Forward to my Next Book

I started “Book II of The Inner Circle” to document my recovery from 17 years in an organization that morphed into a cult during my time in it. Indeed, there was a long period of recovery involved in the specific damage that had been done to me during those years; but the deeper I went into it, the more I realized that my involvement in it was a symptom and an outcome of my own childhood. I had never imagined that my early days were marked by trauma, but as I studied and learned more about Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (cPTSD), I began connecting the dots between my experience and the insecurity and weak sense of identity I had lived with my entire life. Few people would have suspected that I was insecure back in my high school, college, and rock and roll days. I was outgoing, engaged in a lot of musical and artistic activities, and well-thought-of by most of my peers. But my sense of identity was largely shaped by my musical persona, and I only felt comfortable in my own skin while playing the guitar or performing on stage. Most of the time, without a guitar in my hands I was at a loss of how to interact socially.

During my studies to become a Trauma Recovery Coach several years ago, I learned about John Bowlby’s work on attachment theory, in which he stipulated that various forms of insecure attachment (to primary caregivers in infancy) can be the outcome of early, pre-verbal events and circumstances that are so common today that we might not even think of them as traumatic: temporary absence or depression of the mother; raised voices, arguments, alcoholism, or violence in the home; an illness or death impacting a family member – virtually anything beyond the child’s control that would infringe on its sense of security and safety. This made perfect sense, and it seemed to me a logical extension that an insecure attachment style would lead to an insecure sense of identity later in life. When I started putting this together, my earlier involvement in Yogi Bhajan’s Kundalini cult started making sense. Even decades ago when I started writing “The Inner Circle” about my time with him, I was acutely aware that my fractured and insecure sense of identity had made me vulnerable to the idea of “spiritual liberation” and the implicit promise of a new and secure sense of identity, first as a yoga teacher, and later as an “ordained minister of the Sikh religion.” And all that time I thought I was just being ideological and pursuing a spiritual path!

But there was dark side to that spiritual path, rooted in the mantra “turn your emotion into devotion…”. Little did I know that this was a formula for emotional denial and stunted personal growth! It all became abundantly clear, however, when after 17 years, I finally left the organization and tried to integrate myself into the “real world.” I was startled to discover that at the age of 37, when most people should be feeling reasonably secure in their personal and professional lives, I felt like a 15-year-old child. There was yet another very dark aspect of the spiritual path to which I had devoted my entire adult life. Deeply embedded within the organization’s norms were three dangerous concepts – never articulated, but easily identifiable in retrospect: “the end justifies the means”, “might makes right,” and “it’s only wrong if you get caught.” It was deeply disturbing to come to grips over time with the fact that my sense of ethics had become corrupted over those 17 corrosive years. For decades afterwards I struggled to bring myself back to a sense of abiding integrity, instead of feeling justified in cutting corners in financial, legal, and personal matters.

There is another downside to having an insecure sense of identity: in my case it made me vulnerable to charismatic leaders and partners with powerful personalities, for I trusted their strength and dominance of opinion over my own better judgment. In fact, I was incapable of standing up for myself in their presence – and it wasn’t only with the cult leader: this weakness was manifested in my business and intimate relationships, too, and it was nearly 30 years before I started feeling enough self-confidence to trust my own feelings and to speak my truth.

During the course of my recovery, my thinking was further influenced by Maslow’s “hierarchy of needs”, and both Erickson’s “stages of development” and Overstreet’s “stages of maturity”. Their work suggests that human development in many of its facets can be slowed or arrested entirely by various forms of trauma. For example, a person might be physically mature and highly successful in his vocation, but – perhaps as the result of a domineering and demanding father, or some other traumatizing influence – immature in his emotional development (something we see all too often in American business and politics). Such a person would be inclined to self-identify based on achievement rather than character.

And this leads me to another angle I have been exploring: the tension between our animal nature and our human nature, and how, during the course of our lives, we grow from the former to the latter. I think of our animal nature as characterized by instincts, reactivity, defensiveness, and a slew of selfish and harmful behaviors and vices we often see during childhood and adolescence (think “Lord of the Flies”), while our human nature – or should I say “evolved” human nature – is characterized by kindness, compassion, empathy, generosity, thoughtfulness, and a host of other behavioral traits commonly considered virtues.

Healing from the damage caused by cults, like healing from the damage caused by childhood trauma, requires compassion and vulnerability. It is important to understand and acknowledge the conditions that led to involvement in a cult – or any abusive relationship. This is not easy, for it is never easy to accept responsibility for decisions made in ignorance – mainly because it feels like blaming the victim. And, in truth, we are not responsible for the traumas inflicted upon us in our childhood. But if we are to truly heal from them, it is still important to acknowledge how they shaped us and to understand their impact on us. This is only possible in an environment of compassionate listening, where there is no blame or judgment, and where a compassionate witness can allow us to be vulnerable and get past the shields of defensiveness that would otherwise keep us locked into a trauma-shaped sense of identity.

MORE TO FOLLOW… And I welcome your comments.