I learned a new word this week – EmoTrance.
EmoTrance is the new name for bullshit.
In the last week, its received no less than two articles worth of coverage in The Times’ educational supplements; one, a vomit inducing piece of brainless advertorial by Adi Bloom, an arts correspondent with a taste for ‘kitsch’ – i.e. fucking gullible – the other a tidily reflective piece on the well-founded criticism of EmoTrance as a bunch of unscientific psychobabble on which Prof. David Colquhoun has been pulling overtime in comments.
What is EmoTrance?
Well, according to its creator ‘Dr.’ Silvia Hartmann, EmoTrance is ‘the newest energy modality in the world, created by REAL people for REAL people’ and ‘a practical system for energy healing and energy working was developed by a team led by women, and which did not exclude any human being, including women and children, in both theory as well as practice’.
I’m not ever going to bother debunking all that in detail.
What EmoTrance actually is, is just the usual new age grab bag of vitalism, bastardised Eastern mysticism and Western pseudoscientific psychobabble, none of which has any foundations in actual science, let alone any supporting evidence for any of the claims made for its efficacy or how it ‘works’.
It is a practical system for rooking the terminally gullible and relieving them of the burden of having far more money in their bank account than they have common sense, but what make this particular exercise in flogging snake oil all the more reprehensible is that its currently being targeted at schools using a sales pitch that relies on the wholesale pathologising of normal childhood development and preying on the anxieties of over-protective parents.
In a rational society we’d call it fraud but as we have a legal system in which being utterly fucking deluded is a viable defence we’ll have to settle for calling EmoTrance a steaming pile of bullshit that only complete fucking mouth-breathing moron would be gullible enough to buy into.
As for ‘Dr.’ Silvia Hartmann, she has a ‘PhD’ from the Universal Life Church, which she bought off the internet for $29.99 about which she has this to say…
For those who would argue that the PhD isn’t “real” or that I don’t deserve it because I didn’t attend a University, I can only shrug and say that as far as I am concerned, I’ve paid my dues with 15 years of full time research of theory and practice in applied animal behaviour, resulting in The Harmony Program as my thesis and innovation to the field; followed by 5 years of full time research into language, mind and metaphor which produced Project Sanctuary; and another 5 years worth of research, practice and publication in human emotion and the human energy system, which resulted in the three volumes on EmoTrance. I am personally satisfied that this is good enough on every level and I *love* my ULC PhD, which gave me the opportunity to look back on my work and contribution and acknowledge myself, to myself, and for no other purpose.
No, Silvia, you’re not a doctor. You have absolutely no legitimate claim to the title ‘Dr.’ or to use the letters ‘PhD’ after your name because you bought your degree off the internet for 20 fucking quid.
It’s a crock of shit, and to prove conclusively that its a crock of shit you can now all refer to me as the Reverend Unity because, in the last couple of minutes I’ve become a fully ordained Minister of the Universal Life Church, just like Silvia, and I have the certificate to prove it…
For the record, I have actually been ordained under my real name, which I’ve edited out the image above, so the whole thing is 100% kosher according to the rules of the Universal Life Church, all of which makes me eligible to become a Doctor of Divinity or Metaphysics for $29.99.
I could also become a Master of Wicca for the same price, while for a mere $11.99 I can take my pick of any of the following list of religious titles…
Abbe, Reverend of Rock ‘n Roll, Abbess, Abbot, Ananda, Angel, Apostle of Humility, Apostolic Scribe, Arch Deacon, Arch Priest, Archbishop, Arch cardinal, Ascetic Gnostic, Bible Historian, Bishop, Brahman, Brother, Canon, Cantor, Cardinal, Channel, Chaplain, Colonel, Cure, Deacon, Dervish, Directress, Disciple, Druid, Elder, Faith Healer, Evangelist, Emissary, Father, Field Missionary, Flying Missionary, Free Thinker, Friar, Goddess, Guru, Hadji, Healing Minister, High Priest, High Priestess, Imam, Lama, Lay Sister, Magus, Martyr, Messenger, Metropolitan, Minister of Music, Minister of Peace, Missionary, Missionary Doctor, Missionary Healer, Missionary of Music, Missionary Priest, Monk, Monsignor, Most Reverend, Mystical Philosopher, Orthodox Monk, Parochial Educator, Pastor General, Patriarch, Peace Counselor, Preacher, Preceptor, Priest, Priestess, Prophet, Rector, Rabbi, Religious Preacher, Revelator, Reverend, Reverend Father, Reverend Mother, Right Reverend, Saintly Healer, Scribe, Seer, Shaman, Soul Therapist, Sister, Spiritual Counselor, Spiritual Warrior, Starets, Swami, Teller, Thanatologist, The Very Esteemed, Universal Rabbi, Universal Religious Philosopher, Vicar, Universal Philosopher of Absolute Reality, Wizard, Gothi, Gythia, Psychic Healer, Minister of Rock ‘n Roll, Rock ‘n Roll Missionary, Rock Doctor (R.D), Rock ‘n Roll Minister, Child of the Universe, Prince, Spiritual Healer, Saint and Pope.
Decisions, decisions…
Having become an Ordained Minister I think its only fair to warn you that I will now be offended by everything and will sue everyone who disagrees with me for religious discrimination and shit.
Oh, and I will be setting up a paypal account for you all to send me 10% of your monthly income in return for my munificent blessings…
…now where do I sign up to open a school?
EmoTrance? Sounds like an unholy perversion of the popular dance genre.
Doctor of Divinity? Pah. Loads of people have those. Some even went to real universities to get them, the losers. Instead you can become a Doctor of Immortality – now THAT is cool.
“EmoTrance” – sounds like an appalling musical fusion of generically angsty rock with repetitive, tuneless beats that only sound good if you’re on acid. And deaf.
I love the way they have a database of EmoTrance trainers – http://emotrance.com/trainers/ – and it turns out they all teach about a million other things as well as EmoTrance. Take just the first one on the list, she does (deep breath) –
“AMT, Et Advance Practitioner, Relationship Master NLP, Time Line Therapy Practitioner , Advance Hypnotherapy Practitioner, CORT, Brain Yoga, Brain Gym, Art Of Living, MET Member: EFT Advance Practitioner, TAT, BSFF Energy Medicine/ Meridian Therapy Practitioner Touch for Health, Advanced Prana Healer, Reiki, Psych-K Advance Practitioner”
If even one of these things worked as well as it’s claimed to, you wouldn’t need any of the others!
There was me thinking it had summat to do with Dashboard Confessional and silly hair…
Ministry of Truth, Ha you really are a sad little *******
You need to go a long way to find much truth here. LOL
THis so called site of truth is just the usual load of self righteous horse shit, watch out folks, make your own minds up.
“…EmoTrance is
I appreciate your intellect. Have you ever experienced EmoTrance? I had my doubts too. Until I tried it.
I didn’t think I would feel anything. I told myself I wouldn’t lie to my friend that was practicing on me if it didn’t work. But to my surprise, I worked through some deep issues without even talking about them.
The practitioner uses trigger words to provoke a reaction. Then you are asked where you feel it in your body. They tell you to soften it and let it flow. It took about two hours to work out this issue. Sometimes it goes up, sometimes it goes down, sometimes it lifts off your body. It was a strange tingling feeling, like when a limb falls asleep, that passed through me and out. In my experience, most of my reactions were in my stomach and flowed through my toes. Some were in my throat and swirled out of the top of my head. One trigger hit me in my chest and lifted off of my back.
It was helpful. I learned how to let bottled emotions go. I became a certified practitioner myself shortly after this experience. It was so easy to let go, even after many years of emotional pain. I had to share it with others.
Our bodies are designed to heal themselves. We have to start listening to them.