Hi, I'm Dr. Stephen Hassan with another episode of the Influence Continuum, and I'm delighted to have a fellow therapist with me, Esther Friedman, on the show with me.

Esther has a book. We can see it for those of you who are looking at the video. It's called The Gentle Souls Revolution, and the subtitle is A Secret Cult, An Open Rebellion,

and Lessons in Protecting and Honoring Your Gentle Soul.

I love that.

You're cool.

Thank you.

I really appreciate that. So I'm going to just read a little more of your bio. Esther is a licensed mental health counselor, expressive art therapist, songwriter,

author, and former cult member. In 2006, a new friend, an air quotes, introduced her to a quote, esoteric school, unquote,

and 15 years later, she left the secret cult. She didn't recognize the, quote, school, unquote,

as a cult until she started researching cults obsessively.

Then she posted a blog called Cult Confessions, soon a CD of 10 Original Songs,

also called Cult Confessions Followed.

And you're an artist, so of course you're going to be wanting to use your soul and your creative

talents to help yourself heal and help others so i'm just going to read a few more things you know

every time you refuse to keep the cult secret you felt better so that was self-reinforcing. This is a, and I feel the same,

felt the same way and feel the same way. So she started what she called an edutainment campaign,

which I love, and I Got Out.org, I will mention as well, and I'm a collaborating co-founder of, presenting her misadventure to private audiences,

and she realized that releasing secrets freed her voice and her mind.

So I'm going to stop there, but just say, you have quite an interesting story.

You were not recruited at 19. You were a little bit older.

And I just want to say the Gurgif, you know, inspired cult that you got sucked into. I was actually

kind of recruited into that by my next door neighbor as a child. And I read in search of the miraculous and all of the

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