During the month of February, you heard on The Oprah Winfrey Show, you heard them ask, "Are You Ready to Be Awakened?" They began an interactive class on the interent. I was beginning to think could this be another cult? So I looked up the word cult. Wikipedia says, the word cult "typically refers to a cohesive social group devoted teo beliefs or practices that the surrounding culture considers outside the mainstream, with a notable postive or negative popular perception." My understanding of the book "New Earth," is clearly the views are not typical mainstream views. My understanding of the material has the concepts presentsed require you to suspend critical thinking and say there is only "the Now." They give such phrases like, "If you are aware, you cannot be totally possessed by the ego, by the thought form or the emotional form."
A seed is planted in your mind, that is very small, and then they seed is watered little at a time, and before you know it, the seed has sprouted up in your mind, and before long it’s a full grown concept that you know believe.
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ROBERT J. LIFTON
- In 1961, Robert J. Lifton wrote the definitive book on the subject "THOUGHT REFORM, and the Psychology of Totalism after studying the effects of mind control on American prisoners of war under the Communist Chinese.
- One of the factors Robert Lifton describes is the concept of ‘LOADING THE lNGUAGUE." He said: "The group interprets or uses words and phrases in nenew ways so that often the outside world does not understand. This jargon consists of thought-terminating clicki’s which serve to alter members’s thought process to conform to the group’s way of thinking."
JAY LIFTON
Jay Lifton (born May 16, 1926) is an American psychiatrist and author, chiefly known for his studies of the psychological causes and effects of war and political violence and for his theory of thought reform. He was an early proponent of the techniques of psychohistory.
- Lifton's 1961 book Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of "Brainwashing" in China was a study of coercive techniques that he labelled thought reform or "brainwashing", though he preferred the former term. Othes have labelled it also as "mind control". Lifton describes in detail eight methods which he says are used to change people's minds without their agreement:
- Milieu Control -- The control of information and communication.
- Mystical Manipulation -- The manipulation of experiences that appear spontaneous but in fact were planned and orchestrated.
- Demand for Purity -- The world is viewed as black and white and the members are constantly exhorted to conform to the ideology of the group and strive for perfection.
- Confession -- Sins, as defined by the group, are to be confessed either to a personal monitor or publicly to the group.
- Sacred Science -- The group's doctrine or ideology is considered to be the ultimate Truth, beyond all questioning or dispute.
- Loading the Language -- The group interprets or uses words and phrases in new ways so that often the outside world does not understand.
- Doctrine over person -- The member's personal experiences are subordinated to the sacred science and any contrary experiences must be denied or reinterpreted to fit the ideology of the group.
- Dispensing of existence -- The group has the prerogative to decide who has the right to exist and who does not.
Contrary to popular notions of "brainwashing", Lifton always maintained that such coercion could only influence short-term behavior or produce general neuroses, not permanently change beliefs or personality. Psychologists like Margaret Singer and Steven Hassan (author of the book Combatting Cult Mind Control), later loosely adapted his theories and applied his terms "totalism" and "thought reform" to the practices of certain religious and other types of groups
TOTALISM: THOUGHT REFORM
- Totalism, a word first used in Thought Reform, is Lifton's term for the characteristics of ideological movements and organizations that desire total control over human behavior and thought. (Lifton's usage differs from theories of totalitarianism in that it can be applied to the ideology of groups that do not wield governmental power.) In Lifton's opinion, though such attempts always fail, they follow a common pattern and cause predictable types of psychological damage in individuals and societies. He finds two common motives in totalistic movements: the fear and denial of death, channeled into violence against scapegoat groups that are made to represent a metaphorical threat to survival, and a reactionary fear of social change.
In his later work, Lifton has focused on defining the type of change to which totalism is opposed, for which he coined the term the protean self. In the book of the same title, he states that the development of a "fluid and many-sided personality" is a positive trend in modern societies, and that mental health now requires "continuous exploration and personal experiment", which reactionary and fundamentalist movements oppose.
According to Penguin Publishers, "A NEW EARTH" will be the biggest selling book of all time.
Those who have researched Oprah Winfrey, and those who have influenced her, say she is the most powerful woman in the world, and she has made it her mission in her own words, "transform the world." Her "spiritual" evolution and the persistent determination of her mission.
- She is trying to change South Africa, in the girls home. Then she backed Obama. Oprah said of Obama, "He has an ear for eloquence and a tongue dipped in the unvarnished truth."
- So when did she cross over from TV personality to spiritual and political advisor to the masses? It all started ever so slowly years ago........ and isn’t that the way all will go.
Charles E. Whisnant