‍Sarah Edmondson [00:00:00] 

Fear, it's fear, it is just fear, just a viscera is what they used to say.

‍

Mo Dhaliwal [00:00:05] 

Just a viscera.

‍

Sarah Edmondson [00:00:06] 

Just a viscera, which is not even a proper use of the word, going back to loaded language, is it earlier? That's very much an NXIVM term. If I'm feeling uncomfortable, which is like a sign to listen to your body, they say, what if it's just a viscera? It's just a feeling in your body.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:00:25] 

Welcome to High Agency, igniting conversations with inspiring people, leading transformative change. The search for self-improvement begins with hope. It's a desire to grow, evolve, or heal. But sometimes that human yearning becomes the very thing that renders us weak and vulnerable. The self- improvement industry is projected to reach nearly $57 billion by 2027. And it's a sign of our collective hunger for transformation. And within this booming marketplace, there's a bit of a disturbing pattern. Almost 70% of cult members say that they joined simply for personal growth or community, not recognizing or being ready for the psychological manipulation that waited for them. This promise of transformation is really seductive, and we're drawn in to those who offer answers, purpose and belonging, especially when it's packaged in the glossy language of self-improvement. And self-improvement seems such a mild and innocuous virtue, doesn't it? After all, self-improvement it's not some esoteric dogma or violently religious orthodoxy. Within the vast waters of this self-help industry, lurk organizations like NXIVM, which masqueraded as a path to personal growth, while its leader, Keith Rainier, orchestrated a web of abuse, forced labor, and psychological manipulation, ultimately leading to his capture, and in 2019, his sentencing to 120 years in prison. Now, what's particularly chilling isn't just at women in the innermost circles of NXIVM. Were branded with Rainier's initials to establish a master-slave relationship, it's that it was remarkably intelligent, successful people who found themselves entangled in what prosecutors described as a pyramid scheme built on sexual exploitation. So modern cults have evolved. They don't need to isolate their followers in remote compounds. They operate in plain sight. They're leveraging social media, slick branding and the language of empowerment. And they're not looking for the vulnerable and desperate but the educated and the ambitious. Those that are seeking meaning and community. Today we're joined by someone who knows this reality intimately. Sarah Edmondson is a multifaceted talent with over 40 film and TV credits to her name, as an actor and as a voiceover artist. Sarah risked everything as a whistleblower against NXIVM. Her courageous escape helped liberate others and bring down one of the most notorious cults of our time. Sarah wrote the book Scarred, detailing her escape from NXVM. And she co-hosts the A Little Bit Culty podcast with her husband, Anthony Ames, where they explore the fine line between devotion and destruction. She's been featured in HBO's The Vow, and Sarah dedicates herself to helping others identify and avoid abusive situations while balancing her roles as artist, entrepreneur. Thank you so much for joining us. Thanks for having me. Yeah, I was mentioning before we started that I'm super nervous for this conversation just because. I feel like a certain intimacy of, of knowing you from, uh, both watching the documentary and then reading the book, which was just so vividly written by the way, like the language. Um, I mean, it was like, I was spellbound the end of the entire time. We're gonna get into your experience, of course, and what you've been through and what your doing now. But to start off, I wanna read a passage from your book. Okay. And it's actually a picture that you took. Some of the materials that you were given as exercises as a part of this seeming self-improvement program. And in this particular section, you were writing your mission statement, which was meant to be the embodiment of your essence, purpose, and unencumbered values. So at this time you wrote, my mission is to use and develop my creative and entrepreneurial skills to build value in a joyous, compassionate, inspiring way, to share the values of growth and introspection as I learned to know and love myself, and to create a world-changing force that inspires awareness, love and peace and consequently evolves humanity.

Sarah Edmondson [00:05:34] 

You're gonna make me cry.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:05:37] 

What a beautiful intention. And there's just so much heart and inspiration and generosity, frankly, for what you wanted for yourself and others in the world around you. This was your starting point, right? And I think for anybody that, um, thinks of anything extreme, whether it's an abusive relationship or a full blown cult, we sometimes think about them at a distance, right. Is those people over there? I couldn't possibly, I know too much. I'm too aware, but I have to admit to you that in preparing for this episode, even, um, wind up watching a lot of content from Keith Renier. Um, both that was a part of the documentary and past interviews. What's remarkable now, again, having the vantage point and perspective of knowing who and what he is, but what's remarkable going back and watching those interviews is just how freaking reasonable everything sounded, right? From like accountability to how to live your life and you know, that comfort is a poison and you need discomfort and friction in order to break through and get to the next level of your own being and your rest. I mean, this is language I use, right. And So just the sheer reasonability. From the most normie of norms of men that you've ever seen. It was quite disarming, right? And in that vein, it's actually not surprising that he would build audience and, you know, connect with people, right, first on a human level and then later on, unfortunately, as quote unquote followers of his. Let's get to the, I guess the core of what you were thinking and feeling, which was now what, 20 years ago when you started down this self-improvement journey.

Sarah Edmondson [00:07:30] 

Yeah. Well, first of all, don't be nervous. I'm very normal now. I'd like to I'd like to say I'm not going to try to recruit you because if I'd met you 20 years ago, I totally would have. So that's good.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:07:42] 

That's, that's excellent. Yeah, I'm very vulnerable to that. Yeah, impressionable.

Sarah Edmondson [00:07:46] 

And I also wanted to say, I really appreciate you taking the time to read it and also to do that research because I feel like when people hear about what happened to me and they sort of read the headlines, they say and think things like, well, that could never happen to me and I never would have fallen for that. But you're absolutely right. The things that he was teaching on the outset were very reasonable, very practical, very helpful. And I found at a time in my life when I really wanted all those things and was very open to it and. Did have a very idealistic, why I was emotional reading it when you read it, I mean, is because. I did and still do have a very idealistic view of the world, and that hasn't totally changed. And also the irony of, you know, having this big mission that I get to do now with the podcast and on the other side of things is sort of all full circle. So that's where that emotion came from. And I also haven't read that since the book came out almost five years ago now. So yes. What did you just ask me? You asked me.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:08:56] 

Essentially, where does journey start? Where does it start? Because 20 years ago, you had that intention of what you wanted for yourself and the world, and you were starting down this sort of self-improvement journey to break through in your career and your life, and essentially be a better person.

Sarah Edmondson [00:09:10] 

And that mission statement came out of the curriculum. I'd say went before I joined NXIVM, I didn't necessarily have that so clear, but I knew that I wanted more in my life than the opportunities that acting was providing for me, which I could only really. Have a certain amount of control over. Acting is great when you're on set, it's not great when your hustling and auditioning and you know, trying to be a part of other people's projects. I didn't like the lack of agency that I had. To use your own words here. And that's what really appealed to me with NXIVM. I was, by the way, it was called Executive Success Programs at the time. Anyone here in Vancouver?

Mo Dhaliwal [00:09:50] 

Part of that.

Sarah Edmondson [00:09:51] 

That's what it was called. We didn't use the word NXIVM, that came later. So people were taking ESP, executive success, and that's a very benign term. It sounded great. Learn to be an executor in your own life. And as somebody who was a struggling, aspiring actress, it provided a lot of tools that I needed.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:10:11] 

I think that's one of the sort of recurring themes, you know, in this whole realm, right? Like not just with you, but in this kind of realm of the modern cult is this blurred lines. It's like this weird game of two truths and a lie, but at a massive scale because these things get shared or you put through these exercises that are actually kind of beneficial, right. I mean, I didn't have anywhere close to the experience or abuse that you suffered, but- Um, over a decade ago, there was this kind of variant of the landmark form that I was a part of, and it was actually, um, designed and delivered by Werner Erhart and Michael C Jensen.

Sarah Edmondson [00:10:57] 

I didn't remember this.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:10:58] 

It was at UBC and we were sequestered, I think, for like eight days or something, 12-hour days.

Sarah Edmondson [00:11:06] 

Do you remember the name of the program?

Mo Dhaliwal [00:11:09] 

Um, the ontological, phenomenological, something, something leadership, and it was the most clinical sounding thing you'd ever heard. Were we there?

Sarah Edmondson [00:11:16] 

No, but the person who ran it and organized it was just a whistleblower for that program on our podcast.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:11:22] 

Oh my go-

Sarah Edmondson [00:11:24] 

So yeah, I know all about this.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:11:27] 

So, all right, sounds like I'm going to share my cult story first. I wasn't expecting this. So as a part of this leadership program, um, which I didn't actually pay for, because the person that brought it to UBC was like begging me to show up, recruiting, right? And me being extremely cheap and self-important at the time, I was like, I'm too busy and I don't wanna pay for this. And like months and weeks went by and finally it was like I think two weeks before the thing was set to start. And he's like, okay, I got you a seat, it's free. Can you just show up and take this bloody thing for free? I was, yeah. Um, and again, the way it was sold, you know, leadership breakthrough, connect with yourself, all of that. I'm like, these are, these are things that I also aspire to. I want to be a better person. I want it to be better leader. And so we showed up to this thing and it was my first experience with like that level of conditioning and also neuro linguistic programming, because everything from bathroom breaks to nutrition was controlled, right? Uh, and it's 12 hour days. We were sat in this, um, large auditorium. And in chairs, right? So it was a flat environment projection screen and a binder in front of us. And we were basically reading along on these super dense slides that were just filled with text as somebody read them out. And that would go on for two hours at a time, right. And so we're meant to read along and there was times when I'm just like dozing a little bit, but like it's super loud. So you can't really fall asleep either. And then in between there's like these workshops and these sessions. Parts of it, again, I didn't have the language at the time to describe it, but parts of it, you know, day two, you felt a little bit culty. And I was kind of like, OK, this is why people that exit landmark always sound so weird, because they're using what Werner Erhard at the time described as terms of art. And so this weird, codified language they use to describe things that if you're not an insider, you wouldn't know. Right. And so, of course, when you, you go to a dinner party and you're using these terms and language with no context. It's going to sound like you're a part of some weird club or some cult because, you know, you're using these, these phrases that nobody else has ever heard of. So, you now fast forward to the fourth day. And I think one of my saving graces was like, I have a lot of issues with authority. So I got into a little bit of a conflict with Werner Erhart. So I was like half checked in, half checked out of the program. Um, he really liked me.

Sarah Edmondson [00:13:54] 

I bet he did.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:13:55] 

Sorry?

Sarah Edmondson [00:13:56] 

I bet. He did.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:13:57] 

Yeah, and so, you know, coming out of it, I felt like there was some exercise that are really valuable, right? There was this thing we did where we were kind of deconstructing the stories you tell yourself in order to excuse your behaviors or your ways of showing up.

Sarah Edmondson [00:14:10] 

Called stories, right? They call it stories.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:14:12] 

And so there's these super beneficial aspects, right? But there was also people in the room and there's only 80 of us, right. There's people in their room that for them, this was like their 10th or 12th thing that they had done. And this is just a part of their regular lives and they do this all the time, right and so interacting with them was kind of the weirdest part. Cause to me it felt like, okay, this is an exercise. I'm here to get something out of it, level up and move on. But if that's what you're doing, then why would somebody need to do this thing? But they say this is like their 10th or 12th time doing it, right?

Sarah Edmondson [00:14:43] 

Good question.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:14:44] 

Yeah. So that seemed a little, a little odd to me. And I was like, okay, so I think people are just, you know, maybe they're being self-important or they're so worried about the mechanics of it, that they're turning it into mechanics without just taking the lesson and going and living their lives. Right. And I thought that and left it there and didn't really even think about it again. But it wasn't years later when other stories started coming out. When you hear about, um, you know, not only NXIVM, but just kind of a lot of the abuses that were going on in that sort of fabric, because it seems like, um, ESP landmark and a bunch of other of these cohorts were kind of doing some of the same stuff at that time and continue to, right? So that was my, that was the extent of my intersection and experience with any part of this world. But that's also where I, I could kind of see some of what you had been through and describing because I'm like, I was in a room where.

Sarah Edmondson [00:15:35] 

Is very similar.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:15:36] 

Is very similar and the conditioning was happening, right? When, you know, like you're told that you can't go to the bathroom and there's people around you that you can tell are struggling to like stay seated.

Sarah Edmondson [00:15:46] 

That was 2008?

Mo Dhaliwal [00:15:48] 

That was 2012, I believe.

Sarah Edmondson [00:15:52] 

Okay, I'm going to send you Anne Peterson's book and you'll see her, her journey. And even when she wrote the book till now, she like, she was sort of like, is it a cult? Is there, you know, there's a line of between, she calls it transformation and exploitation. And, um, we've had her on the podcast talking about Landmark and, um. It's the one episode in our 200 plus episodes. Could do more, we could do so much more, but we're like, they're so litigious. Oh, really? Yeah, so lititious, but also the most requested topic is landmark in the forum since we started the podcast. People wanna know, and a lot of people get, similar to NXIVM, I mean, yeah, ESP here in Vancouver can come and take like a peripheral course, put the tools in your life, move on, and you're fine. But the people who like make the tools the light in their lives and really dedicate themselves, they get screwed. There are stories, and we have recordings of Werner hitting people, strangling people, throwing beverages at people. It's highly, highly abusive, allegedly. I have to be careful what I say. You can cut that if you want. But I would have loved to have met him. He's a legend.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:17:05] 

Well, my first time experience was that, you know, a real carrot and stick guy, mostly stick and occasionally when he kind of put out an emotional carrot, like he really hung a lantern on it, like wanted you to know and want everybody else around you to know that I'm being nice to you right now. Yeah. But you know kind of like a bit of a rageful personality.

Sarah Edmondson [00:17:24] 

Oh, yeah.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:17:25] 

Beyond that. The thing of like, you know, is it a cult? Is it not a cult, you know, the blurred lines is the thing that keeps coming up time and time again. And I think the confusing instinct is that when you're in a bad environment, and you're going through something that is traumatic and hurtful, there's there's a sort of encouragement to ignore your own instincts. And to conflate that with the friction that we all go through when we're experiencing growth and character formation and we're doing something hard, right? So on some level, your instinct is saying, this is hurting me. Get out. Get out, and I was gonna say enjoy it but I just so felt that part that you wrote where there's multiple points you're shouting down your instincts.

Sarah Edmondson [00:18:24] 

Mm-hmm.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:18:24] 

Your instincts were screaming at you. Uh, but by this point, they've kind of really like adapted, you know, the, the story to say, actually, this is your character formation, this growth happening. This is, you know, th th the growing pains.

Sarah Edmondson [00:18:37] 

And also fear, it's fear, it's just fear, just a viscera is what they used to say. Just viscera. Just a visera, which is not even a proper use of the word. Going back to loaded language, is it earlier? That's very much a NXIVM. If I'm feeling uncomfortable, which is like a sign to listen to your body, they say, what if it's a vistera? It's just a feeling in your body. And the analogy they used give is that if you have a car and there's a light that goes on when the gas is out. Like that's helpful, right? Or there's a light that goes on if there's an engine broken, right. If the light goes on because the light's broken, that means that the, the symbol, the signal is broken. So they're saying you're feeling that something's wrong. It's just a broken signal. That's so bad. It's so because it really dismantled our ability to think for ourselves and trust our gut, but you're right. It's very much mixed in with. If you remember my first five days, I'm sitting there. I'm nervous and I'm. Being confronted with things I've never looked at before. Those things are all happening at the same time. It's really hard to know what's helpful and what's my natural body inclination to get the F out. Can I swear on this podcast? Is this a-.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:19:51] 

Absolutely, go for it.

Sarah Edmondson [00:19:51] 

Get the fuck out of there. Which is really what I should have done. But I also wanted to get my money's worth and I also to please the person who invited me because I wanted to work with him, Mark Vicente. And no beef towards him. He didn't know what was, he invited me to. But there's all these things happening at the same time. And we'll take a little tangent for a second. This happened so long ago and I've learned so much and I have my own podcast now and I talk to so many people and I'm still learning this lesson though. Like I had an interaction with somebody that I had red flags going off, but I was sort of like the train was already moving on this project. And I let, I brushed it into the rug and gave this person the benefit of the doubt. And thought, ah, he's just having a bad day. As soon as you have a bad, this is my lesson for you and your audience, whoever is listening, when you have bad feeling with somebody, listen to that. It's not gonna get better. As soon you have it, like I don't like being around this person or this person's being a dick or a douche or mean or as mean to somebody else, cut it, cut ties, cut and run. Don't try to make it work. Don't say he's having a bad day. Still learning this lesson. And I'm so mad at myself, this just happened recently. Not in a cult context, just in an interpersonal dynamic.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:21:03] 

Yeah, but some of the remnants of like shutting down the instinct.

Sarah Edmondson [00:21:05] 

Yeah. Well, also cause I'm still not like I went through this process and all of a sudden I'm no longer a people pleaser. I still am a bit of an accommodator and I want to keep the peace. I'm not a like no bullshit like totally speak my truth all the time. I'd like to be more. But in that instant with this person, I should have been like, you don't talk to me that way and I'm going to do business with you. So fuck off. But I was like, Oh, okay. Well cause we had a conflict, you know, and like tried to smooth it over.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:21:35] 

And that happens I think in spaces and with people that have like higher purpose, right? It can be used against you because you're here for the bigger thing and so therefore all the smaller things should be, well, not forgotten about, but you know, dismissed, right, as being, as being less important.

Sarah Edmondson [00:21:52] 

Exactly.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:21:53] 

Um, but, you know, you, you said people pleaser, but also like kind of high performance, cause when I was reading about you and you know in that early period, when you were in the executive success program and then first kind of getting things started and even moving into like the recruitment side of actually bringing more people into these trainings, I mean, you were a bit of a killer, like you, recruited like crazy, you built a whole power center around, um, this group and this training here in Vancouver. But you were very high performance, right. And, and, you know, and I'm sure, um, and I understood that quite happy and proud of yourself for doing so well.

Sarah Edmondson [00:22:31] 

Yeah, at the time. Yeah, I mean, I'm proud of myself that I've developed the skills. I'm not proud of my self that I brought so many people in, but I was really good at sharing what we thought NXIVM or ESP was. And if it was what it was supposed to have been, it would have been great, you know? So, and I was a living embodiment of it and I believed it with my whole heart. I didn't even have to hard sell people. I was just like living the dream and people would wanna know about it. And then I tell them and.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:23:07] 

Of course, it's like, how is she doing it? Maybe we can access that. You know, the, the paradoxes and these conflations. So this is the one of like the high demand groups versus the cults, right? Is this like, you know, am I a part of a, uh, like an exercise class, right. That's really hard. And it's going to build me up or has it flipped over to the other side where it's destructive, but there there's a couple of acronyms we're going to throw around in this conversation. And just for the sake of getting clarity, because, you know, even throughout your book, I was at points getting lost because I would forget which one kind of came first and how the structure builds. But, you know, NXIVM is the story, that's the, what we're connected to with Keith Rainier. And underneath that, there was kind of like these sub chapters that kind of fed up to them. So there was acronyms like Genes, ESP, the Executive Success Program, SOP, the Society of Protectors, and then DOS, or I forgot, what did DOS stand for? DOS.

Sarah Edmondson [00:24:07] 

Dominus obsequious sororium or something like that some Latin hodgepodge that he made up sure But he I think he loved he loved making names that meant something else like DOS. He was a computer nerd

Mo Dhaliwal [00:24:16] 

So I wondered about that

Sarah Edmondson [00:24:18] 

Oh yeah, that was a little like chuckle for himself, I believe.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:24:21] 

No, OK.

Sarah Edmondson [00:24:23] 

NXIVM also comes from the word root word NXIVM. I think this was in my book, which is like Latin for debt bondage or something. So indentured servitude.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:24:34] 

Um, so it wasn't the next team at the outset then.

Sarah Edmondson [00:24:37] 

It was executive success programs. It was the first thing that he created.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:24:41] 

And then how did it evolve to what it became?

Sarah Edmondson [00:24:43] 

I wasn't actually part of that decision. So at some point, they started using the word NXIVM as an umbrella for all these companies. And when I started with executive success programs, like a year later, they rolled out Jeunesse, which was for women, and then the men were complaining, so they rolled society of protectors. And then he did this whole thing called Ultima, which was a new series of programs, and there was like five programs under that. The Source for Acting, the Knife for Media. I can't remember all of them. Oh, XOSO, which was like a yoga physical Pilates hodgepodge that he stole from a bunch of other modalities. Somewhere around there, I believe that, and this is, I'm not certain about this, but from my understanding is the executive success programs got a bit of a bad name because the Bronfman family was involved and the father Edgar didn't like it and hired somebody from Forbes. To write a hit piece and that if you like Google Forbes, Keith Raniere, there's a picture of him and like as a coach in a white robe and all these like acolytes looking at him. And so they tried to rebrand and focus on NXIVM. And then when we got out, Mark Vicente and the other whistleblowers and I decided that instead of calling out executive success and Janess and SOP and all those things, we would just use the word Nexia. So that people would understand that there is an organization called Nexiam and there's programs within it. So that's why people know of NXIVM so much and not so much executive success.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:26:09] 

And I've got to say, like, as a brand marketing person, when you look at some of the communications from that area, like pretty shit hot brand, right? I mean, you know, give me a self-improvement organization, uh, that promises all of these things, um, you, know, personal transformation, world-changing performance, uh, and make it look like that. And on the surface alone, I'm, I guess, you know, a horribly superficial person, but on the surface alone it's incredibly attractive, right. It's like, it's something you'd want to be a part of.

Sarah Edmondson [00:26:35] 

But their branding, you should have seen, like when I joined it had this like, do you remember in the late 90s, early 2000s when like Japanese tattoos were really hot? Do you remember what I'm talking about? We would have like a little stamp here. That's what their branding was. It was like Japanese symbols on the side. And then eventually they changed it to this like matrix-y star thing that looks like the star on your Apple watch when it first loads. We had that. Awful website. I want to say to like 2013, the one you see in the vow is a more updated one, but it looked like it was made in 1997 because that's when it was made. And we were always pushing them to like fix the branding, even the sashes. Like that we, when we went into Hollywood and did five day trainings at like celebrity homes were like, can we not do the saches? Cause it's embarrassing. We knew that it was, would turn people off and it did.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:27:21] 

So talk about the sashes a little bit, because there was a whole gradient, you know, almost like martial arts style, where there's certain colors. That meant certain things. And you get stripes on the colored sash and. All I could think about as you were kind of, you know talking about your performance and your work and your yearning to kind of get breakthrough to the next level. It wasn't so much like the aspiration of it, but the structure of it. It just reminded me so much of like the cast system in India. Right. Sure. I mean, mind you, that is thousands of years old. And when it comes to closed loop manipulation, uh, like India does it best, um, and there's no, there's no movement from one level to the other, right? That's very, very locked in place. But the idea that the closed loop exists and that any behavior, any amount of oppression or violence or inequality can be justified, right. You can come up with reasons for it. Um, there's a classism next to it that, you know, maybe it's providing some mobility in between cast, but not really, right. Not for hundreds of millions of people. So I just couldn't help it continue thinking about that. I was like, wow, they actually created this weird cast system, um, that categorized humanity in this, like microcosm, right, but also gave you a little bit of hope.

Sarah Edmondson [00:28:41] 

To get to the next level.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:28:41] 

You let yourself be exploited just enough and we can get you through.

Sarah Edmondson [00:28:47] 

Yeah, so the Stripe Path, I have such an interesting journey with it because my first five-day, and I think I said this in the book, they present you with this white sash. And for those who are watching at home, it's like two inches by two inches, like a scarf. And it's satin and it was white. And then the people who were the coaches were wearing yellow. And then, the people were teaching were like the senior coaches were orange, proctors are called. And then I haven't thought about this in a while. Green was senior proctor. And then blue was counselor and purple was senior counselor. And that's as high as it went. There's only two purples, one blue, 12 greens and 45 oranges when I started or by the time I left. And then the very top was prefect who was a gold sash because he was the head of the school. And then Keith Raniere who had a double white long sash because he's forever a student. So humble, right? It's faux humble guru bullshit. And I didn't like it at first. And one of the things they very smartly did is they said, this is like martial arts. This is a measurement, a system for growth. And how amazing that this is the first time in personal development that you could actually measure your growth. Now, if that statement was true, that would have been amazing because it's true. There's no measurable scientific way to prove that you're growing and that you are happy internally. Like you can measure your success money-wise or however you wanna set the bar, But like, are you working through your issues? How do you measure that? And so this was supposed to be that. And that was really appealing to me, especially as an actor, because you can hustle, hustle, hustle and not achieve results. And now I could do X, Y, Z and I could get my stripes. So every color had four stripes that were marked by things that you had to demonstrate that you could do just like in martial arts. And my boys are in now Jiu-Jitsu, but at the time Taekwondo, and I've seen them get their stripes and get their sat, get their belts. And it's like a little triggering, but it's also like, this is what it's supposed to. So at the time and at the beginning, it was great for me because I went from a very immeasurable nebulous career to a measurable system of growth. And at that, when it was that, it amazing for me. Good for my self-esteem.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:31:00] 

Because you were able to progress.

Sarah Edmondson [00:31:01] 

Yeah, I was able to progress whereas as a kid I was very much like well if I'm not good at it I'm just gonna stop doing it naturally like if I have to push really hard and learn like I was never good at practicing I was ever good at being consistent with swimming lessons piano lessons ballet I would I just sort of like well other people are better, and I just kind of give up on things So this was a way for me to evolve and that felt really good. It was the first time. I really stuck to it

Mo Dhaliwal [00:31:25] 

And they did a lot of that, like there was, you know, he's invented rituals, ceremonies, they kind of created their own system of dogmas. Yes. So the these hashes were one. What were some of the others? I mean, there was the extreme one, we'll get to that. What are some of the others

Sarah Edmondson [00:31:42] 

of the rules and rituals, calling people by their, their title within NXIVM. So I became eventually, it was a green sash when I left. So it was senior proctor Edmondson. Uh, people call me that senior procter. Um, and we called each other that, like I would, if I saw Nancy in the center, I'd call her prefect or P Vanguard, Keith V. Um, every time we entered the space, we would do a little bow. To honor the space like a dojo. We take our shoes off in the space. At the end of every, at the beginning and the end of every class we had like a special thing that we did. We'd go and get into a circle in the room and repeat the 12-point mission statement. Success is an eternal state of clear, honest knowledge of what I am, my value in the world, and my responsibility for the way I react to all things. That was point one. I don't know if I can do all 12, but that was. That was impressive. Thank you. Thanks. It's in there still, unfortunately. I mean that could be a whole other episode just taking the mission statement and breaking down the points and what was good and how it was used is bad also. And at the end of every class we'd go thank you Vanguard, thank you Prefect, thank you Proctors and thank everybody in the room. That part of the constant thanking people and the level of gratitude for where things came from and who created what was something that's really lovely and I still kind of practice. I always thank my yoga teacher when I leave yoga. I always think my server, I'm very aware of people's roles and interdependence and that part is nice. Keith didn't invent that though. Keith did not invent gratitude. Gratitude, yeah.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:33:21] 

No, but the kind of exploitation of it into a structure of conditioning obedience.

Sarah Edmondson [00:33:29] 

Obedience, and also like putting, you know, to always go, thank you, Vanguard, after every class, thank your Vanguard. So by the time I met Vanguard, he was on a pedestal for me and I had massive amount of respect for him because he created this amazing curriculum that changed my life. So that everything has a purpose.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:33:47] 

And I want to talk about language a little bit, like we touched on it a little bit so far, but just the amount of construction of language that was going on, you know, there's a, I want make a totally tangential reference here, but like Steve Jobs, right? People used to talk about the fact that they would go into a meeting with him, so sure about some direction for a product or what they wanted to do, and they would enter what they called Steve's reality distortion field. And after a conversation with him. They would leave having a completely different idea of like how the world works, what the product should do, and their role in it. And they, they described it that way. They're like, it's Steve's reality distortion field. He's got a really strong will, but also a powerful way of communicating. Right. And that obviously led to, you know, incredible product breakthroughs. We don't need to get into that. We, we know all about that. But throughout this, it was like, there's so many of these things that Warner Urhart used to call terms of art, where you take something that is basic and easily explained in plain English. But you develop this weird new vocabulary for it and you'll have your own glossary of terms and now viscera, right? And other things, you're now referencing this other glossary and this other language to describe the experiences you're having as a human that should be common to all of us.

Sarah Edmondson [00:35:05] 

It's called loaded language in the cult space, cult recovery space. The leadership is loading the language so it means a certain thing to the group and it has a lot of benefit, creates like a secret code, a secret club. You know, if I meet you and you've done ESP and even be saying like, you know, how are you doing with your goals? Like goals means something different beyond just Like the whole world of So you're changing the meaning of a word to connect people and also to sort of access a whole bunch of feelings, like that's where the neuro-linguistic programming comes in, you're like almost downloading the word with extra meaning so it hits you in a different way. So I interrupted you though, what were you gonna ask?

Mo Dhaliwal [00:35:50] 

No, no, you pretty much answered it like it was just you know, what like what's the reason for that? But I guess it's that it's you know you Create some sort of exclusion right because if it's language that only we understand then there's some exclusion there But also Just the I Guess I'm still just surprised that you know how much it changes and shapes your reality like I still can't get over Just the viscera aspect. Yeah, right like how like what an incredible psychological scalpel to you to use on somebody to invent a word that they will actually then inflict on themselves to continually disconnect themselves from their own emotions and instincts. Yeah. Incredible.

Sarah Edmondson [00:36:26] 

And there, and there was so many things like that in, in the space that there's another term because of loaded language, um, like thought it's called a thought terminating cliche. So I, if I'm a leader and I want you to stop complaining or stop asking questions or having doubts, I can say things to you that I'll just stop it. Like you're whatever, talking about something I've said about, you just need to, you're in resistance. Oh, I'm in resistance as a, I'll just stop resisting then and just like keep going along with the program or. And NXIVM would be like, you, you seem upset. You might want to journal on that, go get an EM. So it's like, not only is your complaint not valid, but you need to go do some work. Is there something going on with you? So it, it's gaslighting all of this, by the way, there's a woman named Amanda Montel who wrote a book called cultish and her she's a linguist and her whole book is about the, the loaded language in cults and how it's everywhere. And once you see it, you'll see it everywhere. You'll see just in like how the government rolls out a new whatever, with certain buzzwords like sustainability or systems or whatever, like these things have meaning to cultures and to people and to groups and there's a lot of purpose in that. Once you see it, you can't miss it.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:37:37] 

No, and I mean, just because of the work I do, I have an appreciation for it because I have so many times walked into a meeting and talked to a client and been like, well, you know, we create worlds with language and we first have to describe the world we're going to live in with language so we can live into blah blah blah, right? Like cult leader style.

Sarah Edmondson [00:37:53] 

But you probably have good intentions, I would hope.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:37:55] 

Um, yeah, I hope so too. Well, and actually on, on that note, um, let's talk about intentions a little bit, um because you know, we, we know what happened with NextCM. We know what your role within that was, but I want to talk a little bit about Keith Raniere. You know, there's. I think at this point in the story to look at him and everything that he did and ascribe, you know, a lot of intentions there, right? Of how and why he did certain things. And, you know I think those are all entirely valid, of course but this phrase that was kind of stuck in my head as I was watching some of his interviews was this idea like good and evil, right. Cause in places he was described as evil and whatnot. And it made me think of like, you know, every good villain you've ever seen anywhere. It's like, Like it's the, the cartoonish villains are the ones that are like gleefully rubbing their hands together and trying to be evil. The true villains are, the ones, that actually think that by destroying the world, that they'll improve it. Right. That if I, if I can only kill all these people and remake the world in this image, that then, you know, humanity will be so much better. And I'm actually improving things. Right. And so I wondered about Keith Raniere to say that, like, was it true manipulation where he understands his internal agenda? And is just so good at putting on an act, employing so many different tactics to manipulate people around him to fulfill his agenda. Or did he like believe his own bullshit first? Yeah, was he fully delusional? And you know, perhaps till today continues to believe his delusions and they've just been interrupted.

Sarah Edmondson [00:39:36] 

I don't really know for sure. And unfortunately, most people like Keith don't subject themselves to be evaluated in that way. My theory is that he turned, and actually the terminology that he taught us in NXIVM is that when people, that he calls it taking the fall. In other words, they wouldn't get all Nexia nerdy for a minute with a bunch of terminology. In Nexum, we learned that people have options in the world to operate. In business and there's that with the morality there's, that includes, you know, being honest. And then on this other side, there's this whole way of operating that I'm assuming because it's based on who we both know and who you are that you would not lie, steal and cheat for example, in order to achieve your goals. But someone who's taken the fall understands that most people are over here and these are the options which relates to their self-esteem. And then there's the people over here. Who have all the negative, no morality options, and their self-esteem is way higher because they have a whole range of options that nobody else would do, or most people wouldn't do, unless you're one of these people. He taught us about this. Those were the suppressives, people out in the world who have no morality and no consciousness. I believe he was one of those people, and he figured that out at a young age that he could operate and look like this person, but be this person. I think somewhere along the lines, he also believed his illusion. So I think it might be both, but I don't think he's somebody, like in the cults that we've looked at and in a little bit culty, there's a lot of people where I feel like they did start out with good intentions, like certain yoga teachers who started like a new kind of power yoga. Bikram. I don't know about him. Maybe, I don't know him enough. People like him. There are some people like him that did genuinely wanted to teach yoga and then really enjoyed being adored by all these. Beautiful women in tight leggings. And then that got to their heads and then they became kind of predatory. You know, that's different. I believe Keith started out with the intentions of manipulating and really wanted to bring in Nancy to start a school where he could create something of value. Cause I think he realized that's how cults have to operate. You have to create something of a value to be the sticky honey on the outside to draw people in, to create an axiom with Nancy. And then was like, he just wanted a fresh supply of money and women and power and that's really what he wanted. It wasn't ever intended to grow as big as Landmark because he didn't need that. He didn't mean that many women.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:42:01] 

It was a personal ambition.

Sarah Edmondson [00:42:04] 

That's my theory.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:42:05] 

No, I think it's a good one. And again, like I said, you watch those videos and just disarmingly reasonable.

Sarah Edmondson [00:42:12] 

With his little professorial vibe and, you know, I don't know, and he like pushes up his glasses and just kind of is humble, nerdy.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:42:20] 

Yeah. Just nerdy little normie dude. Yeah.

Sarah Edmondson [00:42:22] 

A little bit schlubby, normy like that.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:42:26] 

Um... We talked about this instinct that you had, that you, you, you know, was maybe a little bit quieter in the beginning, but as things got more extreme, I think your ability to suppress that instinct got more extremely, but that, that instinct got louder as well. And at some point there was a turning point. So can you talk about the turning point of when in this sort of era of performance, you had built up the Vancouver center, you had recruited so many people into this way in this path. Um, where it finally turned for you and you said, okay, actually, like, this is it, like there's I've got a, I've crossed the threshold, but I need to come back now.

Sarah Edmondson [00:43:07] 

A lot of things that led up to that in our pod. We use the metaphor of putting things on a shelf. So I had things that I'd put on my shelf, things that don't fit right, that don't sit right, but always outweighed by the good stuff and that shelf had been loaded since day one, you know, even with the sashes and all the things that felt uncomfortable, I put away, um, I think what first caused me to pull back was when I had my son. So this is 2014, three years before leaving. Um, and that kind of forced me to reevaluate my values hierarchy, which as you know from the book is something they kind of get you to do at the beginning. And if you're gonna grow and you're going to go up the straight path, I think I started with creative expression, health and wellness and personal growth and personal and growth, AKA NXIVM has to get to the top if you gonna advance. So at that point, personal growth kind of became under a family. So it just caused me to pull back a bit, which is when they, the leadership, tried to hook me in with more. That's when I got my green sash, which I'd been trying to get for.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:44:11] 

I gave you the carrot.

Sarah Edmondson [00:44:12] 

They gave me the carrot and I'm like, oh, okay, I'm back on the horse. This feels great. I got, I got the dopamine hit of the, of the award and very much a well-trained mouse with the gold stars. I have a little gold star on my, um, jean jacket now. Give myself the gold star. I don't want to look for it from others. It's part of my growth. Um, but the main turning point was when, so once they felt me pulling back, that's when I got invited. And this is way too complex to explain. In a one hour podcast, so I do encourage people to read the book, but I got invited to a secret women's group that had a number of steps that were more and more binding. I was basically being blackmailed. And at this point, I knew that I wanted out of that and I knew it was bad, because as it got more and more... The control got turned up very quickly and it wasn't what I signed up for. And I knew that I had to get out of that and I was trying to figure out how to blow it up. And at the same time, Mark Vicente, the person who brought me in, my business partner in opening the center over here at 505 West Georgia, by the way, it's like right around the corner.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:45:15] 

Mm-hmm.

Sarah Edmondson [00:45:17] 

Um, he was leaving because his wife had left. And finally, I was able to have a conversation with him where he had found out certain things. I had known certain things and we shared that information and that basically allowed us to see a bigger picture, which was the pyramid scheme on female exploitation. So that's when my shelf broke. So people talk about like, what's the moment that you wake up, the, the you wake up when the shelf can't hold all the things anymore. So it wasn't one thing, but that's when it broke.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:45:48] 

I mean, I think it is meaningful that, um, you know, that point was like close to, you know you having a child because there was so much focus on like isolation and encouraging the sort of like solitary way of being like throughout. Um, and it seems kind of, you know, almost obvious now in hindsight that people that had meaningful connections with, you know, whether it was a partner or with family or in this case, you know, a child, which is imagining a transformative event in your life. That that sort of isolationist and solitary thinking and mode isn't going to work as well.

Sarah Edmondson [00:46:23] 

Yeah. I wasn't, they did not want you to have anything meaningful outside of the group that was more important than the group. And that's a hundred percent what happened when I had a kid, like this is a priority.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:46:36] 

And the, I mean, you know, some of the, the conditioning you mentioned, um, like I'm really bad at replying to text messages or WhatsApp or whatever. And so it was wild to me on multiple levels that part of the conditioning was that, uh, the state of readiness that you had to be in of receiving a text and needing to respond within like 60 seconds or something. Um, like how long does that go on for?

Sarah Edmondson [00:46:58] 

Again, that happened slowly over time that was like, it started with, even when I first joined back in 2005, we had to check in with our coach every day to make our daily commitments count. We like committed to like, you know, I'm gonna do ab work every day or floss my teeth or build some new habit. And it didn't count, you had to get to day 30 for it to build the habit, but didn't unless you checked in with your coach. If you didn't, you went back to one. So they were starting accountability really simply. And then when they developed SOP, They were doing these readiness drills, ready for what? I don't know, we never found out, but they would say, are you ready? And you had to respond. I would say I'd have to go back and look at my notes, but like three or four years before I left of just doing readiness drills but it got more and more extreme. It started, it was just at noon, noon Pacific. So three Eastern. So you knew when it was gonna happen. And then it became that it could happen anytime. That was called C level readiness. What was B level and A level? I don't know, I never got there. So, but that also meant that you couldn't go dark. Like you couldn't turn your phone off. And that was when it really started to fuck with my sleep because of my readiness drill that happened two in the morning.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:48:08] 

She's just caught some little language there going dark.

Sarah Edmondson [00:48:10] 

Yeah, going dark.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:48:11] 

Some of the messages were like, dark in the elevator, you know, undarked out of the elevator or dark in a car.

Sarah Edmondson [00:48:19] 

And I got in trouble for going dark in the car. They thought I should be able to respond from the car, I said, I'm not doing that here in Vancouver. I'm gonna risk getting a ticket or hurting my child. That's the one area where I had a voice and managed to push back. I was like, sorry, no.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:48:35] 

Things are ramping up, the control is getting more extreme, meanwhile your instincts are also screaming louder. But for a period, maybe not loud enough, and not before something really, really physical and horrible happens. And I feel a little guilty bringing this up, but you've written a book on the topic, so I'm also feeling like, you know- I have an open book, yes. Okay. I'm an open book, yes.

Sarah Edmondson [00:49:02] 

But I appreciate that. And what I've come to realize about myself is that I have to talk about it from a bird's eye point of view. If I really like bring people through it, it is still triggering for me to walk them through it because it's just, it's so visceral. And that's using visceral in the right way. Not a visceral But the long and short of it, if I can just sort of summarize it, is that to be a part of DOS, this women's group that I was invited to just before I left, was I was supposed to get a tattoo as a part an initiation ceremony, which is something that I really did not want. And I was quite vocal about that. And Lauren, who brought me in, who I think is important to know is my best friend and my maid of honor and sort of like my therapist and also peer in the structure. I mean, not peer. She was not my peer. She was above me. And also in charge of like any sort of promotion or any growth. So I kind of had to do what she said in that system. But she EM'd me, which we haven't talked about, which is basically the process of rational inquiry, which has the tool set used in ESP to evolve your belief system, which we didn't talk much about. But basically the whole curriculum is like your belief system has holes in the logic, and we're here to upgrade it and make it more consistent so you can operate it optimally. And so she did an EM with me, exploration and meaning, about why I did not want, and this time we weren't even talking about a brand, which is what it ended up being. I didn't even know that humans got branded. I didn't even know it was a thing. She may have said when she was telling me that there's gonna be a brand. All I remember was tattoo, because I don't have any tattoos. I did no want any tattoos And so there was a whole yam around that. What does it mean to you to mark your body? And it was eventually I was like, well, okay, it's a symbol. She changed the meaning for me to the point that I accepted. It's a simple for my growth on my body. It's my commitment. That's what I accepted, but the night of the tattoo initiation ceremony ended up being a brand. I'm gonna leave people to the book to read the details of that and how horrific it was and painful. It was without anesthetic and it was right here on my body. And it was found out later that it was filmed and that was something that was used for future collateral which is their term for blackmail to make sure that I wouldn't speak about it and that I would have the requisite shame around that being recorded so that I wouldn't talk about it. Which, by the way, is how all cults keep people quiet. Even if they leave, nobody wants to talk about it. Nobody wants to say this happened to me because then their shame is highlighted, especially if there's sexual stuff involved. So, yeah, the branding actually itself wasn't what woke me up. It's weeks later, realizing the symbol on my body, which I'd been told was a symbol for the elements, was actually Keith Renieri's initials in a cryptic monogram. That's what woke me up. And then the conversation with Mark, because I knew about the branding, he had been told that there was a secret group going on in Albany and that people were being invited and then they were getting assignments and that sex was involved. So keep in mind, and we haven't discussed this, but when I joined NXIVM, I was told that Keith Trenary was a celibate renunciate. So evolved, like a monk, didn't need sex, didn't needs attachments, didn't need money because he didn't, he didn't t need anything from the outside world for joy, which was sort of like the theory. The underpinnings of NXIVM, like, nope. And also stolen from Buddhism, like nothing on the outside makes you happy, right? Sort of true in theory. But like, so I believe this about him. It's ridiculous now to look at his lifestyle and think that anyone ever thought he was celibate, but that was part of the, the branding around him is to make him look like he would never do that. And anytime I did have a hint that he was with the women around him, I'd be like. That's so wildly inappropriate. Like, you know, as a therapist and as a coach, as a counselor, you don't have sex with your students. And also, just looking at him, I didn't think that was a realistic thing anyway. So no offense to the people that did that with him, but... To answer your question, the branding I think was the demise of NXIVM because now we have physical abuse. We have physical proof that he's abusing people. So many years of emotional abuse. And I believe it was the branding and then the article. I'm skipping a lot here, but getting out and going to the New York Times and showing the brand to a photographer from the New york Times and getting on the front page of the Newyork Times was what initiated. Eastern District of New York. Same district, same courthouse, by the way, where P Diddy is right now. Same lawyer, by they way. Same lawyer defending, Sean Combs is the same lawyer that defended Keith Raniere. Crazy choice on Puff Daddy's part, by their way.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:54:08] 

Quite the president. Yeah.

Sarah Edmondson [00:54:10] 

Didn't do very well. But yeah, so up until then, I believe that Keith Ranieri was operating the same way. In fact, I spoke to somebody who left NXIVM about halfway through my time. She just like left to go pursue a doctorate, like didn't leave on bad terms as far as I knew. After I left, she contacted me and she had shared that she was part of his harem and managed to sort of get away. People could leave if it was on good terms and. I mean, it wasn't like locked doors, but if people could find an exit that was acceptable.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:54:41] 

And stay quiet.

Sarah Edmondson [00:54:44] 

And she shared with me when she heard about DOS and how we were living and the readiness drills and, and people getting photos of them naked and things like that for blackmail, she's like, that's what life was like for her. And this was, she left in, I want to say like 2008 or nine. So 10 years before the cell fell apart, she was saying for her life in the harem was like life in DOS. So basically he wanted to expand his control beyond his harem. He wanted all the women to be loyal, all the woman to be blackmailed, all the to have his initials on them. Like next level narcissistic delusion right there.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:55:23] 

What a horrific thing to go through. Um, you know, and I'm sorry, you or anybody had to go through that. Um, but I was wondering about that as well, though. I was wandering if like the dissonance would be so great at that point that some members would be actually pushed deeper into commitment. And if some would be Ashley at that point fully checked out and, and, you know, get to that level of realization that you sometimes you have to go to something traumatic, right? To realize and break, break through to some new level of reality. To say, actually, this isn't anything that I thought it would be. And now I need to.

Sarah Edmondson [00:55:59] 

Believe it or not, Mo, there are women out there. It's a handful of them. Actually, one of them lives in Vancouver. Four minutes that way on BD, if she still lives there. And I believe she's branded. I'm not sure, she's definitely in DOS. A lot of the branding got stopped because we kind of blew it up. I do know that there are women who are branded and are very happy they are branded. I'm talking about like six. And yeah, they double down. They double down and they think that I'm exaggerating. They think that knew exactly what I was getting into and then had regrets. And I'm just having a tantrum, which is what women do. And this is exactly why DOS needs to exist because of people like me. And they think they have a website. You can look at their videos. It's crazy.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:56:49] 

Yeah, that's a whole other level of misogyny. That's interesting.

Sarah Edmondson [00:56:53] 

Yeah, and delusion and also it's cognitive dissonance at its best. For them to recognize really what ESP and NXIVM is and who Keith really is, will also implicate them. And not necessarily that they're bad people, but they made really bad choices. I made a bad choice. When I left, I had to eat a huge shit sandwich and say, I fucked up. Now they have to say they fucked up and they ignored all the evidence from the trial. And they like think that all of these people, that's not just me, many, many people laugh NXIVM. Higher level than me. Need to say we're all wrong?

Mo Dhaliwal [00:57:25] 

That's the escalation of commitment, right?

Sarah Edmondson [00:57:27] 

Well, they are the most committed and they will they are waiting it out because they want to be the loyal soldiers who never Left Keith's side because there's gonna be a payout for them one day

Mo Dhaliwal [00:57:39] 

when you actually came up with the article, and you know, in this instance, had physical evidence, like it's one thing to be a whistleblower with files, but you're carrying the physical mark as proof and evidence. What was it like dealing with media and law enforcement and getting this going? Because like, I'd like to believe that law enforcement media everybody just jumped on it right away. No, sadly learned that that was not the case. Um, must've been frustrating. So what was it like dealing with both media and law enforcement to try to get something started here?

Sarah Edmondson [00:58:11] 

Yeah, there were so many different stages. Like we went to the FBI first in Albany and they were just like, this definitely sounds weird and dark, but like consensual, like you asked for it. You know, like, you said, would you brand me? Like, and I tried to explain, like I didn't know that he was involved. Like I was in a women's group and then I found out that he's involved and he's looking at the video of this. Like, this is like betrayal on such a crazy level, but like, what's the illegal thing? You know, it's fucked up, but what's illegal about it? We also went to the health board in Albany that shut down the woman who did my branding, her license, who by the way. She was.

Mo Dhaliwal [00:58:52] 

She was a doctor.

Sarah Edmondson [00:58:53] 

Yeah, who had her license removed and she's still loyal. I can't talk about that because there's a civil case, but that's a separate thing. She's one of the few that are still loyal and it wasn't until the article, and meanwhile, Mark Vasante and I were trying to get the police here to do something and they were just like, no, it was like so out of their realm of training, you know? And then meanwhile. After the New York Times article came out, that's when I was asked to go to the FBI. That's in the vow, I believe. That's being flown to New York to go speak to the FPI. I spent two and a half days with them, like in a room. I gave them all my computer and my phone, like say, take whatever you want and just try to explain. I think I was the first one to speak to them and I tried to give them the lay of the land of like how NXIVM worked and who everybody was. And that was, after that, things moved very quickly. Like, Maura Penza, the lead prosecutor there. Who I'm still in touch with and she's amazing actually has been on our podcast. She's I believe her and her team are the reason why everything moved so quickly and got Keith extradited. And there was a trial, it was like six weeks. The jury deliberation was only four hours. It was very efficient. And I did not have to testify, thank goodness. I was supposed to at some point, but I was testifying against Lauren, but then Lauren turned. So Lauren was like the key witness. Wow. Yeah, I'm very grateful to that because I had a newborn at this time. My second babe, who's now six. Big time, big time for him.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:00:29] 

You're able to have a lot of balls in the air.

Sarah Edmondson [01:00:31] 

Yeah, I seem to always be that way. It's maybe my Achilles heel.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:00:36] 

What are your relationships like with past members? I mean, has there been any like healing? Has, you know, have you guys come together or is it just?

Sarah Edmondson [01:00:45] 

I mean, at first we kind of got people together just to like share. And also we called them like bitch sessions because up until then, you couldn't express anything negative about anybody especially upper ranks because that would have been dishonorable. That's how Keith protected himself from sharing anything. Like, wait, isn't it weird that Keith, like you couldn't do that. You'd be like in so much trouble. So we were able to share like, hey, I don't have that time when. Nancy got mad at me for bringing too many gluten-free people to Albany, like that's crazy. You know what I mean? Like just to kind of like share and people had to do it for me too. And like tell me how lame I was, which I was. Cause I was being trained by the upper ranks to be, you know, gas lady, which I did cause that's how you got people in line. So I had to take a lot of that on the chin. That was that stage. But after that, I don't want to lead anything. I didn't want bring people together because I was still. I was still trying to be a leader. And I didn't, not only did people not want me to be their leader, I didn't want to be the leader. And I'm just like a normal person. I'm not like someone's green sash, you know, just like Mark was above me as my green sash and he used to call the shots and all of a sudden I'm like, I don't have to do everything that you say, cause I can do things that like, so that's a, a change of dynamic and a friendship. Mark and I are totally friends now. And you know we both have our podcasts and we talk and everything's great. But there was a... You know, a shifting process of like, okay, we're all just friends.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:02:11] 

To recalibrate. Recalibrate

Sarah Edmondson [01:02:15] 

I thought for a while about bringing people together and getting them with a cult deprogrammer and giving them tools. But basically I just put it out to the community, like who needs legal support, who needs therapy. We provided free therapy for a While for people and some of the proceeds of the book did that also. And I went on Cameo to bring extra funds in to get people therapy, because therapy is expensive and people are starting their lives again. So yeah, I mean, I think I've always tried to be available and also that's partly what the podcast is for me. It's like, it's a resource for people to understand how these things work and to understand what happened to them. So in many ways, I feel like I'm still kind of cleaning up the mess, but I don't want to bring people together because I don't really want to.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:03:03] 

Play that role.

Sarah Edmondson [01:03:04] 

Yeah, I'm gonna play that role.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:03:05] 

No, I got that. Yeah. And what about beyond friends or like past members, um, you know, in your, in your wider family, um you, you talk about your parents in the book. Um, and your mom, with your mom in particular, the conversations you had, um, of both her being, um in one section you described that she saw you, I'm not sure if it was the green sash ceremony or which ceremony it was now, but you know you invited her to this sort of ceremony where you're moving up to the next level. And you could tell that she wanted to be happy for you and express her pride in you, but she was also like just incredibly worried about what this was and what was going on.

Sarah Edmondson [01:03:48] 

Yeah, she was definitely very mixed, I think. I think, I mean, she knew that Keith was a megalomaniac. She knew that it was problematic, but nobody really knew how bad it was. And she also knew that she had to be supportive, otherwise I might cut her off. So she loves to tell me stories about all the things that she saw from the beginning. Oh yeah, yes, mom, you were right. Mom, you're right, you saw it, you are the smartest. That's for you, mom.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:04:21] 

And I mean, did your dad, was there anybody else in your family that had to witness this and then kind of come back around?

Sarah Edmondson [01:04:30] 

My dad actually took the curriculum and got the good parts of it and enjoyed it and like worked on his goals and started an invention and lost weight. But there were also some pretty key tenants that didn't sit right with him. So we never really went further, never became a coach or anything. And then we had other family members that were, you know, kind of, I told you so, and that felt shitty. The people who were like, I'm just happy you're back. Or the people who are still in our lives. Other people, I just don't really have the space or capacity to be around people that aren't just happy that we're back.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:05:13] 

I'm gonna ask a bit of a weird question here. And this is on the topic of like, and the idea of transformation. Like I'm firmly a believer that people that have gone through some serious shit in their lives and I'm surrounded by them. I have, you know, a lot of people that had, you know, fucked up childhoods or at some point went through something really, really kind of dark and terrible and then kind of came out of it. Right. That's that dark, darkest night story of, you know, do you succumb? Do you persevere or do you, in some cases, actually kind of go through this, like, you know, chrysalis and now you're

Sarah Edmondson [01:05:52] 

Transforming.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:05:57] 

Wish those experiences on anybody, like any childhood trauma, you wouldn't ever wish this on anybody. But then on the other hand, you kind of look at your life and what you're capable of. And it's like a lot of people I know, their superpowers lie on the side of this really fucked up shit they went through, right? So is there any part of you that feels like I don't want to say that you needed this, but that there was some superpower that arose out of this, right? Or that there something, you know, kind of inherently. Deficient or wrong with you previously that allowed you to be susceptible to this.

Sarah Edmondson [01:06:41] 

This is Three Questions.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:06:42] 

Yeah, sorry. I'm forming the thoughts as we go. So maybe let's talk about the superpower first, right? Of, you know, you went through this, is there something that now you look at in your life and you go, actually, I have this other capability now, I wouldn't have had this otherwise.

Sarah Edmondson [01:06:58] 

100%. And in that way, I wouldn't change anything. Because...

Sarah Edmondson [01:07:01] 

Yeah, I mean, there's not, I can't say that I don't ruminate or have anxiety or whatever around like, you know, what could I have, have I done in my 30s? Like I lost my 30's, my prime building years to this organization and I worked hard, as you know. I hustled hard, I barely slept. And I wonder what I could have built had I focused elsewhere, you now, focused on a legitimate company or a startup or. Marketing company, like anything other than this, where would I be, you know, that's hard to not think about that. I can't imagine my world without my family, you know, my kids and my husband that I met in NXIVM. So I don't go there very often. But in terms of superpowers, I mean, it's really wild and also ironic that so much of what we were doing in NXIVM was like, overcome your, you know your limiting beliefs, whatever, but who do you wanna be? You know, and the mission statement, who do want to be? And how are you gonna do that? And what's it gonna look like? And what are your steps to get there? And what your character? This was like, the idea was that you could design your character. And if you say, I'm a compassionate person, but then you like snap at your family, you're not really a compassionate. If you say that you have balls or chutzpah, which is the word that I would use, but then, you don't in certain situations, you don't really, it's just a theory. So Keith would say, character is only character once it's tested. So I got to test my character. And ironically, one of the things, going back to the people-pleasing, and next thing they called it, like-me disease, I had to drop all that to do this. Think about putting yourself on the cover of the New York Times about the most embarrassing thing that's ever happened to you. The New York fucking Times thing, I was in a sex cult. By the way, I didn't do the sex part of it. I just met my husband there. There was a sex part involved. Nobody, like, half of the people that know my story think that I was having sex with Keith Renieri. You know what I mean? Because they just see the headlines. Like, that's awful. Do you understand how hard that is for someone with like-me disease?

Mo Dhaliwal [01:09:06] 

I can only imagine. It's awful. It's awful.

Sarah Edmondson [01:09:07] 

And I have to like clarify that. And here I am clarifying it again, because I still want people to know that I didn't do that. But really, who cares? Like the point is he's in jail.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:09:16] 

But there's some level of judgment that you've gotten over.

Sarah Edmondson [01:09:18] 

I've had to.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:09:19] 

If you're on the New York Times saying I was part of the sex cult.

Sarah Edmondson [01:09:22] 

To end the sex cult. And that's why people don't go out and do it because they don't want to be associated with the fucking sex cult and people have left and tried in the past. I wasn't the first to try, but we were the first to be successful obviously because he's in jail now. That's your question. What are my superpowers? To know to do the hard thing when it needs to be done, I guess, is the superpower, and to stand up for what I believe in, even when it's really, really, really hard. So I guess that's it. And to figure out what my character is, is that I do have balls. Not all the time. Sometimes I'm still, you know, my inner voice is still.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:10:07] 

I've read the book. Yeah, huge balls.

Sarah Edmondson [01:10:09] 

Thank you. Yeah.

Sarah Edmondson [01:10:11] 

But I need to, what I'm figuring out now is how to do that in like day-to-day interactions where I don't wanna be rude. You know, to speak my mind a little bit more. It's a balance. What's- Oh, but to answer your, that second part of your question was what was my susceptibility? Yep. So even since writing this book, I've learned more about that. And I feel like in some ways I wrote the memoir a little too early, like I'm glad I did because it captured that moment in time. But since doing the podcast and talking to other cult survivors, I've learned so much more about My Achilles heels. So there's like the positive things. You know, I was a seeker. I was into personal development. My parents are therapists. I wanted more community. I wanted personal development, I wanted meaning in my life. Really positive, wonderful, normal human things, okay? Then there's more like, and I don't wanna say flaws, but like I'm an only child and like being alone and wanted a belonging. I like the good feeling I got from being in community. So it's not just community. It's like, what do I get from that? And then in many ways, the power or the feeling of popularity that I got going up the ranks and like running this group and being the leader. That was incredibly intoxicating. And definitely drove me, and then also what we talked about earlier, the gold star. I've always been driven by the, even when I was in brownies, like getting the patches on the, I don't know if you did brownies or boy scouts, you get little patches for achieving things. It's the same thing with the stripes. Like I want the gold start, I want validation versus me giving myself the validations. Why give myself the goldstar now? So I'm not like searching from other people. Do you like me? Do you think what I did is good? Which is hard also when you're doing a podcast because you need external validation or approval from your audience. So it's like, it's constant balance. But I think those are the things that made me susceptible. And yeah, just wanting, just like the desire to feel special and seen and you know, they gave me all that, gave me that.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:12:04] 

And how are things and the projects progressing now? Like you're sharing your message, you're getting a lot of engagement with a little bit healthy.

Sarah Edmondson [01:12:11] 

Yeah. Oh.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:12:11] 

The book's card.

Sarah Edmondson [01:12:13] 

Yes, Scarred has been out for five years. I still talk about it. People still find it and want to talk about, which is great. It's actually ended up as sort of like resources and a lot of cultic studies as like I'm often now as an interviewer on my podcast reading a new book about brainwashing or cult history and then they're referencing like as Sarah Edmondson learned in I'm like reading, it's just like super surreal from an academic. Point of view, this has become a resource, which is like great for me in terms of like feeling good about like, like I'm glad I did it legally. Our case is precedent setting and is used as reference for, for prosecutorial, like strategy with, you know, yeah, Epstein and Petity and R Kelly, like how do you use the Rico as a, and legal is not my forte, but that's my understanding using Rico as a template to get people. Like emotional abuse, course of control is not illegal yet and in all States is legal in like Australia and UK. And I believe it's changing here in Canada, course of which is emotional manipulation. Anyway, you asked me a question. Oh, the book, the podcast, over 200 episodes. It's very fulfilling, it's very rewarding. We are always on. So it's a full-time job on every Monday. And bonus drops on Thursday and we have Patreons. We're trying to like always come up with bonus content for our audience, which is how we can afford to make the podcast, because we're not independently wealthy. Surprise, surprise. I stopped acting. I still do voiceover, which helps with the podcast. And then now Nippy and I are doing a second book, which is all the lessons we've learned since starting the podcast and trying to package it up so we can give to people, because people reach out and they're like, oh my goodness, I just got out of a cult or. My sister's getting into a call, what do I do? Or I'm getting out and I want a whistle blow, like, please give me advice. And I'm like.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:14:12] 

How frequent and common is this?

Sarah Edmondson [01:14:13] 

Oh, daily. You're kidding. Daily, all the time. And I have a resource list on our website of like all these books to read and podcasts to listen to and docu-series to watch and foundations to reach out to. And I wanted to, those things are so valuable. I'm not saying don't do it, but I also wanted to just give people a resource to cover the whole gamut. How to avoid, how to understand the template, how to get out, how do heal, how to whistle blow all in one place. So that's what that book is. And that's, we'll be out in the fall.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:14:42] 

I mean, I'm kind of surprised. But then on the other hand, maybe not because like, when do you hear about a cult, it's after decades of abuse have occurred, right? So I guess on some level of that cycle can be shortened so that when these personalities arise and start to first manipulate and control people that hopefully they can be recognized and thwarted or in some way interrupted.

Sarah Edmondson [01:15:03] 

Yeah, most of the time there's a death, like somebody, you know, someone in the group commits suicide or overdoses or whatever, because they can't handle whatever has come up for them. And then it gets sort of public scrutiny, but there's so many groups, there's thousands and thousands of groups in North America alone that we know about, that are operating just below that level because they haven't done anything illegal yet. Just people being controlled and their lives are insular and they're like doing everything for this leader. And that's such a big like talking point for us in our podcast, is that. We don't even want to use the word cult anymore some way, sometimes because people get like.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:15:37] 

They write it off and they put it at a distance, right? That's something other people fall for.

Sarah Edmondson [01:15:40] 

Yes, and then they tell me that like oh, you know, but I go to soul cycle and I'm like I'm so culty because you know that I can list off all these things. It's not a it's not full-on Destructive cult where people are drinking poison Kool-Aid or flavor aid as the case was with Jonestown But there's a lot of dynamics that are happening there that are super problematic and you'd want to know what they are So you know where the line is for you So that's sort of what we're that's our main thing right now is like understanding what the behaviors are in the group that are problematic or toxic so people can decide, is this healthy for me? Maybe they wanna be in a group where they're totally controlled and every aspect of their life is decided for them. If that works for you, great, but you might be being exploited and you might wanna understand where your money's going or what's happening behind closed doors. And these are the questions that we want people to start thinking about from the cells because they don't. And because they think it would never happen for them, they're very susceptible.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:16:34] 

Is there anything that you're seeing right now, that you are excited about? In the world? In the, in the world in terms of whether it's helping disrupt cults or cultish behavior or in your work, but what do you see going on right now that's giving you some hope and inspiration?

Sarah Edmondson [01:16:52] 

I'd say just the fact that like cult documentaries are still being made, people are still wanting to learn and understand is really good and that the laws are changing around course of control. That gives me hope.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:17:03] 

Course of control isn't a term I've even heard before.

Sarah Edmondson [01:17:08] 

And for those who don't understand, I think that the dynamic that most people do get is like in a toxic relationship, where there's let's say domestic violence. The person who is the controller wants to undermine the controlee. It's usually a man-woman. Obviously it can be otherwise, but it tends to be a man overpowering a woman and wanting to overcome their autonomy and erode their sense of self slowly over time so they have full control, so, you know. Monitoring their texts or telling them what they can do and not do and in many ways a cult is a macro of that micro. People don't say to them like, why doesn't she just leave anymore because they know there's lots of reasons, they're dependent, maybe they're still in love, maybe they're not abusive all the time and those good moments keep them in or there's promises for the future. Same thing with cults. It's the exact same thing. So the course of control is the. The manipulative patterns that is done by the abuser to erode the autonomy and destroy the self-esteem and have the person be under control. Slowly, slowly, coercive is slowly over time and like the frog in the pot of water is an analogy people get.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:18:24] 

Turn it up half a degree at a time and the frog doesn't know it's being boiled alive.

Sarah Edmondson [01:18:28] 

And the, and the answer to that, like, when you look at the P Diddy trial right now, and people say things like, you know, if you're following it, but like Cassie chose to be there, you know, she could have left. Yes, there's no locked doors, but they don't understand all the things that go on with the power dynamic. It's a power dynamic, same thing with Johnny Depp and, um, Amber Heard, thank you. And like, regardless of what happened there, he's still in charge. He's still the most famous, you know, P Diddey is the most famous compared to all those women. Whatever he says goes. And a lot of those women stayed because they were afraid and they're texting things like, can't wait for the next freak off. And that's being used against them. And I'm saying, if you looked at my text to Lauren, I was doing the same thing. Can't wait to see you, love you, because I'm just trying to not rock the boat and make things okay so I can get the fuck out. So I understand that when I look at it, but anyone who doesn't understand those dynamics is saying, well, why did she just go? She's an idiot. I'm very excited that the world is starting to see that somebody like Cassie is a victim and can still text that and understand the dynamics that are happening there. It's also very upsetting, because people like Bill Maher, I don't know if you've heard, I'm in a tangent here, I'm sorry, but Bill Mahr is saying things like, you know, in the era of Me Too, this is post-Me Too, she should have left, but this happened to her pre-Me too. Like there's just so many misconceptions about coercion and these dynamics that really get me. Fired up and I wish that people would understand more, but I do feel hope that the light is being shone there and hopefully it will continue to evolve into the next era of Me Too. Which by the way, was happening as we were leaving, I don't know if we would have had the same success had it not been just after Harvey Weinstein being exposed. It was like literally in the news cycle, same news cycle.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:20:19] 

Yeah, I'm sure the timing helped.

Sarah Edmondson [01:20:21] 

Timing helped, yeah.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:20:23] 

Um, what's what's next for you.

Sarah Edmondson [01:20:26] 

You know, I'm not sure. I, this book is like on its final edit right now, and then we'll be promoting the shit out of it in the fall and still doing our podcasts. We have this amazing network. We have a huge audience that loves our stuff. So we're not gonna stop doing it, but I also wanna do other things. And I feel like this chapter is coming to a close and I don't know what it is totally that's next, but I'm open to something.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:20:49] 

What's the next book called?

Sarah Edmondson [01:20:51] 

Right now, this is the other thing, is that we're not 100% of the title. There's something about it that doesn't capture the whole thing, because it's why we're covering a lot of ground. So right now, it's called A Little Bit Culty, which is our brand. And maybe as a brand expert, you can advise me here.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:21:04] 

I mean a little bit culty for the podcast. I love the name. Yeah, I just loved it

Sarah Edmondson [01:21:07] 

It is, it is a great title, or I'll name her by it's a little bit culty. And the right now, the subheading is navigating cults, control and coercion, or protecting yourself from cults control and corrosion. And neither of those things to me, encapsulate the whole thing. Cause I want it to be for somebody who would like, yeah, I hope our audience would buy it because they love us and they want to support us. But I also want it to be, for somebody being like, Oh, I would like to learn about cults and how to avoid getting out of one. Or maybe if I'm in one, how to get out of. I just don't know what that title is. So. Okay, we're going from a little bit. Thank you. So that's what it is currently it is available for pre-order We're working on the cover design and I want to get I think I might want to go back to acting a little Bit like it, but I also don't want to audition. So offers only that's my joke. Not a joke I just want to work. I don't wanna hustle. I'm too tired. Mm-hmm. I almost 50 Let me 50 in two years

Mo Dhaliwal [01:22:00] 

And you hustled like crazy. I hustled.

Sarah Edmondson [01:22:01] 

I hustle like crazy. I don't want to hustle anymore. I want to have a simple life.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:22:05] 

You deserve it. Thank you. I think I'm closing, I'm gonna go back to this. Not to make you cry, but just because I think it's so beautiful. And it's just such a beautiful intent to hold. And maybe it can serve as a reminder to you, but hopefully it'll help others that hold a similar intent and wanna do something like this in the world. Sarah Edmondson's mission statement from 20 years ago, one more time. My mission is to use and develop my creative and entrepreneurial skills to build value in a joyous, compassionate, inspiring way, to share the values of growth and introspective as I learn to know and love myself and to create a world-changing force that inspires awareness, love and peace and consequently evolves humanity.

Sarah Edmondson [01:22:55] 

Well, I won't cry again.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:22:57] 

Sarah, thank you so much for joining us. I'm looking forward to everything that you're going to do. For anybody that wants to know the current book that was written five years ago, it's out now called Scarred, and you have an HBO documentary called The Vow. I highly recommend the book. You're a vivid writer and it was, I mean, cliche, it was a page turner.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:23:19] 

Oh really?

Mo Dhaliwal [01:23:20] 

What's gonna happen next? Holy shit. Holy shit page after page. It was incredible

Sarah Edmondson [01:23:24] 

Thank you so much.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:23:25] 

What a book. What a life. Thank you.

Sarah Edmondson [01:23:26] 

Thank you. And it's on the audible, I narrate too, if anyone doesn't like to read, read, which I don't anymore, I can't sit still. So I only listen to books. So yeah, it's there. Thank you, I really appreciate it. I appreciate reading the whole book and look at all your notes. Dying to know what you noted.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:23:41] 

A lot of things. Yeah. I mean, again, we weren't going to get to it all in this conversation. We could have done, I think, multiple parts because there were so many, like, veins in this. But I think we touched on the parts that mattered. And yeah, I mean you're, like honestly, definition of High Agency. Like, thank you so much. I'm so grateful that we got a chance to connect and share this time together.

Sarah Edmondson [01:24:00] 

What a gift, thank you, I enjoyed it so much.

Mo Dhaliwal [01:24:04] 

Hopefully, we've given you a lot to think about that was High Agency like and subscribe and we will see you next time

‍