Maria Owl Gutierrez

[Twinkie_Slayer]

 Another Bay Area pay-to-pray. Sells "vision quests" and claims a "five year apprenticeship" with a "Lakota Medicine man". She is conscientious of poor folks though...offers her vision quest services on a sliding scale from $850.00 to $1100.00. How generous

http://www.soul-centeredhealing.com/pages/visionquest.htm

 On her main page she lists a Steve Red Buffalo and Harry Charger among her "teachers". Steve Red Buffalo in years past I heard some stuff about him being a serial lodge-groper, and a search indicates he was involved in that UFO/ star nation nonsense. I think he has since passed on. I have heard of Harry Charger though I have never met him, and really know nothing about him.

http://www.soul-centeredhealing.com/pages/mariabio.htm

[educatedindian]

Most of the sites on her say she's "serving her community for 15 years". On this site she describes herself as a Mexican-American with Mayan ancestry.
http://api.ning.com/files/Ww5Jn9Xw6RaettNGupLLN2Hkg5pmbtSFCxect16eGrYe0FKUB1IBNQo*jDqlr7GYLIPtMyj3GsS8By1Xv0E6LaujFc-kX*rN/MayansvMonsanto.pdf

So why does a Mexican/Mayan go to Lakota healers to learn and claim to do Lakota healing and ceremony? There's no shortage of Mayans, including in the Bay Area. There's also no shortage of Mexican curanderos. So "her community" is seemingly anyone who comes to her for healing in largely wealthy Marin County, right next door to the often poor Latino and NDN communities in Oakland and SF.

She does seem to want to do good on a number of issues, such as sacred sites. I don't see any sign of building up a cult, abusiveness, peddling workshops, etc. The main questions are if the people she claimed taught her actually did, and why choose a tradition not your own? Those, plus ceremony selling of course.

Her other "teachers" listed include Sashana Proctor, a faux feminist pushing feel good "initiations" into made up clans for a group calling itself Wisdombridge.
http://www.wisdombridge.net/Photos2.htm

Debbie Unterman is a common enough name that it's hard to pin down who she means. There's a hypnotherapist that may be her.

Adyashanti AKA Steven Gray is a white Buddhist teacher.
http://www.adyashanti.org/index.php?file=teachings

There's a long list of websites accusing him of being a fraud.
http://oceanofthought.com/philosophy/energy-of-a-free-being-adyashanti/ (See comments)
http://www.indiadivine.org/audarya/advaita-vedanta/90993-fwd-adyashanti-mukta.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klBd7Hr0k20
http://www.care2.com/greenliving/real-meditation-learn-to-let-go.html (comments)
http://zenmonkeys.tribe.net/thread/03799f8d-a78c-47a6-80fe-89e1037b1084
http://www.takuin.com/adyashanti-on-awareness/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fjxAZ5ogGM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bRi6gDLJ_g

I'm guessing this may be the Francesca McCartney she refers to.
http://energymedicineuniversity.org/faculty/mccartney.html

Three of her other teachers Kaplowitz, Campbell, and Riverbend are part of these extremely vague feel good courses.
http://www.solsara.net/solsara-teachers.php
I don't see any harm done by these courses, except to the hole in your banking acount. I also don't see who they do much of anything at all.

Gutierrez seems to have cobbled together her ideas and practices from all over, quite a mishmash.

[Lodro]

Adyashanti AKA Steven Gray is a white Buddhist teacher.
http://www.adyashanti.org/index.php?file=teachings

It says on the site he "took teachings" from Zen. That's not the same as being a buddhist teacher. His name is reminiscent of hindu advaita (non-dualism) teachers. He gives Satsang, which is a kind of loose, discursive teaching session. I'd say he mouthes the words of people who have taught him and books he has read, and it's not possible to ascertain what is the lineage of him and of his teachers. He remains suspiciously silent on the people who taught him. If this were a proper buddhist teacher he would openly state from which teachers he received transmission.

[Twinkie_Slayer]

 What caught my eye is the pay-to-pray vision quest and the claim of Lakota teachers. I know very little about the Eastern religious traditions, so I cannot really offer an informed opinion. Thankfully, we have folks like Lodro and others who are knowledgeable and can provide commentary.

   I found this on Harry Charger:

   

The Akicita Heyoka (Fool Soldiers) is a warrior society of the Sans Arc Band (Itazipco) of the Lakota Nation. We are sworn to protect and care for the people. The Akicita Heyoka is very old and has survived the changing of times. We are here to serve and to help all people. The Fool Soldiers have been in existence for over 200 years carrying the message of peace,non violence,and the coming together of all people. Respect for ones self and respect for others is of the utmost as we are all one. The leader of the Fool Soldiers is Harry Charger (The Charger) from the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe in South Dakota.

 http://www.angelfire.com/me4/charger10/

 This I found on a Stephen Red Buffalo, not sure if it is the same "Steve" Red Buffalo that Gutierrez mentions but it does seem to confirm that he has passed on, some time ago it appears. I would imagine that Red Buffalo is not a common name.

http://www.fpm.iastate.edu/facnews/1999sp/page8.html

 
And this one:

  http://groups.google.co.nz/group/alt.native/msg/5fdd06535f2068f7?dmode=source

[Autumn]

Updated links for Maria.

http://www.linkedin.com/in/maria333healer

http://www.mariaowl.com/default.html

[kansas22]

Still doing it

http://www.sacredfuture.org/vision-quest.html

[kansas22]

950.00 for a  "vision quest"

[Sturmboe]

Qoute"
"Yalila Espinoza is a sexual/spiritual counselor who received a Ph.D. in Transformation and Consciousness and Spiritual Counseling training at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco."

http://www.sacredfuture.org/bios.html

Does this exist in this form? "...who received a Ph.D. in Transformation and Consciousness and Spiritual Counseling training"

[ShadowDancer]

Qoute"
"Yalila Espinoza is a sexual/spiritual counselor who received a Ph.D. in Transformation and Consciousness and Spiritual Counseling training at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco."

http://www.sacredfuture.org/bios.html

Does this exist in this form? "...who received a Ph.D. in Transformation and Consciousness and Spiritual Counseling training"

Apparently it does exist.

http://www.ciis.edu/Academics/Graduate_Programs/Transformative_Studies.html

The California Institute of Integral Studies is an accredited university and officially recognized by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges Senior College and University Commission.

http://www.ciis.edu/About_CIIS.html

http://www.wascsenior.org/

However their accreditation with the American Psychological Association was revoked for the doctorate in clinical psychology.

http://archive.today/Aj2AE

CoA statement regarding decision to revoke accreditation of the Clinical PsyD program at California Institute of Integral Studies, San Francisco, CA

During its meeting of July 23-24, 2012 with supplemental submissions on July 27, 2012 and August 2, 2012, an appeal panel of the APA Commission on Accreditation (CoA) upheld the CoA’s decision of October 20-23, 2011 to revoke the accreditation of the doctoral program in clinical psychology (PsyD) at the California Institute of Integral Studies. The program was deemed to be not fully consistent with the Guidelines and Principles for Accreditation of Programs in Professional Psychology (G&P). In particular, the CoA in reviewing the program did not believe that it was consistent with several requirements in the following areas: Domain B: Program Philosophy, Objectives, and Curriculum Plan; Domain C: Program Resources; Domain E: Student-Faculty Relations; Domain F: Program Self-Assessment and Quality Enhancement; and the impact of these issues across the domains of the G&P.

[Twinkie_Slayer]

 Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but this is a valid update IMO. Fraus is quite lucrative, it seems.

https://www.facebook.com/markandshannonlive/videos/1724432807853335/

[Twinkie_Slayer]

 I just found her website which is, I believe, relatively new.

https://www.sacredfuture.org/

 She's charging a boatload of money for her made up teachings and "channellings" of the "Great Mother" This quote from her "Private Healing Sessions" page is quite revealing.

 

I work primarily with leaders, because I am a leader and have been my whole life. I know the stress that comes with trying to balance a life full of responsibility, especially when many are depending on you and looking to you as a role model. I love working with leaders and highly influential people, BECAUSE they are in a position to create major changes in culture, consciousness and global belief structures.

 Translation: "Ordinary poor people should just stay away. I can't make any money off of you, my targets are those I can scam out of substantial sums of money"

[Twinkie_Slayer]

Maria is still claiming to be a "Pipe Carrier in the Lakota way." as well as an "Orisha priestess in the African lineage". There is no such thing as an "Orisha priestess". Orishas are minor deities or spirit helpers in the Yoruba spiritual tradition and the practitioners or "priests" are referred to as "Babalawos". It's likely she picked up bits and pieces of information from a workshop or a spiritual tourist destination, got most of it wrong, and is selling it to rich white folks.


http://noetic.org/conference/presenter/maria-christina-owl-gutierrez

[Twinkie_Slayer]

Maria is still claiming to be a "Pipe Carrier in the Lakota way." as well as an "Orisha priestess in the African lineage". There is no such thing as an "Orisha priestess". Orishas are minor deities or spirit helpers in the Yoruba spiritual tradition and the practitioners or "priests" are referred to as "Babalawos". It's likely she picked up bits and pieces of information from a workshop or a spiritual tourist destination, got most of it wrong, and is selling it to rich white folks.


http://noetic.org/conference/presenter/maria-christina-owl-gutierrez

Apparently, I am in error. Practitioners do refer to themselves as priests or priestesses in the English speaking world.

  Regardless, I have been informed by a former associate of Gutierrez that the "teacher" who "initiated" her is this person.

http://www.yorubaland.ru/falokun_en.html

 Apparently, even his traditional and legit teachers in Nigeria consider him to be a fraud.

http://www.orishanet.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=311&sid=6e3cdeb51c9527ca437442937b30a0a6

[Twinkie_Slayer]

 This is the man who "initiated" her. He's a white American guy who is identified as a fraud by the Nigerian elders he worked with.

http://www.yorubaland.ru/falokun_en.html

http://www.orishanet.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=311&sid=6e3cdeb51c9527ca437442937b30a0a6

Some more on the fraud David Wilson, with copies of correspondence from elders in Nigeria denouncing him. They've declared that anyone taught or "initiated" by him is null and void as far as any claim to priesthood or any other title or capacity in their faith tradition. Her claims of "Orisha priestess" goes directly against the mandate of the Nigerian elders.

The text is rather lengthy, and contains language and terms that I am not too familiar with, but it is pretty damning WRT David Wilson.

https://www.facebook.com/notes/charles-spencer-king/three-authors-ayo-salami-awo-falokun-fatunmbi-david-wilson-philip-neimark-and-wh/10151720413604813/