FREE YOUR MIND — AND HELP SOMEONE YOU LOVE DO THE SAME
An Evening with Author Meliesa Tigard
We all know the feeling. Someone lost in the depths of coercive control, and you’d give anything to reach them. They disappeared into a belief system or a movement that has overtaken their mind and destroyed their relationships. Or maybe you have exited such a movement and you’re looking to understand what happened to you.
I was born and raised in a high-control religion called the Two by Twos. I now know it was a cult, although, to me, it was just my friends and family. It took me until my mid-twenties to find my way out – and it cost me everything. Everyone I had ever loved. I went through religious trauma before any of us had a name for it or any understanding what had been done to me.
Then, one day, at a retreat for survivors of the Two by Two, I began to hear a story being told in my head. I grabbed my phone and started recording a tale about a little mouse who lived in the True Mouse village — a village with a Purple Door she didn’t understand and was afraid to open.
On the evening of September 25th, I will tell you her story — and mine — and help you understand how high-control groups work: religious and political. We’ll talk about how a mind gets captured. Why arguing never works. And how people find their way free. It’s not through shame or force, but something gentler and far more powerful.
You'll leave understanding your own story a little better. And maybe with a little more hope for someone you love.
Friday, September 25th · 5–6 PM
Moon Bean Cafe · 101 Eastmont Ave, East Wenatchee
Little Mouse and the Purple Door, Little Bea and the Golden Key, and their companion journals will be available for purchase.
The door is always open. And it's always yours.
Meliesa Tigard writes at purpledoorjourneys.com about coercive control and how to recognize it — in religion, in relationships, and in politics.