This American Dream: Jane Marie on Wellness

[00:00:00] This winter, take your icon pass north. North to abundant access, to powder-skiing legacy, to independent spirit. North where easy to get to, meets worlds away. Go north to snow basin. Now on the icon pass. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal, medical

[00:00:31] or mental health advice. The views and opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the podcast and are not intended to malign any religion group, club, organization, business, individual, anyone or anything. I'm Sarah Edmondson and I'm Anthony air quotes Nippy Ames.

[00:00:56] And this is A Little Bit Culty, a podcast about what happens when things that seem like a great thing at first go bad. Every week we chat with survivors, experts and whistleblowers for real cult stories told directly by the people who live through them.

[00:01:10] Because we want you to learn a few things we've had to learn the hard way. Like if you think you're too smart to get sucked into something culty, you're already prime recruitment material. You might even already be in a cult. You better keep listening to find out.

[00:01:24] Welcome to season six of A Little Bit Culty. Hello, everybody and welcome back to this week's episode of A Little Bit Culty. ALBC peeps. We are really enjoying the response from our episode with Julie Bogart, our guest

[00:01:56] last week who taught us all about critical thinking and we really felt that it came at the right time. And it seems like you guys did too. Yeah, big hit, big hit. Big hit. And because of that, we invited her over to the Patreon.

[00:02:08] There is a live Zoom Q&A option for our guests there on the Patreon. And that will be the week after Thanksgiving. We have a new Monday Zoom Power Hour once or twice a month that we've started up.

[00:02:22] So if you want to ask her some questions or share your stories or glean some more wisdom from Julie, please do join us there. Yeah. And if you're ever on Patreon, go ahead and start posting your questions.

[00:02:32] We will put something up there where you can ask the questions underneath it. And what else do we have to say? There's some kind of breaking news in Canada. It looks like there is going to be some legal action towards criminalizing

[00:02:45] course of control. I will share that link on our Twitter. And I'm really happy to see that. And hopefully they can understand what coercive control is so they can hold it accountable. That's the goal. That's going to be another. That's the goal. What is coercive control?

[00:02:59] And then this is coercive. That's another argument, but hopefully I guess that's a start. I'm going to send our library from a little bit called to the team that are behind that bill. So thank you to those in power in Canada.

[00:03:12] And what do you have to say about our new merch line coming up? And to be. I don't really have much to say about it, except people suggested the franchising Jesus. What was the line? I think we were talking about all the like 60,000 variations of

[00:03:25] Christianity. I was like, oh, just different ways to franchise Jesus. Brilliant. I'm printing memes over here. If you don't know our next guest, Jane Marie, you probably know her work. She produced This American Life Before Going Independent.

[00:03:39] She is hot shit, a Peabody Emmy Award winning journalist and author. She started Little Everywhere with Dan Galucci, a podcast production house and recording studio. And she's the scrappy host of the hit investigative podcast, The Dream, now in season three, which I am a new fan of having

[00:03:57] examined pyramid schemes and late stage self care capitalism. Jane Marie is flying down the Coltie interstate right in our lane. And she might be going a little bit faster at times. Wouldn't you say? Maybe speeding? This season, she's giving the side eye to all gurus and life

[00:04:11] coaches that promise new and improved secrets to living our best lives as they empty the pockets of working class people. There's also lots of fun next-time crossover for you next-time nerds out there. Some references to NLP and stuff that is literally straight out of the modules.

[00:04:25] You're going to enjoy this one. We certainly did. In fact, we've been following the dream since we started this podcast. And there's so much to absorb. And if you want to dive more into MLMs in our library, you can check out our episodes with Emily Lynn Poulson,

[00:04:40] who describes suburbia mom squad MLMs. Douglas Brooks, an attorney who represents victims of the schemers and Roberta Blovens, who testified against Lula Rowe. Today we're here with Jane Marie, her forthcoming book, Selling the Dream, dives deep into all of it. You can pre-order it at Jane-Marie.com.

[00:04:58] Jane Marie is here to talk about charismatic leaders, the American dream, prosperity gospel and how smart normal people end up in cults. We are so excited to chat. Welcome, Jane Marie, to a Little Bit Coltie. Jane, welcome to a Little Bit Coltie.

[00:05:24] Thank you. I'm happy to be here. I was so excited because I've been listening to the dream since, I guess, like since it came out. Like since it came out. And then when we started our journey and people would always inundate us with like,

[00:05:37] you know, have you looked at this and sending us resources? So many people sent me the dream, especially referenced in our episodes on MLMs. I was like, well, if you want to do a real deep dive, you know, check out this series. So we've sent people there.

[00:05:49] It's so good. It's so informative. Love it. Oh, thank you. People ask me like, what's your favorite podcast? And I'm like, I only hear my podcast because it takes so long to make it. Then I come out of the podcast hole

[00:06:00] and then I have to make somebody else's podcast. Totally. Usually so. We started the podcast five years ago. Five years. Wow. I believe it came, I believe it started coming out the fall of 2018, if I recall correctly. And then we did the next season, the next year. Right.

[00:06:15] And then COVID happened. So, you know, and then it just took us forever to like get back to, you know, getting in production and all of that. So, but it's been a long time. It has. It was like two or three years in between seasons. Yeah.

[00:06:28] And this has been your all consuming thing and taking the wisdom and writing a book which comes out in March. Yeah. So the book is, it comes March 12th. The book is like a deeper dive into the characters we kind of touched on in season one.

[00:06:44] Like the institutional characters. So like all of the old dudes that started multi-level marketing and how they still run it or their friends do or their children do. And just like how that's possible and why it's like such an important part of the American dream.

[00:07:01] It's a great scam. It certainly is. Keeps us locked in, yeah. And what got you fascinated with this in the beginning? I'm gonna go back to the beginning and we'll focus more on the season three. So this actually came to us through Stitcher.

[00:07:15] There was a producer there, Laura Mayer who had an idea for a show that was just something about MLMs. That's all it was. And I was like, oh, I know about those. And she's like, yeah, so we wanna make a show

[00:07:26] but I don't know what the show is. We think maybe it's like a narrative nonfiction thing but who knows. And then I kept her on the phone for like two hours talking about everyone in my family and all of my friends from home

[00:07:38] and just blah, blah, blah, blah. But she was only asking me to produce it. So then we hung up and I was like, well, I'm totally available to produce it. I love this world and I'm happy to talk about it.

[00:07:48] And then like the next call she was like, would you wanna host it too? And I was like, are you just trying to save money or who wants the deal? But that's how it all started. And then we were kind of like let loose

[00:07:59] to make whatever we wanted, which was a rarity nowadays in podcasting to be able to just go make the piece that you wanna make, make the art that you wanna make. And so we were very lucky that they let us get weird

[00:08:12] and do some experimental stuff on the show and really just follow the story where it took us because we were still producing. This season was the only time we really didn't do that although we have some bonus episodes coming out but usually we're releasing at the same time

[00:08:25] that we're producing the rest, like the end of the season which is how we got the guy from the DSA the direct sellers association on the show the director of that where I was fighting with him in the last episode of the first season.

[00:08:38] He heard the show as it was airing and called and was like, I wanna come on your show. And I was like, no you don't. But yes, come in please. The access that you've gotten all three seasons is mind blowing. I think it's been great. Yeah. It's surprising.

[00:08:53] It makes it so well rounded and definitive on the subject you're like going on the journey with the listener but like let's really figure this out cause I don't know and also really throwing yourself into it as a potential consumer especially season three with the coaching industry.

[00:09:07] Well also like the healthy skepticism I think that you take to it gets some major pushback which is pretty alarming. Like you're asking practical questions and you're getting some pushback that's just totally irrational. And I think it's so good for the audience to see that

[00:09:22] and for me to see that. And I think a lot of times those people expose themselves with just basic questions. Yeah, yeah. Well I think truly bad people, right? Like truly bad people don't know or care that they're bad. So you're not gonna hurt their feelings

[00:09:37] by like pressing their buttons or something. They don't care. They're not gonna not talk to you. They're so convicted in their way of thinking and their way of viewing the world that you can't affect them. So I don't ever feel bad asking like probing questions

[00:09:49] to people that I'm thinking maybe they're like assholes and then everyone else I really wanna figure out if what they're selling is legit and you know so you have to ask. I'm thinking of like this season there were a couple characters that

[00:10:03] I really wanted to hate and I couldn't once I was like face to face with them the guy who does NLP, John James Santangelo he's still texting me like weird memes and he's like being like a dad to me all the time.

[00:10:18] Like are you, you know like sending me little truisms in the morning and stuff? I don't know. He's trying to change your state. He is trying to change my state. But what I was telling him over and over again is like I feel like you're trying

[00:10:29] to change my personality. Like you're trying to change everything about me. I was gonna get into this later but since you brought him up that episode in particular was incredibly cringy for Nippy because not only was it reminiscent of Nexium

[00:10:43] we were taught that some of the tenants were based on NLP but because I never studied NLP before I didn't realize like when he was telling you what NLP was like that was verbatim what we taught people two million bits of information, seven plus or minus

[00:10:57] internal representation, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like I was like, oh, we were just teaching NLP like I didn't realize how like directly stolen it was. I think NLP is directly stolen. It's just a mishmash of like a bunch of other people's ideas

[00:11:12] and it's just like kind of cobbled together like these not that complicated ideas but like if you package them in like a system it seems like something. Which was everything Nexium was. It was just cobbled together ideas put in certain sequences.

[00:11:27] Yeah, that makes it seem like it's something substantive and it's like just a way to make money. I don't know if you know the story Nancy said that she studied with Bander and Grindler. Yeah, that was in her resume. Like she was very proud of that.

[00:11:39] And for me, and I'm somewhat embarrassed to admit this I was like, oh you studied with the origin founders, cool. But when you were like describing like it was done in Santa Cruz and the hippie and I was like, oh my God

[00:11:50] I basically just handed my authority off. And based on like papers research that has been debunked and based on like all kinds of, you know just it's anecdotal most of it It's fun though. I had a lot of fun talking NLP language with this guy.

[00:12:05] I thought it was hilarious. Does any of it stay in your life? Do you change your state ever? Or like, do you just like forget it all? It's crazy. I was like, am I supposed to do that?

[00:12:14] When I asked him, I was like, am I supposed to be doing this like 100% of the time? Like I'm not gonna remember to do this like in line at Starbucks. Like if someone's being a jerk to me I'm not gonna, you know what I mean?

[00:12:23] I'm not gonna like shake it off. But I already was trying to do the don't say can't and don't say but they and I'd been practicing that. But that was like something my therapist taught me. I don't again, like I'm saying it's all

[00:12:35] cobbled from all over the place. And it was more of a like way to not shut down if I'm having an argument with someone and you wanna keep arguing or keep like having the discussion to and instead of but cause but will like close the argument.

[00:12:48] So it wasn't even for the same reasons like he wants to get rid of the negating words or NLP wants you to get rid of the negating words to reach some sort of goal or like to change your state of mind. And my therapist was just teaching me,

[00:13:01] no you get rid of those words so that the person who's like really sensitive on the other side of your conversation doesn't leave the conversation. You know, you can keep having the argument you need to have. Embarrassingly I will say it. I think I do change my,

[00:13:13] I'm not like I'm going to change my state now but like I think it is still part of my life when I'm feeling like sluggish and unmotivated I like think of something that motivates me to motivate myself like that kind of thing. But that's also just like,

[00:13:26] okay make your bed in the morning. Like get out of your pajamas. You know, like that's not, for me it doesn't feel like a discipline. Like it doesn't feel like an academic but there's plenty of people who believe it is.

[00:13:37] But like I said in the show Wikipedia says it's a pseudoscience, it's the first line. It's not a hard sign. Yeah, no I think it's definitely sketchy and clearly manipulative. Well they're messing with language too. Like I think anything that tries to mess with the tools of language

[00:13:50] which are the tools of thought just perceived with caution. You know? And I'm sorry I derailed our original plan because I wanted to go through the seasons but back to season one for a second because so many of your friends and family

[00:14:01] were so you know mired into the MLM world. Are still. Still, right. So how was that for you like kind of exposing it for what it is and having these people that like are so into it? Asking for a friend are we? Asking for a friend.

[00:14:15] Who may or may not. It's fine. They were okay with it? Yeah, yeah for my closest friends and family they have known me for 40 plus years and it's not out of the ordinary for me. You know what I mean? I had conversations like this my entire life

[00:14:28] whether it's like about MLMs or Jesus or whatever. So it wasn't like coming out of left field that I was being critical of them. Yeah. Or skeptical. Yeah. And again, I think people who have like really strong convictions about something don't feel threatened by people asking questions.

[00:14:46] You know? Cause like if I asked my grandma about Jesus she's gonna have the same giggle that she'll have about MLMs. Like she just believes in them, you know? And it's nothing I can say is gonna change that. So she's happy to have the conversation.

[00:15:00] So my family's been fine with it. They were actually really happy about how it came out. And then Danielle who we talked to who was from 31 bags. She's my friend from junior high who like went way up the ranks in this MLM and ended up making $45,000 one year.

[00:15:16] She thought she did great. And her whole down line and her up line like congratulated her after listening to it. And she's the one who was like talking shit about people in trailer parks. Do you remember that? Yeah.

[00:15:27] Where she was like, well I'd rather them spend the money with me if they don't know how to hang on to their money or whatever. And yeah, she texted me after and was like, that was awesome. My up line is so happy. And I was like, what?

[00:15:36] Oh no. Did anybody leave? Like did anybody snap out of it? Not in my inner circle. But a lot of people have gotten in touch with the show and said your show was what made me leave. Yeah, so good. Isn't that rewarding? So rewarding.

[00:15:50] And I think it proves again kind of what we've been talking about, which is like, don't be afraid just to talk about stuff. Because you never know. You're not going to blow up your life having one discussion or recommending a podcast.

[00:16:03] Like if somebody wants to stop being your friend or your sister or your cousin because of a podcast recommendation, that's a bad friendship anyway. Totally. The podcast wasn't the reason. The reason was over. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. People do ask all the time, what

[00:16:18] would you do to try to get someone out of MLMs? And like share the show or share some other resource? The anti-MLM Reddit is hilarious. And I can't imagine someone blowing up a relationship over a link to a Reddit thread. Like that is just absolutely.

[00:16:33] But they could say, oh, that was rude and then you're moving on. Or it could open their eyes. Well, I definitely plan on sending season three. I'm trying to figure out the best way to do it. To this one woman who's knee deep in our bond,

[00:16:46] she's one of the top 1%. And the funny story about her is that she was in Nexium in Vancouver and left. I'm not going to say her name, I don't think you remember her. She's an actress and she left early because she thought

[00:16:59] it was a little weird and culty. And then she's in our bond? And now she's deep in our bond. And does all these exploitative videos of her and her babies and reaching her goals with her babies and it just makes me want to barf.

[00:17:11] Well, so for the people who haven't heard the show, the second season's about wellness. Yes. Then the third season's about life coaching, which kind of combines the first two seasons where it's a lot of wellness talk. And our bond is one of those wellness MLMs.

[00:17:27] It does both like doTERRA, like Young Living Oils, like a lot of the supplement MLMs. Products and services where you need to believe. The believing in something is like really fundamental to multi-level marketing, to life coaching, to wellness. The placebo effect of all those things.

[00:17:47] Yeah, we did an episode about the placebo effect in the second season too. And I came away feeling really good about the placebo effect in that if it works then that's the same as a good drug, right? Like if the placebo effect fixes your problem then who's complaining?

[00:18:03] So for the most part, the placebo effect is great. It works on you. It's not great if the person giving you the placebo is charging an arm and a leg and knows that they're not going to be able to get the placebo effect.

[00:18:16] So if there's a scam, yeah. So our show basically focuses on abuses of power. It's kind of, we used to beat our audience over the head with that term a little bit. But I think the reason we do is because abuse of power

[00:18:26] and cults aren't propriety cults, they go on everywhere and your podcast goes on that. So what are the consistent abuses of power that you see in all your three seasons and your four? And why do you think people do it? Are you optimistic that it can be stopped?

[00:18:39] And if so, how? Okay, this is fun because the next season to this character study of who are the people that are the scammers and who are the people who get scammed? Like what is it about us? What happens to us in early childhood or chemically or biologically?

[00:18:57] What makes us one or the other of those things? And some people have both. Some people just start out as the sucker and then become the one that suckers other people. What's been consistent is here's the thing. It's like a lot of people who are in the position

[00:19:13] of power are not honest. So with themselves even, and a lot of them have narcissistic personality disorder, and that's true. Like I'm not making that up and guessing. Like there's been studies about people in all different industries and like how narcissistic

[00:19:27] they happen to be if they're doing this certain thing. So and narcissism is all a facade, it's all a lie but to the person themselves, like they don't know that they're lying about the world and their place in it. That's the hardest thing for people

[00:19:40] to get their head around. It's different than a sociopath. Yeah, it's different than a sociopath who knows they're lying and doesn't care. A narcissist really has this whole belief system built up to protect themselves because they're really like the most vulnerable people on earth.

[00:19:52] And so they have this whole thing and they can't tell that they're fibbing, right? Who believe in ameritocracy and the American dream. They believe in rugged individualism. They believe in American exceptionalism. They believe all of the stuff that all of us were told growing up by a system

[00:20:09] that needs us to believe that stuff in order to keep contributing to the system so that the people at the top stay rich, right? But for the vast majority of Americans you don't really change your station in life. You know, you don't die that differently

[00:20:25] than how you came in or from that far away from the people that you came from. And I wish we were okay with that. I wish we weren't killing ourselves literally killing ourselves and destroying our bodies and stressing our minds out and having burnout and neglecting our children

[00:20:40] and neglecting our parents as they get older. But I think the people at the top need to keep that promise in place. So they have bought into it themselves in some way or another and they either see the scam or they don't, I'm not sure.

[00:20:52] They either know that they're selling a lie or they believe like Trump does that he earned every dollar that he supposedly has and all the dollars that he claims to have that he doesn't have. He believes that he earned them

[00:21:05] and that he deserves them more than the next guy. And you can't convince him otherwise. No, it's a dangerous psychology. Yeah. So also I did some reporting on Wall Street after the crash in 2008. And I did this piece for this American life with Adam Davidson who's the guy

[00:21:21] who started Planet Money. We went to a bar on Wall Street hanging out after work with some dudes that were having beers. It was right after the bank bailout and they all worked at banks. And they literally said,

[00:21:31] this is not maybe not like the exact word for word quote but they literally said that the reason they got bailed and the reason they still had jobs is because they're smarter than everyone else in America. They were like, well, you took out a mortgage

[00:21:44] so you're an idiot. The fact that we bet against your mortgage just means we're smarter. And I was like, oh my God, and that's Trump, right? He's just smarter than everybody else. That's a system of guys like that. So I'll share a little anecdote.

[00:21:56] When I got done with school, I played football in college and a lot of my friends were kind of the jocks and those are the guys that went into the banking. And I remember having a conversation with this alumni

[00:22:07] who told me he could have me make an 85 my first year out. And this is 1998 and I remember walking back- What, selling Oxycontin? Yeah, it was just, you know, it was like the bank that they worked for. And I remember walking back to the dining hall

[00:22:21] and taking the proverbial fish hook out of my mouth and going, dude, that's how they get you. Like they promise you that. And I remember thinking, and a lot of those guys that went to school would end up going into that field. So your impression of them?

[00:22:31] All my brothers and I played football in college and we watched a lot of these guys go into this world. And we go, did he become big IB? And we're like, what's that? It's like, yeah, big investment, big good guy now wearing suits and like, what's up guy?

[00:22:42] And you're like, oh, you're big IB now? Yeah, you're big IB. You're like, oh, it's gonna go to the big IB party tonight? That's right. And it was just like this joke they all had, but suffice to say- I really appreciate it, it's impressions.

[00:22:54] These guys five to 10 years in after we know them, they were guys I didn't want to know. They had justifications for everything that was going on. They were well fortified in their belief system. There's no diversity of thought. And it is a criticism.

[00:23:05] And I'm not saying I'm those things per se, but I just felt like so glad I didn't go that route. We're in the cult route instead. We're in the cult route. Let's do that. Well, it's not that different, right?

[00:23:15] I was saying the monies about change in the world. Yeah, exactly. I was like, it's not that different. But I was just thinking about one of the characters at the top that we talked to this most recent season who again, she has since passed

[00:23:28] and we addressed that in the final episode. But she really, really believed that she was smarter and harder working than 99% of humans. And Rachel Hollis is another one that like says out loud, I get up at four in the morning like what? To make Instagram videos.

[00:23:43] You are not the hardest working person. There are diamond mines. There are diamond mines. Children are in them 16 hours a day. You are not the hardest working person. And also that's proof that the hardest working person doesn't reap the biggest rewards. So what are you talking about?

[00:23:59] Like it's just a fiction. It's just like a nonsense story, but somehow they've got blinders on, you know? And they don't see the children in the diamond lines. This podcast wouldn't happen without our amazing supportive generous patrons. Are you with us?

[00:24:17] Come find us over on Patreon at patreon.com slash a little bit culty for bonus episodes, exclusive content and the occasional zoom with our fan favorites from our past episodes. It's a lot of fun over there people. Meals bring people together. But for many families,

[00:24:37] providing their next meal can be a challenge. You can help by participating in Macy's annual Feeding the Hungry Food Drive. All proceeds go toward local food banks and families. Now through January 31st, you can purchase an icon in store or online

[00:24:53] or watch out for the blue Feeding the Hungry Shelf Tags where a portion of your purchase will be donated to local pantries. Together we can combat hunger in our local communities at Macy's. The Frankies were a picture perfect influencer family, but everything wasn't as it seemed.

[00:25:11] I just had a 12 year old boy still up here asking for help. He's emaciated, he's got tape around his legs. Ruby Frankie is his mom's name. Infamous is covering Ruby Frankie, the world of Mormonism and a secret therapy group that ruined lives.

[00:25:30] Listen to Infamous wherever you get your podcasts. You've heard from our sponsors. Now let's get back to a little bit culty, shall we? I think a lot of that also is that the higher up you get in those systems, there's nobody around saying like,

[00:25:49] oh maybe it's a bad idea to say, like there's nobody saying no, because that's the culty aspect that we've noticed is that like David Miscavige. Oh yeah. Tom Cruise. You have a fan base. Yeah. You have a fan base going, it's like millions of yes men.

[00:26:02] I mean the commodity in a lot of ways is attention and your ability to double down on your belief. The system kind of rewards that. And they're gaming it. Yeah, double down on your belief, but also sell your belief to somebody else. All you're selling is the idea.

[00:26:15] You don't have a product, but you're selling it, you're charging money for it, especially in life coaching. I would say in all of these areas, there is no actual product. Like in wellness, most of the products, supplements and stuff that you buy are useless. They don't do anything.

[00:26:31] They're powder. They haven't been proven. It's just like bottling air. Like selling water to, well now we do buy water, but you know what I mean. It is just selling a placebo and the success in that comes from being able to convince the buyer

[00:26:48] that there's really something in there. Yeah. I just sharing personally, and because I do think I'm a good test market for this, as somebody who like I just finished my green juice with my ginger and lemon. And I was literally, I went back to listen to episode two

[00:27:03] because I had some extra time yesterday, at season two. And I was listening to the supplement part last night as I was taking my probiotics, my immune boosting shit, my nighttime proprietary blend of things. And I was like, fuck,

[00:27:18] I really don't know where any of this comes from or what it, and I didn't know that any of that about the... I didn't either. The FDA. Yeah. I kind of considered myself a little bit informed in that and that was very like... You realize you weren't?

[00:27:31] Well yeah. I was shocked to know that like CVS, like nothing in CVS. I mean, we've just learned this in a big news story this past couple of weeks. Oh, did I know? Right with the phenolephrin. No, it didn't follow. Tell us.

[00:27:42] The most popular common decongestant on the market, it's in every cold medicine, it's phenolephrin. It came in after epinephrine, I believe was taken off the market because people were making meth out of it or whatever. So they took that and put that behind the counter

[00:27:57] and then replaced it with phenolephrin. And then a study just came out that it does absolutely nothing. And we've been buying it as a main ingredient in our cold medicine for 20 years. And it doesn't do anything. So even stuff that's like packaged and labeled like Robotucin or Tylenolpia

[00:28:14] or what all that stuff has things in it that are just totally superfluous, don't do anything for us, but we keep buying it. And it was a shock to me to find out that all of those rows and rows and rows of supplements and medicines,

[00:28:26] you just are kind of like having to trust the manufacturer that they did their research in every aspect. Like they did their research in sourcing the materials and the products. They did their research on like the scientific side of things. They did their research

[00:28:39] on what they're allowed to say the thing does legally because the FDA doesn't have to pre-approve anything. And we won't get into the whole thing because that's obviously the big arc of season two but it's just summarized for those of you

[00:28:49] who just catch wondering what we're talking about because I didn't know that. I thought that the FDA regulated all of that. They will if someone dies. The parallels I noticed between listening to your podcast and what we've discovered is a lot of these abusive systems hijack that apparatus

[00:29:05] or instrument that can hold them accountable. And they actually get government agencies that should be holding them accountable as advocates and defending them. Yeah, there's a revolving door between the FTC and multi-level marketing. And they work with each other. Yeah, guys will come out of the FTC

[00:29:20] and go be a defense lawyer for an MLM and then get done with that and go back to the FTC. Oh my God. And after doing three seasons now, what was your biggest aha in terms of recognizing how religion and the prosperity gospel and MLMs all fit together?

[00:29:36] It's the belief in the system that we're being sold. And by sold I mean actually spending money on, you know? This system that really benefits very few people but we all have to buy in for those few people to get the rewards that they feel they deserve.

[00:29:52] So I think being a woman of very little faith in anything like there's lots of people like me who would never necessarily fall for something like an MLM. Cult I think are a little different. I do think that there's more overt trickery happening with cult leaders.

[00:30:09] I do think there's like a little magic going on and I experienced that a tiny bit with John James Santangelo and the NLP guy when he was sitting in here. I do think there's like some mind control stuff happening

[00:30:19] that maybe you wouldn't see at the beginning of an MLM. You would have to go, there's only a few MLMs that I know of that dabble in that sort of stuff, you know? And you get there years later when you've already dumped hundreds of thousands of dollars

[00:30:32] into it and then they tell you to go to a seminar and then you start getting mind controlled. But yeah, so I think that that's a little bit different. I think that these other ones though just run on like greed and people wanting to be beautiful and skinny

[00:30:45] and live forever, like pretty vapid stuff, you know? It's vapid culture. You guys want to change the world. I don't think anyone in MLMs or, you know? Well, we were an MLM that wanted to change the world. Right.

[00:30:58] And I was bummed they didn't focus on that very much in the documentaries, the MLM part. I should send you a copy of my book, but I was in an MLM before Nextium. Yeah, that's probably part of why you were okay with Nextium too. Yes.

[00:31:10] Because like the chances of getting into a second MLM go up like, you know how like your second divorce fails or whatever? Yeah. Like your second marriage, if you get one divorce, then you're going to get in the second divorce. Yes. The MLM thing is like that.

[00:31:22] Like once you're in one, you're like prime target. Except ironically we were told it wasn't an MLM because Keith said MLMs are inherently unethical and he's the most ethical man in the world. Maybe he didn't know what an MLM is. It was a hugest hit fuck.

[00:31:38] I was like, oh, so it's not an MLM because this is, cause he started it and he's ethical. Therefore this has to be ethical, which makes it not an MLM. But everything he told us about MLMs and why they were unethical was true.

[00:31:48] A lot of things you talk about in season one in terms of like the distortion of value with the product and the compensation plan and how it doesn't, it's not like equitable and blah, blah, blah. Anyway, I did thrive in it because of my MLM experience

[00:31:59] and I already knew how to like follow up and recruit and blah, blah, blah. Yeah. I mean, that was fascinating this season talking to Jennifer Ryla about like how good she was at recruiting. She wasn't that good at making money

[00:32:12] but she had no problem like asking literally everyone she knew and everyone she saw and anyone she had an email address for, you know if they wanted to join her team and I would be so mortified. Remind me how you found her. Was that through TikTok?

[00:32:25] I found her on TikTok. Yeah, just like random and she happens to be from Michigan which is where I do all my reporting currently on the show. It's a good place to report from. Yeah, cause my family's there. Yeah, no, I just found her like so randomly

[00:32:38] like she was on my for you page. She just got fed to me by the algorithm and then we became friends now. I think she was only out of Arbonne for like three months or something when I found her. Arbonne and Rank Bankers, the life coaching thing. Right.

[00:32:53] So audience Jane interviews Jennifer as she's like admits sort of like takes us back through her whole recruiting process and how she was recruited and how she, you know, rose to fame in the industry. One of my favorite moments was hearing her confront Dan

[00:33:07] her coach and basically say this is bullshit about his like manipulative coaching plan. Ray Higdon. That was awesome. It's Ray Higdon. Oh sorry. That was awesome. Sorry. Dan's my co-host. Okay, sorry. Got that. Yeah, I don't know it's okay. We don't want to confront Dan.

[00:33:21] Dan is a great co-host. Dan's great. So many people like in our position when they realize they're being manipulated they get out of there, they never get to confront, you know? So it was very rewarding. She surprised herself. Yeah.

[00:33:34] She didn't even know she was going to do that. Like she didn't go into that meeting planning anything. I think that a lot of us, you know in a situation like that that we get out of in retrospect wish we would have been able to confront the person

[00:33:44] but in reality wouldn't have, you know? Like you're like, oh, I wish I could have had the guts to do that thing. And I just didn't in the moment and it's more important to get away. She had no idea she was gonna say that.

[00:33:56] Like that just flew out of her mouth before she could put it back in. But it was good. It was good because it severed the relationship immediately on the spot. Like there was no, it was a point of no return for her which was really good.

[00:34:11] And it also really showed the gaslighting like immediately. Sarah, listen to this. Yeah. You know that? I never said hate part. You remember that part? Yeah. And she's going, I never said hate and he's like talking over. Yes. And then telling her that that's a strong emotion

[00:34:27] and if she's been hating this for so long she should have said something before and he uses the word hate like a dozen times and she keeps trying to say that's not what I said I never said hate. The men and the women on our staff

[00:34:39] had such a completely different interpretation of what happened in that moment. Really? Like the women were all like he's so gaslighting her and the men were like, well no, that's just I mean, he's like reading the situation. And we were like, she's having said hate.

[00:34:53] Like the men in our editorial meeting were just like, what do you mean? What she does hate it? And we were like, she didn't say that. He put words in her mouth. He put words in her mouth and then yelled at her about it.

[00:35:04] And like it was so weird that we just had like such a different take on it. You know what? Well, let me answer a little bit of the questions we're asking is to what? But also like even if she had said hate

[00:35:16] even if she was like, I've hated this, this is shitty him saying, why didn't you say it sooner? Is gaslighting? Like it doesn't matter why you didn't say it. I'm saying it now, you're a fucking asshole. You know? And to say, well, why don't you tell me

[00:35:29] I was an asshole sooner? That's not relevant to the point. No. Yeah. It's putting it back on her. Yeah, that was... There's also an answer to that question. Yeah, totally. Yeah. I didn't say anything sooner because I was blinded by your fucking lies you bullshit liar.

[00:35:43] Her losses also were really, they're real. Like she has children and it's thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars. Yeah. She's pouring into this project and basically being told, you know, I keep thinking maybe I should do a season about like student debt

[00:35:58] because how different is it really? You know, that we're all told just been four years at this institution and you come out with a piece of paper that says you can get a job. Well, that's not true anymore. I know you said you already have season four

[00:36:09] in the works, but I did have an idea for you that I think you could do. And it's... Give me. It overlaps a lot of these things because of the Venn diagram of MLMs and coaching, blah, blah. Wellness and the trauma industry. Ooh, I like this.

[00:36:24] Well, one thing I was thinking about cause I mean, I've said this on so many podcasts that I've been on lately, but like all I do is watch TikTok. So one thing I've been noticing on TikTok that I was thinking of writing about

[00:36:36] maybe not doing a whole season is just the armchair psychologist trend and how they repackage pretty common accepted psychological diagnoses and terms and conditions and things into points of rage. Did you ever data narcissists? And they're like, this is what they do. Amping up the abuse,

[00:36:59] it's kind of similar to what you're saying, but like amping up the victimhood kind of thing to create this community that can all sympathize with one another. And I'm not saying that people aren't abused, but it feels like the rage is bubbling

[00:37:13] and maybe it's just cause we're all mad about everything else too. Yeah, it's hard to know what we're mad about sometimes. Yeah, I mean as I'm talking about these personality types and like the kind of people who run these big scams and the kind of people who,

[00:37:30] whether they understand that that's what they're doing or not, but the people who buy into the American dream, they kind of become, I mean like celebrities in their world. And so anyway, we had one of those on our most recent season, this woman who is the,

[00:37:42] according to her the number one network marketer in the world. And she's also a life coach and she also is a big wellness proponent of wellness. And she was diagnosed this spring with cancer and decided to go the wellness holistic route to cure her cancer.

[00:38:00] And a month after I spoke to her for the show, she died. You know, it's like a weird, like believing that you know more than doctors, believing that the system doesn't really apply to you, but the rules don't apply to you.

[00:38:12] Like in this case, it was kind of, the consequences of that were really, really real. Right. You know, having that kind of attitude, yeah. Before knowing that she's passed, that was an interview that I feel was a deal breaker for me, for anyone who's wondering about this industry

[00:38:30] and still propping up the life coaching crap. Like I mean, I see it so, for what I think what it is, but I also see a lot of people still buying into it. And I was really struck by how, yeah, how awful she was to you.

[00:38:45] And also like how you did her the service, your team did her the service of saying who you are, getting your sign of release form, and then to find out that she was streaming, live streaming. Live broadcasting. Live broadcasting during your interview and then continuing to do it.

[00:39:00] Without my permission. Without your permission. Yeah. And then shit talk you afterwards. Not just shit talk me, shit talk me with thousands of people watching her and participating in the comment section on her live. She was broadcasting it on TikTok, Instagram, and I don't know where, Facebook.

[00:39:16] Like live streaming all the platforms, thousands and thousands of mostly women chiming in in the comments to just say what a piece of shit I am. And I was not mean to her at all. You were really polite. I was totally polite. The only thing I did wrong

[00:39:30] was I don't believe everything she believes. Like I don't have the same. You were obedient. I'm not obedient, right? But like does she never encounter people who don't have the exact same set of beliefs? Like is she like that to the grocery store clerk?

[00:39:45] You know, like does she calling them a dingleberry and an idiot and a Nimrod and whatever else she called me? She called me a lot of funny names actually. But is that how she's moving through the world all the time? It's just thinking everyone's stupid

[00:39:59] if they don't fall in line. It's so depressing. But to have like the thousands and thousands of people just cheering her on and denigrating me and feeling really good about it and cheering each other on. And it was just so nasty.

[00:40:15] And I don't know how those people the next hour or the next day wake up like, yeah, let's have a beautiful day and a beautiful morning and go make our dreams come true. It's like if you believe in any sort of karma

[00:40:27] you know that what you did during that moment is probably gonna be a couple of dings against you. I would want to ask you two about that. Do you feel like that karmic anything? I don't know if you believe in that, but did you feel

[00:40:43] like anything came at you after you left Nexium or even if you were still in was there any sort of, I don't know, like was there any like lasting ickiness when you were not feeling ickiness for a very long time

[00:40:58] and maybe convincing other people that it wasn't there or bringing other people into the fold. And then when the scales fall from your eyes and you realize like, oh my God, this was a bad thing I was doing. Like did you have, I don't know any unseen consequences

[00:41:11] of that or unanticipated? Well, I think reality gave us the karma that we earned both good and bad. I mean for me, I joke with Sarah but before any of this happened I was a slave to the laws of the cause in fact

[00:41:25] and how I made my decisions. I wasn't very spiritual if you will or I believe in any of that tarot card stuff or anything. But after my experience it's pretty undeniable. For me that we were in the shackles of some dark clutches

[00:41:38] however the language whatever language you want to use at the dark force and once we broke our shackles to that like I believe like what happened in reality happened like because we made some bad decisions and naive decisions and we're part of something

[00:41:51] and unwittingly aligned with something dark. I felt immediately the light come in a little bit if that makes sense. Because I feel like Sarah and I our hearts were in the right place I don't think karmically there's anything that like

[00:42:04] if you can quantify that I don't feel like my character wasn't the problem for me in terms of how I made decisions. My blind spots and my naivety were the things that I was reconciling more. I didn't stay in the shame that long.

[00:42:15] My character wasn't really what was in question for me and people that knew me. Like maybe people who don't wanna believe that that's the case about me fine. I'm not arguing with them but my internal world wasn't didn't feel compromised then.

[00:42:26] It felt more like I made some bad decisions and I wanted to go clean up the mess that I unwittingly and inadvertently caused and Sarah and I. And you're doing that, yeah you're actually doing that work. And then taking it further if we can, you know.

[00:42:41] For more background on what brought us here check out my page turning memoir. It's called Scarred, the true story of how I escaped next year and the cult that bound my life. It's available on Amazon, Audible and most bookstores.

[00:42:52] And if you wanna see that story in streaming form you can watch both seasons of The Vow on HBO. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? Maybe you never skip leg day or never miss yoga. Maybe it's getting eight hours of sleep.

[00:43:10] I mean, that's my personal and everyone's dream isn't it? Well, I definitely have some non-negotiables. Like I'm in Vancouver right now and I'm spending literally as much time as I can outside of nature. Hashtag cold pools, hashtag crushing it. Nature is a non-negotiable

[00:43:24] not enough time in the fresh air and the trees around me and I start to feel not great not myself, not grounded. Therapy day is a bit like my nature walks. I try to not miss it and I know I'm just gonna feel so much better

[00:43:34] all around if I make it a priority. I get so much out of it. It helps me put my worries and anxieties in their rightful place and helps me clear my mind so I can focus on what I really need and sometimes what I don't need.

[00:43:45] Like I don't need to be overbooking myself just because I hate to say no to people. You know what I mean? Thanks therapy, thanks for helping me see that. And if you're thinking of starting therapy give BetterHelp a try. It's entirely online designed to be convenient,

[00:43:56] flexible and suited to your schedule. Just fill out a brief questionnaire and get matched with a licensed therapist and switch therapists any time for no additional charge. Look, even when we know what makes us happy it's hard to make time for it.

[00:44:08] But when you feel like you have no time for yourself non-negotiables like therapy are more important than ever. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash culty today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp H-E-L-P dot com slash culty. Meals bring people together

[00:44:25] but for many families providing their next meal can be a challenge. You can help by participating in Macy's annual Feeding the Hungry Food Drive. All proceeds go toward local food banks and families. Now through January 31st you can purchase an icon in store or online

[00:44:42] or watch out for the blue Feeding the Hungry Shelf Tags where a portion of your purchase will be donated to local pantries. Together we can combat hunger in our local communities at Macy's. Break time's over people. And let's get back to this episode of A Little Bit Culty.

[00:44:58] It's a good one. I definitely felt a different sense of responsibility and achiness because I had brought in so many people who in turn brought in so many people in the pyramid. So like I brought in about 100 and then they brought in and they brought in

[00:45:11] and they brought in but approximately 2,000 is what I know. It says a lot of people that I felt responsible for. You mean, but this is before the vow. This is before the podcast or before the book anything. It was, you know, get them out,

[00:45:22] you know, get them legal representation if they needed it. Get them other jobs, get them therapy, get them their money back. That was my physical, what I just had to do to make things right for me. Well that's your re-hagged and this is bullshit moment.

[00:45:37] You actually did get to have your this is bullshit moment. I did. I just didn't get to have it to the face which would have been. And honestly, I still have dreams about that. I got one in. Really? Yeah, I do. Where I get to like say it.

[00:45:50] Yeah, Nippy got to that's in the vow where he's like, you know. There was some phone calls I had too. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. But there were some phone calls where I was like playing both sides. Like if you watch the vow

[00:46:00] there's things where I'm like asking Lauren questions and it is at the time where she doesn't know that what I know. So people are like, oh, you took a while to wake up. No, I was awake then. I was just not letting them know that I knew.

[00:46:13] Right, right. So you're still a mole. I was a double agent for like two weeks. And it was like the most stressful time of my life because I was. Double O's Sarah. Yeah. I have a question. Yeah. Okay, the biggest problem I had with the whole thing.

[00:46:27] The biggest problem, like not problem. The biggest hurdle I still have never overcome is like, and if this was true and I could buy into it I could believe a little more in the like how people got roped in. But like people find him attractive? No, no.

[00:46:45] I got this question. People do. Well, hold on. Okay. One of the things that made him sleeping with all the women so unbelievable to me. Like I never considered it is because I never thought any of them would sleep with him. It's what made,

[00:46:58] it was one of the things that made the foundation of that premise so outlandish to me. Cause I thought she would never sleep with him. Look at him. But how many times do I say like. But the documentary made it sound like there was something about him.

[00:47:11] Like maybe he's not asleep at her. His charisma or something. You know, like he's attractive. And that's the whole thing I could never get. Like where the attraction? Go ahead. Do you have an explanation? I have an explanation. My explanation now. I'm sure you'll say it.

[00:47:22] What you've done in the podcast and interviewing experts on narcissism like Dr. Ramini and things like that is that he was really good at rapport, which is an NLP skill, like mirror neurons and matching and stuff. And he was really good at spotting, especially women who were. Susceptible.

[00:47:37] Susceptible specifically, this is not like a proper psychological term, but daddy issues like or poor attachment with their dads. Like so all the women that stayed longer did not have a father figure in their life that was a solid relationship. He came in almost unanimously,

[00:47:53] like Claire Bronfman's dad, Allison Mack's dad. They all had various, like they weren't close with their dad. And so here's Keith coming in as a father figure. In some cases has been abused by their dads. And some case has been abused by their dads

[00:48:04] or like he got Karen under Reiner and she talks about this when we interviewed her when she was 18, just lost her dad. And he steps in as a mentor. He doesn't come in and be like, hey, want a piece of this?

[00:48:13] He's like, he steps in as a mentor. It's appropriate, you know, like. Yeah, as a coach, as like somebody who's gonna help them and gains trust. And he is really good. Cause I mean, I've had this experience with him when I was talking to him, a feeling icky.

[00:48:27] So I somehow managed to keep my distance from him, but he was really good at making me feel like important and special when he was with me. You know what I mean? Like he was when he was focused. The love bombing stuff. Yeah, the love bombing. Yeah.

[00:48:37] So I did feel like seen and heard. And also because of this stuff we've learned about abuse and the cycles of abuse, he was very cruel to people and then would give them these little nuggets of approval and these little crumbs and keep them in.

[00:48:49] So it was like the psychological abuse. Right, right. And so there's that. Also Karen does talk about what he looked like in the 70s and way she describes him. That doesn't do anything for me. I can kind of see it like in the 70s

[00:49:00] when he was young when he had the feathered hair and he'd been working out and he did like a swimmer's body and he was really. So I believe that he still saw himself that way. He passes no standard of attraction at any age.

[00:49:09] I'm saying like I could see at some point maybe in the 70s, he was maybe attractive. Maybe drunk in like after party somewhere. Whatever, anyway. I have the beholder, but it's. It's not happening for me. I never was attracted to him. I respected him.

[00:49:22] Doesn't sound like it, sir. Don't eat put words in my mouth. All of the docs made it sound like there was something magical about him. I think to emphasize too, all joking aside, I think he got really, really good at identifying who those women were

[00:49:36] and spent his time and energy there. It was a numbers game. So, and I imagine, if you spend all your time and that's your game and that's what you're doing and you're fronting another game and that's really what you're doing. You're going to be successful

[00:49:48] because no one really can consider that's what you're doing. It seems absurd. We thought he was spending his time solving the world's problems. He was just trying to figure out how many women he could lock down. Right. Question, have you done an episode about how I, Jane,

[00:50:01] can make sure my 10 year old daughter doesn't get in a cult? Yes. We did actually one called Spotted Spider with Amy Salzman about not necessarily cults, but just like shady characters like abusive coaches or. I'd follow her if you want to. She's deep in it

[00:50:18] because I'm working on another thing that she wanted to help me with terms and another project I'm working on. She's on it. She's ambitious to get her message out there. That sounds like my flavor of parenting. Yeah. And just some really basic things like, you know,

[00:50:33] just explaining to your kids if anyone says like this is a secret. Yeah. You know. I told my daughter if she gets creeped out by anyone, kick them in the nuts and you can apologize if you were wrong later. Yes. I'm going to take that on.

[00:50:44] But don't, you know, don't go along with them because you feel bad that you might be wrong about judging them. Right. If someone is scary, you need to get the fuck away from them. And however you had bite them, scream, go tell on them to somebody or whatever.

[00:50:55] And if you're wrong, you can apologize. But if you're Yeah. If you're not wrong, you might be dead. Yes. And one thing we've learned since this is not from her. I'll share and I tell all my friends this. You may have this already

[00:51:08] is if they're ever in a place that they feel uncomfortable, they may not be able to tell you that they're uncomfortable. Like if Troy is an Apple Watch now he doesn't have a phone. He's an Apple Watch just to communicate with us. Don't give away the bat signal.

[00:51:19] I won't give away the bat signal. We're doing a conversation. I won't give away. We'll give away. But they have to have a bat signal that the person they're with won't know that it's a bat signal or if they don't have a phone

[00:51:27] that they could call and say something to you that you know they need to be picked up. Yeah. If they can't. So I feel uncomfortable here. You know. Oh, that's really good. Yeah. My son's is the middle finger emoji. Nippy, don't say that. It's not.

[00:51:40] How old is your son though? How old is he? He's nine. Yeah. OK. And it's not really hooked up to like a phone number yet, but we'll start doing that. Yeah. That's a really good idea. Yeah. Some things like that because and then that goes into teenage years.

[00:51:54] One of the coolest things that happened recently in my post-cult recovery weird space that we're in is quite a famous cult expert was hired by a family in Los Angeles whose kids were going off to college to like immunize them. And so he invited me to come on

[00:52:08] because he's like I think they'll relate to you more and I love chatting with these young people about my experience and all the red flags I missed and was like so if anyone invites you to something and I was trying to give a couple things

[00:52:19] that I thought would be relevant to them now versus like. Yeah. Yeah. So I feel like that could be an extra. I can't remember who the author is, but there's a book called The Addiction Inoculation. Ooh. Which I hired her on. That sounds good. What's her name?

[00:52:31] Why is it slipping my mind? But it's a really good book about how to raise kids that don't have addiction problems. It's kind of similar, you know, like here are the things you can do early on. Isn't parenting terrifying? It's terrifying.

[00:52:42] The best thing and the most terrifying thing. Especially now. But I'm sure every generation said that. They said that about our cartoons. Yeah. Is there anything else that you feel like our listeners should know? Oh, well they should know that they can listen to the entire season.

[00:52:55] You can hear everything ad-free on Pushkin Plus. So just go subscribe there on Apple and the book comes out in March and I'm on all of the socials. I have the same handle because I'm old and I got, you know, in early.

[00:53:09] I'm an early adopter of social media. So my handle is C-S-E-E, like C-Jane Marie. Got it. C-Jane Run. Twitter and Instagram and TikTok. I have two whole TikToks up. Yeah. To wrap up, I'm not sure if you've heard this. Okay, sorry. No, no, no, no, not at all.

[00:53:26] I mean, like I said, I'd love to just tell you about all the crazy wellness shit that I do and laugh at myself, but I don't have a coach. So I think that I think we're doing well there. We coach each other, right babe? That's a bad one.

[00:53:40] I was going to say, have you heard our segment which is called What Chaps Your Ass? Yeah. Yes. I didn't prep one. Well, you can rev like, I'm sure there's lots of things that chap your ass. You could do the wellness industry

[00:53:52] or the coaching industry or MLM or the whole thing. Or if there's any word cell that you can remember. Oh, I mean, what really chaps my ass is what's up legend and all that stuff in LA. Like, what chaps my ass is like how,

[00:54:02] this is a weird place that I live. It is. Yeah, the first thing that came to mind is like Los Angeles. Really, this is like a fake town. And the whole place is built on like a fantasy. So all the people that believe in,

[00:54:17] I mean we have the Scientology guys here, like it's a, this is a lot of bit culty. A lot of bit culty, yeah. A lot of bit culty. How about that smoothie bar at Erowan? Have you been? I know, it's reminded me of Moon Juice.

[00:54:30] Oh, that's another thing I was going to say. No, I've never even stepped foot in Erowan. Oh. I've never stepped foot in Erowan. Yeah, I'm a sucker for a lot of that stuff, unfortunately. But I feel like I've learned a lot since the last time

[00:54:39] I was there and maybe I wouldn't be anymore. Powders though. But Moon Juice, I went to that when I was there. But there was one across from, was the other one, Gratitude where everything's I am. I am grateful. Graphic gratitude which I always keep in mind.

[00:54:52] I was there in LA with an XEM from like 2010 to 2013. So that was like in the height of my wellness, Nexium extravaganza and something like Moon Juice. This is a place to do it. It's the place to do it. And Moon Juice, when I walked in there,

[00:55:09] I was like, I'm salivating just thinking about the powders and the. And revolution. And revolution. They made me puke. They're so gross. I know. They're so bad for you. Well, what is a very good point about that that I hadn't considered is there is no regulations

[00:55:22] and you were like, but how much do I take? And they're like, whatever you want. Like that's so dangerous. Whatever you want. She said that in the newspaper. I think it was a New York Times profile of her or maybe LA Times, the one we quoted from

[00:55:33] or New York magazine. I can't remember. Big profile about the woman who started Moon Juice and the reporter there asked as well, like, so what's the dosage or whatever she was like? I don't know. Just sprinkle it on stuff. Like something that's supposed to change your body

[00:55:46] or your mind, like supposed to be a medication basically. And you're just like, down the whole thing. That's fun. So dear Coltie listeners, when you're listening to this and you're like, but I like my this, that. And listen, I still do a lot of the things,

[00:56:00] but I'm going to be more mindful of the mindful. I can't believe I just said mindful. Barf, I'm going to be more aware. Or being more mindful. Get your blood work done. Go get what you're deficient or not.

[00:56:14] And then go to a specialist and say, take these supplements and then have your blood work done again to see if what they did worked. That's a good way to do it. That's what I did. Just don't buy blindly. Yeah. Don't buy blindly. Well, there's a measurement.

[00:56:25] You got to have measurement. On that note, I can't wait to read your book. I know. I can't wait either. That's going to be great. Yes. Strongly, maybe we can even do the live Q&A or I don't know,

[00:56:34] whatever you fill up to, you're probably going to get inundated. But our audience is very, very wanting to like learn about all this stuff. So I mean, it's a fun historical deep dive. It's there's some really, really hilarious characters as much as

[00:56:45] you can laugh at this world, you know? Yeah. We are also working on something. We're only in the proposal stage and we will have a chapter on MLM. So maybe we can even like interview or quote you for that

[00:56:57] because we're not so good at research, but you are. Happily, I know. When I got the galleys, I was like, why did they make me write this much? Like it's a book. I was like, I didn't have to write this many words.

[00:57:09] They give you like a target number and I was like, how many words is it smaller like 65,000 or something plus the bibliography, which is big on this one. I bet I was holding it and I'm like, I've held thinner books that have a lot of information.

[00:57:21] Like why did anyway, it was too long. Too much writing, too much work. But proud of you. Proud of you. This information needs to be out there. We got to we got to stop this trend. Well, I'm a fan. Big fan of you. Big fan. Me too.

[00:57:33] I'm a fan of both of you. It's really, really fun to talk today. And Sarah, let's just keep in touch and we can I'd love it. All of our personal gossip about wellness. I would love it. Bye. Bye. Like what you hear.

[00:57:43] Do you give us a rating or review and subscribe on iTunes? Every little bit helps us get this cult awareness content out there. Smash that subscribe button. You know you want to. Y'all, I cannot recommend the Dream Seasons one, two and three available wherever you listen to podcasts.

[00:58:03] Easy listening moves quickly. And the thing that I really like about her is that she's like obviously skeptical and I think scrappy is a word that is used a lot. And she's, you know, brave in her journalism, but she's also legitimately curious. Yeah.

[00:58:17] And I really appreciate that about her. She doesn't have an axe to grind or it doesn't seem like it. Well, it's a subtle axe. Yeah, but it's also like an axe to grind. She's tapped into other people's skepticism around that and it's kind of championing that skepticism.

[00:58:30] And I also just really love how the seasons build on each other and they are interwoven when you talk about MLMs and wellness and was certainly eye opening for me as somebody who takes a lot of supplements and vitamins to go.

[00:58:43] I really did not know, like I'm so educated now on cults. I'm, and I'm recognized how uneducated I am about the wellness world and specifically the FDA and, you know, their control or lack of control in supplements and how unregulated those things are.

[00:59:00] Lots of culty shit in that, in that world. And I certainly, I certainly learned a lot. So recommend it. Also kind of exciting after we had her on, she invited me to be on her podcast

[00:59:11] and that's going to be a bonus for season three of the dream coming out next month sometime in December probably. So thanks for having me on Jane Marie. You are a badass. Scrappy. Scrappy badass. Till next time, everybody.

[00:59:25] See you over on the Patreon, Instagram and wherever you get your podcast. Oh, and happy Thanksgiving. Thanks for listening, everyone. We're heading over to patreon.com slash a little bit culty now to discuss this episode. In the meantime, dear listener, please remember this podcast is solely

[01:00:00] for general informational educational and entertainment purposes. It's not intended as a substitute for real medical legal or therapeutic advice for cult recovery resources and to learn more about seeking safely in this culty world. Check out a little bit culty dot com slash culty resources

[01:00:16] and don't miss Sarah's Ted talk called how cult literate are you? Great stuff. A little bit culty is a trace 120 production executive produced by Sarah Edmondson and Anthony Nippy Ames in collaboration with producer Will Rutherford at Citizens of Sound and our co-creator and show

[01:00:31] chaplain slash bodyguard, Jess Temple Tardy. Our show writer is Holly Zadra and our theme song cultivated is by John Bryant.