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GTD 'cult'
duus | Sep 5 2006
so a friend of mine sent me this message. I am a big fan of GTD and find it very useful. I'm just puttin' this out there. [INDENT] Uh-oh. "J-R" seemed like it might stand for John-Roger -- the controversial cult leader and spiritual guru. And it does. http://religiousmovements.lib.virginia.edu/nrms/msia.html David Allen, his wife, and many of his employees are ministers in the MSIA (Movement of Spritual Inner Awareness), John-Roger's church: http://www.ndh.org/template.php3?ID=65 http://www.davidco.com/coaches_corner/Ana_Maria_Gonz%E1lez/article14.html (employee quoting John-Roger) Anti-cult websites accuse GTD of being part of a program to recruit people into MSIA. Their view seems paranoid to me, but you can read it for yourself: http://forum.rickross.com/viewtopic.php?t=2193 http://forum.rickross.com/viewtopic.php?p=15025&sid=e3195755a2185f9b4710580921d3f527 Now, I'm not saying that Getting Things Done isn't a good book about priorities and organization. David Allen may have very good advice about that stuff. But I am saying don't go to a David Allen seminar, get mixed up with the David Allen Company, or get too involved with the hard-core GTD crowd -- at least not without taking some anti-brainwashing measures. Seriously. This John-Roger character and his followers are not a joke. I learned about John-Roger a long time ago, as it happens, because in high school I read a self-help book called "Life 101" that he "co-wrote" with Peter McWilliams, the poet and anti-drug-war activist. In 1994, not long after I read "Life 101," McWilliams wrote an expose called "Life 102: What to Do When Your Guru Sues You." McWilliams left MSIA in 1994 after 15 years of being brainwashed. It turned out that John-Roger manipulated him into giving him co-authorship in return for keeping McWilliams alive. You see, John-Roger had the power to keep McWilliams alive because -- and this will surprise you -- John-Roger claims to be the incarnation of God on earth. John-Roger has also made headlines in connection with Arianna Huffington -- who admits to being a close friend and who has been accused (though she's never admitted it) of being an MSIA minister as well. [/INDENT] 72 Comments
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 Hmmm. It's interesting to...Submitted by John Booty on April 13, 2007 - 10:39pm.
Hmmm. It's interesting to know what David's into. Thank you for posting this; more knowledge is never a bad thing. Ultimately, it doesn't affect my relationship with GTD. Actually, one of the things that impresses me most about David is his lack of ego when it comes to promoting the GTD method. He is certainly in a position where he can promote himself as a guru, but chooses not to. He does not make self-aggrandizing statements. He does not refer to himself as a guru. And his references to GTD itself are very modest, both in the book and in interviews. He typically refers to it as "the material" and talks about how it was developed over time while working with various people, as opposed to promoting it as some genius creation that he thought of one morning because he is such an incredible guy. I'd heard about GTD for a long time before giving it a shot. I avoided it because I have a high level of skepticism for self-proclaimed gurus, hokey spiritual advice, and "motivational speakers". When I finally dug into the material I was completely impressed by how modest David is and how eminently practical and down-to-earth GTD is; almost entirely free of philosophical mumbo-jumbo. Some of the higher-level thinking espoused in the GTD book flirts with spirituality - the "your purpose on this planet" stuff - but it's done in the context of self-realization and self-discovery: ie, "where do you want to be in 5 years? 10 years?" and he avoids religious overtones where it would be very easy not to. He certainly has the opportunity to position himself as some kind of productivity messiah, or to work his religious beliefs into the material, given the success and rabid following of GTD, but I don't detect any of that and I consider myself quite the skeptical atheist. Or, hey. Maybe the wool is just over my eyes. :) » POSTED IN:
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