Reference: Pursuit of Understanding
- Tao Te Ching, A New English Version by Stephen Mitchell.
Scientology begins with the Tao. It works to the extent it parallels the Tao. It ends up going against the Tao. Scientology departed from attaining toward harmony and equanimity and headed instead toward attempting to conquer the natural balance that is the universe in which we live. That leads to the creation of ego, mental mass, conflict, individuation, and ultimate misery. It effectuates that departure by mocking up constructs as reality, complete with imagined or created or adopted nemeses, enemies, fears, paranoias, and delusions of superiority.
In a later recommended reading selection, Ram Dass relates the following in its preface:
When my Guru wanted to complement me, he called me simple; when he wished to chide me, he called me clever.
Somewhere along the line Scientology strayed from assisting toward simplicity and attempted to instill cleverness.
There is no better orientation, or re-orientation, to the power and truth of simplicity than the Tao Te Ching. Of the many translations I have read, Stephen Mitchell’s best captures that simplicity by not tacking on the cleverness that other interpreters have injected into it.
After faithfully applying all that Scientology has to offer, and after thirty-five years of interacting with and observing the best of those who did likewise, the following passage from the Tao Te Ching struck me like a bolt from the blue:
Do you have the patience to wait
till your mud settles and the water is clear?
Can you remain unmoving
till the right action arises by itself?
I asked myself, ‘have I mastered this ability?’ The answer was ‘no.’ I asked myself whether I had seen other Scientologists who had, including L. Ron Hubbard. And the answer again was ‘no; quite the contrary.’ With some work, including following the course of study I have outlined in the recommended reading, I began to learn why the answers to my questions were ‘no’. Through practice I learned that this ability alone was far more powerful or ‘OT’ than anything Scientology had to offer. In fact, following Scientology assiduously, and exclusively as it dictates it is to be practiced, barred the door to its attainment.
The first step toward its attainment was to learn a little something about the Tao.
Moving On Up a Little Higher 
The first book I purchased at a Scientology Mission was “Hymn of Asia”. And that is because it was the first book on Scientology offered to me at the mission to buy. They offered it to me because I told them that I was interested in and studying Buddhism.
I was told at that mission that Scientology is Buddhism, updated, with meters and science, and shown Hymn of Asia as proof. The person talked to me about what they knew of Buddhism and it appeared to me that they knew quite a lot. I, of course, did not know much about Buddhism, having just started to study it, and there being a paucity of Buddhist texts in the Cornfields in the early 80’s.
I did not know that what the mission staff member had told me of Buddhism came from the few lectures Hubbard gave on it. I also did not know that what Hubbard said about Buddhism was wrong. I did not know, for instance, that the whole concept of a “thetan” in Scientology was completely contradictory to the fundamentals of Buddhism.
So when I studied Scientology, I thought I was studying Buddhism.
Scientology mimics Buddhism in order to attract a person to it. In fact, Scientology mimics a lot of things. It mimics a science to attract people interested in scientific evidence, too. It mimics Taoism, too.
Scientology uses mimicry to deceive people about its true nature. Only after you have been involved and become much more deeply entrenched, does Scientology ever reveal to you what it really is all about.
But Scientologists still believe the mimicries, even after Scientology reveals its true self. When you realize the mimicries in Scientology are just mimicries, you discover the truth about Scientology, and usually leave it – if they can’t hold your job and your family and everything of value that you’ve built in your life hostage against you.
Scientology is a spiritual deception.
Hubbard used mimicry to attract and trap people into Scientology.
Alanzo
The antithesis would appear to be summed up as “make it go right”. Even if, by some stretch of the imagination, one could say that phrase also encompasses non-action, it is not so in practice.
Practice not-doing, and everything will fall into place.
That sentence alone has given me relief. No need to rush anywhere or force anything. Each time I try force, I get a painful rebound.
I’m really looking forward to other people’s thoughts on this, and to Marty’s next article. Your blog is the funnest for me right now, and the easiest to just be.
The full chapter (15) you quoted from is quite nice.
However, I don’t agree that Scientology begins with the Tao.
I don’t even think LRH used it much or understood it well (and if you listen to the Phoenix Lectures you will understand why I can say that).
“Somewhere along the line Scientology strayed from assisting toward simplicity and attempted to instill cleverness.”
From Serenity of Beingness to Covert Hostility in the blink of an eye.
From Fear to Truth Revealed with the observation of a simple fact.
Marty, wonderful post.
Yes, this is what is missing from Scientology, of course you can’t really make money out the simplicity of the Tao, but the irony is that whatever works in Scientology is because it is aligned with it.
Here is the formula: grant the illusion of bank Incidents undue importance over the being’s basic nothingness, wet everybody appetites with all the goodies they could have by pursuing spiritual freedom, and demand the creation of new strong identities while claiming that past identities are aberrative.
In other words, sell the state of non-duality by demanding nothing but duality.
What do you get then? Confusion, conflict and more delusion.
No need to reinvent the wheel, it is already here, and it is very simple:
“In the beginning was the Tao.
All things issue from it;
all things return to it.
To find the origin,
trace back the manifestations.
When you recognize the children
and find the mother,
You will be free of sorrow.
If you close your mind in judgments,
and traffic with desires,
your heart will be troubled.
If you keep your mind from judging
and aren’t led by the senses,
your heart will find peace.
Seeing into darkness is clarity.
Knowing how to yield is strength.
Use your own light
and return to the source of light.
This is called practicing eternity.”
Didnt LRH say the wrong thing to do is nothing? The tao to me is perfection so I try not to feel bad when I cant always attain it,although now that I think of it, there isnt really anything to “attain” is there The hardest thing to do is to just let nature take its course.
Patience is a virtue. Impatience is often a sign of pride and ego. Philosophically and in some processes scientology may have the feeling of beginning or sharing goals with the Tao. But I do believe its overwhelming DNA is filled with impatience. Its founder had it. The organization he created has it. And that is a major departure from the Tao. Thank you for another excellent observation.
The duck is perfect.
Thank you Marty and your advice is taken to heart. I will start with this and allow this knowledge to provide me with a further insight on simple truths.
I always considered this: The simple, the better.
Great stuff Marty. I was born into a typical Christian home but moved on from there at a very young age. My first real contact with a different perspective on matters of a spiritual nature, at age 17, was the book THE THIRD EYE, by Lobsang Rampa. From there I moved onto Buddhism, the Tao and other eastern philosophies. Then in 1960 I got involved in Scientology – very involved.
By 1980 I had enough for all the right reasons and left. Following my exit from Scientology I simply continued my exploration of consciousness and related matters. I guess I have a head start on many who have recently left and who will be leaving the C of S in the near future – a head start in discovering that there is incredible “wisdom” and truths beyond Scientology.
I can say a great deal about my journey so far, but if I had to put in a nutshell where I am currently at, this is as I see it.
I don’t “think” – try and figure how these things work, I feel it – sense it. I have come to realize that the more issues of a spiritual nature are explained, put into words, symbols, models and formulas the bigger the gap becomes between the true awesome nature of it and a typical dead-end analytical orientation. For me the priority is becoming the “experience” more than the “experiencer”.
Joe van Staden
Remove the complexities and the simplicity remains. The ability to easily do or not do. To be completely willing to be the observer or the source. Cause and allow must both be mastered. Marty, your wisdom grows as with my admiration. Thank you.
Brilliant.
YES YES YES!
Since reading the Tao and other books that completely align with it I have returned home….I am no longer desperate to achieve and know that my “cleverness” was all part of my ego.
I am now truly happy..forgiving..patient…loving and the biggest one..Compassionate.
The only real truth one will find in Scientology: Finding out it’s amateur in it’s teachings…not to mention convoluted.
Alanzo, your comment reminds me of a great Twilight Zone episode: A guy and his dog approach the gates of Heaven. He’s told he can come in but his dog cannot. The man politely declines to enter Heaven without his dog. They continue on their way eventually finding the real gate to Heaven where the man and his dog are both warmly accepted. Years after I saw this episode I heard it was based on a Buddhist parable. No wonder it is so memorable!
The TR0s helped me learn and appreciate this truth. Especially bullbaiting. Logic and reason often appear if one just stops and waits for them.
“Scientology begins with the Tao. It works to the extent it parallels the Tao. It ends up going against the Tao.”
I think the first two sentences should be recognized as fully as the third.
So far, I still think that Scientology – in its core – is a supreme way, possibly the best way for most people, to ever have the capability of achieving what was quoted from the Tao Te Ching:
“Do you have the patience to wait
till your mud settles and the water is clear?
“Can you remain unmoving
till the right action arises by itself?”
“The world begins with TR 0” still seems true to me too. And maybe it expresses the Tao in a nutshell.
Joe, what you say rings so very true and what Marty above
laid out from Eastern wisdom is of course also very real.
And that Scientology has strayed from what could have been
a bridge from east to west and worked it into a higher
consciousness attainment for man is also very apparent.
But I fail to see how you can get what the Scientology
processes can give you by any application of any of the
eastern religions, philosophies or wisdom.
What a great quote from the Tao. You have energized my interest.
Wow … the patience to wait until the mud settles and the water is clear. Scientology, in my experience, is one of the most impatient religions of all time, if not the most. There is urgency to everything. To getting stats up. To getting onto the next level. To getting people into Scientology. To clearing cities, states, the Earth.
All is desperate and frenetic. No greater game … the whole agonized future resting on what we do here and now … the enemies all around (and within). The eternal dwindling spiral and lostness if we fail.
In this worldview, there is no time for rest, for family, for anything except Scientology. Work weeks stretch to 100 hours plus. And if you are “keyed in” (some part of your “bank” or “reactive mind” has gotten restimulated) and you can’t get audited right then, just get more busy. “Doingness keys out the bank.” And gets your stats up. And keeps you on purpose.
And controls you.
Scientology controls you by not just stopping thought, but by preventing any possible opportunity for thought. You are too tired, too busy, too tunnel-visioned to let the mud settle and let truth rise from the clear waters. You are too busy and tired to read opposing views, even if that were allowed. You are too enslaved to take time for self, family, other groups, or humanitarian efforts. You are enslaved in and by a false promise of total freedom.
The mud is always being stirred. New levels. New releases. New buildings. New enemies. New lawsuits. New suppressive persons. New disconnect orders. New definitions. New purchases of the same materials, slightly altered. New urgency. New huge wins. New false stats. Infinite expansion, straight up and vertical. The continual cognitive dissonance in our minds, as we try to justify agreeing with the cult that what is truly black is actually white and wonderful.
Despite TR0 or genuine auditing insights (the exceptions that prove the rule) Scientology staunchly keeps the mud stirred with no chance of it settling and freeing up pellucid waters. In fact, to control you, Scientology _dare not_ let the mud settle.
Inevitably, I am reminded of an “LRH joke” that circulated among the scientology community back in the early 1970s:
The new original OTVI goes in to get his CS for his final step on the Bridge. S/he is given an envelope with one folded sheet of paper in it. S/he unfolds the paper and reads the following words, written in Ron’s handwriting: “Go do OT-TR0. This time, do it right.”
Good OP Marty. Good comments mwesten and marildi.
Kathy –
I really like that.
Dogs definitely belong in heaven, too.
What I like about Marty’s post are the questions he asks of himself about his own spiritual state after Scientology using the standards of a real religion.
I’ve done that with Buddhism too, and found myself entirely lacking.
I’ve got a long way to go, and much work to do before I sleep.
But this time, the path feels real, the wins are pervasive, calm, and profound. No one wants any money, no one is screaming in my face, and I am becoming much more connected to my self, my surroundings, and my fellow humans than Scientology ever helped me to do.
So now I’m Buddhism again, the real one this time.
Alanzo
Al, I know that is how it turned out, but I do not think that is how he intended it to be from the beginning. As Marty posted some time ago, Scientology became unbalanced in the direction of Yang. Originally I think LRH intended it to be an integration of East and West, of Yin and Yang. As he put it in the Phoenix Lectures, he thought he would add the “West’s urgency to arrive” to the wisdom which he acknowledged existed in the East, but was resting passively there in a Yin way, without being actively applied to improve the lot of humanity.
Obviously the injection of Yang was far too great and the wisdom residing in the Yin part was overwhelmed. Thus the integration of East and West was lost.
It’s in the Phoenix Lectures, dude.
Alanzo — “So now I’m Buddhism again, the real one this time.” —
Since there are almost as many buddhist sects as there are pebbles in the sea — OK — that’s an exaggeration — a huge one — but still
How can you be so sure the buddhism you are following is THE REAL ONE?
As a buddhist — I only caution you to be open to uncertainty — impermanence — and not even “think” … “the real one this time.”
Unless you were talking about something completely different and I missed you point. If so — sorry.
Christine
It is because L Ron Hubbard wanted to be a king.
That’s true.
In my view, LRH insisted too much on havingness (and I don’t mean the definition of being in ARC with the environment).
He was – at least so it seams – convinced that you need lots of economical means in order to bring the show on the road.
This conquest of the MEST universe is not at all in alignement with the Tao.
It’s true that when someone is uptone, he can be in a better alignement with the dynamics, also the 6th dynamic, but accumulation and insistance is not the same thing as alignement or harmony.
And it’s not that he didn’t know better. He did and he wrote about it. But he didn’t run the organisation like this; it was not economic.
I wrote this spontaneously last week. It is one of many. Contains may be a pinch of both Scientology and the Tao. Or none. Who cares, they’re just words. Tools, Arrows. Mirrors. I humbly believe that a True Taoist, would rejoice with a Scientology which does this. And a True Scientologist would and should rejoice with any win achieved through the Tao. All that matters is walking the walk. Here, exactly as was written:
Auditing on OT5 4.10.2013 – as an Indie: free, full ARC no “agendas” but help/love/respect. And self determinism.
What a week I’ve had, incredible! An intensive auditing week…hard and complex work. Not all is easy on that level. But every time, I came better and stronger. Yes, the greater the difficulty, the greater the happiness in overcoming. I’ve written before about this amazing, crazy, interesting, charming, lunatic, and enchanting level.
And this kind of things repeat over and over. And now and then, after confronting and releasing necessary elements, a great and enchanting miracle occurs: connecting to an inside deep flowing, clear
spring of pure bliss, happiness, and great love. The heart opens up, and the spirit, me, grows and overflows. And the happiness, yes, yes, that happiness deep inside, about which poets write great poems, and legends
and hair-raising tales are told, describing attempts to obtain it through dangerous journeys to mounts of doom or through spells by the witch from the dark forest…but in the end everybody knows it is the inner bliss of being oneself.
Who is a Warrior and a Hero? One who conquers himself. I discover territories in me, huge, fertile, flourishing, and most important Loving, and I give up alien ones, pretending to be mine but are not such at all. Ones which
I don’t really want, but can and need to let go.
And so, more and more peace treaties are signed within me, and war declarations dumped away, to happy cheers and beautiful, colorful fireworks. And I really like this process of peace and Love, and am continuing with it.
Because there is much more work. And much more peace. And an ocean of Love.
Thanks Ron, how the hell did you discover and did this? Huge thanks to the witch from the room up there in the clouds, at Dror Center, Tami Lemberger!! Well, white fairy, rather…Her will to help, enormous knowledge, ability, and above all a vast Love for people and beings, are spells which nothing can resist.
Happy, full of Love, for all of you.
Hemi
Hi Lars — I know you were asking Joe, but I hope you don’t mind my sharing a couple thoughts. The brand of Eastern wisdom that has always most drawn me is Tibetan Buddhism. Some of their adepts seem to have developed what Scientology might call OT abilities. Their description, from Tibetan Book of the Dead, of the bardo or “in-between lives” fits my experience (real or not) of certain “exteriorized” states and the observation of “stuff” coming into existence in those states, immediately and visibly, as a direct consequence of thought (what Scientology would call a postulate).
I sure don’t know the answer to your question. But it goes to the heart of why I, and probably many others, were drawn to Scientology in the first place: it promised a well-taped, methodical, verifiable route to “places” that seemed vague and ill-defined in Eastern philosophy — at least from a novice point of view.
I understand your explanation, Valkov.
And I can see that there is evidence for that. The Phoenix Lectures, I believe, are Hubbard’s best work.
But if you really understand the concepts of yin and yang, then you know that the idea of reaching a state of “cause” without experiencing “effect”, or “adverse effect”, as LRH told Scientologists they could reach through Scientology, has nothing to do with yin and yang.
Again, he used a mimicry of Taoism. Maybe, back in 1953 in Phoenix he was sincerely studying the Tao and trying to develop Scn services that “delivered” the Tao. But the services he delivered were always structured to make money, because he knew that you can’t make any money on people practicing the Tao.
Same with practicing Buddhist meditation. There’s just no money there. You can’t make money at a person sitting down and meditating.
So he changed things in a way to make money of of it.
I think the explanation that as LRH was creating the cult, the cult was creating him, too, brings about a much more workable understanding of L Ron Hubbard.
He was definitely creating a cult all along. It was always his business first and foremost.
And he made the mistake thinking that you could be cause and not effect.
That right there is proof that he never understood the Tao.
Alanzo
“Scientology, in my experience, is one of the most impatient religions of all time, if not the most. There is urgency to everything…In this worldview, there is no time for rest”
In my view, LRH took the same basic approach that Marty did when confronted with real-life enemies who could destroy “all,” as described in the Preface of his book *Memoirs…* (And just to note, voluminous public records show that LRH’s enemies were very real and very powerful and very active against him for decades.) Both men concluded that there was no alternative but to fight fire with fire. Here’s a quote from that Preface:
“Until I helped deliver some hoods to jail, I would continue to guard my wife’s slumber at night, sigging in our carport with my shotgun across my knee.”
It’s like you said, FOTF2012, “no time to rest” – literally, at times. As I see it, thus far, this is the paradox people often face in life – which LRH himself described in a couple of references that I know of, using the same word. Paradox.
Typo: “sigging” should be “sitting.”
There’s an old saying that the truth comes out in jokes.
I know what you mean, Windhorse.
Compared to studying Scientology and thinking that I am studying Buddhism, what I am studying now is the real Buddhism.
That’s what I meant.
Alanzo
By that measure Anons dispense a lot of thruth
Marty,
This has to be one of my favorite post thus far. And Joe, you couldn’t have put it in a better way… Thanks to both of you!
Gotcha
FOTF wrote:
I sure don’t know the answer to your question. But it goes to the heart of why I, and probably many others, were drawn to Scientology in the first place: it promised a well-taped, methodical, verifiable route to “places” that seemed vague and ill-defined in Eastern philosophy — at least from a novice point of view.
This is a very good point. I think one of the most valuable things LRH contributed to spiritual writing was formatting it as technical writing.
Scientology HCOBs are written in a recipe format, very clear and able to be applied.
Buddhists texts that I have read, especially the places in the text that are meant to by applied step by step, are almost hopeless, in paragraph form. With one step in one paragraph and another down the page – none of the steps standing out to be applied like a recipe – as LRH presented Scientology.
I think a dude could make a MILLION DOLLARS reformatting the Tibetan Book of the Dead and other Buddhists texts into HCOB formats!
Alanzo
I get ya, Al. But somehow I have not got the impression from LRH that he thought anyone could ever be “cause” in the way you propose, especially in the early lectures I am referring to. The balance between Cause and Effect, between Yang and Yin, between Arriving and Enduring was there in his original lectures. It obviously got lost in the actualization of the reality of the Church. And I am willing to grant he himself pushed it harder and harder in that direction over time.
All that said, nowadays I have come to feel that what a person finds in Scientology as LRH lectured about originally, and what a person takes away from Scientology when they leave, is what the person brought to it in the first place.
In other words, the cult was in you when you came to Scientology, and the cult is what you took away with you when you left. Ditto with whatever wisdom you took away with you. “The road you carry you lay before you.”
A person is a self-fulfilling prophecy. You create, as “cause”, what you then experience as “effect”.
So that is perhaps why we see it differently.
Alanzo, I also purchased Hymn of Asia and thought that Buddha had incarnated. I was a teen and very interested in meditation.
I actually made my decision to become a Scientologist based on his claim of being the Buddha: that was what the law calls deceptive advertising.
Some call it a con.
What the Buddha would never say:
Eat your hamburgers
Destroy your enemy
Exteriorization is the goal
Make money make money make money
Seek spiritual power
Have faith in a Supreme Being
Clear Light is an implant
I am the only one true way
Some drugs help with meditation
(Benzedrine helps run case)
That brings me to an idea LRH communicated that got me thinking:
He said somewhere (paraphrase) “I will not speculate on how I was able to rise above the bank.”
With the knowledge, of that women that found Ron in Las Palmas after the tale end of researching OT, she said,(paraphrase) “he was in a horrible condition, eaten hardly any food, lots of pills and bottles of Rum all around. I Needed to slowly wean him off drugs and booze, get him eating, his skin looked white(or grey)”
So this piece of evidence points to the answer to his posed question regarding how he rose above the bank.
He was blasted on Rum and speed. Possible withdrawal symptoms.
I am not stating this as the truth. I am presenting, what I feel to be a reasonable possibility taking into account an eye witness and his writing to Mary Sue about ,”popping a lot of pinks and gets.” This letter was dating, I think, around when he was running OT 3.
This is not Ron bashing. This is confronting some evidence as reported by others.
There are reasons why OT Materials run as a process. That is the thought puzzle to unravel. It really is simple.
Let me ask you this, Al. Is the Tao then Cause? If all arises from the Tao and all returns to it?
Scientology and its founder, I think, fell into a very well worn groove that has been extant since time began and quite possibly even before time began. That ‘groove’ being the desire to be separate from Source. Or, perhaps another way to put it…a desire to be an individual. I suspect that the desire was completely innocent. It was more of a ‘what if….’ Like….what if I could exist separate from my source? What would that look like? And the answer was instantaneous! The answer is what Marty refers to when he describes what happens when SC goes against the Tao. Could this ‘what if’ moment possibly be where the cosmos all began? Personally, I don’t know. At this point all I can do is suppose.
On 22 May 2010 Marty posted a video blog titled Briefing from the shack. In this blog he talks a bit about a book, The Shack by Wm. Paul Young and he recommends reading it. It took me a while to get around to it but when I did eventually read it, it was exactly the right time for me to do so.
In Chapter Eight of The Shack Mack, the protagonist of the story, starts a discussion with God (‘Papa’), the Holy Spirit (Sarayu) and Jesus by basically asking who’s in charge? What was said in the discussion, I think, applies to SC’s (and so many other religions) departure from, or going against, the Tao. Here’s a few excerpts from this discussion:
Mack: “Well, I know that you are one and all, and that there are three of you. But you respond with such graciousness to each other. Isn’t one of you more the boss than the other two?”
Sarayu: “…we have no concept of final authority among us, only unity. We are in a circle of relationship, not a chain of command or ‘great chain of being,’ as your ancestors termed it. What you’re seeing here is relationship without any overlay of power. We don’ need power over the other because we are always looking out for the best. Hierarchy would make no sense among us. Actually, this is your problem not ours.
“Humans are so lost an damaged that to you it is almost incomprehensible that people could work or live together without someone being in charge.”
Mack: “But every human institution that I can think of, from political to business, even down to marriage, is governed by this kind of thinking. It is the web of our social fabric.”
Jesus: “It’s one reason why experiencing true relationship is so difficult for you. Once you have a hierarchy you need rules to protect and administer it, and then you need law and the enforcement of the rules, and you end up with some kind of chain of command or a system of order that destroys relationship rather than promotes it. You rarely see or experience relationship apart from power. Hierarchy imposes laws and rules and you end up missing the wonder of relationship that we intended for you.
Sarayu: “When you chose independence over relationship, you became a danger to one another. Others became objects to be manipulated or managed for your own happiness. Authority, as you usually think of it, is merely the excuse the strong ones use to make others conform to what they want.
“Creation had been taken down a very different path than we desired. In your world the value of the individual is constantly weighed against the survival of the system, whether political, economic, social or religious – any system actually. First one person, then a few, and finally even many are easily sacrificed for the good and ongoing existence of that system. In one form or another this lies behind every struggle for power, every prejudice, every war, and every abuse of relationship. The ‘will to power and independence has become so ubiquitous that it is now considered normal.”
Papa: “It is the human paradigm. It is like water to fish, so prevalent that it goes unseen and unquestioned. It is the matrix; a diabolical scheme in which you are hopelessly trapped even while completely unaware of it’s existence.”
Mack: “So you are telling me that whenever we humans protect ourselves with power…”
Jesus: “You are yielding to the matrix, not to us.”
“And so, more and more peace treaties are signed within me, and war declarations dumped away, to happy cheers and beautiful, colorful fireworks. And I really like this process of peace and Love, and am continuing with it.”
Hemi, the above and your whole post validate what Scientology can do – based on your direct, personal experience. Thanks for commenting on this truth. 🙂
Well, it depends which tone level your jokes are on. Check out the first page of Chapter Twenty-Six of *Science of Survival*. And then report back. 🙂
Click to access 1.pdf
The Tone-level is in the eye of the beholder
That’s because the beholder has a tone level too. 😛
Monte, thanks for the thought-provoking post. You chose a great quote! Very clear. And I had a thought on this comment of your own:
“Like….what if I could exist separate from my source? What would that look like? And the answer was instantaneous! The answer is what Marty refers to when he describes what happens when SC goes against the Tao. Could this ‘what if’ moment possibly be where the cosmos all began?”
I would venture to guess that the cosmos all began with the desire to have a game. And now the challenge is to “be an individual and a member of the team at the same time” – which is part of LRH’s definition of “team”.
Marty, I would like to repost this here for Monte and others who may be interested. It refers to “the matrix” Monte refers to, from the book The Shack.
I see our our ‘matrix’ as our nature as “Lambda”(living) beings existing and trying to survive in the physical universe. In other words, our existence as genetic organisms. This is the post about recent studies about our genetic cousins, apes and other mammals.
I think this is quite relevant to this discussion on “human nature”, for those who are interested and have the patience to look into it. It is a post originally made by Maria on Geir’s blog.
The upshot of it is, Humans and chimpanzees have 99% the same DNA. Among mammals, these 2 species are also uniquely violent towards each other. The very similar “bonobo” species, virtually identical to chimps, have completely different social structures which are based on equality of the sexes in terms of social power sharing and co-creation of how they live. Here is part of one of Maria’s posts, and subsequent posts provide much expansion, and a book recommendation “Demonic Males” which is based on much recent research
This is fascinating information:
“Out of almost 5,000 mammal species in the world, there are only two in which males live with their relatives in social groups and occasionally make trips into neighboring territories to stalk, hunt and kill members of neighboring groups. Chimpanzees are one. Humans are the other. And we are so closely related that a blood transfusion from one species to the other will save a life, if the blood types match.”
Here is more:
“In a new book, Demonic Males (Houghton Mifflin), which Wrangham wrote with science writer Dale Peterson, he reveals how he found a glimmer of hope that humanity could reduce its violence and overcome its five-million-year rap sheet of murder and war. Wrangham bases his optimism on the discovery that bonobos(who resemble chimps very closely but have a society completely different from chimps) create peaceful societies in which males and females share power–while the biologically similar chimpanzees live in patriarchal groups in which males regularly rape, beat, kill, and sometimes even drink the blood of their own kind.”
This part of the comment thread is here:
Here’s the book referred to:
More broadly of course, our “matrix” is the Dynamics and the MEST universe, as well as our human physical bodies.
Another thought, Monte, is that ironically, it is Source itself that chooses to Not-know in the first place, thereby initiating the entire Expanded Know to Mystery Scale sequence.
“But I still am uncertain, is the ‘tech’ only those endless written questions and the e-meter? do auditors go ‘free lance’ with the questions at some point?
…nothing done analogous to Buddhist inner visualizing practice, for instance?
I have been a student of various ‘ways of teaching’ for most of my life…I have never come across anything like Scientology, which was literally under my nose for the past 35 years at least…it was dumb-founding to come across it; all as a result of watching a Lawrence Wright interview on his latest book!
Edit to ask: at some time in a teaching there has to be a transition from passive consumption to active experience or what is the point? is Scientology supposed to be a system that has that progression all mapped out ahead of time?”
This is the gist of a question to JPC, after his reply to me in a comment thread over at the Bunker.
Any comments from contributors here would be appreciated. As I stated a few days past, I was a member of a Fourth Way community for over 25 years. It came time to leave. Before and after that? read myth and fairy tales from the age of 3 (yes.) and lots of Jesuits in my life…and an Irish wizard.
ps I would not be in this state of question but for one fact: due to some serious health issues, my family thought it best I move and down-size; I was ok with that and labeled my possessions accordingly.
Some of the youngins’ felt I was ‘too attached to clutter’ and decided on their own to jettison my treasures; after 18 months I still mourn most the loss of all my journals and notebooks kept since high school.
Since in the Work, with its history of oral transmission, all records of the exercises and discussions and themes are up to the student, it has been devastating that mine ended up in a dumpster.
(At least the Irish linens and my personal library went to the Goodwill.)
My local Jesuit (age 91) invites me to think of it as a good thing; after these past few weeks of inquiry I am beginning to agree with him!
Yes Brian –
You are talking about Kima Douglas, LRH’s personal nurse in the Sea Org from the late 60’s to the mid to late 70’s.
There is a very insightful interview of this time working directly for LRH as his nurse at the link here:
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Library/Shelf/miller/interviews/kima.htm
Alanzo
Valkov wrote:
All that said, nowadays I have come to feel that what a person finds in Scientology as LRH lectured about originally, and what a person takes away from Scientology when they leave, is what the person brought to it in the first place.
In other words, the cult was in you when you came to Scientology, and the cult is what you took away with you when you left. Ditto with whatever wisdom you took away with you. “The road you carry you lay before you.”
A person is a self-fulfilling prophecy. You create, as “cause”, what you then experience as “effect”.
So that is perhaps why we see it differently.
This is so beautiful, Valkov.
And so true.
The liar is actually the one who was lied to.
The rapist is actually the woman who was raped.
And the murderer is actually the dead guy laying there with a bullet wound in his forehead.
Thank you for that.
Alanzo
Yea Tao…path, way….
Buddha pointing at the moon…is it the finger (words) that is the message or where it’s pointing?
I suspect that some day Marty, you will be looking to Hubbard again.
My current practice is vipassana, http://www.dhamma.org/en/ , but I see value in the modern, contextual relevance, of scientology.
You dismiss “scientology” from your experience of it as a culture, derived from the mis-application of Hubbard’s intent.
Yes “scientology” is a construct that is narrow and human focused in its attempt to awaken people, and other philosophies have a more basic focus, but the scientology paradigm, interpreted more exactly and without the addition of human baggage and consideration, yet still addressing the human condition, may well point us right.
I am enjoying observing your awakening! Welcome to the game.
Dave
Buddha pointing at the moon….
SKM, I like your comment. Havingness and all that mest stuff, LRH talked about Scn being a Western religion I think, and it relates to financial success for sure, even though he mocked capitalism as another failed “ism”, in fact he did have great admiration for MONEY.
If you don’t have money in Scn, you are DOWNSTAT.
Brian, actually LRH said “WE (my emphasis) will not speculate on how I was able to rise above the bank…” It was in KSW, which, in my humble view, is where the nail starts to nail down the coffin of the Scientology movement and the imperialist controlling abusive Church it would become.
I now read that comment as: “don’t question me any more”. “you dare not”. Do what Ron says, if you question me, then it’s your bank, and it’s “the bank that says we must fail” etc etc etc. It set us up to be Kool-Aid drinkers, right then and there.
Al, for you I highly recommend this little book of interviews of the Dalai Lama.
🙂
“Scientology uses mimicry to deceive people about its true nature. ”
“Scientology is a spiritual deception.”
“Hubbard used mimicry to attract and trap people into Scientology.”
Brother, you don’t know the half of it. I visited an anti cult forum yesterday, they have been fighting against a cult for a few years. The forum author, while fighting against the cult, had created a cult of his own, and become a cult leader himself. And his following mirror all that they protest. That is mimicry.
I visited another forum a few days before that. The people there were applauding someone creating broad illusion in the same blind way as the Church they just left. Applause applause applause. That is mimicry.
This has nothing to do with Scientology and Hubbard, This has to do with people dramatizing the same thing over, and over, and over again. Halloween 24/7. You can bleed yourself dry trying to get people to rise above this black magic. Pointing out, “This is the problem” “That is the problem”. As soon as you figure out what the problem was, and try to show them, they have mocked it up all over again. With Hubbard gone, and Scientology in some far past behind them.
Don’t lie to yourself Alanzo. Hubbard has been dead for decades and the same madness people mocked up over there they are mocking up somewhere else today. And you know what, I do not think it is going to change. And I no longer believe I have the power to change them. I don’t know how Marty stands as he does in these winds and continue to reach.
You have the gift of still being curious. Of still wanting to KNOW and understand. I suggest you let this universe and the anti magic in it go. Go talk to people who are really still curious. Spend your time helping people that are up to rising above inconvenient truths. Help people that building things up, not tearing things down. I honestly believe whatever good was possible with the Scientology happened in many chapters past.
To pick through the ashes and try to figure out what caused the fire, when everyone has just crossed the street into another building with their matches and lighter fluid, is a curiosity that will tax all other possibilities that could have been.
No one person is to blame for this mimicry. There is just a scarcity of new ideas. Most of the population to have anything to do at all, will copy or repeat the past until someone creates a new future for them.
Hi Valkov,
No, I don’t think the Tao is cause; it precedes the concept of cause and effect in the same way that it precedes all dualities. the Tao begets Yin/yang, not the other way round.
I don’t think LRH really got the Eastern concept of non-doing, at all.
To him it appears to be anathema. Wu Wei is not doing nothing; what it is, is clearly stated in these lines,
Do you have the patience to wait
till your mud settles and the water is clear?
Can you remain unmoving
till the right action arises by itself?
For me, Scientology had an anxiety about activity. you had to be BUSY!
I can fault Hubbard with one thing. He knew about the non existence formula. Find out what it wanted and needed and present it.
People do not want to view life from any other angle than the one that is convenient for them and makes them right and mostly everyone else wrong. You come along as a “different” view, get ready for an ass whipping. And here he came with new ideas. He stepped out of line, did not run with the herd.
That is not what is wanted and needed on this planet. People want to free fall in illusion. They want agreement. Anything that causes some discomfort is protested against. “Think for me” “Decide for me” “Lead me” And they can make you feel needed for a minute. And it’s like feeding the dolphins. Until you run out of dolphin food and fall in the sea. And find yourself surrounded by hungry sharks.
Hubbard’s crime? He did not run with the herd. And that is very, very disturbing to most people. Unless they can too, step into those shoes for a moment and experience that freedom. If they can not, you have just run one big fucking can’t have and they will fuck you up for it.
I can tell you from my own personal experience, you can run a CAN HAVE on the truth with people, but if they can’t see it, they will take it as a can’t have, and fuck you up.
You know, because CAN HAVE truth creates CAN”T HAVE illusion. So, one begins walking on egg shells here. Well, that is all I have to say.
This is my last post on the Internet about Scientology. Thanks to Marty, I am moving on. I know I am weird. Had to run out being a freak in auditing. I ain’t a long distance runner. I am very grateful that Marty had the greatness to let me run wild on this blog with out being afraid of me.
Thank you Marty, for not being afraid of me. Your tolerance of strange angels has been an incredible mercy. Damn, you are one huge being.
Thank you Joe. Just yesterday it occurred to me that “life itself is the bridge”.
The journey is beautiful.
Cat Daddy Jedi Master? 😉
Beautiful, thank you for sharing that.
Absolutely, Marildi. And thanks too! (2 smileys..how to attach in here?)
One thing I pray will never change in me is to always to be willing to see the bigger picture in things, including and especially, in things I criticize. Sure, expose evil, always, but please notice the good and cherish it. Do not forget!! This for me is the essence of “the patience to wait
till your mud settles and the water is clear”. Mud is mud, and clear water is clearwater. (And flag is flag….joke). In my indie declaration, I exposed many atrocities and suppressive acts, but did not leave out the good stuff, as I saw it. I have a feeling that many people who write here, unfortunately, have not experienced Scientology as real indies, in a true indie environment, fully on the basis of IF IT IS NOT TRUE FOR YOU IT IS NOT TRUE! And nothing ever enforced. Makes a huge difference.
Hemi
As soon as I began my daily communion with the ‘Big Me’ this morning, a line from Marty’s post came up to be explored. It was this one: “Do you have the patience to wait…” It was as if the two words, patience and wait, had suddenly become bold headings over a doorway leading into a classroom. I opened the door and went on in. Instantly I was reminded that it is never about what I think it’s about. However, I can say this…the concepts of patience and wait are responses predicated on a belief in linear time and duration.
Marty – Great post! I was wondering what you thought about the healing process once a person is out of Scientology. Everyone suffers trauma due to the constant abuse Scientology inflicts upon people. I found that the Organization uses “covert invalidation and nullification” as the “social intercourse” – to control people. One can never be enough, give enough or do enough for “scientology”. It is always the person’s fault and never the Organization. This reaks havoc on the mind and I know the trauma I suffered once I was free.
Here is my question – do you think it is necessary to expose the truth about scientology, help others go free and do everything possible to destroy (legally, of course) Miscavige – the evil dictator?
Can one truly heal by just “not ising” the dangers of Scientology or do you feel one has to do SOMETHING about it? People are getting hurt every day by the tactics used to fleece, trap and enslave people!
I would appreciate your thoughts on this.
Monte stated; “Scientology and its founder, I think, fell into a very well worn groove that has been extant since time began and quite possibly even before time began. That ‘groove’ being the desire to be separate from Source.”
This made me immediately think of the Biblical story of the Fall of Adam and Eve. Born of Pride, Ego and feeding your own will as a source unto itself. Shades of Aleister Crowley: “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.” Here was another Brilliant mind that wanted to be the sun instead of the flower. In the end they cannot see past their own self image and desire for power. Another miserable ending.
Thanks for your considerable, insightful contributions to this forum. You will be missed by many. Afraid? You scare the hell out of me…and I’m fearless.
Your characterization of what I am allegedly doing is inaccurate; as reflected in the evolution of writings on this blog and books.
Thank you Marty for your latest thread and to all the contributors. I have now been declared for some 35 years and during that time I have never stopped endeavouring to get back into good standing with the Church of Scientology. My only ‘claim to fame’ is that I probably have the thickest Ethics file and have been declared and expelled more times than anybody else.
Very early on in my time in “The Church” I became aware that something was not right, but it has taken me until now to be able to verbalise it in a way that communicates to other people. (hopefully)
LRH says on a tape which is part of the student hat “I DEVELOPED SCIENTOLOGY BECAUSE OF MY LOVE OF UNDERSTANDING” That is quite different from a love of the technology, it is as different as “the finger pointing at the moon” and ‘the moon’. In terms of the technology we are all SP’s because the policy states that if H.C.O. declares a person SP then they are SP whether they are or not is incidental. When understanding becomes belief no further progress is possible. Note Ron said “I developed Scientology because of my love understanding” – no understanding = no development. Understanding is the spirit of Scientology, the technology and policy is just the letter and as the Bible says “the letter killeth, but the Spirit bringeth life”. The Church of Scientology will never change for the better by making it wrong, we need to go back in the Spirit of Scientology, with a love of understanding; in the knowledge that no-thing is wrong with the Church and it is no-thing that needs to be put right.
Old Joke. Short version. 3 Scn.sts in a restaurant can’t get a waitress. Clear intend that one comes over. No response. OT3 reaches out and ‘pulls one over. No response. OT8 stands up, snaps his fingers, and says loudly “Waitress”.
Simplicity.
Hi Dave.
Good to see you here.
And good point.
Alanzo
My observation founded opinion differs from your own sense of what you are up to…..agreed.
And your deconstructing of the cult is noble.
I guess my point is more that in fighting anything, and in particular a path with the goal of enlightenment, can have the effect of binding one to it, or it’s opposing goal. The more effort, resistance or other engagement, the stronger the duality.
My apparent reactive defense of Hubbard and his -ology is based on my feeling that it could be practiced as written, but with a different culture, and none of the ill effects.
It is a finger pointing at the moon, its followers observing the finger.
I enjoy reading your evolution.
🙂
You keep resorting to dichotomous terms, this time ‘fighting.’ That is where I think you misunderstand me.
Thanks Marildi. I would agree that some of the enemies were real. On some level, yin-yang-like, perhaps the enemies arose only because of Scientology.
Over time, I think the fear of actual enemies became organizationally realized as the EP (end phenomenon) of being able to create enemies at will. An OT ability? No. We humans have been good at that throughout history. Creation of us vs. them is a group control mechanism. It is in fact a hallmark of cults.
Going back to the “dancing as fast as you can” pace of Scientology, in a broad way, Scientology’s frantic yin may be the naturally arising complement to the East’s patient yang.
Of those I have come to know on this site, you are among those I most closely align with. I have a very pragmatic view of philosophy and spiritual improvement. One should be perfectly able to sit for hours, doing nothing, waiting for the right time to occur. One must be equally able to work like a madman indefinitely should the need arise. Both, equally, in present time, with no ‘case’ affecting your decision what to do or not to do.
“True freedom is the ability to handle anything that comes along.” (MarkNR) The ability to meditate on something or nothing, uncoerced and free, is worthless without the ability to do, freely, and joyfully. The obsession to go go go without the serenity and wisdom to stop and observe is equally fallacious and will produce overt products and bad effects.
The church, as operated, fell into an obsession without end. The Tao, as practiced by many, can lead one to comfort in a static state of false serenity. Both advised of these errors. Both are misunderstood and misapplied by those whose intent is predetermined by their own aberrated state.
Conquering the world, saving the world, sitting on a mountain feeling the cool breeze, or observing life while fully detached are all perfectly valid purposes. Having the wisdom to know what is the right thing to do at any moment, with full knowledge of your past existence, with no coercion or obsession from your past is a worthwhile goal. Sitting and pondering your path without being able to decide and then walk your path is just lazy. Being a dilettante is not a workable path. Again I say “It’s like masturbation, it feels good but it doesn’t produce life.
Find your path and WALK IT. Simple.
Just sayin’.
Mark
You have my admiration , wherever you are , be well.
I have been looking forward to your comments for a long time and would like to stand outside the box with you .
You will be greatly missed….
A very wise comment Val. Knowing All is bliss and has it’s moments, but is completely devoid of action, occurrence. Not knowing gave us activity but also got us into this mess. What can be gained from this revelation?
Play the games. Have fun. Accomplish things. But when the game is over, review it, in detail, leaving NOTHING unknown. Then start a new game.
This statement has far greater importance than most realize. You see, it’s not the ‘not knowing’ that is the problem. It’s the forgetting.
Scientology, in it’s current state of development, discounting errors, can only produce a state of temporary release. Even Dianetic erasure is just a higher release. It’s value comes in unburdening you from your confusions until you get to the point where your entire existence becomes available to you. Even after OT8, you are not ready to review you past directly. That, I believe, is why Ron once said that, once begun, the path must be walked to it’s end.
Just my observation.
TO, a game can be fun, boring, inspiring, involving etc etc.
you have had many ++’s in my book. I will miss your comments.
Thank you for this post, Marty. I find myself most at peace when I slow down, guess it was hoping for the mud to settle so I could see something, anything, calmly, clearly.
FOTF2012 comment: “In fact, to control you, Scientology _dare not_ let the mud settle.”
Scientology, very like a shell game, where the con/operator keeps moving the cups around very fast so you can’t keep track of where the shell is anymore. Gotta keep your speed of particle up, right? Supposedly that is power, which, if so, I don’t want it – rather wait til the mud settles and see what comes into view.
Thanks for stirring the mud a bit yourself, and for the encouragement to see what’s emerging from it all.
Dave, I guess I look at Marty helping to encourage sorting and finding some wheat from the chaff that is Scientology, so I can’t get what you mean that he will be “looking to Hubbard again soon”???
I’m gonna say that those of us who considered ourselves die-hard Scientologists at some point or other began to try to look at the world ONLY through Hubbard’s eyes, and trying to justify the body of his work as best we could, with the unstated premise that Hubbard was actually right (at all times).
I finally took off my Hubbard glasses, but I can still enjoy some of the things he found, suggested, did, that were useful and helpful. I am done electing any person for being my new glasses I will look through, no new philosophy or religion either, but just try to keep my eyes open and remove clouds or false lenses when I notice them.
I sure don’t see Marty ever electing Hubbard his fearless leader ever again. Wow. What a trap to escape from.
There are many tools to help self and others. If it helps, use it, whether its from Hubbard or wherever.
Linear time and duration are deeply enbedded beliefs in quite a few systems, cultures.
But I think Patience and Wait can just be: suspend, neither try to move forward, or backward, no relation to time or duration at all. Hold breath, neither breath in or out, duration not being part of it at all.
Wow, Pip Threlfall, are you still actually trying to get back in good standing with the Church of Scientology?
I don’t look at going back in the “Spirit of Scientology” as you stated it – but I just try to have a good spiritual outlook, be a good spirit, whether any Church or person recognizes me or not, I AM a person anyway, don’t need permission, and don’t need to prove myself good in their eyes, especially if I see their judgement system hurtful. I have found the best system for myself to use (at the moment, I may change it) is to simply look myself in the eye at the end of the day and see if I can honestly say I am pleased about what I have done this day, but if I feel ashamed, determine to do better the next day.
Probably so. Yet on I go, fearless in my stupidity.
I keep promising myself I will not comment here anymore, but fail.
You are just too much fun.
🙂
I second what you say about Marty. But a big Thank You to you T.O. for all the posting you’ve done here and elsewhere. I have looked forward to your posts many times. You’ve looked to me like a person who was not afraid to look and report what you actually saw! Thanks again!
I guess I am still a scientologist.
Even though I have reverted to my previous buddhist practice.
I’ve never considered my self die-hard, and never looked at the world only through the filter of the scientology culture. Hubbard’s work requires no justification and in fact trying to justify it is a disservice to it and contrary to his writings.
I think it is great that Marty has spread his wings and flown on other air, but I stand by my prediction that at some point he will again preach Hubbard and call it true.
With the cult culture removed it looks to me to be the most efficacious path.
You mention helping self and others, I suggest that that is not the goal. Transcending mortal existence is. Self and suffering are things to leave behind rather than deal with.
Use any tools you like. Let me know when you have found samsara’s end.
The Oracle:
“I can tell you from my own personal experience, you can run a CAN HAVE on the truth with people, but if they can’t see it, they will take it as a can’t have, and fuck you up.”
LRH was damned if he did and damned if he didn’t.
“You know, because CAN HAVE truth creates CAN”T HAVE illusion. So, one begins walking on egg shells here. Well, that is all I have to say.”
You tried too – and you had some great successes! Thanks so much for all of it.
‘I asked myself, ‘have I mastered this ability?’ The answer was ‘no.’ ‘
I disagree. But I’d say you’re ‘ego’ is pretty safe 🙂 ❤
Good example of there being truth in jokes. 😉
Thanks – I see us aligned too!
And thanks for another insightful post. 🙂
I have felt and said the same thing, just worded a little differently. Mine was “Life is a process.”
And I think the set-ups to be able to benefit from the process was what I got from Scientology. It’s probably the same for many others too – even for some of the critics, who might not recognize it.
Very well said again, Hemi. Plus some lighthearted fun:
“Mud is mud, and clear water is clearwater. (And flag is flag….joke).”
Two big smileys: 😀 😀
“On some level, yin-yang-like, perhaps the enemies arose only because of Scientology.”
No, those enemies that “arose” in 1950 were already enemies – of humanity. And when Dianetics threatened to expose their contemptible activities, they elected themselves its enemies. Why is that so hard to admit?
I getcha Jiustin. That is a different definition of cause and effect; it is the mechanical one, like of “chains of cause and effect”. The one I meant is the one in philosophy, as in referring to a “first Cause”. Cause in this sense means a knowing causation of something. It is the source, beginning, or starting point which does not require anything prior to be involved.
However, you are entirely correct. Cause is not the right word. “Source” would be the right word. That is what I was getting at. Sometimes God is said to be the First Cause, meaning actually the Source of everything existing, and that is the meaning I was trying to convey.
This is perhaps one of the confusions Scientologists are stuck in.
Thanks for speaking up about it.
Thanks Al! I’m glad it makes some sense to you! It was what surfaced as I tried to absorb and reconcile all the polarized opinions and conclusions people have come up with as a result of their experiences with Scientology, that I have heard and read over the past few years. The solution had to be something other than declaring either half of those people wrong.
Although I must admit Russell Salamon said it in his poem that I keep posting from time to time. More eloquently than I can. That’s where the line “The road you carry you lay before you” comes from.
Justin, I do think he got it, but he wanted to add something to it, because he felt it had not materially benefited the inhabitants of the East much if at all. I think he felt that in the East, they had also fallen away from the Tao, into an unabalanced state that was too Yin.
It is what he said in the Phoenix Lectures – that the East Endured, and the West had “the urgency to Arrive”.
Having been born in the Far East and having partly grown up there, I could see his point. I won’t go into the details, unless someone wants me to, but what LRH thought he could do was combine the Wisdom that existed in the Far East, with the West’s drive and “impatience” for results, to create something that could be applied to improve humanity’s lot and life on Earth. To his eye, the East had sunk into an apathetic acceptance of disease and poverty for the mass of people and largely lived in a widespread “Dark Ages” comparable to what had existed in Europe. All that Wisdom was not being applied to “create a better game”, or people who were capable of playing a better game that would improve the lot of most living in their societies. India had been stuck in a stultified static caste system for ages; Buddhists had withdrawn into their Ivory Tower in the mountains of Tibet.
LRH thought he could develop a system that integrated the Yin and Yang forces in a balanced and ‘centered’ way, and with the advent of modern communication and duplication technologies, could make something that was accessible to the mass of people, which could make substantial numbers “capable of playing a better game”, which would improve the quality of life more widely than ever possible before.
This is what I got out of reading the Phoenix Lectures book.
Considering he didn’t really get going on this project until he was nearly 40 years old, I think he made a helluvaneffort.
Anyone who has ever been involved with any kind of construction projects or remodeling efforts, will know they always take 3 times longer to complete and end up costing 3 times more than you think initially, they will take.
Patience can be a virtue, but it may also be an apparncy cloaking someone who is living in the delusional belief that if he waits long enough, Santa Claus will bring it to him. This seems like the delusion many of the people still in the CoS are living in. Only the ‘Santa Claus’ they believe in is DM.
I have to agree. Study history, folks. “Dark Ages” do not happen accidentally. Why was Socrates put to death by hemlock? He threatened the “established order” by asking penetrating questions. Buddha was one of the few who avoided being put to death, although Devadatta, a close disciple attempted to murder him at least 3 times, colluding with others, paying assassins, all that good stuff. Look what happened to Jesus.
Just read history. It is written in the blood spilled by those entrenched interests who wield the power and the money. It was no different in 1950, it is no different today!
Look, there were 2, count’em, 2 WORLD WARS in just the last century. Some ones were protecting their interests, ya know?
Oh well. it is hard to confront, unless you have been in the middle of it, I guess.
Awesome video CD.
Thanks for expanding on that Mark! Yes, it is the “forgetting” that sweeps things ‘under the rug’ and causes them to persist below our level of awareness. I find Ron’s lectures on those areas fascinating. They raise many questions for me.
I wouldn’t know about the upper levels etc as I haven’t done them. I see the correct end result of Scientology as a person who can manage himself, his goals and purposes, his perceptions and his automaticities himself.
Hi Aurora,
I would be out of my mind with an unforgiving bitterness if some of my ‘younguns’ dumped my ‘clutter’ without consulting me! Be frothing at the mouth, I would! That ‘clutter’ is often the most personal and most treasured of my possessions!
That said, here’s what I would recommend for you: Get a copy of the book Self Analysis. It comes with a little disk that you use in going through the “recall” half of the book. Use it about 20 minutes a day. This is a tool one can use by one’s self, without limit. One can also do it with a ‘twin’, if one knows someone else who is interested, but it is not necessary to have another person to work with, except to the extent that being in a group the people help keep each other going, as you undoubtedly know. But this book does not require anything more than you yourself working with it.
The only other thing I would recommend to a person starting out, would require an interested ‘twin’, a quiet safe space, the simple set of instructions, and 2 chairs. You could then do the very basic exercise called OT-TR0.
However, the Self Analysis book is really all you need, to start doing some exercises that I venture to guess, would soon have you missing your notes and diaries a lot less than you do now! 🙂
I have more than one copy of Self Analysis, and if you like, I can send you one.
You can contact me at “iamvalkov (AT) gmail.com” ( Put the @ symbol where I have the word (AT) to make a valid email address out of it. Let me know if you would like the book, someone might as well get some use out of the extra copy I have! Also if you have any questions, just ask away.
And yes, it is about “active experience”.
Thanks # 2 Marildi -:)))
Should have said ” Mud is mud and clear water is…not necessarily Clearwater..” I’ve noticed some good R between us, in the past too.
Can I mail you? mine: benven@barak.net.il
Hemi
marildi, as I was reading your reply it occurred to me that there was something not right about my supposition that there had been a desire to be separate from Source. Desire is a word that states a lack. IF Source IS Everything…there would be nothing lacking. Therefore, if I am in a state of mind where I am desiring anything at all, whether it be a game, individuality, the experience of time and space…whatever…well, I must have already separated from Source. Or, at least, imagined that I have.
Personally, I don’t think that I can even begin to conceive of what ‘Source’ is. However, I do seem to ‘sense’ it at times. I’m like the fish swimming in the ocean that suspects water IS.
Valkov, you’ve got me wondering…in our attempt to move up to higher consciousness, what is our goal? Do we want to free ourselves from the ‘matrix’ or do we want to attain a conscious position where we fully understand it so that we can completely and utterly control it? It’s a rhetorical question.
Yes, Valkov, it does seem to be that way, but,,, things are NEVER what they appear to be.
O.O., as I ponder the concept of ‘patience’ and ‘wait’ …unless we just redefine them, they cannot be separated out from the concept of duration. Indeed, the idea of being patient and waiting depend on the idea of duration (a passage of time). I am just realizing that my interpretation of patience and waiting suggests a willingness and a tolerance for allowing events to unfold without any interference from me but neither concept suggests a presence of joy, happiness or peace of mind in the process. ‘Suspend’, as you mention, neither trying to move forward or backward also depends on a belief in linear time and duration. I think the concept we’re looking for here O.O. is the concept of ‘NOW’ where there is no past, no future and no duration and all events are simultaneous. Btw, I used to be really caught up in exploring what the duration of NOW was. For the longest time I just couldn’t get past this image I had of NOW being sandwiched between the past and future.
I always kinda went with LRH’s thought about being able “play a better game”, and “improving conditions”. That means creating a better life right here on Earth, for starters. Remember “without crime, without insanity, without war”? Lots could be done in those directions. Of course those dependent on the Defense Industries and the Prison industry etc would not necessarily be in favor of such endeavors.
Cryptic. Is that an Axiom of some sort?
Marty, what things do you disagree with in the Tao Te Ching?
I find things I don’t agree with in it. I also find mistakes.
But that’s part of its charm. Because “The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.”
Cause: The source of action, occurrence, or a state. Just my def.
Ha! You made the joke even funnier. 😀
Yes, I would enjoy having a comm line with you. I’ll email you soon.
Yes. However LRH used it in a more specific sense. Behaviorists and some other scientifically inclined folks use it in a purely mechanical sense, as in every effect must have a prior cause which is itself the effect of a prior cause etc etc ad infinitum.
Valkov, LRH had it right when he said that the basic common denominator, the basic impetus, to life was the urge to SURVIVE. Of course, though, ‘survive’ is a concept that has absolutely no meaning for eternal Spirit. However, in a world of perception…or even worse…a world of misperception, ‘surviving’ is the only game in town. The game of survive could also be referred to as being ‘the game of getting MORE.” In a world based in misperception whether it be a need or want for More or Less there is never enough. In a world of misperception all creativity, all inventiveness, all efforts, all goals…are attempts to satisfy an endless lack. For example, the desire to improve conditions, to play a better game, to have no crime, no insanity, no war…they’re each desires to satisfy a lack of either more or less. This is the matrix where everything is only partial and temporary.
Valkov, being cryptic is sort of like knocking on a door and expecting someone to say, “Who’s there?” 🙂
The line, “things are NEVER what they appear to be” is, for me, an axiom. Several years ago, after a change of perspective, I upgraded it from being a ‘saying’ to being an axiom and I removed the word ‘rarely’ (that I used before) and replaced it with NEVER. The complete axiom is: In a world of perception things are NEVER what they appear to be nor are they EVER about what I think they’re about.
In a world of perception which is a world of linear time, levels, degrees, gradations, dichotomies… we never have the full view. We are only able to view parts. Therefore,in a world of perception, there is always an earlier beginning and there is always more to the story (that’s another axiom).
Thanks for the diolog Oracle. May all good things come to you! :-))
You seem to avoid taking any position in answer to your own question.
I take it you do not believe in the possibility of an unmotivated act?
Hey geek, has Marty ever actually said he ‘agrees with’ the Tao Te Ching?
The Chinese master Wu-men said “To have a Buddha view and a Dharma view is to be enclosed by two iron mountains.”
Robert Aitken comments, “The Buddha view is that all is empty. The Dharma view is that all is karma. One is the First Principle, the other is the Second Principle. You are caught in principles. What is the way out? The eucalyptus trees stand motionless in the night air. Only a faraway rooster can be heard.”
So, do you take the Buddha view or the Dharma view, in your thinking and posting? Which ever one you choose, it will be only the sound of one hand clapping.
That is what Berdyaev calls “objectivization”, to substitute symbols for reality. To find truth, you must steer between the Scylla of Buddhaview, and the Charybdis of Karma-view. Because which ever one you choose, it will drag you down into the Abyss. But if you pretend they do not exist, they will likewise drag you down into the Abyss.
“Having been born in the Far East and having partly grown up there, I could see his point. I won’t go into the details, unless someone wants me to…”
Go for it. I’m interested.
Yes O.O I am “actually trying to get back in good standing with the Church of Scientology”. I originally got involved with Scientology of my own free will (my own self determinism). I found the technology useful and I continue to use it to this day. As I said in my post the “Spirit of Scientology” is “the love of understanding” and I fail to see how one can “have a good spiritual outlook, be a good spirit” without understanding.
From your description of your ‘modus operandi’ it seems to me you are saying that you can “pull yourself up by your own bootstraps” which is exactly what LRH believed was possible, and is the ‘great deception’. This whole universe is one great trap and the only way out is surrender. Ron has said “the world began with TR0, the Bible says “in the beginning God”. To know the relationship between God and TR0 is to know The Tao.
pip_threlfall@yahoo.co.uk
Valkov, it was a rhetorical question meant more to incite exploration than actually answer but, for myself, I do have an answer…the matrix is a desert and there is nothing of value for me here, there are no more ooh la las to be discovered so I’m going back “Home.”
You take right Valkov but my beliefs are always changing as I shift my points of view. That said, in a world of perception, I do not believe in the possibility of an unmotivated act. Beyond such a world, I don’t know what’s possible or not. As I only have a partial view, If your belief is different I would like to consider it.
Monte, I guess I have to say this: You have never actually left home.
This is a repost from another blog:
Valkov
2013-02-08 @ 01:54
The Chinese master Wu-men said “To have a Buddha view and a Dharma view is to be enclosed by two iron mountains.”
Robert Aitken comments, “The Buddha view is that all is empty. The Dharma view is that all is karma. One is the First Principle, the other is the Second Principle. You are caught in principles. What is the way out? The eucalyptus trees stand motionless in the night air. Only a faraway rooster can be heard.” (8)
So, do you take the Buddha view or the Dharma view, in your thinking and posting? Which ever one you choose, it will be only the sound of one hand clapping.
That is what Berdyaev calls “objectivization”, to substitute symbols for reality. To find truth, you must steer between the Scylla of Buddha-view, and the Charybdis of Karma-view. Because which ever one you choose, it will drag you down into the Abyss. But if you pretend they do not exist, they will likewise drag you down into the Abyss.
Maria
2013-02-08 @ 02:05
LOL! This consideration considers that your considerations are nothing more than considerations about some considerations!
Elizabeth Hamre
2013-02-08 @ 02:51
What Valkov said about consideration blown my considerations to smithereens.. what next?
Should I take up knitting after all this when one dont have considerations?Attila the knitter?That dont sound to good to me…
2ndxmr
2013-02-08 @ 04:52
Attila would knit chain-mail using swords as needles.
Hubbard was an individualist and he appealed to individualists.
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Marty,
I just came back to this post after quite a while. I finally smartened up and am reading the Tao te Ching, as you suggest to me years ago.
It is changing my life. Simple. Astounding. Beautiful. Peaceful. True. Wonderful.
Thank you so very much for suggesting the book.
Paul
Attain the ultimate emptiness
Hold on to the truest tranquility
The myriad things are all activeI therefore watch their return
Everything flourishes; each returns to its root
Returning to the root is called tranquility
Tranquility is called returning to one’s nature
Returning to one’s nature is called constancy
Knowing constancy is called clarity
Not knowing constancy, one recklessly causes trouble
Knowing constancy is acceptance
Acceptance is impartialityImpartiality is sovereignSovereign is HeavenHeaven is TaoTao is eternalThe self is no more, without danger.