I think that they're definitely well thought out agendas happening that people are getting caught up in and I think in this case in the case of self empowerment groups, they are praying on people's desire to help the world.

So they're really praying on your good nature and they're telling you that what you're doing is really helping others and it's also not so clear cut because you are helping others but then at the same time you're slowly being very controlled and so the combination really puts you in what I call the translate state.

This week on the podcast we're earning a special four part series on the cult of personal development. So many of us pick up books and go to seminars in the hopes of improving our lives and that's not necessarily a bad thing but it can be when we're not aware of how it can actually lead to a lot of bad things when we let charismatic leaders take advantage of us and manipulate us.

So we decided to bring in former cult members to dissect this process and explain how this actually happens so that you can avoid it.

So one thing I've realized after so many years of hosting this show is that you hear my voice every week but I don't hear yours and I'd really like to hear from you.

For this episode, I'm excited to start something totally new called an airspace an airspace is an audio group chat hosted by me and are you can send us an audio message and when we reply, it'll show up in the main thread.

I'll be using the airspace over the next couple of days to talk with you and are about the process of indoctrination and also answer your questions about this episode.

Click on the first link in the description to send me your questions now and view the conversation so far and when we answer, you'll actually get an email letting you know.

You can also be part of the airspace by going to unmistakablecreative.com slash participate.

Bella, welcome to the unmistakable creative. Thanks so much for taking the time to join us.

Hi, thanks for having me.

It is my pleasure to have you here. So I actually was introduced to you by way of our mutual friends and Stevens when I told her that I was putting together a series about the cult of personal development.

She said that you were somebody that I absolutely had to talk to and when I found it a little bit about your background and your story.

I thought, yeah, absolutely. This is kind of a no brainer, but having listened to this show, you know that that is definitely not where we're going to start.

So I want to start with you. What did your parents do for work and how did that end up shaping and influencing the choices that you've made with your own life and career?

Well, my father grew up very humble background in Brooklyn and he became a shoe salesman originally and we lived in Princeton, New Jersey.

He would take the train every day and commute to New York and he decided he wanted to spend more time with his family.

And he also decided he wanted to have a lot more success. So he became an accountant and then he worked his way up to a company called commodities corporation.

And at that time, he actually started the company with a small group of people and he worked there that was local in Princeton. So he was very happy. He had a great work life balance and that company became extremely successful.

So with my father, I saw that whatever he put his mind to, he could accomplish and if something wasn't working, he handled it.

And as far as my mother goes, she came from Bogota, Colombia to the United States when she was 21 and met my father.

And she spoke many languages and raised us exclusively when we were younger and then ended up becoming a translator and a test writer for ETS. She worked on the GREs and other tests.

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