Hello, I'm Dr. Stephen Hassan, and I'm delighted to have my friend Christian Zirko and colleague,

an American who moved to England many, many years ago, and he is one of those small number of colleagues around the world who have been

helping people out of destructive cults and controlling relationships longer than I have.

And Christian, you know, you're part of Dialogue Center, UK. It's a Christian non-denominational organization, a charity for decades,

and you are helping people who ask for your help, basically. And I asked you to please come on

the influence continuum with me and share your knowledge

and wisdom because you have a different approach than mine as it should.

But I also imagine we have a lot of dovetailing of our approaches.

Because when you do it as many decades as we both have been doing it, you keep learning and improving.

Oh, yes.

Is that right?

I feel like I have learned so much.

And I learned, much of what I've learned, I've learned from clients.

So, Christian, would you just tell our listeners about you?

How did you get interested in cults and mind control

and just walk us through some of the pivotal stepping stones for you

that's helped you get to this point of expertise?

It was entirely by accident.

I came out of, my adolescence really, was about meditation, yoga.

I was involved in several different groups along the way.

I moved through Hinduism into Zen and into some other things.

And eventually I left that because it was damaging me.

...