An Honorable Way to Die

There is a trial going on now in Arizona. James Ray is a self-help author. He's one of those guys who tells you how to have a better life while he, himself, rakes in your money.

In 2009, a bunch of people paid him $10,000 to $15,000 each to participate in his spiritual warrior camp. He did things to them like telling them to go out in the desert for long periods of time with no food or water. Meanwhile, he's back at the camp making sure he's hydrated and fed.

One of his activities was a sweat lodge. He bragged to the participants that this one would be hotter than any he had ever done. He didn't lie. Three people died from the heat. The irony is that these people all thought this experience would teach them to be independent thinkers. Yet they literally followed his instruction to the death.

One of the people who was pulled unconscious from the sweat lodge but survived testified in the trial that she surrendered to the possibility of death just before she lost consciousness. She believed it would be an "honorable way to die." I think it was a stupid way to die.

"Nurse recalls blacking out in sweat lodge." The Dallas Morning News; March 26, 2011; p. 5A.