- Posts: 1
- Joined: 06 Jan 2018
My name is Nathan Lee.
I was a member of the BK world for 32 years. I am currently 45 and have spent the last 2 and a half years trying to think and feel for myself as me now that I no longer live in that environment. I spent a total of 17 years as a fully surrendered BK. 15 of those years at the Global Retreat Centre in Oxford, UK. Doing anywhere from 70 to 95 hours of physical tasks per week on a totally voluntary unpaid basis doing service, I have helped the BKs build 35 centres and houses on 3 continents.
Leaving that kind of intense schedule to a life of standing still to try and work out who I was as I had truly lost all sight of me in my life, has presented many challenges, many I have not yet got any idea how to solve. But I do feel I am gaining strength to think for myself again, free from the should’s and should not’s of other people’s pressure to live up to what they needed me to be, or what I thought they needed me to be.
During my time in the BKs, I witnessed the inner circles of the BK leaderships. I saw some kindness but more cruelty. I have performed my fair share of cruel acts in this time and been on the receiving end of a number too. I have seen much fear and arrogance expressed and seen these acts approved and even rewarded. When I lived at GRC I found myself in a very confined space and the view points of the people there, myself included, became very narrow, judgemental, and incredibly loosely based on something true or real. I found my life become devoid of a feeling of love and that emptiness in my heart replaced by fear. The seclusion from different views of truth or even how to live and express life made life cold and empty. My attempts at Yoga with God became more a meditation on personal survival. I never found any structure within the whole organisation that I could ask for help from that could be impartial and guide me to a place of being spiritually me. I found my emptiness inside just grow.
I found myself receiving attention from the Sister in charge of the retreat centre. This grew after some time into a love/hate pseudo sexual affair, that both compelled me and revolted me all at the same time. My last 2-3 years of this created major trauma for me – to tell the truth of the situation that was going on and to risk being evicted from the place I lived and everything that was my world. I had little money and no family home to return to as my mother had sold it and given all proceeds to BKs and lives in another BK centre. I came to a crossroads where I knew if I did not just leave everything and GO, I would lose whatever little shred of life I had left inside the shell that used to be me.
After leaving GRC and stopping being a surrendered member of the BK world, I received no offer of any kind of help. I admit now that I felt so low about myself that I did not feel worthy to accept any help, and there was no chance I could ask for the same reason. 9 months after leaving I found out through a conversation with one of the six UK BK trustees that they have a department set up to help with people in my situation. I felt anger at his matter of fact disclosure, that it was totally my own fault for not knowing such a thing existed. I have since come to know that many people within the BK management structure were aware of this breach of rule, and just simply turned a blind eye as it made life easier to do so.
Some of my time and experiences in the BK world were great, but I have grown as a person so much more outside of that world than I ever could have inside it. And so many other religions have messages and practices that were in this world before the BKs and say the same thing, but my personal experience is that they do it better than the BKs do.
My reason for writing this email is not to justify or blame, but to set myself free from the conscious and sub conscious guilt that I carry around inside of Me for the lies I have told to protect the actions I performed under the guise that I was an instrument of GOD.
As is so commonly said - the truth will set you free. And I know it is finally time to make peace with myself and move forward without the fear and guilt I have of this time in my life.
I was a member of the BK world for 32 years. I am currently 45 and have spent the last 2 and a half years trying to think and feel for myself as me now that I no longer live in that environment. I spent a total of 17 years as a fully surrendered BK. 15 of those years at the Global Retreat Centre in Oxford, UK. Doing anywhere from 70 to 95 hours of physical tasks per week on a totally voluntary unpaid basis doing service, I have helped the BKs build 35 centres and houses on 3 continents.
Leaving that kind of intense schedule to a life of standing still to try and work out who I was as I had truly lost all sight of me in my life, has presented many challenges, many I have not yet got any idea how to solve. But I do feel I am gaining strength to think for myself again, free from the should’s and should not’s of other people’s pressure to live up to what they needed me to be, or what I thought they needed me to be.
During my time in the BKs, I witnessed the inner circles of the BK leaderships. I saw some kindness but more cruelty. I have performed my fair share of cruel acts in this time and been on the receiving end of a number too. I have seen much fear and arrogance expressed and seen these acts approved and even rewarded. When I lived at GRC I found myself in a very confined space and the view points of the people there, myself included, became very narrow, judgemental, and incredibly loosely based on something true or real. I found my life become devoid of a feeling of love and that emptiness in my heart replaced by fear. The seclusion from different views of truth or even how to live and express life made life cold and empty. My attempts at Yoga with God became more a meditation on personal survival. I never found any structure within the whole organisation that I could ask for help from that could be impartial and guide me to a place of being spiritually me. I found my emptiness inside just grow.
I found myself receiving attention from the Sister in charge of the retreat centre. This grew after some time into a love/hate pseudo sexual affair, that both compelled me and revolted me all at the same time. My last 2-3 years of this created major trauma for me – to tell the truth of the situation that was going on and to risk being evicted from the place I lived and everything that was my world. I had little money and no family home to return to as my mother had sold it and given all proceeds to BKs and lives in another BK centre. I came to a crossroads where I knew if I did not just leave everything and GO, I would lose whatever little shred of life I had left inside the shell that used to be me.
After leaving GRC and stopping being a surrendered member of the BK world, I received no offer of any kind of help. I admit now that I felt so low about myself that I did not feel worthy to accept any help, and there was no chance I could ask for the same reason. 9 months after leaving I found out through a conversation with one of the six UK BK trustees that they have a department set up to help with people in my situation. I felt anger at his matter of fact disclosure, that it was totally my own fault for not knowing such a thing existed. I have since come to know that many people within the BK management structure were aware of this breach of rule, and just simply turned a blind eye as it made life easier to do so.
Some of my time and experiences in the BK world were great, but I have grown as a person so much more outside of that world than I ever could have inside it. And so many other religions have messages and practices that were in this world before the BKs and say the same thing, but my personal experience is that they do it better than the BKs do.
My reason for writing this email is not to justify or blame, but to set myself free from the conscious and sub conscious guilt that I carry around inside of Me for the lies I have told to protect the actions I performed under the guise that I was an instrument of GOD.
As is so commonly said - the truth will set you free. And I know it is finally time to make peace with myself and move forward without the fear and guilt I have of this time in my life.