By Ruth Graham
I would first like to share a quote from Le Petit Prince:
“Men have forgotten this truth,” said the fox, “but you must not forget it. You become responsible forever for that what you have tamed. You are responsible for your rose.”
If anyone wants to see what the ashram was like behind the curtain, it can be seen in many comments to my article Swami’s Evil First Assistant: What Makes Sharon Ward Tick?
A toxic organization that does not want to take responsibility for itself is represented by comments I’ve received for stating my truth.
Attacking my character, name calling, distortions of truth – all
anonymously. That’s the key. None of them are taking any responsibility.
I am.
I’m not hurt by it. It hardens my resolve.
It also shows itself for what it was and always has been.
For now, I stand out, but I’m not the only one. And ya’ll know it.
I always knew what I had to say, and never changed my story. When I said it, I knew it was going to be powerful and elicit a strong response in people. For that reason, I hesitated.
Because these so-called spiritual people do not want light shone on how actually stagnant and rotten they are. I knew they would hiss and whine and shoot stink bombs to high heaven. I knew it was a group of deeply entrenched people terrified of their own imminent expiration dates.
I know there are a bunch of people horrifically afraid of the person they thought was weak and small. When you have this kind of information that damages people, and it’s real, you don’t throw it around to anyone as if it’s of no consequence.
The ashram higher-ups thought of Ruth as inconsequential. She now has a truth of consequence to tell.
Why do you think I waited nine years to share anything? You think I carried a grudge that long? No, I would have not survived with that level of hate for that long, especially since too much happened
to me in that place.
I would not be able to take up new hobbies, travel the world, laugh. I’ve come forward because now I’m compelled to say the right thing.
I think the people who claim I have some unresolved jealousy are actually projecting a lot of how it is in the snakepit community there, and it shows.
The Swami Chetanananda, a drug addicted consorter with prostitutes and a conniver of donations – who women say loves to strangle women for sexual and sadistic pleasure – is seen with his enthralled devotees.
In the cauldron of the ashram, or “compound,” as I call it, rivalries are permanent. It’s a place with decades-long henpecking going on. There is no growth there. People are stagnant and stuck in that place, chewing on each other, a slow, despairing disaster.
They can’t allow young people to take over without exploiting them. Maybe the young people that used to be there, like I used to be,
think they have air when they’re huffing the gas of imaginary promises?
I get it. I can understand that money can be given and money opens many doors, but does that translate to real strength in the real
world?
Maybe they think they are initiates into spiritual cannibalism, and they think they will have magical power over other lesser beings forever. They think the accolades they get from a few people in that one small place will translate into real world respect, strength and understanding among other humans.
I feel sad for them, knowing how fragile it really is. Yes, Shoemaker [AKA Swami Chetanananda] has money, and obviously has manipulative skills.
But what is the outcome?
What skills are you learning, lifers? The skill of covering up for other abusers? The skill of doing every drug? The skill of targeting vulnerable people? The skill of existing in a toxic workspace?
The skill of sitting really still while you fart into a cushion? You can do that at home, can’t you?
What is the skill? The skill of pickling yourself with healthy food, supplements, probiotics, crystals and yoga to give you a long life, but not actually doing anything with it?
The skill of being as fragile as a rice paper when it comes to a
complex reality? Plenty of people do that without a guru.
Let’s talk about someone from the ashram in the comments right now. Lila.
Lila, I know who you are. You’re not trans. You’re on drugs and unhinged. You’ve crawled back to the person you originally claimed raped you, probably to secure more drugs or maybe to try to finally get the attention of another person who shares the same sick proclivities as you.
Like attracts like.
I don’t know, but good luck with that.
Either way, I know you’re not trans, and I have verifiable proof that
would bury you and your lies. I am culpable in one thing, and that is for trusting you in any measure.
Trusting you with Jesse, trusting you with any private information.
However, you seriously miscalculated me, probably due to your own lack of sobriety.
Non-sober people tend to lose against sober people all the time.
Here’s your opportunity for growth. I now take responsibility for this. Have you taken responsibility for yourself?
After all you’re 16 years older than me? You are fit, and told me how strong you were and how you’re bigger than me. I know you’re never going to show your face as “Lila” because if you do, your whole angle is to try to regain good graces with the meth-head Swami by undermining me with defamatory attacks will fall apart.
You’ll lose your temporary hold. It’s temporary. You know it.
The same goes with Fig and many anons here. Your inability to stand forward with your name is a testament to your inability to take responsibility for your words and deeds. You want to cause hurt, but
not openly. What does that say about you?
J. Michael Shoemaker known to his adoring followers as Swami Chetanananda.
The sad thing for you all is it’s actually destined to fall apart. It’s not going up from here. I think even the Rat King Michael himself knows this, and in his cowardly way he is cowering like you are.
Besides, all the prior victims know this. We understand now that the power has shifted and is with us.
For those who might not be in the ashram and are calling me names, etc., I see the same patterns now in the world, as I did in the relatively small community I was in.
I’m now wise to this behavior. It took me a long time to understand these things, because I myself was raised in a very secluded
environment for my childhood, and was very naive to the variety and breadth of human behavior.
I was easily duped and pushed around.
I have learned now to call it what it is, the actions of crybullies, or those seeking authority outside themselves (outside of their own internal locus) by attacking others.
Instead of being self-reliant, these people can’t stand to see self-reliance in others. Most particularly, it’s those who are so insecure in their own beliefs that they must ad hominem (attack the person) of anyone with a different belief. And there are a few that deep down know they are scoundrels and know no other way.
They are stuck, like I used to be, living in that spider trap of an ashram.
Why are your followers so terrified to stand in the light? Because you know it’s a big fat FRAUD.
I want to share what another anonymous person said here against me. It’s a tell, and tragicomic in the way they think this proves anything. This is from Fig.
They say someone said to my face in front of everyone at the ashram.
“You little trouble maker you.”
I want to thank them, because it’s one of those little stories that I remember, but felt it was too small to share.
In my recollection, that person yelled it at me in front of everyone.
They didn’t “say it.”
And Fig who claims it proves something against me will never be able to state what it is that made me deserve to be called it, because it would either be a
1) ridiculous lie
2) Such a small thing it didn’t deserve that level of verbal abuse in a workspace. Ever.
They yelled it at me and never actually explained what I did wrong.
They yelled it at me, because the way that place operates is via abuse and shame, not progression and support. Fig you step on your own self sharing this.
They yelled it at me, because despite the fact they weren’t my boss, they felt they had “rank” and felt entitled to verbally abuse me randomly, in front of everyone.
I still don’t know why they yelled that at me that day. Still.
Fig, who claimed I deserved to be called a trouble maker….they know who the real trouble makers are. I was not one of them.
Fig is someone who clearly has one foot in the door and one out on the ashram. But they will never show their face.
Because despite Fig being older than me, she is not capable of that level of personal responsibility for her accusations.
I want to ask them, too, what they know about the “positive energy” they claimed I experienced there.
My life was hell there. When I left, I went through some truly difficult experiences after that, but still don’t compare to how hellish that place was for me. It truly is a benchmark to me of hell.
Don’t speak to me about what that energy was. Can you measure it? Photograph it?
BTW, leaving for me would have meant homelessness. Fig obviously has the perspective of a lifer of the ashram so that narrows that down. Someone who has never learned about the real world; about
domestic violence, coercive control and financial control, and what homelessness is.
I suspect Fig may come from some family money. I actually did choose the threat of homelessness over the ashram in the end.
That was the calculus I made when I started saying “no” to demands that violated my own integrity, like falsifying SSI or covering up for my sexual abusers.
I actually made that final decision in my head that if I lived there one more second, I would turn into a deranged sociopath like Jimi, Moni or Sharon. Or worse, a broken belly crawler coward, like Fig, or
Govind.
Govind, Swami, Claudia and Margi
Similar to the time Moni yelled at me about my heart chakra being closed, that place was a venomous pit of gossip and backstabbing, under a veneer of Rosemary’s Baby, coated with a pretty good marketing scheme and perks for those who played the toxic game well.
The Swami and Moni O’Neil – one day the true story of what he did to her will come to the surface.
At the core is a conman, serial sexual abuser. Those who threw their hat in with that stripe of humanity, like Sharon Ward, who pledged to take responsibility for others’ lives, need to take ownership of what they’ve done to those lives, like the fox says in Le Petit Prince.
I take responsibility for the fact they duped me for so long. I take responsibility for the fact that I thought I could ever thrive in that place. I take responsibility for the fact that I did benefit in some ways
via learning some trades (not well though, lol, certainly not legally), while behind closed doors massive abuses and fraud were going on.
I take responsibility for the fact that this place inspired me to learn a
lot about cult abuse and coercive control, so I’m somewhat of an expert “troll” as the user WTF said.
I’m only a troll to trolls who crawl in darkness and can’t show their faces. They don’t like me much. They never did.
