After reading many of the posts in this forum, it is clear to me that the spectrum of our experiences was greatly colored by how long we stayed at The Seed. I lived my life at The Seed from the ages of 17 to 38. During those years, I only lived away from The Seed one time, in my mid-twenties, for about 3 months. I also attended graduate school while at The Seed and pretty much am very satisfied with my career. In my personal life, I feel I have only started to really deal with issues a few years ago and have covered quite a bit since then, falling on my face over decisions I would not have made as part of the group since a lot was forbidden, but I am happy that through my growing pains, I feel more alive than ever before.
During my "endless" seasons at the Seed, I became very close to my friends. Despite any negative political undercurrents, I did feel that I loved people there, and to this day I treasure some very good memories. I also have at least a few very good friends, but only one or two that I trust totally (from the group). By the way, I also had a good relationship with my family as a side to my Seed experiences. As a matter of fact, the Seed always tried to remain on good terms with some families, but in the end the key members' terrible mistake of not filling those in the outer circle of the internal problems that were affecting the group damaged my family's perspective of the group and then they began to mistrust me since I had very little words to explain to them what exactly happened, after all Art nor Lybbi nor any of the key members filled me on what was coming down until it actually happened. At that point, the main reason why they wanted to fill me in was simply to win points and secure "loyalty." Unlike some key ex-members, however, I am happy to forgive people for their humanness since I am so very human myself. It has taken me a few years to get over the implications of the fianbl break-up, but more than ever I feel healed when I can tell my story with more and more clarity, not just through the eyes of others.
As I mentioned on another post, I never witnessed any form of physical abuse at The Seed. I did witness a strong presence from staff to convince members of political, social, and even personal issues. Abortion, for instance, was very much supported and pro-life opinions were highly criticised by staff. Supporting the Republicans was frowned upon and embracing the Democrats was praised. I agrred with some of the issues and did not agrree with others. I remember that two years before The Seed closed a few of the key members started really getting into reading "new age" literature. A favorite for a few people was the book Conversations with God by Neale Donald Walsch. I'm not exactly sure where the diretive came from, but the members really pushinng the book, were told not to read it or talk about it becuase at The Seed there was no place for this kind of "thinking." I laughed my way to the bank with that and read all three volumes as they scared each other away from the book. The last thing I was going to do after, after surviving graduate school, was allow someone to now tell me what I could read . . .much of that had gotten funny since staff's ignorance or fear of losing control was becoming so obvious.
Despite all this, I trusted my closest friends at The Seed with my life, and I honestly beleived that they would never hurt me. My concept of relationships, both intimate and social, came from the years of interacting with other members, and I can now see positive as well as negative affects on my personal life from those long-term relationships.
I often wondered if for some who went through the program, stuck around for a few months, yet decided to return home, the ultimate impact was better. Through the years, I watched some graduates who basically just "went through the program." I saw a few come around years later. I remember the few that did were praised by staff in front of us, and I always felt that they were happier, even more stable, perhaps becuase they did not allow themselves to get so deeply and intimately involved in the Ft. Laud. community. For me I ahve forgiven it all and to this day I have not received an apology about the lies and secrets that were kept from us at the end, unfortuantely I beleive I will not be getting one because each side truly beleives that it is right in its way of perceiving the final "truth." None of the key members involved in the secret meetings before telling Art how they felt about that he had too much control and all the other petty B.S. ahve ever apologized to any of us that were kept in the dark until after the fact, and neither has Art or Shelly. Basically, we were each expected to choose a side and "understand" the reasons why things at The Seed had not been perfect.
I have stated before that I hold no resentments against Art or staff becuase I do beleive that their intentions were good. They were human beings; they were/are not perfect. They made mistakes as I have made (and will continue to make) in my life. It is unfortuante that the key members created a very dead-end situation for themselves since each side decided to close the door on the other and "never forgive." This I cannot go along with. I refuse to walk my journey never forgiving for soemthing that is as small and insignificant as a "drama" as the seed's "final battle." I thiink we were all conned into living the war motifs and heroic myths for too frickin' long for now to have to suffer the slings and arrows of the final battle (according to each his version--HA! HA! HA!).
