This article is the first media report that I’ve seen addressing Boston (a.k.a. the poor cousin.) Most are almost exclusively about corporate headquarters in NYC.

This one describes:
1)A Harvard Square recruitment
2)The recruiter driving her target to his first “class.” (Ah, I remember that song and dance. I thought, “Why not just give me an address?” I already understood a tacit “don’t ask, don’t tell” rule. A cult savvy person would have run away.)
3)The poor cousin’s highly educated “student body.” (All of those degrees do seem impressive to those of us who aren’t cult savvy, meaning most people.)
4)The Rules: “…barred from discussing ‘school’ with anyone, including family, discouraged from interacting outside class or sharing their full names and told not to research the group online.”
5)Twice-a-week classes, featuring meditation, body and breath work, philosophical debate and always “ending with personal disclosures, in which members would share their own problems and apply OSG’s teachings to try and solve them.”
6)Minders: “Each member was assigned a mentor and expected to speak with them between sessions.” As an example of loaded language: We called our minders, “sustainers”.
7)A picture of The Faulkner Mills Building, Boston’s main “classroom,” in the suburb of Billerica. Newbie “classes” are scattered throughout Boston and greater Boston. No one mentions the other “classes.” I didn’t know about corporate until I left.
8)Alternatively, the spying, with one source reporting, “We were told the conversations were confidential. But I later learned that information was being passed up to leadership and used to manipulate people.” Yep, the “teachers” keep secret dossiers on each student. While “teachers” withhold information and students have no clue what “school” really is, the leadership knows as much as possible about the rank and file.
9) The secret cult marriages.
10)The seedy history: The Theater of All Possibilities, San Francisco, 1960s, Alex Horn, Sharon Horn and the gang migrating to the East coast, after San Fran shut it down; rebranding in NYC as The Odyssey Study Group, or OSG.
11) It names Boston’s current leader.
12) The monthly, cash-only, “tuition.”

And more. Need to know? Click HERE to read the entire article.