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That first evening I was shell-shocked. Here was my teacher wanting to screw me, without
even being up-front about it. All of my instincts came up: get out of here, don‟t get
involved, the guy has flipped. I said no and fled the room. The next day and for several
days following, Louis pursued me and the subject again in efforts to overpower my initial
choice, using his persistence and skills at persuasion. “This isn‟t sex, this is meditation,” he
said. “Meditate with me and be liberated,” and finally, “Help me in my meditation by
meditating with me.”
The bottom line was that I couldn‟t say no to him. He knew more than I did. I felt flattered
that he even considered me. He was the teacher and I was the student. Because of the
asymmetrical relationship, he held the power. In the end, my rational thinking was subdued
by the relationship. I knew that what he was suggesting was wrong and a complete
contradiction of what he taught publicly. The basic fact was that I knew if I declined I would
have to leave and I had nowhere to go. I not only had no money, but also I had severed all
ties with my family and friends. The life at the ashram was my only life and I firmly believed
I could not make it on the “outside.” I felt completely, physically dependent on Louis. If I
disagreed with him, I would have to go quietly. To decline what I knew was wrong meant
not surviving. I stayed and lied to myself because I felt I had nowhere to go. To handle the
incongruence, I began to “believe.” Thus began the violation and abuse that was to continue
for 16 years. The damage that occurred then and throughout those 16 years has destroyed
much of the fiber and consistency that I as a person was made up of.
This occurred in 1975. He persuaded me to have sex, cloaked as meditation, whenever he
wanted. I loved him before as a father, and that love was transferred to him as a lover. Our
“meditation” was always done in secret. He told me over and over that what we were doing
was mediation and not sex. It was the highest meditation, he said it was a 7,000-year-old
yogic secret. It was an “old religious secret.” No one should be told the secret or their
chances of being elevated to this level of meditation would be spoiled. It was sin to expose
the secrecy. The initial fear of having nowhere to go if I were to refuse evolved into being
convinced that what he said was true. I began to swallow the story, hook line and sinker.
Every doubt I brought up to him was quelled by the statement that if I didn‟t want to
engage in the meditation, well, there must be something wrong with me. If there was
something wrong with me, then I would have to go. I desperately wanted there to be
nothing wrong with me. I had no idea that the yogic secrecy was no secret, but instead was
a cover-up of intense ministerial sexual abuse. And in fact it was not about sex at all, but
about power.
When it was him and me only, it was something I could handle. The secrecy was difficult,
but I had begun to believe that to expose yogic secrets was a worse sin. I promptly learned
that secrecy was justified everywhere. When Louis began to “meditate” with other female
students, at first, he denied it to avoid complications and my upset. When he couldn‟t cover
up any longer, I was told that in non-action meditation, we should not use our will. Louis
was not going to use his will not to meditate with others. It turned out that I wasn‟t the
“chosen” one, but one of several women he would choose from on a daily basis, depending
on who complained less.
The Secrecy Continues
There were about 20 people involved in the inner circle at this time --mostly women, but
also a few men who would follow Louis‟s rules and not interfere with his sexual encounters.
We all believed the yogic secret. When we doubted Louis, we all believed that there must be
something wrong with us, not the technique. The group pressure to succeed, in this case
with meditation, encompassed us and reinforced Louis‟s stranglehold over all of us. There
was a competition to survive the onslaught of sexual abuse in the form of meditation. My
life went into a tailspin. I was torn between the belief I had in Louis‟s outer teaching and the

Cultic Studies Journal, Vol. 14, No. 1, 1997, page 59
horrors of the secret life in which I was entangled. There was no way out. I had been with
the group for 5 years now. I knew no other life. I had no other friends. I had no other job.
When I expressed doubts to others in the group or to Louis himself, I was criticized for not
being able to take the emotional strain of the meditation. I was not evolved enough to
endure it, they would say. I had too many attachments to the “world.” I felt that I was a
failure. I knew that I could not take the sexual encounters that were going on within the
group. This was a fact. Yet, I believed Louis in that his way was the only way. I couldn‟t
stay and I couldn‟t leave. I couldn‟t understand how the others could tolerate what was
going on. Everyone seemed to accept it as normal. I began to accept the inner group‟s
opinion that there was something wrong with me.
In order to be part of the group and not have to leave, I tried all of Louis‟s suggested
techniques to get over what he called my jealousy and possessiveness. I was to watch
others having sex. I was to accept their love. I was to let the jealousy burn out within me.
For 5 years I experienced daily emotional, instinctual, and mental torment trying to accept
non-monogamy at its worst. Trying to be spiritual. Trying to be part of the group. I was
becoming an emotional and physical wreck. I couldn‟t sleep, I couldn‟t eat, and I couldn‟t
live.
Eventually I found I could not take it and in order to simply stay alive, I began to accept
that I was subnormal. I opted out of the sexual trysts that were going on. I stayed within
the system, yet out of the system. It was a lonely time for me. I struggled with
understanding the secrecy. I still believed the outer teachings and still felt some connection
within the outer circle. I began to live in the outer circle of students, trying to pretend that
the inner circle orgies were not happening late in the night. I kept the secrets. They were
yogic and religious and above reproach. I accepted that it was I who was missing something
and that I had no right to destroy it for the others who benefited. Very much later I came to
realize that a healthy conscience kept me from being subdued further to such unethical
practices. Maybe this is one of the reasons why I could later take the good parts of these
years and leave the negative behind.
In 1976 the ashram moved to another part of California. I moved with the group. The group
now numbered 25 in the inner circle and about 150 in the outer circle. Most of the fringe
students, having no idea that there was an inner circle, believed completely in Louis‟s outer
teachings. The ashram was becoming a growing financial success, all of which was
completely controlled by Louis. He had the typical “guru” limousine and comfortable living
quarters. He had a personal cook and women who cleaned his house daily. He did no work
at all. Meanwhile, the volunteers worked 12 hours a day for no compensation. People bowed
and scraped just to get close to him. They followed his every instruction, such as whom to
marry, or whom not to marry, whether to go to school or to renounce the world. Donations
and tithes were a must if a devotee had an outside salary.
The group‟s drama around Louis was getting thicker and thicker. Occasionally Louis would
convince me that AI was the only one important for him,” and I would try “meditation”
again. He would match me up with other men in the inner circle to quiet me. I just never
could get into the scene, the orgies, the multiple partners, the many abortions women were
having, the general group upset. There were times when I would be completely
overwhelmed. I would try to leave, but all such attempts were unsuccessful. I had no
money and no friends outside the group. When I would leave, I would go to people from the
group who lived apart from the group. Louis would always find me and woo me back. I
could not successfully disconnect.