By Ruth Graham
I lived at the Movement Center for seven years.
I measured my start at the Movement Center from 2004, when I was 18. I started seeing Andrew, went to classes, and worked for Julie Galaski.
I moved in in 2005, at age 19. I got my Associates Degree and couldn’t get a job. I was short on rent. I owed the Center $600.
Sharon Ward knew my circumstances. I was desperately looking for work. I didn’t have a car to look for a job and had ZERO money. I was kicked out in mid-2007, because I owed them $600 dollars.
What compassionate wisdom! What a caring place!
I was “allowed” back in July 2010, because I paid them what I owed. I was desperate for a place to stay, because I was homeless. This is something I told Sharon was a risk I faced if they kicked me out in the beginning.
I lived there until early 2014.
I knew it was called an “institute”. And was explicitly told by Sharon Ward that people there were “students.” I knew this from the moment I moved in. Although what was being taught to the “students,” I still don’t know.
What was there to learn?
How to be a good mindless slave so I can burn all my karma?
How to sit completely still and hold your pee when Shoemaker drones on for 4 hours about word salad nonsense?
Maybe I “learned” a special unspeakable energy transmission from Michael’s superpowered eyes?
Maybe he taught me everything I needed to know when he groped me?
Maybe the class was to teach me that I was supposed to have sex with him.
That’s the instruction I missed, right?
Where are my certifications for the landscaping and construction jobs I accomplished?
What license did I apprentice for and obtain as part of that program?
The yoga teaching license? I should definitely sue, since my yoga certification is forever tarnished coming from your group.
You put a known pedophile as a teacher trainer, someone caught having sex with underage prostitutes in Nepal, as well as doing meth in the parking lot with prostitutes in front of the grounds.
You had teacher trainers like Natacha who were high on drugs while teaching, actually high 24/7 actually.
His women used the yoga school to fish for women for Shoemaker to abuse. Shame on you.
What personal mentorship did I get to help me succeed as a human being in the outside world and heal from my traumas?
You want to blame me for “settling in” to a cult designed to trap people?
The Guru himself frequently remarked on the brokenness of the outside world and how people are dying out there. How everything outside is just rotten tension, unconsciously repeating itself, people being born in “envelopes” of tension from their parents and never being free.
I was told “you think it’s bad here, just think about the outside world.”
During meals, we often talked about the horribleness of the outside world. People would literally get anxious, leaving the grounds for fear of losing the “guru’s protection.”
People were afraid to breathe wrong if it offended the guru. I remember people like Kelly Ponzi anxious about having permission to do anything or upsetting Swami in any way. There were multiple people like that there, all affirming this culture of fear and submission.
Sharon Ward and Swami Chetanananda, AKA Michael.
How did people become independent there? Where was the help?
I’m not the only person who ended up being “stuck” there. People were coming in clean from addictions and lapsing badly while there, even dying like Ayaz did.
Ayaz Quadir
People with money and lots of resources, like Michael Bazzani, were lapsing on their addictions and had to leave. People were getting institutionalized for getting involved with Shoemaker just a little bit.
People would say it was because of his strong energy, and it wasn’t his fault. Sure, right.
It was a known threat that he would even say to people, that people tend to leave him and “go crazy” or “commit suicide.” Even Sharon would say that.
If I was smarter, I would have run away the second I heard that. Well, now I’m smarter.
The compassionate wisdom I got from Shoemaker when discussing depression with him one time (I didn’t even discuss suicide with him) involved him singing the MASH song to me with a disgusting smirk on his face.
“Suicide is painless…it brings on many changes.”
I left feeling nothing but confusion. I certainly didn’t feel helped. Was it a special shaktipat for me? I now see it in retrospect for what it is, a demonstration of his contemptible sociopathy.
Why did Sharon want me to lie to the Federal Government and claim mental disability while they had me hanging from scaffolds and cooking meals for 100 people?
More than one person knows the truth BTW about the people I’ve accused. So please do claim they are false. We survivors know what happened and who is who.
What did you learn from this “school”? Tell us.
