Season 9 Opener: A Little Bit Culty Vancouver book launch & live Q&A (Part 2)

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1:02mania, 4 New York strip, 4 rib eye, 4 brisket, 4 sirloin, each one bringing its own flavor to the grill. Boom. Basically, dinners handled even when your schedule absolutely isn't. Try the burger perfection flight at OmahaStakes.com today. That's 20 premium steak burgers for just $79.99 plus get $35 off with promo-cold coltie. That's OmahaStakes.com promo-cold coltie for $35 off at checkout. Terms apply, seaside for details. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal, medical or mental health advice. The views and opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the podcast and are not intended to malign any religion, group, club, organization, business, individual, anyone or anything. I'm Sarah Edminson. And I'm the Beames. And this is a little bit coltie, the podcast where we unpack

2:04colts, control and coercion. We woke up from a cult. The whole wild ride ended up in the vow on HBO and in my memoir, Scarred. Now, after eight seasons of hearing every kind of coltie story imaginable, we've bottled up everything we've learned into a book, also called a little bit coltie. It's available now in all formats on Amazon, Audible and where fine books are sold, or get a signed personalized copy on our website. Better yet, ask your local bookstore or library to order it and encourage them to get on that cult awareness bedwagon. On the show, we break down the shame and secrets that make these experiences so destructive. With honest conversations about how everyday groups can slide into the cult diverse. Each week, we bring in experts, survivors and whistleblowers to talk red flags, resilience and recovery. And yes, we still make time to laugh. Sometimes you have to, or you'll cry. Want early ad free episodes, live Q&As and exclusive extras? Join us on Patreon at patreon.com slash a little bit coltie. Welcome to season 9 of a little bit coltie.

3:08To win my love, for the girl I'm all I could leave, but no one else. Hello everybody. Welcome back to part two of our live in Vancouver, book launch and Q&A with family, friends and fans. This is diving right back into the Q&A, so if you missed part one, you may want to do that first and then come back and join us here. Enjoy! I remember a couple of years ago, I tried to reach out to warn you about somebody that I once looked up to, an author, a podcaster, I won't say the name, but yeah, somebody had complete trust in and admired and whatever. Fast forward a couple of years and I think this person is very

4:08dangerous in causing a lot of problems. Anyway, my last interaction with this person was reminding them that they had admitted that they had fallen for three different cults and that I said, perhaps maybe you shouldn't be so certain about what you're saying now. And I wish I'd heard what you guys just said earlier. I might have used this approach, but essentially it was, do you know how hurtful that is to me? I was like, oh, but it's also true. So I guess that's sort of the question is, do you see a pattern in people who are more susceptible to the alt dynamics and maybe gaps in critical thinking? I don't want to answer my question. The question is that, what are the signs of people who are easy marks or whatever for the stuff? Yes, yes. Case by case. That's important because there's certainly patterns, but it's definitely case by case. When I think about that person who shall remain nameless, I feel like, and I'm going to answer that for them and then paint a bigger picture, I think that they enjoy the smell. This is Nippy's line, the smell of their own

5:12farts. In other words, they're righteous. I believe that there's a certain, specifically, a cult hopping, like people who go from thing to thing. And this is a chapter in the book we call the cult shaped hole in your heart. And I sure had one when I left. I had a whole big hole, but if somebody, if the right person had invited me to something else, I mean, listen, I was allergic. I was super allergic, but I was also very lonesome in that way for the community and the things that we left. I think that's a lot of time building it. So it's different. I did, but I think with that person, people are looking for answers, you're looking for community, and then top it off with a little need to be right about something with that person. And that's what I mean by farts, never. It's just a righteousness. I definitely enjoy it being right and feeling good about finding my brother's laughing in the back. And still do perhaps enjoy being just a little bit, you know, other things that I like, you know, it that I think is a personality type. And then to

6:14want to, is that, you're awfully kind to yourself? Oh, yeah. What would you call it? Joy. Joy. Does it appear joy to be around? I do think that like, it's really case by case. And it's, that's something that we try to lay out in the book. It's like, what's your own hook? And my hook at the time that I got hooked in was very specifically community purpose, you know, wanting to feel like I was part of something meaningful. And, you know, giving me the tools to success that I thought that I needed. And I think that was my hook. Nippie's hook was very different. And I, and drastically different, drastically different. Who hasn't read the book yet? Okay, great. So one of the things we laid out is like, and how we do the structure of it with everything we talk about. So like, why do people join cults? They get hooked. My hook, I just said what was Nippie's hook, read the book. And then like a couple specific. Oh, yeah. But I know we can. But like we, that we break it down to how did, you know, we look at different guests. So every guest highlights a different thing that we talk about. And every guest gets its own little paragraph. And we show how

7:18different the hook can be. And it can be, you know, anything from utopia to financial freedom to, you know, joy. He goes. This is called science of joy. Different phases of their life of feeling low self-esteem, high self-esteem. You get out. Some people, there's life is going to hit you at some point. Right. And it's going to cause you to self reflect. And if you had met Sarah and I during that point, I'd have been like, Hey, we got some great tools for you to self reflect and evolve that. And we were right. That's the thing we did. You would come and take a five. I had two friends. One of them took it. Did a five day, and hugged me crying. Said he was thinking of suicide. I had no idea. Another one had just gotten out of divorce. They didn't continue. But they got what they needed felt better and moved on with her life. I, I'm actually still proud of that. Like, I don't have a problem. Now, I wasn't trying to get him to join a cult. I just said, Hey, you might want to try this. It helped me here. So the thing. Yeah. Megan. I really like these questions where we're talking about like, because we, I think as humans, we want to learn, like,

8:18could I possibly have become part of a cult or like, what are some of the behaviors that I exhibit that might make me vulnerable to being a cult? And so we look inward at ourselves. But as I was telling our 19 year old that I was coming today, and she's like, do you think it's not about the people? She's like, do you think that that like was the cult always planning on being a cult? Or did it start as something and then become something else? And so instead of looking a little bit more externally now and more of like, last about our wee vulnerable as people and more to sometimes do something accidentally become a cult. And it runs away from us. What do you think about that? I said, I'm going to say this. One of the things I say is kind of like one of our taglines is the coercive patterns that are the behaviors that what's the line? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. The abuses of power that go on in cults aren't proprietary to cults. It can happen on a less sort level like with coercion and abuse. And you can kind of be in a cult, just cult light. And you

9:21don't even know it. You could have come across it, left it, looked back and not even known that you're involved with something. And I guarantee you most people have had an experience like that. So it's not so much it goes full blown cult. You were involved with someone where someone was gaslighting you, love bombing you, trying to manipulate you, coerce you in some sort of abuse of power away. You didn't even know it. You didn't even think it was going on. And then you look back because you have more awareness or something bad happens. And you go, oh, I wasn't in a cult, but they did behave like that. Which happens to us a lot after the vow. People reached out from around the world still do saying, thank you for giving me the language to what happened. And to answer the second part of your question, Megan, we have just found lots of groups that started with great intentions, wonderful intentions, little utopian communities, little, you know, communes of hippies trying to live a better life. And then one person, you know, humans are humans. So the dynamics can shift. One person gets into power and ruins everything. For example, I mean lots of things like that can happen. We do believe in our case that Keith turned bad. No, I think he was

10:27associated path as age of 12 or whatever and figured out that he could manipulate people and got good at doing that. Same way someone goes, I'm going to be a great hockey player. They put Marley Lou Mu or great Wayne Gretzky on their wall. He found he was good at something when we're down that path. But the other thing to that. Oh, sorry, I can just finish the one thought. No, you may not. You're right. You're right. You're right. No, well, just that there is people, there are people like Keith who plan it. And then there's people, there's lots of people that have list like the narcissism of their own followers, fuels their demise. So it gets worse. What I was going to say on the heels of that, this is somewhat dark. I think what allows these people to get away with what they get away with is because they are proactively looking for areas of vulnerability in the human condition because they've studied it. Know what it looks like. Sometimes you don't have a chance. Right. If you meet them and they're committed and they find that area of you and they know how to listen to it, they know how to look for it, they can even probably tell when you walk in the room, that's a target. They target you and you don't have a chance unless you move or something like that. And that's how these people work. And they're out there. And if they

11:30can get themselves inside a system where they can cheat their way to the top and they're in a position of power, authority, admiration, whatever hat would have you, then a lot of the people underneath them that are bought into them are in trouble in some shape or form. And when that bomb or that shrapnel goes off, you know, we got skimmed by it. But people that were next to Keith in his immediate circle have lifelong damage. It's undeniable. And that's their advantage. They know what it's like to be you. They understand your psychology. They've studied it. You're an un-the-wizer because you find yourself in a position of being at the end of someone who's put themselves out as someone who's been evil and you don't know that they have that bad 10. And they're out there and you might know some. Quick, shameless plug for our book because there's a very exciting update. The audiobook is officially out and it's narrated by us. So you can now read the book however you like, hardcover, e-book, or listen to us tell you the whole damn story ourselves. And if you've been

12:33listening to the podcast thinking, I know the story. What else is there to learn? We think you might be surprised because the book does something different. It pulls everything we've learned together into one place. Not just what happened, but the patterns underneath it, the red flags we missed, and what we understand now. And what we hope you can take from our experiences and actually use it in your own life. And if you're more of a just give me the goods person, we've got you there too. There are simple takeaways and checklists throughout so you can skim, highlight, dog ear, or come back to the parts that matter most. It's the story, yes, but it's also the okay, what do we do with everything we've learned book and how do we use this information to protect us in the future. And now you can hear it in our actual voices, which feels like the perfect way to experience it. A little bit culty, navigating, cults, control, and coercion is available now in hardcover, e-book, and audiobook wherever you get your books. And if you've already pecked it up, first of all, thank you. Second, if you enjoyed it, please take a minute to leave us a review, reviews make a huge difference in helping new readers find the book. And we do read them,

13:37all of them. Then pass that hard copy along, give it to a friend, leave it on someone's nightstand. Maybe give it to someone who might be in a cult, you never know. And save the audiobook for your next long drive, gardening marathon, dog walk, closet purge, or whatever activity makes you think, you know what could really improve this? A few hours of cult education. However you read it or listen or pass it along, we are so grateful you're part of this conversation. Enjoy! This summer we decided our Vancouver condo needed a serious glow up, and Wayfair was our first stop, mostly because I have zero patience for wandering 17 different furniture stores. Wayfair verified products are hand vetted by actual specialists using a 10 point inspection. So you're not gambling on some flimsy end table that looks great online and then collapses the first time someone sets down a coffee mug. Nah, Saiyan. They've got thousands of products across every style and budget,

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16:43Join the millions of customers who trust HomeServe. For 50% less your first year, go to homeServe.com slash callty. That's homeServe.com slash callty for 50% less. Savings compared to renewal price. Void in Florida. Thank you for listening. Now let's dive back into the calltiverse. Kevin, thanks for coming two times in the last week. First off, I'm sorry for the time and energy you had to invest in making this adjustment, but I'm grateful that you did. Thank you. Probably AC here too. AC here. Yes. In not there. Absolutely. It's lovely. Sorry if this question is too personal, I think. You've been very personal throughout your podcasts, but you have the unique position of having met in a cult, and I'm kind of piggybacking on what Nippy just said a little while ago, but you're playing a character of yourself while

17:43you're in the cult. So I'm just, I'm curious, did you fall in love with each other's character, or did you see through the character and connect that way and draw our sense of what you're answering yourself to each other? Did you kind of save each other? It's not even so cute. You're right. No, I'm just kidding. You have a good answer. What? You are. Yeah, well, you know, I have a good answer for you. Only to tell me what it is and then all. Confirmely. Well, I think there is a little bit of both actually. You know, we both, I do think that Nippy was more his authentic self. I for sure was. I was going to sleep on your table. I didn't give it. That's why he didn't get promoted. I mean, stash. I was getting what I was getting. You didn't care. You didn't care. I was obedient. I had more of a good girl mask on, but underneath it, I was still. I was a bad girl. No. I just said that. Delete that will. Delete that, dude. Delete that. But I actually was. I didn't really realize it till later. It was

18:44a persona and even towards the end, if you've read Scarred as well, you'll know that I was doing all the things I was supposed to do. I said I was doing all the things, but I had started to not and to lie and to like inside was like, this is bullshit. When that mask was down. Outside, I was like, this is bullshit. Yeah. Nippy was outwardly like that internally. So I think we did. I was able, I think one of the reasons why I survived in the way that we did it personally is that I had Nippy to talk to and like I could complain to him and he wasn't going to go tell on me. Yeah, we can bring to Mark. We all had grievances around the organization. It wasn't Hunky Dory. It was a shit show. In addition to the good stuff. Yeah. We were constantly trying to battle things with the organization outside of it. We're like, what's going on here? What is this going to be the well-owned machine that, you know, and times taken. We're burning daylight, you know. I would have stuff to do. And so I always know what it was like. We always discredo. But to your question, I think we weren't in Albany. So like I never felt the pressure to behave. Like I was always going to be

19:47me and I didn't really have the energy. I was too lazy to be like. But you also had certain values. We did have values and then one of the things that I say that I learned in Nextium that I still agree with is that a good relationship is a match of values. And our values were our values. And we met there and we loved each other as values. Go ahead. What we signed up for, growth, push yourself, success, community, all those things. We had in common. Right. We still have in common. We're still doing it. So here we are. And that never changed. That never changed. And it got tested. So I got to see how she was. So I got to see it. Like a lot of people flex a persona, but you don't, you know, very few, when you make friends, you don't necessarily know you assume that they're going to have a character. You assume that when you go into an alley and you get a jump, they're going to stay there and have your back and not run. Very seldom is it tested, right? You don't know. You don't really know someone's character until it's tested. Her's just tested right in front of me. And I got to see it and it was confirmed.

20:50That was the answer I was thinking of. Yeah. Thank you. Love you. So thanks for doing a, ask me anything. This is great. Yeah. The other night at Banyan, we were talking about Scarred. We were talking about the day you got out. The day you blew got out of there. And I think you tell the story in Scarred about, I think it was being I am attracted to Troy. It's Toronto. Toronto. Yeah. From Albany to Toronto, nine hours with a three year old. Now you were, you, you had a plan and you executed it. What would you say to somebody who's in a very controlling cult and they're a few that are quite popular right now? Yeah. Like how to go? That like what steps should they take? How, if when they're ready to go, like, how controlled do they need to be of themselves? And then how much planning do they need to take? And what steps do they need to take? And who should they reach out to? Great question. And that's why we wrote the chapter what to do when it's time to GTFO. And it is like Nippy said earlier is case by case, but

21:51like depends how immersed you are. Like do you live on the compound? You know, like are you escaping an island? Or is it foreign country? Or are you just like leaving an online book club that's become coercive? Like there's different things you need to do. But then everything in between and in that chapter, we really break down like your security and your livelihood and like, you know, for some people, they have to leave everything and learn how to use a debit card. And like they don't have any of that. And everyone they've ever done business with is in their community. That's a whole different thing. So we try to break down it into categories. But I think it's laid out very specifically in the book. And there's also the section before is when the shelf breaks. Like what causes the shelf to break? And if anyone not heard that metaphor, I feel like most people, Uncle John, you don't listen to the podcast. I don't think I'm calling you out. No, I was kidding. I don't expect you to, I don't expect my family to listen to the podcast. Why would you? But, yes, I'm going to, I'll explain it for those who've never heard it. So there's a metaphor in the cult space that like you have a shelf, a metaphorical shelf in your head. And when something happens

22:54in your life, and I'll use a different example, let's say domestic violence, because it's if you've never experienced a cult, well, you saw example. Sure. Okay. I'll back to our example. I'll use both examples at the same time. The first time the guy says something kind of mean, you're like, did he just say that? Now he's a good guy. I'll put it on the shelf in the cult. Did he just have to make a wish a sash? That's a bit strange. Oh, there's a reason I'll put it on the shelf. So all the things that happen, the moments, the interactions, those little feelings, those little things that give you the icky feeling, and you're not totally sure what it is. And you can't name it. You put it on the shelf. Our shelf was front loaded a little. Yeah, it was a real heavy 12 years later. And the, you know, the final thing that happens is the thing that breaks the shelf. And it's very different for everybody. Obviously, and actually for those who know, like the details of my story, it wasn't actually getting branded that broke my shelf. That I was still high on the adrenaline on that for a while. It was finding out that it was Keith's initials in the symbol for the elements. And also that he was, that sex was involved, that some people were having sex with him. And

23:55that put it all together for me and that broke my shelf. But other people have shelf breaking moments from the littlest little things. Why were we talking about shelf breaking? We were asked about what, what's how they get out what you decide is that it's happening. Yeah, so sometimes, thank you so much, Megan. You sometimes you, your shelf breaks and it's not time to get out because you need to gather evidence. You need to make sure you're safe. You need to find a place to live depending on how involved you are. So it's really case by case and we have family members. Yeah, I do like you, yeah, some people can't leave because they're leaving family members. There was a lot. There were people that left with us. And I knew that they were out, but they stayed. And they stayed in the community because they were waiting to get paid. They had family that they were trying to extract. So they couldn't become an enemy like I was. They saw what happened to me and they're like, oh no, we're going to stay and like, what the fuck are you doing? Come with me? And they're like, no, we're happy. But then I found out later that they had to like take a bit more time. You know, so yeah. Does that end up answering the question? Yes. The only other person I know named Troy. And to you, sorry, sorry. Oh, sorry. This woman's been,

24:56okay. Thank you, Megan. We'll come to you. Thank you very much for this. And I just wanted to ask the question around, what was the time that you realized, because control is obviously a big part of cult? What was the pivotal time that you realized something really didn't sit well with you? I mean, the things not sitting well with me were from the beginning. Unfortunately. Yeah. But not that bad. Just little things. Like I said, the shelf. But I was, I knew I couldn't get my money back. I would trust the person who told me that things were going to get better. And they did. But there were so many weird things from the beginning. I just didn't know what I was looking at. All of those things together started to accumulate. Like the shelf just get pinning heavier and heavier. There were other things like in the years leading up to me leaving, us leaving were like, you know, a couple of people died suspiciously. And it was from very advanced cancers. And at the time, I thought it was something in the water. But I believe that Keith poisoned them actually. And

25:58poisoned the women around him that he was trying to get rid of to make room for the younger, newer batch of women. So, but yeah, no finding out the truth about who he was the final thing. But yeah, yeah. But there were so many other things that were just nying at me that I knew as it was time. Thank you for coming. Hey, Tracy. So when you had your space in Vancouver, and you would do presentation night, kind of like this. Yeah, a bit like this. Yeah. And I brought two of my friends and then we went for coffee afterwards. And you know, we sat down and then my friend and it goes, well, that's a cult. And I said, no, it's not. It's, you know, anyway, my question might not be answerable. But I'm just wondering if there are certain traits in people who are able to not be in doctorate it is to buy it. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. There's not

27:02that even with people like that, though I will say that they may have seen that our thing was a cult, but could also be because this has happened a lot where people say they came to an info night or whatever. And they were like, oh, I saw that a mile away. And then they tell me about something they're involved in. I'm like, but you do that. You know, so it doesn't, they might see this very obviously. And that does happen. But I do think that people who've had certain experiences, like where they grew up and I want to share something. Can I, can I get with what you told me like 12 or 13 20 years ago? Yes. Okay. Candace was a deer acting is a deer acting friend of mine. But at the time I tried to recruit her like I did all my friends. And she came in and I think even met Nancy and did you know, like yes. And she was like, as soon as you heard about the sages, she was like I grew up and these are my words. As I remember them from 20 years ago in, you know, a partite South Africa and like the hierarchy and the ranking. And I was like, I totally understand why you think that's that. But that's not what it is. But Candace saw it like a mile away because of her experience.

28:06Does that seem accurate? Did my saying that right? Your yours and your mother's yes. So, so she was able to sniff it out because she had the background and have that background. Like my experience of cults was like shaving heads, goatbloods, people in robes, like eyes wide shut, like all that's what I thought a cult looked like. I didn't know what I know now. If I knew what I knew now, I never would have signed up but let alone gone. I would have been like, oh, you're pressuring me like back off. All that say I do think people have areas of susceptibility. And if you're the kind of person who says, Oh, I don't have that areas of susceptibility, you just advertise and broadcast areas of susceptibility. Because if I'm a levelant person, I go, Oh, this person's prideful or whatever, I can just stroke their pride and that then now I'm in. Right. So and you fortify a blind spot when you do that. So I didn't think I was a kind of person that would fall for this. But I also didn't think my high school girlfriend who I was still in love with would give me to come take her training that's based on goals. Right.

29:10And I was like, Oh, come check it out. I'll go do your cult. I actually said that. And we actually had somebody on the podcast and I'm going to say his name because he was on the podcast and he may or may not have family in the room. It seems Ian and he was XJW, Joe was a witness and he was a voice over actor here in Vancouver and I tried to recruit him or somebody else tried to recruit him, but I did the sales pitch and he was like, yeah, group Joe was witness and like, no. And I was like, Oh, no, you're just like projecting your bad cult experience onto what we're doing. This is not that at all. And we laughed about that when he came on the podcast because it was very similar as we found out, but you know, live and learn. I have a pre question that follows up her question and that is when you said that key you thought Keith may be poison some of the people that are dying of cancer. Did you mean real poison or psychologically poisoned? Well, but I mean, that's not my question. He asked

30:12my pre-quest. Okay, so let me answer that question first. So there was a time when what? Give the actual forensics that we know about. Yeah, first I thought it was psychological poison, like just tormenting. Like if you watch the vow, Keith tormented these women, gaslit them and just terrible things happened to these women. Then later we found out from somebody who left that she had said something she was in love with him and was part of the harem. And she said that she felt uncomfortable with all these women dying. His friends, these are people who have been with us since they were teenagers. And he said, I think that they're being poisoned and it wouldn't be hard to poison somebody through the water. So we think that he that was his admittance to her. Often times he sees people tell you what they're doing while they're doing it. Yes. And she was upset about being having to share him because she loved him and didn't want to be part of a harem. And he said, don't worry, there's going to be a changing of the guard soon. So those are the two evidence. But that's our evidence. And also, but it's, you know, third hand. Yeah. Yeah. So here's my real

31:17question. That wasn't really my question. Here it was tested. Oh, yeah, the hair. Yeah, that's that's public knowledge. Yeah, there was a documentary. Yeah, the documentary made about the hair being tested. Karen enteriders hair. She had really long hair and they tested it and there was bromine in it. I think rap poison and she had. She had cancer too and overcame it. So did Nancy. And so did Nancy. There were nine cases of cancer in the women around him. Wow. Yeah. And three or four of them died. So you had good reason. Yeah. But the question. Yeah. The question I had is people study people in the penal system who have committed rape. And they have identified their certain characteristics they look for before they choose their victim. So what I'm wondering as in the situation where someone's running a cult and the people that work with them and they're looking for their new victims, what are the characteristics they're looking for when they look for their next victims? I can't, like I mean, I'll tell you for me when I was recruiting for next year, I wasn't looking for people like vulnerable people that sort of the stereotype. I was looking for bright lights. I was looking for people who are producers who are creating shit in the world who

32:20were wanting to be a part of team humanity. I know that sounds really naive now, but that's what I was looking for. I would say that somebody like Keith was looking for people that he could get close to and manipulate. And there were certain patterns of behavior. And that's also in the women. What? In the types of women. In the types of women. Yeah. And we talk about actually attachment theory and different types of attachment theory and how certain people with certain types of attachment styles gravitate towards people like Keith and what they can offer in terms of connection and safety and being seen in a way they may not have gotten from their parents. Time to have a little word from our sponsors. Remember when summer actually meant freedom, no homework, no teachers, no alarm clocks, just weeks of glory is nothing stretching out ahead of you like an endless Saturday. As adults, we don't get that magic bat, but meant mobile summer sale is bring a decent chunk of it now.

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34:25plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes may slow when network is busy includes up to 20 gigabytes hotspot capable device required availability speed and coverage varies cement mobile.com this message is sponsored by raycon there's something about the start of fall that puts me in full reset mode clearing out the old getting organized rebuilding routines that collapsed over the summer one thing that's become part of that reset raycons everyday earbuds classic the active noise cancellation is great for blocking out distractions while I'm working through my to do list I've been using these pretty much every day since I got them Jim errands listening to audiobooks at home listening to the podcast and make sure it's good these are the ones that I actually reach for because I tune out everything and focus on what I'm listening to they've just become part of my routine up to 32 hours of battery life quick charge for 90 minutes of playtime from just 10 minutes of charging and awareness mode from when I'm out walking and still want to hear my surroundings same premium

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36:29does a hundred times before fatigue most recipes are ready in 15 minutes which during back to school season feels like wizardry and they don't cut corners screening out over 200 sketchy additives quality meat and seafood with no hormones or antibiotics the standard never slips so you know exactly what you're getting honestly we don't even think about grocery shopping or a meal planning anymore it just happens we seriously missed it when we were at home in vacation of Vancouver which is a wild sentence to say about groceries but here we are and honestly all at time we're not spending wandering grocery store aisles or scrambling to plan dinner that's time we're pouring right back into making this show for you so I think we can all thank hungry root for that you are going to love hungry root as much as I do for a limited time get 40% off your first order plus a free item in every box for life go to hungry root dot com slash quality and use code colt that's hungry root dot com slash colt code colt to get 40% off your first box and a free item of your choice for life enjoy break times over let's get back to the show I have two questions one is after you got your

37:40you were branded you didn't tell nippy you told mark right was that yeah and I just want to think a comment about that and then lastly this is kind of a jovial one for nippy nippy I just wonder what's your perception of Canadians that's all I want yeah I was scared shitless because I had collateral I'd given collateral and I don't know what the long term plan was really because obviously nippy would have seen it eventually for those who don't know the order of events really quickly I was derailing I was like I have to get out of this I was trying to figure out how to blow it up to know how I was so scared then mark for cent a my business partner said that he was leaving next him and he had his own thing going on because Bonnie his wife had left and I felt I want to know why so he made me sign an NDA and under the NDA I somehow felt safe to tell him and but it was after he shared with me would he knew but why he was leaving which was that there was this secret women's group and that the women were being tasked to have sex with Keith so I already knew that I was out

38:44I knew I had to get out and because he shared that with me I I felt safe to tell him and we hatched a plan that he would tell nippy because then somehow I wouldn't be breaking my vow of secrecy and my collateral wouldn't be released it made no sense but it was my knees just trying to like figure out how to let him know without getting in trouble like be no sense but that's why I told Mark first and nippy responded appropriately and we were out and then we went to the FBI and that was it and well actually what you wanted to skip a few talk to the FBI actually we went to the FBI like three days after nippy found out it was that like they after my birthday yeah it was very fast we moved fast once like we woke up very quickly yeah and for anybody who has seen the vow and for those of you who've read the book I do have to say that I and seeing you evolve over the last many years and all of the acquisition of information and conversations that you have you two are very disarming in your like you present as is you are the same as we've had in

39:45private phone calls as you are in this room and I think that's probably why so many people are charmed and friendly and comfortable to speak to you because you really make everybody at ease and you are who you say you are and as you are in the book and there's and for those of you when you read the book what you'll notice and it's something that I mean we've spent hours and hours together in the last few years talking through what the plans will be for your what you're going to include in the book and how it's going to be released and I said to these guys earlier today one of the things that I still well I feel like I know them as many of you do there is a piece in the book where they there is a both an admission of shame and embarrassment that can come with their experience and that looks different on each person and just the fact that you guys are so vulnerable in this room and that you're so vulnerable in the pages that are of bestselling book now that you know live in homes and libraries beyond that you that homes you'll never go to this book lives in

40:50and that admission is such a huge indicator of who you are as people and I hope you give yourself credit for that because you spend a lot of time shedding spotlight on other people and helping other people but I hope you give yourselves a lot of credit for the light that you are yourselves and in order because people have to like see the light to be able to experience it for themselves and they're here and on that note I my last question for you today is for anybody who might have that little feeling inside of them listening either in the room today or on the podcast for anyone who might be just questioning something and that may be cultish like behavior out in the world that they're encountering or it might be something in a family dynamic if you if somebody in the room were to have something that is embarrassing them or that they feel shame about that they haven't nested that that's preventing them from moving forward what advice would you give them?

41:51Barry Meyer who is the journalist who broke the story in the New York Times said sunlight is the best disinfectant and I really agree with that and that's certainly been our experience and our motto from the beginning has been to blow the shame both blow the lid off the shame and the stigma around these things and I think that's largely why we were able to do what we did is in the wake of me too where it was like okay and shifting off the victim blame that had always occurred with situations like this and still does but it's less so now and I'm very grateful for that because I don't think that we would have been able to do what we did without that that being in that wake so and also okay I'm more think is just to say thank you Megan I don't know if we set it properly at the beginning Megan and the self publishing agency is the reason why we have this book and one of the reasons why it's super important to mention is because while I had a great experience publishing traditionally with SCARD I didn't have a lot of things in my control and I didn't realize that would be so hard as a cult survivor to not choose what was on the cover or to not

42:54have the final say in the edit and that's something that Megan pitched us and I'm so grateful because there are so many things that I know publisher would have said in fact people said yeah you need to make this into two books or that those there's appendixes at the end that are very niche how to write a cult memoir very niche right how to whistle blow I know most of the people in this room are not going to read those sections but it's okay the book is meant to skip around and what I wanted and what Megan gave us permission to do is write the book that we wanted to write and so that when somebody came to us who just got out of a cult fresh out of a cult or their loved ones in a cult or they're just curious I can give everything that we've learned up until now in one book and there's no like things they need to download off the internet or something like everything's there and I'm very proud of that and no way a regular publisher would have let us do that because it's too there's a lot of there and thank you Megan for guiding us keeping us on track this book will probably be about five years out with Megan so thank you to Megan thank you back and also this time last year for

43:54those who know us we came back last time we were like we're done and then we found melody it was in the audience and melody looked at us she said you're not done you're not quite done and it was melody what's that she edited this book yes yeah we actually had two editors melody was our main structural editor Shelley Stoper Dia was our first but it was almost like a writing coach editor and then Shelley came in once it was done and restructured it was Shelley's idea to do I mean sorry it was Melody's idea to do the culty check culty cheat sheet if you see every chapter as a cheat sheet which I think is really helpful it's Melody's idea she was an incredible resource to us and I mean listen I could go on a huge like tribute list of everybody who's helped make this book and we can't and we can't do that and it's in the acknowledgements so please do read the acknowledgements but I will say obviously my mom and dad there who not only were so supportive this whole time what we're in when we got out but also to make tonight happen we couldn't have done that to bring the food to bring the drinks to thank you show up and Cecilia and Sandra and I'm

44:56no one forgetting something yes why don't do this because I'm gonna forget somebody but you know who you are because you like we wouldn't have been able to do the third place oh my god you're thinking about the person no but I have to say this on the podcast so Eric Lee and this space which is called co-function jumped in at the last minute to give us this space and we wouldn't we I don't know what we'd be doing probably doing this my mom's living around outdoors or out to her somewhere on the kids beach where we used to play volleyball back in cult days so they this space is beautiful it's brand new it's rentable for those emerging art authors who are gonna have their book launches please come please use the space for the venue he did not charge us for this it gave it to us as a gift and that was a real gift he's he's he saved thank you thank you Eric Lee and co-function space so it's not for Sarah nippy to tell you to go and buy another copy of their book that's my job and the reason so at the self-publishing agency we have I've made it our company's goal and my

46:00personal mission this year is that just to gift more books gift more stories gift more education gift more things that entertain people or that spark ideas so for those of you in the room today I know with your ticket it comes with a book and I know some of you might have bought it but I do really encourage you it's not just supporting Sarah nippy these guys don't need your support you they got it by you showing up today but when I think about what you could do for other people when you leave this room as part of the energetic send into the world and the contribution to people's thinking consider buying another copy just to gift to somebody and you know what if they're not in a cult or they're not question they're not questioning anything give it to them for entertainment because quite frankly it's very entertaining I think it's funny the examples are phenomenal in this book the language the the vocabulary that you introduce to people about cult like behavior it's fantastic so if I have anything that I can leave you with today it is to gift more books

47:03starting with a little bit culty and you will be the coolest person at a dinner party when you do because you'll be showing up with not another bottle of red but a book that will start conversations that you will be remembered for so thank you for everybody for coming through you are welcome thank you you well that's a wrap on our very special Vancouver summer bonus episode we want to say a huge thank you again to everyone who came out to our launch brought your questions bot books waited patiently in line and generally made the whole night so much fun it was such a joy to meet so many of you in person and to see our family and friends and to reiterate our special thanks to Eric Lee at co-function events and workspace for hosting us check him out for his new business out there which is very cool space awesome great views right across the street from some great venues to hang

48:04out afterwards he saved us and to Jennifer Lee Gunson for recording this episode for us we're grateful for everyone who came out and rallied around us so and to everyone listening thank you for being a part of this weird wonderful slightly culty not super culty just you know it's a community we are so excited to be launching season nine and until next week stay curious trust your get maybe don't join any groups that require you to surrender your credit card your boundaries or your personality do not do that all the best bye bye bye all the if you're finding this podcast helpful please do us a solid drop a rating leave a review and hit subscribe on apple spotify or wherever you get your podcasts and if you're feeling extra

49:05culty join our patreon at patreon.com slash a little bit culty for early ad free episodes and all the bonus content even better pass this episode along to someone who might need it maybe they're in a cult maybe they're just a little bit suggestible or maybe they just can't resist a good cult story oh if you want the full download of everything we've learned over eight seasons grab our new book a little bit culty it's out now on amazon audible and anywhere you can get books by the way we narrated the audible it's super fun your local bookstore or library can order it too share the love and spread the culty wisdom thanks for listening and catch you next time on season nine a little bit culty is a trace 120 production executive produced by Sarah Edminson and nippy aims in collaboration with producer will rutherford and citizens of sound our co-creator is just temple tardy and our production coordinator is Leslie Dinsmore writing an admin by Sandra Nemoto and social media marketing by Eric Grzyski and Brook Keen our theme song cultivated is by the artist john Bryant and Nigel Aslan