An anonymous contributor writes:

I want to express my disgust at the treatment meted out to two wise and wonderful elders and servants of the Esalen community. I have been visiting Esalen from Europe for a decade, and luckily for me, Kathleen and Eric were there to offer a containing presence from day one.

Whoever the buffoons are who have treated Kathleen and Eric so shabbily, may karma catch up with you. You mustn’t have the first idea what these unassuming yet brilliant people did in Esalen’s engine room as well as at its heart.

An Esalen elder writes, paraphrasing Michel de Certeau, a perfect description of what is unfolding:

When a bureaucracy loses its authority with the people, it has only the naked exercise of violence at its disposal.

Another adds:

Yes, and when an organization can no longer follow the hearts and intention of it’s founders, it names buildings after them instead. (Little House becomes “Price House”)

An anonymous contributor writes:

In the words of one of the most loved and respected to have graced this land:

We need a hard road closure IN BOTH DIRECTIONS — NOW

Let the current Directors figure that one out.

An anonymous contributor writes:

Consider this:

When I wrote about Esalen five years ago the cost reduction program was supposed to mold the Institute into a hyper-efficient business machine. Yet today Esalen has more layers of management than it had in 2007. These extra layers come at a cost both in dollars and in accountability. Those extra layers insulate Esalen’s top management from responsibility for their decisions. At the highest levels in the Board they think things are going beautifully because they are out of touch with the reality of their own company.

Today at Esalen the workers who try to save the business are the first in line to lose their jobs. Management accountability is gone. The people who mess up get to keep their jobs; and those trying to retain the business lose their jobs.

This is actually an excerpt from an recent article about IBM with only a few words changed. So the particular patterns of Esalen’s downfall are really very typical of today’s businesses-in-decline. The surprising part is that an institution founded on particular values of human awareness would banish those principles at the executive level, effectively blinding itself to its own purpose and sealing its fate. Esalen now emulates the worst of corporate America.

An anonymous contributor writes:

I have eyes filled with rage and disgust and my focus is pointed at Tricia [McEntee] and Scott [Stillinger], who I believe are perhaps the most dangerously out of touch, short sighted, and simply incompetent leaders I have ever experienced. I imagine in the future they will either resign in disgrace, be forced out by a coup d’etat or — if they refuse — drive the organization directly over a cliff. I do not trust them; I know few who do. I do know a few who attempt to maintain a — let’s give them a chance to explain — attitude.

Tricia, I believe you are surrounded by ass kissing yes (wo)men. Many people believe you are a puppet to a Rasputin-like, snaky, manipulative puppet master named Scott. Do you know that? Are you buffered by that reality by your yes people? I just would like to offer you a touch of reality in case you are, in fact, making such horrible and aggressive and ignorant moves because you’re too removed from the community to understand what you are doing. I can’t believe this is what you do with the blood of Jimbo still on your hands. Perhaps this is your incompetent way of making amends? As Trisha’s memo indicated this restructuring will make more maintenance positions available that are full-time and benefited. You’re a day late and a dollar short in the most horribly disgustingly absurd way possible.

An anonymous contributor writes:

To be clear: Kathleen and Eric were summoned by Trish and Jan, and terminated unexpectedly and immediately. This is a blatant move of power, no matter what the double speak. And the effect is fear. Kathleen and Eric consistently spoke out for the community, and for truth. This is a direct result. So much for the hierarchy of values. The Maslow rooms should be renamed the Zimbardo rooms, in honor of his famous Stanford Prison Experiment.