{"id":496,"date":"2021-09-27T03:01:07","date_gmt":"2021-09-27T03:01:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/leavingsiddhayoga.net\/?page_id=496"},"modified":"2021-10-10T06:36:37","modified_gmt":"2021-10-10T06:36:37","slug":"alison-cliatt","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/leavingsiddhayoga.net\/alison-cliatt\/","title":{"rendered":"Alison Cliatt"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>[et_pb_section fb_built=&#8221;1&#8243; _builder_version=&#8221;4.9.2&#8243; _module_preset=&#8221;default&#8221; custom_padding=&#8221;0px||||false|false&#8221;][et_pb_row _builder_version=&#8221;4.9.2&#8243; _module_preset=&#8221;default&#8221; hover_enabled=&#8221;0&#8243; sticky_enabled=&#8221;0&#8243; width_last_edited=&#8221;on|phone&#8221; width_tablet=&#8221;95%&#8221;][et_pb_column type=&#8221;4_4&#8243; _builder_version=&#8221;4.9.2&#8243; _module_preset=&#8221;default&#8221;][et_pb_text _builder_version=&#8221;4.9.2&#8243; _module_preset=&#8221;default&#8221; text_font=&#8221;Arial||||||||&#8221; text_text_color=&#8221;#663300&#8243; text_font_size=&#8221;16px&#8221;]<\/p>\n<p><span>My name is Alison Cliatt. I am 29 years old and I live in Oakland,<\/span><br \/><span>California.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>It has taken me the better part of 10 years to be be able to speak<\/span><br \/><span>openly about being abused and manipulated by Gurumayi and her<\/span><br \/><span>teachers.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>But now I speak. What happened to me in Siddha Yoga almost cost me<\/span><br \/><span>my life. For years I have lived in a silent darkness of shame and<\/span><br \/><span>guilt. Trapped in a self destrcutive numbness that came from<\/span><br \/><span>internalizing the betrayal of trust that took place when Ram Butler<\/span><br \/><span>invited me to his hotel room and after talking for awhile asked me to<\/span><br \/><span>lie down on the bed with him.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>What followed was an affair that Ram characterized as tantric &#8211; he<\/span><br \/><span>told me I would be the next author of the Correspondence Course &#8211; he<\/span><br \/><span>said he&#8217;d known it since I was a young girl and had been writing the<\/span><br \/><span>course just for me. Ram would call me from his house in Sadhana Kutir<\/span><br \/><span>every night and we would talk for hours. He made allusions that I was<\/span><br \/><span>going through what Gurumayi went through with Baba.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>I went along with it. Ram represented the Guru. Everyone around me<\/span><br \/><span>revered him as a holy man; as someone who had realized the highest<\/span><br \/><span>teachings of the Guru. He told me Gurumayi had sent him to me. He<\/span><br \/><span>told me that Gurumayi knew everything. She knew about our being<\/span><br \/><span>together and it was OK with her. I flew to meet him in different<\/span><br \/><span>cities where he was giving workshops.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>He also told me he had had other affairs. One was with a woman who<\/span><br \/><span>lived in the Ashram. Another was a woman he met at one of his<\/span><br \/><span>workshops. He reassured me that she had recently come to the Ashram<\/span><br \/><span>to let him know she was married and pregenant with her first child.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Ram told me he was writing to Gurumayi to tell her he wanted to<\/span><br \/><span>divorce his wife and marry me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>And then, one day, Ram told me Gurumayi said no, he could not divorce<\/span><br \/><span>his wife and marry me. We were to stop our relationship. Ram was<\/span><br \/><span>not supposed to communicate with me for a year. Ram follwed that by<\/span><br \/><span>saying we would stay in touch. I was the love of his life. Now I<\/span><br \/><span>would just have to transition from being the girlfriend to the<\/span><br \/><span>student. He told me if I suffered at all it was because of my<\/span><br \/><span>pride. He told me I seduced him. He told me to write a letter to<\/span><br \/><span>Gurumayi telling her I was sorry and that it was my fault.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>I realize I&#8217;ve been telling you alot about what Ram did. I should<\/span><br \/><span>tell you what I was doing &#8211; but that&#8217;s the new part &#8211; I&#8217;ve held all<\/span><br \/><span>that back for so long.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Well, I was suffering. There was a part of me that knew that this<\/span><br \/><span>was wrong, but at the time,I could not reist it. Ram represented<\/span><br \/><span>everything I thought I was striving for in life.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>I wasn&#8217;t able to believe that Gurumayi would allow someone with a big<\/span><br \/><span>problem to go around abusing other people, but that is what she did.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Gurumayi knew that Ram Butler had a history of abusing his power as a<\/span><br \/><span>teacher of Siddha Yoga to seduce young women. She accepted that kind<\/span><br \/><span>of behavior. Ram even told me that Gurumayi once told him that he<\/span><br \/><span>could have been a great Guru but the bad press caused by his behavior<\/span><br \/><span>would have ruined it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>I was so confused. When I wrote to Gurumayi I never got a response.<\/span><br \/><span>I&#8217;ve been writing letters ever since. No one will respond to me in<\/span><br \/><span>writing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Richard Gillette, Gurumayi&#8217;s resident therapist, met with my mother<\/span><br \/><span>to tell her the situation was my fault. But he never spoke one word<\/span><br \/><span>to me, never asked what I went through or how I was doing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Ram Butler got therapy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>I got nothing. Every one I knew thought Ram Butler was a great guy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Being betrayed by Gurumayi and Ram I was cut off from what had been<\/span><br \/><span>my source of comfort in life, the place I trusted to learn about<\/span><br \/><span>myself.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>I quit my job, I quit Siddha Yoga. I quit seeing my therapist<\/span><br \/><span>beacuse I couldn&#8217;t tell her what had happened because she already<\/span><br \/><span>thought Siddha Yoga was not a safe place because of the experience<\/span><br \/><span>which had brought me to therapy years earlier which was that George<\/span><br \/><span>Afif had singled me out as one of his girls when I was 17&#8230;bought me<\/span><br \/><span>gifts, tried to kiss me during a break from Darshan seva&#8230;I know<\/span><br \/><span>another former darshan girl, who was 16 or 17, that ended up having<\/span><br \/><span>sex with George Afif in Gurumayi&#8217;s house in Ganeshpuri. Gurumayi<\/span><br \/><span>walked in on them. She let Geroge stay, but the girl was told to<\/span><br \/><span>leave darshan seva &#8211; she left the Ashram. A saw her a few years<\/span><br \/><span>later and she told me what had happened.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Gurumayi knew that George was raising hell with the girls, with his<\/span><br \/><span>crazy projects, with his lavish lifestyle&#8230;one night after darshan<\/span><br \/><span>he rented out a movie theatre in Middletown and drove a bunch of us,<\/span><br \/><span>including Namdev Hayes, to see Terminator 2. Ram was the one that<\/span><br \/><span>had talked me through that one, he said George was gone, Gurumayi<\/span><br \/><span>loved me and didn&#8217;t want me to feel bad&#8230;I hated myself, I hated<\/span><br \/><span>Siddha Yoga, and yet I kept going back. I hated Gurumayi and at the<\/span><br \/><span>same time I was hoping that there was a good explanation for<\/span><br \/><span>everything I had seen and lived through.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>When I told Ram I was having a hard time living my life he told me<\/span><br \/><span>that affairs like ours happened in all organizations. Clinton was on<\/span><br \/><span>TV at that time dealing with his affair with Monica Lewinsky. Ram<\/span><br \/><span>told me when he saw those parts of the news he was glad he didn&#8217;t<\/span><br \/><span>have to go through that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Ram told me if I was ever going to say anything about our affair I<\/span><br \/><span>should wait until his daughter got a little older. My parent&#8217;s<\/span><br \/><span>divorced when I was was two (my dad had an affair) so Ram said to me<\/span><br \/><span>think what a difference it could have made in your life if your dad<\/span><br \/><span>had been around a few years longer.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>My life was a wreck. My health was a wreck. Ram told me to go back<\/span><br \/><span>to my college boyfriend. And you know what? I did. It was awful. I<\/span><br \/><span>couldn&#8217;t get close to anyone because I was protecting Ram and<\/span><br \/><span>Gurumayi and Sidda Yoga. Ram told me thousands of people read the<\/span><br \/><span>course. He couldn&#8217;t be exposed it would be a disaster for Siddha<\/span><br \/><span>Yoga.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>So, I suffered alone.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>There is so much to say&#8230;..<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Since May of 2001 my boyfriend and I have been challenging the Ashram<\/span><br \/><span>to communicate with us about the history of abuse in Siddha Yoga.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>The truth needs to be told. People who hear about Siddha Yoga<\/span><br \/><span>deserve to know that the stories about Baba and the girls are true.<\/span><br \/><span>Affairs and abuse of power are a deep and ramapant issue within the<\/span><br \/><span>Siddha Yoga community.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>I believe that there should be an open investigation of the abuses of<\/span><br \/><span>power. For years I supported Gurumayi with my time, my money and my<\/span><br \/><span>heart &#8211; and during that time people were getting hurt.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Now I give my support to the wounded to the survivor in me, and in<\/span><br \/><span>anyone who has suffered from abuse or injustice.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Together we can bring awareness to these issue so that there can be a<\/span><br \/><span>resolution, a peace.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Siddha Yoga doesn&#8217;t have a trademark on the truth.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Radha &#8211; thank you for telling your story here. I&#8217;ve been wanting to<\/span><br \/><span>say something here for so long&#8230;you helped me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>I hope other women will read this and tell their truth. I don&#8217;t want<\/span><br \/><span>another person to go through an experience like this. It has changed<\/span><br \/><span>the course of my life in a dramatic way.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Even though it has been very difficult SY did not kill me or my<\/span><br \/><span>spirit. In some way it made me stronger because of the depth of<\/span><br \/><span>darkness within myself I had to face.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>I know that Ram behaved the way he did because he was suffering.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>It must be true that Gurumayi is suffering and that is why she has<\/span><br \/><span>allowed the culture of abuse that surrounds her.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Just like I don&#8217;t want to suffer I wish that Gurumayi and Ram and<\/span><br \/><span>everyone can be free from suffering.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>I write this and the letters I have sent to the SY managers because<\/span><br \/><span>these issues are a part of my life. I don&#8217;t want to hide from them<\/span><br \/><span>like Gurumayi does, I finally accept them, and now want to resolve<\/span><br \/><span>them in a way that can benefit everyone, not just the few people<\/span><br \/><span>trying to protect the image of Siddha Yoga and Gurumayi.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Peace,<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Alison Cliatt<\/span><\/p>\n<p>[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>My name is Alison Cliatt. I am 29 years old and I live in Oakland,California. It has taken me the better part of 10 years to be be able to speakopenly about being abused and manipulated by Gurumayi and herteachers. But now I speak. What happened to me in Siddha Yoga almost cost memy life. 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