How To Not Be A Cult | Protecting Your Autonomy in Spiritual Communities

It is very, very easy even in a community centered around anti-establishment revolutionary values for hierarchies to emerge spontaneously: its usually the weirdest, most eccentric clown that rises to the status of outcast king of the clowns in a circus gathering of weirdo outcasts that we call "sangha". 

And after all, what is a spiritual community but a gathering of weirdo outcastes for whom community and sense of belonging have been withheld by mainstream society?

Its this very need to belong, this very human craving for connection that is often leveraged against you to stay in communities that you should have long since left. 

The point of school is to graduate but we often don't want to because it means entering into a world that once harmed us and rejected us and because it would of course, naturally, be safer to stay in the supposed safety of the school yard. The point of a community is to make us all individuals and yet how often do we sacrifice that sovereign individuality in order just to fit in? As a consequence, spiritual communities, even those with high ideals reacting to the problems of society, become micro societies with the exact same problems (and because of their insular nature, often much more exaggerated versions of the same problems). 

To this we say, lovingly: fuck all that. Let's be self aware, vigilant, ruthlessly independent and unafraid of entering and (more importantly) leaving spiritual spaces and communities that no longer serve us. Here's a somewhat self-aware talk about protecting autonomy & sovereignty. 

We will not "animal farm" up in this bitch, okay?! 

Here are the talks from the retreat + some other talks we gave immediately before and after the retreat that are related:
https://www.patreon.com/collection/2206631