44 International Journal of Cultic Studies ■ Vol. 5, 2014
myself, and I wanted the space to change my
answer.
The fact that I was able to marry at all, and that I
did so less than two years after leaving Aesthetic
Realism, now seems almost a miracle to me.
Siegel taught that criticism is love, and watching
up close the pain my parents were encouraged to
inflict on each other left me sure I would never
be permanently connected with another human
being. Today, I accept, love, and trust my
husband even more than I did 25 years ago.
I have gone through stages in reflecting on and
understanding my life. The first, for 10 years or
so, was shutting the door on anything that
recalled my past. The second stage began when
I turned 50 and felt that, although I had made
great progress in my personal and professional
life, something inside me was stalled. I started
therapy at the Cult Clinic in New York City and
began to look at the past, but still at my own
pace, controlling how much I looked at and how
deeply. As profound and necessary as this stage
was, in retrospect I realize I was hovering at the
edges of what I might see.
The third stage began 7 years ago with the first
workshop sponsored by ICSA for people born or
raised in cultic movements—second-generation
adults. Until that workshop, I had not met
anyone else born into a cult. I felt, as much as
cult educators did understand, that there was
something in my experience they could not
grasp. I felt that even my husband, who had
been in Aesthetic Realism for 14 years, could
not understand.
When you choose to join a group, you have
experience prior to your joining that is part of
your mental and emotional makeup. There is
something, no matter how deeply buried, to
which to compare the group, and there are
usually friends and family in the “outside”
world. When you are born into a group, there is
no other experience. You are totally invaded
and violated, without even an unconscious
memory of being your own self.
When I walked into that workshop filled with
people who shared that specific experience,
being born to parents who already belonged to a
movement, never knowing anything other than
that environment from day one, I felt a
connection I had not felt anywhere before, and a
bond with those people I will never lose. Others
may grasp intellectually what occurred, but there
is an emotional level only one who has shared
the experience understands. This workshop is
where I first felt not entirely alone. A door
opened. It was a beginning point for trust, for
opening up inner areas of myself to myself, and
also, however slowly, to the outside world.
About the Author
Ann Stamler, MA, MPhil, graduated from
Brooklyn College summa cum laude and Phi
Beta Kappa in 1965, and earned graduate
degrees in Latin from Columbia University. She
was in the Aesthetic Realism movement from
birth until she left at age 41, in 1985. In 1987
she married Joseph Stamler, whom she had first
met in Aesthetic Realism. From 1985 to 2006
she was a senior executive of a nonprofit agency
in New York that worked with the labor
movements in the United States and Israel. She
has served on the boards of various civic and
cultural organizations. In 2007 she was elected
to the legislative body of her town in
Connecticut, a position she held until 2013.
From 2008 to 2011 she served as founding
administrator of a new Jewish high school in
Connecticut. She has been on the editorial board
of ICSA’s magazine ICSA Today since its
inception and in 2012 was named Associate
Editor.
myself, and I wanted the space to change my
answer.
The fact that I was able to marry at all, and that I
did so less than two years after leaving Aesthetic
Realism, now seems almost a miracle to me.
Siegel taught that criticism is love, and watching
up close the pain my parents were encouraged to
inflict on each other left me sure I would never
be permanently connected with another human
being. Today, I accept, love, and trust my
husband even more than I did 25 years ago.
I have gone through stages in reflecting on and
understanding my life. The first, for 10 years or
so, was shutting the door on anything that
recalled my past. The second stage began when
I turned 50 and felt that, although I had made
great progress in my personal and professional
life, something inside me was stalled. I started
therapy at the Cult Clinic in New York City and
began to look at the past, but still at my own
pace, controlling how much I looked at and how
deeply. As profound and necessary as this stage
was, in retrospect I realize I was hovering at the
edges of what I might see.
The third stage began 7 years ago with the first
workshop sponsored by ICSA for people born or
raised in cultic movements—second-generation
adults. Until that workshop, I had not met
anyone else born into a cult. I felt, as much as
cult educators did understand, that there was
something in my experience they could not
grasp. I felt that even my husband, who had
been in Aesthetic Realism for 14 years, could
not understand.
When you choose to join a group, you have
experience prior to your joining that is part of
your mental and emotional makeup. There is
something, no matter how deeply buried, to
which to compare the group, and there are
usually friends and family in the “outside”
world. When you are born into a group, there is
no other experience. You are totally invaded
and violated, without even an unconscious
memory of being your own self.
When I walked into that workshop filled with
people who shared that specific experience,
being born to parents who already belonged to a
movement, never knowing anything other than
that environment from day one, I felt a
connection I had not felt anywhere before, and a
bond with those people I will never lose. Others
may grasp intellectually what occurred, but there
is an emotional level only one who has shared
the experience understands. This workshop is
where I first felt not entirely alone. A door
opened. It was a beginning point for trust, for
opening up inner areas of myself to myself, and
also, however slowly, to the outside world.
About the Author
Ann Stamler, MA, MPhil, graduated from
Brooklyn College summa cum laude and Phi
Beta Kappa in 1965, and earned graduate
degrees in Latin from Columbia University. She
was in the Aesthetic Realism movement from
birth until she left at age 41, in 1985. In 1987
she married Joseph Stamler, whom she had first
met in Aesthetic Realism. From 1985 to 2006
she was a senior executive of a nonprofit agency
in New York that worked with the labor
movements in the United States and Israel. She
has served on the boards of various civic and
cultural organizations. In 2007 she was elected
to the legislative body of her town in
Connecticut, a position she held until 2013.
From 2008 to 2011 she served as founding
administrator of a new Jewish high school in
Connecticut. She has been on the editorial board
of ICSA’s magazine ICSA Today since its
inception and in 2012 was named Associate
Editor.
