Peter’s wisdom was to break down a person to the bare core then build back up properly, undoing the bad and starting over. His best friend influenced him to try EST.
Erhard Seminars Training, an organization founded by Werner Erhard in 1971, offered a two-weekend (60-hour) course known officially as “The est Standard Training”. This seminar aimed “to transform one’s ability to experience living so that the situations one had been trying to change or had been putting up with, clear up just in the process of life itself”.
Peter’s friend was also into Macrobiotics, a dietary philosophy based on Japanese Zen monks, meant to balance the yin and yang elements of food and cookware, to reduce animal product, eat locally grown foods that are in season, and consume meals in moderation. His friend also went through Primal Scream Therapy and later committed suicide. The point is that I didn’t know at the time but Peter was finding himself too. All the hippie stuff I was attracted to wasn’t really him. Being a vegetarian at the time I wanted to add a little Macrobiotics in my life and learned as well as practiced the diet with Peter. I went to an EST Seminar and I was the first of 300 people to speak about being sexually abused by my brother and that I could no longer keep silent about it. I almost broke down because so many people stood up after me indicating I was not alone. A lot of people were standing in my support but more to acknowledge I was not alone. So many people abused! It didn’t help really even though I pretended I was healed.