In the late 70’s I worked for a man who was involved with a Quote personal transformation Unquote program called the Erhard Seminars Training (EST for short). If you are not familiar with this wiki has a short article about it here .
I am not going to go into all the reason I thought the training was more like brain washing. But it had something to do with the voice inflictions and pace of the speaker, you did not get to go to the bathroom except and set times, and they seated us away from anyone we came in with. After attending a seminar my boss paid for to get him off my back and keep peace in the work place I came away with that opinion. The other thing I took note of were the key phrases used over and over again by the ESTee’s.
The world of boss manipulation opened to me with these key phrases. Boss not happy? Just tell say ‘I get it” or you “got it” conversation over with him thinking we had decided something. Transformation and Getting It saved me job hassles more than once. The other key theme in EST was that they encouraged, no more like pushed, folks like my boss to recruit new participants and continually pay for more training seminars/courses. I received phone calls from those folks until my phone was disconnected when I lost my job because the boss spent to much money on EST seminars than he put back into the business.
Through the years brain washing cults have come and gone. I attended a Moonie deal with a friend at Chico State. Yikes! I ran did not walk out of there but unfortunately my pal stayed. Never saw her again.
I was not raised to fall for get rich quick schemes so I avoided the pyramid schemes like the plaque. I did watch several acquaintances loose their life savings to the swift talking ploys of believers. Conversations based on fact or common sense are usually futile when someone has bought the get rich sales tactic’s of a good salesman.
Next Part 2 of this post will cover how relationships can be harmed by people exploiting personal friendships and relationships via “networking.” of multi-level marketing organizations (MLM).
I never attended those exact seminars, but others which were close in appearance. Mine were geared toward the education marketplace, but had the same makeup, I’m sure. It always amazed me how swayed people could be. Ever the skeptic, I rarely took any of their suggestions.
Peace,
Muff
Yeah the cults of the 70’s really snagged a lot of kids. The get rich, empowerment type seminars are not all bad but statistically they are more than likely a set up to make someone else money – if nothing else the people putting them on do.
looking forward to next post…
I guess i better write it LOL
EST – there’s something I haven’t heard about for a while!
Multiple Level Marketing (MLM) business models drive me crazy. At one time I found some liquid minerals that really made me feel better. Every time I quit taking them, I’d notice it about three weeks out. However, I could only buy them from a dealer – grr. They’ve gone by the wayside.
the particular MLM I have been researching uses a repetitious saturation model like EST and the separate from family and friends techniques not as bad as the cults but same principle.
Buying from some dealers (depending on how the MLM is set up) can be a time saver. It is the MLM’s that push the limits of being illegal but stay a hair away from crossing the line.
Oh I suppose I should write another part of this post . …