Hey Hamza,
Ex One Taster here. I really appreciated this read. I’m with you in finding myself resting in an in between, or what may appeal to you as a helpful concept- a dialectic. Both and.
As someone with a strong way with words, I have found myself still crippled to write about my experience in and after OneTaste. It took me 15 years to write about being raped and escaping the lock-down cult I was sent to and escaped from as a teenager. So, I can only presume my psyche has it’s own timing. When will I be able to sort out and describe my experience of being within and of breaking from OT.
I am not able to fully make balanced meaning of my experience. Dialectics allow me to hold the contradictions I do see wrestling within. Dialectical thinking allows me to relax in the discomfort of knowing and now knowing what happened to me, of feeling like a survivor and a failure at once, of gratitude for the wild ride I was courageous and weird enough to embark on, and simultaneous sorrow for the painful woundings that were created, exacerbated and abused in a power structure I ultimately could not succeed within…
I want to high five you for being able to form salient contemplations in the wake of one of the many mysterious pseudo- deaths we as humans seem to manufacture for ourselves, on behalf of that within us which needs to explore, grow and mature. I felt a resonance with you at OT because I knew you were an artist. I am, too.
Almost immediately after my swift and painful ripping from the cult I found my mind body energy enter a down ward spiral that in contemporary society is called a "breakdown." I experienced the harsh vacuum of hyper connection, and a psychic break. As you elucidated on beautifully, a manufactured self was forced to surrender. In fact, I was teetering on the on the verge of psychosis for sometime while within the community and although OT claimed to be my everything, it was fully incapable of holding or giving appropriate support for that experience. Since they took over my whole life, shouldn't they haven also have been able to care for me when I was reaching out? I kept telling my community members that I felt myself "going down." Chicken or Egg?
Subsequently, my life force reallocated itself to my deep calling as a musician and painter. It was a voice — the being that was still “mine” that continuously reminded me, even while living in the OneTaste realm that my purpose was as a creator, not a sex coach. Anyways, I would love to have a dialogue with you.
Again, thank you Hamza.