How to Start a Cult

In 2004 I got invited to a spiritual orgy in a room beautiful people in robes at the Osho compound in Pune. A few days earlier I saw hundreds of people speak in tongues together as they accessed their own spiritual truths. This was my first, but hardly my last, experience from the inside of cultic thinking and practices. 

The world is awash in cults. Some promise spiritual insights, others offer miraculous health innovations while still others build on fundamentally new ideas about how to organize personal finances.  In almost every case, cults follow similar patterns of thinking and employ methods to test the loyalty of their adherents. 

This month a new TV show appeared Netflix staring Peter Dinklage called "How to Become a Cult Leader." It was a great show, but I thought they missed a few salient points. This week's EP is meant to fill in some of the gaps.