For anybody that’s been able to catch the recent flick “Milk”, there’s probably no doubt that questions of the tolerance within your own family, friends, religion or culture would arise. Growing up in the ashram, I had to listen to a lot of homophobic, ignorant and intolerant remarks about homosexuality. To be fair, I had …
“Hinglish” ???
There’s Spanglish, there’s Engrish, but what’s the word for mixing English and Hindi? Have there been any coined terms? As a native English speaker, who eventually learned broken Hindi and Punjabi, I am curious to know. The little I know of Hindi and Punjabi is in spite of the learning of languages having been severely …
Amritsar 1983
Images of India float around the web. They bring up a lot of conflicting feelings. There we are smiling for the camera. Smiling for our parents back home, not yet knowing how disassociated we would become from them. It’s taken a long to time to have a parent/child relationship again – but now we’re adults, …
Agoraphobia
Black Friday. In the wee hours of the morning after Thanksgiving day, throngs, hoards and mobs of people storm the doors of big box stores all over America. Today at a Walmart in Long Island, these “shoppers” trampled a worker TO DEATH. Read the article here and be prepared to be utterly disgusted with humanity. …
Janja Lalich on Jonestown
Janja Lalich, PhD, author of “Cults in our Midst”, gave the keynote speech a the International Cultic Studies Association and forwarded a copy which is now online. In the beginning of her speech she talks mostly about Jonestown, and the question cult leaders pose to their followers: “Would you die for me?” When I watch …
On Lifestyle and Autonomy
Many Kundalini Yoga students came across Yogi Bhajan during the last years of his life when he was very infirm and didn’t speak in public as much. Most of his teaching was remote, via pre-recorded, and pretty old, videotape. For the Kundalini Yoga students who never had the pleasure to meet Yogi Bhajan, I can …
Letter to Siri Akal
The following is an excerpt from an email I sent to Siri Akal, who was headmaster of GRD Academy, the first of a series of 3HO led boarding schools in India, est. 1989. It’s been a few months now, and he has yet to reply. I figured, since he probably doesn’t care, why not just …
Halloween, 1984
It’s hard to realize or even be aware of congruent events in one’s life until hindsight makes them clear. One of the things that I can recall about being a child in 3HO was this feeling of foggy confusion around what grown-ups were doing and discussing, and around big international events that seemed to be …
GNFC circa 1983
Posing for group photos was agonizing! It always took the photographer forever to set up, and right when he’d get ready he’d say “Ready… Steady… …no hold on…” It was hot, we had be dressed in “bana”, but usually by the time a couple of frames were shot half of us were too loopy to …
The “guides”
Nanak Dev Singh wasn’t the only adult in India to inflict abuses on us children. The list of “guides” is long and exhausting, each person accountable for some loathsome memory of mine, be it neglect, indifference, public humiliation, emotional abuse or coercive tactics. I’ve spent many sessions with my family recounting the rediculous and immature …
on forgiveness…
Forgiveness, I am told, is an important part in healing, letting go and moving on. But I don’t think it’s fair to be “expected” to forgive when the individual perpetrators have not been available to take responsibility for their actions upon children. None of us know what currently goes on in the minds of the …
It takes a village…
It is very common within cults (of all types) to raise children communally. The leader takes a basic notion “It takes a village” and twists it into dictatorial orders that go against what most see to be important in basic child-rearing and child development. A healthy bond between parent and child is crucial in developing …
Nanak Dev Singh
The winter of 1984 was particularly hard. Most children spent the winter break at Rishikesh in a dorm-style bungalow. The American Sikh converts who were appointed to live with us in India were referred to as “Singh-Sahib” (for the men) or “Bhenji”(for the ladies). These were “the guides”. The guides had little to no experience …
GNFC
Being at a boarding school at such a young age was not easy, although it was at times fun. It did get more nerve-wracking the older I got, and the more independent I became, which I think was a sign that I was healthier than I thought, and ready to live my own life. Every …
about
I was born and raised in 3HO Sikh Dharma, a religion that I now know to be a cult. I left at 18 to live my life as I saw fit. After many years of not being able to shake the early childhood and India memories I am here to share my experiences and my …