatekeeping, and at the end of the day,

(01:11:51):
I think to myself, we're all trying to achieve the
same thing. We're all trying to reach. We're all trying
to help survivors, we're all trying to heal, and we're
all trying to hold exploitative individuals to account. We just
want them to take accountability and to stop harming people.
And I think you know you've mentioned there that got

(01:12:15):
people to sign NDAs that they had contradictory public responses
to what the three sc as in yourself and your
team were putting out to the public or what was
being said on the Facebook group. And to have survivors
fighting amongst each other almost gives more credibility to ISTA

(01:12:40):
when they deny those public responses, because if people come
to your Facebook page for information and all it is
is people yelling at each other on what they think
is the right thing to do. That is detrimental to
the activist process. And I always talk about the Scientology
in this way because the Scientology survivor community is really

(01:13:01):
difficult to navigate. It's it's it's contentious, it's it's uh.

Speaker 3 (01:13:10):
It's tricky.

Speaker 2 (01:13:11):
And I think to myself, you know, Scientology are going
to take one look at at at the ex Scientology
community and and probably say, wow, well they're all too
busy fighting amongst themselves to worry about what we're doing here,
so that's really good for us. And and and even
using the infighting as an example to two scientologists to say,

(01:13:34):
this is what it looks like if you leave, and
that's not nice to look at. It's not you know,
and I know that not every survivor community is going
to be like this, but I always always talk about
the minefield and how hard it is to navigate. And
I think you're so right in what you've just said.
We can all work at it differently and but in

(01:13:54):
a collaborative way. You know, we can all I said,
it's about podcasts as well, because gatekeeping is wife in
the podcasting community. But we could all if me and
ten other podcasters could talk about the same cult or
cultic group in an episode, and every episode would be
different because we're all different podcasters and survivors are very

(01:14:16):
much the same way, and they're we're going to take
this approach, and I want to take that approach, and
I'd like to do this, and let's work together to
do that. And it doesn't mean that you know, you
going and doing one type of activism is going to
prevent somebody from doing their type of activism. Actually, if
we're all doing different things, it culminates into a bigger
and better process. I'm just not a soapbox now. But

(01:14:38):
you can tell Kara that this has been getting to
me for the last five years.

Speaker 3 (01:14:42):
Oh and I can't tell you how much I appreciate that, Casey,
because I've felt pretty alone, you know, in being like,
wait a minute. It's funny because it's like, uh, you know,
I'm in ISTA, or I identify with Ista. Oh, I identify
as a survivor. But then there's a group of survivors
who are using some of the same shaming coercion blaming

(01:15:06):
on other survivors because they're not doing it the way
they want to do it. And uh, you know, and
we're all imperfect, like yeah, no, I'm not going to
do even what I set out to do perfectly. And
yet the doing something other than apathy or sitting in

(01:15:28):
the cheap seats and throwing eggs at the people who
are on the field actually you know, engaged in the
hard work of talking to people that you're really angry at.
I mean, that was just an experience for me as
a human to be like, I'm sitting in the zoom

(01:15:48):
room with people that I want to rip my hair out,
I want to sit and scream at them, and yet
there's no productive conversation that starts with me unleashing my
emotional raid on that. And so you know, what is
our responsibility to at least attempt civil discourse. And I

(01:16:10):
understand some of the suspicions of our group based on
you know, other members had friends or connections with an
Is Stunt, so there was a sense that we were
just a whitewashing machine, and so that people are really
suspicious and I recognize that. And yet I've also learned

(01:16:32):
in the process, as I'm sure you've learned with your
voice and your platform, is like, it's not my job
to respond to every one of your accusations. It's not
my job to prove myself to you as a fellow
survivor in that way. That's just as much as me
trying to prove that I'm good enough within the cult.

(01:16:53):
And I'm just not here to do that anymore. And yeah,
I appreciate you saying that it is is a minefield,
and I recognize it. When I was also hyper sensitive,
so raw, it was hard to talk to anybody without
getting triggered, without misinterpreting it, and with paranoia and uh

(01:17:15):
yeah right, so it's it is really I.

Speaker 2 (01:17:18):
Think that's another tricky thing though, isn't it another minefield
if you will, This fear, intimidation, humiliation, and paranoia that
is cultivated in the group. Those are things that people
carry with them post cultic experience or involvement. So it's
it's hard to and and trauma, I think trauma is

(01:17:42):
the most important thing when it comes to the survivor communities.
It's it's not that people shouldn't be heard or that
people shouldn't express themselves. It's I think it's just understanding
that everybody is going to these spaces with trauma, and

(01:18:04):
everybody is expressing themselves and experiencing that that that trauma
in a different way. How we accommodate for all of
that noise and still remain compassionate towards one another. That's
the That's the key. I mean, obviously I don't know
the answers to that. I could probably cultivate world peace
if I do the answer to that, But it's it's

(01:18:25):
hard because you know, you recognize that everybody is going
through something. There's a spectrum. It could be a small thing,
it could be a big thing. Everybody is experiencing their
own trauma differently, and that is really what's what's rearing

(01:18:47):
in these survivor communities. The distrust and the paranoia and
the humiliation. These are all things I think that are
cultivated and groomed within the cultic environment, are carried outside
and then continue. There's so much work we have to
do on ourselves to recognize those things, to recognize when

(01:19:10):
we're doing those things, and to kind of almost like
regroom ourselves or I should say, coach ourselves there is
a better way to say it, into changing those habits.
And that is really hard because it's ingrained at that point,
isn't it.

Speaker 3 (01:19:29):
Yeah, I think, you know, if we're going to do
that kind of work, one of the things I would says,
we can't do large group awareness trainings like any of
that dealing with trauma, you know, relational group dynamics, sexuality.
People say, well, where do I go if I can't
go to ISTA? Because there's a demand for us to

(01:19:49):
be able to heal and create and connect in these ways,
and we post it on the website. You know, we
don't have an answer. We can't tell you to go.
We're not gonna promote anybody. But here's a series of
questions to really consider about what your motivation is, what
you want to get out of it, and then just saying,

(01:20:10):
you know, especially if it's evolving sexuality, don't go to
a large group training. Don't go to something with I
mean I would say, do one on one or you know,
two or three. I wouldn't. I would say, like you
deserve the attention and the you know two to move,
smoke smoothly at your pace, in a in a in

(01:20:31):
a in a real way, or you know, find sex
positive communities and small trainings, and but be very careful
of putting yourself in these large group containers. Uh A,
begut because of the social impact, right that we talked
about in the beginning.

Speaker 2 (01:21:13):
So in conclusion, really, if you're exploring sacred sexuality, shamanism
or tantra, do so with trained, licensed professionals, transparent programs
and structures that prioritize consent and safety. True consent I

(01:21:36):
mean as true as you can find. EASTA based on
available evidence fails to meet those necessary standards. So if
you are considering it then and you're listening to this episode,
I would say, consider this a big red flag, big
red flag, we're waving it. Look elsewhere.

Speaker 3 (01:21:59):
Yeah, I have to say that that that's the case.

Speaker 2 (01:22:03):
Yeah, when you think about other people in the survivor
community that have experienced ISTER or something similar to esther,
whether that is like one taste or a landmark, you know,
all the different kind of areas that ister might fit into.
When you're looking at cultic groups, what would you say

(01:22:27):
to survivors that are going through their own healing process
and trying to trying to reconcile with themselves, you know,
trusting themselves again, trusting others again, trying to find or
trying to find the confidence to explore safely their sexuality

(01:22:48):
and sexual spaces. Do you have any advice that you
would give to people that are going through all of
these things?

Speaker 3 (01:22:54):
I mean, I can speak to what's worked for me,
and it's been one on one therapy weekly with a
licensed therapist. I did go on to antidepressants a couple
months into you know, discovering it because it was I
was just so messed up and I had been very

(01:23:15):
scared about using antidepressants. I was kind of in the
world of like I should be able to manage it
all through my amazing brain. It's all my fault that
I feel that, like just layers of shame that got
in the way, and so it was a really big
deal for me to say, hey, I'm gonna accept help
for this period and time. And then I've really found

(01:23:36):
so much good in small survivor groups and they haven't
all been just ista survivors. I kind of find that
difficult to navigate, being both the survivor and then the
activist and then feeling so I'm working on that to
see who wants to show up. But I've participated in

(01:23:57):
like Rachel Bernstein's, you know, survivor groups, and it's just amazing.
And there is something that happens to my nervous system
where I just I feel so safe. None of these
people are judging me. Everybody's dealing with their own battle,
and it's like my body recognizes that these people are

(01:24:20):
not a threat. I guess, or you know, we have
something really in common. I have a T shirt that
I want I want to make that says, all the
best people join cults and leave them and it's you know, because,
as Carol Murchison says, like you have really pro social behaviors.

(01:24:42):
You're trusting, you want to make the world better. You know,
you're you, you want to belong and and those our
beautiful pro social behaviors they get manipulated, captured by coercive groups.

Speaker 2 (01:25:00):
Yeah, absolutely absolutely, I would say actively identified and and
and and they're like almost recruitment. I think what I'm
trying to say is I think those personality traits are

(01:25:20):
identified in people and then are exploited by cult leaders.
People want to have loyal people, smart people, confident people,
hard working people. These are all again pro social traits
that I think are identified by cult leaders and people
in leadership and and con artists and uh and and

(01:25:40):
and abusive individuals in our lives bosses or husbands or
fathers or whatever. And they take those pro social parts
of you and they're like, I can I can exploit
those traits for my own personal gain and which is

(01:26:01):
really sad it is.

Speaker 3 (01:26:03):
And I think there's two flavors I'd be curious about
your thought on this Casey. I think there's the des Nichols,
where there's probably some kind of a sex addiction, you know,
But I don't think he's so much of a power
player in that he brought in other leaders, and he
brought in Bruce Lyon, and we haven't talked about Heiden,

(01:26:23):
but there's this connection between Ista and Heiden. They're super intermingled.
They cannot separate from each other, no matter what their
mouth noises are about that. But I think that Bruce,
based on reports from those that have known him, he

(01:26:43):
is more of the conscious or manipulative, where I think
he would identify it consciously and I think other people
identify it unconsciously. Does that make sense, Like they're they're
not saying, Oh, that's the confident one, They're reacting to
the feeling of that's the one I should target next.

Speaker 2 (01:27:05):
Yeah. Yeah, I think you're right. It's different when people
are indoctrinated and then deployed to the streets and told
look for people that fit these characteristics. But obviously in
a workshop setting, you might be looking around as a
perpetrator for somebody that fits a certain model or exhibits

(01:27:31):
certain behaviors. I think you're definitely right in that way.
But something that Laura Richards said to me on a
panel the other day when we were at crime con together.
Is that you know, people that are sexually abusive, sexually exploitative,
it's not because of the sex, it's because of the power.

(01:27:51):
It's always about control. So you know, David Berg in
his predatory way, it was still about control. And I
would argue that ist claiming to be about you know,
safety and consent and sexual freedom is actually about controlling,
controlling people at least when.

Speaker 4 (01:28:11):
You look at the leadership, I would say especially, I mean,
I think Dez had a vision that why can't we
all just get along and everybody can have sex and
it would be beautiful and.

Speaker 3 (01:28:22):
It's all love and it's all light and genuinely it
would be like, that's really my vision and intention. Bruce
Lyon and Heiden Temple, just to mention that the temple
training is six weeks. It does about a week, but
if you go to Heiden and you do their temple training,
that's six weeks. And Bruce very much owns his quote

(01:28:46):
unquote spiritual lineage as coming from Alice Bailey, the Blavatsky lineage, okay,
and right, is claiming that he's channeling the same entity
trans you know, trans Himalayan whatever. I just mean't anyway.

(01:29:08):
So you know, he's in in a lineage and he
uh designed level two, which is the initiation and level two. UH.
Level one is like, you're working through your personal stuff.
This is the sex education you should have had in
high school or college. Don't you wish, you know, we'd
all had this kind of healing. Level two is we're

(01:29:31):
working on the energies of the world. This is the
trans personal or outer planets. If you're into astrology, it's
it's you know, beyond that that personal. And I thought
that was really exciting. I'm like, oh, I can tap
into the grief of the world and and try to
you know, channel that or shift that into the love

(01:29:52):
of the world.

Speaker 2 (01:29:52):
We can heal the world. We can make the world
a better place. We're on a mission that's bigger than ourselves.
Do you know what? That's really interesting that you mentioned
Blavatsky there, because we've talked a bit about the New
Age stuff. Were you talking about astrology there? That feels
more new Age in how I understand it. But now
the word initiation and now you're talking about Blavatsky and esotericism,

(01:30:14):
so that is all tying in very that ties into
my understanding of that side of esoteric teachings. And I
think that's really interesting that you've got somebody that calls
themselves Barber as far as I understand, so.

Speaker 3 (01:30:35):
Well, yeah Barba deez, and then Bruce Lyon and wh yeah. Right,
So it's like a marriage of two angles of that, right,
And you know, so Bruce, I would say, is much
more of our traditional cult leader archetype. And from the

(01:30:58):
survivors I've talked to, very few will come public. And
part of the fear is that they've entwined their spirits
on these other planes with Bruce, and so he has
access to them, might read their minds, you know, hugely charismatic,

(01:31:19):
lots of galaxy brain if you watch his YouTube, lots
of you know, blah blah blah hypnotic nonsense. But having
people you know, be under his thumb for six weeks
or then join the larger community or stay or by
property now all over the world to land the temples

(01:31:40):
to save the planet as part of the transition to
twenty thirty or whatever. It's way more culty than Ista,
which I think has you know, some really bad teachings
and learnings and it ties together. But I think Ista
with one we is really a funnel to hideen for

(01:32:03):
six weeks and the deeper community idea. And now Ista
and Heiden are claiming that they're different. Bruce and Des
have parted ways and are feuding, and if there's been
a letter and drama and you know the feeling that

(01:32:26):
Bruce really took over and pushed Dez out and Des
became the scapegoat for all the bad things. And so
when we collected reports of harm, I will say the
way we categorized them as we went through and counted
up the individual harms and categorized them, and that Bruce

(01:32:47):
Lyon had the highest count of harms. But when we
engaged with Ista and we provided information to Bruce, we
had more information on Ista, and as so much as
a small team, we did not have the capacity to
take on Bruce. And again because fewer people will speak

(01:33:07):
out even now, there's a lot of silence around it,
and it's a smaller number of people that have probably
been impacted, I think far more deeply.

Speaker 2 (01:33:20):
Wow, that's a yeah, that sounds particularly problematic, but again
goes back to the paranoia and the fear and the
intimidation and humiliation that is carried from within the group
to outside of the group, and people will be genuinely
worried for their spiritual selves. And that for people that
aren't spiritual, I think can be a really hard concept

(01:33:42):
to grasp, Like when we're talking about religious and spiritual
abuse or spiritual and ritualistic abuse, it can be really
hard for people that don't have that spiritual self or
haven't considered their spirituality or their religiosity to contemplate their

(01:34:03):
their like non physical self, which which can be just
as harmed. You know, your spiritual self can be used
as a tool of control, you know, whether that's talking
about your eternal soul or whether that's talking about you know,
your your even generational ancestry stuff, you know, your your

(01:34:24):
your ancestral wounds or whatever people will use to to
People will use anything to control you. Basically as what
I'm trying to say. But I've got really one last
question to ask before we sign off today, and that is,
for somebody that has been interested in New Age shamanistic

(01:34:50):
spiritual seeking in their life, how can you find that
in today's age when there is so much con artistry,
when there is so much exploitation, so many influences online
that claim to have you know, these guru charm and

(01:35:15):
medicine people titles, but are just all there like to
make a quick book. How do you explore that that
you know? How do you seek safely? How do you
seek safely? Kara?

Speaker 3 (01:35:27):
Yeah, I mean I would like you know, is the
practitioner you're looking at have they signed up for a
Seek Safely pledge? Right? Seek Safely is actually an organization
that you know, came out of the death of a
woman through James Ray or James Ray, James Ray, j Ray,

(01:35:48):
James Ray anyway, and their position is we are seekers.
I've had friends tell me like, stop joining things, stop seeking,
and I'm like, I actually don't know how to do that,
Like it is part of me. Can I seek more safely?

(01:36:10):
Can I seek safely? Way more? Now? I think the
discernment of moving slowly, being educated about pressure techniques of sales,
you know, being educated is the best thing that we have.

(01:36:31):
I also think that's really tricky because we often are
attracted to or targeted by these groups when we're really vulnerable,
and that's not an easy time to try to employ.
You know, these deep critical thinkings. And I know I
was excited about it. I watched the film and I thought, oh,
thank god, this guy's not running it anymore, because he'd

(01:36:52):
already stepped away. But I didn't think, oh, this is
the guy that set the die in motion, honey, you know,
And so ways that we check ourselves or lie to
ourselves or you know, rationalize and justify, you know, I
want to do it, and I'm gonna find a way
to rationalize it. So I think there's how do we

(01:37:15):
avoid them? But then how do we handle it when
we're in one or need to get out of one,
because we might find ourselves in them. I talk to
my kids about you're really smart, you're really clever. Somebody's
going to trick you one day, and it's not that
you got tricked, it's that you don't let that undermine you.
Like some teenagers that are, you know, being targeted online

(01:37:37):
and children and they're being manipulated into giving compromising information.
They get threatened and they commit suicide because they don't
have the resilience. They don't understand about the shame, they
don't have a time horizon that things can get better
over time. So as adults, I think it's like, what's

(01:37:59):
your game plan. If you get tricked, how do can
we say like, oh shit, I got tricked. I need
to get out. And so, you know, maybe maybe we
can't avoid the mistakes without playing. Maybe it is just
risky by nature, but we can be educated. Don't go
to a large group awareness training. Try to get some background,

(01:38:20):
try to get some second opinions. I finally have a
friend where I send every website and they're like, this,
this is ridiculous. What is it that you're And I'm like,
but they're so confident, and they're promising this, that and
the other, and they're like, yeah, honey, which is all
smoke and mirrors. It's an illusion. So don't give your

(01:38:41):
power away. We're in an age of glam influencers, the
false confidence.

Speaker 2 (01:38:49):
I would love prosperity.

Speaker 3 (01:38:51):
They the manifestation. Look how I manifested it, and I
you know, I just recommend actually being doing your best,
especially if you're someone like me who doesn't my nature
super skeptical. Learn some skills around skepticalness.

Speaker 2 (01:39:11):
It's not a word, but just skepticism. It's usually me
making ons off. It's usually me going out just to
explain afy yourself.

Speaker 3 (01:39:25):
You know, and and uh. And ideally, you know, cultivates
If you're not a great skeptic, maybe you cultivate that
in your life and you have a friend like I
do now where I'm like, oh, you're my double check,
and then I really trust you. I have ways to
reality test with diverse people. And that's a little vulnerable too,

(01:39:46):
because like, oh, I want this thing and I'm gonna,
you know, let you opine about it. But I think that,
like you said, it's not that every sex positive community
or or meeting or even possibly a retreat is harmful.
It's just that a lot are Yep.

Speaker 2 (01:40:09):
Absolutely, And if something seems too good to be true,
keep doing that digging, keep doing that due diligence as
much as you can. I mean, you've spent a year
in conversations with Ister, and they seem to have made
some changes, but they have not made as many positive

(01:40:30):
changes is perhaps they should have done. But think about
all the public information there is now from yourself and
others doing this work. That if you type Ister into Google,
you're going to find some of that information that perhaps
wasn't out there when you went on your first retreat.

(01:40:50):
And also, what I love is that one of the
facilitators themselves shared the Facebook page like, look, this type
of stuff's being said about us. You know, you might
still be attending these retreats. You might be in the
inn in a circle, you know if you if the
facilitator themselves hunt shared that. So there's the power of

(01:41:11):
information control people. This facilitator provided a leak that leak
led to the downbreaking and hYP you are today with
an activist talking about all the things that she has
done to speak out about this exploitative group, so that
you get power of information.

Speaker 3 (01:41:27):
And I will tell you that one of the leaders
who's been around multiple years helped build it. She is
leaving ISTA. The facilitator who darvoed me is leaving ISTA.
So some of us are like, yeah, it looks like
a sinking ship. And the right I think a few

(01:41:47):
people have actually been disillusioned. I think other people are
saving their skin. But what's important to know is that
all of those people who are going to go on
and facilitate are in general perpetuating this same harmful practices.
And so be skeptical. And you find you know someone
with this in their background, or we're willing to talk

(01:42:09):
to them about how have you personally learned. What have
you done differently? How do you take responsibility? Because what we.

Speaker 2 (01:42:16):
Fast is what you'd need on a T shirt Stay
Skeptical hashtag stay Skeptical, That's what you need on a
T shirt. And also, I don't know if Lyons and
Nichols would have gone their separate ways and had this
kind of feud if this information didn't all come forward
as well. So then again, you know, is the ripple effect.
There's not the accountability that we would expect and hope

(01:42:39):
to see as optimists and as people that just want,
you know, everything to be okay. But I think when
you look at it all in black and white and
things that have transpired since this activism started, there are
definitely lots of positive changes that you hopefully can carry
with you going forward in your own recovery. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:42:59):
I think often of them as seeds, and I thought
of them as like seeds of light that we got
our report inside ISTA and that all of the seventy
or so facilitators and organizers were exposed to those reports
of harm. So I'm like, oh, those are seeds that hopefully,

(01:43:20):
if they're not sprouting yet, we know that sometimes it
takes years and years to collect enough data to break
the shelf, as Jana would say, and come to have
to deal directly with Oh these were the red flags
or these are the things that really hurt me, the
breadcrumbs that you know come together. So thank you. Yeah,

(01:43:45):
I do, I do. You know, I thought mediation would
be three months. We thought we'll just get in there,
We'll have these meetings because of Ista's schedule, because of
the degree of changes, you know, it took over a
year and then a year of like chats and stuff.
And I think it's worth if you have friends in

(01:44:09):
a cult and you know, to stay connected to them,
to keep the lines of communication open, to not shame
people who are trapped in those mindsets and dynamics, because
it's really hard to come out, and we are shaming
ourselves and we've been shamed, and so if we can

(01:44:31):
keep that compassion and kindness open, then if we get
sucked in, it's easier to get out. And if it's
easier to get out, if we build these skills and
these muscles and we're looking out for each other, that
these groups are gonna, you know, just not be as powerful.
How we meet the demand to have crazy spiritual experiences

(01:44:54):
in a safe way. I don't know. I mean, I'm
on that journey. I'm been pretty kept myself kind of
isolated and taken a lot of time and you know,
disconnected from a lot of the sex positive community. All
these you know, as part of the healing journey. And

(01:45:15):
so I would say, you know, a lot of it
just takes more time than we think, both to recover
but also to have the influence the change, to reach
the number of people's a podcast like yours does right
that that that's been your consistency, your dedication, and so
the ripples are huge. So I do hope that we

(01:45:35):
see ripples.

Speaker 2 (01:45:38):
I think so. I think so. And it's it's it's
an exciting time to be doing this work because more
and more of these types of patterns of abuse of
being recognized faster, and things are becoming more publicly available quicker,
and even you know, age old cases or decades of
patterns of abuse in cases like with Russell brand who

(01:46:02):
this guy kind of reminds me of this Nicols guy.
When I looked at a picture of him, kind of
gave me Russell Bryant vibes or vice versa. You know,
I think he even even those decades old allegations are
now being brought into the light. So hopefully we're in
a period of positive change, even though sometimes the world

(01:46:23):
sounds crazy with its conspiracies and it's Donald Trump's.

Speaker 3 (01:46:29):
And I do think, as I said with day Don
p did, even going after Neil Gaiman, you know that
women are coming forward and we're putting the shame where
it belongs. I think that's a really big piece, is
that we've been conditioned to be ashamed, and we've been
shamed as women and as victims or survivors, and for

(01:46:53):
us to have the growth power to say I'm going
to put the shame where it belongs and it's on
the perpetrator, and that we back each other up to
do that because it's really hard and we don't have
the laws. But as all of this, like you said,
is coming up, we're building the laws. And I will
say you know now that I'm in touch with Carol

(01:47:16):
and other lawyers. If there are is to survivors that
have criminal harms that have happened to them, you know
there are people we can connect you with. And a
criminal case is not outside of the possibility, nor a
civil case there are possibilities for civil cases as well,

(01:47:39):
and so I do want that to get out there.
We were done with this phase of the project, but
I've by making all these connections resources getting educated. It
doesn't mean it's the end of road of holding them accountable.
They have huge financial infrastructure, all kinds of you know,

(01:48:01):
organizational uh fraud, and so that's another place that they
might be taken down.

Speaker 2 (01:48:09):
It's and you know, legal experts and lawyers, people like Carol,
they know what spiritual and ritual abuse looks like, and
they're really good at working with survivors of these types
of environments who might walk into another like solicitors or

(01:48:32):
another law firm and explain their situation and have somebody
kind of go CROSSI and say, I don't know what
your tribe, what is the what? What? What's the criminality here?
So you know, it's really amazing to have people like
Carol and her team that understand these experiences and you
can go in and explain it to them and not
have somebody say to you, I don't understand what you're

(01:48:53):
asking me for. So, you know, and that goes with
therapists shorma informed therapists cult inform therapists, and just kind
of building more and more of a network of frontline
workers and experts and professionals that understand these these nuanced
areas as well. So again it's an exciting time. Things

(01:49:13):
are changing, and in some areas for better, in cell
areas for worse. It's just kind of slow going and
we have to keep doing the work as and when
we can. But I'm so thankful for you, your work, your time,
the website that you've sent me. I'll put a link
in the episode description to the three SC website and

(01:49:33):
also to the news articles that are out about Ister
The New York, The New York Magazine and The Cut
and a couple of other pieces that are out as
well regarding Ister, and so if anybody wants to check
those out, then they can. And if you're thinking of

(01:49:54):
joining Ister, just don't, just don't. Thank you so much,
Curra for your time today.

Speaker 3 (01:50:04):
Thank you, Casey

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The International School of Temple Arts - ISTA

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