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- Michael Dettmers Interview Posted by M. Finch on Forum VII - Feb 12, 2002.
- Questions to Michael Dettmers
Caller #17: That's really sad. I can't imagine being in that type of situation myself. Would you communicate this to him now? Bob convinces Maharaji to retract Messiah claim Bob: No, we came to a final confrontation prior to when I left the Divine Light Mission. He knew how I felt. We'd talked about it. At the beginning of 1976, we had agreed that we would in fact change his image. I had persuaded him to see that he was going to lose his popularity and ability to do any good at all in this country, if he became a cult leader. If he continued to allow his devotees to believe that he was God, that was inevitable. He agreed, and we started de-programming our own membership and telling them to see Maharaji as only a human being who had a great concern for humanity. In fact, he went along with this image change for about half a year. Then, when he saw that he wouldn't have the same kind of ascribed status that he had as the guru being God, he suddenly realised he wouldn't have the same kind of control over people. He started worrying about what was going to happen to him in terms of his finances.
Somebody brought up the name of Ted Patrick earlier, and I wanted to ask if you have had any contact with him? Bob: I haven't had any first hand-dealings with Ted Patrick, although when I was President of the Mission, I remember that I had to deal with situations in which members of the Ashrams were abducted and deprogramed by Ted Patrick. In the early years, he didn't have a very good success rate with Divine Light Mission people. In fact, he couldn't de-program them. He didn't really know enough about the group at that time to be able to do it. Recently, however, that has changed, and he has a few former premies working with him. He is having a very good success rate with the Divine Light Mission premies. Recently, three individuals who were de-programed by Ted Patrick within the last three months, called me. All three of those people told me that they felt he was not at all like the images that exist of him in the Press. They felt that he was a very sensitive person who treated them with a great deal of respect. During the whole period, what he did was keep them questioning and talking and talking, until they were finally able to use their own reasoning to recognise what had happened to them. This would enable them to recognise what had happened to them, and to work their way out of the belief structure that they were trapped in. Caller #18: They started to listen to what they were actually saying, in other words. Bob: Right. By talking it out, they began to listen to what they were saying. It helped having some former members there to point out the things that they didn't really know, things that they had just learned to accept by rote. Caller #18: That's fascinating. I was really interested in hearing whether or not his methods were as bad as people had been portraying them. Bob: Evidently not. I guess you hear about that when he fails. When he fails, obviously when somebody escapes or something like that, they are going to portray it as a terrible thing, because they say they are being physically kidnapped. In all the cases I am familiar with, the person is usually being detained in their family's home. Some family member has arranged to get the person there, and then they do detain them. They have to keep at it until the person has managed to go through the whole thing and gets to the point when they can start reasoning again. Caller #18: That's very interesting. In that case, I hope he has more success. In the same vein, there is a recent book out by a man and woman who have researched a variety of cults. It's called 'Snapping'. I was wondering if you were familiar with that. Bob: A number of people have recommended it to me, but I haven't seen it. Caller #18: Apparently they were on the Carson show the other night. From what I gather from their conversation, they refer to the mental process that goes on when a person is subjected to high pressure indoctrination or propaganda that some groups give out to new members. They say that something actually 'snaps', that they actually do 'turn' and become mentally different. Bob: I think that this is something that social philosophers and social psychologists have talked about for a long time. In a crowd, the person loses his individuality. In fact, their intellectual capacity is debilitated in that situation. If there is a systematic attempt to transform that person's thinking, you could hypothetically say that there could be a point at which they would 'snap' and start seeing things differently. Caller #18: It's good to know that the situation can at least in some cases be reversed, as shown by the experiences of Ted Patrick. Bob: Human beings are such complex creatures. We have all kinds of possibilities in our lives. I'm not willing to write anybody off. Caller #18: I was wondering if you'd mind stating your age. Bob: I'm 34. I was 26 when I got into it. Caller #18: That's interesting. I feel that some of these groups are appealing to a specific kind of immaturity in people. Bob: I don't think it's just necessarily an immaturity. A lot of grown people are immature at times. I think that everyone is susceptible at certain times under certain circumstances. I know there are a lot of people getting involved after the death of a loved one or maybe a divorce. There are all kinds of circumstances that can even affect mature individuals, rendering them psychologically vulnerable. Host: Most people who will suddenly embrace religion at any point do it because of some deep need. Bob: Maybe it's some disillusionment with what they find going on around them. Let's face it, during the early 1970s there were a lot of people who were disillusioned with what was going on in the predominant culture here in the United States, as a result of the Vietnam War, Watergate and so on. So you look for something better, and somebody offers you something that's supposedly perfect. It's a good ploy. Caller #18: It's powerful. It seems like there is a tendency to revert to something simpler. That happened to the young people in the Sixties. I thought it was fascinating to hear your comment about the Maharaji putting up the picture of his father and worshipping it. Bob: When he had doubts, he looked to the way it had been taught to him for strength. Caller #18: He looked to the situation he was in when he was young, when he had guidance from someone stronger. The tape ends abruptly here! Open Mikes Mike Finch, Mike Dettmers and Mike Donner were all prominent members of the cult for many years, who also knew Rawat personally. They have all since left the cult and talk honestly about their memories and feelings. Mike Finch An Open Letter to Maharaji from Mike Finch
This letter, and other essays from Mike about his time with Maharaji, can now also be found on mikefinch.com Maharaji, You are known now to the public as Prem Rawat, but for the 30 or so years that I gave my life to you, I knew you as Maharaji, or Guru Maharaji, so that is how I will continue to refer to you. I have had a long and involved relationship with you, ranging from sublime moments of incredible beauty, good times, mediocre times, through boredom and frustration, to pain, abuse and feelings of desertion. I have withdrawn from you in stages. For the 20 years up to 1990, you were my Lord - someone who could reach into my heart whatever my situation, and rescue me. I practiced Knowledge almost everyday, and begged and prayed for your grace to make the Knowledge work, in full confidence that you could and would do this if I were open to it. And if it didn't happen, well then I was obviously not open enough, and needed to surrender to you more. In the early 90's, I had my first doubts that you were the Lord; perhaps you did not control this amazing grace that could enlighten me. But that was OK, because the Knowledge was internal, between me and God, and could still take me to the deepest place; even if your role was just to give the Knowledge, and remind me of the importance of it periodically, that was enough. In the mid 90's I met you briefly backstage at the Atlantic City event, and that was the last time I spoke to you. Since then, the accumulation of 30 years pursuing an impossible goal - or to be precise, pursuing two goals which are mutually impossible to fulfill - had become an overbearing weight from which I had to escape. The two goals I refer to that a premie has to fulfill are these: The inner goal of finding their heart or center, and the outer goal of being connected with you. The essence of your message for 30 years has been that you need to pursue both goals, and that you cannot get one without the other. I see now that achieving these two goals together is an impossible task. It is quite possible to achieve either goal on its own. I believe that the first goal, the human search for ultimate meaning and freedom within the human consciousness, is both possible and a worthwhile endeavour; in doing this, other people can be teachers, but no other person can become the master to whom you dedicate your life. It is also of course possible to attain the second goal - a connection with you as a person, devotion to you as the Master. For most premies this meant being near you physically, or at least having access to you; selling family and career to be with you at an event on the other side of the world, selling anything to be seated near you, and so on. A particularly virulent form of this devotion was the urge to be in the inner circle around you. During my 30 years as a premie I have observed this phenomenon closely and intimately - sometimes from the inside, as someone in the inner circle, but usually from the outside, as someone who was trying desperately to climb up the ladder to the inner circle. The interesting thing about this phenomenon, is that I really did not want to be near you, or rub shoulders with other inner circle players - I only did so because I thought it was the passport to the first goal of inner contentment. I now see that it actually prevented inner contentment. Ironic. So that in a nutshell is why I no longer consider you my master, nor practice your Knowledge. The first goal of inner discovery I have always wanted, and still want. I took you as my master to help me fulfill that goal, which you promised to do; but you introduced another goal, centered around yourself, which in fact made it impossible to fulfill the first goal. Unfortunately, for 30 years I accepted your message that the second goal of a connection or devotion to you was necessary to attain the first goal. To see and logically understand the dynamics of the last 30 years is one thing, but of course there is a lot of emotion and feeling too. As I have said, there were good times and profound experiences. At the time, I thought the deep experiences I had were due to your grace; now I think they were due to my grace, meaning that I had them independently of you. I did of course learn much from you; the problem is that I had to invest so much - way too much - to learn what I did. So my predominant feeling now is one of grief and anger. I grieve for the last 30 years: for the careers given up to be ready to go anywhere anytime to do your bidding; for the relationships given up to be in the ashram or 'available for service'; for the money given up in order to be free of ego (I gave you a house, inheritances, wages and enough spare cash over 30 years that would have left me financially comfortable for the rest of my life had I not given it all to you.) I grieve for a book I wrote that was suppressed after writing it, because the initial suggestion for writing it came from your brother SatPal. I grieve for the lost thoughts and dreams, my own thoughts, lost because they were not allowed to exist in a premie, otherwise he was 'in his mind'. I grieve for what might have been, had I not been marching up a dead-end alley, all the time proclaiming to myself and the world that I was marching along the golden highway to liberation. I grieve for all the people that I tried so earnestly to convince that this dead-end alley was the glorious road that they should be marching on too. I am not sure how you see yourself these days. Do you see yourself still as the Perfect Master, needing of course to tone it down for public consumption, but still the living embodiment of that grace, without which no one can really benefit from the Knowledge techniques ? Or do you privately think of that as a Hindu myth, and you are content to live off it - and live very well off it, like a family business, as your detractors maintain ? Or was it a gradual change over the years from one to the other ? To be honest, I don't really care - my grief is felt and expressed, and now I intend to move on. As the English expression says, there is no point in crying over spilt milk. Although I left you 18 months ago (I first publicly posted on the ex-premie Forum in January 2001) it has taken me these 18 months to fully extricate myself from your influence. So I thank you for the good times; for all the rest, and the grief I have expressed in this letter, I drop them from my shoulders - thus ! The dream I had before I met you, I still have; and I am going for it, unencumbered and feeling very much lighter. -- Mike
Mike Dettmers Michael Dettmers Interview Posted by M. Finch on Forum VII - Feb 12, 2002. A friend of mine had this chat with Michael Dettmers 14 months ago, and transcribed it. Michael has recently re-read this, made some minor changes, and approved it - so here it is Questions to Michael Dettmers - 2 December 2000 Q: What is purposefully hidden from premies and why? MD: Well, the stuff that I’ve talked about - his drinking and pot smoking, that was pretty prevalent in the 70’s and 80’s. I don't know if that’s still the case. And his affairs with various women, and his long-standing affair with Monica Lewis. Q: Why would he want to hide these things? MD: Oh, well he would basically take the view that it’s his private life, his private business but in fact it’s because it’s inconsistent with the stand he’s taken in public vis-à-vis the premies, i.e. what it takes to lead a spiritual life or whatever, the ashrams for instance. He’s concerned that people will recognize that he’s acting in a very hypocritical manner. Q: And what steps does he personally take to cover up information, or make sure that people don’t find out about it, which is rather the implication of what you’re saying? MD: You create an inner circle. This is not unusual with many leaders, and you could certainly say that this applies to cults. You create an inner circle, and they somehow have to be sworn to secrecy about the inconsistencies, and that was what the whole “X-rating” scene was about. The belief system was that Maharaji can do anything because he’s the “Perfect Master.” He isn’t subject to the influences of the world. They presumably don’t have any effect on him as they do on everyone else. Hence, for supposedly our own benefit, he created the ashrams and all of those rules, but simultaneously he exempted himself because as the “Perfect Master” he’s above and beyond it – that’s what the Lotus is. So the rationale is, because most people wouldn’t understand, it’s best to keep it (his lifestyle) a secret, and that’s what the X-rating ritual was designed to ensure. Q: And that was something that Maharaji instituted personally was it? MD: Yea. Q: Can you just say again the extent to which you witnessed this drinking and how it would have affected him? Any comments about that? MD: Yes, well I was X-rated by Maharaji’s pilot when he was touring Canada with his mother in ’74. At that time, I wasn’t part of Maharaji’s inner circle, but I was integral to organizing the tour and that included arrangements for Marolyn who was not known to be his girlfriend at that time. But they were at the beginning stages of a relationship. Maharaji was unhappy that the tour had been organized for him to stay at ashrams. So, one of the first things I was asked to do was to see if we could organize his arrangements in hotels rather than in the ashrams, which I did. This made it easier for Maharaji to have some time with Marolyn, but to do all this organizing and to get things in place, I was X-rated so I could be around Maharaji. That’s when I first learned about Maharaji’s drinking. So Maharaji’s been drinking ever since ‘74 in my personal knowledge and, as I learned, even before then, and throughout the seventies and throughout the eighties and perhaps even today, I don’t know. Q: So there’s nothing wrong with moderate drinking? I don’t think that anybody could be accused of that. So what makes this immoderate in your opinion? MD: Well, first of all there was something wrong with it because Maharaji made it very clear that drinking was not something that the ashram premies could do, so one could argue then, why would he perpetuate these rules if they weren’t good for everyone? That’s the hypocrisy issue - number one. Number two, my experience is that Maharaji didn’t drink moderately. Now, I don’t have experience of alcoholism either personally or in my family so I didn’t have any reference point at the time to know if it was moderate or not, but it just seemed like he could polish off five or six cognacs in an evening and get a little bit inebriated, not dead-drunk. And sometimes he would get rip-roaring drunk. In any case, he drank every single day. Q: Over a period of how many years? MD: All the time I knew him, which was fifteen years. Q: So apart from the obvious hypocrisy that you mentioned was there any other way that you perceived that to be corrupt or bizarre? Did it affect him negatively in other words? MD: Well, it’s corrupt, yes. When he gets drunk, he becomes very negative. He becomes abusive in the sense that he verbally trashes certain people, whoever happened to be on his negative list for that day or that period, or he could be very rude in public at restaurants, just the kind of behavior that you would perhaps see in a person who is drunk and not in control. Q: Any particular examples of that sort of abusive behavior? MD: Oh yes, I remember that during the San Ysidro conference when, at the end of one of the days, we went out to dinner with all the people that were participating as well as Will Schutz and his associate, I forget her name. Yea, we were having a general conversation and, I think I’ve pretty much reported how he found the whole thing very confronting. I remember at one point Will’s associate made some comment, and he made some kind of drunken remark like, 'Listen sister - let me tell you something!' I can’t remember exactly what he said but she got up from the table and said, 'And let me tell you something! Nobody talks to me like - listen sister!' She could recognize that it was very abusive the way he spoke to her, and he was clearly drunk. And that’s a person who wasn’t a premie. Q: What do you think Maharaji’s family make of it? Are they all just like premies? MD: Maharaji’s family has grown up considerably since I was involved. When I was involved the kids were very young, early teens, now they’re adults in some cases. So with Marolyn, say...she went through a couple of phases. First there was the phase in which she was Durga Ji. So she worshipped Maharaji and people worshipped her because she was declared the ''Durga,” whatever the hell that means, right? And then that ended. I guess that ended around the end of the seventies or so. My interpretation is that she started to get her life together. She went back to university to complete her degree at Pepperdine. I don’t know what Maharaji thought about that. At different times I think he tolerated it, at other times I don’t think he liked it. But that was a period during which she tried to develop her own life. But I didn’t have a lot of contact with her. Sometimes when we were on tour, a little bit, but most of the time she wasn’t on tour. The only thing I remember is that we used to get together, for an annual luncheon or something about a month before Maharaji’s birthday. She wanted to organize some kind of gift and she engaged me in that, but I didn’t have a whole lot of contact with her and very little with the kids. When Maharaji wasn’t on tour, I would meet with him in his office at the residence when I was around, maybe every other day or so. And then I would leave. So I had very little real exposure to the children, and certainly no dialogue or anything with them. So it’s not fair for me to say what they think or not. Q: You said on the Forum 'I was a willing accomplice in a conspiracy of lies and hypocrisy for which I have no excuse'. What are the main lies and hypocrisies that you refer to and what, do you think, are the most serious of those in their consequences? MD: Well, that was in response to Sir Dave’s question. You see, when I started talking about the drinking and the smoking pot, Sir Dave asked a very reasonable question which was, “How was all this kept a secret?” That’s when I talked about the “X-rating.” His next question was, “How do you feel about yourself being a perpetuator of that?” and that was my response. When I look back and realize that was what was going on, that’s all I can say that’s honest about it. At the time, we were all serving Maharaji, and we had some kind of story about why it was OK for him to do whatever he wanted to do and not OK for us, and this was just a way of protecting his privacy. So that was the rationale then. When I look back at the whole thing with a great deal of disgust, I have to say, of course, I was foolish to have ever been a part of something like that. Q: Can you tell me how you perceive fear to be a dynamic around Maharaji and if he is intimidating? A lot of people have said he’s intimidating. How does fear play role around him and in his work, if this is the case? MD: It’s a game in which he holds all the power. Obviously you’re only afraid if you feel you have something to lose and the people around Maharaji have many things to lose, given the world that they live in. One is their position. It’s more a question of 'What happens to me if I’m not in this position?' A lot of these people are not thinking about a life without Maharaji, and can’t envision one without Maharaji. So then, what happens to people that stay in the cult but who are no longer around the master? They always feel like they’ve blown it, like they’ve blown some opportunity. So there’s the fear of blowing the opportunity, the fear of displeasing Maharaji, the fear of losing position, the fear of uncertainty ('what’s going to happen to me? What am I going to become, what will people think?') The people around Maharaji are accorded a great deal of respect by premies who would like to be in that position, and think that these people around Maharaji have something to say, or some unique story - a darshan story or whatever. And, 'what happens if I’m no longer in that position?' They see what happens to other people who get - quote 'dismissed'. They’re shunned. It’s a cult kind of behavior. Nobody wants to be shunned, of being ostracized from the community because the vortex of the community is Maharaji. So if you get outside of that vortex it feels as if you’re being shunned. That’s another form of fear. Maharaji plays on that, he’s aware of that. I think he likes to keep people in a state of uncertainty. It even rubs off on the kids. I remember one of the people who did the laundry at the residence was shattered because one of Maharaji’s kids said to her, 'You know, I could get you fired if I wanted to'. And the interesting thing is that the person who did the laundry actually knew that that was true. And so it’s a kind of attitude that exists. I don’t know if that answers the question? Directory: pages pages -> The Project Gutenberg ebook of The Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms Amended pages -> Regional Association IV (North America, Central America and the Caribbean) Hurricane Operational Plan pages -> Review of the ra IV hurricane operational plan pages -> Cyclone programme pages -> World meteorological organization Download 1.11 Mb. Share with your friends:
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