I don't think it's that unusual to have a fear of cults given that there has been stories on the news about cults and some of the horrible things they do to people. Most of us have been exposed to news of that. It's probably a healthy fear mostly.Why is there an unconscious fear that this is all a cult? I really do not wish to hold this belief but have come to realize it is there so I must face this harsh reality. I really look up to this forum + the members, Laura, and the books so how is it possible this fear is hidden within?
The goal isn't to suppress feelings - they have a job to do. It's just that you don't want your feelings to do your thinking and your thinking to do your feelings. Feelings need to be questioned just as much as thinking does.
There's this from the Cass Wiki:
Emotional thinking
In Fourth Way discourse, emotional thinking refers to emotions taking over the thinking functions. The intellectual center may be taken over by emotions and, directed by these, can construct arguments for defending some decision purely based on emotions. An example would be the fantastic rationalizations true believers have recourse to when defending clearly deceitful, even psychopathic actions of their leaders. Such ’thinking’ is not affected by arguments appealing to reason. The intellectual center is isolated from these by a sort of wall formed by the emotional investment in one’s belief. In the event of along standing practice this can form buffers. Emotional thinking is an example of the wrong work of centers.
That can be tricky to sort out!
A personal example:
Over a period of about 8 years, there were 3 two week periods where I went overseas and I had to leave my dogs in kennels. I was a bit worried about that because even though the kennels had a good reputation, if anything untoward happened to my dogs during their stay, or if they found that environment stressful, then it's not like they could pick up the phone or tell me about it when we got home. And I just plain missed them. So when I landed back home and went to pick up my dogs, there was joy and peace that we could just go home and get back to normal.
Probably around 8 - 10 years later, I made a series of really bad decisions that caused a lot of suffering. I was emotionally thinking, and forming buffers that really slowed down the ability to think clearly and make good choices. This was a surprise to me because I had the notion that I blocked feelings, but I hadn't really, I was just not paying attention to them and questioning them. They were doing the wrong work and were skewing my thinking.
So in the aftermath of those decisions when I was getting down to how I could possibly have made all those bad decisions it come down, in part, to a fragrance! I was aware of the fragrance in the environment when I was making the bad decisions but didn't realise that I had a history with it. There were other things going on of course the, situation was more complex and there is more in me that contributed, but this fragrance and the way I felt about it was driving some of my thinking.
As it turns out, the fragrance was a coat conditioner/deodorant that the kennels put on dogs before collection by their owners! The point being that feelings can be trained and conditioned and have triggers that initiate them mechanically regardless of the circumstance. This has been studied in behavioural science - classical conditioning - which is conditioning feelings and involuntary processes. Also, I was studying dog training and behavioural psychology at the time and had taken a particular interest in classical conditioning. WTH! Lessons, eh?!
If I'd been aware enough to question why I liked that fragrance and where had I smelt it before, maybe some of my decisions might have been different, or probably more likely back then I would have taken the feeling as a sign that I was making the right decisions. Feeling good doesn't necessarily mean things are good, and feeling bad doesn't necessarily mean things are bad.
Tricky!