Some hard-core ‘independent’ Scientologists have ruminated among themselves lately the idea that I am somehow trying to bring down L. Ron Hubbard and Scientology. Otherwise, they reason, ‘why wouldn’t he just move on and let it be?’ I am going to try to address this concern as directly and succinctly as I can.
L. Ron Hubbard developed a number of unique, aggressive methods for tackling problems of the human psyche. Used intelligently there is nothing that compares to their direct, predictable effectiveness in intensifying present awareness.
However, there is a potential trap in the fields of therapy and spiritual practices discussed by Ken Wilber in his Kosmic Consciousness interview series that applies in spades to Scientology. In segment eight of the series, Wilber speaks of people attaining ecstatic, exalted altered states in their particular discipline that they consider to be so miraculous as to be without compare. They are convinced that they have found the only way, which results in a sort of tunnel vision and puts a figurative ceiling on their own continued growth and development. Such people become opinionated, exclusive and intolerant – ultimately repelling others from experiencing the transcendence they experienced and losing whatever they gained in the process.
This trap is particularly acute in Scientology, because along with the peak and plateau experiences it delivers, its scripture is saturated with reinforcement of this sense of only-one way and superiority to mere mortals. As intensively and effectively as Scientology can focus an individual’s attention and concentration, it just as intensively and effectively conditions those new found abilities onto worshipping and defending to the death the construct that made them possible.
In an ironic way, the zealous, judgmental, super egoic, ‘I will save you if I have to kill you’ mentality of the advanced Scientologist serves as testament to the effectiveness of that which they are hell-bent on defending and promoting.
Just as assuredly, it is evidence that somewhere along the line the science of ‘knowing how to know’ is converted into the practice of ‘knowing so best that we had better not be exposed to learning anything else and not allow anyone else to either’.
The observation I am trying to share is that it is this vicious cycle that is at the root of the demise of the methodologies of Dianetics and Scientology. It is the cause of every other ill – disconnection, fair game, Simon Bolivar, violence in management, money is everything, image is everything, you name it – every other ‘situation’ that folk continually mistake for the ‘why.’
I have witnessed tremendous relief, rehabilitated ability to learn, and renewed capacity for transcendence by getting this ‘why’ understood by many who have devoted their lives to Scientology. I have also effectively helped a number of people with Hubbard methods by using them – sans the only-one religious indoctrination; people who knew little to nothing of Dianetics and Scientology when they came to me.
It is for this reason that I believe the ideas of L. Ron Hubbard are doomed to the extent they are not used in an integral (integrated) fashion. The whole package – taken as the whole package requires it be taken – leads inevitably to all of the ills ex-scientologists, those effected by Scientologists, and Scientologists (including and especially independent ones) seem to make a pastime out of clamoring about.
Why do I bother? Because I want to help free those who are stuck in this Scientology dichotomy, and because I don’t want to see the demise of ideas and discoveries that can be effective in helping people in the future.
Moving On Up a Little Higher 
Marty, this is an excellent post. I am hoping for interesting comments from your readers on this one.
I posted something relevant to this just yesterday. My readers gave some interesting viewpoint as to why the current scene of the Church of Scientology is in such mess:
Very well written, Marty.
Really well stated, Marty. I recall LRH deconstructing the definition of Scientology and the derivation of Scio meant “to cleave.” The value of differentiation cannot be overstated, in my opinion, and that includes every datum one encounters in Scientology. If a person took the care to inspect everything he or she was presented with in books, lectures, bulletins, policies, you-name-it, a lot of the nonsense that clouds the real value of Scientology could be avoided. Of course that can be easier said than done, especially in some lectures when LRH was amping on coffee or exhiliration.
Succinctly put and I like its ultimate aim. This aligns consistent with your blog’s title. No one said enlightenment was always an easy path.
Agreed. Completely. It’s going to take thought, analysis, and discernment to save what is awesome and good about Scientology. No “authority” can do it; we must each be true to our own observations; and we must each have the integrity to shed our own “held-down sevens” to do what we can to see what is there. I feel we must do this if we want to save what is good, not because of some moral obligation or “duty.”
Your mission has been clear to me, and I thank you for it. I am half-way through your new book and it is rekindling in me what is really fine and really cussed about Scientology. And Scientologists.
Peace to you and Mosey.
Well, to those who are stuck in the “we are the only hope for mankind” trap, you are in fact trying to take down Scientology as they know it. Within their paradigm, the only niche available to you is “enemy”.
Which is unfortunate, because I think you have hit upon the exact key to unleashing the full power of the tech, and nobody is more in need of that key than those who have been trapped by their own wins.
Thank you
What came to mind while reading this post, was this video of good ole Ed Bryan, an OT H8, demonstrating total corporate spiritual freedom.
I think I understand what you are trying to do, and that to many it awakens a sense of fear and uncertainty. Scn. was very pleasantly comfortable in its “only one way to Rome” approach. Thanks for the push, reality is not optional.
I believe this, Marty. I believe you are catching hell from the die-hards, and I believe you are spot on with the dichotomy mentioned above.
During my decompression period, I was logging on multiple times a day. Here lately, I’ll check in once in a while… a post maybe once a month or less.
I’ve even had a friend of mine express a wish to begin “living life again.” The hang-up on Scientology and the drama has slowly wained away and we can get back to Livingness again.
And your reason to persist is admirable! And you are the one to DO what you are doing. Not many out there are so qualified. That’s not bluster to feed the ego. It’s fact based on the successes you’ve shown here and found from others who have met you.
Finding the balance is always the problem now isn’t it? 😉 Funny enough, I’ll be the “Tech” is out there on this. LRH never failed to have an answer for everything. Studied from the right open perspective, I’m sure some piece of the tech addresses all this, and that your are exercising it. Just need to bring the awareness up of others so they can “get it” and carry on themselves.
People, sooner or later, logging on to these sights on a daily basis WILL fall away. If you do not want it to, then you need to work your Be-Do-Have and figure out what hat you want to wear in the salvation of Scientology and those leaving the “co$” and how best to be involved. If you are here just to be a mouthpiece, you are wasting everyone’s time. Especially your own. Own this, embrace it, pick up a Hat and Wear It. Or wrap things up, do a locational and recognize… there’s a great big world out there just waiting to be lived in! Go find it!
Lot’s of games. Pick one and play. Don’t dabble.
“Do. Or Do Not. There is no Try.” Master Yoda 😉
Marty, I for one think of myself as being both and admirer and a strong supporter of yours but, in all honesty, I do think you spend too much time on what is wrong with Scientology rather than what is right with it. Like you I too would like to see other people helped and while I think the management of Scientology is nuts I think much of the technology of Scientology is the most advanced method ever devised by anyone to bring about heightened states of awareness. For that reason I want to see the workable technology of Scientology used and protected for others to use.
Also, as I’ve said here before, I have studied lots of other technologies and I have never seen anything close to the results possible by using the techniques and teachings of Scientology. As it is, I doubt that there is anyone one on earth, no matter what technology or philosophy that they have been exposed to, that wouldn’t benefit greatly from some of the simple auditing procedures used on the lower end of the bridge.
Other than that, continued success.
“I have witnessed tremendous relief ….. by getting this ‘why’ understood by many who have devoted their lives to Scientology.”
YES.
I agree. Removing the ceiling and making way for new ideas and learning has made my life better.
Same why I came up with. A trap. The way out for me in this was/is education which starts with first knowing that I did not know.
So I carry on and the years past (’74-’09 – 21yrs old to 57) are very valuable lessons I never would have understood very well simply reading about it. In fact – looking back It would have been ‘oh that would never happen to me’ so I would not have learned a thing. I did learn many many valuable workable procedures to help myself and others in the meantime. I’m looking forward to studies that define the workable procedures for all to know and yes, they may have to come from a different ‘source’ to get past the barriers we have put in place with mankind.
So I understand why you bother.
Cece
Excellent, perfect and cogent summation Marty of the entire Scientology “ride” for all whoever experienced the Scientology means of attempted transcendence and transport to a higher place and ended up “spit out” of the system wondering “what the hell?”. Many thanks for this dissection.
Thanks Dan. I think you would really like The Tao of Physics. Among a lot of other things, it demonstrates ancient wisdom’s and quantum science’s agreement on the idea that identification, differentiation and association serve us well, up to a point after which they need to be given a rest in order to witness more absolute truth.
Marty,
Quoting you: Some hard-core ‘independent’ Scientologists have ruminated among themselves lately the idea that I am somehow trying to bring down L. Ron Hubbard and Scientology. Otherwise, they reason, ‘why wouldn’t he just move on and let it be?’ I am going to try to address this concern as directly and succinctly as I can.
The answer to your issue or dilemma more accurately, is on the Hubbard chart of human evaluation.
Column: “handling of truth” and a few other columns too.
Dio
Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish.
Euripides
A wise man does not pee in the wind.
Great post, Geir. As we both can attest, these related thoughts (yours and mine) are arising independent of, and quite some physical distance from, one another.
Gawd I love Mosey:)
“At 3 I knew how to Walk at 30 I knew how to Stand”, the Buddha
Marty, a very brave well thought out posting. Continue to explore, read, write your journey is one that interests me and I enjoy watching. You are choosing a spiritual path not obsessed with wealth yet filled with knowledge and compassion.
Thank you that you continue to preach this superior WHY, Marty 🙂
I am really stunned how fast some zealous ‘Scientologists’ forget about basics like ARC and good communication, the undesirable service facsilimes ( making others wrong and self right, dominating others etc. ) and the book Science of Survival ( explaining that certain emotional states will lead to happiness and success, while others bring about destruction and suffering for others and self ). I guess those basics have been instrumental to Scientology’s expansion in the 1950s, and are a major reason why people get attracted to Hubbard’s work. These basics are sane and pro-survival. I cannot think of a reason under the sun to throw them away.
I don’t consider myself a hardcore Scientologist as I study many other related subjects however there is an interesting phenomena that I experience when I do study other materials.
I always seem to compare what I read elsewhere to LRH and use that as the yardstick to measure other data. You are correct in stating that one achieves wins that then gives them tunnel vision. Its almost like a drug addiction that blinds the user into only seeing Scientology as being of help. After being told for many years that Scn is the ONLY answer and having had such fantastic wins in session is really an addiction.
This creates a sort of end of endless Q and A in my mind as I try to be objective, kind of goes like this “Is it because it is the only answer? Am I too rigid in my thinking, Have I been brainwashed? I am sure LRH would have though of this… Maybe I haven’t been trained enough and the answers are on the higher levels… Did LRH steal this from this author
It goes on and on.
You are correct in saying that Scientology creates a close minded attitude. You either apply it without looking elsewhere or drive yourself crazy trying to figure who has the answers. Neither are healthy. If one is arrogant and says I have all the answers in Scientology you remove the fruits of learning.
It is my feeling and understanding the grades processes and Dianetics (ran without evaluation, letting the pc run what the pc comes up with sans an indoctrination into what “should” be ran by means of listening to any of the “whole track” tapes, etc.) would bring about wonderful, bright thinking, smart and fun people: people exemplifying the top buttons of the Chart of Attitudes.
The ideas that all the people of Earth are in big, big trouble and that some people are wogs and there are inferior people and that Scientology is the ONLY way out are all borne out of administrative indoctrination, not out of a session’s cognitions.
I say an “administrative indoctrination” but this is not wholly so: The OT 3 materials and above: in order to run them it seems that we have to postulate an evil adversary and an entire planetary system’s population as victims. That’s an indoctrination, of course, that fits well with that administrative indoctrination just mentioned. And I THINK (not certain as I have not received these materials) acceptance of such would predicate some pretty bizarre behavior all by itself.
But in all my auditing on the grades and on the lower grade chart, I saw the pc’s cognitions lining up always with “Wow! People are SO good! And me, too!” and a feeling of well-being, I never heard a cognition in the same breath as any idea that there were enemies to defeat or that one should be in any hurry to “save” anyone from anything! It was all the easing of resistance and not about the imagining of MORE resistance or the need to defeat or overwhelm anything.
Marty
Since your first post I’m reading your blog. It’s quite an adventure.
Above statements are the way I always understood Scientology and I thought I learned that from Scientology itself.
And this was always the way I was applying it,and was one of the main reasons I had continous troubles, as I couldn’t understand what my fellow Scientologists got out of it and the way they interpreted it.
I was applying KSW in a very liberal way and always thought this is what LRH wanted and that he just was upset when he wrote it.
After 40 years I was able to discover that my way of thinking, never was formed by Scientology but it’s something I just had from birth on and when I was successful with Scientology, it was only when I stick to my own principles that just are in myself. I don’t know who teached me kindness and understanding and trusting people, even I’ve 1000ds reasons no to, having a liberal and humantarian mind.
I had this funny idea as other religion have, Scientology saved me and there I learned all that ! No I’d it already before and some people in the COS wanted to change my thinking !
Continue your work. I can envision what will come out of your work at the End (if there ever will be one !).
” . . . the science of ‘knowing how to know’ is converted into the practice of ‘knowing so best that we had better not be exposed to learning anything else and not allow anyone else to either’.”
That’s an incredible observation! It comes from LRH though, doesn’t it? KSW, the taped, workable path the must not be strayed from, The Reason For Orgs, etc.
Agree, agree and agree some more. Boy, did you hit that nail squarely on the head! Think about it. Hundreds of hours of overrun, wrong indications, creating your own financial catastrophes while suppressing and justifying every observable outpoint, just to get back to those short periods of elation. Was looking at this last week. Kind of like drug addition if you ask me. Brilliant post!
“OT H8” — boy, is that a great term. Thank you.
I agree with Marty – Great post, Geir.
Sorry, but …
1) I find them delusional, still riding on delusional statuses of Master of Qual, Master of Tech, Fleet-Command-Master-Chief-Petty-Officer of the mop closet, etc.
2) They are definitely INSTITUTIONALIZED.
Marty, you have effectively and coherently summarized & clarified a growing realization that I have been expanding into for the last 18 months, so clearly that my remaining bit of entangled attention/concern has been released. Beautifully stated in a truly useful way that opens the doors to further progression!
“The ideas that all the people of Earth are in big, big trouble and that some people are wogs and there are inferior people and that Scientology is the ONLY way out are all borne out of administrative indoctrination, not out of a session’s cognitions. ”
Labels of people:
“Out -ethics bait” SP, Open minded, PTS A_J, Wog, downstat, Db, Psychopath, Out-2D, LSD-Case, Wide open Case, 1.1 , Downtone, No confront case, dramatizing evil purposes, nattery, no gains case, criminal, out-exchange, confused, service facy .human, ennemy, dramatizing H&R, needs a SRA, Rpfer, in treason, in liability,reasonable, in sympathy, theetie-wheetie, not too bright,etc.. ad nausuam.
Question : How many positive adjectives do you know for describing people with Scientology ?
Another thought for the diverse mindsets of the Independents:
Go on an enemy fast. Fighting the evil other is so ingrained in the psychological make up of Scientology that it is natural for it to keep reverberating.
Go on an enemy fast. As soon as someone is becoming an enemy, stop yourself and say: today I am on an enemy fast. If we simply don’t allow these preconditioned responses to take full hold on our dealings with others a lot of foolishness will be cut off at the pass.
You will go through withdrawal symptoms and a sort of healing crises, but keep up the fast until the toxic waste of needing enemies releases from your life.
Also I perceive confusion with the Infependents on how to proceed with Scientology. In this confusion I have a perfect suggestion for a stable datum to apply. In this confusion, choose to apply the stable datum of WHAT IS GREATNESS. If Ron is your teacher how can you disagree with me?
If WHAT IS GREATNESS is applied to the scattering of perspectives and clashing growing pains, then a benevolent outcome of decency and respect will be a grand reward.
Then each of you can make a reasoned argument for how all things Scientology can progress.
Word clear WHAT IS GREATNESS, clay demo WHAT IS GREATNESS, apply WHAT IS GREATNESS and see what will happen.
Do these two things: go on an enemy fast and make WHAT IS GREATNESS the pole star to navigate these shallow rocky shoals of shifting beliefs and understandings.
Truth is simple right? What made a Gandhi a Martin Luther King? Simple truth made their name forever etched in immortal victory because of one practice: WHAT IS GREATNESS.
But if you love having enemies and it gives you a sense of energy and purpose, then please don’t follow this advice, it won’t be for you.
For you I would suggest more study of GO/OSHA tactics to crush dissent. Continue marring the reputations of your friends and colleagues. Maybe you are right, the establishment of sanity on the planet starts with ad hominem attacks and third party rumors, sanctimonious judgementalism and hate masquerading as non compromising application of standard tech.
You can do it, go on an enemy fast and learn how to LOVE DESPITE ALL PROVOCATIONS TO DO OTHERWISE.
Then Scientology can start to heal.
Great post!
Yesterday I was invited to an OTO Gnostic Mass. They were a lovely bunch of friendly smart people. One of their central philosophies is “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law” and “Love is the law, love under will.”
Also “Everyone is a Star.” So no judgemental telling others what they should do, or not do. And it was clear they lived these ideas.
LRH recomended reading Crowley. I took that bit seriously. 🙂
Perfectly said! And lines up so well with the CORE teachings of every great teacher. “What is Greatness?” could be described as a core teaching of Scientology, the “Ethics” and “Justice” Polices should not be as they contradict the Axioms and Logics.
The Ethics and Justice Policies (and all others we find ANY objection to, violate the rationale in presented in the Logics. They are all attempts to solve problems, not using core Scientology or factors derived from natural laws, but using arbitrary solutions that become even bigger problems:
Logic 14
Factors introduced into a problem or solution which do not derive from natural law but only from authoritarian command aberrate that problem or solution.
Logic 15
The introduction of an arbitrary into a problem or solution invites the further introduction of arbitraries into problems and solutions.
Clarification needed in what I said after reading yours: yes; invalidative, evaluative writing also appears within the technical materials, too as instructions or explanations for the auditor. But, sessions can be run (and typically are, outside of confessional auditing) without such invalidation and evaluation. When they are run without eval and inval, pcs win.
The most prosperous Scientology groups in history, I am quite sure, expanded under close personal management that validated rightnesses as a primary tool, and there was little of “the darker side” of Scientology admin tech in their day to day activities.
The head of the nail receives another blow from the most accurate hammer wielded in these parts.
I agree that people can get stuck in their Scientology wins, and then use them as aberrated stable data blocking further progress. But that happens in every other “big solution” practice, too. What’s really going on with this is that the wins one gets from applying any workable mental and spiritual tech encourage one to want more, and that opens the lid of Pandora’s box on greater and greater charge as one goes up the line. If that charge is not properly addressed and handled, one can seek refuge in cultish belief based on earlier wins.
The solution to this is not to turn away from Scientology, or “transcend” it in a way that ends up mixing practices. Rather, as LRH says, the Road to Truth must be walked all the way to the end. The way out is the way through. What turns it on turns it off. Get the pc through it.
It’s just a matter of sticking to actual Standard Tech — not the squirrel tech the Church CALLS Standard Tech, but ACTUAL Standard Tech. And in my humble opinion that means getting help from Scientologists who began their Scientology careers with a total tech orientation, getting trained, interned, further experienced, and audited themselves to get rid of their own cases, over a period of many years BEFORE they ever had anything to do with the admin, “command intention” side of Scientology.
When someone comes into Scientology on the admin side, joining the Sea Org before becoming an auditor, and then spending years and years getting grooved in by osmosis-outside-of-actual-study on low-toned victory-at-all-costs command intention, and receiving next to no auditing along the way, when that person finally does get some auditor training and personal Bridge progress, it’s too late, because the ruination of the being has already occurred.
What do I mean by “ruination”? I mean that people going through this meat grinder get forced out of valence just to survive. I previously wrote about the real story of John Colletto. He was the OT 3, Class 6 Senior C/S at Bridge Pubs in the mid and late 70’s, and told me that the biggest challenge he had in providing case gain for Bridge staff was that most of them had gone so far out of valence while on staff that their real cases were on suppress and unavailable. The auditing they received ended up not actually being for them, but for the valences they were being, that weren’t actually themselves.
The problem is those valences, and their roots in the OT case. The way the administrative side of Scientology was set up just restimulated the hell out of staff in a totally overwhelming out-gradient, which was directly the opposite of what Standard Tech called for. Too much valence restim, with too little tech training and auditing to enable the person to stay in valence while producing, yields a Nazi cultist who destroys Scientology.
It’s a matter of balance. Tech has to come first, with admin and chain of command kept light. Admin and the running of the organization has to be limited to the SUPPORT of tech delivery, not COMMAND over it. That’s the simple WHY for what happened to the Church, and points the way towards what we must do to make the tech work today.
It’s NOT inherent in Scientology philosophy and tech that everyone who gets involved has to go out of valence and become trapped. But LRH did make a mistake in thinking that he could launch a high-powered organization like the Sea Org without exceeding the gradient of case restimulation its members could withstand. The Sea Org became what it resisted, and today we’ve properly rejected that organizational plan.
But minus that organizational error, there is nothing unworkable or entrapping in actual Standard Tech on the auditing side. Many people will always become so thrilled with their wins that they become true believers for awhile. But in a lightness-of-organization environment that would be just a phase some new people would go through. They would “graduate” on their own — not out of Scientology, but to true and valuable leadership actually helping others in a big, big way through personal delivery of tech, not strutting around with a clipboard and a scowl.
Marty…you explanation is 1000% on track…for example many Scientologists at Flag in particular were shutting off the door to medical treatment or any treatment for threatening illnesses like cancer etc etc as they thought is was OT case and handled by NOTS auditing ..I was called in by for the MAA FSO Cossimo/Haviva as there were many OT’s with serious body issues some terminal…I had a handling for them out of Canada and was shocked to see that these guys had “sonic shut off” on getting any freaking data on health or body stuff due to the false datum “it is just a body…auditing will handle it…my folder is with the C/S ” etc etc…well when your seeing your last days on Earth non volition in nature you will do anything versus the PR line “he/she dropped the body”…another bs response to justify the out ethics aka “I am better than anyone cause I am a superhuman OT”. So some of them lived some of them died..THEY TOTALLY WERE UNDER THE MISCONCEPTION THAT THE TECH CAN HANDLE ANYTHING NO MATTER THE ISSUE!!!…well again another misguided viewpoint. Lesson learnt here from Martys’ analysis.. .When you shut the door on your spiritual and body awareness to one “SOURCE FOR TRUTH”..then BEWARE as this is going TO COME BACK AND HAUNT YOU…(RECIPROCITY)…tks for the info Marty…spot on as usual… .
I must say I couldn’t agree with you more.
Boiling it down to something LRH said “If it’s true for you, it’s true.”
After reading your book and those by others regarding LRH and reflecting back on my own observations and experiences with LRH and with Scientology, I think LRH only took people so far yet drummed into everyones heads that he was “the only way”.
He was not infalable. He had many, many outpoints that I personally and many others, justified away.
Your chapters regarding the handling of All Clear was another example of LRH directing things, that DM blindly followed to the extreme, turned out to be wrong, just like many of us experienced with LRHs orders regarding Gold and International Management.
By staying closed minded, rather than open to learning and experiencing new things, people get stuck in their own fixed ideas and never progress any further.
That’s not to say that what was good about LRH and his tech and policy should not be used. it should. It just means that one should be open to new and different ways to do things.
We are not all just Robots. We can observe and learn and make decisions on our own.
“If it’s true for you, it’s true.”
Superb article.Thank you.
Fantastic post and comments.
Thank you for “bothering”.
“Because I want to help free those who are stuck in this Scientology dichotomy, and because I don’t want to see the demise of ideas and discoveries that can be effective in helping people in the future.”
You are doing this well and to the benefit of others.
Hi Dan,
This, to me, is a very useful piece of advice. I am in the position of coming to a gradual study of Scientology afresh from outside the church (having never been in), and I enjoy being able to look at what is being said both critically and also with a view to LRH’s having recognised some deep truths.
Sometimes I come across some real nuggets that seem to be the undoing of a lot of the problems that have arisen within the religion. Case in point, in the Ability Congress, “The Clear Defined”:
“There is an organization, I think they have a place over — called — I’ve forgotten the name of the place; it’s someplace in Italy, I think. And it tells people they *must*. And any time you solve things with telling people, ‘If you don’t believe, we are going to get you excommunicated,’ you don’t have a science, folks, you have a hoax.
If a man cannot be persuaded by the reasonability of a thing, it ain’t. As far as he’s concerned, it isn’t. So, why bother?”
I was listening to that last night actually, and as an interested person approaching from a little distance, it made me do a double-take; I had to get the transcript out to be certain of what he was saying there, but there it is.
Happily this coincides with the title of Marty’s latest blog entry too.
Warren, with regard to clipboards, scowls and the Scientology tech elite, have you had a chance yet to read Marty’s latest book, Memoirs of a Scientology Warrior? If not, I recommend chapters 9 and 10: “Scientology’s Peter Principle” and “A Matter of Life and Death.” I think you’d find it pertinent to this blog.
In response to the quote below:
” Wilber speaks of people attaining ecstatic, exalted altered states in their particular discipline that they consider to be so miraculous as to be without compare. They are convinced that they have found the only way, which results in a sort of tunnel vision and puts a figurative ceiling on their own continued growth and development. Such people become opinionated, exclusive and intolerant – ultimately repelling others from experiencing the transcendence they experienced and losing whatever they gained in the process.”
Absolutely. I have witnessed this firsthand not only with Scientology but also with two other separate cults which I had brief dalliances with. I did not stick long with the other 2 (They did not have KSW or KCW (keeping the cult fill-in-the blank working) I did experience brief ecstatic altered states which felt unsurpassed by previous experience but eventually realized that this was NOT the exclusive realm of any particular discipline but could rather be experienced by any Self who had the discipline to do the work and that thanks to the widespread availability of knowledge today one can get there by eliminating out of their practice the mistakes of earlier seekers.
I feel that by eliminating 99 percent of the errors one is prone to make if they had nobody who took the path ahead of them to point out pitfalls AND by actually having enough self-discipline to practice, by Oneself, one has a fair shot at experiencing the Indescribable.
Also, I attended a lecture quite by accident given by Marta Szabo who wrote the Memoir The Guru Looked Good based on her own experiences getting trapped into a certain cult and how she eventually cognited her mistake.
Listening to her tale very definitely reminded me of my entrance into Scientology and later into another discipline which I subsequently bailed from.
In short Scientology is a two terminal practice, so in that you have another terminal (auditor) there is the potential for rapid “case gain”.
While, in say, meditation, you practice by yourself, however there is in many if not most meditation disciplines an “object” if you will, of your meditation
which can serve to keep one focused. It is all about the practice.
Bottom line- Only one way? Lol, Lol, Lol!
I had an epiphany about this subject this other day, which could be applicable to this blog and to Geir Isene’s blog also. The question being, is there some fundamental problem or outness to SCN that lead to the mess we are in? My answer is yes.
First I should say that I am thankful for SCN for both the gains received but also for opening up my path to spiritual freedom. Second, I should say that I see SCN as seriously flawed. That flaw is most seen in its most important PL…KSW 1. LRH did not figure it all out, nor did he have the answers to everyone’s freedom. He did, with the help of others, figure some things out.
From LRH’s ego came the claim that one must only do SCN, but also that one must do it all now!!! You see, I do not believe you can do it all now, nor do I believe you can achieve total freedom with that pushed PTP in full bloom. You MAY be able to, but most of us cannot. I believe many of us have a lot of real-life work to do to “earn the rights” to freedom. Whether one believes we are cleaning out our own karma from the past or whether one believes we are earning the “merits” to freedom, I do not believe any one path can be a guarantee to freedom this life time. To add on some “urgency” that nothing else matters is an additional flaw.
So the problems are: 1) ego claiming this is the only way, 2) it has to be done this lifetime as no one else has ever had the opportunity in the trillions of years of the universe. This in itself creates a stuckness and GPM that creates more problems. It is a lie and invalidates all earlier religions.
If we are beings, without time-place-form-event, who the hell cares how long it takes. Just continue on your path to freedom. We all need to take responsibility for our lives and dynamics.
LRH did some good, but he killed SCN with KSW and ego. You see, I believe he had a lot more work to do to clear out his own ego and negative karma. It caught up with him and is thus reflected on his tech and the Church.
I wonder if people will be able to use the tech into the future…that would be great. Can you do that in the face of KSW? I do not know.
As a result, the Church and LRH started to focus way too much on getting rid of all case. They should have focused more on training and what you do in life. That is what one needs to do to “balance life and karma.” The urgency for case now as we have the only way EVER is the major flaw.
Excellent, cogent essay. I recall being amazed at a reg in the St. Louis Org telling me he has NEVER known LRon to be wrong. I thought he was an anomaly. Little did I know where and how this attitude was developed.
Very good post. I saw the same problem growing up in a fundamentalist christian church. “We are the only church with the right message. All other denominations are wrong.” That kind of thinking helped lead me to be an atheist. Once you see the inconsistencies, the lies, the hypocrisy, etc., what is there to turn to?
Just an aside about where i come from: I studied anthropology and archaeology and read about religion from the neanderthal burials at Mt Carmel to.modern movements such as Scientology. I am an atheist but I can see some of the ways people benefit from religion and I “live and let live” as long as nobody is being harmed. I’ve seen a lot of harm in corporate Scientology.
Marty, I used to wonder why someone so intelligent and well-read was still so involved in Scientology, but your writings here over the past month and your book (I’m halfway through) have made it clear to me that you’ve managed to keep what is good and helpful and set aside what is dangerous and hurtful. That can’t have been easy to do. Much respect!
Ps: My only complaint is that your books aren’t available on nook (but I’m managing)
That’s not just a nugget it’s the HOPE diamond of the gems in Ron’s body of data he lectured and wrote over the early years of the evolution of his tech. Thank you so much for putting it on the thread here rainbodhi. THAT’S the man who had a philosophy that got my attention in the first place.
Thank You Marty. This really goes to the very heart of why it can be so very hard to “move on,” so to speak.
For anyone who has had a lot of gains from Scientology, it can be necessary to isolate what is wrong so that one can walk away with what is right still intact.
To do otherwise tends to invalidate the gains one really had but became “owned” by “the tech” rather than oneself.
Really great post.
Very interesting observations. I saw much of this too. Yes, as per the Book of Case Remedies: ” At the lowest place on the route up, one finds the roughest auditing conditions.” and “The secret of handling the preclear is getting the pc wins he or she can have in the world he or she is living in, and getting more and more such wins, until new gains are acceptable and therefore stable.”
Most people in the SO were recruited early on in their Scientology experience and had few, if any, wins in auditing. And then, for most, they don’t get much while in. Most just get sec check after sec check. And those were mostly intended for political reasons, to keep us in control.
Those who had not had wins in their auditing looked for, I think, acknowledgement or approval from their seniors as a “win”. And that ties in with rewards and penances, which joins at the hip with stimulus-response behavioral psychology which winds up with a bunch of half mad, half broken people in “the hole.” Even though, for most of us, we never had to experience anything quite that bad, there were plenty of experiences we all had that were at a close enough parallel.
Speaking as a non-Scientologist, I see a lot of truth and value in its philosophy that I have studied. There is too much that accords (sometimes quite masterfully) with deep teachings of Eastern religion, for it not to be taken seriously to some degree.
Furthermore, there are many unique and compelling presentations of (and perspectives on) subjects that are not found or emphasised in other religions whatsoever – and yet they are still potentially able to work within the philosophical and cosmological models presented in those scriptures.
As such, I think that a case for a degree of exceptionalism can be made. In order to really reach people, it’s important to make a strong case as to why a particular teaching opens the door to life’s answers – and it needs to be able to set itself apart with distinction.
The downfall is, as always, getting lost in this so thoroughly and unthinkingly that other people are repelled; and its corollary: rejecting a sole truth claim.
I hear a lot about the loss of one’s “eternity” in Scientology. But according to its own teachings, wouldn’t people just keep reincarnating until there is a decision or opportunity to connect again?
Surely it can’t be held that you must finish the entire Bridge in this very life “or else” – what happens to those who pass on before they are able to do that, for instance?
And who has the right or the power to cut a Thetan off from finding their true nature, forever?
When Hubbard makes truth claims about being the “only”, it sounds to me like a device; in some lectures, it could easily be seen that way (“there have never been Clears before, because we don’t have the evidence”, to paraphrase) – how are we to make sense of it otherwise?
I keep coming across statement after statement that run contrary to some of the statements and policies that have been posing difficulties. In light of that, isn’t it paramount to apply logic, common sense, inquiry, and a bit of kindness as fundamental principles?
If it is truly believed that every single being is a Theta being, is there nothing more wonderful than the acknowledgement of that? Why does there seem to be such a difficulty in recognising this, given the way that some hardline Scientologists conduct themselves? A Thetan is precious by their very nature; shouldn’t this be upheld as being of central importance?
To me, these are some important questions to ask in order to start unravelling the problems.
In the end though, there is nothing stopping LRH, or former life Scientologists for that matter, from coming back again to help and restore everything.
In a way, maybe it’s better to step back and try to find a bigger view.
My pleasure, Gayle! 🙂
I think that if there is a case for urgency, it is that people are suffering and need help. If it is possible to attain enlightenment in this lifetime, I think it’s worth pursuing for that reason alone – so long as one doesn’t render oneself helpless in the process!
Pingback: Scientology: The root cause of the harm | Geir Isene
I did a follow-up on this with a blog post titled, “Scientology: The root cause of the harm”:
Interesting co-creation here, Marty 🙂
I have always agreed with Mosie sinice day one. She sends the message straight home “I am not the one standing here making an ass of myself in front of the whole world”. It doesn’t take too much of a brain for ANYONE to realize that people coming to anyone’s house dressed the way these freaks are and with that kind of demeanor IS making an ass of themselves in front of the whole world, not to mention the neighbors across the street. It just takes a little TR’s to notice. This is what the members of the church are normally like:
“You are god damned right I am f*****g standing here putting you down you low life with the out ethics blog because I am a god damned f*****g Scientologist that’s why and if I want to come to your house at 2:00 in the morning with the Squirrel Busters I will because my ethics are IN”.
Mosey, you are a true friend. How much brains does it take to know that this person is a moron, never mind trespassing and harassing people? 🙂 I laugh when I think of this! 🙂 What is so trend setting about these Squirrel Busters? 🙂 Hey man! 🙂 Thank you Mosey! 🙂
Excellent summary. I’ve rarely seen a connection and conclusion about this subject made with such efficacy.
I believe you will accomplish your purpose of enlightening these misguided souls to understanding the snarl they are in if you keep releasing short and to the point observations like this.
Great post Marty. I don’t think is even about Scientology. Fanatics and Bible thumpers appear in every field. The book “Hawaii” by James Michener published in 1959 illustrates how these driven types and the intolerance and entitlement are purposed with DOMINATION at all costs.
And when you get to the bottom of the glue that holds it together, it is NEVER about religion. It is simply about DOMINATION. DO MIN A TION.
“Let’s PUT SOME CONTROL in on this society, Let’s CIVILIZE these miscreants. Let’s make them GOOD ”
Recommended reading , an expose on how damaging these types are when entrusted with government:
With God On Their Side: How Christian Fundamentalists Trampled Science, Policy, And Democracy In George W. Bush’s White House
Editorial Reviews
Review
A call to arms to battle those forces who want to return America to the dark ages. — Janeane Garofalo
A riveting account of the radical right’s assault on science and family planning…A frightening and necessary read. — Ms.
A truly shocking dossier of recent religious fundamentalist incursions into the soul of American democracy. — Tony Kushner
Kaplan’s exposé is welcome—and alarming. — Mike Marqusee, The Independent [London]
Scrupulously researched and documented, and enlivened by Kaplan’s trenchant reportage…[a] journalistic masterpiece. — Mark Crispin Miller, Globe and Mail
At the Flag Land Base the book “The Secret” was declared on Golden Rod. Can you imagine what would happen to a staffer carrying around a book by Crowley? Even though Hubbard himself recommended it? I know of one staffer that was comm eved for buying a magazine subscription. A magazine about motorcycles!
Hip Hip, Hooray! Hip Hip, Hooray!
Agreed.
“Art, Science and religion are all branches of the same tree”
Albert Einstein
Good dissection Marty. Super egoic indeed. Permeates the whole system. If LRH had been possessed of true humility it would already be game over. But he wasn’t and the game goes on with the added handicap of the worst PR since Nazi Germany. I believe you doing the right thing and that its the only way forward in which the tech can make some broad inroads, gain acceptance, and do good on a larger scale. Others may not like it, but from a 3rd and 4th dynamic viewpoint, from a PR viewpoint, they are dead in the water as they now stand and unable and or unwilling to reform a seriously flawed organization. Looking forward to your next book.
To dove-tail TO,
“Who controls the food supply controls the people; who controls the energy can control whole continents; who controls money can control the world.” – Henry Kissinger
My song for the evening:
I read the news today oh, boy
About a lucky man who made the grade
And though the news was rather sad
Well, I just had to laugh
I saw the photograph
He blew his mind out in a car
He didn’t notice that the lights had changed
A crowd of people stood and stared
They’d seen his face before
Nobody was really sure if he was from the house of lords
I saw a film today oh, boy
The english army had just won the war
A crowd of people turned away
But I just had to look
Having read the book
I’d love to turn you on.
Woke up, fell out of bed
Dragged a comb across my head
Found my way downstairs and drank a cup
And looking up, I noticed I was late
Found my coat and grabbed my hat
Made the bus in seconds flat
Found my way upstairs and had a smoke
And somebody spoke and I went into a dream
Ah
I read the news today oh, boy
Four thousand holes in blackburn, lancashire
And though the holes were rather small
They had to count them all
Now they know how many holes it takes to fill the albert hall
I’d love to turn you on
Why bother?
“I’d love to turn you on”.
I believe that until we honestly and fully evaluate and get to the very root causes of the problems with Scientology, until we carve out what is rotting it from within, we will not be able to fully recover the awesome it harbors.
A=A.
That is too much! 🙂 That is too much! 🙂 Holy crow, and I thought I was funny once in a while. I am happier to listen to you! 🙂
Yes, this is a fine post, Marty.
“Religion is a system of wishful illusions together with a disavowal of reality, such as we find nowhere else but in a state of blissful hallucinatory confusion. Religion’s eleventh commandment is “Thou shalt not question.”
― Sigmund Freud, The Future of an Illusion
“Religion is a system of wishful illusions together with a disavowal of reality, such as we find nowhere else but in a state of blissful hallucinatory confusion. Religion’s eleventh commandment is “Thou shalt not question.”
― Sigmund Freud, The Future of an Illusion
Men cannot remain children for ever; they must in the end go out into ‘hostile life’. We may call this ‘education to reality. Need I confess to you that the whole purpose of my book is to point out the necessity for this forward step?”
― Sigmund Freud, The Future of an Illusion
“Where questions of religion are concerned, people are guilty of every possible sort of dishonesty and intellectual misdemeanor.”
― Sigmund Freud, The Future of an Illusion
“…perhaps the hopes I have confessed to are of an illusory nature, too. But I hold fast to one distinction. Apart from the fact that no penalty is imposed for not sharing them, my illusions are not, like religious ones, incapable of correction.”
― Sigmund Freud, The Future of an Illusion
Sorry TO.
You’ve offered up a Main Steam Media (MSM) clip that I find, frankly, putrid. Do a Google search on who Bill Maher’s brother is.
All things MSM are a mind fuck game. And it’s all run by some few old lunatics who identify themselves as Zionists who front for some European black nobility financiers.
May they all burn in a concept called hell. They’ve already screwed mankind. It’s about time us folks said that’s it and that’s enough.
Unfortunately, we are not there yet. Here’s a song that should get the point across….
Is some little apologize to David Mayo & free scientologists of the 80s needed at this point?
Excellent post Marty. I totally get where you’re coming from – this is a post-grad course to your books – sort of.
I several times observed a recruiter getting a potential recruit who wasn’t fully on board a session or some action so that they may have “the cognition”. The cognition being along the lines that “Scientology is IT”. This is the process as you so accurately state it of “exalted altered states … that they consider to be so miraculous as to be without compare. They are convinced that they have found the only way..” From an outsider point of view this is quite sinister – but the recruiters in question no doubt had “the cognition” themselves so it seems entirely reasonable. And thus a cult is born.
Just to answer your question without evaluating it: gung-ho, on purpose, OT, big being, super being, in ethics, high confront, with good intentions, ton40, snap and pop, unreasonable, crystal clear, uptone, upstat ….. ad nausuam 😀
I don’t agree with those labels but there are a lot like in every club, religion, group, company, politcal groups, races etc. ….
I agree and would like to add that there is a mechanism behind this creation of certainty.
Man is used to optimize his actions. The question is always: How can I create more with less energy and/or in less time?
We do this every day. All inventions like industry, tools etc. have this concept at the back of it. And we don’t invent the same tool again. We TRUST the inventor and/or builder and just use it to do our own job more effective/faster etc.
This works in day to day life. And then one engages in Scientology. And after a few wins one starts to trust LRH and thinks „Why searching myself the next years through endless books and philosophies if LRH did that work already for me?“
So one starts to optimize one‘s search. Based on that this certainty builds up. And one stops to look critical, investigative etc. as one trusts the „inventor“ or finder of knowledge etc.
This mechanism is the backbone of our evolution. We build on things that got found out before. It’s an important mechanism.
This mechanism however is not quite working when one deals with his own spirutal search ….
IMHO 😉
.
I’m not seeing much acknowledgement of the existence of a 3rd-dynamic reactive bank in this discussion. Isn’t it pretty clear to those of you have evolved and integrated, that the problems the Church is encountering are the same types of problems that the US gov’t, itself, is suffering – namely, infiltration by people whose intention is to do harm, rather than good?
I mean, I look at the NSA and what the US has allowed itself to become, and I see very many parallels with what DM is creating internally in the Church. Doesn’t your Auditor training give you a real handling for this situation – that in fact aberration is contagious, that we are capable of transmitting valences and personalities – both destructive as well as creative – among ourselves on the 3rd dynamic, and that we are in fact being impacted by the effects of the facsimile upon the individual, amplified through the group?
Because, thats how I see it. Either we take responsibility for the dramatization of the 3rd and 4th dynamics towards counter-survival, cannibalistic behaviour, or we don’t. This isn’t a Scientology-caused thing: Scientology is simply designed to put a person at more cause over the phenomenon. Whether their intention is to eradicate the problem, or profit it from it somehow in their daily lives (Terror Industry veterans, I’m talking about) is what actually makes the difference.
Intention *IS* important in Scientology. If you intend to enslave and trap: you’ve got a mighty powerful tool to do so. If your intention is to help and enlighten, evolve, integrate .. then Scientology works extremely well too. This is the problem with Truth: whatever the truth may be, the intention of the observer and what they do with the Truth, is the only thing that matters. Books don’t kill people; people use books to kill people.
“…it just as intensively and effectively conditions those new found abilities onto worshipping and defending to the death the construct that made them possible.”
Very astute observation. What exacerbates this condition is the often imaginary or embellished “threats” against Scn. While LRH is certainly guilty of rallying the troops against the “enemies” of Scn, RCS has institutionalized it to the point where it is no longer questioned.
“Such people become opinionated, exclusive and intolerant…”
The church could recognize this phenomenon as a case manifestation that will get sorted out with auditing or training, and/or possibly with age and maturity. Unfortunately, this has become the accepted norm, even desirable. Witness the Tom Cruise/Matt Lauer confrontation: most Scnist I know applauded Cruise’s performance and conduct as “ballsy” and “tough” for setting Matt straight and “telling it like it is.”
I note that it is not limited to “RCS” and ‘the church.’ ref: https://markrathbun.wordpress.com/2013/06/20/the-way-out-is-not-the-way-back-in/
Your continued fixation on the ‘church’ being the root of all evils (or the 12 from RJ 67, if that is your point) is fatally flawed: see, e.g. https://markrathbun.wordpress.com/2013/06/20/the-way-out-is-not-the-way-back-in/
Paolo, did you read my book, Memoirs of a Scientology Warrior?
I did as you suggested. Quite frankly, the attacks on him through his brother sound, in logic and tone, much like the church of Scientology’s attack upon me through mine. It is a rather weak, paranoid and creepy line of attack in my view.
absolutely.
No, sorry I haven’t. From your answer, I guess you did it in there, and i am happy for that, but I was not thinking about what you did 30 years ago that is almost history now, but it is about what you wrote a couple of years ago. Anyway, back in the 80s one of the most red non scn book in the AACs was “The Tao of the Physics”!:)
“urgency” ….now that’s one helluva a program based in fear that gets abundant use. Selling/pushing the idea that time is running out is a most efficacious method of making the unreal appear to be real. The church was incredibly adept in its application of the urgency program.
Tom,
You keep going off on a tangent, looking for other boogey men.
Religious compulsion is its own brand of psychosis.
Hi Marty
I loved your post and some great responses. This phenomenon that Ken Wilber speaks of I am well aware of having experienced in The Church of Scientology and then in Christianity as a “born-again” believer. In fact I found the phenomenon so debilitating that I finally gave up both the label of Christian and Scientologist. I had for some time been aware that the essence of Jesus’s teaching was unconditional love and that the essence of Scientology was understanding, my problem was how to harmonise LOVE and UNDERSTANDING. My breakthrough came with the cognition that I did not understand understanding.
There are two ways of understanding understanding. One, when applying it to the MEST universe, and an entirely different way when applying it to the THETA UNIVERSE. When applying understanding to the MEST universe one uses JUDGEMENT, but when applying it to the THETA universe one uses NON-JUDGEMENT and hence UNDERSTANDING becomes STANDING-UNDER. What changes understanding to standing under is when FEAR IS REPLACED WITH LOVE, 8008, the goal of auditing.
Thanks. Do you have any apologies to share here? Or are you the Ethics Officer?
Marty,
Your posts are getting closer and closer to As-is-ness.
You are masterfully threading on that very fine line of pure considerations.
My two cents on this, is that before anybody launches Dharma III, they should thoroughly complete the evaluation of the subject at hand.
The main areas to be reviewed and hopefully solved, I think should be:
It is the approach to the subject going to be scientific or religious? Apart from any legal necessities.
Is the idea of Source going to be debunked and/or properly assigned its correct importance and place?
Will the idea of Scientology as a servomechanism to the mind be finally assigned its exact importance and role within the rest of the humanities?
Will the study and application of Scientology occur within the context of all other fields of human knowledge?
Those questions should also be tackled personally by anybody who is practicing the subject right now, whether as a pc or practitioner.
Just my thoughts.
bkelly – I certainly don’t need to answer for Marty, but I’ll just say from my observation that he has never expressed any point of view that would counter the idea of seeing “the workable technology of Scientology used and protected for others to use.” Seems to me that a large part of what he is doing is to comment on the parts of Scientology that are not workable or desirable so THAT the very workable and valuable parts will not be lost to future folks who might want to study and use them.
Yeah, that would be a Guilt By Association fallacy as well as an Ad Hominem fallacy. Sadly, this sort of fallacy is all to common in the
land of PR (planned efforts to control and manipulate opinion).
Michael A. Hobson
Independent Scientologist
Hans – you nailed it. The data you mentioned is TREMENDOUSLY valuable stuff for success all along the dynamics in every day living (and someone like Alonzo somehow can never understand this). My life is immeasurably better by what I learned in Scientology. It is very unfortunate that LRH and the Church dramatized totalitarianism and oppressive religion in the years after the basic books, but such is life. The answer to that is to gain more truth and understanding of what occurred and I think this blog goes a long way to doing that. And as Scientology professes to be ABOUT life, then yes, it had better integrate WITH life if it wants to survive as a relevant subject.
Oracle – was this the mag that has the hot bikini chicks sitting on the cycles? Just sayin’.
Great point Oracle. Service Fac brackets rule so much of Earth behavior and especially when it comes to religions which have organized to “save” people or control third dynamics. (in my humble opinion, most of the attacks against Pres Obama one sees on facebook and all over the internet are simply driven by a sort of religious fanaticism – he represents “sinners” – gays, pro-choicers, etc – and the evil must be fought and destroyed.)
“To apologize” is not a terminology used by an Ethic Officer. it is more Buddhist or Christian!
Marty, Geir,
2 wonderful posts. Written by 2 very dedicated former Scientologists, who went all the (orthodox) way through for many years, until finally came the other side, gaining and actually practicing the ability:to kick it all to pieces, throw it all to hell, and now look at it all again with new eyes: as Masters,not students any more. Seeing what they are seeing, and knowing what they are knowing. Any chance that was part of the plan? The plan without which you 2 could not have risen to where you are now? Am I going too far? Too fantastic? May be.
Has it ever occurred to you that all this bad, negative blended with the good and positive, installed in the system by Ron, that you consider a series of mistakes – that this was part of the grand plan to really get beings free? Sounds crazy? May be it is.
But consider: For you, Marty, Geir, or anybody, being dedicated scientologists for many years, having to compromise your reality countless times in order to survive and continue with your wins and ‘eternity’, – to finally notice,see, overcome incredible inner struggles to admit what you saw and get back your integrity, and shout it loudly, come what may, this was and had to be an awesome OT task to accomplish. A task which marks the death of the student and the birth of a Master, of a Free Being. Independent thinker, and creator of thought.
And not being for sale any more. Is that not the ultimate test of an OT? To see truth where it is so difficult or impossible to see it? When it is so well hidden by heavy indoctrination, when it is extremely risky to go for it, when it seems there is an ultimate price to pay for it?
I know you both went through the above, each in his own way. You described those in detail. I know I did too. And it was Hard and soul shaking. Could anybody be real OT or real Being, or real anything, by just having always knowledge given to him on a silver plate without finally
getting him to go find the most difficult parts of it himself? No more Ron, Jesus, Lao Tzu, Guatama, Gurdjieff…around to hold his hand.
You 2 and quite a few others, have cut loose, only AFTER you went through the orthodox way. Now, you have come up one more step, you can cut loose the teacher’s cord, and become teachers yourselves. Marty, Geir, how would you have gotten to where you are today, Free
thinking Beings, if you did not have to confront this amazingly difficult situation, risky, heavy, where devoted, believing beings, accepting everything Ron said for years and years, having to confront the observation that your own sacred teacher and his system, are not only not perfect, but also strewed with negative elements? And risking losing everything, by confronting and stating. You had to go through huge integrity, observation, honesty, and yes: Strength tests, to be able to
survive and go higher.
It is well known that the greatest teachers, while indoctrinating heavily for long periods, than KNOWINGLY made the right situation for the prodigy student, to kick their teacher’s asses, tell them, SHOUT at them, that however great they are, they are also wrong and he, the student can do
better now, and then GOES ON AND DOES BETTER!!! this happens in any masterful teachings in any subject.
It is more than likely that great teachers, including Ron, have planned this, if they were worth anything. THEY HAD TO PLAN SUCH TOOL, SUCH DEVICE. Is that not much more probable than assuming these clever teachers, were so stupid as not to see this coming? You really believe Ron would say one day:
“You have to follow anything I say blindly or you are a criminal andbe declared”,
and the next day say:
Those things I tell you are true are not true because I tell you they are
true. And if anything I tell you, or have ever told you, is discovered to differ from the individual observation (be it a good observation), then it isn’t true! It doesn’t matter whether I said it was true or not. Do you
understand?”
Sorry, I don’t buy it. Too easy. I think I buy the next one as more likely what Ron really intended:
If you will just stay with me on this line, up to the first milestone in Scientology, and bring yourself up to a high level of ability and apply yourself to that, you will be free – free from me and from Scientology too!
This existence IS quite a trap. Ron’s Tech gets you out of many traps, in a big way. You both know, experienced and stated it. But that is not enough, because HE was there guiding all the time. That is the Tech. But to get us to become real trap destroyers and detectors, he, YES HE, set up the ultimate trap, in the most unexpected way and against all
odds and left us to get out of this one without help, and most importantly: ALONE, guided by nothing but ourselves. The ULTIMATE OT level. Or better to stay humble: the NEXT OT level.
Isn’t that more likely, than thinking this guy was so dumb not to have seen the dichotomies and contradictions he was setting? So dumb not to have seen how truth, freedom, kindness, theta, were mixed with ruthlessness, fanaticism, making the whole world wrong?
Life is a game. I think Ron (and others) got that one right. Ron stated clearly that he did not intend to dismantle this game. Getting everything and everybody good and positive and sacred and eliminating all bad and negative would have ended the game. No dichotomies – no game. He stated his intention was just to get beings to play better game. That’s all. And here we are, playing a great game..! Look at these blogs! God… full of brilliant posts, countless ideas, original thinkers, so many of them,
some sheep, some wolves, many rebels, but mostly beautiful beings. It has been similar with all great religions: new system/way put forth, very enlightening yet containing contradictions and seeds for both positive and negative. And some beings use these tools and transcend and others fall deeper into the trap, and have to go back to the end of the line and start all over again….
Good luck to all,
with love,
Hemi
The way out is not the way back in, my friend.
I just finished reading Memoirs of a Scientology Warrior. That was a great read. I finished it in two sittings. I understand where you’re at, and look forward to walking with you to where you’re headed. Have you considered writing some fiction? I think there’re some good spy and adventure stories inside you.
Interesting thoughts. Because Scientology by firm policy includes the harsh punishment of putting any of its results to any objective test, all we have to judge it by is our subjective observation and evaluation of the conduct and behavior of its products. One of my observation is that the ingrained, automatic justified thought mechanisms that make Scientologists assign any good to Source and any bad to being ‘off Source’ or misapplying Source, makes Scientology strikingly similar to any number of religions that demand love, devotion and surrender. And like any other religion, fundamentalist Scientologists are as dangerous as any other religious zealot.
Thanks. Edited out your last two sentences. I don’t permit this forum to be used for promoting the way back in, including links to forums that promote such. This forum is devoted to helping people to move on up a little higher, not back down into the filth they managed to survive.
Hemi — what a wonderful world this would be IF all the great teachers truly did build in this type of fail safe to ensure their followers would grow up and not be dependent on them.
To me — part of the proof of a teacher is how did the teacher die? Alone? Unloved? Disgraced? From over indulgence in liquor? etc.
IF we are to believe Marty’s book — very sadly LRH died quite alone (except for a few), unhappy and without his family.
Not my idea of someone who PLANNED it all so that WE would aha … rise above it.
No — I believe I gained tremendously from what LRH did — even the much maligned Sea Org was a great asset to my life.
And then when I left — it took years to sort through what had been 20 years (at that time) of my life — almost 1/2 of my life at that time.
I’m STILL sorting through stuff — working whether things I adopted as ULTIMATE truth are indeed true. It’s a daily process but I don’t for a minute think that LRH brilliantly planned all of this AND MY OWN SUFFERING so that one day I would stand on my own two feet.
IF he planned my own suffering — much of it caused by the auditing I received, the group belief surrounding divorce and how that should be handled etc etc — then I saw he’s absolutely someone I would never ever recommend HIS technology to.
No — he didn’t plan all this. It happened AS A RESULT of various things built into the technology that Marty (and Isene and others) are trying to tease apart. SO THAT the good doesn’t die with the bad.
In conclusion, I stopped believing in the tooth fairy a long time ago — although I will admit to believing in unicorns 🙂
Christine
Hemi: I’ve read s lot of fiction along these lines and the reading is never repeated. The great designer creating traps for his followers.in order to improve them is extremely cruel. Sequels have to deal with the hero’s sense of betrayal and guilt . Not a good story idea–worse to consider in real life.
I for one agree with you, bkelly.
More and more on this blog, it has come to FEEL (rightly or wrongly) that if one believes that “the technology of Scientology is the most advanced method ever devised by anyone to bring about heightened states of awareness”, and therefore wants it “used and protected for others to use”, one is viewed overwhelmingly as an intolerant zealot, a nazi or fascist who wants to make others wrong, look down on them, and/or force something on them.
And while there are many who do indeed manifest those characteristics, there are many who don’t, myself among them.
For 2 years I came to this blog daily, with anticipation, enjoying and participating in the discussion. But over the past several months, I visit much less frequently, and now always with apprehension. It FEELS as though the “middle ground” is no more – if one believes, as I do, that Scientology is a uniquely workable system, better than any others I’ve tried (which is by no means all that are extant), and therefore deserving of preservation and protection, one is considered a fanatic, a religious nut or zealot who overtly or covertly wants to lord it over his fellows. Or that believing in the uniqueness of Scientology, one becomes almost definitionally close-minded. Which is, again, true as applied to some – but not to all.
I would LOVE to be wrong about the observations I’ve expressed above. But I don’t think I am.
I believe that if you believe this is not the middle ground, you are on fundamentalist ground. There is not a single person in the world, inside or out of the church, who does more use and protection of Scientology (in its most efficient, effective mode of use) than myself. I know that sounds absurd to a fundamentalist mind. That is one of the problems this forum exists to help cure; because it is most certainly a malady.
Nice to see a diverse array of viewpoints enjoying a reasonable discourse.
In Scientology we gained,or believed we gained,admiration not from being or doing right but from toeing the party line unquestionably and vociferously denouncing any opposing viewpoints.
Even after leaving it took me a while to shed this operating basis in my day to day dealings. The inclination to sarcastically call out opposing points of view with straw man arguments and ad hominem attacks can be a difficult one to shed, but is vital if one wishes to progress on the journey of enlightenment.
.
Well, if I’m a fundamentalist, then that term occupies a huge portion of the spectrum of possibilities. Since my own support of and active participation in the Church of Scientology under one DM ended nearly 3 decades ago – out of total disagreement with management policies and practices. A series of disagreements that has only grown larger with the passage of time.
I believe I understand what you are trying to do, and I admire you for doing it. It just seems to me that some, especially in the comments, are taking your efforts to be embracive and inclusive as an opportunity to “deconstruct” Scientology and LRH, both the good and the bad. Maybe this is not what’s happening, in which case my perceptions need some fine tuning. Wouldn’t be the first time.
Well,if Scientologists can’t confront and deal with disagreement and protest at their behavior, practices and aims their subject is as good as dead. They are getting trampled in the marketplace of ideas. The solution is not to run from it and create yet another cult light. The solution is to man up. Look at your original comment. Did you even read my post? It stated: L. Ron Hubbard developed a number of unique, aggressive methods for tackling problems of the human psyche. Used intelligently there is nothing that compares to their direct, predictable effectiveness in intensifying present awareness. Then it proceeded to constructively analyze so as to increase the intelligence with which it is used. Why aren’t you supporting my argument with those whose comments have bent you out of shape – and whose ideas you have apparently transferred to me?
” I am going to try to address this concern as directly and succinctly as I can.”
Nicely done.
Fully agreed, Joe.
Right now I believe we are experiencing the throes of “integrating Scientology” or “transformed Scientology” or something like that. This concept is so new that it has not yet been grasped or appreciated by too many people who are used to sticking to *everything* ever written by LRH ( no matter how contradicting it might be ). But time will change this.
I am still not sure.
There are many justifications for overts. “Certainty” would be one justification. So would any of the Deadly Sins, such as Jealousy, or Greed. So would affection, as in “All’s fair in Love and War”. An Overt is still an Overt.
The excesses of the Church are justified by “Certainty”?. I am not sure about that.
Seems to me that excesses are justified by the fun of excesses. Stealing is fun, drug use is fun, disrupting others relationships is fun, harming children is fun. Overts against the Dynamics prove that one is strong.
I call this the “Dark-side of Scientology”, just like Star Wars. Committing overts against the Dynamics to achieve personal success.
Registrar-ing some fool into maxing-out his credit to pay for a bronze plaque results in overt harm to the fool. Is Certainty involved? The thrill of causing harm is enough. The confidence that the group supports this activity is helpful. The “Certainty” that Scientology is valid, does not seem very close to being a significant motivator.
Perhaps I am not thinking this through.
Thank you for bothering Marty. This article hit homerun for me!!!
I offer up this book for consideration, by Sheldon Kopp. If You Meet the Buddha on the Road, Kill Him! The pilgrimage of psychotherapy patients. The tittle says it all. The meaning seems obvious to me… don’t be attached to the guru/therapist but find your own truth…. but I was amazed at all the different interpretations people came with on Yahoo Answers.
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100205114032AAWFgOP
I read it a couple of years ago. And it has added nuance when you consider that Hubbard implied he was Maitreya… the Buddha returned.
You are too polite Marty.
Brilliant.
Bill Maher doen’t have a brother. He is one of two children, his sibling is his sister Kathy.
I believe that.
Don’t give up Marty and Mosley. I think your both really brave.
Mea Culpa: It is Bill Maher’s father, not a brother, my mistake, sorry, who was a senior corporate news editor for NBC out of New York city, main stream news center of the world.
When I viewed the post from The Oracle I found it offensive that an avowed atheist who espouses other highly debatable issues pontificates from his media throne.
All US media is now controlled by six, YES SIX(6), conglomerates.
Here’s the point, anyone who can garner a Main Stream Media position like himself or his father have had to have sold their ‘soul’ to the devil seated and centered in the City-based Tavistock Institute and orchestrated through one of the abc organizations like the NSA.
Nothing, NOTHING, is shown on American TV that isn’t read off a teleprompter and or sanitized at highest levels before it hits the airwaves.
Bill Maher reads from a script and a story board. Otherwise he’d be an unknown .
Bill Maher and all he represents and forwards still makes me want to puke.
What I found particularity repugnant in this video was Bill Maher’s denigration of a 5 year old’s viewpoint and understanding of his own life.
Bill Maher is a scripted puke. I’ve also got a sense he’s a sociopath on the TV screen that invades living rooms and minds.
It would be interesting to see Martha Stout’s observation of someone like Maher who always has to win.
Bill Maher reads from a script and a story board. Otherwise he’d be an unknown I respectfully disagree. I’d bet everything I own on him in a spontaneous debate with a neutral voting audience against just about anybody paid to pontificate about politics.
Agreed, Maher is a formidable orator. That doesn’t make the point of his argument(s) right though, does it? You know, those ethical and moral considerations. Unfortunately. compromises can be made for a couple of million or so. Maybe even less. Look at the Senate or Congress. Key positions are held with run of the mill blackmail.
Regards politics, I believe we should have direct democracy, internet based. It couldn’t do anymore harm that the current kleptocracy!
The Swiss have the most workable model I know of.
Unicorns then, will be our point of agreement. Great beings. As to teachers/masters, how about Jesus and HIS disgraced death? Yet he was a great teacher with huge impact. Good and bad impact…What you say has truth in it too. I am not saying Ron planned it ALL, just the general design/principle and the final graduation option from a cult HE KNEW AND STATED might rise. Please observe, so many people are seeing and learning this great lesson and graduating. We believe that there are more Indies than people inside. And the trend grows. And we become stronger than before. And we did suffer greatly to earn this freedom which we will cherish more than ever. But we all needed a MAJOR lesson: receiving gifts of truth and freedom (which we all did while in CoS), should never shut our eyes and put us to sleep ever again. A lesson truly learned through exactly what happened. Sure, I might be wrong on that one, the only always right person seems to be Dave… But a plan like this is potentially incredibly smart, in getting high level results. And passing the cult test, the indotrination and implants tests, can only be achieved genuinely, coming from each individual using his own observation and integrity against all odds. Cannot be passed verbally and casually to the ones still indoctrinated, they won’t listen…cannot be achieved by a valence. has to be seen by self to be believed..
Best of luck in sorting things out!
My best,
Hemi
Quoting LRH via Bodhi, “And any time you solve things with telling people, ‘If you don’t believe, we are going to get you excommunicated,’ you don’t have a science, folks, you have a hoax.”
It is these types of nuggets that make me cross-eyed. Hubbard also demanded adherence to his KSW policy. You MUST believe in everything you haven’t even studied yet when you read KSW. After all, he would rather have us dead than incapable. Therefore, believe what he promulgates in KSW, or be dead rather than wasting the time and efforts of those who believe.
Am I wrong in this summation?
Nancy
Guys, this is Marty’s blog – a place for his personal exploration and thought processes which he generously invites us to share. If you have read any of Marty’s books, it is very clear that he deeply supports a great deal, if not the vast majority of LRH’s tech and works. IF (that’s a big IF) you are willing to sort the vast writings of LRH into various categories beyond those that can be unanimously accepted, you must spend a great deal of time and energy into not merely disagreeing, but making salient points that support your disagreement. This takes a great deal more time than simply acknowledging what works. Reasoned disagreement is deeply time consuming. Agreement takes a nanosecond.
Nancy
Publius – If I may. Personally, I believe you have good perceptions and also the ability to fine tune them when you see fit. If you truly believe the statement: “the technology of Scientology is the most advanced method ever devised by anyone to bring about heightened states of awareness” – and your only support and participation ended over “total disagreement with management policies and practices.” — then, yes, I believe you would be considered a fundamentalist.
If you actually fit the following more – “if one believes, as I do, that Scientology is a uniquely workable system, better than any others I’ve tried (which is by no means all that are extant), and therefore deserving of preservation and protection” then you are in the middle ground.
This is quite similar to what Marty posted of “Used intelligently there is nothing that compares to their direct, predictable effectiveness in intensifying present awareness.”
I think, if you will compare a “workable system” and “predictable effectiveness”, that you will find this very different from the “MOST ADVANCED method EVER devised by ANYONE….” That type of think immediately closes the door on any other developments; and borders on arrogance.
This does not take away from the gains available by the proper application of the gems in the tech. There is no need to have the attitude that this is the top of anything. It is just workable and effective. I see no need to deconstruct it but that does not mean we should blindly close the door to enhancing it and integrating new ideas. If someone came out with a better meter would it not make sense to utilize it.
An example – if the necessary steps to heal the proteins in the bi-lipid cell membranes was integrated into the purif then you could actually remove heavy metals and certain chemical toxins. Once these have damaged the cell wall there is no way to eject the offending toxin short of death to the cell. Heal the cell, increase the internal ATP (molecule used in all cells for energy) and allow the cell to eject the toxin and then get it removed from the body. That is what is the value of the purif.
If the offending toxin is interfering with case gain and the technology to handle was not known to LRH then why the heck should it be ignored. As an aside on this subject this process will take far longer than a purif done today but the end result allows the restoration of health and vitality to the host body. Not to slight the purif tech at all. The truth is this additional procedure may be needed by some to handle the drugs in their body. The fact is there are advancements in knowledge available today and their potential benefit to all is immediately rejected once one “believes” that the BEST thing EVER invented by ANYONE, etc.
Having followed many of your posts for years I truly believe you are capable of understanding this. In understanding it and the use of the effective and workable parts of scientology then a good future result can be achieved. If you didn’t believe in that I don’t feel you would be following this subject after the 30 years of withdrawing your support to part of it.
The why: contrary facts coupled with ‘the only way’ resulting in loss of integrity / robotism / loss of observation.
Final result: A mass
Hi,
I find it interesting to see the different interpretations too – and I think this is something that Zen sayings are great at evoking in us.
I interpret it similarly: “the path itself can become an obstacle to realisation”.
On the subject of LRH’s relationship to Metteyya (Maitreya), I agree that he implied a very close identification (“Address me and you address Lord Buddha. Address Lord Buddha and you then address Metteyya.”), but it was carefully posed in the form of a question, perhaps intended to leave a little bit of room.
It’s interesting how the Buddhist narrative was subtly woven into Scientology at a very early stage. In fact, I find the early editorial propaganda surrounding this to be strangely hagiographic. This was clearly played down by the church over a period of time, but I don’t think they’ve ever found a way to address or present it sensibly.
I find your mention of the Zen koan to be very pertinent at this time, thank you for sharing it. 🙂
Hi Pip,
I am intrigued by your mini-exposition of Theta/MEST theory. Would you be able to give any further references on where to look in the materials for coming to this understanding?
I wasn’t arguing the substance. If I did, this thread would go far astray.
Wonderful integration and articulation Pip! Thank you much.
It looks like I was not banned by you Marty since my comment today appeared “awaiting moderation”. The other day I couldn’t post. I don’t know why. Anyway…
Maybe I was hard on you when I said “when you see your 3rd and 4th dynamics we speak again”. But you have also been hard on me and others when you keep calling us hard core Scientologists and fanatics. There is no such a thing, as a hard core Scientologist. The emphasis should be placed on being able to apply Standard Tech. If that’s considered hard core, why bother all those years?
In any case it’s good to see I haven’t been banned.
We may disagree much on how one should go about life but, hey, isn’t that a big thing: to be able to disagree, fight sometimes and then be able again to keep communicating.
I have been on this blog for 4 years and it’s wrong when you said I didn’t learn anything from you. I did. I did open up my view on things but I wouldn’t like that to make me now so “open minded” so that I don’t see the benefits of the Tech. Or let other be attacked when they try to do something on a more organised basis, which you disagree with (and permit me to say, I don’t know why!!!) Our disagreement is how rigid and ruthless is that Tech and given that you have been applying it under the influence of a suppressive (DM) for so many years, I can assure you that you have just seen that “rigid” side. Out here, the Tech does not have to be “rigid” or “ruthless”. It can be just applied in a more organised way so that more can benefit from it. thank you.
First, do you have a rational thought to share about the post you are commenting under?
Second, you noted ‘given that you have been applying it under the influence of a suppressive (DM) for so many years, I can assure you that you have just seen that “rigid” side.’ In fact, I have delivered more on the outside than your 11 apostles combined, while taking the brunt of attacks making it possible for them to do the same. It is amazing how fundamentalists are so susceptible to receiving pat lines from their opinion leaders that they spit them out as dead-certain judgments about people. No, I am still waiting for a glimmer of evidence that you have learned a thing here Theo, https://markrathbun.wordpress.com/2013/02/15/sitting-in-judgment/
Marty: “The whole package – taken as the whole package requires it be taken – leads inevitably to all of the ills ex-scientologists, those effected by Scientologists, and Scientologists (including and especially independent ones) seem to make a pastime out of clamoring about.”
Spyros: And as per KSW1, it also leads to anti-SCNists attacking SCN as well 🙂
(but “no, we are perfect, it’s just that there are SPs out there”) 😛
According to my research .Scientology has been altered by the church of scientology since at least the early seventies.
I think the church of scientology has been used to bring down L.ron Hubbard and scientology.
Hi Nancy,
Choose the nice bits. 😉
In all seriousness, though, I think that there’s a place to apply something wisely and thoughtfully. All religions have contradictions, but a resolution can sometimes become apparent through understanding the underlying meaning.
Accepting or rejecting completely can lead to serious problems.
If these kinds of nuggets aren’t supposed to be thought about, or have become completely depreciated, then why are the books and lectures containing them still issued to this day, as they have been since inception? As curios?
It’s entirely possible for a teacher to change their mind, but if that’s the case, there’s even more reason to think carefully and try to understand why.
It doesn’t make any sense to accept something that one hasn’t even studied, particularly when the premise is to find out for oneself. I do understand the importance of being committed – but shouldn’t the commitment be to study with wisdom and personal integrity?
The mindless adherence to black-and-white storylines that have developed over time has turned many people (both Scientologist and non) into squawking parrots without a pleasant song to sing.
Here’s to unearthing more nuggets. 🙂
With unicorns on our side, I’m sure we can have a closer meeting of minds.
A few things I disagree with :
While I’m sure there are many more indies, under the radars, ex’s, critics than those still heavily drinking kool-aid —
I have *trouble* with this line : “We are stronger than before”
Stronger for what? Some sort of take over and *showing* the world our wonderful tech? 🙂 I think we would do well to work at eliminating any kind of — we are stronger, better, smarter, more helpful, more in tuned, etc thinking. It can lead to elitism in a New York minute … or hour.
As for the death of Jesus — I believe he was at peace with himself at the time of his death – according to the stories. Otherwise – why would he say “father forgive them etc.” LRH on the other hand felt he had failed and was apparently wanting to kill himself. Not very comparable.
I was also talking about other *respected* lamas whose deaths were brought about by an overindulgence of alcohol and other things.
All in all, Hemi — the very fact that we are striving to wake up and are aware that we are, at least, not FULLY awake is a good start.
Christine
Rainbodhi :”I think this is something that Zen sayings are great at evoking in us”
Zen Koans, as I’m sure you know and for the sake of brevity called them sayings, are given to a student by their Zen Roshi to contemplate – sometimes for YEARS.
They aren’t just interesting pithy saying but the heart of a certain type of Zen practitioners practice.
As for Maitreya — this is often mis-understood but the Buddha (that we are aware of — Shakyamuni Buddha AKA Siddhartha Gautama — the buddha that buddhists follow his teachings is supposedly the last of 1,000 buddhas who came before him.
MAITREYA is the future buddha who has not yet appeared (to our knowledge) in the world.
Some are even positing that Maitreya will not be in the form of a human body but perhaps as some sort of technology — ie the internet.
Rumors abound 🙂
IMHO LRH was definitely NOT the buddha of 2500 years ago reborn. And I don’t think he was saying that exactly but pointing to Maitreya – the future.
*Could* he have been foretelling of a future buddha, Maitreya and *could* his workable technology be part of that …
Interesting thoughts to ponder.
As Marty and others slice through the BS — to the gold — it will be interesting to see what arises …
Christine
If that is what you want and need, for someone to be sorry, permit me to oblige!
David, Free Scientologists of the 80’s, I am SO sorry. I am sorry. I feel so bad. I was so wrong. I am so ashamed and regretful and sorry. I am bad. So bad. I did bad things to you I am so sorry.
Nobody could possibly be more apologetic. express greater remorse, or regret. I am atoning through my own very bad karma through attritional elements. I am on my knees with conciliatory longing.
I humbly lay myself at your feet with my contrite, expiatory, explanatory, penitent, penitential, propitiatory, regretful, remorseful, repentant, rueful, self-effacing, self-incriminating, sorry, supplicating self and beg for you to let go of what ever ser facs you may harbor towards me.
Does that do it for you?
Thanks, Marty
Regards, Pip
Nevertheless, your report about being banned by Marty was published on the Internet. Inviting all sorts of public slander and other false reports. A real “theta” exchange? You false reported. False report = treason in your “K.S.W.” book right?
Do you want the truth or do you want to float in some convenient illusion? Illusion can be a beautiful thing to float in. You are high as a kite on it. You even contribute to it with false reports of your own and cast a stage with performers!
That is why it is wrapped all about you.
Then you post here as if you are trying to pull Marty out of some hallucination or false information. Like, It’s MARTY you need to sort out!
Yes! Why, it’s Marty that needs to be handled! THAT must be it!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I wish I could help you little brother. Because our love goes back a long way. And you DESERVE to stand on the path of truth and this is a big loss for me. But your addiction to illusion is standing in between us, and you and lot of other people too.
Meant as reply to Theo.
Hi Rainbodhi
I think my starting point would be on the study tapes where LRH says “I developed scientology because of my love of understanding”, again in another tape he explains that because he is approaching the mind from an engineering viewpoint every word must be definable. As a result he says I am removing the word LOVE from the subject and in his own words “putting it into the waste paper basket along with all the ‘pulp novels’ written on the subject”.
He then goes on to say he is replacing the word love with the word affinity which he defines as “consideration of distance” and from there we get the ARC triangle. However the resulting UNDERSTANDING is a limited understanding bound by the MEST UNIVERSE.
This word LOVE can in fact be defined as “co-existence of Static” and I think somewhere LRH says as much. However co-existence of Static cannot exist in the physical universe because Static is a NO-THING and no-thing by definition must be quite different to MEST. Just off the top of my head one might say LOVE-COMMUNION-HEAVEN=STANDING UNDER. This could be termed the THETA triangle or maybe it should be the THETA TRINITY. The only thing wrong with the Holy Trinity is it does not include thee and me. Our rightful place is IN THE SON. This is the essence of Jesus’ message. Just as the eight dynamics start with the first dynamic – lots of mest and not much theta, they finish with the eighth – lots of theta and no mest. The dynamics were never intended to be seen in isolation apart from checking them over. If you have an eight cylinder motor car and run it with one of the cylinders not firing it is only a matter of time before the whole engine self-destructs. Better to have all eight working in balance even if not very efficiently, than one not working at all.
Ron wrote an article in an O.T. magazine once pointing out that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, or as he put it “just because you know the parts of a ‘Buzz Saw’ you don’t necessarily know its BEINGNESS. Right there is the difference between UNDERSTANDING and STANDING UNDER.
Regards
Pip
Hi Monte
Thanks for your validation.
Hi Christine,
Good to hear from you. 🙂
Yes, koans are used as a practice leading to contemplation in and of themselves. However I do think that reflecting upon their meaning as a saying is beneficial in its own right, and is perhaps in fact part of the same process.
The whole speculation and movements surrounding Maitreya has become so loose and varied that I wonder if the real one would ever turn up in a form that’s recognisable in that fashion at all.
It’s interesting to look at the Tibetan mythology too, whereby actual texts are considered authored by him, or through his blessings. Actually I don’t see why this can’t be the case, but it’s hard to verify (as many other Maitreya claims are) so in the end it’s best to look at the quality of the teachings.
The same principle should apply to the Tech and its attendant philosophy.
Agreed.
🙂
Moderator note. Comment rejected as did not meet several-times-published moderation guidelines. Perhaps you can learn from Scientology and demonstrate the cycle of communication. You are making a very poor showing to the world of a Scientologist with your ramblings full of spite and lies. I’m trying to help you out here.
Marty, this post describes the paradigm in which the tech could potentially catch fire with public and even go viral in the future. Fabulous post.
Private note not to post: just a final thought thats pressing on my mind as a follow up to my comment about common sense protection of DNA and fingerprints. Where I grew up, my family and everyone around had what we called a “burning barrel” on our property. It’s a 50 or a 100 gallon steel drum that has its top lid cut off. We all burned everything that we didn’t want going out in the trash. You can get years of use out of a drum. 😉
Marty/Mark (which do you prefer, by the way?)
I just finished your latest book. Masterpiece. Incredible food for thought, and absolutely a must- read for anyone who is it was immersed in Scientology. Thanks. I will write more later, but I had to say that it is awesome. Thanks for writing it.
Hello Pip.
Additionally to what you have already said, LRH in the “Admiration-Lectures” (The Factors) had a nice and interesting talk about “love”.
I also think that like the word “soul”, the word “love” has so many different meanings, and as you said, he wanted to have good definitions.
In the lecture he spoke about love and admiration and there he pretty much summed up the reason for the seldom use of the word Love in his writings.
MODERATOR NOTE. UTTERLY NON-SEQUITOR TO THE POST, AND THUS A DIVERSION TO THE SUBJECT AT ISSUE. CONTAINS LIES. MAY BE RELEVANT TO A LINE IN A POST OF MANY DAYS AGO. OTHERWISE IT IS DEV-T, SPECIFICALLY OFF LINE.
Note to Theo: Having private messaged with you several months ago — an experience I found so frustrating that I ended up leaving the private facebook group. I threw up my hands and said “why do I bother”
The fact that Marty continuously tries to communicate with you is … IMHO … almost saintly.
To that end — I’ll leave you with these words by a renowned Tibetan teacher:
“Unless you become free of conceptual thinking, there is absolutely no way to truly awaken to enlightenment.” -Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche
Please do not respond to me unless/until you can tell me exactly what you think Tulku Urgyen is saying. Even if we disagree — at least I’ll know you are willing to make an effort to be communicating with me – instead of dodging the issue or making me wrong.
Best,
Christine
Great post, SA, in that it does evoke further consideration and, as you say, fine-tuning of one’s viewpoints.
The quote about the technology being “the most advanced ever devised . . . ” was from someone else.
Mine was that “Scientology is a uniquely workable system, better than any others I’ve tried (which is by no means all that are extant)”.
I’m pretty sure you got that; just wanted to be clear about it.
In looking over the 2 quotes again, I’d say the first could be seen as “fundamentalist”, if only because it is so absolute. It’s not my style to profess such completely certain about anything; better to always allow for at least the possibility of error in one’s beliefs and also one’s observations.
I also agree, if someone can come up with an improvement in some area of Scientology technology, such as the two you mentioned, about the meter and the purif, I’d be open to that. More cautious, however, with the auditing tech. Mainly because I think Ron had a special genius in that he could think like – parallel – the reactive mind & its identity thought mechanisms, better than any other philosopher/writer/thinker I’ve yet come across. I really doubt anyone else could have come up with the axioms, for example. Or the Power Processes – pure genius, unbelievable simplicity, elegance, and, when done right, powerful and positive awareness changes.
But still, I keep an open mind and try to expose myself to as many ideas as possible and have always done so – especially when it comes to the subject of Scientology. 60+ years of experience has shown me that even if I wanted to, I simply do not have the ability to close off my mind to other ideas. So I think we are on the same page.
“All things MSM are a mind fuck game. And it’s all run by some few old lunatics who identify themselves as Zionists who front for some European black nobility financiers.”
Wow! This creeps me out on so many levels–particularly as a Jew. This has been up here for over a day or two and no one even comments about this–but talks about whether it is Maher’s brother or father being referred to?
“Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is the truth.” – Mahatma Gandhi
Thanks for bothering, Marty.
While grace shone upon me with a marvelous time in Panama with my Dad and friends, I had a chance to read your Memoirs.
Wow!
Among other factors, it was a trip through an amusement park house of mirrors. Not me, but boy, the reflections were unmistakable.
Thank you for the opportunity to see something I would not have seen otherwise.
Brings me back to truth in this universe and my appreciation for your bother.
Truth is an absolute and as such does not lend itself to comparable magnitudes, which from this wonderful level of existence are usually essential for some understanding.
Your experience has aided me to separate LRH the man from his philosophy and the consequences of incorrect or inappropriate application, regardless of my agreement with your position, that of M2 or any other.
Dichotomies are a bitch. Fortunately they are much less so when one gets somewhat exterior to them and can identify them as such as opposed to individual terminals.
Oh, yeah, thank you my friend. Thank you and that powerhouse Mosey.
Bruce
Thank you Bruce. You did mighty fine job of your own in summating some important truths here.
Thanks Mark. Look forward to hearing your thoughts.
By the way. I don’t know that you’ll be permitted to post on this forum at all until you take responsibility for what you and your merry pranksters attempted to do to my wife.
My problem with Scientology and Scientologists, in and out of the church proper, is that they seem to have to have enemies. And where enemies don’t exist, they mock them up. It seems as though, in order to stay motivated, there has to be a perception that they are “under attack” at all times.
So it doesn’t surprise me that the independent movement is fracturing and turning on itself. I guess the Church proper just isn’t putting up enough of a fight so everyone has decided to mock up so new enemies to take on.
Face it indies: you may not be in the Church anymore, but until you stop fighting everything (including the Church) you haven’t changed one bit.
Hi Pip,
I love your response. 😉
Seriously, thank you. In many ways, with explanations like that, it becomes clearer why I am finding certain elements of Scientology to really put me in a particular space – there’s so much potential.
I remember reading in one book (can’t remember which) where LRH says that energy doesn’t actually exist. It is reasons such as this which invites a comparison to Buddhism. I wonder if this applies to static as a whole? That would be interesting.
In The Factors, I notice that affinity is defined as “co-beingness”:
“Admiration and sympathy. Where they exist in unbounded quantities you can have co-beingness. And when you’ve done that you have described the force of life or the pool of nirvana, or anything else you want to call it, for this universe.”
He goes on to say that when one falls away from this, individual characteristics become apparent. Would this be the beginning of MEST?
Having a look at these references again, I see a little bit more at what you’re saying.
It makes me wonder – where is all the scholarship?!
p.s. I like your equation of us, as individuals, being The Son and I agree with your definition; it doesn’t make any sense to me for only one being in the universe to hold that privilege forevermore. In fact, could there be an analog of the Trinity in the presentation of Space, Energy and Matter?
Thank you again.
Theo
I followed your posts since the beginning and somehow I like you.
There was just something I couldn’t understand. This blog is about “Moving On Up a Little Higher”, but you kept repeating the same thoughts over and over again !
And by the way there is no big conspiracy to ruin Greece, but the EU is just getting ethics in there on the finances and that’s all !
Hope to see you soon back !
Hello SKM,
I was only just thinking of The Factors in where to look for the relationship between what is defined as love, and affinity – thanks for the extra pointer.
In relation to using the word love:
“Get that first word that he used: ‘I was in love.’ Right at that moment take your choice. It’s down here below 2.0 on the Tone Scale or it was way up. And if it was way up he wouldn’t be sitting there talking to you. You get that? With what clarity you should get that.”
And:
” […] all of a sudden the sympathy and admiration will merge as an emotion and you’ll get what’s known as love. And he will feel that and he’ll say, ‘My God, I haven’t felt that since I was fifteen.’ That’s real love.”
So perhaps the term love could still be used, at least in a colloquial sense?
Also, I personally find The Factors to be an amazing series of lectures, and really got me to truly take notice of what LRH is teaching. It’s acted as a starting point for me and I don’t know why it’s not more widely recognised outside of Scientology as being such an important discourse.
MODERATOR NOTE: PERHAPS YOU OUGHT TO LOOK UP THE DEFINITION OF OFF LINE IN THE ADMIN DICTIONARY.
WHY BOTHER?
Rick: Don’t you sometimes wonder if it’s worth all this? I mean what you’re fighting for.
Victor Laszlo: You might as well question why we breathe. If we stop breathing, we’ll die. If we stop fighting our enemies, the world will die.
Rick: Well, what of it? It’ll be out of its misery.
Victor Laszlo: You know how you sound, Mr. Blaine? Like a man who’s trying to convince himself of something he doesn’t believe in his heart.
MODERATOR NOTE: PERHAPS YOU OUGHT TO LOOK UP THE DEFINITION OF OFF LINE IN THE ADMIN DICTIONARY.
I did read your post, and especially appreciated the part you italicized above. And while I don’t have a completely thought out response to the rest of your points yet, I take them very seriously FWIW. And also FWIW, I did not mean for my comments to suggest that I am projecting the comments of others to you.
FWIW? A lot to me. Thanks.
I am still banned… my comment didn’t go up in due time.
Right, the Admiration lectures are great, as a lot of Lectures from the 50’s.
Given your Buddhist background, there is one specific lecture I’d like to suggest to you. It’s name is: Granting of Beingness. Great stuff, really – got to love it.
I was into Buddhism for a time myself and while in Scientology I never lost my view on other Religions. Metta is a great term in Buddhist scripture. Much better than the trivialized love.
Have fun with Scientology. For me personally, it helped me to connect many dots in different religions. Not because it is superior, but because it has some unique approaches for data comparison.
“So perhaps the term love could still be used, at least in a colloquial sense?”
Well, I use this term often. LRH used it also, even in his private communication and in some HCO Issues. You will often find: Love, “ML” (for Much Love) or just an “L” (for Love) before his first name.
The terms ARC and admiration are “precision” tools, kind of, for the auditor. There have been some admiration processes at the time of the lectures (around 52/53) and ARC itself is used not only by the auditor to make auditing possible (part of the Auditors Code) – it’s used in auditing all the time.
That is a blatant lie. There is no pending comment for Theo. Gosh, you guys seem so enamored with stewing in your own juices.
Marty, hahaha, you want to start the war! Is fine for me!
I surrender.
MODERATOR NOTE: ARE YOU TAKING LESSONS FROM JIM LOGAN? THIS COMMENT IS REJECTED AGAIN FOR THE SAME REASON AS THE FIRST – IT IS THE FIRST, BUT WITH MORE LIES INCLUDED. I TOLD YOU WHY IT WAS REJECTED AND YOUR RESPONSE IS TO IGNORE ME. TAKE YOUR WARS TO THE FORUM YA’LL CREATED FOR THEM, IN RESPONSE TO MY KEEPING THIS ONE TRUE TO ITS PURPOSE AS STATED IN ITS TITLE. IF YOU CAN RELAIM YOUR CONSCIENCE AND HAVE A SANE CONVERSATION – WITHOUT DESIGNATING ENEMIES, AND ATTEMPTING TO CREATE WARS – YOUR COMM WILL BE WELCOMED ON A RED CARPET.
Windhorse, sorry I cannot answer. Marty is delaying to say at least my posts. Sorry, buddy.
Windhorse,
I am publishing his lie about me to demonstrate in real time the dangers of hardKore KSWdom.
Yes you start understanding what LRH was talking about referring to the One Worlders come and talk to me! By the way I don’t have to repeat myself over and over again when a simple idea cannot be understood.
Scientology’s Founder is LRH. Sorry, if you know of a better technology come and tell me.
A few might want to know what a blog is and the purpose of a blog:
What’s a blog?
A blog is a personal diary. A collaborative space. A breaking-news outlet. A collection of links. Your own private thoughts. Memos to the world.
Your blog is whatever you want it to be. There are millions of them, in all shapes and sizes, and there are no real rules.
In simple terms, a blog is a web site, where you write stuff on an ongoing basis. New stuff shows up at the top, so your visitors can read what’s new. Then they comment on it or link to it or email you. Or not.
Definition of BLOG
: a Web site that contains an online personal journal with reflections, comments, and often hyperlinks provided by the writer; also : the contents of such a site
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog
blog [blawg, blog] Show IPA noun, verb, blogged, blog·ging.
noun
1.a Web site containing the writer’s or group of writers’ own experiences, observations, opinions, etc., and often having images and links to other Web sites.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog
Definition of BLOG
: a Web site that contains an online personal journal with reflections, comments, and often hyperlinks provided by the writer; also : the contents of such a site.
Definition of blog
noun
a personal website or web page on which an individual records opinions, links to other sites, etc. on a regular basis.
I posted above the definitions and purpose of a blog. I hope that helps.
Oracle, I really don’t get you. Obviously there are many different realities now created between me and this blog. This doesn’t mean either side is correct or wrong.
It’s simply different realities. Don’t get upset about it but don’t try to tell me that I am the only one who is just doing wrong here. I just have a different reality. Remember? KSW, maybe? Well, that’s different now for a lot of people and Marty is really doing a good job on it. But when he steps on the toes of those who do want KSW as a reality, well, despite all his PR and good intentions, he is stepping in a field he chose to not support anymore, if he ever supported it (as we do know under DM no real KSW existed, give me a break, KSW DM style).
The game I am playing has to do with Standard Tech. If some people don’t like that, sorry I think they are just dilettantes who just want to get benefits out of something but not to pay back. Scientology has a discipline as a doctrine but as an application it has vast and huge use.
Marty has chosen to name all those who want Standard Tech radicals and fanatics and he even went further to name 11 Apostles the former 11 of MS 2. So, he continues labeling…. but we, I, you or anybody else here can’t label him or his friends… oh yes, then we are irrational because we express a different reality.
My solution: you guys, stay on with the transcendentalism thing and let those who want Standard Tech unlabelled please, without harsh posts and comments. Each group can do its job. Peace! Say to Marty to stop his gun firing and all will be fine.
I could also be very ironic and mean in my comments and I haven’t done it up to now. But I could. Like, let’s say why don’t you guy discuss a bit about the future of psychology here and such stuff… See? I could do that but that would be absurd and a lie. If you are interested in applying Scientology your way, you are free and intact as long as you respect other to apply it the way they see it. Standard Tech! No Trespassing, please!
Pip, you wrote “This word LOVE can in fact be defined as “co-existence of Static” and I think somewhere LRH says as much.”
Believe it or not that’s a definition of affinity, as per Axiom 25:
AXIOM 25. AFFINITY IS A SCALE OF ATTITUDES WHICH FALLS AWAY FROM THE CO-EXISTENCE OF STATIC, THROUGH THE INTERPOSITIONS OF DISTANCE AND ENERGY, TO CREATE IDENTITY, DOWN TO CLOSE PROXIMITY BUT MYSTERY.
By the practice of Is-ness (Beingness) and Not-is-ness (refusal to Be) individuation progresses from the Knowingness of complete identification down through the introduction of more and more distance and less and less duplication, through Lookingness, Emotingness, Effortingness, Thinkingness, Symbolizingness, Eatingness, Sexingness, and so through to not-Knowingness (Mystery). Until the point of Mystery is reached, some communication is possible, but even at Mystery an attempt to communicate continues. Here we have, in the case of an individual, a gradual falling away from the belief that one can assume a complete Affinity down to the conviction that all is a complete Mystery. Any individual is somewhere on this Know-to-Mystery scale. The
original Chart of Human Evaluation was the Emotion section of this scale
Yes, I don’t know about specific dates (I think probably 70s too), but evaluating texts compared to practices, the Church and LRH seem like opposites. It answers my ‘why is there so much nonsense, like setting people free by forcing them to obey?’.
*a thing which makes me a pro/anti-SCNist 😛
One just cannot accept the whole 3D package of SCN without being glib. It’s full of contradiction. It’s nice to be (self determinedly) loyal, but if you think you can whip people into being self determined, that’s dumb, to speak lightly. Of course, self determinism is no longer in fashion in the 3D at large. Now, it’s about ‘ethics’ which is no longer self determined either…ahh don’t get me started 😛
Roger: And by the way there is no big conspiracy to ruin Greece, but the EU is just getting ethics in there on the finances and that’s all !
Spyros: The conspirancy is well created by ‘Greeks’ themselves. You’ll get to notice, if you see how ‘we’ treat each other. Nevertheless, punishing all for the out-ethics of some, is not ethics at all. I don’t remember the last time I witheld money from my employees or wherever I should had given them to. I’m wrong target, and so are others that I know.This ‘Greeks’ is as true as ‘Wogs’, as ‘Scientologists’, as other generalities. And above that, the Greeks that have been stealing big money (primarily from us Greeks, not the EU) are not touched by anyone. They conviniently have their $$ stored in swiss banks, and have probably moved to another country as well. Not to mention that some even rule the country through connections with politicians etc
An association of factory owners etc proposed to the government to set as minimum wage to be half of the ridiculous current wage (with the threat that they’ll take their sick business elsewhere, because them poor slimes can’t survive otherwise, sniff). If the EU wanted to actually help, it would go after such guys, not ‘Greeks’ in general.
Hi Marildi
Wow! That’s such a beautiful axiom, but don’t you see it is not defining LOVE it is defining AFFINITY. It has been mentioned recently on this blog, that to evaluate a datum one needs a datum of comparable magnitude. There is no datum comparable to LOVE. Affinity is a scale of attitudes, LOVE IS – period. In ACIM the central thought is “GOD IS” this is theSINGULARITY that science longs for and the missing datum in Scientology. The datum that changes UNDERSTANDING to STANDING-UNDER.
I believe this post to be appropriate and relevant in terms of a trend in thinking, which is observable in recent posts on Marty’s Blog and a recent post by Jonathan Hyslop.
A point made by me, on the odd occasion, is that there are truths beyond the truths of Scientology. I have been asked by some; what do I mean by that? My complete answer to that question is contained in my book – Mastering Mindset. Nonetheless, put concisely and in the simplest of terms, this is what I mean. .
The “ball game” as I see it.
Consider the phenomenon of H2O being transformed from steam to water and then to ice as the temperature drops. In a way, this transformation from steam to ice may be equated as steam collapsing into ice. Such a collapse would be dramatically evident if the temperature in a steaming sauna were suddenly to drop to minus 100oC.
In science there are various theories regarding waves and particles. A comment by Stephen Hawking on the subject is revealing. He says, ‘Waves and particles are concepts created by humans which aren’t necessarily concepts which nature is obliged to respect by making all phenomena fall into one category or the other’. Nonetheless, the concept of waves and particles is conveniently descriptive of certain phenomena. For instance, the idea of a wave collapsing into a particle, works well to make the point of something insubstantial, undefined and uncontained collapsing into something much more solid, defined and measurable.
Note that for various reasons the word consciousness is used here in preference to theta.
Using these two analogies – steam collapsing into ice and a wave collapsing into a particle – now imagine “pure” consciousness collapsing into a point of view – a particular identity, a sense of self, a fixed location, me, I – ego. What we essentially wind up with is two fundamental states of consciousness – un-collapsed consciousness and collapsed consciousness. The former is consciousness maximally oriented in terms of time, space, meaning, relevance and value. The later is consciousness minimally oriented in terms of time, space, meaning, relevance and value.
Also note that consciousness (theta) being maximally oriented is not the same as being well oriented. The former denotes being pinned down by all kinds of physical, mental and emotional baggage – ice-like characteristics – an inability to express full potential. The later describes physical, mental and emotional flexibility – steam-like characteristics – the ability to function and operate at full potential.
It should be self-evident that between these two extreme states of consciousness (maximum and minimum orientation) are many shades of grey – many degrees of greater or lesser orientation. (The nature of consciousness beyond these two extremes is not under discussion here).
What we wind up with is a scale, where consciousness at the top end of the scale is virtually unlocatable, immeasurable and unpredictable and, at the bottom end very locatable, measurable and predictable.
And the point is? A useful criteria by which to determine the merits of any teaching, doctrine or belief-system promising the way – a bridge, to heaven, nirvana, OT or any other desirable state, is the extent to which it un-collapses consciousness (theta). In simple terms; the question is whether the teaching results in a less fixed viewpoint, less definable identity, less concern about me, I the self – less ego, or not.
Many teachings, which promise “salvation”, when initially encountered satisfy expectations. When initiates first discover “The Way” or “The Bridge” it allows them to let go of their earlier orientation (viewpoint) in which they felt stifled and trapped. The new lease on life they are experiencing is due to them un-collapsing from their previous orientation, which was perceived and experienced as unacceptable. Otherwise why would they have moved on to something new? Nonetheless, it is inevitable that the shift to lesser orientation is accompanied by a sense of freedom, being less fixed and located by time, space, meaning, relevance and value.
Here is the thing, however; also inevitable seems to be that sooner or later, the individual, begins to identify with the doctrine of his or her salvation – the teaching which promises total freedom now totally determines orientation. And guess what; this sets in motion a new cycle of collapsing into a fixed point of view and identity – an uncompromising self- centered me, I, ego. And once again, before the individual realizes it, he or she is orientated by “truths” in accordance with which they analyze and categorize everything. Consequently the new belief system takes over as the deciding factor as to what is true and real.
This cycle of something un-solid (subjective) collapsing into something solid (objective) is evident throughout history in the evolution and development of religion and science, and is obvious in human relationships.
Whatever the original awareness; be it the awareness of being aware, a sense of wonder or simply the feeling of love; the instant the need to hold onto that unique experience comes into play – the moment fear of loosing it sets in and survival becomes the primary focus, that is when fluid consciousness collapses into a fixed viewpoint – that is when the “eternal now” collapses into linear time of past, present and future.
Feelings collapse into words and language – symbols. That inexplicable all embracive sense of being aware of being aware, is collapsed by scientists and philosophers into millions of words and formulas (symbols) in their efforts to explain existence, which is far better understood when directly experienced. In an attempt to explain (capture) the wonder of love it is collapsed into the language of chemistry or symbols like ARC.
This collapse of potential (the un-manifested) into reality (the manifested) is a natural phenomenon. It happens in nature all the time – it is the source of existence. What is being suggested here is not that the collapsing of consciousness into denser states should be avoided. The point here is that becoming enabled to let go – to change one’s mind when required is a prerequisite for un-collapsing any undesirable state. .
With reference to Scientology the cycle goes something like this. Initially there is the creation of knowledge – all knowledge is simply created. .Then along comes L Ron Hubbard and gives us “Knowing how to Know”, which is a collapse of the original state into something more defined. To begin with this worked well for many. It was a step up – an un-collapse from where they were when they first encountered Scientology. Scientology provided a more acceptable orientation – a new game, requiring related points of view. With the passing of time certain choices and decisions were made by LRH and later by C of S management, which resulted in a further collapse of the original state. Viewpoints became more fixed. It seems that at this point Scientology has collapsed into – to quote Marty Rathbun; – “knowing so best that we had better not be exposed to learning anything else and not allow anyone else to either”. : .
By the way, you may have noticed similarities between what has been written here and other teachings and philosophies? This brings us to an interesting point. In fundamental terms, should we look at what a mystic thinks about existence compared to what the physicist thinks, the two will be miles apart. Now cut out the language and symbols in accordance with which each is oriented and ask them how they “feel” about existence. In other words, ask each at a less collapsed state how they each experience existence. You will be surprised at the extent of agreement. The point being that as mindset opens up – as consciousness begins to un-collapse, we become less restricted in how we interpret what we encounter.
On the one hand, functioning mainly at a level of intuition (feeling), rather than logic (thinking) we will be able to read the Christian Bible, Dianetics, the Koran, Bhagavad Gita and the latest journals on quantum mechanics and sense the connectedness. On the other hand, restricted by logic and reason, which is collapsed intuition, we see no connection at all.
In my book an entire chapter is devoted to a scale of consciousness, going from being minimally oriented to being maximally oriented – from an all pervasive view of existence (a birds eye view) to a restricted perspective of existence (a worms eye view). Several chapters cover the nature of consciousness to be found beyond the characteristics depicted on the scale.
Joe van Staden.
Hi bkellyusa. I quote you for reference;
” For that reason I want to see the workable technology of Scientology used and protected for others to use.”
I want to use this sentiment to make a point about the word PROTECTED. Not that you intended anything but good intent, but that need to protect the tech is basic to the monopoly of it, and intolerance, in my view. I don’t think it needs to be protected. Does the Bible or Veda or Tora need to be protected: NO. It can be defended or explained or promoted, but it does not need to be protected. A persons right to practice may need protection under the law, but not the material itself. If its workable, it will survive on its own just fine. Most of the issues on the subject of the tech on this blog have to do with KSW and application and orthodoxy. I think its pretty much tied in with that need to Protect which was never needed in the first place and has proven counter-productive to the subject. Look around to see what the monopoly has wrought.
SKM,
Thanks for the lecture recommendation… I’ll track it down and give it a listen.
It seems to me that the lectures from the 50s form the true foundations of the philosophy, and most anything afterwards are expansions arising from that experience.
I really think that something quite magical was emerging at that time.
It makes me wonder why there has been such a feeling of restriction when it comes to studying other scriptures and philosophies.
As an example, LRH pretty much equates Nirvana with Serenity of Beingness. So why not also study the meanings of Nirvana are according to Buddhist, Hindu, and Jain philosophy? Marty has also been speaking of a similar identification of being able to attain realisation through the Tao.
These teachings clearly exist in Scientology. I do understand the purpose behind keeping things on track and in focus. But equivalencies have already been made, and they exist within the most important parts of its body of knowledge.
I personally wouldn’t worry too much about “superiority”. It’s possible (perhaps necessary) to make a case for differentiation, while also keeping in mind a fundamental unity where it occurs. And it’s better to be honest on both counts.
Hi SKM
I don’t think I have ever listened to these “Admiration Lectures” so I am not really in a position to comment on them.
I do have a particular issue over how the Factors begin as it seems to me there is a fundamental flaw at the onset. They start with “Before the beginning was a cause”; well that makes no sense to me, there has to be something or someone to cause the cause. Causes ultimately cannot cause themselves, they have to be caused by PERSONHOOD, at which point causes becomes effects.
Baring the above in mind the Factors would now start – “Before the beginning there was personhood, and the sole purpose of personhood was the creation of effect. In the beginning was the decision and the decision was TO BE”.
Now I know this challenges the fundamental “holy cow” of Scientology, and turns the whole technology upside down although I would suggest it turns it right side up. I am personally satisfied that PERSONHOOD PRECEDS BEING as this article points out http://www.leithart.com/archives/003435.php
Personhood is not a term that most people are familiar with it is quite different to the word PERSON. Personhood is ONENESS – SPIRIT. Person is separateness – SOUL. Person comes from the word PERSONA which is a mask that an actor wears, in Scientology speak A VALANCE. Personhood is your very essence which is undifferentiated INDIVIABLE verses INDIVIDUAL. SPIRIT is to SOUL as LOVE is to AFFINITY.
The Bible is the only writings I know of that differentiates between SOUL and SPIRIT, in Hebrews 4:12 it says “For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword piercing even to the division of Soul and Spirit ……”
Hi Rainbodhi
Thank you. But seriously don’t get too serious because “Seriousness equals mass” (joke). Energy exists by postulate for the definition of energy is “Postulated particles in space”. This is perfectly compatible with Buddhism and the idea of Maya. Incidentally I hadn’t come across the word Metta, what a beautiful concept, The Philosophy and Practice of Universal Love – http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/buddharakkhita/wheel365.html
A static does not exist for the simple reason IT IS EXISTANCE in the same way God doesn’t exist HE IS EXISTANCE that which causes everything that exists to exist. As someone with Buddhist persuasions you might enjoy this http://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/buddhism/bt_52.htm
MEST is the result of the CONSIDERATIONS OF THETA and exists solely because the viewpoints consider it exists.
“It makes me wonder – where is all the scholarship” please explain, I don’t understand this statement.
The “Course in Miracles (ACIM) which is very Buddhist in nature says in truth there is only one SON and we are all that Son, but have been fragmented into countless beings but as with a hologram we each retain that fundamental image. When God looks at you He says “this is my son in whom I am well pleased”.
Yes Space, Energy and Matter could well be seen as analogous with theTrinity. Space would be The Father, Matter would be The Son and Energy would be the Holy Spirit (just a thought)
The game you are playing is an enemy condition. Where you feel obligated to harm attack and suppress someone else, who has done you little disservice. Maybe one wrong indication (that you have never learned anything from reading this blog). O.K. I got that.
By definition a VITAL Target is something that must be done to operate at all.
Man’s worst difficulty is his inability to tell the important from the unimportant. “Every target is the same as every other target” is part of A=A=A.
It takes good sense to be able to survey an area and find out
1. What MUST be done.
2. What SHOULDN’T be done.
3. What is only desirable to be done.
4. What is trivial.
You are wallowing in what is trivial. Bullshit conflict.
And you are nipping at the heels of a known POWER because of applause from KNOWN liabilities.
HCOPL 21 Jan 65 revised 5 April 65 Vital Data on Promotion
“You can therefore know your enemies by those who seek to knock out any part of your:
a) POWER
b) AUTHORITY
c) PERSONNEL
d) WEALTH
e) PROPERTY
I am only suggesting that you WAKE UP. And I would not be having this exchange if I DID NOT CARE ABOUT YOU!
Response to Theo.
Joe,
Thanks for this. This is why I believe that Scientology – or Hubbard methodologies – are best applied in an integral fashion. Used intelligently they can lead to the recognition and better realization of these broader truths. Used as prescribed – requiring devotion and surrender of curiosity – the deny such realization. To those who think what Joe wrote is ‘out there’, a once-through of the Tao of Physics will give you the grounding to see that it is, in fact, right on the money. Perhaps his book approaches it on a gradient that would bring that same understanding – I don’t know that because I haven’t read it.
Christine thanks for all the “kind” words and the public labeling of me once again in this forum. Actually there is too few who have done this here, namely Marty and you. Nobody else did that to me here.
So, with all your saintly Tibetan wisdom I hope we can finally communicate. What Tulku Urgyen is saying to become free of conceptual thinking, is actually a gradient above what I have been trying to do, become free of symbols. And I attained that through the humble technology of L. Ron Hubbard. And I can have conceptual understandings.
But I guess I am not up to the point of what dear Tulku Urgyen said. But I will try and have that in mind. And hopefully through symbols (words) and the internet one day we are gonna reach a better understanding of who is who really with less labeling.
thanks a lot for the quote.
Where is your 300 heart against evil messengers? I am more Greek than you are.
Submission? Now that IS a problem.
blog = web log or…borrow the ‘b’ from ‘web’ and join it with ‘log’ to get ‘blog.’
Oracle, way back in 05′ the concept of a ‘blog’ was quite a mystery for me. Then, on an online forum I was participating in one day, I finally asked what the hell a blog was. The answer I received is what I began this comment with. The clarity that answer brought launched me into writing blogs. And I’ve never been the same since. 🙂 While I smile I am not joking about that. Writing blogs and commenting on the blogs of others actually became a very rewarding process for me to get in touch with a lot of things I really needed to get in touch with. Also, the process, although it took a while, helped me to exorcise the LRH insanity I had become attached to and had been so adamantly identifying with. Of course, I didn’t recognize that until after it was gone. Btw, the sanity of LRH has remained. No need to jettison what is real. Indeed, it is impossible to jettison what is real.
Marty, I am grateful that you have the certainty to consistently walk your talk. Thank you so much.
“LOVE IS” “GOD IS” …impossible to conceive from a universe of perception yet, ironically, progressing through the seeming myriad gradients of perception is the way we return to LOVE IS, GOD IS.
Hi Pip,
By scholarship, what I mean is, where are the independent studies of Scientology philosophy?
Sometimes the philosophical statements seem straightforward enough, and at other times, perhaps not so much, and they can have idiosyncratic meanings (such as “static” itself).
And furthermore we have detractors on one hand, who dismiss practically all of it as being ripoffs or ramblings, and true believers on the other, who often accept things blindly. Unfortunately, aside from the indies, there’s nobody really in the middle. However, it would be useful to really scrutinize thoroughly what is being said and taught.
I studied ACIM a while ago and find it a very helpful book, and great for many people, especially progressive Christians. It does have a mildly Buddhist flavour, although it does teach some particular distinctions in terms of a higher power. I think that ACIM is intended to bring people to a certain point, and as it states, there is more beyond the scope of its curriculum.
Marildi, this is a great axiom! Thank you for posting it. I find it to be quite viable. Yet, it is important to keep in mind that, while it can be most useful, it is a symbol of a symbol of a symbol and so on….
Shortly after I read your comment I read lesson 184 in the Course of Miracles and, for me, there was an integration that occurred between the content of your comment and the content of the lesson. Following are excerpts from that lesson.
“You live by symbols. You have made up names for everything you see. Each one becomes a separate entity, identified by its own name. By this you carve it out of unity. By this you designate its special attributes, and set it off from other things by emphasizing space surrounding it. This space you lay between all things to which you give a different name; all happenings in terms of place and time; all bodies which are greeted by a name.
“This space you see as setting off all things from one another is the means by which the world’s perception is achieved. You see something where nothing is, and see as well nothing where there is unity; a space between all things, between all things and you. Thus do you think that you have given life in separation. By this split you think you are established as a unity which functions with an independent will.
“What are these names by which the world becomes a series of discrete events, of things ununified, of bodies kept apart and holding bits of mind as separate awarenesses? You gave these names to them, establishing perception as you wished to have perception be. The nameless things were given names, and thus reality was given them as well. For what is named is given meaning and will then be seen as meaningful; a cause of true effect, with consequence inherent in itself.
“This is the way reality is made by partial vision, purposefully set against the given truth. Its enemy is wholeness. It conceives of little things and looks upon them. And a lack of space, a sense of unity or vision that sees differently, become the threats which it must overcome, conflict with and deny.
“Yet does this other vision still remain a natural direction for the mind to channel its perception. It is hard to teach the mind a thousand alien names, and thousands more. Yet you believe this is what learning means; its one essential goal by which communication is achieved, and concepts can be meaningfully shared.
[…]
“It would indeed be strange if you were asked to go beyond all symbols of the world, forgetting them forever; yet were asked to take a teaching function. You have need to use the symbols of the world a while. But be you not deceived by them as well. They do not stand for anything at all, and in your practicing it is this thought that will release you from them. They become but means by which you can communicate in ways the world can understand, but which you recognize is not the unity where true communication can be found.”
Hi Joe
What you say in your post makes a lot of sense. I was in Scientology back in the ‘60’s and although I could see the sense in what LRH was saying I never allowed my identity to be collapsed into “group think”. When I eventually got thrown out I continued to study the subject from the outside, having accepted the datum of knowing how to know through study.
I did not know it at the time, and your post has helped me see it, that whereas I wanted to be IN Scientology the folk in the org. were OF Scientology. It was this solidity in the CofS that finally allowed me to let go of the organisation, but to do this involved a larger truth and that’s when I had my Damascus Road experience. For a while I was a “born again Christian” but it soon became apparent that to satisfy the dictates of fundamental Christianity I would have to let go of Scientology. This I was unwilling to do and for a while I considered myself both a Christian and a Scientologist. Eventually this caused me to embrace a higher truth and both these identities disappeared. About this time I had the revelation I was a DIVINE SCIENTIST and embraced the New Thought movement. I now have no label and instead endeavour to practice LOVE and UNDERSTANDING, which I express symbolically as ChristianScientology. I took a look at you book on line, it appear very readable.
I agree with you Christie. I think it is also important to be willing to look at everything said about a subject including Scientology. The negative included and then make your own decision on the subject based on personal experience and really thinking for yourself!!!
Good questions.
I can’t give any satisfying answer to them.
Maybe this personal thought of me will give you a hint: I consider Scientology (and other schools) as a help to find my own truth. There is just no way to show someone else the absolute truth.
Let’s be happy, at this time we have access to so many different materials and we can talk to people of any walk of life, any ethnic or cultural or religious background – it was not always that case, at least not so easy.
It seems to me that the lectures from the 50s form the true foundations of the philosophy, and most anything afterwards are expansions arising from that experience.
Yes, very much so.
My favorite materials are from late 52 through 62. After that time LRH did not give public lectures anymore (only to students).
However, there have been technical breakthroughs and further codification of processes all along the way.
Interesting questions, Pip.
What could that “cause” be?
And what is meant with “beginning”?
Note that there is no speculation about what the “cause” did before the beginning. It just says “Before the beginning was a Cause…”.
The dictionary (google) says: Cause (Noun) : A person or thing that gives rise to an action, phenomenon, or condition.
There may be different definitions.
Thanks for the article, btw.
“The Bible is the only writings I know of that differentiates between SOUL and SPIRIT”
I understand. However, it lacks definitions in the Bible. Later scholars philosophized about the different meanings of biblical terms.
It doesn’t make the Scriptures less vital in my life. It just means, that at different times, the same words in your Bible translation could have been used for different phenomena. The Bible was written in different languages (different books of the bible like Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek ). It is a pretty much inconsistent piece of work. This may be one of the reasons why so many different sects emerged from it. So many interpretations.
Oracle, I think this conversation has gone to the lowest bottom it could. Whoever REALLY cares can email me and we can discuss having a two way comm. sismanidest@gmail.com
As low as it can get on this forum at least. Glad you’ve decided to take it somewhere else. Good luck.
Hemi. I think you touch on some fundamental truths. When the student is ready, the teacher will come, as the saying goes. One such teacher was L. Ron Hubbard. And the information he laid out was a part of the spiritual journey for many thousands. But for most, its only one leg of that journey. Something we passed through for various reasons. Each person has their own reason. They each now know what it is and could tell us if we asked them. But I don’t think the parts of scientology that are a challenge or a trap were put there by LRH intentionally as some sort of final exam or test. But they are there as a test or a hurdle to be overcome as part of each persons spiritual awakening or growth who felt so trapped or challenged. What I believe is that those persons who needed such a learning experience in such a setting and in such a place are the ones who found scientology at the time they did. I don’t think any of this is by accident. Likewise it is for those who never leave it or hear of or know of it . They are experiencing challenges that suit their own growth. For most of mankind it does not include scientology.
Hi Pip,
Yes, that axiom is defining affinity, but as I recall LRH used the word affinity instead love to avoid confusion in meaning – with affinity being a much broader term. In Axiom 25, it seems to me that the word “love” as you are using it would be at the highest level of affinity where there is a “co-existence of static”. From that highest level, which is the “Knowingness of complete identification”, it descends “down through the introduction of more and more distance and less and less duplication”, including all the negative levels of affinity.
Possibly related to the idea of “co-existence of static” was something I saw on a website for the book *The Magic of Quantum*. On one page of that site there are two kirlian photographs. The first is of the fingers of 2 people thinking negative thoughts about each other. The second is of the same 2 people thinking positive thoughts about each other, and in that second one the “energy” around each finger overlaps with the energy around the other. It’s about midway down the page: http://www.themagicofquantum.com/review.php
Btw, on that same page there is mention made of scientific evidence of emotional vibrations – basically talking about the tone scale. It seems that LRH was way before his time in yet another way. Here’s an excerpt:
“Emotions have unique vibrations just like colors and physical objects do. These emotional vibrations also go from higher/faster to lower/slower. When you are laughing and having fun, your body’s vibrations are lighter (higher and faster). When you are tired and sick your vibrations are heavier (slower and lower). You know how when you are in love, you feel “energized”, “high”, like you’re “walking on a cloud?” That’s because your emotions are literally adding voltage and power, lightening your body. And when you’re negative and depressed, you feel sluggish, “feeling low,” “heavy”. “I’m down today.” Your emotional vibrations are giving your body a slower, lower vibration. This is not speaking metaphorically. This is scientifically measurable. (Molecules of Emotion by Dr. Candace Pert and HMI http://www.heartmath.org ) “
Thanks, Monte. I read the excerpts you quoted and it seems to me that all of it aligns with LRH data. Would you agree?
So often the kids who keep loudly threatening to take their toys home and leave the sandbox to others never get around to the leaving part.
Thank you Sugar, that’s what I was looking for!
To Theo, (the email addy).
Spyro, I don’t know if you are the Spyros I know. Well, said in any case. The EU sucks and we are sitting here fighting each other instead of creating a worldwide movement to inform people about things not just the tech. I think we have the potential.
LRH talked about the One Worlders long ago. Now we see them in the form of the EU being a suppressive and incompetent organisation which has brought Europe in an even worse situation.
They want to makes slaves of people and they cannot provide any jobs for them.
Hi Rainbodhi
“By scholarship, what I mean is, where are the independent studies of Scientology philosophy?”
I have asked myself the same question for the past 30 years and have come to the conclusion they don’t exist. After I was expelled from the CofS I longed to find someone who could view Scientology objectively but no one can. It was when I was in despair of ever finding a terminal that understood what I was going through that I met Jesus. The cognition I had was “Jesus is alive today” and as such he knows Scientology inside out, in fact after that cognition I went straight down to St. Hill and saw the examiner. I said “Jesus is alive today” he replied “Thank you your needle is floating”, so that must be in my folder. Who says the tech. does not work?
I am in the middle, I am neither a Christian nor a Scientologist, I am a ChristianScientologist.
Interesting you have studied the Course. In the preface it says “Forgetting all our misperceptions, and with nothing from the past to hold us back, we can remember God. Beyond this, learning cannot go. When we are ready, God Himself will take the final step in our return to Him”.
Yes Marildi, I agree.
Well said!
Hi Monte
I had to look up Lesson 184 to find out what it was saying. On page 346 paragraph 7 lines 4 and 5 it says “Learning that stops with what the world would teach stops short of meaning. In its proper place, it serves but as a starting point from which another kind of learning can begin, a new perception can be gained, and all the arbitrary names the world bestows can be withdrawn as they are raised to doubt”. Axiom 25 is talking about affinity which as ACIM says is “but a starting point and falls short of meaning” since this “scale of attitudes” is about appearances. Co-existence of static is this “new perception” that the Course is talking about. “The truth of GOD IS BUT LOVE, AND THEREFORE SO AM I” Lessons 171 to 180. Here it seems to me is the true answer to the Enemy Formula – “Find out who you really are”. I am God’s son and God is love, therefore – I AM LOVE. I have the feeling that this answer would not be acceptable in the CofS and would be considered theety-tweety!
Whereabouts in the world are you from – I am in Portsmouth, England.
Hi SKM
Thanks for your reply. Whether man has both a SOUL and a SPIRIT has been hotly debated in Christian circles over the centuries. Those that hold that man is composed of BODY and SOUL are known as DICHOTOMISTS and include such groups as Jehovah Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists. Those that hold that man is a three part being BODY, SOUL and SPIRIT are known as TRICHOTOMISTS which would include Evangelicals, Charismatics, and most Pentecostals. The bible does say “May your body, soul and spirit …” I feel comfortable with the idea that Soul and Spirit are two separate concepts in the same way that A THETAN and THETA are not one and the same. It is my conviction that only “THE WORD OF GOD” can truly discern the “WORDS OF GOD”, however much scholars philosophise about the different meaning of biblical terms, but then I would say that because I am a “bible believing believer”.
Well stated Crashing Upwards!
It does appear that we each are following curriculums or scripts tailor made to suit our specific needs. In reviewing my life as Monte, it is obvious that I always have gotten, and continue to get, the exact lesson I need exactly when I need it. However, that said, I don’t always fully understand the lesson at the time I’m receiving it. On numerous occasions I have not been willing to receive an experience I was having as the lesson it was. But, as there really is no such thing as time, space or distance, no lesson ever goes wasted.
I agree, Monte. At the time I am receiving the lesson, I usually do not understand how the piece fits in with the larger plan, except that its a lesson I have yet to learn, or else I would not be receiving it. With some distance, I can better see how the parts all relate to my own spiritual progression. And once the lesson is learned, balance achieved, feelings or desires held in check, or whatever occurs which constitutes progress, it does not have to be repeated. This applies to L. Ron Hubbard as well. And with all due respect to his achievments and contributions, he will, like most of us, be challenged on a lot of things again. The physical body is one of the more important tools we have for making progress. At some point, the need for it is no more. But I am 100% sure I will be back at least a few more times.
Yes, I’m Spyros Polkas (or Spyros illusionist in fb). I like NW Europe mostly because of the pretty women, the lash land and that they’re not as submissive to employers as we are here. I was reffering to those EU politicians and their friends that propagate that “Greeks are…” as if we were some mass, to justify imposing those financial measures just to get the government to pay for interest rates to the bankers. I don’t know about the One Worlders, but I think that ‘to rule the world’ is a common goal in SP valences.
“Find out who you really are”. I am God’s son and God is love, therefore – I AM LOVE. I have the feeling that this answer would not be acceptable in the CofS and would be considered theety-tweety!
LOL! I was just imagining informing an ethics officer that I had competed the Enemy formula and then hand over my answer…”I AM LOVE.” The head lifts from the page and the expression that comes over that face…priceless! Then, the EO says, “What’s love got to do with it?” Yes, LOVE, in the CoS is considered theery-tweety!
Thanks for that Pip. Btw, I agree… “Lessons 171 to 180. Here it seems to me is the true answer to the Enemy Formula…”
I reside in Fort Smith, Arkansas, US. Here’s where you can reach me (and please feel free to Pip): monterock@yahoo.com
CU: “And once the lesson is learned, balance achieved, feelings or desires held in check, or whatever occurs which constitutes progress, it does not have to be repeated.”
But, until that moment when the lesson is learned, it is repeated and repeated and repeated. This, I suspect, is why we have time. The constant repeating of the lesson not learned gives us countless scenarios of probabilities that, through our choosing, we manifest as present time experiences. Once, the lesson is learned, though, it (as you point out CU) does not have to be repeated. Thus, in the learning of a lesson, myriad possible and probable scenarios are removed from one’s curriculum and time collapses. I do not think it far fetched to say that in learning just one lesson, hundreds (perhaps thousands) of lifetimes of learning scenarios could be swept from the board.
CU, you wrote: “The physical body is one of the more important tools we have for making progress.” I agree. The physical body is an efficacious device for both communicating and learning. However, in this physical universe everything has a flip side. The flip side of the physical body, because it is never not lacking, is that it’s an incredible ‘tool’ for keeping one encapsulated in all manner of distractions. Distractions that keep one from recognizing experiences as being the lessons they are. Distractions that perpetuate time.
Like you CU, I too am 100% sure that I will be back for more. While this ‘Monte’ lifetime has been a major leap forward in my journey home, I sense there is much more to recognize before I transcend the desire, need, want or compulsion to have a physical form.
Well said, Monte. Its certainly not a once and done for this pilgrim. The issues can be addressed from many angles over many lifetimes if needed. Male bodies and female bodies are picked up as needed. Different familial situations are likewise entered into. One can come under particular influences over and over if needed. Of course I cannot prove any of it. But some things very much indicate as being true and one can see the reality at work in a limited sense. I enjoy Harold Waldwin Percivals 1950 work Thinking and Destiny. One can read it online at the Word Foundation. I wouldn’t be surprised if your not already familiar with it. Best to you.
I know I am way late in reading these so why for my late comment.
I tried to talk to Theo in the past on how things have to go and he could not get past the church think as well as others can’t.
I learned this though another way which I call the resource based economy. Which you do practice a bit of as you can.
I have seen you grow and I now come to respect you as a person because you were deep in the cult and you came through because you were willing to read and learn. I have done that most times myself.
I pat you on the back and thank you for doing so. I am going to start cutting those who are dogmatic loose in my facebook page. I no longer post in their groups including the progressive Scientology for I found that group is not progressive. I get a robot repeating back what they were told to say or what they read and no thinking involved in between.
If some call this judgmental then so be it. I can’t be the cult waker up whisperer any more. IT is too hard to do so so I am going to let life do that.
Barb