Chad and Lori Daybell's Hybridized New Age Beliefs: Examining the Dangers of New Age Delusions with Saturn Rx and Neptune Rx in Pisces

On July 31, 2023, Lori Vallow Daybell was sentenced to three life sentences in prison without the possibility of parole, following convictions on two counts of first-degree murder for the deaths of her children, Joshua "JJ" Vallow and Tylee Ryan, and three counts of conspiracy to commit murder. Lori was also convicted of conspiring with her husband, Chad Daybell, in the murder of his then-wife, Tammy Daybell. Lori received an additional 10 years for grand theft.

Chad Daybell will be tried separately in 2024. He is charged with three counts of murder for the deaths of Tammy Daybell, JJ Vallow, and Tylee Ryan. He is also charged with three counts of conspiracy to commit murder. (Update: Chad Daybell was convicted of his crimes and sentenced to the death penalty in June 2024.)

Lori's then-husband, Charles Vallow, was shot and killed in July 2019 by Lori's brother under suspicious circumstances after Charles pleaded for help from police because he was afraid of Lori and afraid for his life. 

Lori's children, JJ and Tylee, went missing in September 2019.

Chad Daybell's then-wife Tammy Daybell died in October 2019.

On November 5, 2019, Chad and Lori were married in Hawaii.

The remains of Lori's children were found buried in shallow graves on Chad Daybell's property in June 2020. The bodies had been dismembered and burned.

Chad and Lori Daybell are horrifying illustrations of how dangerous New Age delusions can be. People mistakenly believe New Age is innocuous. It absolutely is not, and this is why I have worked to expose and deconstruct the New Age scam for the past 15+ years. The astrology world is rife with the stuff.

Chad and Lori Daybell had set themselves up as New Age doomsday gurus, creating their own hybridized version of the New Age scheme. Reading about the dangerously delusional beliefs espoused by Lori and Chad, as well as their manipulative tactics, is like reading out of a (slightly-customized) New Age 101 Playbook.

From the October 8, 2021 Newsweek article, "Accused Killers Chad and Lori Daybell Had Cult-Like Belief System, Documents Reveal," written by Zoe Strozewski:

 

 

 A screenshot from the article - click to enlarge

 

"Believing in the presence of both good and evil, the Daybells employed a unique scoring system, assigning every person a "light" or "dark" rating to designate whether that individual had made a contract with God or Satan, according to the court documents. They also assigned people a number in reference to how many previous lives they had.

They scored people on a "vibration" scale, with those deemed as having high-enough "vibrations" to have special powers, or be "translated...

Lori Daybell's close friend Melanie Gibbs told investigators Chad and Lori Daybell drew people into their circle of believers by giving them bits of information and flattered followers by telling them they were part of the select few who were supposed to carry out a special spiritual mission.

Those who questioned the beliefs were pushed out of the group, investigators said...

The group also believed that once a person became "exalted," they couldn't be held responsible for their actions on Earth."

 

 

The Daybells believed that Lori was a Goddess who had supernatural powers. This is a commonly held delusion by people who ascribe to New Age beliefs. Because of this "Goddess status," Lori could not be held to the same rules as other people on Earth, and apparently, in their clouded minds, this extended to serial murder.

 

The Daybells took New Age to a new and bizarre level, however, because they believed that people could become "zombies" after their bodies became inhabited by a dark spirit. Once people became zombies, they believed their physical bodies had to be killed in order for the spirit of that person to be released to heaven. The Daybells believed Lori's children had become zombies and that they were basically doing them a favour by killing them. Lori even reiterated these delusions, insisting she had done nothing wrong, at her sentencing hearing.

 

They added their own bizarre twists, to be sure, but the Daybells were living and espousing their own hybridized version of the New Age paradigm. 

The New Age paradigm teaches adherents that there is a hierarchy of "vibrations" and that the "highly-vibrating" people (New Age adherents or "chosen ones") exist at the top of that hierarchy. Adherents are taught that they are spiritually special and superiour to common people. The terms "enlightened," "awakened," and "evolved" are often applied to them. Those caught up in the New Age paradigm promote the belief that these "highly-vibrating" people will "ascend to the 5th dimension" while the "3D, density-dwellers" (non-New Age adherents) will simply die off or disappear. 

There is an unbalanced and unnatural focus on "light" and "positivity" in the New Age paradigm. "Love and Light" is a common catch phrase, and toxic positivity in all circumstances is enforced. Those labeled "dark," "dense," or "negative" (or in this case, "zombies") are demonized, de-humanized, and considered "3D." Throwaway people, basically. There is also often a devaluing of the physical body and the Earthly life, as people's sights are set on the paradise of the spiritual realms instead.

New Age espouses a paradigm built on false spiritual hierarchy where, again, New Age adherents exist at the highest levels of that hierarchy, above the common people, and are to be looked up to, followed, and emulated.

The New Age paradigm is set up as a pseudo-spiritual pyramid scheme where adherents blindly follow those they consider to be gurus or higher up the ladder of pseudo-spiritual hierarchy. Adherents seek to "raise their vibrations" until they, too, reach "Ascended Master consciousness" or "God/Goddess consciousness." At this point, they are told, they will become gurus with their own herd of followers or - in the case of the doomsday version - simply disappear into the blissful spiritual realms (often referred to as "the 5th dimension" or "the New Earth.") New Age is set up akin to a multi-level marketing scheme with people bringing others into the fold, using "consciousness," "vibrations," and "enlightenment" as its product and currency. 

There is great pressure to adopt the ideas of the guru, Goddess, or Ascended Master, and anything or anyone critical of those ideas is viciously rejected as "dark," "unenlightened," "unawakened," "unevolved," or "living in density." Again, in the case of the Daybells, the terminology used was "zombies." The Daybells, like all New Age leaders, were to be considered the ultimate authority, no questions asked. Followers who had differences of opinion or questions were ejected from the group, and this is a common practise in New Age. Because people are taught that they are far beyond the consciousness of the common person, the scheme often includes separation from family, friends, and the rest of society. This isolates people and makes them more dependent on the leader or leaders.

New Age is a form of false spirituality with roots to consciousness-based eugenics. The New Age pseudo-spiritual pyramid scheme has existed in its current form since the late 1800s. The "Mother of New Age" is considered to be Russian mystic Helena Blavatsky who lived from 1831 to 1891. The religious umbrella under which Blavatsky operated was called theosophy, and she founded the Theosophical Society in 1875. Her most famous book was The Secret Doctrine, published in 1888, and it promoted the foundational tenets and false spiritual hierarchy that we still see promoted by New Age adherents today, including Chad and Lori Daybell. An excerpt from The Secret Doctrine:

"Mankind is obviously divided into god-informed men and lower human creatures. The intellectual difference between the Aryan and other civilized nations and such savages as the South Sea Islanders, is inexplicable on any other grounds. No amount of culture, nor generations of training amid civilization, could raise such human specimens as the Bushmen, the Veddhas of Ceylon, and some African Tribes, to the same intellectual level as the Aryans, the Semites, and the Turanians so called. The 'sacred spark' is missing in them and it is they who are the only inferior races on the globe, now happily – owing to the wise adjustment of nature which ever works in that direction – fast dying out. Verily mankind is 'of one blood,' but not of the same essence. We are the hot-house, artificially quickened plants in nature, having in us a spark, which in them is latent" (The Secret Doctrine, Vol. 2, p 421).

Blavatsky's successor was Alice Bailey, who lived from 1880 to 1949. Bailey and her husband Foster founded the Lucis Trust in 1922, and the activities of the Lucis Trust included the formation of a United Nations group called "World Goodwill" in 1932. The Baileys also founded the Lucifer Publishing Company. These very sinister organizations used glowing promotional terms for their work, and we hear much of the same glossy terminology and PR spin in the United Nations framework today. Bailey believed there would be a rise of a "New Group of World Servers" and openly supported global government and the "New World Order," making the declaration: "[And] out of the spoliation of all existing culture and civilization, the new world order must be built."

We have seen these same calls for globalized government, called the "New World Order," echoed by high-level politicians throughout the world, up to current day. Stephen Harper, former Prime Minister of Canada, used to refer to it (slightly euphemistically) as "Global Governance." The idea is that the common people are too unintelligent and unconscious to govern their own lives and affairs and require an "enlightened and awakened" globalized elite to dictate their lives and set out their choices for them.

This is far from the first time that New Age delusions have caused physical injury or death (not to mention the rampant psychological and sexual abuses). It would be impossible to recount the full list of crimes - both ethical and legal - committed over the past 150 years by those in the New Age paradigm, but I will offer one example from 2009 that I covered extensively at the time.

Another self-styled New Age guru and "Harmonic Wealth" pusher, James Arthur Ray, was responsible for the deaths of at least three people and the injuries of a couple dozen more during his reign of Love and Light-fueled terror. "Harmonic Wealth" was Ray's regurgitation of the so-called "Law of Attraction," also promoted by Blavatsky. Ray's scheme occurred during the craze around The Secret, a New Age book and video that centred around the "Law of Attraction," "creating your own reality," and "manifesting abundance."

In November 2011, Ray was given a slap-on-the-wrist prison sentence of two years after he was found guilty of three counts of negligent homicide. The three deaths and more than a dozen injuries, some permanent, followed a deadly and botched sweat lodge seminar near Sedona, Arizona where proper sweat lodge practises and safeguards were not followed. The sweat lodge was improperly constructed and had a plastic tarp over it, blocking ventilation. Participants were bullied into staying inside the faulty sweat lodge after they expressed a desire to leave. 

I wrote a series of articles on this New Age huckster, including this one from September 30, 2011: White Men Can't Sweat Lodge: Background

An excerpt:

"As the faulty sweat lodge participants grew uncomfortable and ill and wanted to leave the plastic tarp-covered hothouse, Ray told them to push past their boundaries. He told them they were "better than that." He sat at the entrance of the hothouse so people had to pass him (badgering them to stay) to get out."

James Arthur Ray never should have been allowed to continue his schemes to the point of causing the three deaths and scores of injuries at that botched sweat lodge ceremony in 2009. Multiple people had been injured (including a suicide) at his previous events, stemming back to 2005. These injuries included a woman shattering her hand after being badgered repeatedly by Ray into trying to break a board with it; a woman who jumped to her death during an exercise where Ray convinced people to dress like homeless people in public; a man injured by an arrow after being encouraged by Ray to press it against his neck; and a previous sweat lodge injury that required medical assistance for the injured participant in 2005.

Ray had been warned by multiple indigenous leaders, following the participant injury in 2005, to stop using sweat lodges in his seminars because he was not properly trained in how to build the lodges or conduct the ceremonies. 

Examining the Dangers of New Age Delusions with Saturn Rx and Neptune Rx in Pisces

The-buck-stops-here Saturn is transiting Pisces from March 2023 to February 2026, and it will meet Neptune in late Pisces in conjunction during the later part of the transit. Saturn and Neptune will not make an exact conjunction until they reach the zero-degree of Aries (the birth point of the zodiac) on February 20, 2026. 

Until then, we are working through the many challenges and problems (Saturn) related to false versions of spirituality; delusions; illusions; escapism; spiritual narcissism; spiritual ego; spiritual materialism; charlatanism; cults; mind control; and the difficulty in determining real from fake (Pisces).

Exposing, deconstructing, and then nullifying the harmful, even deadly, influence of New Age is part of this work, and it is ongoing.

Both Saturn and Neptune are currently retrograde in Pisces, and this indicates a theme whereby we must learn from the past if we are not to repeat unfortunate history in the present and future. This very much applies to the crimes of New Age hucksters and scammers and to the mistakes made by their sadly misguided followers.

The truth is: there are tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, of Chad and Lori Daybells out there. There are tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, of James Arthur Rays out there. Still misguiding people. Still harming people. Still wrapping people up in that special brand of Luciferian false Love and Light(TM). Still glossing over their crimes (ethical and legal) with pretty facades and a whole lot of smoke and mirrors. 

The New Age pyramid scheme has tentacles that reach around the globe, into every city and small town. The New Age tentacles reach into the worlds of natural health and healing and spiritual healing; into the worlds of astrology, tarot, psychics, and other readers; into the yoga world; into the world of organic food; into the metaphysical bookstores and crystal shops; into the world of essential oils; into the worlds of Hollywood and corporate music; into the worlds of organized religion; into the worlds of politics, government, and non-governmental organizations. The reach of it is mind-boggling, and it has only gotten much more widespread in my 20 years of astrological study and work. 

I work on an ongoing basis to lift the parasitizing veil of New Age delusion and falsity from people's minds, spirits, and eyes, and I will continue to do this work as long as it's needed. I hope all those who see through this miserable scheme will do the same.

 

Further resources:

 

Saturn in Pisces (2023 - 2026) and Deconstructing New Age as a Pseudo-Spiritual Pyramid Scheme

 

The Vilification of Virgoan Analysis and Scorpionic Intuition Within the New Age Meme Complex

 

Saturn in Virgo Calls Bullshit on The Secret/Law of Attraction Phenomenon


New Age Solipsism


All Willow's Web Astrology articles on Deconstructing the New Age Pyramid Scheme


Dark Moon Podcast #3 - Deconstructing the Cult Mind and Pyramid Scheme Power

All Willow's Web Astrology articles on James Arthur Ray

White Men Can't Sweat Lodge: A Slap on the Wrist

James Arthur "Death" Ray was sentenced today to two years in prison after being convicted in June of three counts of negligent homicide stemming from a faulty sweat lodge he performed in Arizona.

This means, of course, that there are people in United States prisons serving more time for robbery than Ray will serve for the deaths of these three people. 

Many other participants suffered health damage - some permanent - from the faulty sweat lodge.

Prosecutors had requested three consecutive three-year terms (nine years), the longest allowable sentence for Ray's crimes. The defense requested probation.

The families of the dead more than likely will not even be able to recoup their losses in civil court. It was declared in court records during the trial that, despite living in a Beverly Hills home, Ray is $4 million in the hole.

All those people bilked and not a dime to show for it. Pretty depressing all around that this scheister is getting off so lightly.

Background articles on James Arthur Ray

White Men Can't Sweat Lodge: Background

New Age huckster James Arthur "Death" Ray, currently free on bond, is still awaiting sentencing for the negligent homicides of three people in Arizona in October 2009.

Ray was convicted in a jury trial on June 22, 2011 under the cross-hairs of the summer solstice Cardinal Grand Cross formation.

Ray's attorneys filed a motion for a new trial July 13, which was denied by the judge in the case, Warren Darrow, September 14. There have been multiple delays of a pre-sentencing hearing that would involve Ray's supporters providing testimony in hopes of lowering his sentence, which has possibilities ranging from probation to nine years in prison. Judge Darrow now says he will schedule the week-long hearing and sentencing to begin sometime after October 15.

Note: The sentencing has now been scheduled for November 18, 2011.

Background

James Arthur Ray has a long history of recklessness and negligence causing harm to participants of his phony seminars. Participants were made to sign long, detailed waivers indicating their acknowledgement that personal harm and even death were possible while attending one of his events. The waivers released Ray and his company from liability including "physical, emotional, psychological, financial or otherwise."

From the waiver: "I am fully aware that I may suffer physical, emotional, financial or other injury during any of the Activities and there is and can be no assurance or guarantee regarding my health or safety in connection with my participation in the Activities. I understand that (1) there are inherent risks in the Activities; (2) people may have been seriously injured by participating in the Activities; and (3) if I voluntarily choose to participate in the Activities, there is a risk that I may receive injuries requiring medical attention."

- In May 2005 at a James Arthur Ray event at Disneyworld, a woman shattered her hand after Ray allegedly bullied her into repeatedly attempting to break a board with it. Happiest place on Earth, indeed. The woman filed a negligence lawsuit against Ray, who settled it out of court with an undisclosed sum in 2007. - In October 2005, officials were called to a James Arthur Ray "Spiritual Warrior" seminar after a man became unconscious during another sweat lodge ceremony at the same Angel Valley Spiritual Retreat Center in Arizona.

- A man reportedly sustained injuries during another of Ray's "Spiritual Warrior" exercises in 2006 when participants, after signing the aforementioned waivers, were told to put the sharp point of an arrow against the soft part of their necks and lean against the tip. The man did as he was told, the shaft of the arrow snapped and the arrow point cut deeply into his eyelid, narrowly missing his eye.

- In July 2009, a woman committed suicide by jumping from a three-story mall balcony during a James Arthur Ray event in San Diego. Ray had reportedly instructed the participants to dress up as homeless people and play the part in public. Ray and the rest of the participants left the mall knowing the woman was missing from the group.

- And of course, in October 2009, three people died and 19 others were hospitalized, some with permanent health damage, after the botched sweat lodge at Ray's "Spiritual Warrior" seminar near Sedona, Arizona.

Ray's practises were deeply unstable and suspect long before things escalated to injury and death. In his seminars, he used several techniques he was not trained to use. One of these techniques was Holotropic Breathing, where people were led to accelerate their breathing in order to "reach altered states of consciousness without drugs."

Another was a "team-building" technique called the Samurai Game in which Ray played God and ordered participants dead. The (dead) participants would then lie nonspeaking and unmoving until Ray ordered them to get up again.

Ray is pretty much the dictionary definition of New Age cultural appropriation, and one of the most heinous examples, of course, was his use of faulty sweat lodge practises, inaccurately appropriated from native people without permission.

From an excellent article written by Bob Ortega of the Arizona Republic: "Sweat-lodge trial: James Arthur Ray often misused teachings, critics say"

"Years before the deadly 2009 ceremony, Ray "was approached several times by native leaders and told he was not trained to run Native American ceremonies," said David Singing Bear, an Eastern Band Cherokee and Sedona resident who has run sweat lodges.

Singing Bear said that Phillip Crazy Bull, a Lakota chief who died in 2006, spoke with Ray in 2005.

Such training matters for physical safety reasons as well as for spiritual authenticity, says R.J. Joseph, a Cree filmmaker and former Native American program director at Sedona's Enchantment Resort. "Desert people aren't really vision-quest or sweat-lodge people; they've adopted those ceremonies from Plains Indians. So when you have a fast or vision quest, it's generally in cooler climates. You certainly wouldn't put anybody out in the desert for two days with no water. Not in the desert," he said.

Almost every aspect of Ray's sweat lodge was inauthentic, said Wambli Sina Win, a former Oglala Sioux tribal judge who has written about sweat-lodge practices. "Whatever he led was not a sweat-lodge ceremony as I understand it," she said. "He evidently learned bits and pieces and created a Frankenstein.""

Ray also appropriated Hawaiian huna as well as Peruvian spiritual practises, falsely claiming he had been initiated into them. Ray was also approached by Hawaiian huna leaders who told him to discontinue what he was doing.

From the article:

"Ray used techniques that he said he had learned from being initiated into the shamanic rituals of Hawaiian huna, traditional spiritual and healing practices of the islands. But Ray was not initiated or ever given permission to pass on these teachings, of which he had only superficial knowledge, according to his huna teacher, Dr. Matthew James, president of Kona University. He said the training process to become a huna teacher takes a decade or longer; Ray took several short introductory workshops from James in 2004 and then began holding his own version of huna ceremonies at a local hotel.

"I had someone from my office call James up and say 'what you're doing is improper, you weren't given permission, you need to stop right away,' and his response was that he was going to keep doing it," James said. "So we informed him he would no longer be able to take training with us.""

- The Astrology of James Arthur Ray -

I've written previous posts about the transits at the time of the 2009 deaths, which echoed transits going on at the time of the Jonestown Massacre in 1978.

What follows is my astrological interpretation of how James Ray exhibits some of the placements in his natal chart. This does not mean that all people with these placements exhibit the same traits. The signs of the zodiac are multi-layered with many, many different possibilities for expression.

I could find no birth time or place for James Ray, but his birth date is listed on several sources as November 22, 1957. Assuming this is correct, this would make him either a 29 degree Scorpio Sun or a 0 degree Sagittarius Sun. My personal guess, considering the deadly ramifications of his character flaws, is a 29th degree Scorpio Sun.

The 29th (anaretic) degree of a sign holds possibilities for the most wise and masterful use of the sign's energy and also for the most irresponsible and detrimental. It's a make or break degree. The anaretic degree holds the energy and lessons of the entire sign as well as the responsibility for their proper application, and this can make lesser men and women grow restless, reckless and impatient, trying to shrug off the responsibilities and requirements of the placement.

- Saturn-Mercury in Sagittarius: Shirking Responsibility But Enjoying the Jovial Spoils -

With a natal Saturn conjunct Mercury in Sagittarius and a Sagittarius Moon, we see a man falsely adopting the cultural knowledge and wisdom indicated by Sagittarius while refusing to keep himself in check (Saturn).

Ray completely shrugged off the Saturnine responsibilities that come with being a true Mercurial conduit for the transmission of ancient cultural knowledge. Instead, he rode the (to him, unlimited) expansion of the rhetoric of The Secret and the so-called Law of Attraction to a deadly end.

The irresponsibility, recklessness with people's lives and souls, and carelessness that this man has exhibited are extremely grievous, to say the least. Ray was impatient, arrogant, a man who believed he already knew it all - exhibiting some of the worst qualities of Sagittarius.

He pumped up his natural charisma and the excitement people felt in his presence, capitalizing on rabid New Age Guru Mania, while accepting none of the responsibility for those gifts. This is a man who skipped steps (Saturn) at every possible turn.

As mentioned in the Bob Ortega article, many practises Ray was using required a decade or more of apprenticeship under a shaman or spiritual leader. Ray was co-opting these techniques after a few brief introductory sessions and then charging thousands of dollars for them. This is highly irresponsible and highly dangerous, and those who truly understood what he was playing with warned him repeatedly. He didn't listen (Mercury is in its detriment in Sagittarius), and many people were harmed because of it.

With a natal Jupiter in Libra dispositing his Mercury-Saturn and Moon in Sagittarius, the crucial elements were: putting into practise a full understanding of energetic balance and justice (ie. knowing right from wrong) as well as forming equal relationships with the people around him and concerning himself with their welfare. Ray failed on all fronts.

With Venus in Capricorn, Ray certainly has friends in prominent public positions, taking his place beside the Oprahs and the Larry Kings of the world without having the foundation (Saturn) to back up his big, splashy, grandiose claims (Mercury in Sagittarius). This is a man who did not put the work in to become who he said he was, failing his Saturnine lessons miserably.

- Coercive Persuasion - North Node-Mars-Neptune in Scorpio -

Ray has a Mars-Neptune conjunction in Scorpio conjunct a Scorpio North Node. This is a grouping of energy that requires the utmost responsibility since, at the tail-end astrological Piscean era, this combination is rife with potential abuses and misuses.

This, of course, makes it a perfect combination for a narcissistic Neptunian guru type who uses common brainwashing techniques to promote a false understanding of his skills in order to bilk people of their money and energy.

With this combination, Ray knows people's weak and naive spots intuitively - and capitalizes on them.

Variations of misanthropy are a possibility with Scorpio energy - common within a New Age that wants to "transcend" the distasteful condition of being human altogether - and this trait is quite apparent in Ray's character and behaviour.

With a natal Chiron in Aquarius, Ray is able to take his indifference and the emotional detachment from fellow human beings to deadly extremes.

An online comment from a person injured at one of Ray's speaking events:

"I attended a James Ray event in Dallas in January, and I was injured, and James Ray did not care – not in the least. He was using a teaching tool to demonstrate that what you wanted was right out in front of you – simply take it. He was holding out his teaching CD’s. People from the audience were standing up and taking them. On about the 4th one, I stood up. I was sitting on the front row. A man came up from behind me, jumped on my back, knocked me to the ground and took the CD. Instead of urging people to be careful or asking me if I was okay, James Ray CONGRATULATED the man for having the courage to take what he wanted. He never even stopped his high pressure sales tactics to ask if I was okay. This happened less than six inches from his very feet. After the event was over, I waited a long time to tell him that I was injured. I am disabled with Multiple Sclerosis and injured my ankle and knee as the result of being knocked down – and also had an injured back, neck, and shoulder from the man jumping on my back. Do you want to hear how James Ray responded when I informed him that I was hurt in the incident? He smiled BROADLY and said “It sure got crazy, didn’t it?” And he laughed. He literally did not give a darn about me or anyone else in attendance."

Psychologists would say Ray is utilizing coercive persuasion on the people with whom he comes into contact. The influence of Neptune in Scorpio permeating his physical energy and presence (Mars) allows Ray to mesmerize people, a snake charmer exerting control on hidden levels.

Scorpio is a sign of extremes - of life and death, of emotional, psychological and psychic crisis, of domination and subjugation. And it is in these arenas that Ray committed his crimes. A common theme with Ray is pushing people - to a crisis point, to their breaking points, to a simulated point of their own deaths, where Ray would have their lives in his (horrifically irresponsible) hands. This forced a transference of personal power and responsibility from the individuals to Ray and attempted to create a level of false trust.

(All the better to remove your funds with, my dear.)

This is a common tail-end Piscean era sham: the Master-student relationship. The "Master" is set up as being above the student - more enlightened, more God-like, more spiritual, more powerful, more in-the-know - and it is frowned upon for the student to question or disagree. Ray used this one all the way to millions in the bank.

- The Pitfalls of Letting the South Node Drive -

And this draws us to the point that is really key to it all - his Taurus South Node. Ultimately, it was about the dollar, dollar bills. The story from Ray (who knows if it's true) is that his Daddy was a preacher man. A dirt poor preacher man. And little Jamie Ray didn't even have enough money for a Boy Scout uniform so he could join the troupe.

This set up an unhealthy South Node fixation.

Whether he called it Harmonic Wealth (TM), manifesting abundance or achieving your dreams through the law of attraction, it was all about the money. This is what Ray was after, this was the underlying basis for his seminars, and this is what a lot of the people who took his seminars were after. The get rich quick, pseudo-spiritual-style.

Ray spoke the language of the Scorpio North Node: transform, change your life, push past your boundaries, give up control, face your fears, face death! But here we see the problem with following a single dude claiming to have the answers. He was talking to himself. The energetic rules that applied to him and his natal chart were not the rules that applied to the tens of thousands of people he scammed and hurt.

Ray was aggressive, coercive, manipulative and abusive, using some of the worst traits of Scorpio, but all wrapped up in a mesmerizing Sagittarian charisma and dirty attraction.

As the faulty sweat lodge participants grew uncomfortable and ill and wanted to leave the plastic tarp-covered hothouse, Ray told them to push past their boundaries. He told them they were "better than that." He sat at the entrance of the hothouse so people had to pass him (badgering them to stay) to get out. He used his presence (Mars conjunct Neptune in Scorpio) to bully and intimidate people into doing things they did not want to do, so that they would feel "unspiritual" or "unenlightened" if they could not pass his tests. This ultimately cost three their lives and many their health.

Ray was not using his Scorpio North Node to empower people. He was using it to get people to empower him by transferring their personal power and responsibility over to him as well as large sums of their money.

The South Node is a point that holds a great deal of talent - and also horrendous pitfalls. Ray was skilled at money-making schemes, and he also used these talents in some of the most abusive ways possible.

The South Node is not an area where we are meant to be hanging out all that much, and the constant focus on more and more and more money, wealth, abundance, accumulation created a situation where the nodal polarity was dangerously overcharged and unbalanced.

As with the entire The Secret phenomenon, the energy was built up to a dangerous and unsustainable point. Anyone with any type of real understanding of energetics could see that. Something had to give, and it did. The lives of the innocent were sacrificed to this tail-end Piscean era multi-level marketing huckster shitshow.

Jupiter Rx is currently conjunct James Ray's South Node, and this is a perfect example of how Jupiter's expansion is not always a beneficial thing. Jupiter is putting a spotlight on the abuses Ray has committed via his South Node obsession with mass accumulation.

- Tip of the Rotten New Age Iceberg -

At the same time, James Ray is not an isolated case. He's a sacrificial lamb for something much larger and more malevolent - a fall guy for the corrupt energetics of the entire The Secret phenomenon and even broader than that, for the New Age scheme itself.

As stated, the energy of The Secret phenomenon was pumped up to an insane, dangerous and unsustainable point. It was fatally flawed, as is New Age as a whole, and something had to give. Those further up the dirty pyramid sit on their fame and their millions, won through equally corrupt methods, and continue the scheme to this day in one form or another. They're guilty of metaphysical crimes if not physical, Earthly ones. They're just sophisticated enough to get away with it.

The current timeframe for the pre-sentencing hearing (post-October 15) is set for just after Venus, Mercury and the Sun in Scorpio oppose Jupiter in Taurus along Ray's nodal polarity.

Previous posts on the subject are here: James Arthur Ray

White Men Can't Sweat Lodge: An Update

New Age guru and snake oil salesman extraordinaire James Arthur Ray was scheduled to be sentenced September 26, 2011 after a week-long hearing that would have had his supporters supplying testimony in a bid to lower his sentence.

According to what's being reported, one of the attorneys involved in the case had a medical emergency, and the hearing was cancelled. There's no word at this time on a new date for the hearing or sentencing.

On June 22, under the cross-hairs of the Cardinal Grand Cross, Ray was found guilty by jurors on three counts of negligent homicide after a four-month trial in Camp Verde, Arizona. He is currently out on bail and faces a sentence ranging from probation to nine years in prison.

From a previous post: "Three people died ("ascended"? "transcended"?) and 19 were hospitalized - some with permanent health damage - after a botched sweat lodge at Ray's "Spiritual Warrior" seminar near Sedona, Arizona in October 2009. Participants paid up to $10,000 for the honour of attending Ray's five-day workshop where, according to accounts, they were encouraged to shave their heads, play death-related games with Ray and fast for 36 hours before entering a faulty sweat lodge. Ray reportedly goaded participants into staying in the sweat lodge longer than they wanted to, advising them to ignore physical discomfort and push past their boundaries.

According to the Huffington Post, participants were told by Ray: "The true spiritual warrior has conquered death and therefore has no fear or enemies in this lifetime or the next, because the greatest fear you'll ever experience is the fear of what? Death. ... You will have to get a point to where you surrender and it's OK to die."

The dirty, pumped-up Neptunian bullshit of The Secret and its "creating your own reality/manifesting abundance" memes finally blew up after every New Ager and his/her dog dry humped the scheme for its very last penny. Unfortunately, people lost their lives in the process."

More background posts and the astrology involved in this case are available here: James Arthur Ray I will post on Ray's sentencing when it's reported.

James Arthur Ray Awaits Sentencing Under the Cardinal Grand Cross

New Age guru and snake oil salesman millionaire James Arthur Ray, who schlepped (and is still schlepping) that utter crap The Secret has created quite the reality for himself.

On June 22 (Summer Solstice), in the cross hairs of the Cardinal Grand Cross and within triple eclipse season, Ray was found guilty by jurors on three counts of negligent homicide after a four-month trial in Camp Verde, Arizona.

A Full Moon lunar eclipse in Sagittarius June 15 closed a chapter on those taking the dangerous, tail-end Piscean era rhetoric of The Secret to the bank, and Ray is the one finally paying the piper.

Ray is awaiting sentencing by the judge in the case, which could range from probation to nine years in prison. There will inevitably be an appeal, but apparently Arizona does not often overturn convictions.

Three people died ("ascended"? "transcended"?) and 19 were hospitalized - some with permanent health damage - after a botched sweat lodge at Ray's "Spiritual Warrior" seminar near Sedona, Arizona in October 2009. Participants paid up to $10,000 for the honour of attending Ray's five-day workshop where, according to accounts, they were encouraged to shave their heads, play death-related games with Ray and fast for 36 hours before entering a faulty sweat lodge. Ray reportedly goaded participants into staying in the sweat lodge longer than they wanted to, advising them to ignore physical discomfort and push past their boundaries.

According to the Huffington Post, participants were told by Ray: "The true spiritual warrior has conquered death and therefore has no fear or enemies in this lifetime or the next, because the greatest fear you'll ever experience is the fear of what? Death. ... You will have to get a point to where you surrender and it's OK to die."

The dirty, pumped-up Neptunian bullshit of The Secret and its "creating your own reality/manifesting abundance" memes finally blew up after every New Ager and his/her dog dry humped the scheme for its very last penny. Unfortunately, people lost their lives in the process.

I wrote about it at the time:

October 14, 2009: New Age Dumbassery Turns Deadly 

October 19, 2009: More of Those Pesky Saturn in Virgo Details Surfacing And The Death Toll Rises To Three 

The deaths happened and the case hit the media as we were experiencing the horrendous Saturn in Virgo opposition series to Uranus in Pisces, with transiting Saturn in Virgo trine the Capricorn North Node.

The tail-end astrological Piscean era energy was at a point of extreme. It was overwhelming, confusing, exhausting, paralyzing. The blinding veils were thick and very, very dirty, and setting up the guru-student power dynamic so prevalent in New Age was absolutely ripe for detrimental effects. The Saturnine challenges at the time related to taking on one's own spiritual authority while having the most exacting, detail-conscious standards possible (Virgo) for anyone allowed to have influence over us - body, mind and spirit.

We were challenged to use Saturn in Virgo's earthy analytical skills to see through the dangerous, pseudo-spiritual trex being promoted by Ray and others like him, getting crystal clear on the old Piscean karmic loops and those taking them all the way to the bank.

"Saturn is a picky taskmaster in Virgo, making us go over and over things with a fine-toothed comb. Even the smallest rough edge, neglected detail or sloppy statement can put us way off course. Saturn in Virgo knows this. So we've been drilled on all those Virgo subjects. Yes, the usual ones like work, service, duty, communication, perfecting of details, cleanliness, organization, diet and holistic/systemic health and functioning, in general. But also on the finer points of Virgo. Honing our skills of personal discernment, defining and enforcing boundaries, separating the necessary from the unnecessary, rejecting those things that are damaging to our systems, defining our particular skills and service and applying them in the right ways in the right situations, removing our energy and influence from situations that are no longer right for us personally, determining preferences, stripping down to the essentials in self and life, learning and mastering ourselves."

With Saturn in Virgo in a series of four oppositions to Uranus in Pisces, grounding the too-good-to-be-true, over-the-top Uranus in Pisces energy was crucial. But the glamour and wishful thinking and Neptunian merry-go-round of The Secret phenomenon, amped up by the electric Uranian charge and multiple appearances on Aquarius Sun and New Age promoter Oprah Winfrey, proved too powerful.

Hundreds of thousands of people had found a new shortcut to riches, fame and material splendour, separating them from all those negative-thinking losers as they climbed to greatness. They became 'creating your own reality' foot soldiers, forming the newest rungs to be tapped in the pyramid scheme.

I'm sorry people lost their lives, and I'm sorry people were injured by this hideously, criminally irresponsible, vile little man and his fakery. But I'm not surprised. I could see from the get-go how out of control, how dirty, how manipulated this stuff was. It was and still is obscene.

I saw the ill effects it had on the people I came into contact with then and I still see them. I saw the glossed-over, over-simplified fervour of it, the robotically repeated memes, and I knew how dangerous it was. All New Age is this dangerous. Far from harmless, feel-good "spirituality," it brainwashes on a mass level, creating people who will fight tooth and nail to remain brainwashed. It lobotomizes. It disassociates. It incites people to hand over their hard-earned money to fake people telling them fake things. It takes people out of themselves and has them giving their personal power almost entirely over to those they consider higher up the spiritual hierarchy. It disconnects and detaches people from the importance and meaning of their physical lives and of the world and people around them. It's a con. 

The point is not that "The Secret works for some people." All pyramid schemes work for some of the people involved. The point is, this stuff was always a dangerous and irresponsible use of energy. It was never ethical. 

From October 13, 2008: The Secret Vs. My Use of Astrology (Or Why The Secret Doesn’t Do it For Me) 

 From April 21, 2009: Saturn in Virgo Calls Bullshit on The Secret/Law of Attraction Phenomenon 

At the time that the Ray sweat lodge deaths happened, Saturn was in Virgo - the same place it was 31 years prior when 918 people were killed in Guyana, most following another New Age guru Jim Jones in the search for utopia.

With Saturn in Virgo, cutting through pseudo-spiritual crap, leveling the abusive and dangerous hierarchies, focusing on the details that just don't add up and puncturing the glossy, glossy Neptunian bubble realities are a big part of the modus operandi.

Now that Saturn is in Libra within Cardinal Grand Cross formation, it appears that Ray is being forced by the courts to take the responsibility he eschewed. Let's see what they come up with as a sentence...

James Arthur Ray Has Been Arrested in the Sweat Lodge Deaths

My Mum just sent me this link (thanks, Mum):

Self-help Guru Charged in Deaths 

 I wrote about the retreat deaths around my birthday last year. The stories are here and here. 

This is why I've been speaking out about The Secret and its promoters from the get-go. It's dirty, people.

More of Those Pesky Saturn in Virgo Details Surfacing And The Death Toll Rises To Three

A third person has died as a result of James Arthur Ray's The Secret-themed retreat and sweat lodge outside New Age Mecca Sedona, Arizona, on October 9.

Liz Neuman, a 49-year-old Prior Lake, Minnesota, woman, was in a coma since that date and succumbed to multiple organ failure October 17. Neuman was one of Ray's converts and was the leader of an affiliated "Journey Expansion Team" in the Minneapolis area. It is also being reported that people have become unconscious at previous sweat lodges conducted by Ray and that emergency medical responders were called to a sweat lodge in 2005.

A Philadelphia blogger, Cassandra Yorgey, has had contact with survivors of the deadly retreat. According to participants:

- immediately upon beginning the retreat, all participants shaved their heads

- participants were encouraged to go without sleep

- one game participants played involved Ray playing the role of God. He would point to a participant and that person would have to fall down and play dead. They would be covered by a blanket, and if they moved, another person would "die." (One of the saddest aspects of this was that Kirby Brown, the 38-year-old woman who died in the sweat lodge, was reportedly holding herself and crying after this particular "game.")

- prior to the sweat lodge, they had been dropped off in the desert for 36 hours without food or water. Ray and his staff did not participate.

- after this 36-hour "fast," they came back to a buffet breakfast. Within an hour of returning to the Center, they were taken to a group meditation and then to the improperly-constructed, overcrowded sweat lodge.

- once in the sweat lodge, "[Ray] not only encouraged participants to stay and push past physical discomfort, he also actively dissuaded people that wanted to leave. The phrase “push through your threshold” was repeated often by James Ray. If participants didn’t make it to the door fast enough they had to wait for the next round. James Ray would slam the tarp shut shouting “Too late! Door’s shut!” and as he was sitting directly next to the door he was escalating it into a physical confrontation...playing off something we are trained from birth to avoid. Throughout all this, James Ray is speaking words of encouragement. He speaks of how throwing up is good and actually purging...and explains that passing out is common...He encourages people who find it too hot to bury their faces in the dirt, because it was cooler...Participants who expressed concern over others were told time and time again to focus on their own journey, and not to interfere with another’s."

Sounds as if it's straight out of the "New Age Cult Leader 101" handbook.

Again, this entire incident is a perfect example of the complete disconnect from physical reality that is preached by the proponents of this garbage. There is an utter lack of regard for the requirements and necessities of physical life, and those physical requirements and necessities are often looked upon distastefully, merely as pesky, unenlightened throwbacks to "push beyond."

People are frequently talked out of their personal boundaries, concerns, physical limitations and comfort zones.

Our bodies tell us when something is wrong, but you see how people are being encouraged to listen to a supposed guru over their own physical bodies and over their own intuition and personal discernment.
 

As always with this stuff, there is a dangerous lack of balance - preaching limitless expansion, exponential growth and zero restrictions. Jupiter without Saturn. Pisces without Virgo. Scorpio without Taurus. As students of astrology know, that just doesn't exist. And you can see the result of that imbalanced ideology when followed to its inevitable result.

I've been writing for so long about the dangers of setting up the master/student hierarchy, especially spiritual hierarchy, as we move from Piscean Age to Aquarian. I've written extensively about the dangers of The Secret and its ideology and self-declared gurus. And I'm disgusted that it has been allowed to go to such a ridiculous extreme that people are losing their lives by putting their faith in these charlatans.

It's my birthday today. I was born during Saturn's last transit through Virgo, a month before the Jonestown Massacre, when 909 people committed mass suicide or were shot and killed by followers of Neptunian utopia cult leader Jim Jones.

My Sun has progressed to just after the day of the massacre, which was November 18, 1978. With a Pisces South Node in the 8th House, I'm so aware of the abuses of these pseudo-spiritual self-declared gurus and their misuse of energetic dynamics. And I think, do we really need yet more lessons on this subject? Apparently so.

Because James Arthur Ray and his ilk are cut from the same cloth.

Jupiter was stationing direct in Aquarius at the time of the deadly sweat lodge, conjunct Black Moon Lilith, Chiron and Neptune in Aquarius. And here you see the dark side of this Pisces-to-Aquarius transition, the aspects that have been glossed over and the abuses of the constantly-promoted "limitless expansion" dogma.

Remember all those Taurus-Aquarius squares we experienced as Saturn turned direct in Virgo in May? Those squares were about not just leaping into the possibilities of the "Aquarian future" without first taking into consideration the physical requirements and necessities of our lives on Earth. Respecting those aspects of physical life and working within those grounded, earthly limitations and boundaries. REAL physical law, not the segmented, incomplete, only-what-suits-you version of reality preached in The Secret and most New Age dogma.

New Age astrologers have focused almost entirely on the vision and the idealism and the grand possibilities of the Aquarius triple conjunction. But here we see, with the help of Saturn in Virgo opposite Uranus in Pisces and Black Moon Lilith in Aquarius, the work that is left to be done, the details people have skimmed over, the necessary perspective we must develop before moving forward into a real Aquarian future.

If we don't learn the lessons of the Piscean past, we carry the same problems and abuses of humanity forward. And speaking of Aquarius, particularly the use of technology...

The Twitter updates Ray was making during the time frame when the deaths occurred were very telling:

"JamesARay: is still in Spiritual Warrior… for anything new to live something first must die. What needs to die in you so that new life can emerge?

JamesARay: Day 5 of SPW. The Spiritual Warrior has conquered death and therefore has no enemies, and no fear, in this life or the next."

Ray actually deleted these tweets, but they were somehow recovered. 

You can see Ray's complete disconnect from any sort of responsibility or care for the victims as he continues his money-machine speaking tour as if nothing even happened. Are these the actions of a truly wise spiritual leader? No. They're not even the actions of a decent human being. It's all very disgusting to me, and again, I sincerely hope this man is held accountable for his actions.

There was a quote in one of the CBS stories from Joseph Bruchac, a man who wrote a book on Native sweat lodges, about how with that many people involved and without breathable fabric covering the lodge, all the people inside would be fighting for the same oxygen.

And I thought, that's what happens when the pyramid scheme starts to run out of steam. Everyone starts off high on a blast of pure oxygen with dollar signs in their eyes. And the people at the top of the hierarchy who got in at the beginning of The Secret pyramid scheme made off like absolute bandits. Multi-millionaires. They all got a piece of the pie, selling books and videos and classes and seminars and sessions and retreats and guest appearances to the masses.

(The other people behind The Secret book and video include Rhonda Byrne, Rusty G. Parrish, John Assaraf, Michael Beckwith, John Demartini, Bob Proctor, Jack Canfield, James Arthur Ray, Joe Vitale, Lisa Nichols, Marie Diamond, John Gray, Esther Hicks, Jerry Hicks, Mike Dooley, Bob Doyle, David Schirmer, Marci Shimoff, Lee Brower, Hale Dwoskin, Cathy Goodman, Morris E. Goodman, John Hagelin, Bill Harris, Ben Johnson, Loral Langemeier, Denis Waitley, Neale Donald Walsch, Fred Alan Wolf, among others.) 

And so did the other people who started selling this delusional ideology before anyone had really heard of it. People have built entire careers on this shit. They all hitched their wagons to the momentum and the money rolled in. But then, as is inevitably the case with pyramid schemes, things start to run out of steam. They run out of people who are going to hop on the bandwagon. They run out of converts. Their critics start to get louder. And the air starts to get stale. Things start to degenerate. And finally, the oxygen high starts to wear off.

The people at the bottom of the pyramid scheme realize that they aren't going to get rich like the people at the top did. It turns out they're just the ones who made the people at the top rich. And eventually there is not enough oxygen to continue the scheme.

Reality...real reality, not the Neptunian-delusional, solipsistic version preached about in The Secret...sets in. I just hope three dead and two dozen injured is enough of a reality check.

New Age Dumbassery Turns Deadly in Arizona

New Age "success guru" James Arthur Ray (aka The Secret-schlepping hack) packed between 55 and 65 people into a sweat lodge his company built (improperly) at the Angel Valley Retreat Center in Sedona, Arizona, leading to the deaths of two people and the injuries of 19 more on October 9.

One of the 19 injured remains in critical condition in a coma. The rest suffered from burns, dehydration, respiratory arrest, kidney failure or elevated body temperature.

The sweat lodge was improperly constructed, covered in layers of tarps and blankets, which restricted air flow.

Properly-run Native sweat lodges generally involve no more than 12 people. Ray and his company packed in five times the safe number of people into the improperly-constructed structure.

Properly-run Native sweat lodges are also headed by people with real knowledge and understanding of the process who are responsible for monitoring the health and well-being of each of the participants. Not qualities you will find with the "instant guru" Native cultural appropriation that Ray favours.

Charge for the retreat: between $9,000 and $10,000.

You can see why they would want to pack it as full as possible.

Ray actually appeared in the video for The Secret, so he's been involved in this pseudo-spiritual pyramid scheme since the very beginning and has made multi-millions from this crap. He has appeared on Oprah, The Today Show and Larry King Live, among others.

"The self-styled success guru says people are ready for his wisdom if "You simply (and deeply) want to make more money and become more successful" and "want to double, triple, even multiply by ten the size of your business."

Hmm...multiplying the size of a safe sweat lodge by five to line your pockets even more didn't turn out so hot for you or your victims. I'll pass on your supposed wisdom, thanks.

"Joseph Bruchac, author of "The Native American Sweat Lodge: History and Legends," called the number of participants in the lodge "appalling."

"If you put people in a restrictive, airtight structure, you are going to use up all oxygen," he said by phone Saturday from his home in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. "And if you're doing a sweat, you're going to use it up that much faster."

American Indian sweat lodges typically hold about 12 people and are covered with blankets made of natural materials, such as cotton or wool, and the air flow isn't restricted, he said.

"I don't see how the person running that lodge could have been aware of the health and well-being of that many people," he said.

The participants had fasted for 36 hours as part of a personal and spiritual quest in the wilderness, then ate a breakfast buffet Thursday morning.

After various seminars, they entered the sweat lodge lightly dressed at 3 p.m. Two hours later, a woman dialed 911 to say that two people, [identified as 38-year old New Yorker Kirby Brown and 40-year-old James Shore of Milwaukee] did not have a pulse and weren't breathing."

The full story is here.

I love how Ray updates his Twitter account:

"I am spending the weekend in prayer and meditation for all involved in this difficult time; and I ask you to join me in doing the same."

You should be spending it in handcuffs for criminal negligence causing death, buddy. And you might be if you hadn't skipped out of state.

This level of irresponsibility is hideous, really. And the abuses of this get-rich-quick, "instant manifestation" New Age ideology and its self-declared gurus continue. Completely disconnected from physical reality.

When people preach exponential growth without any level of responsibility for that growth...things go wrong. Case in point.

Building a business or anything, for that matter, that is on solid ground, that is sustainable and of real benefit to the community takes time, effort, patience, diligence, persistence, development of knowledge, expertise, and personal responsibility, among other things.

All those Saturn in Virgo things that so much of the New Age finds distasteful.

Here is some commentary that includes the leaked transcript of a telephone conference call Ray made to the victims October 14 trying to cover his ass and reinforce "the teachings."

Circling the wagons is a very common technique used in New Age indoctrination to keep everyone "on board."

"All part of the divine plan; all part of the divine plan; all part of the divine plan."

Also trying to keep himself out of future litigation, I'm sure.

I sincerely hope this man is held accountable and brought to justice. I also hope the victims' families sue this guy and he loses his phony fortune as quickly as he made it.

Instant manifestation, instant de-manifestation!

That would help raise the profile of another couple "laws" we've got on Planet Earth - easy come, easy go, and what goes up must come down...

Honestly, a tragic incident like this was just waiting to happen. The energy of this stuff is so unbelievable dirty. A pyramid-scheme spiritual hierarchy built on phony foundations and an incomplete understanding of "universal law." Misuse of energy for personal gain in the most extreme ways. It was only a matter of time before it came crashing down.

Unfortunately, people have lost their lives in the process and others will probably have lifelong ill effects to deal with. The two deaths are now being investigated.

And none of this has stopped Ray and his money-making machine. He has continued his "motivational speaking" tour since the incident.