Landmark Forum - Is it a cult? My honest opinion and what I got from the Landmark Forum (2023)

Introduction

Recently I attended the Landmark Forum in central London. In this video I offer my thoughts on the forum and whether I would recommend people attending.

I had some very insightful experiences while doing Landmark which really opened up a lot of possibilities in my life.

There are a lot of videos discussing whether Landmark is a cult online and after attending the forum I definitely have my own opinion on whether Landmark is a cult.

Landmark forum review | should you do landmark | Did Landmark change my life | Is landmark a cult

Content

So I've, just completed the landmark program up in London over the last four days and I wanted to just shoot a video, just to kind of summarize, everything that I thought of in my reflections come of the day after so first of all, the first thing to say is, if you look online landmark is one of those things that polarizes people.

You've got some people to say that it's the best and most thing, the most enlightening thing they've ever done.

And then you've got others that will say that quite frankly, landmark feels a little bit more like just a cult and little else.

And to be honest, a little bit of a waste of your money, which it's something that costs five hundred and ninety quid that's, definitely something you should factor in in your decision in terms of whether to do it for me.

I can actually see both elements of it I did have probably two of the biggest revelations I've had in my life force during the course and I also came away thinking.

There is some elements of this course that do make me feel a little bit uncomfortable and I would also argue that those two life experiences in life epiphanies that I had came as a result.

More of the people that I met on the course rather than actually what the course material was itself.

So the premise of landmark really kind of revolves around and really kind of comes down to the idea that essentially life has no meaning and everything that we give meaning to everything that has meaning in our life is something that we have essentially given meaning ourselves to ie.

We've created a story on top of the event that actually happens and landmark really works towards kind of shifting away from those closing the past or from kind of moving into a new world, what you'll be able to assign or go through a life where you don't assign meaning to things that doesn't need to have meaning assigned to it.

So on one hand, I think I is a hugely liberating concept and I think on one hand, there's, actually a lot to be said for that.

And for me, personally, the reasons I actually took the course was really I just wanted to have a little bit more confidence in life and I really want to have a little bit more confidence in my working capabilities as well.

I'd always kind of felt I had the ability to blog and project confidence without actually thinking that I necessarily had the confidence within with.

You know, with inside me, actually to go with the confidence.

I was backing up and I hope that landmark could help me to get that self, belief, it's too early to say whether it's done that, but it's definitely helped me shift off a lot of the anxieties that I had kind of bubbling below the surface that you could argue, I, didn't, necessarily need to have and I think for that reason there's there's been some merit in me doing the program.

I would also argue that landmarks days are very very long.

And if you are the kind of person that struggles with being restless, well, you're the kind of person that wants kind of an immediate answer it's, not the program for you I mean, each day starts at 9:00 a.m.

and each day finishes at M p.m.

with the exception of the fourth and final day and I would argue that though those days do go relatively quickly, and they don't feel like thirty nowadays, they do for like unbelievably long days.

And on each day, when you get home, it's, probably going to be realistically for most people between eleven and twelve the thought of then going back the next day, leaving your house, you know, seven or eight or whatever to be there for nine.

It can feel very psychologically draining knowing that you have to do that.

So that is something to definitely be mindful of I also say as well that the tip of the trainer teacher, whatever you want to call him that we had.

He was quite a divisive character.

I mean, I myself work in HR and staff training.

So I have seen how a coach or a trainer.

Sometimes at times works best when they're divisive, and you almost don't want a coach to necessarily be liked by everybody in the room, and it was interesting for me to observe that in our course, where we had I think roughly between about 130 150 people, a lot of the women were the ones that more kind of disliked him and I.

Suppose you could possibly argue that maybe he could have shown a little bit more empathy to some of the issues that were coming up in the room for people and I think you could possibly argue that.

Maybe there were times when he came on a little bit harder than he needed to for me, personally, I don't have a huge problem of that.

But there were a lot of people that took homage with that.

And there are a lot of people that did challenge him at times, but I think part of being a good joke.

A good coach is to deal with challenge as and when it comes on.

The third day, when lamb Marcus kind of final principle revealed as I said that the idea that life has no meaning.

And we are all essentially just human beings that react to previous life experience.

It was a very odd experience, because he essentially delivered it in a way that first of all made, you feel very bleak and almost numb towards the rest of your life and almost questioning what the purpose was before then building us up again.

So when he did the revelation and built us back up again, everybody left in this kind of euphoric state.

And it was just before our it's, just before our dinner break on the third day.

And it was strange going for people with dinner on the course, because it was all like we were kind of living this euphoric high together and I mean, I have done drugs in the past.

And it almost felt a little bit like that in terms of we were these people that were sitting together on this shared path, kind of living life, a slightly higher level than we previously had them.

Obviously when you have that kind of experience it's not going to last and reflecting on it, the day after I kind of feel a little bit like it's, nothing I didn't already know, I kind of feel like it's nothing that you couldn't find from doing your own research online.

And a lot of the concepts of land markers.

People pointed out in the room are quite similar to things like Eckhart Tolle with the idea of living in the present and being in the now taking some concepts away from Buddhism and the Kabbalah and also those elements of NLP and kind of like emotional reframing as well.

But if you're somebody that's never taken your mind there or you're, somebody that's never researched anything like that, then possibly that's something that you will definitely definitely get out of that.

The two life experiences I've actually hadn't taken away from landmark I actually, am incredibly grateful to have had.

And for that reason alone, I'm happy to have paid the five hundred.

Ninety quid I paid.

And instantly we were not joking here within two days, help me patch up my relationship with my dad in a way that I'd never really thought of actually doing.

And that that for me in itself is worth all the money in the world and I also had some really really interesting conversations with people that I never would have probably met outside doing a course like that.

And that again is is worth all the money in the world because there's been things that I've struggled with that just talking to people that have had not similar experiences.

But people that have had the same goal in terms of working through their previous life experiences.

We've kind of you know, insights and shared views.

And they've kind of really helped me to kind of reframe my mind and kind of take it in a more positive direction.

And to give the program credit again as I said, I, don't know, if this is landmark, whether this is the people that I met I've had counseling several times between the ages of sort of 24 to 26 27.

And then a little bit later again, at kind of 29 and I've never really got that far with counseling I've kind of unburdened a lot of things, but never really kind of taken them to a.

You know, a level where I actually resolved them.

They've just kind of heightened them in my awareness and I think to a certain extent, that's possibly because I found that counseling kind of at times, often if it's done to a average standard and not exceptional standards, often kind of allows you to process it without actually finding the solution for yourself when you're just kind of unburden and landmark actually helped me kind of find a solution for myself, which I have to say instantly I feel has has been a massive positive step of like 10, 15 percent already in my life.

And some of the revelations that I've had probably came due to the intensity in the length of the course.

And the fact that the were times when when you kind of forced to face up to everything, and you are kind of forced to reflect I also have to say as well that I thought that the course would be quite technique focused at times I thought, there'd be times when we do kind of group work, a subset I work in HR and staff training.

So I'm fairly well aware of how a structure of a training course works.

But there wasn't actually so much of that.

And a lot of the times it was actually a point it's, very, very emotional and I'm, quite a I'm, a sensitive guy in terms of my ability to empathize and relate to people, but I'm, actually, not a particularly sensitive guy in terms of things making me cry.

But there are a couple of incidents where I found myself getting very very emotional.

And for a, you know, you do empathize with people in the course, very quickly.

You do empathize a lot with what people have been through and make your own kind of correlations and kind of similarities with it.

And essentially that is what you're meant to do that's, the power of shared and group learning and it's really effective to do that from people that you would never actually have met before that would have had experiences that you can't actually have imagined happening to you with that being said, there are elements of the Cole beside which a lot of people do say.

And in fact, on the first day, when he did a kind of opening Q&A, is there any questions that people had one man did actually step up and say, his landmark coal.

So the first thing that makes it feel cultish is the fact that there is a lot of very strange and almost melodramatic language.

That's used, for example, there's references to creating a new genesis of possibility, which kind of feels like it's, almost making its own take on religion of viously.

Of course, it isn't.

But that kind of language, one might sounds like it's kind of landmarks kind of getting above its station and possibly that it.

It doesn't necessarily need to be quite over there so over-elaborate with it.

And then the other thing as well is that there is several references throughout the throughout the program to what what the next program you should be doing is and that whilst it does feel cold ish, because it kind of feels a little bit like once you're in you're in it's also a little bit like we're going to catch these people whilst they're in the course and feeling vulnerable.

And at that point, we're then going to try and get another sell out of them and I can understand why a landmark does that in terms of the fact that they don't actually do any external advertising.

So essentially people booking onto the course, comes directly from word of mouth.

And the best way obviously to get people on the course by word of mouth is to get people that have done.

The course, bringing their friends along and on the third day graduates from the program are invited to come along with the people that they recommended through the program and it's kind of very much it's, a very kind of cultish, meaning in terms of when you've got a room full of 150 to 200 people altogether that have done the same course and have the same shared vision and have taken the same principles back to their life and I would appreciate it if you're an external person.

And you were watching that you may think a little bit like perhaps the people in this room have been brainwashed, and that isn't the case, but it's just it's, such a it's, such a kind of add something away of phrasing.

It it's actually kind of let's bring everybody together and get them to articulate the vision together.

But it does.

It does have a cultish element to it.

And the other thing as well is that prior to the fourth day.

The fourth day is the shorter evening session.

People are about to finish the program can bring loved ones along to kind of watch them and not quite graduate, but Washington complete the program you'll be encouraged to tell your loved one, what they should be doing the program and it's a little bit like a kind of cult in terms of you're, bringing people from the outside and you're welcoming to them they're welcoming into them into your world.

And something that I have to say, I, actually, really did dislike was on the third day.

When the teacher said, referencing, the fourth day, when he said, tell the people that you'll bring that tell the people that you're bringing to bring their card because they're gonna want to sign up it's a little bit like that kind of pre conceiving that this is how people are going to come and it's a little bit like we're gonna take their money.

You know, we're gonna recruit them in and then were going to take their money.

Just as we tat yours, and that a makes it feel a little bit of a scam, which it isn't.

And that B makes it feel a little bit like let's, recruit new members, let's take everything we can from these new members.

And for me that kind of devalue is actually the quality of the program and some of the stuff that you do come out with so that being said, I'm, glad I did it like I say, there's, there's already been some positive influences in my life and there's already been some things that I've taken away and I thought, I actually really liked that.

But there is a that slightly darker side just to be mindful of, but I was actually talking about it with my friend yesterday know the day before sorry, when we were coming back from the third day and I said about how I feel the cultish nests and the sales stuff kind of devalues the program.

And he made the point that he's perfectly right to say if you're a grown other when you can make your decision, and you can ignore that it's, not really that detrimental and it's, not really about damaging to do that.

You just have to assume that people are grown adults and capable of I suppose just capable of making decisions for themselves as to whether they want to do the program or not so I, leave it there more than happy to answer any questions, anybody's got on the program, but I hope I've given a fairly accurate and very truthful review of what my experience of doing landmark actually was.