A good indication of the “mental health” of an esoteric group is how the group responds to a crisis. The reactions can range from panic to complete indifference. Panic and indifference are undesirable extremes. It is only in the middle of the scale, in the zone of proactive action that groups are healthy.

One should be aware of the mental health of the esoteric groups that they join. Given the fact that initiations, in part, link new members into the group mind of their respective group, the mental health of an esoteric group will reflect into the minds of its individual members. It is one of the drawbacks of being a group member.

The perennial example of a group mind gone bad, which showed up in its method of coping with crisis, is the Nazi party. They resorted to overkill. Jones Town, Heavens Gate and Waco are also good examples of how bad things can happen when bad procedures and reactionary behavior is allowed to exist in a group.

My advice to students is if you don’t like how a group reacts to a crisis--leave fast.

There is always a crisis available to judge a group with; the little crisis is more desirable than a large one. The admission of a new member is a crisis, as is the resignation of a member. In fact, anything that disturbs the group mind can be viewed as a crisis.

Changes--how a group deals with them is a good indication of the group’s mental health; if you are alarmed with how they deal with change, you should consider leaving.

For instance, in some occult groups, I have witnessed that as soon as a member leaves (no matter how politely worded the resignation was), the leadership turns around and officially expel the member. This is reactionary and downright paranoid. Provided that the ex-member wasn’t a complete nutjob, one should leave the door open for them to rejoin--burning bridges down should only be done in the case of outright war. But many esoteric groups treat anyone who leaves as a traitor committing an act of war.

That type of behavior is undesirable, and is a sign that the group is on the way to becoming a cult. If they are not there already. And the earlier named groups scale high on the Bonewits Cult Evaluation Scale; one should never join a group that scores as high as they did.

On the bright note, not all esoteric groups react badly to change and crisis. Some groups have a knack of turning crisis into opportunities for growth; these are the groups that you want to be a member of, for they are doing the spiritual alchemy of turning adversity into spiritual growth.

If you find one of these rare groups, I advise you to join it--it will be well worth your time.