Welcome to the second half of our two-part conversation with Adi Goren (recorded back in August). If you missed Part 1, you’re gonna want to circle back, because we’re picking up right where we left off! Last week, Adi shared a bit about her personal life, how she first discovered ‘the Org’, and her subsequent devotion to the practice. Part 2 opens as Adi reveals more about her relationship to ‘the Org’ CEO; how she saw him as a ‘father figure’ and how he groomed her for a role within the company. She shares what it was like working remotely from her home in Israel, fielding calls while trying to overlook the many red flags – ie: love bombing, high employee turnover, and teachers regularly calling in with worrisome requests. And then Adi bravely tells Tracy & I about the staff meeting that shattered her faith in the business and its leadership once and for all; sharing about the moment when she challenged the Org CEO, appalled by his dehumanizing rhetoric. Unsure of how to transition away from the work she’d structured her entire life around, Adi held onto her job for another few months before being fired unjustly. She expresses what it was like stepping away; how she was sick with grief and how her classes doubled in size once she was no longer devoting all of her precious life force to someone else’s bottomline. Adi speaks candidly about what she’s learned from her experiences with the Org. She talks boundaries, and why she thinks she was personally vulnerable to exploitation and power-over abuse. Then, the three speak about how collective trauma may factor into: why so many women gravitate toward the practice; why the vehicle of movement is so damn potent; and what happens when ‘joy’ becomes an addictive and dissociative escape. Coming together in collective cult recovery, we seek to answer to the question – how do we heal from moral injury and reclaim a sense of autonomy (and agency) over our bodies and our lives?
Adi Goren is a former Org affiliate and experienced movement teacher who is developing what she and her community know as The Architecture of Movement. She manages a dance dojo in Israel, offering classes, workshops, and retreats in Israel and abroad. Adi qualified as an architect from the University of Cape Town, South Africa, where she lived for 18 years. She is also a single parent and has been studying the practice of Aikido since 2010.
November 8, 2023