Landmark Forum - Werner Erhardt - EST, etc.

[4_Legs_Good]

About 5 years ago a very good friend of mine atteneded the "Landmark Forum" which is a kinda self-help workshop deal - 2 or 3 days long, and it supposedly helps you overcome difficulties and dig up long burried animostity. It was started by Werner Erhardt who also did Est in the 70's, IIRC.

Anyway, I've been to several religious retreats, and when you come out of them you're usually pretty psyched and feel like you've got all the answers.

So my friend attends the Landmark Forum deal, and when she comes out she's acting the same way as I would after a religious retreat, so I think they use similar techniques to get you to have a "religious experience" without the religion. They then use that enegery to get the attendees to bring their friends and family to an orientation to try to get them in as well.

Anyway after the seminar for many months, my friend was very annoying, self-righteous, as well as confident, etc. Years later, I think she's totally over it, but who knows?

It seemed very culty to me, but maybe it can help some people deal with serious problems? I don't know.

Anyone have any experience with this program or others like it?

curious!

david

[Cassandra]

1. Yes, I did the Forum in 1987,

when Werner was still running things. I did a lot of courses and the IFLP and finally left around 1991 when I realized that the style was too male-oriented for me. It was not a cult (can't speak for how it is now) but any organization that promises that you will find answers and understand yourself better (and you do) will attract cultish people looking for someone or something to worship. I left easily, with no animosity or anyone trying to keep me there, and have belonged to a women's group, Life Works, ever since that suits me better.

[4_Legs_Good]

2. Interesting...

I went to the seminar deal where they try to get you to come, and between that and my friend's urgings, I felt really, really uncomfortable about the whole thing. I'm sure my friend was being genuine and thought it would help, but the sense of urgency really just turned me off.

I'm glad to hear that it was a positive experience overall to you!

david

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

3. I did the forum, est and worked with Werner personally in the 80's

I agree with you that unless someone does a program or a religious retreat to enhance their OWN life, they will often use it to dominate others or hit them over the head with it.

One has to be sincere about transforming themselves ..not to fix everyone and everything else.

While I don't currently do anything with any of the programs and have not spoken to Werner in years, I would say the following:

They do and did screen people to make sure people who needed therapy were not doing their programs in place of therapy...although some did anyway which is not a good thing.

I think they are too heavy handed with enrolling people into other courses and over the years that has turned a lot of people off. It is a well deserved criticism.

I don't consider the work I did "cult-like" as cults are very closed and secretive..the work I did with the forum inspired me to be more active in my community and other projects outside of the forum.

Feel free to ask me anything else

[4_Legs_Good]

6. I found it hard to find any real information on the Forum

soon after my friend attended, I did a bunch of research, because it was really freaking me out, but I found it very difficult to find any *real* information about it. I can understand wanting to keep techniques secret such that someone can't just publish a book and the corporation loses it's ability to get the customers it needs to survive, but the inability to discover much added to my mistrust of the program, and that's one of the reasons I thought it felt cultish.

All in all, however, I'm sure it's has very positive aspects that help people with their lives, and that's always a good thing.

Hmmmmm... what other questions do I have...

david

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

8. One other thing

It's really not a program for people with problems...problems should be dealt with by professionals..

At any rate, there isn't any intentional secret keeping as regards "techniques." The program uses conversation to have people see the way they've been interpreting their life and how that interpretation colors every decision they make. It's less about them doing anything than it is about people undoing all the decisions they've made about life out of incidents that have occurred in their lives.

I can understand that you were left with creepy feelings..I do think some people in their enrollment process have, indeed, been creepy.

[4_Legs_Good]

9. Understood on the "problems" deal. There were a lot of Buzzwords

like "breakthrough" and "commit" that kept coming up. The later from my friend afterwards. It was kinda like shooting off a nuclear bomb when that word came out - you knew you had to run for the hills because she was DAMNED serious if she was going to "commit" to anything.

I think that conversation is ultra important in these types of programs, same as on religious retreats. It has a lot ot do with just opening up and facing what you've done and who you've been - it's a cleansing of sorts.

There's a lot of "cutting with the past" isn't there? I remember an example they gave about being in a new relationship, and the problem being that when you were with this new person you were also with everyone else you've ever been with and they were clouding your judgement of the new person. Something like that.

It's weird to be thinking of this all again so many years after the fact.

david

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

10. Yep..and while the jargon can be useful when considering we often

don't say what we mean, it becomes hackneyed to hear over and over..especially when it starts sounding like "technique." That said, there is benefit in people realizing how much they weaken themselves to repeatedly make promises to themselves and others that they have no intention of keeping or don't act on with any real intentionality.

As for your second paragraph, I do think there's a real distinction between what we've been doing or thinking in life and who we've been "being"...all of us have had some experience in life with someone who has drained us...it really wasn't what they were doing..it's who they were being...and it's who we were being too! We were being nice, or being a hero or whatever.

So those sort of realizations are useful..in business, in communication and in our most intimate relationships.

As far as your last paragraph is concerned, it isn't really cutting from the past. YOu can't cut from the past or change it but you CAN recognize when experiences and decisions from the past are entering into a present situation. At that point, you have some power to not have those decisions and interpretations color the present because you can recognize them as the past.

[Love Bug]

4. I went to one of their introductory meetings once with a friend

Gave me the heebie-jeebies but my friend took the course and she said she benefited from it. I think you are correct in that they give you a religious experience without the religious trappings. My friend also took their advanced weekend but I haven't heard her mention anything about the Forum for quite some time. YMMV, I guess.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

5. A good friend of mine did it

and was also very confident (to the point of backhanded arrogance), self-righteous, etc. afterwards. However, it did sound as though some of the advice and teachings was kind of worthwhile.

I then discovered a bunch of websites outlining its methods and "cultishness". I directed him to those sites to get his take on what they had to say.

Haven't ever heard his take on those -- but the self-righteousness and arrogance disappeared after a couple of months.

[Patiod]

7. Akkk! I lost a job because of "The Forum"

Had a severely bipolar boss who insisted that everyone in her division attend "The Forum" - most did. She basically said she couldn't work with me unless I signed up for it, and I told her that a client had once blackmailed me into going to an "est" training introduction, I said it was brainwashing, plus I didn't appreciate the cult-like hard sell that followed (calling me at home months later, pushing hundreds of dollars worth of classes.)

Don't know whether it was the use of the word "cultlike" or "brainwashing", neither a good word choice to use with someone who could fire me, but she went batshit (I have legal recording equipment on my phone, but it didn't occur to me to tape her, which would have made my case to management), screamed and carried on, threatened me, and then wrote up a lot of nonsense about how she had only "suggested" The Forum, and that I had refused without giving it any consideration. I got fired from the company the next week.

I recently ran into one of her other victims, and she listed all the employees she had pulled the same shit with (except that all of them DID go through The Forum).

I have a strong aversion to anything where they "break you down and build you back up". In high school, my CCD class (religion class for public-schooled Catholics) was hijacked by evangelicals who sponsored a weekend retreat where we were lectured for 4-5 hours at a stretch, deprived of food & sleep, aggressively challenged, and then asked us to declare our lives for Christ on the last day. I was the ONLY ONE in the group of 12 who didn't find Jesus as my Personal Savior and subsequently leave the Catholic Church for an Evangelical congregation. My parents didn't believe me until their friends kids started going leaving the Catholic Church, after which they contacted the parish priests about what had happened, but it was too late.

[4_Legs_Good]

11. OMG, CCD retreat story is amazing!!!

Yowza!!! How sinister is that???

I agree about the break down to build up point you made, although I also accept the technique as a very effective way to help break barriers and bring in an incredible powerful experience. It is, however, dangerous to put it into someone's hands who is untrustworthy. It's like hypnotism or something; I'm not sure I'd want to trust my subconcious with someone I didn't trust completely and absolutely.

That totally sucks about the job too. One of my co-workers was trying to get the management to pay for anyone to go to the Forum, which kinda freaked me out even more.

david