[Oe List ...] FW: Landmark Education News

Mon Oct 4 13:53:54 CDT 2010

Ask Vinod about Werner.  I believe he met him after they visited Maliwada.  The Hunger Project wrote an article about Maliwada raising money for their work and we got nothing for it was my memory.  

I know several people, both Order and non, who found good stuff in the Forum seminar but they all said to ignore the volunteers who were a bit odd.  My experience of a couple of those volunteers attempting to recruit me was to run away as fast as I could.
Elizabeth

On Oct 4, 2010, at 2:15 PM, Marsha Hahn wrote:

Ditto my own experience.  Several years ago an acquaintance invited me to her home to learn about a "leadership program."  I was naturally intrigued. It turned out to be Landmark Forum, which I had never heard of before.  At some point during the presentation something clicked for me and I made the association with Werner Erhardt (sp?).  I asked the presenter if there was a connection.  She looked very flustered (not my intention, but interesting) and gave me a vague answer.  The more we got into it, the more my "yuck" button was getting pressed.  It was getting late, and I decided to excuse myself.  The other invitees promptly followed me out the door and shared their reactions similar to my own.

However, I do know people who have found their work very beneficial, including at least one former Order colleague.  It just wasn't for me.

Marsha

From: Herman Greene <hfgreene at mindspring.com>
To: Order Ecumenical Community <oe at wedgeblade.net>
Sent: Mon, October 4, 2010 12:43:10 PM
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] FW: Landmark Education News

A week ago Sunday I was out running and an old friend recognized me and stopped his car. He said he was on his way to a Landmark Presentation that he was leading on my street and asked me to come over. I didn’t know what it was about, but thought I would stop in after my run. I ran pass the house he was in and he saw me and came out to the street and asked me to come in right then. I said to myself, “Who knows, maybe this is something I should know about.” In my sweaty running clothes I went in and there were two other newcomers. We were asked to right down problem areas in our life and share. About five minutes into that I said, “I’m feeling this is not where I should be this afternoon” and left.

These guys were a little like RS-I recruiters.

Herman

From: oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net [mailto:oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net] On Behalf Of W. J.
Sent: Monday, October 04, 2010 12:55 PM
To: Order Ecumenical Community
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] FW: Landmark Education News

Yes, ICA was mentioned in the Hunger Project materials. Maybe Joe Thomas did that. Don't remember exactly, so don't hold me to it.
I think the point of the Hunger Project was if they talked enough about eliminating global hunger and raised enough money to keep talking about it more and more, then that alone would raise consciousness enough to eliminate global hunger. Or something like that. Voila! Gone. Amazing.
A.M. Novel used to be very big on Landmark Education. Wonder what he thinks of it now.
Marshall

From: frank bremner <fjbremner at hotmail.com>
To: Dialogue OE <oe at wedgeblade.net>
Sent: Sun, October 3, 2010 11:45:39 PM
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] FW: Landmark Education News

Dear colleagues

There was a rumour around, in the late 70s, that Werner Erhard (originally Jack Rosenberg) had done RS-I.  I found no reference to this in any of the books about est(Erhard Seminars Training, or Latin for "it is"?) or Werner Erhard that I came across at that time.  But he did do a lot of homework before setting up his organisation.

I took the est  training in late 1978 or early 1979, in Chicago .  The same things that impressed Beret and Ron impressed me.  Of course, at that time anything remotely psychological was O:E/EI/ICA heresy.

I did a followup course in Philadelphia in 1979-80, and another one in Adelaide in 1980-81.  They were disappointing, with very litle new content or processes.  They assumed that doing another course was the only "next step" that was OK, while successive courses just concentrated on doing more courses, and on recruiting people to the basic est  training.  The volunteer and paid assistants were very poor at participating in discussion or dialogue around the edges - they behaved like the "est-ies" of the various caricatures and sendups of them in the movies.  Very much "Join our movement - it's the best!" in style.

So: at least one good event, but a crap organisation.  [I remember an Anglican clergyman saying something similar about EI about 1973:  "Great ideas, great courses, but I don't think much of the organisation."]

Worth reading: Luke Rinehart's Book of Est, and Bill Bartley's book about Werner Erhard.  Nothing else I came across took "the work" seriously enough to do a thorough commentary and critique - most articles and books never got inside the est  mindset, and its interplay of Zen Buddhist thought, psychology, and the middle-class audience, to be worth much.  I was trying to write some papers on "the consciousness movement" at the time, before Peter Russell or Marilyn Ferguson achieved any prominence, and I came across so much sensationalist garbage in my research.  A colleague said recently: "All organisations and movements have their blind spots".

I have heard little about Landmark Education, as the organisation is now known.  The est Seminar  has been replaced by The Forum, and has a small (?) Australian presence.

In the 1980s, the library at the high school where I was teaching received a thick volume about global hunger, as thanks for letting someone speak to a lunchtime meeting about The Hunger Project, an endeavour set up by the est  organisation.  It covered a variety of approaches, including comprehensive community/human development.  And in one of the Project's newsletters I saw a mention of the ICA work in Maharashtra State , India ; so there was some information transferred there - did Werner of somebody visit India ?.  One of the Project's themes was "the possibility of eradicating hunger".  Now there are T-shirts and so on on this theme - if smallpox can be eradicated, why not hunger?  Etc.

Cheers

Frank Bremner
Date: Sun, 3 Oct 2010 22:17:07 -0500
To: oe at wedgeblade.net
From: beretgriffith at charter.net
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] FW: Landmark Education News

I don't think there was any connection between RS-1 and EST. Ron and I took the EST training in Chicago in 1976 or 1977. Marshall 's take is on target. Ron and I both felt the EST training was a unique avenue to getting people to look at their lives rather than escaping from life. It was far more aggressive than any thing EI/ICA did with people and I think it was an avenue of transformation of many people. There were about three hundred people in the training we took. The trainers were outstanding. In any EST event I attended trainers used no notes, the set-up impeccable, and no excuses were accepted for anything. While at the EST training we became acquainted with an interesting couple. We brought them over the Kemper to see the ICA . They were more interested in getting us to go to additional programs than in the ICA . We did not keep up the connection with them. The EST enrollment tactics were high pressure. 

There is a film out on his life which I have seen. Enjoyed it. There is a site with his quotes.A sample:
“Happiness is a function of accepting what is. Love is a function of communication. Health is a function of participation.  Self expression is a function of responsibility.”

-Werner Erhard

I think Erhard is an interesting character. Here is a bit on him from  http://www.wernererhard.net/ 
For nearly 40 years Werner Erhard has been the creator of innovative ideas and models of individual, organizational, and social transformation.  His ideas and models have been the source of new perspectives for thinkers and practitioners in fields as diverse as business, education, philosophy, medicine, psychotherapy, third world development, conflict resolution, and community building.  He has created new ways of seeing things in areas where progress has stalled or where breakthroughs would make a significant difference.  A majority of the Fortune 100 companies and many foundations and governmental entities have used his ideas and models.  Fortune Magazine’s 40th anniversary issue (May 15, 1995), in examining the major contributions to management thinking, recognized Erhard’s ideas as one of the major innovations of the last few decades. 

While Werner Erhard may be best known to the general public for applications derived from his models including The est Training and The Forum of the 1970s and 1980s, currently Erhard commits his time and intellectual effort almost exclusively to the academic world.  Werner Erhard's recent research and writing, and lectures and courses can be found on his author page in the Social Sciences Research Network – http://ssrn.com/author=433651.  More than two million people around the world have participated in the public, corporate and academic programs and courses he has created.  Social scientist Daniel Yankelovich said of a study he conducted of participants of The Forum: “Several of the study’s findings surprised me quite a bit, especially the large number of participants for whom The Forum proved to be ‘one of the most valued experiences of my life’. This is not a sentiment that people, especially successful, well-educated people, express lightly.”  

Werner Erhard is largely self-educated, albeit with tutoring from some important thinkers of his time, Sir Karl Popper, Hilary Putnam, Michel Foucault, Humberto Maturana and Richard Feynman to name a few.  Professor of Philosophy, Michael E. Zimmerman said of Erhard “He had no particular formal training in anything, but he understood things as well as anyone I’d ever seen; and I’ve been around a lot of smart people in academia.  This is an extraordinary intellect I saw at work…”  In recognition of his humanitarian work around the world Werner Erhard was awarded the Mahatma Gandhi Humanitarian Award. 

There is a site with his more recent papers. I'm going to take a look.
Beret Griffith

At 06:41 PM 10/3/2010, you wrote:

I choked and gagged reflexively when I read that RS-1 in any way birthed Werner Erhard's EST. [pardon me while I throw up]. 
The only similarity I can think of might be the style of boxing people into a weekend format and forcing them to deal with something rather than escaping into their favorite avoidance patterns. 
Hmm, sound familiar?
Or maybe this one: "There ISN'T any Messiah..."
Marshall
And I don't think we made people hold it until they wet their panties--a famous Erhard tactic.

From: "slottaglobalnews at earthlink.net" <slottaglobalnews at earthlink.net>
To: Order Ecumenical Community <oe at wedgeblade.net>
Sent: Sun, October 3, 2010 4:04:14 PM
Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] FW: Landmark Education News

I think Landmark Education is a spin-off from RSI through the work of Werner Erhard. Once called EST it became Landmark Forum and then Landmark Education. It is still recruited pretty much like RS-I.

On Oct 2, 2010, at 10:10 AM, KarenBueno at aol.com wrote:

That looks like a dynamite organization.  I wonder if they have plans to replicate it.

Karen Bueno

In a message dated 10/2/2010 8:29:53 A.M. Mountain Daylight Time, amnoel at comcast.net writes:
the following video that has impacted my family and 3 million lives

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