My BK friend is confused

Dear Cranutha,

Are you sure you are not in love with one another?

If not, why is it not possible for you to remain friends.

BKs are not meant to get angry ever

Offtopic: That is what we attempt as BKs to do. Cut off from our emotions. A very unhealthy, dangerous thing to do. I managed it to a large extent and I still feel that it is a miracle that I am not in a mental health facility permanently. I notice that in more recent BK talks that emotions are being mentioned. In my time, the answer to questions about feelings and emotions was that everything follows from the thought patterns. I believe that, (as someone else has pointed out) they are changing things according to demands. Which makes them far from the leaders they purport to be.

As you have read from many posts on this forum, your friend is in a very strange and possibly isolated, lonely place. I think you should be very careful to protect your own life and happiness. You have told him about this forum but he is obviously very fearful.

Sadly, that is how many people end up. Scared, isolated and very confused. Ultimately, the person needs to want to leave themselves, or get medical or counseling help themselves. Another sad fact is that no matter how much we love or care for someone we cannot help anyone unless they want the help.

As the old saying goes "you can take a horse to water, but you cannot make them drink".

If it is possible to get through to your friend that you are there for support, but please protect your own happiness.

Best Wishes

Are you sure you are not in love with one another?

Dear Cranutha, I agree with Starchild's points. It seems that you two have an emotional and sexual attraction towards each other, which is not a sin. This is a very normal and healthy reaction of two adults loving and liking each other.

But under your special circumstances, your feelings towards him and working with him everyday together makes you sad and let's you thinking too much of him. So you have to repeat to yourself that you are going to marry soon. But I have not understood much about your feelings towards your fiancée.

Your friend's position seems, as ex-l said, very complicated. His guilt feelings under the influence of his channeled BK spooks, and his BK Seniors, are in conflict with his very healthy attraction towards you. This inner conflict makes him mad and vulnerable towards serious mental breakdown.

Crying with fear of losing you and sitting at your bedside 24 hours although you have a finacée and - I assume your own family members - let's me think of a passionate love from his side, and maybe a response from your side also, which has nothing to do with some feelings of friendship towards a colleague.

You have to sit and speak out frankly your inner feelings. But I am afraid he would not allow himself even to think about his feelings and that you are not yet clear about your own feelings towards him, and towards your finance and yet not sure of your own attraction towards him.

I wish you to protect yourself and your life from getting more involved into this relationship which could have a tragic end.

Hi Cranuta!

It seems very likely to me that your friend is in love with you. He may not be fully aware that he is an he may not want to call it like that.

BKs do not stop having sentimental feelings just because they decide to remain celibate but they would generally see them as undesirable or even sinful and are taught to "burn them in the fire of Yoga", which means having more intense love for God. The theory is that if one's heart and mind is full with vivid experiences of God's love, there will be no pull for any human love. Reality is that not many, if any, are able to do that and it seems to me that most BKs do not know how to deal with their feelings in a healthy way and end up supressing and denying them.

Mood swings like you describe are not uncommon but BKs would not usually take help from a therapist.

I know BKs who ended up having to go to a medical doctor for stress related health issues and being told by the doctor that they should take some meditation lessons!

As others have said, there is only so much you can do. I would imagine that, since you will remain work colleagues, you could keep an healthy friendship, if not so close, respecting each other's beliefs and keeping off sensitive topics. On the long run your friendship might do him a lot of good but I hope you make sure to give priority to your own life.

I wish you a very sucessful and happy marriage!

Hi Cranuta,

I think you are getting really good advice here.

I have been in a similar situation and no matter how much feeling there was between us, Brahma Baba always won out in the end. Your friend's love for you has to be stronger than his love for Brahma Baba and the BK family.

Perhaps you care so much about him because he is a victim. Have you asked yourself how you would feel about him if he was a different person? Not a victim of the BKWSO? Not trying to be spiritually perfect?

It's very admirable to meet a gentle person who appears to have so much love for God, humanity and spiritual values. But it's not necessarily true.

When BKs have feelings come up, they don't know what to do about them.

I once witnessed a Brahmin friend, a grown man, panic and run away from me because we had to sit alone at a table. I was in disbelief.

Another time we were supposed to meet just to chat, and he was an hour late. He was simply terrified of his feelings for me and behaved in strange and erratic ways. I felt very sorry for him.

It is not easy to walk away but that is what the BKs do all the time, with friends and family, once they join the organization. So you can do it too once you realize you should be looking out for yourself first. Besides, it might do your friend some good too. You know, when we lose friends, it makes us think.

I still think about my friend but I don't communicate with him anymore. He can justify it in his BK way, but deep down I am certain that he knows he has been caught in a web.

If you are in love with your fiancee, you would be better off focusing on your future with him than with a confused BK.

Hello to everyone. Been quiet for some time. According to BK teachings, my friendship with my confused friend made me a devilish one. Their senior cults came to know about our closeness. Guess what ... he was punished for that! So horrible, he was asked not to eat, not to speak with anyone (family, friends and especially to me).

He religously followed whatever instructions was given to him. In doing so, he will be forgiven with his mortal sin ... having a friend like me. He was also stopped from buying a new house and taking a new car as well. In short, they simply wanted him to spend for them. So sad ... he has been really working so hard and not even making his life comfortable.

I have decided to avoid him, so as not to be involved too much and just get hurt like Jannisder. I am still very civil with the way I am dealing with him. He is my colleague and I see him everyday in the office.

I thought that we can be real friends inspite of our differences and beliefs but, sorry to say ... the BK cult is indeed very very powerful and nothing matters to him except this movement.

Thank you for all your comments and help. I still need your advice as I am still in the process of getting over my so called true friendship with this guy. I just want to remember the days when he took care of me when I was in the hospital ... I know that he cares so deeply about me but his cult is more important. I am letting him go and I give up. Perhaps our friendship was not really meant to be.

I will be getting married soon with my fiancee, he understands everything and he's helping me to forget this horrible experience.

I really don't know how to stop this cult from destroying people and relationships.

Thanks once again for everything.

Hi, Cranuta and good luck with your marriage.

You sound very wise and balanced.

I have decided to avoid him, so as not to be involved too much and just get hurt like Jannisder ... I am letting him go and I give up. Perhaps our friendship was not really meant to be.

Prevention is better than cure and one has to know when it's time to "let go", and find the power to do so. Ironically, one of the main teachings of the BKs, is about understanding that we are all different. Each one has his role to play, so we don't need to get over-involved in anybody's drama. We can try and open their eyes like it happens, say, when your best friend is involved with an abusive partner or drugs but ultimately it is all up to them. Hopefully they will survive and come back to surface, after having hit the bottom!!

In short, they simply wanted him to spend for them.

This is the essence. Sad to say!

So sad ... he has been really working so hard and not even making his life comfortable.

This is what happens to men when they fall in love with a wily prostitute (or a woman with a gigolo ). The BK high ranks decide who is entitled to live in comfort and who are to remain soldiers, who are to live in simplicity in barracks, or who die in a trench. The motto of "simple life, high thinking", doesn't apply to everyone. They are very capable of convincing adepts, that they do not need to pursue education, career, comforts, relationships, leisure, health. After all, even in their imaginary heaven, there is a "numberwise", so the ideal of equality is permanently ruled out.

What for would your friend need a new house or a car. He can go to the BK centre, get mesmerized, have a bunch of pseudo yoginis flirt with him and feed him toli, give him some task to accomplish to keep him busy and motivated.

It is like a vortex, like a downwards spiral that strangles the soul, and one of the tricks for this to work is isolating the victim from friends and relatives.

I thought that we can be real friends inspite of our differences and beliefs ...

They make it difficult/impossible for him, so be sure that it is not you lacking tolerance or flexibility, they bind him and put blinkers around his eyes like they used to do with donkeys and oxes who were going round and round a wheel to grind grains etc.

sorry to say ... the BK cult is indeed very very powerful and nothing matters to him except this movement.

I guess it is, but many escape sooner or later, so the BKs are NOT almighty, they are cunning, and their methods work temporarily with some folks.

I really don't know how to stop this cult from destroying people and relationships.

Just today I was thinking at how they programmed us to think that people who accepted to be split up from their partners and "go on Godly service" somewhere on the other side of the country/world, were heroes. And, of course, if one claimed the right to have a sexual life, they were a dirty, lascivious person ...

Thanks once again for everything.

Thanks to you for reporting. You say it helped you reading the posts here, and your posts will help others. Like Sudama's story, any experience shared and published here contributes in the creation of a palace of truth; a safe place for others to get information and strength.

Guess what ... he was punished for that! So horrible, he was asked not to eat, not to speak with anyone (family, friends and especially to me). He religiously followed whatever instructions was given to him. In doing so, he will be forgiven with his mortal sin ... having a friend like me.

He was also stopped from buying a new house and taking a new car as well. In short, they simply wanted him to spend for them. I really don't know how to stop this cult from destroying people and relationships.

Hi Cranuta,

Yes, thank you to for laying out the truth of the BKWSU from yet another country and community. Notice how the Brahma Kumaris treat adults just like naughty children and have to separate them from their physical family in order to do so. Of course, I am sure his normal family would be deeply upset by all this.

Ultimately, the Brahma Kumari leaders will encourage his to "completely surrender" which to an Indian male often means adopting the center-in-charge as his virtual boss/wife/mother. What I mean by this in the practical is handing over their entire wage to the Brahma Kumaris and then the Brahma Kumaris giving him back what they think he needs to live.

This actually happens, and the individuals and praised and rewarded for their surrender. Their reward? Some extra sweeties and being stared in the eyes by a Senior Sister, if they are lucky an extra private meeting with leader ... and the promise of a high status in the Heaven on Earth that is meant to come after the imminent Nuclear War and blood bath that will kill off all human beings so that the BKs can rule India for 2,5000 years. Yes, there are the true BK teachings.

What can you do?

Well, you are now an expert in the Brahma Kumaris. There is very little you can do for someone that has been mentally trapped by them. The most you can do is by educating others around you and them the truth about the Brahma Kumaris. This will take a tiny bit of work and studying by reading some more on this site and some of the original documents that are on it, e.g. the posters in the Library section. But nothing more than a hour or so. You can talk surely about what we have told you. Many here used to be teachers, centers-in-charge and close to the leaders.

There is nothing very deep about the teachings or practises he will have been given and told to do. It is all about cutting off all his humanity and all other human beings outside of those in the control of the BKWSU leadership, e.g. not eating "impure food" contaminated by touch and vision of non-BKs.

If it drove him to a mental breakdown, which it may do, they would not really care. That would be "his karma" for sinning. Only then would they send him back home to his family to look after. He will have been told to separate from you for at least 6 months, talk nothing, spend no personal time with you etc. He is likely to be making "extra efforts" to brainwash himself, e.g. checking every thought, saying "Baba, Baba, Baba" 10,000 a day (not literally but inside him), writing confessional letters to the leaders, and/or keeping diary.

What can you do?

Show and tell the world what the Brahma Kumaris are really like so that others do not go through the same as you ... and his family. I would not give up on him entirely, I would go see his mother and family, and tell them about your worries and fears for him. Warn your church of the "angels of light" and the spirit mediums of the BKWSU. Prevention is better than a cure.

For now, it is as if he is a kidnap victim. Although he is only mentally kidnapped not physically kidnapped. He is imprisoning himself. The result is the same. Likely, they will have demoted him, not trust him so much and only give him lowly manual service to do. In short, use the imaginary crime to their benefit under the guise of it "purifying" his karma. And, of course, he is likely to give additional donations ...

It seems to me everyone I know of, who has been surrendered, has gone through a breakdown after leaving the Brahma Kumaris, then things get even more weird upon reintegration with society and family.

A quick mail: I see a lot of fear throughout.

Apart, from pure motives and hopes, I think it's escapism and mainly fear which leads spiritual seekers into the jaws of the BKWSO. Fear of the end of the world and the way things are going out there, fear of relationships and of competition in the tough and rough lokik arena.

The organization instills many more fears about making mistakes ... failing ... not being worthy ... not deserving love from the Father ... neither respect from the elders (SS) ... fear of the guru's curse ... that if you leave you defame the Father and are a traitor ... you will repent ... be punished ... will become a cremator ... crush your bones falling from the fifth floor and eventually will have to come back just before the End of the World/Judgment day to the BK shop and ask for forgiveness tail in between your legs ( S*it!!!).

And, if eventually you leave them and try to fit into society and link with humans, relative, friends, colleagues again - and most of all with yourself! - you will have a huge burden of negative feelings accumulated in you that will make you frightened and helpless ... a looser to both worlds.

Fear is what keeps people in a discomfortable zone for an unreasonable amount of time.

The typical BK, even if fed up and doubting, will be terrified at stepping out of the nest and wondering as in the Incognito's song "Where do we go from here??"

BTW, where is love?

Can you imagine how different scenario we would have if Love, rather that fear and hunger for power and money, was in charge of the whole thing from the first approach, during the relationship with the BKs, and after in case you decide to divorce them?

Thanks again for all your time and broad information about this cult. I still feel sorry and bad for him. He was such a good friend and we had some great times together. How I really wish I can save him but I guess they are more powerful.

One thing I noticed as well before, he was so fickle minded. And I guess he has to seek the approval of senior cult members before doing anything that involves spending etc. He used to tell me that he's not happy (in general terms) not specifically about being involved with BK. He was asked to detach himself completely from his parents. They made him believe that they are evil and not worth to be given respect and love.

As a senior manager in our office, he is traveling frequently but guess what, he is required to visit their centers in whichever country he is and spent some time learning their horrible teachings, reminding him that he should do this and not to do that etc.

He was also told that if you try to explore and enjoy any place in this world, it is a big sin and against the teachings of Baba. Hence holidays are not allowed at all. He has to work hard so he can provide whatever he is asked to purchase for promoting their cult but he can never enjoy the fruits of his labor.

Having a new house and car is also a big sin. They did everything they can to stop him doing so. Instead they asked him to buy something for their headquarters in Mt. Abu and in London. He cannot even buy decent clothes. It is also a sin to be tidy and presentable as you need to spend for that. Horrible indeed! How could they ever do this to someone who has a good heart?

Yes, I am heading to a new life by getting married with my fiancée. Honestly, I feel a bit of guilt that I am letting a good friend of mine to be hooked forever in this evil cult. I want to do something for him but things are beyond my control. I am sure he is suffering now while doing what he was asked to do to be holy in the eyes of Baba, and to be saved. Shall I just really forget completely and move on with my own life? Any thoughts will be appreciated.

As mentioned from my previous posts, we are in the same company. I see him every day but we don’t talk anymore. We communicate by email only for business purposes. Sometimes I see him looking far in one direction for such a long time. He looks very disturbed and my colleagues are beginning to notice his very strange behaviors. I just hope he won't ever to do something just like what I have read here ... taking his own life due to severe feelings of guilt.

Thanks again friends.

As a senior manager in our office, he is traveling frequently but guess what, he is required to visit their centers in whichever country he is and spent some time learning their horrible teachings, reminding him that he should do this and not to do that etc.

He has to work hard so he can provide whatever he is asked to purchase for promoting their cult ... they asked him to buy something for their headquarters in Mt. Abu and in London.

And, of course, when ever he goes to another country, he will be expected to drop some cash in the center, or "Brother house" donation box.

The only holidays which are allowed is a trip to Mt Abu or other retreat centers where they do even more meditation and classes ... and, of course, he will be expected to drop some cash in the donation box.

What is the best you can do ... to begin with be normal, be happy and be free. Pull him out of that world. Do not give up on him. Tell him from us that there is another world out here and that we were exactly where he was decades ago ... life really does go on.

Yes, the advice, "Shrimat" they call it, which he will have received will have to been to complete cut off from you, just as he did to his family. Yes, their god spirit calls non-BKs, and especially anyone that does not submit to its control, "devillish" ... but my feeling is that it is the devillish one.

In Christianity, the translation for Satan or Devil comes "satanos" and "diablos"'. In rough translation from the ancient Greek, "the one who casts apart" and "the one who accuses". The god of the BKWSU is full of breaking families and communities apart and accusing others and other religions. Even Gandhi he called "The Dictator of the Crow Race", ignorant and "unself-realised". They think they are more superior than anyone.

But you can break through all of that. I do not know what is appropriate now that you are to be married ... but to be cheeky, fun and light might be good. Just do not allow your happiness to be spoilt or be dragged down by it all.

If you really loved him ... tell him so. If you really loved him and would have married him ... tell him so. It will go right through his armour and touch his heart.

"I just want you to know that I love/loved you and you can be free ... when you are ready to leave, there are people that will help you".

It is all just an illusion. The Brahma Kumaris are controlling their followers and taking money off them the whole world over.

Perhaps, if his behaviour continues, you could speak to the personal manager at your company about the nature of his involvement. If it starts to effect the company and workers, then they will be concerned too.

How long has he been involved with the Brahma Kumaris?

He was also told that if you try to explore and enjoy any place in this world, it is a big sin and against the teachings of Baba. Hence holidays are not allowed at all. He has to work hard so he can provide whatever he is asked to purchase for promoting their cult but he can never enjoy the fruits of his labor.

Having a new house and car is also a big sin. They did everything they can to stop him doing so. Instead they asked him to buy something for their headquarters in Mt. Abu and in London. He cannot even buy decent clothes. It is also a sin to be tidy and presentable as you need to spend for that. Horrible indeed! How could they ever do this to someone who has a good heart?

Hi, Cranuta. These things you report fill me with indignation now but would have seemed reasonable to me (to some extent ), in my BK days.

Avoiding relatives and friends, refusing to having meals with them and cooked by them, no "eating out", prohibition to travel for leisure and spending money for one's own selfish needs ("everything of yours now belongs to Baba, you are just a trustee ...), are behaviors a BK is forced to follow for his own benefit, a protection.

In truth, I don't mind reaching the conclusion that we have to carefully choose companions and places, and that the energy of the person cooking goes into the food. What I don't like is the imposition, from above, of a lifestyle and the BKs never suggest, they brainwash, scare people, threaten and belittle them if they don't obey; never explain thoroughly the reason why a certain discipline should be implemented. Their art of persuasion stinks. They are control freaks.

When your friend is staring in the void, he's probably practising "traffic control", a few minutes meditation in between work, to recreate elevated awareness ... or maybe he's really starting to go nuts!!

God bless you, and him!

Dear ex-l and alladin,

Thanks again for your valuable comments. My friend has been in the cult for more than a decade already. I don't know exactly how many years but he told me more than 10 yrs.

I was able to prove that the words of the senior Sisters are like God's worlds for him. One time I was eating a chocolate bar and I offered him. He took and enjoyed it. But when his Senior Sister looked at the ingredients of my bar, she told him not to take that again which he gladly obeyed. Next day he refused to take my offer. Sounds really funny and weird!

Once I cooked an Italian dish which I shared with my colleagues, then when I told him to try it he blatantly said no. I realized later on that they only eat food prepared by themselves, or BK members, besides which I put garlic and onions, which they are not allowed to eat at all.

There are still a lot of strange things about their teachings and day to day activities that shocked our colleagues.

As mentioned before, he is such a good fellow, caring friend, helpful colleague but a diehard cult member.

He’s not really enjoying life and he is being threatened by the senior Sisters. May God help him and punish the cults.

Young, recent, BKs like him have been so badly deceived.

If you want to keep trying to awaken his critical faculties and make him start thinking again, in a subtle manner, we could prepare such fact and you could mention them to him. It might surprise him if you start to use the precise BK language because half their trick is using special language that others do not understand.

For example, print out the posters in the Library section, here called the 'original tree' and the 'original cycle' and say something like, "Look, did you know there was no mention of God Shiva in your religion until after 1950 and Om Mandli thought the world was going to end in WWI? They thought Lekhraj Kirpalani was Prajapati God Brahma, and he was the Gita inventor, not Shiva."

He will be closed to anything but what his slave owners tell him, and they have a well practised excuse for everything, but probably even they do not know about all this either and you might pierce his armour. By surprising him that you have access to new and direct Knowledge, you might get him to open up.

Although the BK practise is not 'just' hypnotism (there is other psychic stuff going on), it is so much like hypnotism, self-hypnotism and based on constant repetition that it is hard to break through the wall of thoughts that they have. And, as you say, they have many habits to separate themselves from "impure" humanity.

You could also ask him, "why does your God call we non-BK impure shudras in the Murlis? Why does he want to destroy all other religions?". You can print off copies of these, here (also in English).

If he does says or does something strange, you could ask him, "is that a Yukti, your Senior Sister (Didis) taught you?" or if he does something strange or bad, ask him, "are you sure that is Shrimat?".

We could teach you how to speak like one of his center-in-charges!

My friend has been in the cult for more than a decade already. I don't know exactly how many years but he told me more than 10 yrs.

It might sound funny but, from our perspective, that is really not all that long. If he only took "The Knowledge" in the late 1990s, he probably knows nothing of the history of the organization and what has gone on. By the late 90s, the BKWSU's activities had become quite polished and was moving towards looking "corporate" to outsiders but, underneath, the same old things are obviously going on. Grown men reduced to children unable to think and act for themselves, sucked in to the point of total exploitation. They will take, and take, and take. "Donate your bones", they say.

He won't know about their god's failed predictions of the 'End of the World', which they call "Destruction", in WWII, 1950s, 1976 and mid-1980s; although he might have heard the scare around the Year 2000. And here we are in 2009 now. He won't know that for the first 20 years, there was no god, which they call Shiva, and instead they thought and said their leader Lekhraj Kirpalani was God and the Gita inventor.

The BKWSU have removed all these failures, and hidden then from newcomers, to make themselves look better. They have messages spoken by their mediums called "Murlis" which in public they claim are God speaking through Lekhraj Kirpalani (but in private sometimes admit they are just Lekhraj Kirpalani thinking randomly), which they use to control their followers ... but someone sits in their headquarters editing them out, removing failures and changing them, e.g. where "God" says that there are only 5,000,000,000 or 5,500,000,000 human beings and the world is going to end in the mid-1980s.

Many of us did not even find out until years after we left for other reasons.

Thanks ex-l, I appreciate your time. Yes, that is what I need. Teach me how to speak like one of his center-in-charge. Provide me some useful and relevant dialogues, particularly with detachment and attachment issues, and their punishments.

I want to believe that I have a mission now, at least to enligthen this friend of mine.

I am looking forward to getting your scripts with substantial facts.

Thank you once again.