❀ the cult of: ➥motivational speakers ➥life coaches ➥personal growth gurus ➥new-age charlatans ➥AWESOMENESS FEST

my god

It'd be a neat study to track the different framings that hucksters have used to hawk their gnosis over the decades.

I doubt that each would use as many scare quotes, tho

The crazy thing about all this is that it all just bottoms out at affiliate marketing and pyramid schemes.

http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20141008-wooing-reluctant-relocators

author uses "online education company" in the first sentence and then never once attempts to explain wtf MindValley actually does to generate $20m in revenue annually

haha bad reporting

"juicy genius"

http://www.embodimentexperience.com/

my favorite cult leader/talk radio host back in the news http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/11/23/the-godfather-of-right-wing-radio.html"> http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/11/23/the-godfather-of-right-wing-radio.html

roy masters was the weirdest thing ever on talk radio, seguing from spooky hypnotizing-his-listeners sermons into all-out rants where he'd "advise" callers that they were consumed by anger and then get start yelling and hang up em

Roy Masters also had a relationship with Sean Hannity. The talk radio phenom and Fox News staple has identified himself as a longtime listener of the TRN patriarch. In 2011, Hannity invited Roy on his radio show to promote Roy’s book The Hypnotic States of Americans. At the beginning of the interview, Hannity told Roy, “I first heard you on the radio, it had to be, in either the late 70s or 80s. On WMCA in New York. You did a weekend program that used to scare the living daylights out of us.”

oh man I laid awake listening to this shit on sunday nights. me and sean hannity, jeez

By 1993, Masters had expanded KOPE-FM into a 24/7 national operation called Talk Radio Network (TRN). “Roy couldn’t be put on any commercial stations because he was too crazy,” Fredinburg says, “so he wanted to create a network that could carry good programming with the goal of syndicating Roy Masters’ lunacy out into the world."

mission accomplished

The most recent This American Life has an interesting segment on "Wake Up Now," which is one of those network marketing cults - http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/543/wake-up-now

i heard that -- it was really depressing
they are exploiting educational inequality and manipulating people and it makes me really mad

Me, too.

The bright side, I guess, is that the guy they talked to at the end had stopped paying money into it and had gone back to work a real job. Although I liked his partner's attitude about the whole thing, that she was just glad to have a stay at home dad to handle the housework while she worked full time.

One thing that stood out to me as particularly insightful was the guy at the end's justification for continuing to take part in Wake Up Now despite the statistics that pretty much nobody actually made a profit from it. He said that he was glad that not everybody made a profit because it showed that only people who worked hard and had the right attitude or drive or whatever would succeed. Because he knew he was willing to work hard, he knew that he would be in the minuscule minority of profit makers. It was just a great example of a certain mindset that humans bring to so many unlikely things (winning the lottery, dieting, any money making endeavor) - like knowing full well that nobody really succeeds at the thing and using that as proof that you will succeed because you are special. It's kind of depressing but kind of impressive, too, this human capacity for optimistic self-delusion.

Yeah but I see the delusion more clearly than I see the optimism. And where did that delusion come from? People who intentionally exploit other people based on their lack of critical thinking skills are a special kind of horrible people imo.

I'd like to hang out with these people

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cd791x1gIxw

shroiyogishoes

http://socialtriggers.com/

is the sales pitch here "You, too, want ugly suits and giant watches"?

it is like he literally used the template from this

http://tiffzhang.com/startup/index.html?s=818164298310

putting this here because i'm convinced it's related

http://gizmodo.com/some-slimy-clickbait-dickhead-stole-my-identity-to-blog-1717040176

this has to be the base-level engine keeping the rest of this crap afloat, right?

Much-needed warning for pregnant women

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BpPOIoBCcAEpvi1.jpg

That's weird.

Anyone heard of Isagenix? Seems to be tied in with this whole scene.

i dunno but i'm in their periscope now so i'll report my findings

the crowd is "woo"ing about how excited they are

Yeah some annual gathering is happening in San Diego.

the guy told them a phrase to say at each other and now the whole crowd is peas-n-carrots-ing each other. It sounds like madness.

The crowd is riveted by this donkey parable.

Anyone heard of Isagenix? Seems to be tied in with this whole scene.

http://www.dealstreetasia.com/stories/mindvalleys-fundraising-aiming-for-acceleration-and-ipo-in-four-years-13804/

i am so glad to see at least on discussion of this on the web. and a good discussion it is. An acquaintance who is pretty much a total flake told me about this 2 years ago and upon looking at the site and reading everything i came away 1) even less informed about what exactly this was and 2) no clue on cost. Not that i was remotely considering this any way. Seriously any one that thinks they are "Awesome, genius, game changer" or what ever other quasi-business/intelligent euphemistic bullshit they want to attach to themselves is inherently not awesome at all. They are an asshole.
So just seems like another scam aimed squarely at those who think they are profound searchers. Easy marks for sure.

"IIRC one of the two speakers was trying to get us to learn about "optimizing teamwork" based on lessons from ... wait for it... people who "successfully" survived the holocaust."
holy shit! that's fucked but comic gold.

"how did your family survive the holocaust?"
"OPTIMALLY"

http://i.imgur.com/sZoNWBm.png

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=th7BZXXbWV4

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CYg43xjUkAAiaw6.png

sometimes i just wish i had the guile and networking skills to bullshit my way through life like these people.

rmde @ "Edupreneur"

this is an odd list

http://www.watkinsmagazine.com/watkins-spiritual-100-list-2016#.Vr3o4ij1Cd0.twitter

no lag∞n, no credibility

http://sebpearce.com/bullshit/

fuck guys how did i miss they totally rebranded??

http://i.imgur.com/LTipTec.png

A fest for u

"mind valley" kind of makes me picture this brain with a big chunk missing on top, in the shape of a valley.

Uncanny mind valley.

rising_wedge_of_head.gif

my mom (former Andrew Cohen follower) forwarded this to me, "warning" me that it refers to Cohen's group as a cult (as if I care). She's moved on to some other guy, Thomas something.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJyYccwCVBk

I am fine with not being radically anything tbh

http://static1.squarespace.com/static/5621346ce4b0a2db4626f7d9/t/56291530e4b0337fcee1ecbe/1445532976554/Book+Cover+Picture.jpg?format=1500w

i'm pretty sure i've discovered the new snorg girl

technically NSFW photos:

http://www.harpersbazaar.com/culture/features/a16297/inside-the-worlds-chicest-cult/

Fun article. Feels like it's the inverse of fedora types, defending "traditional" (recent invention) ideas of gender while being blissfully unaware that times have changed and you can't get away with that stuff anymore. They'll probably do less harm with the feminine caring sharing motherhood emphasis than the patriarchys HULK SMASH but they seem to be coming from the same instinct.