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The James Arthur Ray Verdict

In response to the link,
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2079491,00.html posted in the 24/7 chat room today, the following:

Time Magazine, with its long history of fear mongering (helps sell magazines) and criticism towards the self-improvement industry (approval-seeking from its conservative subscribers), did a predictable job of reporting only the information that supports its pre-existing point of view.

The content of this article might well have generated the title, "Ruthless Rich Guy Kills Seeker Devotees." Were they intending to promote any of the notions that: 1) to make money, you have to be ruthless, 2) rich people are dangerous and uncaring, 3) the unabated self-improvement industry can get you killed or 4) wayward people should return to traditional religions? Maybe they didn't do this overtly, but what impression does the article leave?

I first heard about this on a Sunday morning from church members at a church where we held our monthly support group meetings and which I had just started attending. I was selling copies of the book, "The Sedona Method," (TSM) in the lobby that very same morning. Attendees, who made a mental connection between the title of the book and the news of the incident in the sweat lodge near the town of the same name, of course asked if there was any relationship. I told them that I hadn't heard of the event and that there was no connection. I told them we didn't do sweat lodges and handed them an informational flyer about TSM.

I ended up selling a good number of books that day and, over time, a higher-than-average percentage of the church members learned to release and started attending support group meetings. Some of those people have had extraordinarily good results, have gone on to retreats and posted inspirational gains.

Although I saw him in "The Secret," I've never done any of James Arthur Ray's work and have never purchased any of his materials but it stands to reason that he was as successful as he was, for as long as he was, because he provided ongoing and genuine value to his customers.

This incident is indeed tragic and I expect the negative ripples will go on for a good while. Pushing too hard can have negative consequences and there's a price to be paid for being negligent with people's lives. I see it as a cautionary tale for us all.

If the article or my comments here provide you with good releasing material, please use it as such.

Happy to hear your own perspective on the article or your response to my comments in this thread.

Tags: articles, news, self-improvement

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Lisa [Hootless Crew] on June 24, 2011 at 4:01pm

There are many articles out there on this one as the verdict was apparently only two days ago. What is also disturbing is that many self professed gurus out there in the 'self help' world have jumped on this case to market their own selves and products in their mail shot systems. It seems some will go to these extremes to benefit straight out of someone elses misfortune. Not good! Headings like 'Would you follow a guru' and 'Guru killed his clients'...

This sorry tale all went terribly wrong, but I doubt that JAR set out to kill as the media is portraying. It has gone the homicide route and not accidental death or by misadventure....all very sad the whole thing and love to those families of those that died and those that must have been terrified being part of something that was going so obviously wrong....they are sentencing by the end of the month but he is apparently looking at 11 years plus...

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Permalink Reply by Frank on June 24, 2011 at 9:17pm

A couple years back I attended a one night free lecture by James Ray in Albany, NY (USA). I drove two hours to hear him speak being drawn by recorded interviews others had done with him and of course by his appearance in The Secret. It was a two hour slimy sales pitch to attend his $1,300 weekend seminars. My opinion that night went from he's trying to help people to he's trying to take advantage of people. And I wasn't the only one. As the vast majority of the people were heading to the exits, he was screaming at us that they were only going to allow 20 lucky people that night to attend his seminar. Twenty is all he needed for then as he was due in some other city for another free lecture the next night and I'm sure they got their quota. I did see some poor souls scrambling to the front to sign up.

What happened in Arizona was a tragedy, but it so could have been avoided. These people paid $10,000 believing that James Ray will give them the answer that they were so convinced he had. James, I'm sure, was just trying to give them an experience so they leave thinking it was worth it. I totally believe James was caught up in the money. I'm convinced he lost his original purpose of why he got into the business.

There's this other guy, Genpo Roshi, who as a Buddhist monk started this practice called Big Mind. He was doing pretty well for himself. Some retreats he was charging (he calls them donations of) $15,000. As I understand it, he has three residences and lives a pretty good life, but he comes across as a Buddhist or non-material seeking. Then this past winter he admits to having three inappropriate relationships with female students, one a married woman that he was grooming to take his place. And this wasn't the first time for him, as this occurred back in the 1990's in the state of Maine. This from a man who gives all the appearance of being enlightened? He has since disrobed.

And even with Hale and Larry, but to a far lesser degree, they have people who are addicted to their retreats and yet are not improving their lives. I met some. These women I met were off to their fifth retreat and if I hadn't known better I would have thought they'd be good candidates to introduce the method to. These women didn't impress me at all as participants that have attended a retreat, let alone five. And they could ill afford to attend them, but they just loved the experience. Cannot Hale or Larry identify these individuals that are wasting their money? Or is it that the money is just too good? Just asking, that’s all.

Now saying that, I do remember Hale sharing a story at a weekend seminar that he was contemplating working with Jack Canfield on a project but decided against it because he was uncomfortable with the money Jack wanted to charge. If you know of Jack's seminars, he charges upwards of $10,000. So, I truly give Hale a lot of credit for pulling out.

But for many of these "gurus", the money is just too good. The people get addicted to the treatment. The "gurus" get hooked on the money, or power, or sex, or whatever. That's how it seems to be. Less than ten percent of the people who buy self-help books never get past the first chapter. Is that the responsibility of the author? No, obviously not. But at some point when desperate people are paying what little money they may have so to end up better than they came, there has to be some responsibility of that provider to make good on their claims or at least be fair with these people.

James went a step too far. Was it unfortunate? Of course it was. People died! Was that James' intent? Of course not. James simply wanted the ten thousand dollars per participant. Is he responsible for the casualties?? Indirectly, I believe he is. I think the jury got it right this time.

But the good news is, James Ray is enlightened. So, he should be content and happy with himself whether in or out of prison. So, in a sense, he’s beating the system.

(and, btw, I've yet to read that article so what I've said here in no way reflects what was written there)

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Permalink Reply by Tom Verbroekken on June 24, 2011 at 9:47pm

"You shouldn't support people in their weaknesses, it boomerangs." - Lester Levenson

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Permalink Reply by Frank on June 24, 2011 at 10:00pm

Lester said that? That's great!

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Permalink Reply by Tom Verbroekken on June 24, 2011 at 10:55pm

Yep, he did :) It's in The Keys To Ultimate Freedom, Session 21 - "Attitude And Action" on page 59.

Supporting people in their weaknesses only can harm one person - you. It's like taking poison and waiting for the other person to die.

My advice would be to STOP IT! ;) (Bob Newhart skitch joke)

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Permalink Reply by John [Hootless Crew] on June 24, 2011 at 11:01pm

Obviously the whole thing is very sad. Frank's comments are interesting.

I also agree with Chuck that the article is not great, though I do not go so far as to think JAR's success proves his worth. Let's face it, the most outwardly successful teachers are not necessarily the best, and probably a handful are even destructive.

One news story says that American Indians consider he got his comeuppance for unfairly appropriating and exploiting their traditions http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/06/24/verdict-in-self-help-gurus....

But the big question for JAR, and the rest of us, is of course: 'Do you still believe that our thoughts create the circumstance of our lives?' (This notion was central to JAR's teaching of Harmonic Wealth--I bought and read his book of that title--as well as to The Secret.) Either we (and JAR himself) believe that he must have had destructive thoughts to attract such misfortune on the victims, and on himself; or we reject that teaching, and take a more mainstream view of his fate as a case of bad luck and / or bad judgement (looks to me like a bit of both).

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Permalink Reply by Frank on June 24, 2011 at 11:44pm

After reading that article, I have to agree with you Chuck that one thing that isn't needed right now is a witch hunt. There are clearly people out there who are taking advantage of people that are hungry for what these people dish out, but not all of it is bad. If they want to point fingers at the self-help industry, they should also be pointing at the "corporate will take care of you" industry. People can just as easily get addicted to pain killers, "solutions in a pill" or mainstream health experts. How about the deaths of Michael Jackson or Jeff Conaway here int he states? Why aren't the drug companies manufacturing those medicines more on the hook?

The real issue might be that humans are very addictive beings, be it to a pill, to a speaker, to an experience, our body/mind wants to feel at peace - or at the very least pleasure. And so pleasure it typically is, since peace is so, so hard to attain.

In that article the author wrote, “I found the U.S. is still full of seminars, programs and training courses that will gladly take your money and replace all those ineffectual thoughts you currently have with brand new thoughts they've sold you”. And I would agree with that. But isn’t that what's great about SMaRT? Isn’t the Sedona Method and Release Technique pitching to simply let go of your thoughts. It's the pitch, but is it realistic. Even Hale admits that he didn't go 'free' till after Lester had passed on. And even the six steps are a true indication the process is simple, but hardly easy.

The article says one of the participants in James Ray’s ill fated event Amayra Hamilton is “writing a book about {her experience}”, (any chance that this person is attempting to profit from the misfortune of others?). Then the article goes on to say, “the book will probably argue (gently) that some good came out of the sweat lodge deaths, in the form of a new consciousness: you don't need a guru to improve your life. You just need to know yourself better”. Sounds like the method to me. In fact, when reading testimonials of people who have personally worked with Chuck (as well as other coaches here), one tremendous benefit people mentioned is the help they get in sending to themselves love and approval. And I've come to believe that is truly key. Until you love yourself inwardly, you can’t love your life outwardly. Simple as that.

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Permalink Reply by Lisa [Hootless Crew] on June 25, 2011 at 12:55am

Great points made on all this. For me what permeates through this terrible happening is how Lester would actively push those that guru-ized him away as he didn't want anyone to become reliant on him as a facilitator/teacher or leader. He always maintained that SMaRT was and still is a do it yourself tool that can be learnt and self used.

Where am I going with my thoughts on that? Well that many self helper type facilitators out there today want to be actively followed and relied upon, they want followers to come back and back and back again parting with more and more cash along the way and even more! Certainly JAR might have fallen into that category mightn't he? When the thirst for money kicks in it can just become the next addiction that replaced something else that went before that. That I believe is doomed to failure eventually because those that truly are taking it all for checking themselves will soon come to learn that there are indeed 'Many rays that lead to the same sun'.....it is unfair to let others believe that one modality or another is all there is and all that should be relied upon. At least until the person gets to that decision for what is right for them all by themselves.

And what is right for one person may be very different from what is right for the next person and so on.

Michael Brown has it right methinks where he ultimately says "Let Presence be your facilitator" - In other words beingness or source or whatever word you like to use for it. Therein is another being not unlike Lester in that he actively discourages anyone follow him, but learn the tools to unlock what is needed only and then be guided by source.

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Permalink Reply by Chuck Goodwin, [SMaRT Host] on June 25, 2011 at 2:55am

I guess we, who practice Lester-style releasing, can all be grateful that we have found something that's so good, so cheap and really can be done alone or with a buddy for free thereafter. Special thanks to Hootless also for creating a wholesome environment where avid releasers can get quick, quality support.

Thanks, everybody so far, for your thoughtful points of view on this. Anybody else?

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Permalink Reply by Thomas Rydell on July 25, 2011 at 12:40am

I checked out some material by James Ray before I started with The Sedona Method. It's very unfortunate what has happened, but I can certainly imagine James Ray pushing things a bit too far, and if you combine that with a bunch of people that think they will achieve enlightenment at the end of the retreat if they just are committed enough... then I am not surprised that it went wrong. What I like about Lesters material is that happiness comes first, any other gains (such as money) is just a bonus. That's really the essence of what masters like Jesus said too... Anyway, I am still on James Rays mailinglist. At first he talked about the incident, and how he had hired his own team to perform investigation of the events (like he was not there). Then he just stopped sending updates about it, and continued to promote his material like nothing had happened... I found that a bit disturbing to be honest. I also read in an article that the local Indians are really tired of white men coming to exploit their customs, something that I can totally understand.

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Permalink Reply by John [Hootless Crew] on November 27, 2011 at 8:12am

It is now over a week since the press reported that he got 6 years. Of course will be inside for less.

Now the dust has settled, and one can give it a bit more perspective, I do not think that this means that other self-help gurus need to watch their backs or fear litigation. His methods were extreme and unusual. He placed people under extreme physical stress which he said would make people think they were dying. Few coaches or teachers do that. If Mr Ray felt it was necessary to do this for his teaching, he could at least have hired a sympathetic medic out of his huge fees to supervise the risk, and advise on whether it was safe to pressurise any reluctant student to continue with the exercise.

So it is just common sense that he was criminally negligent, and in so far as there is any sense in the legal system (not much, sometimes) this kind of sentence was to be expected. He was only a victim of circumstances in the sense that any of us might do something criminally stupid, unable to think clearly at the time: surely a lot of crime is like that.

Whether Mr Ray finds the integrity to address publicly the implications of his misfortune for his very public teaching on the law of attraction is between him and his conscience. He has a smart new website, from which all reference to the case has been removed. It looks like a relaunch of his career which has taken investment and hard work. It shows chutzpa, though considering his actions led to some bereavements, it seems to me that there is something not quite right in this manner of presentation, and in the site's deafening silence about the truth.

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Permalink Reply by Evan on November 27, 2011 at 9:18am

While i'm not too familiar with the details of his work, the assumption that the big household names have any spiritual mastery themselves, or will hold high spiritual / ethical standards is interesting. As is the assumption that they are where they are for providing excellent value or service. To assume this guy is enlightened is really pushing it, IMHO.

I am personally familiar with a situation going on like this right now in a totally different arena so no point going into it, but the essence of it applies here:

It's not really that hard to read a book or two on this subject, or take a little bit of what Lester says, and repeat it. If you are good at marketing and can package it you can completely create this and say all the "right" stuff. People will assume you MUST know and have reached a high level in order to be writing a book about it and to have the balls to get up there and sell it. But you don't. At all. And in fact because the material would be great (it's all available) you'd have even people in the know saying "well I read that guys stuff and it is really on point."

The entire process can be outsourced, literally.

McDonalds has been in the food industry for decades and have made billiions and billions. It has nothing to do at all with their food being good. A better example might be in music - many people assume that the people who become famous are the "best" musicians when in fact some of them know nothing at all but have the right machine behind them or are masterful at creating the image they know what they are doing.

Some of these guys are marketers first and foremost and this is their niche. They can use their wealth and such to justify being able to teach "wealth manifestation" when all of their money has come from selling courses about wealth manifestation. This exists in internet marketing too - there are people who have never made a dime and couldn't put a website together but have made millions selling courses telling other people how to do it because they know how to market that material and position themselves as an expert.

This may sound surprising in the context of this forum but I am not a huge fan of the "industry" and do not really get triggered at all when people say it is all BS because of the high likelihood they've had it sold to them a certain way. I welcome more investigation into it for a lot of reasons.

Every arena has it's household names and stars and then the ones who are actually all about the art and the craft. Occasionally and rarely this aligns that it is the right combination for someone to be both, ala Miles Davis but this is the vast vast minority. The real masters are usually lesser known and busy doing their thing to their audience.

Be grateful to have come across Lester who is the real deal. Be careful in assumptions that anyone in this niche who has gotten "big" even belongs in the same universe.