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The Netflix docuseries "Escaping Twin Flames" gives viewers a look inside the controversial spiritual dating community Twin Flames Universe. It's led by Jeff and Shaleia Ayan (who now use the last name Divine) and has been labeled a cult by former members and the relatives of current members who spoke to Vice News and Vanity Fair for investigations published in 2020.
Along with promising their teachings will help their followers find a love match so deep it transcends physical connection and becomes spiritual, Jeff and Shaleia also run offshoot businesses, including a church called the Church of Union and a meal-delivery service called Divine Dish. Then there's TFU's Mind Alignment Process, which promises to heal trauma using "three easy steps" that will transform a person's life in "just 12 weeks."
Christine "Chrissy" Emerick is the CEO of MAP Inc. and a retired lieutenant colonel in the US Army. According to her bio on the website, she served in the Iraq War from 2004 to 2005. After 20 years of service, Emerick retired, and then hosted the "Soldier for Life" podcast, a part of a US Army program to provide services, advice, and training to active and retired military personnel and their families.
In a May newsletter, she offered advice on how to have a "harmonious military transition."
As of May 2023, she was listed as an executive officer of the organization. Insider has reached out to Soldier for Life to clarify her current status with the non-profit.
Emerick says she first encountered MAP, which was created by Jeff Ayan, to "heal trauma from war and childhood abuse" in 2017. Emerick, who has a Ph.D. in public safety leadership, is also listed as the chief operating officer of TwinFlamesUniverse.com in an email obtained by Business Insider.
The MAP website describes its "healing program" as "gentle," "peaceful," "quick," and "easy," but doesn't actually explain what the process is. "Your MAP practitioner will expertly access your trauma like a world class computer programmer rooting out a bug in the system," the site reads.
In a video on MAP's YouTube channel, Emerick explains that "the MAP practitioner walks you through your traumatic experience and brings you peace there." According to Emerick, who describes the process as a "new healing modality for trauma," this is done by discussing a traumatic flashback and "moving through it." Emerick also says in the video that a single online teleconferencing MAP session healed her PTSD.
In "Escaping Twin Flames," one former member of the community says that using the MAP techniques created by Jeff Ayan, Emerick got her into a meditative state and falsely suggested she'd experienced sexual trauma as a child.
"To my best belief, I don't think I've ever actually had anything like that in my childhood," said the former member, known as Elle, on Netflix. "It was like a memory that was sort of planted inside of me." Elle said that after going through exercises in MAP, she started not wanting to be around her family.
Netflix
According to their couple's story on the TFU website and the accompanying interview, Emerick met her husband Jason in 2017 in the TFU. They achieved "harmonious Twin Flame Union" (meaning Jeff and Shaleia said they should and could get married) in January 2020 and married through TFU's Church of Union in September of that year. Jason is a chef and CEO of the TFU meal plan service, Divine Dish, and a director of training at MAP.
The couple are also executive ministers in the Church of Union, and moved to Michigan to progress their TFU work, according to their interview. However, per a Facebook profile that appears to belong to Emerick, they seem to have moved to Bristow, Virginia, in 2021.
Emerick and her husband are both Twin Flames Universe Master Certified Ascension Coaches, meaning that Jeff and Shaleia have deemed them qualified to teach TFU beliefs to others for profit. Their coaching company is called As One Guidance. They post frequently about beingn a couple with autism on TikTok and advertise their TFU coaching services on Instagram.
Emerick spends at least some of her time moderating and responding to comments in Twin Flame Universe's 43,000-strong Facebook group. She's been especially busy since both Amazon and Netflix released documentaries critical of the group in the last several months.
Emerick didn't immediately respond to BI's request for comment. In a media statement on the TFU website that was previously shared with BI via email, Jeff and Shaleia Ayan denied the allegations against them and their organization, calling former members' claims an attempt to "distort our true aims, methods, and curriculums" and "also misrepresent the autonomy of our community members."
