Calling Out Cult-ish Behavior in The Spiritual Community.

There’s a strange thing that can happen in spiritual communities.You come looking for connection, healing, meaning, or maybe just a place where you can be a little more you. You find people who seem open-minded, intuitive, compassionate, and deeply committed to personal growth. And sometimes, it’s wonderful. Sometimes you find your people. But sometimes, slowly and almost imperceptibly, something starts to feel… off.

I’ve spent enough time in spiritual and wellness spaces to become interested in the difference between community and control. And I think that distinction matters.

I’m not talking about any one person, organization, school, modality, or community. Some of my own experiences have been complicated, and I’m intentionally keeping the details vague because this isn’t about putting anyone on blast.

It’s about patterns. Because “spiritual” does not automatically mean healthy. And a community can use beautiful language while still operating in very unhealthy ways.

When questioning becomes a problem

One of the biggest red flags for me is when curiosity is encouraged only as long as you arrive at the right conclusion. Healthy spiritual communities should be able to tolerate questions. You should be able to say:

“I’m not sure I believe that.”

“That doesn’t resonate with me.”

“Could there be another explanation?”

“I had a different experience.”

And you shouldn’t be punished—socially, emotionally, professionally, or spiritually—for asking. If questioning someone’s teachings is interpreted as being “blocked,” “low vibration,” “ego-driven,” “unhealed,” or somehow spiritually deficient, that’s worth paying attention to. Sometimes “you’re resisting the lesson” is just another way of saying “please stop challenging me.”

When one person becomes the authority on your reality

Another thing I’ve learned to watch for is the elevation of a particular teacher, practitioner, leader, or “guide” into someone whose perspective is treated as inherently more trustworthy than your own. This can happen subtly.

Their intuition becomes more important than yours. Their interpretation of your experience becomes more important than your interpretation. Their approval starts to matter. Their teachings become the framework through which everything is understood. And eventually, you can find yourself outsourcing your own discernment to someone who constantly tells you to “trust yourself.”

That contradiction is worth noticing. If someone is teaching you to trust your intuition while simultaneously insisting that their interpretation of your life is the correct one, something has gotten sideways.

The language can be a clue

Cult-like behavior doesn't always look dramatic. Sometimes it looks like love and light. Sometimes it looks like constant talk of alignment, ascension, frequency, awakening, spiritual warfare, divine purpose, or being part of a special group of people who “get it.”

None of those concepts are inherently problematic.

The question is what happens when that language is used to create an us versus them mentality. When outsiders are portrayed as asleep. When criticism is automatically labeled negative energy. When leaving means you have “fallen off your path.” When people who disagree are characterized as jealous, threatened, unhealed, spiritually immature, or simply incapable of understanding the truth.

That’s where spirituality can stop being a tool for expansion and start becoming a tool for control.

When belonging comes with conditions

A healthy community should allow you to have boundaries.

You should be able to say no.You should be able to step back.You should be able to have other teachers, friends, practices, beliefs, and communities. You should be able to grow in a direction that eventually takes you somewhere different.

If belonging requires loyalty, secrecy, unquestioning agreement, financial commitment, constant participation, or cutting yourself off from people who don't share the group's beliefs, that's a different dynamic. And it deserves scrutiny. Especially when leaving is framed as betrayal.

Spiritual bypassing can make this even harder to recognize

One of the reasons these dynamics can be so difficult to identify is that spiritual language can make genuinely unhealthy behavior sound profound.

Someone hurts you? It's a lesson.

Someone violates a boundary? You're being triggered because you need to heal.

You disagree with a leader? Your ego is resisting.

You want to leave? You're afraid of your next level.

You're uncomfortable with something happening in the community? Don't give your energy to negativity.

Sometimes those things may contain a grain of truth. We all have projections. We all have wounds. We all get triggered. But self-reflection should never require you to abandon your ability to recognize when something isn't okay. Not every uncomfortable feeling is an opportunity for deeper healing. Sometimes discomfort is your discernment doing its job.

I also think we need to talk about fantasy.

This is something I've become particularly passionate about. I love imagination. I love ritual. I love symbolism. I love tarot, energy work, meditation, altered states of consciousness, storytelling, mythology, and all the strange, beautiful places the human imagination can take us. My background as an actor has probably made me especially comfortable living in that space.

I understand the value of temporarily stepping outside of ordinary reality. Fantasy can be healing. It can give us somewhere to put our grief. It can help us process trauma. It can give us language for things we don't yet know how to articulate. But eventually, we have to come back down.

We have to eat lunch. Pay the bills. Have difficult conversations. Take responsibility. Respect other people's boundaries. Question our assumptions. And recognize the difference between an experience that feels meaningful and a claim that can actually be established as fact.

For me, groundedness and imagination aren't enemies. They need each other.

Discernment is not cynicism

I used to think that becoming more discerning meant becoming less open. Now I think it's the opposite.

Discernment allows me to stay open without believing everything. It allows me to enjoy a spiritual experience without needing to make it my entire worldview. It allows me to learn from a teacher without making them my authority. It allows me to say, “That was profound for me,” without insisting that everyone else must interpret it the same way. And perhaps most importantly, it allows me to say: “I don't know.”

There is enormous freedom in those three words. I don't know what that experience was. I don't know whether that message came from a guide, a loved one, my subconscious, intuition, or somewhere else. I don't know whether something is spiritually significant or simply psychologically meaningful.

I don't know. And I'm okay with that.

So what does a healthy spiritual community look like?

To me, it looks a lot less glamorous than some of the spiritual spaces I've encountered. It looks like people who can disagree. Teachers who can admit they don't have all the answers. Practitioners who don't make themselves indispensable. Communities that encourage outside relationships. Spaces where consent and boundaries actually matter. People who don't need you to be impressed by them. People who don't need you to stay. People who can say, “Take what resonates and leave what doesn't,” and actually mean it. And maybe most importantly: A healthy spiritual community should ultimately make you more yourself, not more dependent on the community.

Your intuition should become stronger. Your critical thinking should become stronger. Your sense of self should become stronger. Your ability to make your own decisions should become stronger. If your spiritual practice is making you increasingly afraid to question, disagree, leave, or think for yourself, I think it's worth pausing. Not necessarily because everything is sinister. Not necessarily because someone is intentionally manipulating you. But because you are allowed to pause and look at the dynamic for what it is.

You don't have to call something a cult. You don't have to diagnose the people involved. You don't have to convince anyone else.You can simply notice: This doesn't feel right to me anymore.

And that's enough. Because spirituality should not require you to surrender your discernment in order to belong. Your intuition is not just there to tell you what you want to hear. Sometimes it's there to tell you when it's time to walk away.