Twin Flames, defined: Contained in the disturbing Netflix docuseries

Think about a bunch that guarantees that can assist you discover your soul mate. What could possibly be extra pure?

After I stumbled throughout the idea of “twin flames” years in the past, my rapid response was to roll my eyes: On a distinct segment nook of the online, a group of latest age practitioners was trumpeting the thought of an intense cosmic romantic connection, directly each sexual and religious, that was stronger than any run-of-the-mill soul mate may ever be. To seek out your “twin flame,” you needed to be uniquely attuned to the universe … or else you needed to pay individuals who claimed to have the ability to determine your twin flame for you.

On its face, this concept may sound like a simple rip-off, the kind that always manipulates and commodifies new age practices and beliefs with the intention to rip off individuals searching for love. And it was: One “twin flame” guru named Jeff Ayan used the idea to fund a million-dollar way of life constructed from the earnings of his (paradoxically not-for-profit) group, the Twin Flames Universe, or TFU.

However the TFU is far more than only a matchmaking service and money-making scheme. Former members of the group allege Ayan makes use of cult-like coercion and multilevel advertising ways to regulate his followers. Over the course of its three episodes, Escaping Twin Flames provides us a really disturbing, typically stunning glimpse into the maintain that Ayan exerts over his “twin flames” group — one which goes far past relationship recommendation towards controlling each facet of his followers’ lives, with every thing from their romantic companions to their gender identities dictated by his whims.

Whereas Ayan and his spouse Shaleia insist their group isn’t a cult, Escaping Twin Flames will at the very least be sure that you by no means take into consideration soul mates in fairly the identical means once more.

The “Twin Flame” builds on the double-edged premise of soul mates

It’s possibly essential to incorporate a disclaimer up prime that even for those who consider in real love, the way in which we’re about to debate soul mates just isn’t actual. You’ll rapidly see why the thought of a cosmically ordained good romantic match that you may actually by no means escape from might be each damaging and harmful.

Advocates of “twin flames” level to varied Hindu teachings and different Asian religious practices and writings as proof that the theme of cosmically aligned soul mates has existed all through historical past and throughout cultures. The particular “twin flame” notion, nevertheless, was first popularized in 1999 due to American New Age spiritualist Elizabeth Clare Prophet, by way of her “pocket information” guide, Soul Mates and Twin Flames: The Non secular Dimension of Love and Relationships.

Prophet’s strategy to soul mates attracts on the Hindu perception in karma and the Buddhist idea of yin and yang, but additionally matches totally inside an evangelical Christian view. She argues, full with Bible verses, that you may’t discover your good match till you might be aligned with God. “It’s our relationship to God and our Increased Self that holds the important thing to discovering and turning into one with our twin flame,” she writes. In different phrases, one’s twin flame is greater than only a soul mate. The connection is a manifestation of an individual’s relationship with the divine, and the 2 of them are supposed to assist one another proceed alongside a mutual path to enlightenment.

Prophet claims that our separation from our good soul mate is a punishment from the divine due to our rise up towards “cosmic regulation,” so all of us are in search of to get again into the universe’s good graces so we are able to reunite with our different half. It’s an idea seen in every single place from Plato to Hedwig and the Offended Inch. Right here, let Marisa Tomei clarify.

Proponents of “twin flames” have developed much more esoteric variations of Prophet’s explicit narrative. One of the well-liked threads is the declare that solely 144,000 precise “twin flames” exist — so solely 72,000 {couples} all through historical past have certified. The quantity 144,000 occurs to be large in area of interest religions, due to its significance within the biblical E book of Revelation. It’s additionally not a complete lot of individuals, in complete. (And for those who’re considering that gatekeeping who will get to be a super-special twin flame is an efficient approach to get individuals to spend money on the notion that they’re “chosen” for one thing uncommon and divinely ordained, properly … simply wait.)

The core attribute of Prophet’s imaginative and prescient of the “twin flame” is that it’s everlasting. “The factor about this karmic marriage or relationship that you’re into is that you may by no means get out of it,” she writes. “Nobody in heaven or on earth can separate you out of your twin flame.”

This proclamation is a double-edged sword: On the one hand, it virtually guarantees the believer a fortunately ever after, if they will solely acknowledge their twin flame and align themselves accordingly. However on the opposite, as we’ll quickly see, this stress can doubtlessly be devastating to somebody concerned in an abusive relationship, who’s then led to consider they’re destined to be tied to that particular person perpetually, or anybody on the receiving finish of romantic delusion from a real believer who unilaterally determines that particular person to be their twin flame.

Witness one very discomfiting remark on a “twin flame” weblog from 2019: “I met my twin soul, and he or she is 50 years youthful than I’m … I’m questioning what it means for somebody (i.e. my twin soul) so younger and inexperienced on this life.” There’s no good final result in any respect right here, buddy!

All of that is the final backdrop to the “twin flame” phenomenon. It units the stage for the entry into the sphere of a self-styled guru who realized about “twin flames” from his girlfriend after which turned it into — properly. You’ll see.

It solely takes one shaky religious idea and a manipulative guru to make a coercively managed group

Jeff Ayan studied enterprise at Western Michigan College earlier than transferring to Hawaii in his early 20s, the place he glided by the title Ender Ayanethos and styled himself as a “way of life design entrepreneur.” His decade-old web site, with its assertions that “His mission is to encourage you to reside a acutely aware, heart-centered way of life now,” reads like a religious chief in coaching, whereas his contemporaneous social media, with mantras together with “I all the time get what I would like” and “I’m a pacesetter, and once I categorical my concepts I’m simply describing my actuality. I’m not involved with anybody’s approval,” implies a extra dominant, assertive aspect to his persona.

Ayan met Shaleia — actual title Megan Plante — on-line within the early 2010s. They rapidly married and moved to Michigan. In line with YouTube movies the couple made, as proven within the documentary, Shaleia first launched Jeff to quite a few new age practices like tarot studying and twin flames, which he rapidly adopted. Though Shaleia was the one who launched Jeff to the idea, Jeff has clearly made himself the unquestioned chief of the Twin Flames group.

The connection between Jeff and Shaleia is meant to be the most important draw of their Twin Flames Universe group. By branding themselves as the proper couple, they’re additionally advertising their relationship as one thing they will educate others to have, and as vloggers they cultivated a gradual viewers. Since they created their YouTube channel in 2014 (styling themselves as “Jeff and Shaleia Divine”), they’ve gained almost 30,000 subscribers and garnered over 3 million views. The TFU Fb group reportedly boasts 40,000 members and counting — members who could have been drawn in just because they have been trying to find details about love and attraction to individuals outdoors of the group.

Their success led to the publication of a guide about twin flames and a coterie of teaching providers for these fascinated with pursuing the “twin flame” path, all marketed underneath the group Twin Flames Universe. As taught by Ayan, the thought of discovering a “twin flame” quickly advanced into a complete way of life largely dictated by his teachings and trainings. And these trainings have been costly. As reported by Sarah Berman and Sian Bradley for Vice in 2020 and 2021, respectively, prices to take part in TFU programs and workshops ranged from $699 to $4,000, and got here with intense stress to degree up.

It’s unattainable to overstate what an abrasive persona Ayan has, as captured extensively on movie in Escaping Twin Flames. He regularly speaks in a grating, mocking voice. He asserts to queer members of the group that queer identification isn’t actual, and seems unfazed when members break down sobbing in convention calls. He berates, interrupts, and belittles group members, together with his spouse, whom he typically talks right down to and forbids from talking. At one level, he describes throwing Shaleia down on the mattress and forcing himself on her.

The Jeff/Shaleia bond is meant to be the glue holding the group collectively. In actuality, the documentary captures video after video of Shaleia sitting silent, solely to be instantly shot down or talked over when she does converse up. Their relationship comes throughout as something however idyllic; if something, it regularly appears strained and compelled.

Ayan allegedly instructs members of the group to aggressively pursue their purported different halves in any respect prices. The considering goes that being somebody’s “twin flame” trumps every thing else taking place in your life — even for those who by no means agreed to be co-opted into the “twin flame” idea to start with. In Escaping Twin Flames, when one group member is coping with the truth that her alleged twin flame is a person who was dwelling in one other state, in a relationship with one other lady, and about to have a child, Ayan tells her, “None of that fucking issues.”

In line with one former TFU member, a number of members of the group had restraining orders as a result of Ayan basically inspired them to develop into stalkers and to “aggressively pursue” the item of their affection. When she acquired a restraining order, she alleges, Ayan and different TFU coaches informed her the restraining order didn’t truly exist, implying that she may overcome it together with her thoughts.

Jeff and Shaleia Ayan have repeatedly insisted, each in statements to Vice in addition to statements posted on their web site (and included as disclaimers on the finish of every episode of the Netflix sequence) that they aren’t a cult and don’t interact in cult-like practices.

But Ayan’s makes an attempt to insist he wasn’t a cult chief truly drove some members to the other realization. “Jeff informed us to observe Seduced and The Vow and write a complete essay as to why Jeff is not a cult chief,” a former coach named Keely says within the documentary. “Each level we have been coming throughout after we have been doing this analysis was pointing to the truth that he was, in truth, a cult chief.”

The truth is, over the course of Escaping Twin Flames, Ayan does a litany of issues which can be a veritable bingo card of cult tropes:

• He insists that solely he, out of everybody on Earth, is enlightened sufficient to inform who an individual’s twin flame is. Cult leaders almost all the time purport to have a particular religious energy that makes them distinctive out of all different religious guides.
• He separates members from their households, typically by convincing them that their households have been abusive to them. This can be a basic type of cult management. The documentary sequence introduces us to a assist group of moms who’ve all been totally or almost fully separated from their kids as a consequence of their involvement within the group.
• He institutes a rigorously managed way of life routine, dictating every thing from how members ought to eat and train to when/if they need to get married. One couple, who in the end wind up leaving the group collectively, get married after simply two months of relationship after Ayan tells them they’re soul mates.
• He creates a system of isolation that deems anybody not within the Twin Flames Universe group a suspicious or unenlightened one that isn’t to be trusted. That is described as “power leaks” within the sequence — the concept any power you give towards anybody who’s not your twin flame or not a member of the group is wasted, a “leak.”
• He claims, as numerous cult leaders have, to be the reincarnation of Jesus. As Ayan leans extra into the thought of Twin Flames Universe as a non secular non-profit, he more and more types himself to resemble Jesus, rising his hair lengthy and remarking on his resemblance to the biblical illustration of Christ. (Ayan is white, and never Jewish.)
• He facilitates “therapeutic” classes that emphasize private failings and function an ongoing type of coercive management. That is much like the method of many different cults, equivalent to Scientology’s notorious auditing classes. Former TFU members report being compelled to do therapeutic classes that last as long as 24 hours. These classes in addition to a routine observe known as the “mirror train” are designed to maintain members in a relentless state of turbulence and upheaval, excavating private trauma and points that will or will not be actual, all with the intention to preserve a state of disaster and additional dependence and reliance on the steering of Ayan, the coaches, and different members of the group. In line with the docuseries, Ayan presents members’ private issues as manifestations of how damaged and broken they’re as people.
• He arranges relationships and marriages inside the group, basically ordering sure members to get collectively by advantage of telling them that they’re each other’s twin flames. All the idea of a “twin flame” is that it’s distinctive and everlasting, and the complete foundation for Ayan’s alleged religious powers is that he’s the one one who can determine an individual’s distinctive everlasting cosmically ordained twin flame. But a number of members are initially knowledgeable that their twin flame is one particular person, solely to have Jeff change his thoughts and assign them a special twin flame, typically after the primary particular person has left the group.
• He pressures members to speculate an increasing number of cash in this system, both by “leveling up” to develop into a extra central a part of the group, or by buying yet one more product supplied by the group. Whereas he and Shaleia bragged about driving Porsches, dwelling in a mansion, and carrying designer vogue, they inspired members to shell out hundreds of {dollars} to buy group supplies and coaching classes. One former TFU member reviews spending $20,000 simply to develop into a licensed TFU coach.

“Those that stayed ended up going deeper and deeper,” one former TFU member says within the documentary.

In a single facet, The Twin Flames Universe group goes a lot additional than typical cults may: Ayan insists that sure members are both “spiritually masculine” or “spiritually female,” and that they should settle for and categorical their true gender. This stress regularly escalates into stress for members to transform to a special gender expression altogether. Since Ayan denies the existence of homosexuality and nonbinary identification, this trick makes it simpler for him to extra successfully prepare relationships between members of the group, most of whom are girls.

It additionally, after all, is an excessive type of coercive management, and it could’t be overstated that the modes of coercion on this group don’t have anything to do with precise trans identification. Certainly, one former member of TFU who is trans left the group as a result of she noticed by way of Ayan’s makes an attempt to coerce members into artificially altering their gender expressions. One other former member named Angie discovered herself first being pressured to just accept that she was “spiritually masculine” and to decorate and elegance herself as more and more butch. After growing a crush on one other lady within the group, this escalated into stress to reside and current as a person, together with altering her title. Angie lastly broke and left the group, resuming life as a cisgender lady.

One of the heartwrenching tales recounted in Escaping Twin Flames considerations a younger lady named Marlee who joined the group on the age of 19, solely to be informed by Ayan that her twin flame was a random stranger who had messaged her on Fb. The person turned out to be 11 years older than Marlee, with no job, extreme psychological well being issues, and a legal document. However, Ayan coerced Marlee into transferring to a special state with the intention to be with him, despite the fact that in her personal phrases, “I didn’t like this man; he was creepy.” In a single video early of their relationship, a sobbing Marlee relates the legal issues her new twin flame is having, clearly distraught. “Everybody has points,” a supremely unbothered Ayan tells her. “You need to take a look at this because the prequel to your union.” After dwelling like this for 3 years, Marlee in the end concludes that “the one who I believed was my twin flame was just a few random man I used to be compelled to be with.”

Different TFU members have been coerced into transferring throughout states to reside with their twin flames, even when they’d simply met. Some have been coerced into altering their names or getting gender reassignment surgical procedure or different associated surgical procedure. The group additionally appears to institute hierarchies of abuse, with higher-level coaches passing alongside to newer members the abusive ways and orders Ayan used on them. One member, in accordance with the documentary, died by suicide shortly after becoming a member of the group. The group, in accordance with Escaping Twin Flames, disclaims that it’s not a psychological well being remedy group, however internally enforces the concept members ought to look to its teachings for all their psychological wellness.

It’s essential to keep in mind that higher-up members of TFU are most probably additionally topic to intense types of coercive management and persuasive ways that preserve them from questioning their position within the group too deeply. However there’s hope. Practically the entire former TFU members featured in Escaping Twin Flames, together with a number of members in positions of authority, departed from the group after exposés of the group appeared in Vice and different media retailers. The impression of Escaping Twin Flames debuting at No. 1 on the Netflix Prime 10 in its first week of launch can’t be overstated. Even when it could’t attain everybody who’s dedicated to the Ayans and their group, maybe it can attain the following particular person searching for cosmic solutions to life’s questions — earlier than they develop into a goal for a self-styled guru with something however divine intentions.