Informative post about a harmful club on campus as a warning to students to avoid the organization was removed by the r/berkeley moderators. I have only posted facts about my experience so that people can make decisions for themselves and be aware of the presence of this group on campus.
For years, I helped to run workshops through the student org named Self-Discovery & Meditation at Cal club. Years before the official student group, I helped poster around campus for my meditation teacher. You may have seen posters for Meditation & Enlightenment, etc. Here’s an example of a poster.
I was recruited by this group at 18 years old, my very first semester as a Cal student. I’ve just left the group after 10 years, and finally realized that the organization I was a part of was a controlling cult group. The workshops on & around campus were harmless, but they were a pipeline to become the student of a woman (Sunyata) who convinces you to distance from family and friends, change your career (get into tech), pay her money (I gave her tens of thousands of dollars over the years), and devote many aspects of your life to the group. There was a lot of brainwashing that occurred, and all members used the same lingo around enlightenment, self discovery and realization, inaccessibility (the key was keeping the energy a secret). The group specifically targets young college students.
Sunyata (Lelia Morrill) was the student of Rama (Frederick Lenz), a cult leader from the 90s who recruited thousands of students, profited off of computer science programs and student $, had numerous sexual allegations against him, and committed suicide in ’98. The framework of his cult lives on by his followers. (Look him up if you want to read more about it…)
I used to help book workshops at the faculty club, the YWCA, and helped get the student org established. After 10 years of being involved and helping people find the group, I’m finally out and coming to the realizations of harm as I’m recovering from the coercion and manipulation I was living inside of for years.
I want to share the truth with people on campus so they can be weary of this behavior or help their friends who they may know who got involved. I still have many friends involved in the group who I care a lot about and hope to help them start to question what they are involved in, although I know it’s a very personal journey to leave a group like this. All I can do is share the truth of my own experience, and the truth of the challenging recovery process that I am going through after leaving.
I’m posting more about this story to continue exposing details here: https://www.instagram.com/milo_ellington?utm_source=qr
If anyone wants to talk about or share their experience with me, please reach out.
I never thought I would get involved with a cult, and it was a slow honeymoon process of getting more and more involved. Thanks to my sudden departure, I was able to learn about the red flags of cult tactics and realize that this group uses a lot of those traditional frameworks.
For reference, here is an article published from Wesleyan that showed the same recruiting tactics that were used by the original teacher, Rama, in the 90s: https://wesleyanargus.com/2025/10/24/from-the-argives-campus-workshops-serve-as-cult-pipeline/
Selling my 1 day pass for Sunday at the price I paid! $109! Cheaper than the current tier-3 tickets you can buy rn.
Sunday lineup: BIKINI KILL - The Return of Jackie & Judy - The Dead Milkmen - Frankie & The Witch Fingers - Frightwig - Las Nubes - Hosted by John Waters