Author: Russ Wise From http://www.christianinformation.org/article.asp?artID=28

Change has become the latest commodity for sale in the world of business and the Transformational Seminar1 has become the tool of choice. However – this new transformation of the workforce is not necessarily for the best. In fact, it may likely be detrimental!

As a result, this new commodity is a multi-billion dollar growth industry. The issue that the Christian needs to address is simply this: Is this new transformational technology in agreement with my Christian worldview or is it a potential hazard to my spiritual well-being? The answer lies ahead! This paper is written for the express purpose of helping you, the reader, to adequately determine if becoming involved in a transformational seminar is healthy for you and your family.

So! – What is a transformational seminar and what is the purpose of such a technology in the workplace? To fully answer this question it is first necessary to understand that business management and owners not only want productivity from their workforce, but also desire to foster a sense of shared goals within the work environment.

Historically, people in the business world have always sought out those who could give them the competitive edge. Consultants are hired, strategic plans are made, ad campaigns are launched, and consumers are lured.

Many business people, in order to gain this edge, are turning to consultants with non-traditional training methods. Modern business trainers are usually well-versed in traditional business principles and methods, but some apply these concepts in a troubling manner. In applying their ideas, some trainers use Eastern forms of visualization, meditation, and guided imagery. Some also promote the development of one’s “intuition” and divining the future. These questionable practices can open people up to occult influence.

Dozens of major corporations have employed seminar trainers in an attempt to align employees with the goals and purposes of the employer. In doing so, the employer – naively in many cases – hires a consultant to bring about this transformation in the work place. And as a result – the Transformational Seminar was birthed.

The pay-off for business is twofold. First, there is a perceived need in many corporations to ensure that each employee is in alignment with the goals and purposes of the company. In many cases, like-mindedness has become the opiate of corporate management. Therefore, because of this new cooperation, productivity is believed to be enhanced significantly. Secondly, transformation occurs in the workplace: transforming one from an out-dated way of thinking about work to a new understanding of working together in harmony. Sounds like a worthy goal? Yes! However, it is not so much what the trainee receives cognitively but what he receives subliminally as he is introduced to foreign ideas.

Transformational seminars were already on the scene. They were and continue to be a part of the counter-cultural revolution of the sixties. These seminars were a rejection of the Judeo-Christian worldview that was embedded in the American consciousness during previous decades. Mind Dynamics was one of the earliest seminars that arrived on the scene. It fostered others, such as Actualizations, est and Lifespring. These seminars were an eclectic combination of pop-psychology, new age spirituality, and personal experience.

It was a short jump from Transformational Seminar to Business Seminar for these entrepreneurs. One seminar previously titled New Age Thinking Seminar was changed to Investment in Excellence, a product of The Pacific Institute. Louis Tice, the seminar owner-leader, is one of the most sought-after trainers for corporate transformation. His seminar alone does more than twenty million dollars a year according to a Wall Street Journal report.

New Age trainers have cleverly disguised their agenda in the marketplace. Their goal is to bring about a paradigm shift, a total realignment of humanity from a Judeo-Christian world view to one that is metaphysical (the belief that the mind has power to influence forces within the universe which can change material reality) at its root.

Trainers of new age programs speak of their “value neutral” approach, yet on close inspection one finds that they are not totally candid regarding their approach. These trainers certainly are not neutral where Christians are concerned. Cynthia Hargrove, a New Age trainer with Relationships Seminar, says this about her approach. “My New Age philosophy sneaks in when I talk about the need for love, openness and respect in the work place.”At least according to this trainer, one has to be manipulated in order to accept this new “truth”.

Perhaps a more alarming trend is the growing exposure of this new age teaching in business schools. It is one thing for a mature adult to be exposed to this aberrant philosophy in a management seminar, but quite another for an impressionable student to be subtly introduced to a philosophy meant to bring a shift in their belief system even to the point of dislodging it.

A case in point: A professor at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business has been teaching a course not about marketing strategies or balance sheets, but about such unlikely assets as understanding one’s essence and how to develop one’s intuition.

Professor Michael Ray doesn’t rely on graphs or analytical data to convey his ideas. Instead, he helps students tap into their own inner wisdom through spiritual disciplines such as meditation techniques, yoga and I Ching. Dr. Ray has a rich background in Eastern philosophy from the time he studied with Swami Muktananda in India. Chanting and meditation has become an integral part of his daily life and he introduces these disciplines to his students with zeal.

As an example, Ray will have his students draw mandalas to bring out images of their inner selves. He also teaches his students to use mantras to connect themselves with the primal essence of all things. A mantra (chant) is intended to create a sound vibration to facilitate a bridge between the origin of the universe and the root of one’s mind. These ideas, so thoroughly expressed in many ancient religious and spiritual teachings, pose great problems for most in the business world.

In the world of business Eastern ideas are gaining ground. These Eastern techniques do not attempt to sharpen one’s business skills but bring about, as stated earlier, a total transformation in the way one thinks and interprets information. There are a large number of organizations catering to this type of training. Two of the most notable groups with widespread access to the business community are Sterling Management and Transformational Technologies Inc. Sterling Management is part of the World Institute of Scientological Enterprises (WISE), an umbrella organization with ties to Scientology. Transformational Technologies Inc. is the business management division of The Forum, formerly known as Erhard Seminars Training (est). It is interesting to note that Werner Erhard borrowed from several occult new age organizations including writer L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology, to establish est in 1971.

Transformational seminars are more commonly referred to as Large Group Awareness Trainings. Werner Erhard – the founder of est – was one of the first on the scene. He had been involved with Mind Dynamics in the early seventies and quickly became the one to imitate. John Hanley, a training associate of Erhard’s, developed Lifespring and quickly became known on the training circuit as one who had mastered the process of self-discovery, peak performance, and success. His non-traditional techniques and exercises were meant to literally transform one’s life. Hanley’s program was developed to help an individual realize who he really is through non-traditional thinking and learning.

Large Group Awareness Trainings have not only become popular, but they have also grown exponentially. There are literally hundreds of such programs available. Some are blatantly new age in their approach while others attempt to mask their underlying philosophy and draw upon a Christian label for credibility.

The challenge for the Christian, or for that matter, anyone – secular or otherwise, is to determine whether a given seminar would be psychologically healthy for them to pursue. In this author’s opinion, after twenty-eight years of observation, there is not one seminar that would meet the criteria needed to allow any degree of peace.

Transformational seminars, regardless of their origin or who developed them, have a large number of shared characteristics. The reason for their common profile is that they all have a common ancestor – Alexander Everett, the creator of Mind Dynamics. Everett, a student of Unity (and later Jose Silva – the founder of The Silva Method of Mind Control) had a great interest in mind-cures. As a result, he created a mental exercise program to help the participants reach their full mental potential – Mind Dynamics. Werner Erhard was one of Mind Dynamics first disciples and after his completion of the training course he was given the Mind Dynamics franchise in San Francisco.

Erhard quickly became a success in his new venture. By the fall of 1971 he was laying plans to step out on his own and develop a new seminar program that would become the standard for other like seminars to emulate. In doing so he attempted to recruit other successful Mind Dynamics trainers like Stewart Emery, who later developed Actualizations – another in a long line of transformational seminars.

A potential recruit to the seminar is met with the non-telling phrase, I can’t tell you about it. You’ll just have to come and experience it for yourself. It changed my life. I just can’t describe it! The methodology of the seminar staff and recent graduates of the training is simply to get you to an exploratory meeting. Once there, the sales pitch begins! The majority of those in attendance are seminar graduates. Their job is to sell you on the seminar without actually telling you anything about the seminar – at all! They give testimony of the positive changes in their lives and how they know that you would benefit from the training. Once the testimonials have concluded the high pressure is applied. The force is so strong it is difficult for anyone to stand against.

The potential recruit may ask for more information before making a decision to participate, but the answer is always the same. More testimonials and pressure! The seminar does have a brochure and other material available. However, they do not offer any further information other than non-descript verbiage that lends little if any help in answering the original question. The brochure usually mentions that you are about to begin an adventure into better understanding yourself. It’s experiential! It is a life changing experience and of course – more testimonials. One popular seminar, The Forum, “promises to produce an extraordinary advantage in your personal effectiveness and a decisive edge in your ability to achieve.” Every seminar has a brochure and every brochure is pretty much the same – it tells you nothing!

There are brave souls among us! They have withstood the pains of the seminar and survived to render aide. They, in short, are the ones who have filled-in the blank spaces the brochure adeptly left out. Mark Brewer, a writer for Psychology Today, is one of the brave souls. He attended est and wrote about his experience. Mark gives an in-depth look at the seminar and reveals to the reader the underlying “truth” of est. You are perfect the way you are! Werner Erhard gave greater understanding of this idea with the following statement, “Sometimes people get the notion that the purpose of est is to make you better. It is not. I happen to think you are perfect exactly the way you are.” To arrive at this profound understanding the participant is first told, “We’re gonna throw away your whole belief system. We’re gonna tear you down and put you back together.” In essence, the trainer is given the responsibility to cajole the participants to the point that they no longer have a sense of individuality, but are left with a debilitating sense of worthlessness.

However, this sense of worthlessness is only temporary. The trainer is then responsible for restoring the individual to a sense of empowerment, wholeness, and potential to conquer. In effect, what happens is a psychological conversion experience. Some liken this conversion experience to that of being reborn – as a Christian might view it. However, this conversion is not Scripturally supported. It is rooted in a psycho-spiritual realm that is bathed in deception.

According to Margaret Thaler Singer, a clinical psychologist and professor emeritus of University of California – Berkeley, “The majority of complaints about this kind of training have centered around the fact that employees weren’t informed either about the intensity of the psychological attacks that would be made upon them as individuals or about any underlying belief system or philosophy being taught.”

There are other concerns that open a new forum for debate within the workplace. Singer mentions three: “They are religious and philosophical in nature and thus don’t belong in the workplace. They use thought-reform [brainwashing] techniques and methods of psychological coercion and can cause psychological breakdowns. And third, they produce social friction in the place of business.”

It is one thing to have your personal religious belief system challenged during the course of a seminar, but it is quite another to find only after much psychological damage that you were exposed to thought-reform (read brainwashing) techniques that were designed to manipulate you. In extreme instances the participant undergoes a psychotic-break where the individual considers and ultimately takes his or her life.