There are those who dismiss L. Ron Hubbard as the consummate con man. They insist that with conscious aforethought he created and operated dianetics and scientology as a fraudulent bait and switch operation fooling and fleecing tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of relatively intelligent adults. So cunning was Hubbard according to some anti-scientologists that if you were to take their words for granted you would have to rank Hubbard as one of the more able and intelligent minds of the twentieth century. The complexity, the breadth, and the duration of Hubbard’s alleged fraudulent scheme would be a virtual impossibility for any mere mortal to accomplish.
At the opposite extreme pole hard core scientologists truly believe that L. Ron Hubbard was ‘Source’, a sort of God from which nothing but ultimate truth was issued. They have trained their own minds to reject any information even tangentially relating to mind or spirit that does not come from Hubbard’s mouth or pen.
The anti-scientologist with his name-calling, absolutist statements and lampooning serves to reinforce the scientologist believer’s conviction that Hubbard and scientology deserve undaunting and vigilant defense. Likewise, the Ron-quoting scientologist’s aggressive certitude serves to reinforce the anti-scientologists’ views that Hubbard’s work is good for nothing more than creating unthinking, conformist zealots.
Members of either side of the scientology extremes demonstrate as severe a case of denialism as the other. As with any hotly contested, complex issue denialists cling hard to simple answers that make them comfortable with putting difficult questions out of sight and out of mind. It seems that in the scientology world L. Ron Hubbard is either God or Satan. One won’t find much truth on either side of a passionate debate between denialists, whether the subject is politics, science, philosophy or scientology. But, if one listens without embracing one side or the other the minute it seems to agree with one’s prejudices and intelligently looks for oneself, one will generally find that the truth lies somewhere between the polar extremes.
We will explore the reasons why those affected by scientology in the long-term continue to act out scientology’s patented us vs. them drama behavior and why that holds true even for those who become virulent critics of the subject.
It is quite easy to understand why someone gets involved in scientology in the first place. Scientology includes features that play well to those going through the adolescent stage of human development. That stage was well summed up by James W. Fowler in his book Stages of Faith:
New expectations, qualitatively different disciplines and a host of difficult decisions are the requirements with which societies greet the now more womanly or manly adolescent. In trying to meet and fulfill these requisites youth will call on the available and personally resonant ideological resources of their environments, particularly those that are embodied in charismatic and convincing leaders. They will seek sponsoring groups and figures and will appoint otherwise well-meaning persons as temporary enemies over against whom their identities may be clarified. They may band together in tight cliques, overemphasizing some relatively trivial commonality as a symbol of shared identity. In this cliquishness they can be quite cruel as they exclude those who do not share this common element.
What is so unique about scientology is not that it at first capitalizes on this adolescent growth stage and its needs. Instead, it is that scientology manages to implant within the scientologist’s sub conscious that this stage is as far as development goes. By continually communicating constructs as reality with a convincing combination of charisma and certainty, Hubbard manages to make scientologists buy into a universe view that is completely encompassed within Fowler’s adolescent development perspective.
That scientologists receive what they consider adequate solutions to their immediate needs from those constructs and related practices reinforces the indoctrinated universe view. The closed culture of scientology makes stage growth stunting inevitable. That culture convinces the individual to assign any and every personal development along the Fowler schema — or by any other standard — to the brilliance of Hubbard and scientology. Likewise, it includes sophisticated and complex analyses for blaming any regression or depression on perceived enemies of scientology, directly or indirectly. All of these dichotomy creating mis-assignment of causation devices serve to reinforce the adolescent, denialist universe view taught in scientology.
The adolescent stage of faith universe view is so thoroughly ingrained in the sub conscious of the scientologist that even when an individual manages to disconnect from the scientology organization he or she often continues to act with the adopted us vs. them, misassignment of cause, and blame mentality. The former cult member can gravitate toward groups of independent, former, and even anti-scientologists who act in the same cliquish and cruel manner that they did while actively participating in scientology.
In the scientology milieu – organizational, independent, former, and anti – reason holds little currency. It is replaced by the adolescent, denialist language of absolutism and condemnation. It is a culture of facile appointment of enemies and easy bandwagon riding with those perceived to share trivial commonalities.
Getting out of the scientology sandbox begins with one simple, liberating step. But, for the reasons outlined thus far, it is a step those involved in scientology culture find difficult to navigate.
Moving On Up a Little Higher 
good article and very truth. I saw the Catholics also go through this as I was raised Catholic and believe me it was at a time if you were not a true believer, whatever that meant you were nothing!!
Very good article. Accurate. This is the way actually Things are.
When I read the quote of James W. Fowler, it sounded to me like he would explain the lure of ISIS for adolescent Westerners.
In that light Scientology maybe actually beneficial for those of being afflicted with the need of ideological solutions. They will loose their savings accounts and houses, but at least heads stay on their shoulders.
But really this seems to be all faces of the same coin. People unable to face uncertainty short circuit into a reality that becomes their true truth and in the extremes justfies what ever attrocity is committed.
So, in a way former scientologists’s belief, as main ingredient for accepting all what was said, outlives their physical, but not mental departure. It is like they think the same way with the difference that the enemy is now that one who was the friend before.
Could it be that so much ‘intake’ caused a stuck flow inward and, independently of where you are physically, the flow remains stuck irregardless of the name of your new group or activity?
This will create a sort of ‘no time’, no progress; but nothing is permanent unless you adopted and agreed to it, otherwise there would never be evolution and progression for any individual.
Great points. As you say, its not surprising that scientology appeals to adolescent urges at spiritual growth and change and helping to fix society. But then they are closed off and their growth is only within the constructs of that group. By design or not, that is a good example of betrayal after trust. So many thousands willingly allowed their heads filled like helium balloons with self-righteousness and importance. On the other hand, a lot of folks who badly needed some structure got their shit together. As you say, its not black or white. Its a large gray field with some black and white dots. Thanks for the article Marty. Looking forward to the book.
Yes it is difficult to navigate out of the sandbox… LRH had a lot of charisma coupled with a carnival presentation that broke down your natural ability to evaluate incoming information..
I am relearning and it is interesting to find myself reluctant to voice anything contrary to LRH for fear of the sky falling!
Good post, Marty. I think some in-depth understanding of the GPM materials and processes would be helpful as well.
“So cunning was Hubbard according to some anti-scientologists that if you were to take their words for granted you would have to rank Hubbard as one of the more able and intelligent minds of the twentieth century. The complexity, the breadth, and the duration of Hubbard’s alleged fraudulent scheme would be a virtual impossibility for any mere mortal to accomplish.”
Can’t say I agree with that assessment of Hubbard as brilliant. He started a long con, there have been thousands, some much larger. Conning people doesn’t take brilliance, it takes cunning and ruthlessness. PT Barnum, Bernie Madoff, Aimee Semple McPherson, psychics; the willingness to prey on vulnerable or unaware people is not brilliant, just psychopathic. Hubbard was just one in an endless line of despicable con men.
Marty wrote:
“There are those who dismiss L. Ron Hubbard as the consummate con man. They insist that with conscious aforethought he created and operated dianetics and scientology as a fraudulent bait and switch operation fooling and fleecing tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of relatively intelligent adults. So cunning was Hubbard according to some anti-scientologists that if you were to take their words for granted you would have to rank Hubbard as one of the more able and intelligent minds of the twentieth century. The complexity, the breadth, and the duration of Hubbard’s alleged fraudulent scheme would be a virtual impossibility for any mere mortal to accomplish.’
“At the opposite extreme pole hard core scientologists truly believe that L. Ron Hubbard was ‘Source’, a sort of God from which nothing but ultimate truth was issued. They have trained their own minds to reject any information even tangentially relating to mind or spirit that does not come from Hubbard’s mouth or pen.”
Kay – it’s been a long time since I’ve challenged you, Marty.
So I hope you have got your pads on and are wearing your cup.
Ready?
For some reason, here in the Scientology Sandbox, there are people who continually define others’ views “at the extreme end of the spectrum” seemingly to position themselves as the only one with a reasonable stance around here.
No one I have ever known here in the sandbox – neither critic nor scio – can accurately be placed in either extreme straw man position that you have created above. Neither extreme position on the spectrum, nor the spectrum itself, represents any real person’s actual stance on anything here.
I submit that these extremes of yours do not exist in reality. They seem to be more of a cartoon caricature of others with whom you disagree, or a position of ridicule you have created in order to slap a dunce cap on someone.
So what are you trying to accomplish by simplistically mis-characterizing people in your own sandbox as extremists?
And why do you have to think in “spectrums” at all?
Alanzo
Wow. Everything you say can be observed in scientologists and former ones (and ‘never-ins’, for that matter) but not all of them, even as regards why they first became involved in scientology.
This includes myself with respect to most of what you wrote. And, if I do say so myself, I think some of us have evolved and are still evolving beyond all that, to whatever slight or great degree – either when still in scientology or after.
In any case, there’s a whole lot of truth in this post! Thanks for shedding light equally on all ‘sides’. 🙂 Awesome.
It’s Ironic how L ron Hubbard warns his flock in lectures about things that in fact he is going to do to them but accusing others, outsiders or “enemies” of such practices.
L Ron Hubbard was indeed smart.
A flock that Hypnotizes itself, He is the Master.
With this difference. It still goes on long after he passed away.
L Ron Hubbard still lives. His spirit incorporated in that what we know as The Church of Scientology.
L Ron Hubbard was an great mental Artist that uses the unconscious mind as his canvas.
It’s fortunate Marty, that your blog has exposed both polar extremes of the spectrum, and helps the truth seekers to sort out their middle ground. Not only that, to shuck off their idee fixes that pin them back and step out into the wide world again. It’s encouraging to see the free expression work its way out as the extremes bounce off each other! More importantly, it points the way to seeking out new truths and workable technology in other subjects that Scientologists are proscribed against totally. Nice one!
Excellent article Marty. I went in as an adult to better understand myself, others and I did gain some insight. However, it transformed into a “denialist language of absolutism and condemnation.” Thanks for making this clear.
Yes Vicar, “good example of betrayal after trust.” “Its a large gray field ” Pity it takes so long to find this out, after one’s reached some limit. Until then, we can’t be wrong or seem stuck in, it’s our own fault and we are responsible full on, which is hard to confront because it’s not really true.
I think it is closer to the truth to define Hubbard as one of those Messianistic heroes who think and act as if they are the real messias, having come to save the world. It could be called the ‘Messias complex’ or ‘syndrom’. These persons use all their talents and gifts to persuade other people to believe it too and to become disciples and to work to make the belief a reality.
In my opinion Hubbard sincerely thought at a time that he was the new Buddha. He really thought he had the answers to mental health and a sane society. But at a certain time he realized that he was mistaken, but then the orgs and centres existed already and people were very busy with their holy mission. At that point in time Hubbard became a liability for them. Also because of his ‘secret agents’ paranoia. Those who were making lots of money with the messianistic ideology did not want to loose their golden egg chicken. Those were/are the real con men/women. I reckon Miscavige especially belongs to this group of messianistic entrepreneurs. They were/are exploiting Hubbard and his messianistic writings to the fullest. Fortunately, more and more people are aware that ‘saving the world’ has been replaced by ‘making a quick buck’. And that’s the end of this Messias. Until another appears on the scene … elsewhere.
“In the scientology milieu – organizational, independent, former, and anti – reason holds little currency. It is replaced by the adolescent, denialist language of absolutism and condemnation. It is a culture of facile appointment of enemies and easy bandwagon riding with those perceived to share trivial commonalities.”
Very well expressed.
I was thinking about how interesting it is that all those different groups are talking with 100% certitude about their opinions without further analyzing and reflecting about their statements. I’m also culpable of this.
But this is a problem of mankind and the only solution is more education and send people to school, where they should learn how to think rational and how to analyze data. One of my suspicion is that rhetoric was banned from schools in the beginning of last century as a mean of keeping this knowledge about logics and rationality for the elite.
Lrh was using the principles of rhetoric for his own purpose but never taught those principles so his comrades wouldn’t become too strong.
It seems to be you’re working on a Renaissance of some old principles of the Greeks that again were forgotten. Perhaps ?
To see a fascinating example of a Scientology earlier/similar con I suggest the blog author and the readers this astounding book about Joseph Smith, the Mormons founder. I read it one month ago and it let me speechless
http://tinyurl.com/omt9dcd
“No man knows my history. The life of Joseph Smith”.
A truly preciuos and fascinating book where I learned how a con can create a strong community. Strangely after reading the book – while I understood the huge con perpetrated by Smith – I also gained some respect for him and his tragic end.
“No one I have ever known here in the sandbox – neither critic nor scio – can accurately be placed in either extreme straw man position that you have created above. Neither extreme position on the spectrum, nor the spectrum itself, represents any real person’s actual stance on anything here.”
That’s interesting. I’ve seen a number of both on this blog: “Ron is a god and everything he said is true,” vs Ron is the devil and everything he said was a lie and/or had a sinister, hidden intention to enslave.”
Most of the “Ron is infallible” group have long since vacated. Based on some your posts that I’ve read, I had assumed you were at the end of the spectrum which saw only evil in Hubbard and everything he ever wrote.
I’m in communication with quite a large number of people who have been or still are involved in scientology. Almost all are out of the church. I have a number of friends who are Ron haters and a number who still adore him and believe miscavige or someone else altered Ron’s words or intent and that Ron himself is 100% what he claimed to be. The vast majority of these people never read this blog or WWP or Ortega or Rinder.
The vast majority of my friends have sorted out their scientology experience and have moved on. Take what you need or want and leave the rest.
I really like the sandbox analogy, Mark. It’s very apt.
Yes, it does seem a pity that it takes so long, as in hindsight we can see it. But I am of the opinion that we are dealt or help deal ourselves the hand we need to play in order to grow. Spiritual progression. For most of us, it included involvement with Scientology. Hard lesson learned. But lets realize and reap whatever benefit we can now that its over. That requires growth in its own right, in my opinion. Its the polar opposites that Marty refers to, the hater and the blind adherent, who have not risen out of the mess. There is the actual pity. But they will get there. We all get there eventually.
In addition to framing the subject as 2 extremes on a spectrum, here’s another way to frame the subject:
If Hubbard believed everything he wrote and said, then he was crazy.
If he believed none of what he wrote and said, then he was evil.
Crazy or Evil.
Take your pick.
Alanzo
The middle path is not always in the middle. It is left, it is right, it is center left, center right, middle, slightly off middle.
The middle path is whatever is actual. In any endeavor as fraught with pitfalls and potential as this one, only careful observation and paying good attention can sort it out. I wish you all clarity in your searches.
Mark
QED
Smart with misguided goals in life.
Alonzo !
What happened ? I don’t understand your writing today….
I think weas a society, especially when young are very uncomfortable with uncertainty.We tend to look for something to ground us. There are alot of “gurus” around willing to fill that role. i have been a victom of several, not just LRH’ although he probably cost me more money.I am now on a journey to find the strength and flexability to enjoy this life of uncertainty and constant change and learn what I can from it.Marty you have been a great learning experience.
LDW wrote:
“Based on some your posts that I’ve read, I had assumed you were at the end of the spectrum which saw only evil in Hubbard and everything he ever wrote.
That would be a misunderstanding and a mischaracterization of my position on L Ron Hubbard and Scientology.
It’s easier for people to think in “spectrums with extremes” and with simple boxes to place peoples’ positions in – especially those with whom they disagree.
It is very difficult to accurately duplicate and to understand an argument with which you disagree.
If my position can be summed up in one sentence to place in a box, it would be “The Truth of LRH and Scientology is both the good and the bad.”
I’ve said that a lot. And people who agree with me have seen me say it over and over.
Those who do not agree with me never seem to see me say it.
“I really like the sandbox analogy, Mark. It’s very apt.”
What’s interesting is that a sandbox is not spectrum.
It’s individuals sitting in their own unique positions, building up castles made of sand and tearing them down.
I think that’s a much more accurate description of what’s going on here than a spectrum with two extremes.
Alanzo
Most all of us came in to scientology at different times, backgrounds and for some different reasons. Also starting off in different type orgs or missions. An individual will be individual on his finding what is true or works for him also. Patience is a virtue and education is a must, imho, to find our individuality again and allow other there’s.
Even the never-ins through much study and interest to help, have an independent view of these workings. Some show a more balanced and lighter thought, which can be helpful to living in this world.
I found my best friends and some family who were never-in, yet educated in cult activities, to be those who best understood and stood by my side.
Mark C wrote:
“QED”
Guess you didn’t get the joke.
Alanzo (:>
Clarification.
When I said: ” In any endeavor as fraught with pitfalls and potential as this one….”, I meant any mental, spiritual, personal improvement, enlightenment. Not just Scn.
Thanks. Mark
Thinking in spectrums has evolved into the use of a “Pournelle Chart” or a “Political Compass”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pournelle_chart
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_compass
If we graduate into thinking with one of those, maybe we can more accurately characterize the denizens of the Scientology Sandbox.
Alanzo
Thanks Alanzo, may Lord Buddha help us all. That’s what I have to say here.
And I do say it, not for Marty anymore but for some people who might want to think. I have been labelled many times by Marty a fanatic but yet there was not once that I felt that some question of mine would be answered by him directly. Isn’t that strange?
So all of that construct (at least I am learning new words and concepts by Marty a fact that I do appreciate, improving my english) that Marty is putting out may refer to a behaviour of groups (groups of church members within the church, groups of ex-es and antis etc. etc.) and especially when such groups are run on arbitraries. So all of Scientology confused with the submerged arbitrary policy enforced on individuals is presented as a construct. Well, why then does such construct brings about results too? Because the results are there. Otherwise people are not so stupid or hypnotised to such a degree as to continue paying their good money or serving Scientology.
So when you take each individual aside and you look at him you won’t find such elements, such extremes. The oversimplification and big generality that Marty is putting out certainly does not apply to a lot of people who have left the church and can act outside of a suppressive 3D like that of the church.
All those philosophical and scholar words have literary value as well as other values but they lead to some very dangerous misleading paths. Scientology is not that bad nor was Hubbard. Otherwise we wouldn’t have the results we do have today even with a suppressive management in the church.
Excellent perspective Marty. As I flit here and there and read the Independents blogs I find one imprinted mindset always there. It is the condescending view of “well I tried other paths and they were all inferior until I found Scientology.”
I believe that mindset was layed in by Ron always being condescending about other paths. So the student is imprinted with “knowing all about” other paths.
Regarding being adolescents that were highly impressionable, I came across this LRH writing that reveals much of his understanding of that influence.
“In altitude teaching, somebody is a ‘great authority.’ He is probably teaching some subject that is far more complex than it should be. He has become defensive down through the years, and this is a sort of protective coating that he puts up, along with the idea that the subject will always be a little better known by him than by anybody else and that there are things to know in this subject which he really wouldn’t let anybody else in on. This is altitude instruction … It keeps people in a state of confusion, and when their minds are slightly confused they are in a hypnotic trance. Anytime anybody gets enough altitude he can be called a hypnotic operator, and what he says will act as hypnotic suggestion. Hypnotism is a difference in levels of altitude. There are ways to create and lower the altitude of the subject, but if the operator can heighten his own altitude with regard to the subject the same way, he doesn’t have to put the subject to sleep. What he says will still react as hypnotic suggestion.” (Hubbard, Research & Discovery, volume 4, p.324)12
Pretty telling in my opinion.
Vicar, I was going to comment on your first post with regard to this:
“On the other hand, a lot of folks who badly needed some structure got their shit together.”
I was about to reply that because of the structure and for other reasons, it can be a good stepping stone, one of the best, IMO – because of both the good and the bad. And there was plenty of each, at least in the beginning.
In your post just above, as to what you wrote about the “hard lesson learned” – well said again. Because even with respect to the bad, it was exactly that – a “lesson learned” – one that, sooner or later, must be learned.
Sorry, something from your first comment bled over and led me to read it literally.
Marty ,
Q.E.D ?
I agree there are many, many gray areas and I continue to become aware of more of these as time goes by. In addition to this there is demonstrable truth to LRH’s confusion and the stable datum theory, especially the part about solutions ultimately morphing into new problems. In 1970 I was literally sick and tired of taking drugs and having to keep up with what was/wasn’t hip. Getting into Scientology was a such a relief. It afforded me a much needed opportunity to get off the pop culture merry-go-round but I always maintained at least a foot somewhere in “the real world.” And I never broke with my family. Despite being horrified by A New Slant on Life’s 1950s view of a woman’s worth and role in life, my mother was won over by the changes she saw in me after my first year on staff. Now fast forward to my second generation Scientology daughters being pressured by Class V & SO recruiters along with their father (my ex-husband) to do “their duty.” Soon enough they were both crushed physically and emotionally by the vise of unrelenting physical and psychological demands that can never quite be met. I did what I could to help them and eventually they put their foot down with me. Did I choose Scientology over them? No. I never even considered it for a moment; didn’t have to. For me, disconnection was neither on the table for discussion nor ever a remote possibility. When extricating myself from Scientology the physical part was easy compared to the more fine emotional and spiritual aspects of full disentanglement. The underpinnings of my involvement was the hope offered by Scientology zero. I was a real sucker for this stuff. According to Zen Buddhist master, Gudo Nishijima in his book To Meet the Real Dragon the philosophical conflict between idealism and materialism is the root cause of war. He suggests an alternative to these extremes: a philosophy of reality that urges us to consider the meaning of real time and real existence. This all encompassing philosophy makes sense to me. It neither validates nor extinguishes Scientology. Scientology, like every other way, just is.
That makes a lot of sense.
When ‘the enemy is now that one who was the friend before’, it’s a sign that the person has just shifted valence but is still stuck in the same game package (or GPM).
Great post Marty. So glad someone can find these words, some sense of it floats in my head but I never seemed to able to hit it with such clear vision and understanding . There are a lot of things I don’t understand. One thing your post did make me see, that I hadn’t really focused in on, is that Hubbard had a lot of different identities. And a lot of people have a morbid fear, love, distaste or fascination with one or more of these identities.
Ron the mental health expert.
Ron the magician.
Ron the commodore commanding a militia.
Ron the new world leader.
Ron the politician.
Ron the Guru.
Ron the religious leader.
Ron the God.
Ron the scientist.
Ron the rogue.
Ron the poet
Ron the writer
Ron the photographer
Ron the rascal
Ron the Buddha
Ron the prophet
Ron the loyal officer
And all kinds of Rons I probably don’t even know about. Maybe he was even a daddy to a lot of people.
I guess it might behoove people to figure out exactly which Identity it is they oppose or support. Love or hate.
People now add to this multi identity figure.
Ron the mad man
Ron the con man
etc etc.
I was only curious, about Ron the magician. So, I don’t really understand other people’s attractions, entanglements or disappointments or losses with the other identities.
In many regards, he was a just mirror of other people’s wants and needs. I guess, whatever people wanted him to be, he became. Then and now.
Which aligns with my understanding about his magicality.
Abracadabra.
Ya think?
He did pass the craft on:
1. Find a communication line.
2. Make yourself known.
3. Discover what is needed or wanted.
4. Do, produce and/or present it.
Good post, Dee.
I think you are right about that. Good point.
Roger maybe the Q.E.D is that people who even exteriorised with the help of Scientology processes are currently forgetting all about it.
Yes, very true and clearly expressed. Maybe this tendency to see issues as Us vs. Them, Perfect hero vs. Foul villain is hard-wired into humankind. Or maybe it stems from the two-sided nature of games.
It’s just so tempting to have a hero to believe in – Einstein, Jesus, Hubbard, Batman. If one idol crumbles, we look for another. But it’s doing these people an injustice to make idols of them. They all had their weaknesses and difficulties (with the possible exception of Batman). Those who dared the most and achieved the most may have also made the most blunders in their lives.
Science has not progressed by divinely inspired sages blasting away the dark clouds of ignorance with the lightning-bolt of eternal truth. Instead, it proceeds from one guess to another, through slightly correct ideas that lead to more correct, or at least more workable, ideas.
Okay. You must be right and I missed it.
What were a couple of things you had to say about Hubbard or scientology that you thought were good or beneficial?
The Pournelle chart for the Scientology Sandbox can be a picture of a big sandbox, with:
ANTI-SCN on the left wall of the sandbox.
CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY on the right side of the sand box
NO IDEOLOGY on the top wall
KSW on the bottom wall
Then we have various individuals from Marty’s blog sitting in different positions in the sandbox, building sandcastles.
We need a good graphic artist for this.
I’ll bet SchwimmelPuckle could do this!
Or Observer over on Tony’s blog.
I would gladly place myself somewhere in the upper left quadrant.
Alanzo
You’re welcome, Theo.
Theo wrote:
“So when you take each individual aside and you look at him you won’t find such elements, such extremes. The oversimplification and big generality that Marty is putting out certainly does not apply to a lot of people who have left the church and can act outside of a suppressive 3D like that of the church.”
It is very difficult to accurately understand and describe someone else’s position with whom you disagree. It’s probably one of the hardest skills for a human being to develop.
But there are many benefits to working hard at this skill and never giving up on it.
For some reason, I have always understood you, Theo, and what you are trying to accomplish. I know that you are a good guy, and I have always had a lot of respect for you – even though we disagree about LRH and Scientology.
I think that it is extremely therapeutic for a person, after having been in a cult, to remain connected to people with whom you disagree and to keep striving to understand and to duplicate where those people are coming from.
It is also therapeutic, after having been in a cult, to stand in front of a group that you know disagrees with you, and to say what you think anyway, to take all their slings and arrows, and then to consider each one as a reasonable person’s position who is not insane.
I’ve seen you do both of those things, Theo, and I very much respect that.
Alanzo
Don’t worry, Rog.
It was a joke: A play on the illogic of the false dilemma.
After I made him shed a little blood – Marty got it.
Good thing he was wearing his cup!
Alanzo (:>
I gotta think about this post.
If I was scolded I don’t like it..
If I wasn’t scolded I like it.
Also, some say that any good people get out of scientology is due to the person himself, and I would agree that this is part of it – but there again, it think that would be true of any (quoting you) “mental, spiritual, personal improvement, enlightenment. Not just Scn.”
We get deep into the magickian identity in the upcoming book.
When I first got involved, Scn helped me tremendously.
Said that many times and in many places.
And it is very true.
Also, I have said that Hubbard was a very smart dresser, and looked great in a sailor hat.
Alanzo
I still go to myself:
where are the clears & ot’s?
and this has question I ask, has nothing to do with the middle path.
I like the word “denialism”.
They are many of this type on this blog. They just blurt out their simplistic denial without adding anything relevant to the discussion.
don’t forget, when you where on staff, you wore of of those “hats” ,
identities, given to you by Ron. ie, maybe you were the LRH Comm, or the HCO Executive Secretary?
H meaning Hubbard CO.
Two people come to my mind: Valkov and Alanzo.
And when did you start thinking outside of the (sand) box?
Attack or Defend… That is the game being played in the Scientology sandbox.
What is outside the sandbox? Mature people like Nobel prize winners discussing the complex problems of life and human society.
Yes. Hubbard was very intelligent and smart.
But he was fighting his own demons using others.
Very poetic!
How about Christianity as a whole… of the Dark ages… could it be an earlier similar?
Well said, Vicar and Marildi!
Alanzo… Take the middle way.
Alanzo:”When I first got involved, Scn helped me tremendously. Said that many times and in many places. And it is very true.”
Wow, Al. That comment has the face that should launch a thousand ships of rebuke, beginning, no doubt, with Grand Librarian Marildi finding some of the great “other faces” you’ve shown.
Your statement made my own anchor drop back into a recall of your Great Turd analogy* that so clearly showed that while you may understand a variant of 4 value logic, when it comes to Hubbard you hold extremely well to 2 value logic: [i] the bad is so bad that it totally outweighs any possible good.[/i]
* (the analogy:) [Scn] is a bunch of turds with a few raisins in it. Maybe you could pick out some of the raisins but [you shouldn’t bother]
I apologize for the very rough paraphrasing of your turd diatribe but you’ve been hoisting the extremely black sail for so long that I don’t think you can justifiably award yourself a shade of grey tonight.
“When I first got involved, Scn helped me tremendously.”
That was probably the point where you should have left Scientology.
The AAA guy helped me too tremendously, he made it easy on me. When I was up and running again he left. First I was a bit heartbroken, but than I looked at a picture of a smart dresser with a sailor hat and realized it is for the better.
Insisting on something at some point has helped is being stuck in the past. Move on, there is more territory to cover.
Hubbard’s work, in a way, has led to the possiblity of treating spirituality in a scientific way, though he himself failed at it.
I think the main aspect that characterizes extermeists is their vehemence in trying to convince others of their viewpoint. Such an effort is basically a poor application of “hypnotism.”
It is hard to convince anybody of anything without listening to them carefully and observing where they are coming from. So, it is better to back off when one is having a hard time convincing others. Instead listen to others carefully and understand what the confusion really is, or if there is a confusion in the first place.
And then simply explain one’s viewpoint with well constructed arguments.
.
“Otherwise people are not so stupid or hypnotised to such a degree as to continue paying their good money or serving Scientology.”
After thorough inspection of the Valley fundraising efforts I would dare to say reality has disproved your point. And furthermore:
“Otherwise we wouldn’t have the results we do have today even with a suppressive management in the church.”
What results are you referring too? Rondroids giving their last shirt believing they are saving mankind by doing so for real? Sea Org members being abused and kept under slave labor conditions?
People can be made to do all kind of really, really I mean really stupid things. There is no limit to it. And then there are people specialized in making other people do really stupid things.
It is not about judging or defending, it is about looking and inspecting.
As pointed out, adoloscent thinking tends to be absolutist.
As a person matures, the thinking becomes more relativistic.
2ndxmr, I don’t think I could come up with better proof of your point than The Great Turd Analogy. 😀
Sure Christianity was earlier … but not so similiar. I do not think Jesus was a conscious “imposter”; to me he was a bona fide idealistic preacher. Along the time others build fables about him and so we have the Gospels.
On the contrary Smith and Hubbard deliberately lied to their followers.
Aah!
No, I did not wear any of the hats I mentioned above. I did not change my identity. My job was to encourage people. That is what I did.
When I was asked to discourage people, I left.
I went in thinking I was so crazy they would throw me out in three weeks. It was process to discover I was actually the sane one.
OK I thought about it..
Marty.. I bragged about you yesterday on the Bunker. I don’t know of any blog that has been able to bring Anti Scn..Indies..Scn. Never Ins etc. together so successfully as you.
Because we do have strong opinions about Scientology. We ALL are passionate about our viewpoints. I personally think that we have gotten along remarkably well given the subject.
I see less ” Ron Said That..” or Fuck Scientology.. or all Scn are nuts..” trust me all of us could scream one of these at any given time..
But You take someone as critical as I and blending with strong voices like The Oracle.. now that is a miracle..
and I see others complimenting or validating their opposite mindset often.
We gotta lot to say. You have given us the space to say it.
One thing we all agree on is DM is an asshole. I hear older x Scn. say that the church is not the way it used to be. I respect them for saying that.
I am not one who would say, ” How stupid would someone have to be to join a cult. ” I would have been the first one signed up after a personality test during the early 60s. I know..I know what the 60s were like.
So don’t be too hard on us. We all are attempting to see the other side in our own way. On our own time. I see a lot inching over a little. I scoot at a time.
Giving us the time, space and permission to discuss this heavy subject is Necessary.
Will we all agree? I hope not. If that would be the case I would be on a forum discussing ” Cooking Tips for Seniors..” instead of coming here.
You are doing a remarkable job. It must be frustrating for you to hear us argue and nit pick.. Snark and give our opinions.
Life is messy. Scientology is messy. And as my mother used to say when her 4 children were fighting.. ” You are going to be in big trouble if you get BLOOD on the Carpet! ”
So as long as we don’t get blood on the carpet let us talk it out. Many of us need to.
Valkov and Alanzo have provided you with hours and hours of companionship and conversation. Now you judge the company and conversation to be irrelevant , after wallowing in it for months. That is denialism.
You sure can re shuffle the cards in a right away manner. Laughter!
Tah-dah! Flavp is back with his 2 cents, for whatever they are worth!
I am going to come out of the scientology sandbox closet and tell everyone that scientology and LRH are neither bad nor good and all this dualistic back-and-forth is pointless.
However, let me clarify things a bit; although I am no longer affiliated with the church of scientology and no longer practice, I have at home a person who considers himself quite the “open-minded” philosopher; unfortunately, his open-mindedness is limited to the fact that, whatever datum he encounters, can only be accepted if it agrees or not with LRH’s body of knowledge, known as scientology.
The person about whom I am talking is my father. Now, my dad has not taken a course in years. He listens, occasionally, to some PDC lecture and everytime he starts telling me how LRH is a genius, etc, etc.
At first, I could not understand why someone who actually knew very little about scientology could regard LRH with such admiration. Why LRH and not someone else?
I will probably never know the precise answer to that and, factually, it is not something I consider very important.
If someone really lets go of scientology, he lets go. This does not mean that one becomes a hater of the subject — because that isn’t letting go.
Letting go means extricating oneself from the Hubbard zealot vs. Hubbard critic dichotomy.
Scientology may have some correct data in its body of knowledge. Hubbard must have been right about something or, else, I would not have had all the spiritual experiences I have had in auditing. Invalidating these is as beneficial as dropping a brick on my foot. However, when I decided to let go (after a few years I was actually out of the S.O.), I told myself that the best way to let go was to do something that scientologists considered extremely harmful and contrary to their mores. In short, I looked up advanced material data on the internet and I discovered what OT III was all about. I told myself that that was a surefire way to cut all the bridges with the subject. It worked. Obviously, the fact that I am here writing this today points loudly to the fact that knowing OT III data doesn’t kill you. On the contrary, all the brouhaha they make inside the church is a lot more detrimental to one’s sanity than knowing what OT III is about.
However, and most importantly, I saw scientology in a completely new light. One has to be on some side of what I call now the scientology sandbox dichotomy in order to process advanced material data. Each side reacts in a different manner: the zealot, if given access to this data at the right moment on his progress of “enlightement”, feels an incredible boost and therefore he can be, do and have all sorts of other spiritual experiences, which are not up to me to invalidate or judge. The critic has a nice laugh and tells other of like mind that Hubbard is a con man — because how can anyone intelligent enough believe such stuff?
The bottom line in all of this is that it doesn’t matter. The true middle path out of this “sandbox” lies in accepting both sides as potential truths, just like one would do with any other body of knowledge.
After all, as I said many times in the past, scientology is nothing more than a key — a key that allows one to be able to put in certain context other data and, from there, build an understanding of other subjects and allows you to converse about these other subject in a new light, often giving others a fresh new outlook on these very same subjects.
So, scientology and Hubbard are neither good nor bad — they are a key (and Hubbard is the purveyor of that key) and for that I will always be grateful to him. What one does with that key is up to him and that, in short, is the gist of what Marty is trying to tell us, in my opinion. Could be that I am wrong but it’s how I see it.
Τhank you Alanzo, thanks for the kind words. It’s true that we should keep communicating no matter what. And we should do that with respect to each other’s viewpoints. I have to acknowledge and I have said that many times that Marty has been inspiring people to look for themselves. That would be the best thing one could do, to keep on writing to people so they look for themselves. Now, if they want to use this or that tool (and not be used by it) is another story.
I choose to use Scientology though when I go in bed at night all I have is myself and a dark universe, a whole world that I try to communicate with. But it looks like I would have to do some meditation and get better at it. Or just do OT TR 0, eyes shut. It’s hard when you know there is no way out. At least with scientology I found a way. Now, far from the church and far from being a fanatic what I would like to see is spiritual people to unite with each other under the umbrella of spiritualism and start doing things.
There are those who won’t listen to any spiritualism. Even them can get some wins but one has to do something.
In any case I enjoy the discussions here, yes I do defend Scientology but not the group or the church, I defend the tech and it’s a good tech and it has yielded results.
What I am into lately is clearing up more and more words and getting more and more concepts. It’s amazing to see that there can be understanding, real understanding of concepts and then you can draw your conclusions.
I indulge in Marty’s writing, reading his essays but I do not share all of his views. It’s great to have a free spirit but then again one has to really be consistent. I see there is a thetan there. I see things can be done in that area. I have seen people improve through processes. Others choose to do that in other ways. And some tend to cannibalise on those who cannot understand themselves and amass money from them for the sake of salvation. I am not one of these guys and never been. I do see good in people. And I will persist until we come to terms even with our worst enemies. Because this is the Era of Spiritualism. The world is changing and our kids deserve to know all about that new world.
If L. Ron Hubbard had been good, bad or somewhere in the middle is like Einstein had been this or that or in the middle. Does not tell us anything about relativity theory. If it is true, false, usable or not.
L Ron Hubbard is basically a follower of Sigmund Freud .. Sigmund Freud is in my view a follower of harmony .. in this view a follower of messiah and senses of a good world ..
Hubbard has put up a short cut psychology and mixed that up with other ideas .. and added some ideas to it .. especially science fiction, because it is what he could best .. after all we have a mixture of a lot of things .. when he added the e-meter he made experiments about reactions .. original he meant once that the e-meter shows the tone level (so it is called today still tone arm) .. had nothing to do with emotional tone ..
Lets say, when I got an F/N indicated, I got VGIs too. I have asked me often why this came together. Did the e-meter really realize that some release was occured .. or did I simply VGIed because my knowing that the session was now at end. I have not found the real answer in my older days, it could be both true .. but I had surely to accept that the e-meter did know before me that something was released .. unfortunately is that I have never realized what was released .. I myself could not see a release .. could only see that the refused and protestet session has its end ..
So, for me it is a cute psychology where people engage in phantasie about her eternity .. and the e-meter helps to get that fixed ..
Today I know, because of my basic refusing and protesting about what the auditor did .. we went up to an ARC break needle .. which shows like an F/N but without VGIs .. so my own analysis was always right .. unfortunately I have always tried to convince me that I were wrong .. but it seems like the sand on which you are going when you try to control something which you can not control really ..
I have studied all religions on the world before scientology, so I have more knowingness about than over scientology .. basically I had interest in religion .. the dark ages is only using powers for oneself .. had nothing to do with religion ..
2ndxmr wrote:
“I apologize for the very rough paraphrasing of your turd diatribe but you’ve been hoisting the extremely black sail for so long that I don’t think you can justifiably award yourself a shade of grey tonight.”
If the truth about Scientology is both the good and the bad, it would still be a mistake to create a false equivalence between the good and the bad in Scientology.
For instance, the good in Scientology – as singanddanceall points out – still does not include Scientology’s ability to create Clears and OTs as LRH defined them. Scientology has never created a Clear or an OT as defined by LRH.
But it does create temporary good feelings and a sense of relief sometimes. So that’s good.
However, the bad in Scientology includes the lies LRH told about Clear and OT.
See?
The scales between the good and the bad in Scientology do not balance. And it is a mistake to believe they do.
And it is an even bigger mistake to believe, as LRH taught, that the good justifies the bad in Scientology – such as when he justified shuddering people into silence and ruining people utterly because Scientology is mankind’s “only route out”.
You’ve seen me raise the black flag for so long (great metaphor, by the way) because most people coming out of Scientology have a delusory sense of the good from LRH’s lies about Clear and OT, and are no where near understanding how bad the bad in Scientology actually is.
So to people just coming out of the cult, or still stuck in its delusions, I look like a cruel and insane Pirate. And to keep up their delusions about Scientology, it is to their advantage to keep placing the eye patch on my eye, the stump on my leg, and the parrot on my shoulder, over and over again.
Arrr.
Alanzo
Another critique of the thinking you are using in your post, Marty, is the false equivalency you are using by grouping every individual Churchie, Indie, Ex and Anti and saying they are all the same – stuck in an adolescent stage of faith – because of having once participated in Scientology and now discussing it from their different positions.
Since border agents are fighting drug cartels they’re both the same?
Since Abraham Lincoln made anti-slavery speeches that makes him a slave owner?
This false equivalency happens a lot in the Scientology Sandbox.
It is well explained by two of LRH’s outpoints in the Data Series: Similarities are not similar and Identities are not identical.
The exposures of the deceptions and abuses in Scientology are not the same, or even similar to, continuing those deceptions and that abuse.
Alanzo
For me it boils down to two key questions.
One: Does Scientology deliver objectively verifiable products of Clear and OT VIII? Answer: No objective evidence that it does.
Two: Are its theoretical underpinnings sound re how the body, mind, and spirit work (e.g., engrams, radiation, drugs, Whole Track recall and verification of past lives, exteriorization, etc.)? Answer: Engrams could not be verified in the one clinical test I know of; radiation is misunderstood; drug storage in tissue is misunderstood; past lives have not been documented; true exteriorization is not demonstrated; etc.
The other points — people got wins, they felt belonging, they had a sense of purpose, they served others, they saw some truths, they realized things about themselves and life, etc. — is ultimately a “so what?” It’s a “so what?” because the same or similar results can be obtained from “psychs” and other isms and ologies and groups ranging from Naziism to belonging to Rotary.
The difference between say Nazism and Rotary is not slight. One is a totalitarian system that repressed humanity — and that was not Rotary. Scientology may not be overtly killing people or calling for death of others, but is is in the totalitarian zone, it is a proven pseudo-science, the motives and the veracity of its founder lie in disrepute, and its “offspring” such as Narconon are found to be pernicious. Facing such facts is simply coming to grips with the truth of the matter.
Calling a lemon a lemon despite the fact that it contains some good vitamin C does not an extremist make. It is a sign of a realist. After all, there is much sweeter fruit that contains the same vitamins.
Hexagonal Thetan wrote:
“On the contrary Smith and Hubbard deliberately lied to their followers.”
Exactly, HT.
And that has made all the difference.
Alanzo
Not Jesus… he was just the figurehead… He did not put Christianity together.
Same with Scientology… the earlier similar were the Dark Ages.
You don’t get it because you are one of them.
Marty OK just dissected your post again.. What I wrote above doesn’t really address it. So feel free to delete. Sorry I misunderstood.
I personally believe most the critics / anti-Scientologists have a platform to inform, educate and enlighten about the injustices regarding Scientology’s abuse.
For example Alanzo has worked diligently spreading his message on several venues. I can’t imagine how many eyes he has opened in his quest. He has done it at the risk of speaking alone.
Many Exs are activists and lending their personal stories. They are my heroes.
I for one can’t see myself in the middle of the road. I’m just being truthful.
I have read so many books about the abuses due to Scientology.
I try to answer posts respectfully, but I do think Hubbard was a Conman. It angers, saddens and sickens me when I read the posts from some whose lives, minds have been so damaged due to Scn.
” In Matters of Style,
Swim with the Current;
In Matters of Principle
Stand like a Rock. ” Thomas Jefferson
Again, I don’t see how those of us who have spoken out against the abuses that we all know that has happened within the ” Church” walls can walk that middle road.
It is not so much denialism in your case as it is a fixation and a continuous, detailed commentary.
There is something wrong with this logic. Similarities are not similar… or too broad a painting brush…
Good article Marty.It was true for me. Got into scientology at 19,after 6 months hanging around haight st,I was lost and burnt out.the new group seemed I found something special.a couple years later was ot7.it is a mixed bag,having wins and being involved with a militant group.the 60s were a special time where to many groups caught all these lost kids.hare Krishna, t.m.,gurgeff,communes,the moonies,and scientology.
I don’t think that will happen again. And it’s true now in Arab countries groups like Isis, Taliban are attracting lost kids that want to belong.
A lot of Scientology works because of the person and the simple act of mindful looking. Scientology may not encourage mindfulness but mindfulness did happen in many cases because of the nature of the preclear. In those cases the gains were real and went beyond just “good feelings.”
The thing favorable to Scientologys is that it made many people look. I wish Scientology had encouraged mindfulness but it didn’t. However, some mindful looking did happen because of Scientology.
I am referring to the results of the Tech. Not the results of a suppressive management of the church and the behaviour of the parishioners. It’s too hard for them to keep away from their group until another stable datum is established for them.
The problem with e-meter is that it does not go very deep and it can easily be manipulated.
Marildi wrote:
<i."2ndxmr, I don’t think I could come up with better proof of your point than The Great Turd Analogy. 😀”
Don’t be so negative!
It’s the great “RAISINS in the Turd Analogy”!
And it’s not original to me. It goes all the way back to the Alt.Religion.Scientology days.
Alanzo (:>
Yes, any particular knowledge should be looked at and evaluated by its consistency to rest of the knowledge.
FOTF wrote:
“Calling a lemon a lemon despite the fact that it contains some good vitamin C does not an extremist make. It is a sign of a realist. After all, there is much sweeter fruit that contains the same vitamins.”
Exactly, FOTF.
Well said.
Alanzo
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_equivalence
The thing about these opposite poles, the fanatics vs an anti anti, is that they have something in common. Oh yes, they have something in common.
The Church of Scientology profits off of other people’s misery. If you are not miserable about something, you will not be dropping off a check at your local C of S. People that have issues that are making them miserable, these are the people that are going to help the Church profit.
You have these stellar anti crusaders out here attacking and attacking and attacking and guess what? They too, are profiting off of other people’s misery to keep their ships afloat. Upon the misery of the people who are now miserable with their Scientology experience. I’m not talking about whistle blowers. I’m talking about people that mete out punishment for applause.
And, the people that are paying the dues, are the miserable. The people that become puppets, are the miserable. The people that are getting played, are the miserable.
If everyone was totally happy, they would have no reason to align themselves with either. The miserable are used as fuel on both ends.
And not just by these two. Many people on this planet profit off of other people’s misery. In the mental health profession. Criminal Lawyers. Prison guards. Public defenders. Doctors. Ambulance drivers. Drug pushers. Police officers. Many religious people. Foster Parents. Divorce lawyers. Loan Brokers. Bar tenders. Guru’s. Parole officers. Journalists and reporters. Look at what happened to the princess Diana! There is a host of terminals that profit off of others people’s misery. And they are out there. And they need people to be miserable.
Now, the miserable do not realize how valuable they are in their use. If there was no crime starting tomorrow, the economy might collapse. Judges, lawyers, police, prison staff, they would all be out of work! Their livelihood depends upon the miserables! These people need to put food on the table, for their children, who are not miserable.
If there were no miserable people starting tomorrow, the Church of Scientology would fold. The staff wouldn’t even be miserable about spending their lives among “wogs”.
If no one was miserable about the Church of Scientology, the tribe leaders meteing out the attacks and punishments and public humiliation wouldn’t be flanked by blood thirsty soldiers.
So you see, many people posing as a person “concerned about your welfare and happiness” are perfectly aware they need you as a miserable. And maybe that is why the more you give of yourself to them, the more miserable you become. It’s sacrifice in it’s greasiest form.
The miserable get played and used. And the only way to escape the viscous cycle, is to find something to be happy about. And then something else. And then something else. And, you keep it going long enough until you are not a target for those that profit off the misery of others.
Victor Hugo had it down when he wrote Les Miserables.
I think it is the right thing to speak out against abuse. I think it is the wrong thing to become abusive, in fighting the abuse. And that happens.
Sorry to keep beating up on your post, Marty, but I have been casting about trying to find the main logical fallacies at work in it. There are many.
With this post, I think I’ve finally found all them.
The last fallacy that you use is called “Argument to Moderation” and is described well in this example of your use:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_to_moderation
I am not saying that Scientology is like cyanide.
I am saying that the argument you are using is that:
“… if one listens without embracing one side or the other the minute it seems to agree with one’s prejudices and intelligently looks for oneself, one will generally find that the truth lies somewhere between the polar extremes.”
Without describing that truth, you still claim it is there in the middle.
Then you describe all these “polar extreme positions”, and all the unique individuals who you say hold them, this way:
In the scientology milieu – organizational, independent, former, and anti – reason holds little currency. It is replaced by the adolescent, denialist language of absolutism and condemnation. It is a culture of facile appointment of enemies and easy bandwagon riding with those perceived to share trivial commonalities.
Both the structure of your argument, and the description you use of what you are criticizing, are false. They are broad generalities which accurately describe no one, and your accusation that “reason holds little currency” with all these different people is a cranky falsehood.
There.
I’m done.
Alanzo
Mornin’ Brian. (Brain)
Thanks for the quote. I don’t Have the R&D series and I was a little bit curious about the date.
Yes, this is a very telling article. I’m a little bit unsure of the purpose. It seems as though he is telling us up front, exactly what he was going to do behind our backs. Was he so arrogant that he was saying that I’m going to run my halfback off left tackle, just see if you can stop me? Or did he notice important aspects of human nature, and then fall victim to them himself.
Could he have thought that the persons who learned about control would defend themselves, and those who did not or could not learn from his teachings deserved to be controlled and dominated.
Perhaps he was of the view that his ‘discoveries’ were so correct, that if people were hypnotized by them, they were better off than their current ‘normal’ hypnotism.
My uninformed opinion is that during the 50s, his procedures did not perform as he had hoped, and he received some disagreements and some attacks on his work. Some attacks were real and others were believed. He thought his work was so valuable, and the organization to carry it forward was so important, that he went into lockdown and control mode, activating purposes in himself that he did not recognize. These purposes had exposed themselves at lower levels earlier in his life. Protect and control became his primary activity. Also, the ‘Other Hubbard’ was in a frenzy to make his procedures work for everyone consistently.
Some may say that I give him too much slack and credit. No. I just want to understand every aspect of this subject for exactly what it is. As I have said before, there is value and pitfalls that need to be sorted out. That, I suppose, is the group I fall into.
Mark
Another thing. He may have believed that study tech and a little auditing would insulate one from hypnotic indoctrination. Couple this with his belief that O/W auditing would solve the problem of persons in his organization having harmful and controlling purposes. This was an error. Then he got stuck on the believed BT problem.
I believe if we simply move on without learning from all this, that will be the real tragedy.
Exactly, Vin.
But you left off: Now use that new found understanding of data and disseminate the information. You do some of that yourself. Let’s encourage others to do so as well.
Mark
Theo,
i’ll never Forget my exteriorisations and I think think most People will never fogert those experiences.
I can exteriorize at will and know of People that can do it too without Scientology. It’s kind of a natural abilty.
Think about being 1 meter behind your head and bang ! You have the Feeling of being out of your Body !
Sometimes I can feel emotions of People at the other end of the planet and sometimes it’s total delusions when I check up .
When you’ll have done OT8 you’ll see it’s still the same Thing as on the objective, perhaps a Little bit more powerful, but not that what was promised as an OT state.
It would be lots of Training for years to be constantly exterior and perhaps one could then develop some Special abilities. i nver have met somebody being interested inn doing that. most want the one time clear shot !
have a nice day !
🙂
I haven’t seen yet the science behind the E-Meter and would be curious about some scientist working on it.
Once a C/S thought that I’m a dog Pc because i reported to the examiner of the nonsense an Auditor wanted to with me ; “don’t cross your leg it cuts the F/N”…or i told the Auditor to look at my nice F/N as I’m exterior and he was surprised and meant: ” your needle is Floating”.
I was 18 at the time and Aosh was pissed at me as the Auditor who was on line up to complete had to retrain a lot.
So they gave me a very good Auditor who controlled me with good 8C and we were running R3R for about 5-6 hours and I kept repeating I have to go immeditedly to the bathroom. He didn’t care and kept asking is there an E/S incident and I kept answering : ” I Need to go to the toilet to piss , I c’ant hold it anymore !”. The Auditor nevertheless kept asking about an E/S incident….i couldn’t hold it anymore and let loose and i said “I pissed now into my pants”. The Auditor was totally happy and VGI’s: ” Your needle is Floating !”.
I didn’t have an E/P of this chain, but a happy Auditor !
So what does this say about the E-Meter ?
Alonzo,
Got it was Kind of a joke but I’ll not clear up “A play on the illogic of the false Dilemma” 🙂
Scientology is a subset of knowledge. It should not be studied and considered in isolation because that makes it hypnotic.
Scientology should be studied and considered within the wider context of knowledge. Then it can be much better understood without the liability of hypnotism.
The results of the tech are right there in front of your eyes. Most of the OTC members that are hardcore Co$ today have been processed with the whole of Tech up to OT VIII sometimes twice or three times over.
Yet they have not achieved any personal freedom, quite the opposite, they have been subdued by a suppressive management as you put it and yet they have received the Tech that makes them impervious to suppression. (Often many times over)
Nobody puts a gun to their head and forces them to do what many would consider stupid stuff. They happily agree and dance the dance of what many would consider the glee and insanity.
So what results exactly has the Tech demonstrated here?
What I see is a tremendous reduction of the ability to perceive truth and a complete mastery of maintaining believe despite it being directly opposed to any form of objective reality.
Maybe they are subjectively happy with these results they received from the tech and embark enthusiastically on redoing their student hats. Maybe some feel Scientology has saved their lives. They may subjectively very happy in their bubble.
But I do not think many outside of that bubble would consider that a desirable state of mind.
Looking at the obvious facts, that is what the end product of the tech is: Living in a bubble. And do not think DM and his followers don’t live in that bubble as well. They are just so much more committed to the insanity that they feel they have to resort to criminal behavior exactly because of their believe system.
DM is a product of Scientology, he came into as a young boy and has probably never seen anything else for real. At the same time he is a sociopath lacking any compassion with anything or anybody. So he just applied Scientology more ruthless and untampered by scruples and made it so to the top. The chrome steel RTC approach is exactly that. Scientology untampered by scruples and compassion.
So where exactly would you see any results of the Tech in any kind of objective view of things?
Friend, thanks for your reaction. Indeed, Hubbard’s messianism is an elegant and clever mix of Freudian principles, some pseudo logical structures, science fiction, some old eastern philosophy and an old fashioned biofeedback system.
I agree with Vinaire about how easy it is to manipulate the e-meter. I know, because I did it my self. E.g. to end the processing of mocked up past lives experiences. What Hubbard said about the e-meter – that the meter itself does not do anything – is right, but in a different way than he wanted us to believe. The e-meter though was instrumental in the development of the auditing proces. That it manipulated the pc, did not occur to him apparently. In the end Scientology is a lot about manipulation. But of course, a messias needs you to believe him and everything he prophetizes.
Hi Theo
I just want to clarify something here.
You said: “I am referring to the results of the Tech.”
Many of us have seen some results with some of the “tech”.
My question here is: “Have you ever seen, or experienced, results from ANY aspect of “the tech”, that did not meet the promoted results, that you have not assigned to “suppressive influences,” mis-duplication of Ron or the “tech” itself, mis- application of the “tech”, or something wrong with the PC?
The point that many of us are making here is that, although there may be some value in some applications of the “tech”, there are some processes, or applications, that are questionable or even dangerous, and some that demonstrably do not produce the promoted results. The other thing many of us are saying is that some of those shortcomings are attributable to Ron, and the design of the “tech”, and not some other agency.
You appear to be able to see flaws in “admin”, or “administration”, and aspects of “ethics”. Do you consider that Ron made some errors in these areas, or have you assigned ALL flaws to some other agency?
That someone can not, or will not, see any flaws in Scientology, that are attributable to Ron himself, worries some of us, on that person’s behalf.
Kind regards,
Eric
I mostly agree with you on this one, Mark. I don’t go so far as to say that Scientology is unique in this. The constant self-command some folks do to keep themselves in Faith is pretty much the same thing, no? “Don’t lead me to temptation!” “Retro Satana!” Refusal to look at all at “negative” viewpoints. “Jesus loves me, yes I know, because the Bible tells me so.”
There are refusals to look on the mechanical side as well. The gyrations atheists go through to explain Out of Body experiences and past life recall are actually hilarious to me. I remember years ago listening to an expert explain OOBEs to the audience, and I parodied him thus: “Well, you see, what happens is that the brain rises up, see, out of the body during surgery, and floats above the body, so it gives the appearance of an OOBE.”
As for Hubbard, he was absolutely brilliant. He was a brilliant speaker, and a brilliant writer, and he was incredibly prodigious. And he was a tireless worker. From my point of view he was sincere in his research. He was sincere in wanting to help.
That said, he was also wrong, wrong, wrong about a lot of things. He was wrong about the “Big Being/DB” stuff. He was wrong to set up the SO. He was wrong in his so-called “justice policies.” In fact, his whole ethics write-ups and areas were so weak it is hard to believe it was the same man who wrote the ethics and justice P/Ls, and also the PABs and the better HCOBs. Some writings were perfect. Some were completely off the mark.
You say your efforts now are to warn people away from Scientology: “Thar be monsters!” Just forget the whole subject – it all exists elsewhere, and therefore why deal with the subject at all and risk the pitfalls?
But you know what? I decided that I am going to be greedy with the tech. There are gems (not raisins, Alanzo) among the turd, and there are a lot of them if you mine it with love and compassion – two things which I know Ron valued only indirectly, if at all. Who cares? I use Scientology in my daily life, and it helps me. I got lasting value out of _Scientology_, not some other thing that Ron supposedly stole.
But you know what? I am greedy for any workable tech. I participated in a three-hour session with Toby Robbins the other day, and it was phenomenal. I read Alan Watts, and his insights were amazing.
We can jawbone about this all day long, all year long, all lifetime long: “Ron’s a devil!” “Ron’s a saint!” and it does not cussing matter. It is ALL fluff. What matters is the meat. And you know what? I’m going to have mine grilled.
Vaya con Dios Mark and everyone else here. I hope you find peace in your lives – how ever many you may have.
Mark Patterson
Why do people want to defend or criticize Scientology on this blog? There can be many reason’s for doing that but the rational reasons may be summarized as follows.
People see knowledge in Scientology that can help and which can also harm. They want to ensure the beneficial use of that knowledge and prevent the harmful effects. In short, people want to prevent ignorance because harm comes from ignorance.
The most dangerous and harmful part of Scientology is to study it in isolation, and not while comparing it freely to other knowledge. This is where Scientology can be used hypnotically to manipulate the mind. The biggest blow to this danger was given by Internet.
What should be promoted is not Scientology, or anti-Scientology, but knowledge as such. This means that if one is advised to look at Scientology, he should also be advised to look at it in the broadest context possible. I would not advise people to avoid Scientology because that is also manipulation. Let them look at it, but in the context of what is said about it on Internet (both pro and con), and also how it compares with other similar knowledge, which can also be found on Internet.
People like Alanzo don’t want people to be harmed by Scientology. Their intention is good, but then they try to manipulate other’s thinking against Scientology. That is no less a manipulation. The whole idea of convincing people one way or the other is nothing but manipulation, when repetitive insistence is employed. These breeds unnecessary disagreements and arguments.
Instead of trying to convince other people shotgun style (for or against a viewpoint), one should try to engage in one-on-one discussions. Really listen to the other person and find out what they are confused about, and what they really want to know. If the other person thinks he knows it all then leave him alone. Whether he is brainwashed or not doesn’t matter. Life is there to teach him anyway. You need not waste your breath on him.
So it all boild down to (1) Having a clean intention to support knowledge and prevent harm from its misuse, (2) engage only those who are accessible, (3) always encourage them to look at knowledge in a broad context, (4) direct them to helpful resources on Internet and books, and (5) be honest in providing them with your experience and viewpoint.
.
And I might add, “workable tech,” is a misnomer. I really mean interesting and truthful information, valuable points of view, methods and technologies to help people, and insights into this crazy place that may or may not be _right_, but do inspire further exploration and elucidation. We can actually gain wisdom from people we do not completely agree with. In fact, we have to in order to gain any wisdom at all.
And of course I meant Tony Robbins! Geez.
The auditor didn’t understand the tech and was being mechanical.
If one has attention on being exterior, he is not exterior, no matter what it seems like. There is simply a delusion.
I try my best into believing that others can direct themselves given exposure to broadest possible knowledge.
It is very easy to get into a manipulator’s valence even when one’s intentions are good.
Al, I didn’t get that Marty was committing the logical fallacy you suggest:
“ARGUMENT TO MODERATION – argumentum ad temperantiam
(also known as: middle ground, false compromise, gray fallacy, golden mean fallacy, fallacy of the mean, splitting the difference)
“Description: Asserting that given any two positions, there exists a compromise between them that must be correct.
“Logical Form:
Person 1 says A.
Person 2 says Z.
Therefore, somewhere around M must be correct.”
http://www.logicallyfallacious.com/index.php/logical-fallacies/57-argument-to-moderation
.
I didn’t get that he was saying “somewhere around M must be correct.” He’s saying that the absolutes of A and Z are false, and inferring that “SOMEWHERE on the spectrum” lies the truth.
The direct looking of mindfulness is much more accurate and quicker that long drawn associations of logic. Again I find Alanzo using “non-similarities are similar.”
Logic is useful in determining where to look. Byond that it is looking that must be given priority.
.
^^^ Strawman.
There is sufficient evidence available to sustain the premise that L Ron Hubbard was a consummate con man. He was arrested, charged and convicted of cheque kiting in 1948. The only other time he was in police custody was in 1952 when he was briefly detained for not paying his debts after having looted the bank accounts and offices of his Dianetics Foundation. Embarrassingly for him, L Ron Hubbard’s arrest at that time came during his presentation of the Philadelphia Doctorate Course. Consider also that Immediately prior to and for some time after the release of Dianetics, L Ron Hubbard was running a mail fraud scam he called “The Allied Scientists of the World”. As for Dianetics, a large part of his promotion for the efficacy of Dianetics was that he had “discovered” its principles while healing himself from otherwise devastating injuries received in combat during World War II. We now know that to have been a fradulent claim. The “bait and switch” aspect of Dianetics and Scientology is two-fold. First, L Ron Hubbard invites people to examine their mind – then he tells them what is there. That switch is amplified in Scientology when imaginary Engrams are switched for even more imaginary Body Thetans.
This is just a brief example of what evidence is available. When one examines the entirety, it becomes obvious that L Ron Hubbard does indeed deserve a place in the annals of history as, perhaps, the most successful criminal of the twentieth century.
Ι am happy to hear you can exteriorise at will, Roger. Well, it would be a good thing for more people to be able to do that. That’s a first thing that Scientology can achieve. No doubt about that. So, it’s one valid way. There may be others. But it is a way, too. So, I chose that one and I feel good about it. I am not thinking about OT8 for the moment, I am thinking how it could be that people could get a glimpse of WHO they really are.
Gerhard, I see the results in me, I see the results in the word-clearing tech, I see the results in the application of the doctrine of Gradients, I see the results in the org board and how one can organise things, I see the results each time I help a person make some Understandings in life… I see the results each time some success story comes from the Indie Field and the Freezoners… So these are results and there many, many more.
I am not interested in the OTC. They are all PTS. And as you have Clear Cannibals you can have OTs of that type, too. The training side of the Bridge is not just for fun. It’s the Hatting thing. And I bet you there is a lot of holes, huge holes, big gaping ones in that hatting. They have gotten that chrome steel RTC type of scientology as you very well put it.
But a thetan can only expand if he can BE the dynamics. Those people cannot be the dynamics. They are cannibals who got to be lifted up and are just hanging there. Their background or innate abilities do not allow for much hope from them. But there are others who do really happen to do things and who are BIG, bigger than those just-certified OTs. And it’s true that OTs do best with OTs. We have not reached that state yet where one could just produce such raw power that it could move the planet. So, we are moving up in gradients.
So, I don’t disagree with you. If you look at it that way there are no results. But if you look at it from my side you will see that Scientology is a very promising thing, IF applied in a free and open minded way, not a rote thing such as the church has ended to be. But it takes discipline too and that is missing. Once we move through that stage of smattering and we move onto some levels of real understanding we will be better. Until then we can at least communicate as we are trying to move ourselves and others up. Scientology is a tool, it has been misused and things should be put back into their proper perspective.
Vinaire: “Scientology may not encourage mindfulness but mindfulness did happen in many cases because of the nature of the preclear.”
I don’t see why you say that, Vin. The auditing cycle in itself, when followed, gets the pc to look/confront – and that is what causes the as-isness. What would a pc who is being “mindful” be doing differently?
AUDITING CYCLE, 1 . the basic of auditing is an auditing cycle of command which operates as an attention director. Call it a restimulator if you want, but it’s an attention director, eliciting a response from the pc to as-is that area and who knows he has done so when he receives from the practitioner an acknowledgment that it has occurred. That is the auditing cycle. (SH Spec 189, 6209C18)…
Swiss Roger wrote:
“I didn’t have an E/P of this chain, but a happy Auditor !
So what does this say about the E-Meter ?”
LOL!!
Very perceptive. Excellent observation.
Alanzo
To quote him exactly, he wrote “somewhere between the polar extremes.”
The above comment was an addition to my reply to Alanzo.
Plus one more thing. I have seen so many people quickie things and have false stats in Scientology that I wouldn’t be surprised that one or too many could graduate to OT states in such ways. Behind the courses and behind the auditing there is understanding of the fundamentals of life and theta. And I am afraid such understanding has not been achieved.
Marildi, mindfulness is not just limited to a session. Plenty of gains continued after the session because the preclear continued to look.
But Scientology discouraged any discussion of Scientology and looking at Scientology in a wider context. This was very suppressive.
From my point of view there is false understnding in Scientology too. For example THETA-MEST Theory uses binary black and white thinking. A thetan is falsely assumed to be the permanent and eternal core of the individual. That is absolutism.
The results in Scientology are very narrow and limited if you are confining yourself to Scientology only. Try looking at Scientology within the context of broader knowledge, such as, Vedas, Buddhism, Hinduism, etc., and sorting out the inconsistencies. You will will be surprised at the gains that are possible.
Exterirization is not having attention stuck on the body. That is the simplicity of it. There is no thetan hovering outside the body.
He did not use generalities at all and his comment that “reason holds little currency” was 100% spot on. No falsehood there.
I can see no reason behind the going ons in the Church today. I can see no reason behind the domestic terrorism that goes on in that place and drifts out of that place. People are being punished because they are not Scientologists or they have with drawn support from the Church.
There are forms of domestic terrorism and fair gaming going on out here from the opposite side. People are being punished for being involved in Scientology. Not because of who they are, not because of the good they have done. Because they are Scientologists or have helped the Church. They are being fair gamed.
Both places do not tolerate criticism or free thinking. If you don’t run with the herd, you are censored, declared something, and fair gamed.
Both places have ethnic cleansing goals. To wipe out or destroy or replace an entire culture.
Both poles are in a civil war with their fellow man. Where human sacrifices of people are made for the “good of the group”. To weed out dissension.
Both poles have the same purpose, to torture people through shame and public humiliation. Children are not excluded.
Both poles are propelled by hate of the other. And the need to “wipe out or booby trap systems”.
There is no reason on either side. Where you see social injustice and brutality, fair gaming . Blood shed. Human sacrifices. I am sorry but this is not backed by reason. As a person falls deeper and deeper towards hate and urges to unmock and fair game their fellow man, they fall farther and farther away from reason. And farther away from the truth. Anyone can suddenly be made “evil” and worthy of a public execution where their identity is attacked.
That isn’t reason. Attacking people for their views isn’t reason. Fair gaming people isn’t reason.
Unmocking people isn’t reason. Public shaming, fair gaming and humiliation isn’t reason. It is bullying. Simple bullying.
There is a wide difference between whistle blowing and bullying.
You look at Karen de. Her videos on youtube are priceless testimony. They are not filled with false reports and fair gaming of your average citizens. She is one of the most competent to speak on the subject as she has viewed it from every angle. She gets her message across without brutality. Just fine. She just isn’t sadistic. So she doesn’t make victims.
There are people out here auditing without selling status’ or policing others and fair gaming.
The majority I am afraid, are walking a middle path.
The far left and far right are contributing to the body count. Who matters and who does not. Who should be worshipped and who should be condemned. Who is fair game and who is safe.
Sorry to disappoint.
Well yeah Brian. Altitude has a lot to do with it. When a police officer tells you to pull your car over you act just like a little hypnotized robot and get that car right off the road. Don’t you?
When someone holding an AK47 at your face asks for your wallet, you cough it up just like you have been hypnotized.
How telling is that?
You really didn’t need the R and D vols to figure that out did you?
Alanzo, you are too fixated on logic. There is life beyond logic.
The Scientology can become a hot potato. If you don’t want to eat it, you still want to do something to it. It can become like a little magic potato you just can’t let go of. If you love it, it sucks you in. And if you hate it, it sucks you in. If you are on the far right or far left it becomes a revolving door you just can’t walk through. Some sticky thing you just can’t get off your hands. There are people that have never walked the halls of Scientology that are immersed in it like some kind of fever.
There is more than your illustration. There are people that can pick things up, inspect them, and then put them back down.
Marty and many others can do this with the Scientology. Pick it up, put it down. Pick it up, put it down.
There are some people that pick it up, and it seems to meld into their hand like some crazy glue. When they love it, when they hate it, they can not put it back down.
And this is a real situation. Not just with Scientology. Not just with Scientologists. It goes on all over the world with different subjects, experiences, people and substances. They pick thing up and they can not lay them back down.
What you have omitted from your box of identities, are the people that can pick the Scientology up and put it back down.
Absolutely Agree Oracle.
There is much life beyond Scientology.
Theo, the subjective approach is not very usable as a measure for good results. ISIS just wrote their subjective success stories how well they did in enslaving 7000 women and children and how proud they are to relieve the urgent sexual problems for young men not being able to have sex with their girlfriends per the Koran. Since the Koran does not prohibit sex with slaves they found this wonderful workaround, enslave the women and you can rape all you want. If you think I am kidding, just google the topic and the promotion of ISIS.
That is the problem with subjective measures for good results. If you are moved far enough off base you are liable to write success stories about how your $50K donation to the IAS completely handled your case.
So if you want to recognize subjective successes as a proof for good results you move onto a very, very slippery slope.
There is a reality, even if we with our mind can only grasp a reflection of it. It does not change, it is the truth and everybody is free to ignore it and prefer their own subjective world. The danger is of course if one makes decisions based on one’s own preferred subjective world, the results will be at best comical, disastrous or just plain criminal in the context of the truth.
So there is a need for an objective measure of good results. The better a person can perceive the truth and is in as close as possible contact with it; the better results will be obtained by the decisions of such a person. One could also add the more a person is free of fear and able to love the more this person is moving toward realizing his true self.
Scientology tech has a very limited benefit for a very short period of time to move a person further in such a direction. Any further exposure to the Tech after this short period obviously changes the direction toward more and more unreality.
You are free to hope for OT states as promised by LRH and blame the truth that nobody has attained them to wrong application, overzealous church management and DM. The problem with that decision is it will demonstrable not move you closer into any direction I described above. And over time the rift between reality and your subjective world will grow.
Not all unrealities are as criminal and destructive as those of the CO$ and ISIS, many are benign, but none are really beneficial for the individual.
Hey Mark, good afternoon 🙂
It is interesting isn’t it. LRH in his writings is really revealing himself a lot. For instance; the Brain Washing Manual (written by Beria/Ron) was intended to warn the free world of how communism was threatened by Scientology/Ron.
That writing is in fact the blueprint for the RPF.
As far as him knowing that he was revealing himself in those writings I don’t think so.
But did his leadership and teachership illustrate the above essay on influence? Beyond a doubt he knew. It could be said that this essay above is how so many young kids were caught up in “Daddy Ron.”
Only Ron knew the track, only Ron went through the wall of fire, only Ron rose above the bank, only Ron found the road to OT, only Ron could create auditing processes, only Ron could save the universe….. Only only only only.
And for those young kids looking for spiritual guidance, Hymn of Asia was the ultimate in altitude influence: the reincarnated Buddha himself–
The ultimate hypnotic cheese: he’s Buddha
Did he know what he was doing?- absolutely, if you read this above quote.
Did he believe he was Buddha? Probably, because he also believed himself the Prince of Darkness and the anti Christ.
If the needle went “blip” then it must be true.
No, Mark I don’t know the date of this. 🙂
Hope all is well
How is this for reason? I go to check out Tony Ortega’s blog today. Two people that adopted six orphans that obviously, nobody else wanted, are being fair gamed.
I don’t care who they are, what their religious beliefs, how much money they have. The point is, I was orphaned at one year old, my brother at two years old. We were never adopted by anyone but raised in foster care by various relatives.
So, I really have a deep appreciation for people that adopt children. I consider it almost holy, and I won’t write a book about it here. I understand the gift because I was raised as an orphan. It did not bother me about myself, but my childhood was agonized by what I saw it do to my brother who was a year older than I. For all intensive purposes, I raised him.
So, I go over there to plead for just a drop of mercy towards these people that took in six orphans, raised them, provided for them and are still providing for them. Because in my mind, anyone that takes responsibility for an orphan, means the world to some child. And that, is humanity.
So I write:
theoracle 9 hours ago Removed
Maybe not everyone is capable of making the kind of responsible parenting decisions Tony is.
As you can see, my post was erased by moderation.
And this ensued:
Disqus Comments Observer • 9 hours ago
Dying to know what Oracle said!
2 •Reply •Share ›
Avatar
Tony Ortega Mod Frodis73 • 9 hours ago
Oracle has proved to be an awful person. I’m not putting up with personal attacks today.
23 •Reply•Share
Here I am, being fair gamed for pleading the case of orphans.
The orphans do not matter. The children do not matter. You know what matters? Two people to be fair gamed because they are involved with Scientology.
Tell me where is the reason? Where is the mercy? Where is the humanity?
Am I angry? No. Why? Because I need to be there for other orphans and I need to hang on to my love. Contrary to the report that I have “proven to be an awful person”, these are the charities I am currently a sponsor for, a spokes person for , or a patron of:
Toys for Tots
Since December 2006 Children
Working through the holidays to ensure children that may be facing challenges are not excluded from the holidays or penalized due to unfortunate conditions.
Save The Children
Save the Children gives children in the United States and around the world what every child deserves – a healthy start, the opportunity to learn and protection from harm. When disaster strikes, we put children’s needs first. We advocate for and achieve large-scale change for children.
Baby’s Bounty
Baby’s Bounty™ is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that provides essential clothing and gear to babies born into low income families for their health, safety and well being. Recipients include babies born to victims of domestic abuse, teen mothers and those living in poverty.
Plan International
Founded over 75 years ago, Plan is one of the oldest and largest children’s development organisations in the world.
We work in 50 developing countries across Africa, Asia and the Americas to promote child rights and lift millions of children out of poverty.
In 2013, Plan worked with 78 million children in 90,229 communities.
The Gentle Barn
Animal Welfare
In these times of gangs, drugs, crime, violence and war, it is essential that we make efforts to ensure a more peaceful future for our children. We feel it is imperative that we teach our children kindness, compassion and empathy for all living beings. When a child meets another, looking different than themselves, with perhaps a different religion, race, sex, or language, if that child knows that…more
Shiloh Horse Rescue
Animal Welfare
Shiloh rescues abused, unwanted, neglected, and slaughter bound horses of all types. We are located in Sandy Valley, NV- approx 45 minutes outside of Las Vegas.
Founded in 2003, Shiloh has rescued almost 600 horses from slaughter, abuse and neglect. Horses are evaluated and whenever possible are adopted out to new homes and futures.
Talent For Humanity
Civil Rights and Social Action
Talent for Humanity is an international non-profit organization conceived by a group of professionals, entertainers and business people all drawn together by a single vision of serving humanity and by the idea that it is possible to create a better world through entertainment and the performing arts.
Do I deserve to be abused? I don’t agree with that.
Marildi wrote:
“I didn’t get that he was saying “somewhere around M must be correct.” He’s saying that the absolutes of A and Z are false, and inferring that “SOMEWHERE on the spectrum” lies the truth.”
Yes he does say “the truth will lie SOMEWHERE BETWEEN the polar extremes”.
But the SOMEWHERE BETWEEN TRUTH remains undefined by him, and the extremes that he does identify are not positions actually held by anyone I know.
Also, the characteristic of the extreme positions that he is criticizing are identified as not valuing reason.
Do you know anyone in the Scientology Sandbox who does not value reason?
Alanzo
The people to the far right are using “Scientology” as a license to abuse people, the people to far left are doing the same thing.
This is what some people CHOOSE to do in the Scientology sandbox. Pick it up, and use to harm attack and suppress and profit, of off others.
Really, it’s the elephant in the room.
Well said, Theo – both posts above.
It sucks that this happened to you over on Tony’s Blog, Oracle.
It is astounding to me that Tony did that.
It is clear to me, and always has been, that you are motivated by love and loyalty. That has always been very clear to me.
You did not deserve to be abused.
I do not agree with it either.
Alanzo
I think Ron got a lot of stuff right and good, however, then there is definitely the bad and ugly.
My point though is that I have found with preponderance that card-carrying
status seeking scientologists are some of the dumbest and most ignorant people I have ever met or associated with.
Hubbard’s maniacal path did not and does not allow an exit route. Hence it’s a religious cult on steroids.
As a final comment, let me add, that the people least able to HELP during these ongoing and upcoming economic, political and sociological catastrophes that are looming down on us are Scientologists.
Ron created a self-consuming delusional closed loop.
Frankly, I am and have become burned out on ‘scientology’.
Let’s move on.
The biggest mistake Hubbard made, in my view, and the “why” for the cult it has become, is because he made it law that, “you can’t be half in and half out of Scientology”.
How sane is it I ask you, to not be able to pick something up and then put it back down?
If you do put it back down, you are “blown off the bridge” or “a dilettante” or “reasonable” or a host of other derogatory conditions for being SANE!
It is TABOO to pick it up and then put it back down in that culture. And I’m sorry, it is not sane, to not be able to pick something up and then put it back down. That is not sane.
What I see from my experience and view with this blog, is that Marty has helped people, to be able to pick it up, put it down, pick it up, put it down.
That, is sanity.
Thanks for the eval. pls keep your opinions to yourself.
Thanks Marildi, it looks like some people tend to forget rather easily. And then all assumptions start. I am not talking about subjective realities here. If one would be honest to himself, he would go back and look and see that those results were not just subjective. But what can we say when forgetfulness steps in.
Grasshopper
This is beautifully said:
“We can actually gain wisdom from people we do not completely agree with. In fact, we have to in order to gain any wisdom at all.”
Eric
Eric, I have not moved far up the Bridge. What I did was mostly by pulling myself by my bootstraps. I am hearing you as I am hearing other people and people on OT 8. A friend of mine doing Excalibur in the Freezone claimed that it is the best level he has ever done and all his wins combined couldn’t give him such a win that he is now having. He even came to Greece to visit me, which is a sign of taking some responsibility. So, I cannot say for sure what is happening up there. But I can certainly say that many people misapply things and then claim it’s Ron’s fault or the Tech’s fault. What I see is that on the lower levels one has to go step by step. I imagine that on the upper levels it can be even more frustrating.
So, I can say now there is no Technical Authority on this planet. Maybe Ron wasn’t either. But he certainly could make his point come through. There is a difference in that. Maybe Ron got to know things down cold and certainly could think with the data. I am not claiming he was a god or even the brightest person in the world but he had a knack. And that is missing now. I would love to see people apply standard tech and then see what happens. But standard tech not just some mumbo jumbo.
Ron was a man like the rest of us. He was not here in an angelic form or something. He had his flaws. But what he did which is still holding even with such a dump management proves that there are things to this tech.
Certainly humans tend to fight more than look and find out what is the true data. Arguing is not leading anywhere. We got to find out what works and do that. And that has been called standard tech once. Whatever happened to that thing I don’t know. It’s all confusing now but there are people who do things to move up. That’s all I am saying. And I respect people who have doubts and questions. I too have such. But I am not bringing the whole edifice down because of my questions and doubts. Scientology is a new level in the humanities. It can be applied modestly and standardly. It is okay to do that. All the rest is just noise. People have a right to practice what they feel is good for them. And I trust Ron more than any other human being on this planet. Tell me I am wrong. But because I trusted Ron I got out of the prison scientology Miscavige is making. By insisting on standard tech and admin. That alone tells me that scientology can undo itself too. It’s a tool not the end of things. And it should be used as such. I am sorry we had to complicate things so much. I believe one day we will start to see that things are much simpler.
“Do you know anyone in the Scientology Sandbox who does not value reason?”
It may be that nobody is all the way at the “black” end of the scientology spectrum; or all the way at the “white” end. But for all intents and purposes, being TOO EXTREME, even though not in a truly absolute sense, does involve not valuing reason. I think you yourself have tried to get those who view scn as “almost-all-white” to use reason – because you consider they can’t be doing so when they take that stance. And, vice verse – some people try to get those at the “almost-all-black” end, to use reason. So yes, I would say that there are some in the sandbox who don’t value reason.
HT
Thanks for the reference to Joseph Smith. I am going to order that book
on your recommendation. I read a good deal about Joseph Smith and talked to a few Mormons at my local library. One astonishing fact I discovered was that one of Smith’s followers – who blew off – claimed that Joseph Smith used the ancient trick of reading a salamander to verify his dream narratives.
Also read that Smith was directly confronted by an Egyptian scholar who claimed Smith was a fraud. Smith just walked away, it is reported.
Very curious about your handle “Hexagonal Thetan”. I had the thetan idea pegged as a pentagon myself.
GMW
Excellent post, Grasshopper.
point number 5: Isn’t that what we are doing?
On the otherhand, why criticize scientology?
Hubbard used trickery to get people involved with his scientology, so called body of knowledge (hubbardology).
For instance, Hubbard uses a volcano on the cover of dianetics so as to restimulate people or key them in so they would run into orgs seeking help. Of course, there are methods like ruin finding, and even the personality test.
Consider this:
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Kaja_Ballo
Hey Oracle, no I did not. I found it online and thought it fit nicely with Marty’s idea of influencing young people. He knew the theory and demonstrated its application by being the only one to ever………
And when a self promoting world savior claims to be the “only road to truth” it acts just like that AK47 once the position of “only way world savior” has been agreed upon.
One effect is being riddled with bullets if you don’t follow orders
One effect is fear of being an SP and loosing friends, family and jobs for criticizing the “only road to freedom.”
That is an absolute altitude influence: “the only road to salvation.”
Or for those daring to go public like Paulette Cooper: afraid for their lives.
Altitude Influence.
These examples certainly are qualitatively the same indeed.
Don’t you think it interesting you chose violent metaphors to make your point. Yes, there is violence in all three: the cop, the AK47, and Ron being Buddha “the only road to truth” who will hunt you down and seek to ruin you utterly for freedom of expression.
I love you and yours – and all that have supported you.
Thank you for this: “one will generally find that the truth lies somewhere between the polar extremes.”
“Don’t be so negative! It’s the great “RAISINS in the Turd Analogy”!”
That’s funny! However, if you had said (as Grasshopper did) that there were “gems” in those turds, it would have been different. But you said raisins – and no one would think it worthwhile to pick a few raisins out of turds. So it does seem that you are hoisting a pretty black sail.
The most positive kind of thing I can recall you saying is that “sometimes” a person can “feel good” – “temporarily” – but that, at the same time, what is actually occurring for the person is insidiously harmful. Can’t get much blacker, can it?
But hey, I would be happy for you to contradict me if I got it wrong.
Okay, I thought you were talking about in session.
As for gains continuing after session, I believe the tech actually says to let the pc have his win – not to rush him back into session or onto the next major auditing action. If that tech had been followed, I think it would have been the case that, as you say, “the preclear continued to look.”
I would have to agree with what you wrote here:
“But Scientology discouraged any discussion of Scientology and looking at Scientology in a wider context. This was very suppressive.”
Is arsenic a nutrient? Yes, it is. It is characterized as an “essential trace mineral”. What does too much arsenic do, however, when ingested by a human being or other living organism?
Perhaps scientology is not like cyanide, but is more like arsenic?
“…the false equivalency you are using by grouping every individual Churchie, Indie, Ex and Anti and saying they are all the same…”
Straw Man, Al. He said “SOME anti-scientologists,” and then those “at the opposite extreme pole.” In other words, he was talking about the extremists, not “every individual.”
Vinare…………….. :-(((((((. Now is that a break in the discussion policy:-( ??
Go to your room, it’s time out for you Mr Scientist!
I think you are getting close to the truth. Can you say it in simple words? For us haven’t doud the Primary rundown?
Nothing proves Marty’s point more than the reactions and comments. Isn’t it obvious?
It is easy to pick on a few details to “prove your point”. Marty’s point was that there are too many people who really mean business trying to prove THEIR point with all their might.
Why are people so passionate about their “Source” or “Con man” version is another question entirely, but sure enough, here it is – just read the comments.
Not considering myself a Scientologist any more (and I spent many years in the Sea Org) I can tell you what I observed and what I think about it:
– I see evidence that suggests Hubbard actually meant what he was doing – why would he call the best auditors he knew to audit him when he felt he was in trouble? Why would he direct spending huge sums of money on preserving his works for eternity (money from royalties that he could have just kept to himself)?
– I see evidence that he presented a lot of things as “absolute truth” that weren’t actually proven anywhere, by anyone. And I see him announcing to the world that “his technology” could do certain things better than anything else out there, but then one can see his organizations failing rather spectacularly at those very things one after the other, while others without the benefit of his “only workable tech” seem to be doing just fine.
– I can see evidence of turning what may have started as a genuine research project, into a cult where Hubbard’s words must be believed and followed as gospel. That’s, as far as I am concerned, was the (early) end of the road for any usefulness Dianetics and Scientology may have had – the moment it ceased to be research and blocked input, review or contribution from anyone else but Hubbard, it reached a dead end and ceased to be useful as a self-help movement.
– I can see evidence of wrongdoing, lies, criminal activity and trying to be “above the law”
– I hear people saying that “he was in it only for the money”, but I don’t see evidence of that. With the money he was receiving from his royalties, from a certain point on he could have led an absolutely lavish millionaire lifestyle, which he doesn’t seem to have done. As far as I can tell, he had a modestly rich lifestyle, but nothing extraordinary. He had the money to buy a castle in England, but instead of keeping it to himself and enjoying it with his family like any “normal” millionaire would have done, instead, he moved his operations there, invited the public, and basically, made it into a workplace with staff and mostly open to the public. Not the extravagant, cordoned off lifestyle of the rich.
– He seemed to have loved to be right, his every need tended to, he seemed to love to lecture and write and it seems like he considered himself infallible in his observations, which real life experience doesn’t seem to bear out. He seemed to be enjoying having power, insight and control – and obviously considered himself very smart and more important than other people – and he seemed to be indeed a very talented and smart person.
– He seemed to have been pretty cunning, and believed that the end justified the means. He seem to have believed so much in his cause that he considered it more important that the law, the outside world, the world of “ordinary people”. According to him, everyone else was involved in less important things than him and the right thing for them to do would have been to join him and help him in his crusade instead of their unimportant endeavors.
– He had guts for sure. And he got a lot done – for better or worse.
Those (and many more, I just don’t want to go on) paint a very complex picture where nothing is really black or white. My current view is Hubbard must have been a very complex personality, a mix of a lot of things good and bad – my gut feeling is that he was on a self-appointed “save the world” mission gone wrong. At the end, he failed, which is obvious if you just look into the final years of his life and his legacy. He may have meant well, but at a certain point, he failed his mission (maybe due to arrogance or self importance?) and everything started to go downhill, and he ended up at a completely different place than he set out to go.
With all that said, I learned some neat tricks from him that I still use to this day, because they work. I am not pro-Scientology nor anti-Scientology. I no longer feel the need to pick a side. Who cares? I have read many books from many authors, and many of them had one idea that was worth buying the book. And I have no idea who the guy is who wrote the book, what his life story is and if people love him or hate him. I just read his book as his opinion, picked out the stuff I could use and forgot the rest. If you can do the same with Hubbard’s stuff, there is probably some things you can learn from it to. Devoting too much of your life proving how wrong he was in “everything” is only evidence that you have too much free time and you need to get a life.
In my opinion, being hard core anti-Scientology or anti-Hubbard today isn’t much different from being a hard core Scientology/Hubbard true believer and defender. There is a need to expose the abuse that’s going on in Scientology but all you need is a Google search to show that that mission has already been thoroughly accomplished. How much more dead can Scientology be? Yes, I got it, it’s a rotten, very bad horse. Have you heard the news that it has been dead for a few decades now…? Keep kicking it if you wish though…
I keep coming back to this blog because it’s interesting, and does what it says on the can – you can read a lot of interesting viewpoints and ideas on how to keep moving on up a little higher. And Marty, contrary to both Hubbard and Hubbard bashers, doesn’t seem to feel like he has to take a side and shove “his point” down your throat with vengeance. He just keeps writing about his own observations and progress along his own path. Moving on up a little higher.
What is the cause of ISIS? I do not think it is Islam. More probable it is the meddling of one culture with another.
A voice of reason…
Yes that was not a good response.
Marildi, I am seeing much better understanding in you now.
Personally, I am moving away from the idea of session altigether, whether it is Scientology, Idenics or some other methodology.
I like the idea of Mindful Discussion, which can be done any time.
Marildi –
“In other words, he was talking about the extremists, not “every individual.”
Yes, every individual that he referring to as an “extremist”. They are each individuals, you know.
Is the label “extremist” what is fooling you here?
No one is named by name. Therefore there is no way to evaluate for yourself exactly who he is talking about, and by looking at exactly what they write.
They are just “extremists”.
This is a label with no specifics. It is propaganda with no substance.
I’m surprised that you are not seeing this, Marildi.
Is it because you believe in this “extremist” label, too?
On a clay table checkout, would you pass a label with no clay beneath it?
Alanzo
If you are doing points (1) to (5) then that is great!
Marildi wrote:
“So yes, I would say that there are some in the sandbox who don’t value reason.”
OK, so let’s drop this over-generalized nonsense and name a name.
Exactly who do you know in the “Scientology Sandbox” who is an “extremist”, and who does not value reason?
Marty can chime in here as well any time he wants and name a name as well so that we can all see exactly who he is writing his substance-free propaganda against.
Marty?
We all evaluate and we all provide our opinions. If you don’t like some opinion you just ignore it. No need to get upset.
Be a big being!
It was not a good response on my part.
You are sure are getting aggressive Brian.
Well said, Globetrotter!
Globetrotter –
So, basically, anyone who disagrees with you or Marty about L Ron Hubbard, and who voices their disagreement, is an adolescent extremist who does not value reason.
This is just a big troll, isn’t it?
It’s like TR 0 Bullbait without saying “Start!”
I get it.
You got me.
Alanzo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socratic_method
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialectic
“Dialectic (also dialectics and the dialectical method) is a method of argument for resolving disagreement that has been central to European and Indian philosophy since antiquity. The word dialectic originated in ancient Greece, and was made popular by Plato in the Socratic dialogues. The dialectical method is discourse between two or more people holding different points of view about a subject, who wish to establish the truth of the matter guided by reasoned arguments.”
Scientology only involved this method, although somewhat, during it’s development, during the St Hill days.
Then KSW hit the scenes. Oh, so slowly did KSW take hold,
And how many of the St Hill folks get declared SP?
Don’t forget when KSW in 1965 was issued, so was PTS/SP issued, and refined by Hubbard slowly afterwards.
But who cares, as I have yet to meet a clear as hubbard promised in Dianetics.
“It is propaganda with no substance.”
LOL! Coming from the king of “Style over Substance.” 😀
I think you may be the one who is being thrown by the word “extreme.” There are books, articles and posts written all the time that don’t name names in expressing ideas about people. In fact, you yourself wrote a post with your own idea of how to describe the scientology sandbox – and there was only one category of several that you named a name. Why not the others? Here’s what you wrote:
“The Pournelle chart for the Scientology Sandbox can be a picture of a big sandbox, with:
ANTI-SCN on the left wall of the sandbox.
CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY on the right side of the sand box
NO IDEOLOGY on the top wall
KSW on the bottom wall ”
“Then we have various individuals from Marty’s blog sitting in different positions in the sandbox, building sandcastles…
“I would gladly place myself somewhere in the upper left quadrant.”
https://markrathbun.wordpress.com/2014/10/14/the-scientology-sandbox/#comment-322692.
.
Btw, would you place yourself in the “extreme” part of the upper left quadrant?
There is always the iRS asking you in for an audit. The teachers in schools that tell the kids to sit down. Yeah, It is all over the place and it is very true. And it is interesting because we see it and we don’t see it at the same time. I think it’s a great reference and I am glad you put it out here. Altitude hypnosis, laughter! The thing is, there is always an opposite I swing over to. Under altitude hypnosis is equally as powerful. I was in a parking lot today and there was a homeless girl, very young looking and clearly suffering. I watched her flag down every car that passed her and ask for money. People were riveted and throwing cash out the windows.
Yes, I agree with you that it’s not just subjective realities – there are often changes that can be observed in the physical universe, either by the pc (or student!) himself, or by those who know him. Those observations would be objective evidence if a study were to be done. The problem is that there haven’t been any valid studies done, so it’s an easy criticism to say the gains are ONLY subjective.
+1 !
Yes Oracle, I see your point. It is true, those under the spell are…….. under the spell.
In my experience, until we know who we are, we will always fantasize about who others are. Be they kings, celebrities, deceiving gurus, the less fortunate. Etc.
How can we love our neighbors AS ourselves if ourself is still a mish mosh of deluded identities aquired from societal and cultural imprinting and then giving altitude to those who claim it.
We are cause, we are source, we are the only way, our individual path the best path of all!
May all beings find joy and happiness
Wow! Great post!
XXOO Loved the Thomas Jefferson quote.
You were right. It was perfect.
Notes From The Desk of Alanzo:
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
What’s Good About L Ron Hubbard?
He wrote on foolscap paper
His penmanship was very stylish
His technology on washing windows with newspapers and water is very thrifty
He was an avid camera buff
He upheld standards of punctuality
He was an interesting public speaker
As a Boy Scout, he was more than competent
He had many children
He could be seen sporting a very classy powder-blue ascot on many occasions
He served in the Navy
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
There.
I hope this list doesn’t put me in the extremist category, but gosh darnit, I want my argument to be heard.
Alanzo
“Don’t you think it interesting you chose violent metaphors to make your point. ”
One. The ak47. Yeah, that can give someone some “authority” and altitude.
The cop who pulls you over for speeding, that isn’t really violent on most occasions. But he has the authority. And people do what they are told as if they have been hypnotized.
Thank you for tenderness.
Well, thank you for the tenderness.
Mirrors
Vin: “I like the idea of Mindful Discussion, which can be done any time.”
Same here. It’s amazing how much gain can be had. It’s been my “bridge” for a good while.
What do you think of the following as well:
“Any two people in constant association who will conduct themselves according to the Auditor’s Code will soon find not only that they are Clear or almost as a group of two but also that their knowledge of, and joy in human relationships, has been immeasurably increased.” (from *Notes on the Lectures*)
First step is recognizing you might be in a sandbox …
Next step is figuring out that the sandbox had a great deal to offer but was still a sandbox.
Next step is … whatever might work for you … bit by bit. You almost have to get out one grain at a time, which is a lot of grains in a sandbox.
I just discovered this teacher — who I previously wouldn’t listen to because he was a “bitter apostate” from my erstwhile buddhist practice …
It’s a free download from Sounds True DOT com …
Put Reggie Ray into the search … and you’ll see a FREE download … about an hour. Stay with it … the first minutes he speaks very slowly and deliberately which was irritating to me but he was so highly recommended by new friends and teachers I stayed with it.
OMG — and guess what? You’ll discover that although LRH was all that we’ve said here and elsewhere. You probably learned WAY more than you might have thought and your ability to evaluate isn’t quite as skewered as you might have thought.
BESIDES – Robert – just listening to a long long time meditator and teacher is SO contrary to LRH, you’ll basically be voicing opposition to LRH and if after the end of listening to Reggie – the sky didn’t fall in.
Well — you’ve broken the “spell”
Let me know how it goes.
Love,
Windhorse
Oracle, Tony Ortega was just showing his true colors. Of course you did not deserve it, but you should not be surprised and I hope you are immune to it. He is a yellow journalist in the business of selling it. I visit his blog for headlines because he is wired into a lot of news about a subject I keep tabs on. But beyond that I believe that this is just a meal ticket for him. He doesn’t need or want you raining on his parade. He is not even in your league. Cheer up and carry on. Thanks for all you do.
Scientology was a manipulative cult and a manipulative subject, long before KSW.
As early as March 1955, Hubbard had devised an elaborate system of layering and compartmentalising Scientology so as to monitor who says what to whom. The general public were (and still are) only to be told certain things. If someone can be successfully handled with that initial PR, then that, per the tech, is all that needs to be done. It only gets nasty when the person doesn’t respond to being handled with PR.
^^^ L Ron Hubbard’s 1955 ‘Manual on Dissemination of Material’
Some additional background prior to KSW:
1951: Tone Scale placement determined by person’s attitude towards Dianetics. Bad attitude = Low Tone. Persistent low tone level results in the person being “disposed of quietly and without sorrow” – that is, in the envisioned Scientology world.
1952: Scientology’s founder invented a past and a future for Scientologists. He made it trillions of years in both directions. He first experimented with inventing a past for Scientologists in his Benzedrine-inspired text ‘History of Man’, (originally titled ‘What to Audit’). Around that same time, L Ron Hubbard tested other ideas, such as that a person’s reaction to Scientology (or to him), would place that person on the “Tone Scale,” with a disapproving reaction placing the person low on the scale. Those low on the “Tone Scale” – not being “sane” – were to have no credibility, and “no rights of any kind.” L Ron Hubbard also tested the idea of using meters as “truth detectors”. Does anyone doubt that showman and hypnotist L Ron Hubbard, when using an early Mathison e-meter, one which projected its needle movements on a wall or screen for all to see, did not notice when many in the crowd oohed and aahed at the display of a reaction? Yet, it was premature for the implementation of these ideas on the still small, fragile and tentative membership. He had already lost many of the original Dianetic followers with his rebranding to Scientology and the concomitant nascent religious cloaking.
May 1955: ‘Manual on Dissemination of Material’: Secretive stratified nature of Scientology introduced, “ruin him utterly” legal harassment policy, complete intolerance for dissent and debate.
1959: Confidential ‘HCO Manual of Justice’ – the beginning of Scientology’s intelligence gathering operations and such ethical considerations as
1960, Security Checking, (“In this Lifetime..”) used, unbeknownst to most Scientologists, as means of collecting blackmail, etc. Also Thought Policing codified: “Have you ever had unkind thoughts about LRH?” as first started in the “Manual of Justice” for investigations.
1960: ‘Department of Government Affairs’: “Find or manufacture enough threat . . . bring the government and hostile philosophies or societies into a state of complete compliance . . . This is to be done by high level ability to control and in its absence by low level ability to overwhelm.”
1960, ‘Special Zone Plan’: “Locate its leader. Get a paid post as an officer or secretary of the staff… any nation or state runs on the ability of its department heads, its governors or any other leaders. It’s easy to get posts in such areas… Get a job on the secretarial staff or as a body guard, use any talent one has to get a place close in . . . ” This echoes L Ron Hubbard’s instructions in his secretly written 1955 faux “Russian textbook,” which instructed that “psycho-political operatives” to be: “Planted besides the countries powerful persons . . . The rich, the skilled in finance, the well informed in government are particular and individual targets for the psycho-politician . . . This every rich man, every statesman, every person well informed and capable in government must have brought to his side as a trusted confidant a psycho-political operator.” As early as 1965, the ‘Anderson Report’ spotted parallels between Scientology and L Ron Hubbard’s “Russian Textbook on Psycho-Politics.”
In confident instructions, L Ron Hubbard wrote of the importance of “using enemy tactics,” and would even use those “enemy tactics” on his own loyal followers. He had written of psychiatrists in August 1963 . . .
Soon to follow would be the secret and very serious, and very dangerous “Clearing Course,” “OT 2” and “OT 3”, in which Hubbard would do what he said the psychiatrists did.
The original Fair Game Law, condoning murder and arson, was written in March 1965. L Ron Hubbard’s “There are men dead because they attacked us,” goes back to 1959. “Ruin utterly” and “Always attack ,” dates from 1955, and “No rights of any kind” and “Disposed of quietly and without sorrow” dates from 1951.
With most of its operational procedures being confidential, Scientology is a secretive and sneaky cult. The end result is that many people who have endured its processing don’t know what Scientology actually is until some stage after they have left. Scientology deeply influences them, yet they – in important areas – don’t understand it. Many do not realise, for example, that the grubby intelligence work goes hand in hand with the PR work. Thus, we see the well-intentioned novice and then there’s the aggressive “Always attack!” type of Scientologist. Then there are clumsy and inept PR people. Then there are slick PR people. Then there’s those few who know the score completely. Often a response from a Scientologist will reflect one or several of these categories. For example, the Scientology adherent starts out answering questions which seem innocent enough but, when asked more pointed questions, switches into PR mode, and then, when questions become too sensitive in nature and appear “critical,” becomes flustered, and decides to “Attack!” Over-all, PR tech is better applied amongst Independents and Freezoners than by Scientology personnel, especially over the last few years. After all, as the Independents and Freezoners say, “Tech is out in Orgs.” And that would include PR tech.
As a secretive and manipulative doctrine, Scientology does come complete with a valid truth-coating. There is zero evidence of Scientology achieving the states it promises but there is definitely some short-term benefit accrued to its adherents, especially in the early stages. Whether that’s correlated or causitive to Scientology remains to be determined, although a good guess can be ventured. When it comes to discussing the subject, conveying the idea that there is both a positive outer display coating which is ultimately subordinate, and also a negative hidden core which is ultimately dominant, can be difficult. However, it is a foolish critic who cannot recognise the truth coating because failing to do so denies the fact that Scientology has something about it which initially attracts its adherents, a question many people who know only a little about the subject have. These days, with the Xenu story being ubiquitous, passing public often ask “why would anyone be attracted to it?” It can best be explained by pointing out that the truth-coating is displayed while the negatives are often hidden or disguised; or, when they no longer can be denied, are rationalised or “spun.” For those looking to promote Scientology spin is usually applied, as here in the attempt to polarise those who apparently refuse to perceive the positive and those who apparently refuse to recognise the negative and then labelling them with the perjorative “extremist” or “hater” tags. (Note the Dissemination Manual stricture to paint people as “having something wrong with them”). For the unwary, such spin isolates those who give Scientology a bad name, either by speaking truth about it (which is a “suppressive act”) or being obviously nutty, and frames Scientology as something other than as L Ron Hubbard fully defined it. It is also an attempt to control what is said about Scientology.
TL/DR: What’s really going on, I suggest, is that the so-called “negatives” and the “positives” are are competition for the hearts and minds of the public and recent escapees. Most members of the two groups can see both the positive and negative, they just choose not to water down their positions unless it becomes necessary in order to more effectivley communicate with different audiences. Suggesting that the introduction of KSW or the year 1965 was some sort of tipping point is another part of the Scientology spin being applied outside of the cult. It is also a recogised weigh-station for many people who undergo the decompression phase after leaving the cult and is not a place to hesitate for too long, I reckon.
Yes. I would like to see everybody follow it.
Well! Who is an absolutist here? Who knows it with total certainty?
He would be the extremist.
It would be nice if we all had the goal that everyone really could come out winning. I have heard Tony is writing a book about Scientology. Maybe with all of his experience and knowledge it will become a best seller. When we are near the end of the tunnel. He could go on to be a really great writer.
Marty has already written some great books, and will write more. Marty understands about the spiritual things and can translate that like no other.
I would love to read a book written by Karen de, she is a real continuous success story. She has had some enormous adventures.
I would love to see a movie about Emma’s life (esmb).
Mike Rinder could write a really great book. He has this keen insight into outpoints and he translates them well.
We all really do have a lot to offer the rest of the world in terms of understanding. Everyone’s life has such incredible value.
I am pretty cheerful. I am just really happy to have these conversations. I am happy to have people to talk to. I am happy Marty asks questions and says things that push me into places where I find out more about myself and others. Other people too that post on the blog.
I have some weird character make up, where I am a blank slate until someone asks me something or tells me something. Until something summons me up. I am like a genie in a bottle. It is very quiet and I would be very lonely with out all of these great conversations. It is very hard to explain. But I am very excited about new conversations. It is like some kind of kite string that keeps me grounded. If there were not great great conversations, I might float away.
Yes, true
I think people go through various stages of attitudes. It is like the process of someone who was abused.
First they look up to the abuser and think low of themselves
Then they recognize something is wrong
Then they want help
Then they work out their self worth
Then they get angry at the abuser
And after a time they learn to forgive the abuser
There are many people just coming to grips with their experience with Scientology. People are on different stages of the process.
Some may say I am a Ron basher. That is your right to think that. I have forgiven Ron years ago.
My intention is to try to uncover masked intentions, see the man behind the curtain, to help regain an ability to be constructively critical.
To uncover the lies of an “only way.” To validate other paths that Ron squashed.
To a person who needs to get angry, telling them to be balanced and forgive may not be the next step.
Brainwashing took place, that is not a light thing.
I heard you.
Crepuscule –
Very complete rebuttal to the Opening Post which thoroughly debunks it.
And the fact that you wrote it makes you an insane extremist – you know that don’t you?
Alanzo (:>
This is a very good comment Gerhard made to Theo. And Gerhard gave some great examples of how just evaluating within one’s own subjective reality, rather than objectively, can lead one falsely. I thought of a whole bunch of examples as well. The first example I thought of was myself. As I made some serious mistakes once thinking only in terms of my own subjective reality. And I made those mistakes at the very height of my past Scientology auditing.
And we’ve seen some gross examples, like the Klu Klux Klan. They were sure they were right within their small subjective reality.
And leading up to the Civil War here in the US, the South’s main customer for their cotton sales then was England, so British agents were commonly seen in the South in those days. These agents beat the drum to the wealthy opinion leaders in the South that the South should succeed from the Union (northern states), which was a message that The Bank of England wanted delivered. The South thought they were hot shit (within their subjective reality) and thought their subjective reality of slaves and slaves ownership was good. And the Bank of England made a lot of money financing both sides of that war.
I see this subjective reality situation in many places, where people get stuck in it and don’t look objectively. It seems to be how cults everywhere operate. It’s how people get taken advantage of. And how they lead themselves to failure.
We try to hurt others with our responses to teach them a lesson.
You are welcome, Oracle. 🙂
Globetrotter –
This is a really well written post, and it is good you took the time to write out your thoughts.
My question for you is how much time have you spent actually learning about cults and brainwashing technology?
See, it isn’t “extremism” that causes some people in the Scientology Sandbox to call a spade a spade, it is knowing what a spade is.
You wrote:
“Those (and many more, I just don’t want to go on) paint a very complex picture where nothing is really black or white. My current view is Hubbard must have been a very complex personality, a mix of a lot of things good and bad – my gut feeling is that he was on a self-appointed “save the world” mission gone wrong. At the end, he failed, which is obvious if you just look into the final years of his life and his legacy. He may have meant well, but at a certain point, he failed his mission (maybe due to arrogance or self importance?) and everything started to go downhill, and he ended up at a completely different place than he set out to go.”
This is a very reasonable paragraph in summation of your very reasonable post.
But the problem is that you do not recognize well established knowledge on the technology of brainwashing, and your post shows it.
In “Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism”, Robert Jay Lifton describes this technology of brainwashing and your “gut-feeling” above that L Ron Hubbard was on a “self-appointed “save the world” mission gone wrong” shows that you are not recognizing one of the most blatant tools of brainwashing that LRH applied to you – especially as a Sea Org member.
http://www.culteducation.com/brainwashing19.html
This one web page is a great overview of what I am talking about. It is an important education that shows what Hubbard was actually up to, and why his “save the world mission” that you recognize proves that he was blatantly and cynically just brainwashing people.
“Totalism” is always a “save the world mission”. It is a bridge, not to greater freedom, but to TOTAL FREEDOM. Totalist goals and slogans have a psychological effect on a person that takes him out of every day reality and glues him to the control of the totalist philosophy.
On the BC, while researching SOP Goals, L Ron Hubbard made the statement that a person’s goals control his emotions, attitudes and behaviors. He also said that finite goals which had finite ends, would end for the “thetan” once he reached it. But a thetan with an absolute goal would keep trying to reach it forever.
And then Hubbard set out to create a Bridge to TOTAL FREEDOM.
Can you spot the totalist goals that LRH littered throughout Scientology for his thetans to adopt?
While pointing this out to you brings me very close to being labeled an “extremist” here on Marty’s blog, there really was no more extreme guy than L Ron Hubbard. What’s funny is that you make the point that calling LRH an extremist makes me an extremist myself. This, of course, is false and completely illogical but hey – we’ve all fallen for illogical arguments before.
If calling a spade a spade makes me a spade in your and Marty’s eyes, then so be it.
Alanzo
Let me think…Shoot.. You know I thought that I could lend my voice to this blog. I never thought of myself as an extremist before.. I never thought you were an extremist either Alanzo.
I only see you as a truth teller. I try to be a truth teller too. It is difficult knowing all the information available about LRH to give him any semblance of an ” Atta Boy..”
There has been blood shed in his honor and at his direction. Lives have been ruined including his children and his wives.
This man created a process known to screw up people’s minds. There are those that have followed Hubbard and will never recover. AND WE ALL KNOW IT.
………………………………………………
“There are those who dismiss L. Ron Hubbard as the consummate con man. They insist that with conscious aforethought he created and operated dianetics and scientology as a fraudulent bait and switch operation fooling and fleecing tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of relatively intelligent adults. ”
I am one of ” Those.” I will never accept Hubbard as anything other than a lying conman who has ruined good people’s lives.
………………………………………………….
” Each time a person stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, the send forth a tiny ripple of hope. These ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls. ” Robert Kennedy
I will be checking back now and then. Marty I only wish you and Mosey good luck. I am rooting for you. Baby
Vinaire you’re so funny.
So, per your theory when you have the attention on that place you’re at you’re delusional. I you jump out of a plane and have your attention on that you’re in the air, you’re delusional….
Common……
Are you the new prophet that knows everything ?
Best comment I have seen on any of these blogs…good job
If I am, what objection would you have?
I think prophets are adored as well as reviled and crucified for their opinions because they speak on matters close to the heart.
Prophets seem to be very independent in expressing their visions.
I was talking about exteriorization only. I don’t know if it can be generalized.
I am getting away from knowing anything. I prefer not knowing.
My focus is simply on resolving inconsistencies. When an inconsistency is resolved there is no more ateention on it, or knowingness about it. I can not know it.
The key is understanding that “you” are not separate from the rest of reality. If there is any consideration of separation, it is just that… a consideration. “You” or “I” is created out of this consideration of separation.
Hi Theo
Thank you for all that. I see where you are coming from. You apparently still have a lot more trust in Ron and the “tech” than I have.
There are a few pivotal things that really changed my view on things. This blog, for one. It has made me re-evaluate many aspects of Scientology from one or two steps back. I started to see some flaws in how the tech itself was constructed. My personal experiences, looked at with a more discerning eye, pointed to and confirmed some of these flaws. I have to tell you, it was hard to let go of some of the false ideas I had been clinging to.
The book “Bare-faced Messiah” was a real eye opener. If you are going to read it, be forewarned, it is a real myth shatterer. I already had some misgivings about Ron, but this book really paints an entirely different picture than Scientology would ever allow you to believe. I understand that “the man is not the subject”. Hell, I used that line myself both externally and internally for years. But looking at a different reality of who and what Ron was, and how he operated, sure casts a different light on his products.
As things move forward I am still rummaging through the rubble of what was, or has become, Scientology. I am still finding pieces that I consider of value, but the majority of it I no longer have much use for, and what I use, I use with caution and vigilance. I have made it a policy to not use anything that I have not inspected carefully. Of course, even then, I am sure I will make some errors in judgement, but hopefully I learn from those too.
I guess many of us are “sorting through the rubble” in some way or another, and each take different things away from the experience. I am willing to experience others taking whatever they find of value, and leaving behind whatever they don’t.
Thanks again for your communication.
Eric
http://rutube.ru/video/465ebe29c4e8e88e439faea0adc80211/?ref=logo
1952 demo session by L. Ron Hubbard
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Library/Shelf/miller/interviews/kima.htm
I’m with you Alanzo
I didn’t get upset. I just don’t like people making evaluations when they talk, especially on such things. I think we should be sensitive thetans, though sensitive is really integer to a thetan. Anyway, I guess we are all learning things day after day.
Vinaire, you may be right. It’s a valid thought. I just wanted to point out that sometimes we come across in a different way that we intended. And it’s too basic a thought to put it in a line and just try to shove it down one’s throat. I guess that’s what I like about LRH, he spoke and wrote so many words in so many contexts to try to give understandings, not quotes.
Marildi, one has to look around and see the results in others. That’s all. My gf was not a Scientologist. Apart from the fact that when iI I told her stufff about the tech and some basic things and she read for example the 2nd Dynamic book and some other little things, she could easily start applying them with her ex and her father who seemed to intervene too much with her life, she also understand bits of the study tech and she could apply it to her children. Now, if that’s not objective results, what is it then?
I am always willing to discuss. 🙂
I can take that as an eval and be “sensitive” about it, but I think that is a waste of time.
I don’t agree with those examples because then we enter into another thing. Groups and their realities. Here we were talking about my own subjective reality.
Then permit me to say, in an analogy of your examples, that Americans do have a very subjective reality on the world around them. And it ain’t a good one at all. But that’s not “their” subjective reality.
See you are confusing subjective with group thought and group behaviour. Though the examples have some analogy with subjective reality, those are too different things because when a “subjective” reality becomes a group thing it is a commonly accepted thing. It becomes a reality, it is real and solid as a rock. Now, if it collides with other realities it does not mean it is subjective. It is another reality.
In my very real to me example about the American civilisation today I wouldn’t say their reality is subjective. It is what it is. It is their reality. It may be right or wrong to certain degrees. As is the reality of the Greeks for example. Because it’s different or wrong it does not make it a subjective reality.
Subjective has to do with
4. a. (1) peculiar to a particular individual : personal (2) : modified or affected by personal views, experience, or background
c : arising out of or identified by means of one’s perception of one’s own states and processes — compare objective 1c
OBJECTIVE
b : of, relating to, or being an object, phenomenon, or condition in the realm of sensible experience independent of individual thought and perceptible by all observers : having reality independent of the mind — compare subjective 3a
Once a subjective reality is perceptible by all observers it becomes an (objective) reality. Because it’s just agreed upon and then it starts manifesting in more solid states and forms.
I guess we can all share some objective realities on the subject of spirituality, call it scientology or whatever you wanna call it. Just because we have different views from materialists does this makes it a “subjective” reality. No, because we can perceive things that they can’t or wouldn’t admit they can. So there is a lie there and our reality is objective, indeed. We can see it manifest to a certain degree in the physical universe independent of individual thought. Now, the degree to which one or many can observe such realities depends on how perceptive and hatted as thetans they are. How many of those phenomena of theta they can recognise and have an understanding of.
For the sake of my parents and for the sake of others who gave decades of their lives to this operation, as well as for my own sake, I hope there is a middle ground.
Windhorse:
“I just discovered this teacher — who I previously wouldn’t listen to because he was a “bitter apostate” from my erstwhile buddhist practice …
I’ve listened to a few Reggie Ray teachings. Couldn’t stay with him, though. Too much of a hippie for me. (:>
Were you a student of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche?
Have you seen the documentary called “Crazy Wisdom: The Life and Times of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche”
It’s on Netflix:
http://www.netflix.com/WiMovie/70247854?strkid=265179539_0_0&trkid=222336&movieid=70247854
Very interesting view of gurus and their students – who I understand include Robert Thurmann, Pema Chödrön and others who I have immense respect for.
Thinking about Chögyam Trungpa himself, as represented in that one documentary, makes my head spin, though.
Alanzo
Jim wrote:
“Good post, Marty. I think some in-depth understanding of the GPM materials and processes would be helpful as well.
I doubt it.
Alanzo
why take it personally? Come on!
Oracle, I do not think there was “fair gaming ” on the Duggans for adopting. How about the indifference of the adopted children’s possible mental needs, handicaps, and getting casually tossed out to strangers who have no qualifications to care for children with problems. It is an abomination as adoptive parents, they just threw the kids away. The kids need treatments, not sure what kind, but they are obviously ( kids) not getting it. It is wonderful when people take the responsibility to adopt children that otherwise might have a very hard time out there. But these children are faring worse than one might have thought, and in the hands of people that have reduced them to amounts of money just to download screechy take them off their hands. IT IS ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF DEPLORABLE CULT SCIENTOLOGY!
Just keep on bringing the truth to the table Alanzo. I am a spade also.
Baby –
I don’t blame you for not wanting to hang out somewhere after you’ve been called an extremist who doesn’t value reason.
But it’s just an adolescent rhetorical tactic that Marty picked up from Hubbard. Anyone who disagreed with Hubbard had to be insane, see, and that kind of “always attack, never defend” impulse was drilled deep into Marty’s psyche for many decades. He’s also achieved a lot of results with it over the course of his career.
In many ways for Marty, it’s the winning valance.
And he just dramatized it for a post, that’s all.
I’ll bet already he is wondering why he thought he had to use a “spectrum” in his mind to organize other people’s opinions about LRH and Scientology, when there are so many other ways to look at it.
Well, Hubbard’s “GPM” tech taught Marty about the 2 poles, etc etc,
He just dramatized a little of his Scientology indoctrination there. Very probably only temporarily.
If I know Marty, he is already reflecting on all this and has a new way of seeing this that is all his own.
So don’t let Marty run you away.
I’m sure he values your input.
I know that I do, and so do a lot of other people around here, despite butting heads every once in a while.
Alanzo
I think this short vid of Eckhart Tolle ties in with the discussions here. It’s titled “What is My Responsibility?”
I’ve transcribed part of it:
“The entire future is about what your state of consciousness is now. Now.
“…All you have to do then is, primarily, take responsibility for your state of consciousness now. And this is what the entire teaching, really, is about. What is my state of consciousness at this moment? Am I generating disturbance, am I generating negativity, am I generating conflict and suffering for myself and others?
“Am I generating inner pollution – am I polluting the beautiful being that I am with continuous absurd movements of thought producing negative emotions, producing an entire entity that is illusory, that I call “the me”
“…Some people don’t know that there is even a possibility of taking responsibility – that’s why YOU are so important. Anybody who realizes it…you are the beginning of the transformed world…You hear it quite often these days – you need to be the change. The change that you want to see out there, you need to embody that.
“…And that’s not primarily what you DO. There’s something more primary than what you do. It’s who you are.
“Who you are is your state of consciousness. Whatever you do flows out of that…The change is the transformed state of consciousness, now. That is your responsibility. Once you’ve seen that, that’s your responsibility: Now you know it.
“People who are not yet at that level don’t realize it, and that’s fine – you can’t expect the whole world already to be at that stage. It’s enough for YOU to take responsibility, knowing that there’s still a few million others who don’t know that they can take responsibility, because they live in such unconsciousness that they see the entire evil in others – it’s all in them. And they make half the world into their enemy…
“Only those who are required to take responsibility are those who are up to it. Even those entirely unconscious still: On the one hand, they don’t know what they’re doing…as Jesus said…they know not what they do. In other words, they’re in the grip of unconscious forces…in the grip of mental-emotional streams…
“However, the fact that they’re not responsible because they can’t be responsible does not mean that they do not suffer the consequences of their unconsciousness. So they generate suffering. And eventually suffering is the fire in which the ego gets burned up – the collective ego and the personal ego. That’s the long way, the slow way, the painful way…
“And then there is a short cut – which is any spiritual treatment. It cuts through that.”
Oops – that was the whole playlist. Here’s the video I meant to post:
Letting go wrote:
“For the sake of my parents and for the sake of others who gave decades of their lives to this operation, as well as for my own sake, I hope there is a middle ground.”
You are such a good writer, Letting go.
This one sentence says so much.
What do you think that middle ground should be that would benefit yourself, your parents, and everybody else?
Should it be something less than the truth, but that makes you temporarily feel better to believe?
I think that, especially in scenarios where there is a cult leader involved, or a cheating husband, a thieving partner, or any kind of deep betrayal, the truth sometimes hurts for a while but then starts to heal you way more than you ever would have been healed by settling for a comfortable fairy tale.
But who knows? Maybe the comfortable middle ground fairy tale really is the truth.
All I know is that when you put yourself in L Ron Hubbard’s shoes, and experience what we now know he experienced, and say the things he said about his experiences, and do the things he did to Scientologists, you know what *you* would have to be thinking in order to do the things Hubbard did.
That is the best way I know to figure out the truth about L Ron Hubbard: Apply the Viewpoint PL to him and his words and actions.
Alanzo
Globetrotter wrote:
” I see evidence that suggests Hubbard actually meant what he was doing – why would he call the best auditors he knew to audit him when he felt he was in trouble?”
This is an important point.
If you examine the times we know for sure when he sent for Mayo to audit him when he was sick, what tech did he have Mayo apply to him as a sick pc?
The PTS Rundown?
An SP Search and Discovery?
Why did LRH, the King of Standard Tech, that standard tech that he railed about and threw people overboard for, and declared, expelled, and fair gamed people for not applying, have Mayo run NOTs on him? Something was not part of Scientology at all at the time?
Why does he say one thing to Scientologists and do another thing himself?
And how do you know this wasn’t just a big pity play – something his nurse, Kima Douglas, watched him dramatize many times during this period?
https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Library/Shelf/miller/interviews/kima.htm
Alanzo
You say, “these children” and now the myth of neglect has spread across all of their children. The myth now is that they have “just threw the kids away”. It has morphed into them, “take them off their hands” By the end of the week the Duggins will be referred to as murderers. That is how witch hunts go. You need these lies. I don’t. You spread these lies, I don’t. You long to be part of this injustice. I don’t. You don’t mind dragging children into the war and airing their dirty laundry or mis haps for your own blood lust. I do. You are a trash talking little liar spreading injustice and using children as tools to do it. And everything you are doing to others, will someday happen to you. It may not be tomorrow, it may not be this life. But it will come back you. The black magic you are wallowing will stick to the bottom of your shoes and walk with you wherever you go. You don’t two fucks about those kids or you wouldn’t be spreading lies about their parents. Describing them as mental health issues that need “treatment”.
SCAT!
“If I know Marty, he is already reflecting on all this and has a new way of seeing this that is all his own.”
I would be more inclined to think Marty is reflecting on some of the posts on this thread and has a new way of thinking about the given posters. 🙂
Nice!
Theo, you are so right. That’s the kind of objective results I was talking about too – objective in the sense that changes can be observed in the physical universe. But that is still considered anecdotal and subjective because it’s based on someone’s subjective observation, either that of the person him/herself or another person observing the changes in them. So I think it would be great if studies were done using the scientific method. That might settle some arguments. 😉
Also, your verdict that that “they just threw the kids away”, is only what you want to believe. For all you know the adoptive mother is dying of a terminal illness and trying to PROVIDE a stable future for those kids. Your mind goes into dark places when you like to be parked there and think dark thoughts.
Alanzo, well done yourself in attacking and not defending! 🙂
That middle ground will be not being fixated on Scientology. It is high time you look at that possibility, Alanzo.
I share your sentiments, Oracle.
Really? You mean, I’ve made it!! Yippeee. Lets dance . . .
If KSW is on the bottom, then anti-ideology would be on top. No ideology belongs in the middle of the sandbox.
I was being snarky, I just thought it funny that you are giving links to “discussion policy” and then being snarky yourself to Alanzo, Val and Oracle.
It was more a chuckle Vinay. My intention is never to hurt. I was overtaken by a jovial snark cootie. 🙂
Namaste Vin
no worries.
Debbie Cook email got me to realize I was sane afterall,
finally somebody pointed out all this stupid ass hardsell regging for dono’s was insane, per just thinking with LRH policy at the time of Jan 1, 2012.
Mind you also, I’m just a low level pc & auditor, so I had no status in the make believe game.
Obviously my viewpoints have changed since then, regards the great one LRH.
Sick pc’s do get auditing too, you know, especially if they are Type II – such as the PTS Rundown and maybe even the Suppressed Person Rundown. Or, LRH may simply have gotten a 10 August. In any one of those, the SP item that came up might have required NOTs type auditing.
Al, I think you’re grasping at straws on this thread.
Even if you don’t believe that what is audited on NOTs is BT’s but rather the pc’s own creations, there is the datum that pcs can be PTS to themselves.
yah, good questions.
and why didn’t Mayo insist that Ron get a PTS interview?
And I would have thought Ron was at least a Cleared Theta Clear?
shoot, any PT OT8 gets that, in fact they have to redo the PTS/SP course for the 10th time. Yah, I know, number of times over = certainty. laughter.
ROFLMAO
well,
are we all not to a certain degree, some greater, some lesser, fixated on scientology?
Even you in your website, as you make comparisons to scientology and here.
And what is Martys new purpose, but to write a book explaining scientology with the purpose of not getting involved with scientology, from a insiders view.
I think everybody posting here is somewhere in the middle ground?
Why, because we would still be scientologists if we were not.
Not really. Fixation means something very different from being interested. In fixation there is an element of compulsion. One is kind of driven by, some may say, insane passion. The word JIHAD may apply.
The insane element that is see here is Alanzo demonstrating the characteristics of “Attack as defense” in his behavior that he associates with Scientology and is very critical of.
This is a perfect example, perfect, of extremists lacking reason. Right up to being butt assed stupid loose cannons! The children of billionaires are always required to have monumental security and secret locations. ALWAYS. Because they are targets for kidnappers, extortionists, terrorists and a host of other murderous sorts. By using this child as a weapon . his location and identities of his care givers, the son of a billionaire, has been broadcast planet wide setting him up as a TARGET.
Does anybody on this blog have familiarity with The Silva Mind Control Method of Mental Dynamics?
And I think you are putting wads of straws over your eyes. Is that even a thing?
Someone needed a specific about “reason holds little currency” ?
If that kid was happy and doing well where he was, and apparently he was. Now he is going to have to pack up . Why? Because of blood thirsty extremists creating a security risk for him and putting his life in danger.
To my mind, “anti-ideology” is not the same as “no ideology”. Because “anti-ideology” becomes itself an ideology. A person might become very “KSW” about being “anti-ideology”.
That’s about what I thought. As soon as Marty posts that LRH or scientology might not be 100% “black”, then suddenly he is characterized as “still indoctrinated” by Al. If you don’t agree 100% with Al, you’ve had it.
no, I was a KSW type dude and not allowed to compare.
so you think LRH was the OT of OT’s?
Yes.
Compare Alanzo’s reactions to Eckhart Tolle’s. How would Tolle react to this issue?
How does Silva’s fundamental axioms compare to those of Hubbard’s… broadly, since both approaches look at the mind?
Theo, I think your reasoning is based on a number of assumptions that have no merit.
Your definition of “group thought” is upside down. No group is thinking. The mind of an individual is thinking. If several individuals are thinking along similar thoughts or agreements they individually have, then you have individuals with shared subjective thoughts not “group thinking”.
So if members of the same culture have agreed during their upbringing on similar values, thoughts and ways to look at things, you do not have “group thinking” but individuals basically thinking independently along the same agreements.
Individual members of ISIS, Italy, CO$, Germany and the USA share different sets of agreements that they subjectively hold true. They base their decisions and actions on those shared agreements. There is not something like “group behavior” it is individuals approving or disapproving certain actions and any leader ignoring those agreements is quickly deposed if he has not force at his disposal and uses it against the individuals he is in business to lead and govern.
Because some agreements are shared by many does not make these agreements objective or a reality. That is just pure nonsense. In the beginning they are reality for the individual, something the individual holds for true has invested his agreements in, and when this is shared by other individuals you don’t get objective reality.
The truth exists if you agree with it or not. It does not care and is unmoving. It exists and does not need our minds to agree with it to confirm it. We are free to agree and invest our life into anything. In an unaware person the agreements are held as true. Such a person does not have the awareness to realize everything in his mind is just what he agreed too and by agreeing to it made it his “truth”.
That is why people are fighting for their version of the “true god” with blood and steel. They are so invested in their subjective “truth”, that they do not realize that an objective truth actually exists and always demonstrates them its existence as a reflection of their actions.
At the level of the physical universe gravity does not care if one agrees with it or not. When one steps of the cliff gravity just will demonstrate you the reflection of one’s decision. Gravity won’t even laugh at you.
If ones actions are generally governed by love the truth will demonstrate itself differently as if ones actions are driven by fear or its child hate. The truth exists, the truth does not change, it does not matter what our mind thinks.
Scientology is a subjective reality that was seeded into the minds of others who individually agreed and made it their subjective truth. LRH lied when he said ‘reality (truth) is agreement’. He knew that was a lie. Just because people agree to something in numbers does not make it true. That is sheer nonsense dreamed up by the great deceiver.
700 Years ago almost everybody agreed the earth was flat. That was not the reality (truth) than nor is it now. And for numbers there is this old joke: “Billions of flies can’t be wrong, eat shit!”
The existence of an independent truth has become unpopular possibly because to many stood up and said they knew it and are the messengers to tell us the truth and we believed in them, just to find us stripped from our ideals, life and possessions. Similar like many (ex)Scientologists.
LRH and Scientology are just another one of these large numbers of false prophets that made people agree to their brands of lies.
I say it again, the truth exists and our mind is not capable of grasping it, so we take its reflections and distortions we can perceive or things we assume or something somebody whispers into out ear as our subjective truth and we are deep asleep if we have no awareness about this.
The awareness about this has the potential to set us free from false prophets and can make us open to search and ever trying to get closer to the truth. But the first recognition is that anything one knows is a lie, (including Thetans and theta perceptions).
So if you, Theo, want to hold on to the agreement that your mind and your knowledge capture the “truth” I wish you a peaceful sleep.
For my part I am not confused a bit about the fact, that I know nothing as it relates to the truth. All I have in my mind is ever changing knowledge that is and will be lies.
never read or listened to Eckhart Tolle.
Why would I care how he, Eckhart Tolle would react to this issue?
I’m asking two questions of you, which you never answered.
You didn’t answer my two questions. which are:
“are we all not to a certain degree, some greater, some lesser, fixated on scientology?”
“I think everybody posting here is somewhere in the middle ground?”
so what are your answers to those questions?
That wouldn’t be his claim to fame, no. I’m sure there have been, and are, beings who are more OT than he was. But I believe he was pretty OT.
And he does have a claim to fame, apart from the infamy, because he made some valuable contributions. My guess is that in time this will be acknowledged too.
Bales of hay. 😀
I think I like the Vin and Val show better that the old Al and Val show. 😀
Alanzo,
You know, some people use eternity to lessen the cost of one life. In the process of leaving scientology, one day it suddenly dawned on me that really, I know nothing. I do not know that there is a next life, and I no longer believe that any of us know this for a fact, although we may like to hold on to it. If all that one can be certain of is this life, then how can you look back when you reach the end, bankrupt, in poverty and having spent most of your time working for or chasing a fata morgana, and not feel utter despair? The pain and horror are real. I do not know how to help my parents deal with it, let alone deal with it myself.
Perhaps my outlook is too bleak. The more I look at the result of Hubbard’s work, the “product” in scientologese, the more I believe the good found in scientologists was always theirs, and not brought forth by auditing so much as by life experience.
If you no longer have eternity to lessen the cost of this life, then what is left to you?
These are real concerns for me, I do not see this as a discussion of theory.
And another thing….
Two rational, well-reasoned and well-supported arguments, whose conclusions totally conflict with each other, can both be valid.
One of those conflicting arguments does not have to come from an insane person who is also an adolescent extremist who does not value reason.
For instance, Marildi often presents very sound reasoning for the conclusions she holds, sometimes with very sound supporting evidence for her reasoning.
And also, Crepuscule continually presents extremely well crafted arguments with iron clad reasoning to support his/her conclusions.
Yet the conclusions that Marildi and Crepuscule present are often in direct conflict with each other.
Does that make one, or both of them “extremists” who do not value reason – especially when they continually display their well-crafted reasoning for other people’s inspection?
No.
Just the fact that their reasoning is available for inspection by others is a pluspoint – and can serve as the objective proof that that both of their arguments are valid.
It was the cult that said there was only one way to see things and everyone else was insane.
Human beings are social animals whose greatest strength is the multiple viewpoint system where well meaning, sane, and rational people routinely hold conflicting conclusions. Throughout human history, any system that recognizes and values multiple viewpoints, and does not denigrate or dead agent them, thrives.
One of the fundamental reasons scientology failed utterly was that L Ron Hubbard shut out every one else’s opinions than his own. And he labeled every other opinion than his own as “bank dominated mob”.
Instead of seeing all these opinions in the “Scientology Sandbox” on a “spectrum” with insanity at each pole, why not test each individual argument for the soundness of its own rationale, and see all of them as a constellation?
One path leads to Mao, Stalin, and L Ron Hubbard.
The other leads to Socrates, Plato and Thomas Jefferson.
Alanzo
Thanks Eric, makes sense. At least we can exchange ideas and viewpoints with enough calm and enough respect for each other’s values. I am happy with that.
Please read my last response. I am sorry if you don’t get it.
https://markrathbun.wordpress.com/2014/10/14/the-scientology-sandbox/#comment-323121
https://markrathbun.wordpress.com/2014/10/14/the-scientology-sandbox/#comment-323122
An argument can be well reasoned in a limited context, but no so in a wider context. Please see,
The Secret of Hypnotism
.
People who are hypnotized do not think that they are acting irrationally.
Letting go, I love hearing from you. You bring forward concerns that I can relate to. When we die we may then realize there is more to go, or have no further realization. So what is the position or viewpoint we can or should assume now in order to lift our spirits or give direction in our lives? I think a person needs to find activities that thrill him or her at a level which connects to their inner core and makes them feel great. Many religious ceremonies or practices can do this. Some spiritual group activities do this. Charities, compassionate activities can do this. What is it that you have done or can do which would add meaning to your current life and add value to it and contribute to the welfare or betterment of others? That is something you can control, is positive, and has benefit regardless of additional lives or Karma, etc. It should not be just anything which is considered a good thing to do or be involved in. I am not suggesting you do something just for the sake of doing it. Its that thing or time and place that really, really got to you and made an impression on you. Maybe you felt it in your solar plexus or your hair stood on end. I would explore that.
Scientology has its pros and cons. Best is not to get fixated on it and explore wider contexts of knowledge.
One pro for Scientology is that it got lot of people looking more closely at the subject of spirituality and evaluating it more scientifically, even when most of Scientology is humbug.
Basically, Scientology encouraged one to look. As one looked naturally one got results. But then Scientology started to manipulate how one should look. Those who succumbed to this manipulation suffered.
The founder of Scientology also fell victim to his own flawed system of “looking.”
Marildi, it is not good to make fun, if it is not fun for all involved.
One thing I didn’t like on Geir’s Blog was using logic to nit-pick and be oblivious to the much wider scene.
“Logic” itself can become a fixation. It can become quite “mathematical” referring to one fallacy or the other. One can get lost in some abstract la-la land, oblivious of actual issues at hand.
What seems to work best is starting from the broadest context and narrowing down to the area of most outpoints. It is important to not lose sight of the broad context.
Focusing on just Scientology as one’s context, one loses sight of broader context of knowledge.
Apart from judging LRH on the scales of good/evil, or constructive/destructive, one should also look at him on the scale of contribution/non-contribution.
I think LRH made original contributions to the subject of knowledge even if they are in terms of what-not-to-dos.
It was worth making a movie on his life… see THE MASTER. I am sure there are going to be more such movies.
I understand what you are saying very well.
I was faced with the same despair that you are facing – for yourself and for others.
All I can say is that studying Plato saved my life.
And studying and practicing meditation, and continuing to learn new ways of thinking besides Scientology, healed me back to normal again.
You wrote:
“The more I look at the result of Hubbard’s work, the “product” in scientologese, the more I believe the good found in scientologists was always theirs, and not brought forth by auditing so much as by life experience.”
I agree completely.
And I have also come to see that my eternity that Hubbard sought to threaten, and to steal from me, was never his either.
This is why I say that confronting the truth about Scientology and Hubbard, as dark as it is, actually heals, and progresses a person forward on their spiritual path, more than they ever could have progressed had they never confronted it.
For me, Scientology truly was a vital lesson on my own spiritual path. One that was inevitable for me, and who knows, one that I may have even picked for myself when I picked my character, my fate, and my own destiny in a sort of tragically Greek kind of way.
In Plato’s “The Republic”, in Book 10, there is a story told buy a soldier left on the battlefield for dead, who wakes up three days later and returns to his regiment to tell them what happened to him.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_of_Er
http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/platoworks/a/062910-The-Myth-Of-Er-From-The-Republic-Of-Plato.htm
I’m not trying to steal your despair from you. The spiritual despair that you are experiencing right now is actually extremely valuable.
I’m just telling you what happened to me.
Alanzo
Gerhard, you make a very good point that there is a broader reality beyond agreements. Reality does not equal agreement as Scientology poses. That is just a human-centric view.
Group agreements usually result in filters that distort the actual reality. Scientology distorts the actual reality in many ways, by trying to manipulate it. Scientology axioms simply outline certain agreements. There are inconsistent in many ways with the reality of this universe.
Take Scientology Axiom # 1. It is just the idea of “Unmoved Mover” cast in a new form. It is inherently inconsistent.
.
The most valuable contribution by LRH has been the introduction of RELATIVITY in a universal manner including the mental and spiritual spheres. He did that by using infinite gradients when describing dichotomies in terms of SCALES.
Unfortunately, he did not explore this idea in any scientific manner, and freely violated this principle, as in Scientology Axiom #1.
.
Hubbard violated the principle of RELATIVITY in his THETA-MEST Theory as well.
Alonzo: I’m assuming that you chose not to listen to this particular talk by Reggie Ray … based on your prior experience with him, finding him too much of a hippie.
I chose THIS particular talk to share with Robert as I felt it might address some of Robert’s own issues/comments regarding talking about LRH and feeling AS iF the sky would fall.
Also … without a large large background on CTR, his life and path, what he brought to the West, without knowing students who were and are devoted to his teachings … and having your head spin …
Isn’t that much different than having people learn about LRH ONLY through “The Master” or perhaps future documentaries about LRH/Scientology etc etc.
But — no — I never met CTR. He died one year after LRH in 1987. I was still involved in Scientology having done OT VIII in ’89. I did study for quite awhile with his heir and left that group around 2011-12. But I appreciate everything that I learned there — the good, bad and ugly and am grateful for all of it. It TOO (just like Scientology and my life before) has brought me to where I am today.
Best,
Windhorse
I am so sorry; I am a never-in and therefore cannot speak to Hubbard’s work from experience.
Thank you Marty. I feel more me and am very grateful I made it out alive. I just wish you didn’t use those big words and simply spelled it out for us ‘lower classed’.
Vin. “…cause if ISIS….meddling of one culture with another.”
Very simplistic, media based thinking. The seeds of violence and evil are deeply imbedded in Islam, just as the seeds of cultism are imbedded in Scn. Judaism was a violent and vindictive religion until the Reformation. Turn the other cheek and love thine enemy is one of the hallmarks of Christianity, but that was based primarily in Eastern philosophy. Hindi has just too many metaphors for me to dig through right now.
Just my simplistic view.
Mark
The source of ISIS, in my opinion, is OIL. Not in the way you think.
Societies which requires everyone to work, to struggle to survive, don’t have the time, personnel, or money to wage large scale war. When excess comes along and a large part of the population doesn’t have to work full time, the general tone goes down, rulers have excess funds and go nuts with it.
Couple that with a lot of unhappy, unemployed people, living off the Govt. not producing anything worthwhile, and disaster follows.
The Middle East is a very poor area with small pockets of fertility. When oil money started rolling in, population increased and worthwhile labor decreased. Retail increased, but the Mid East has always had a culture of dishonesty in the trade of goods. No ethics presence there.
This principle has played out over and over throughout history, when any society could be fed by a few, while the rest kinda hung out all day, discussing their troubles with other non producing people. The welfare state. Look at the Palestinians.
A big part of the success of the West has been a culture of “An honest days work” and honest dealings. A relatively strong justice system kept that going for the most part. The “Help thy neighbor” culture kept welfare systems to a minimum until recently. You had to maintain friendly relations with the environment so that when bad times came, you wouldn’t starve. These are generalities, but they apply on a large scale.
I believe food stamps and EBT cards should be replaced with commodity foods and soup kitchens. When one has failed to provide for him and his, he should have to suck up his pride, get off his ass and stand in line. Disability is different. Sure, there are pockets where things aren’t that simple, but they can be handled individually, and in a limited way.
Well, gotta go, Ritchie Rich needs a loan, and I have a renter to kick out.
Mark.
Sometimes Ron’s policy was “Do as I say, Not as I do”.
Thanks Brian. Me and mine are doing well and loving life.
Building a small foundry to do some metallurgical research.
There isn’t any “Ping” metal on this world, but that is probably a good thing.
LOL
Mark
Well said, Mark P.
Mark
You speak sooth, Vin.
Mark
Regarding the Debbie Cook email. I too, being in one year, after being gone for many, was at a point wondering how the heck was I going to get out from the heavy clamps binding me. Debbie’s letter encouraged me, which I also saw happening and was not alone now, to research. That research opened my eyes to evident truths that finally set me free.
I once read, don’t recall where, that Ron said “The biggest problem with Scn. is incompetent auditors.”
My opinion is that to audit really well would require 2-4000 hours of training by a skilled compassionate Sup, 2000 hrs of supervised auditing, and another 2-4000 hours of free auditing IN FULL RESEARCH MODE. But that’s just me, I’m a little slow.
Mark
Quite true, Vin.
Mark
As I have said before, I don’t believe in the Middle Ground or the Middle Path.
I believe in what is correct for the conditions and circumstances, right now, at this moment. That, to me, is mindfulness in action. Seeing what is in front of you, right now, and doing the right thing accordingly.
That may be punching the mugger with all your might in the face, it may be quietly slouching away, it may be good 8-C. Sometimes full Pro is the right thing, sometimes Con. Usually somewhere in between is correct, simply because there are a lot of quantity of choices between full left and full right.
But to have a general operating policy of either A or Z or mostly M is just another stuck fixed opinion, inability, aberration.
The ability and willingness to do anything. The judgement and wisdom to do what is right.
Mark
Excellent comment, GW!
Gerhard ~ what do you think would happen in a world of ‘un-teaching’. I only had LSD, Pot and boyfriends. Oh and Bob Dylan. My head is at least on my shoulders. Good words. Thank you. I look forward to the real reality. I’m happy that in those 35 years I didn’t bend much. I had the ‘no’ drill down pat. My head is on my shoulders. I’m not home yet but I’m still lookin 🙂
Marildi: Yes, “If that tech had been followed, I think it would have been the case that, as you say, “the preclear continued to look.”
I’m one of those who got more when allowed to continue. However, when they used the other ‘tech’, one was made to do other actions right away. I see it now as suppressive back then, as I could’ve gained a lot more given some time, but I had to suppress it to further their goals and stats.
Yes yes yes
Crepuscule: “There is sufficient evidence available…”
Perfect!
I believe Plato thought a strict caste system was the ideal way to organize society……
Agree Alanzo about “somewhere between”
Reminds me of some enlightened beings I read who stated, there is no black and white, everything is gray. So what shade one could ask and try to define that? Yoi! 😀
I believe Plato thought a strict caste system was the ideal way to organize society……
I believe this was double posted. It is intended to be a reply to Al’s post below, in which he contrasts Mao Stalin and Hubbard with Plato, Jefferson, and himself. No wait, it was Plato Jefferson and Socrates….
Letting Go
Hi
I think I might have a glimmer of where you are coming from. I once thought that life was a waste of time… why suffer when there is really no hope of things really getting better…
Luckily, I believe, I have moved to a much better place.
One thing that helped in that shift was the sudden realization that that route goes nowhere except to a miserable life and/or a miserable death.
The concept of “Live every day like there is no tomorrow.” took on a different meaning. I realized that if things were so bad that I was considering suicide, then what could I really lose by changing? I just said “f- – – it, I am going to do whatever the hell I please, at least I will enjoy a little while…”
…Well, one thing led to another… and here I sit, writing to you.
I know, that is a totally wild and crazy notion, to just do whatever you please, and there will no doubt be a thousand “reasons” why you shouldn’t that move in on you, or are insisted on by others, but, if you look at them, you might find that none of those reasons assist you in being free, being “self-determined”, having more “self worth”, or even being happy.
It may not work for everybody…. but… here I sit, writing to you.
Find ways to have fun… cherish them, wallow in them…
They are YOUR life.
Eric
Vinaire: “How would Tolle react to this issue?”
Eckhart Tolle: “You strengthen their egoic pattern by opposing the them.”
Mirrors 🙂
“The cop who pulls you over for speeding, that isn’t really violent on most occasions. But he has the authority. And people do what they are told as if they have been hypnotized.” – Oracle
Do you really believe that? We live in a civilized world and laws are made by people who follow the law. Any upstanding citizen will obey or respect these laws without any hypnotism involved and will use common sense, no?
Your long post is an Impressive argument Crepuscule! Thanks.
You are so right on Brian, “people go through various stages of attitudes”.
I like and fully agree with your synopsis of this situation.
My intention is the same and Ron has nothing to do with it, only his writings=laws which I work to expose and keep others from such trappings and danger, through support of honest people who’s lives have been upset.
Baby, ” Each time a person stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, the send forth a tiny ripple of hope. These ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls. ” Robert Kennedy.
And that is what’s happening and it’s necessary, right and so to do.
What do you mean by “OT”? Just curious.
CD. That demo session was eye opening some more. I was surprised to hear MSH voice and it just was not what I expected. This talk reminds me of hearing some friends on heavy drugs and the nonsense of what they came up with.
Baby and Alanzo, looks like we have a hand of spades here. Keep educating!
In my view, that short cut is definitely not with scientology.
Marildi: “I would be more inclined to think Marty is reflecting on some of the posts on this thread and has a new way of thinking about the given posters.” I would think Marty, while allowing discourse and comments open to all, will learn or gain as we all do, hopefully, from the variety of opinions. Thanks Marty for allowing this on your blog.
Singanddance – Exactly!
It’s time to live your life fully, I have gone done the rabbit hole, as a never in, and some of you need to move forward. It seems that you respect marty and Monique, maybe, some of you could follow their example. Get married, adopt a child who needs love, find a friend who needs help, or sing in the shower. Hubbard did not care about you or anyone else, except himself. Get out of your heads!
Aurora, I say yes also, but not know enough to comment. Only that it isn’t comparable to to the insidiousness of the scientology organization from what I saw and heard.
The Silva Method concentrated on getting “better and better” without all the negatives. It was pro positive!
Letting Go, Just a comment abut eternity. I knew about eternity before scientology and one can find it elsewhere to be sure. Keep looking and you’ll find it exists outside of the cult.
Marildi, I think I like the Vin and Val show better that the old Al and Val show”
Absolutely much more fun and educational.
Your comment was out of line… those people are ultimately hurting those kids, not helping them, and from the biological father of the one in question, he did want him, but was convinced others would be better to raise him. In applauding those who adopt (often for selfish reasons, not altruistic ones) you have cheapened those who have decided to try to give something better to their children by giving them up. Get off your high horse, your opinion is coloured only by your specific experience – try to think of the bigger picture.
Nicely put.
I feel the same way about it.
While I think that the Scientology third dynamic (as created by LRH) turned out to be a Soviet style fascist organization, I also think that many of Ron’s ideas and processes were true and fantastic in making one’s life better. I enjoyed most of my thirty five active years in Scientology and got great gain from it. For me, the good way outweighed the bad. Of course LRH’s methods of running an an authoritative oppressive organization have ultimately doomed the expansion of Scientology (for the time being and quite into the future anyway). Personally I think it is great that people have different viewpoints and realities on their Scientology experience. I can have your viewpoint Alanzo and Marildi’s and Marty’s and my own as well.
“The anti-scientologist with his name-calling, absolutist statements and lampooning serves”
Hey! What about the Anti Scientologist with HER name calling (Miskabitch) and HER absolute statements (Davey Wavey is a psychotic ahole) and lampooning services. (ummm, lampooning – that means making fun of? Like Tommy Boy and PMK?)
Giving some thought to all this, it struck me that there are “different things” that are called Scientology and they are all lumped together, typically in conversation. Lumped together there is controversy and argument, pulling them apart a bit gives a better view and I think more opportunity to see where we learned and where we were bamboozled.
1. There is Dianetics. I guess that it’s pretty impossible to have an absolute in terms of non-evaluative therapy, but good old engram and secondary running is pretty close to it. You find pain or loss and run it out, and there is relief. Most people who have experienced this have had various degrees of benefit. The basic technology of it works, and if an unbiased scientific study of it were given, and they factored in the willingness of the preclear to get a benefit and good, interested presence of the auditor, I think there would someday be scientific validation of its workability. The Book One defined clear might not ever be fully realized; there’s been enough people audited and that hasn’t happened yet. But, if we shinny down the pole a bit and assert a more realistic end result of “profound relief”; there’s been plenty of that. Releases, yes; clears, I don’t think so.
2. There is Scientology Zero and the Grades. Confusion and the Stable Datum, SCS, Be Do Have, ARC, the Grades, comm cycle, lots of good stuff you find in the basic books and the VM handbook and that a Class IV can run in session. Once again, little or no evaluation and the objective seems to draw out the person and invite him or her to more fully “appear” and more fully “be”. Lots of line charging here and smiles and much of what is given as the end phenomena of the grades. With many individuals these gains remain stable for years. Once again, little controversy in this area.
If all Scientology was just #1 and #2, it is my feeling it would be a generally therapeutic activity and we could encourage it and all would be happy.
But, it’s not. (“But wait, there’s more!!!)
3. The game or campaign or “movement” of Scientology. This is the dwindling spiral; this is get to OT3 or be a burning cinder; this is no one can be half in and half out. This is “yer with us or agin us” disconnection; this is the government or the psychs or the stupid wogs are the enemy. This is shoot first and ask questions later and heads on pikes and imagined emergencies created to excite temporary bursts of production.
This was the “tough love” of Scientology when you gave a person no sympathy when he needed a hand.
All of #3 is the result of indoctrination. It is not a consequence of benefits from 1 and 2 above. It is something completely different. This is all indoctrination and is not inherent or something that could easily be extrapolated from the simple and loving activities in 1 and 2. The source of the indoctrination was L. Ron Hubbard. Wild that he is the same person that gave us the stuff in 1 and 2 and now, this! And it was due to the trust that we had in the man from the benefits in 1 and 2 that we decided to go with him and accept these bizarre stable data even though it meant a suspension of reason it doing so. I mean, really look at what these assumptions are! Beings implanting you with electrical equipment between lives??? Whole track psychs??? Sex is a tool of the psychs??? Those are all hypnotic indoctrinations and just aren’t helpful to assume to be true.
4. Having trouble finding stuff to run on Dianetics? No problem! Here’s Ron’s case – and he’s the authority we talked about with the utmost hypnotic altitude in Scientology – and it’s full of villainous creatures that want to zap you and lobotomize you and your friends. This fits in real well #3 above. Every body can now get anxious about how we are all the “only ones” who can do anything at all about this whole outrageously abberrated and vicious universe we are living in.
5. Strange policies that violate the wisdom and brilliance in 1 and 2, yet validate and prop up the game mentioned in #3 and #4.
I think that there are a lot of people who truly benefitted from 1 and 2 and then got PDH’d by the same cat that gave us 1 and 2 – L. Ron.
From the little bit of study that I have given of independent auditors in the field, there are many that are delivering 1 and 2, and they use as their sole “management tech”, “give them what they want and keep them happy”. If they don’t preach the dogma of #3 and #4 and don’t use the mean hearted policies in 5, they get auditing and they get better.
I don’t think that they live forever and have lots of OT powers and exteriorize and knock off fedora hats at 50 meters, but I don’t think that they reside at either end of the spectrum that Marty postulated in his article. I think that people who solely imbued the stuff in 1 and 2, got the good vegetable juice of Scientology. I think that 3, 4 and 5 is the kool aid that gets people at the extreme ends of the spectrum and seeming to fight to stay there.
So, we all have had some 1 and 2, and I don’t think there’s many of us who have not benefited from it. That’s the stuff that I consider the real stuff of Scientology and there’s more of that in the material than there is the stuff or 3-5.
I have argued with Alanzo on his silly turd analogy before. As a metaphor, it’s crap. Scientology is diamonds. The crap that’s dulled it’s brilliance are other inventions. I don’t know what to call them, but it does not seem right to call them Scientology. What brought us together was Scientology and its real value; what’s torn us apart and individuated us from the rest of the world is this other stuff.
The exact quote should have been “You strengthen the egoic pattern by opposing them.” (By “them” he was referring to people, i.e. opposing people.)
Not really, Vin. In 8-80 he says that there is “a gradient scale of beingness, from the zero-infinity of theta to the solidity of matter.”
Seriously? People who adopt and take on kids that others do not want or can not take of shouldn’t be applauded? I never mentioned you or biological parents. My applauding others for taking on the responsibility does nothing to cheapen others. Or you. I’m the one out here pointing out that these kids should not be dragged in to this and used as weapons and you have decided I am the one who needs to be shot down? No. I do not deserve abuse from you either. You can FK off too.
Spot on. Mark N.
LOL 😀
For your info, every “problem child” in my family, was sent to live with ME.
The first one I had to take when I was only 19 years old. The second, 21.
I know what it is like to take someone else’s kids because they believe their children would better off with you. And they are right.
I don’t feel like being cheapened by you either. That was your purpose. I never even met you or mentioned you.
Anyway, if you want to step up and make a difference, become part of the solution, get back the child you doubted you could raise, now might be a good time to step forward and offer to take your kid in and help out if you think the kid is being harmed. I didn’t meet my father until I was 39 years old, and it was love at first sight.
You know, Dee, there was a time when I thought scientology was for everyone. But now I don’t think that isn’t the case. Not everyone views things the same way and scientology may not suit their personality, needs and wants. Some of us did feel we benefited, others obviously didn’t – and one factor, I believe, was the qualities and beingness of person him/herself.
I’ve been into Eckhart Tolle recently, and in one video he talked about how some people, even though they are “awakened” to consciousness and can enjoy the “stillness,” they like the “DO” part of life and are very active. Others, who are also awakened, like more of the “BE” and they lead very simple, quiet lives.
Scientology fits the first type better, I think. Here’s what Ron had to say on the subject of living:
“There is only one way, really, to get into a state of living, and that’s live! There is no substitute for an all-out, over-the-ramparts, howling charge against life. That’s living. Living does not consist of sitting in a temple in the shadows and getting rheumatism from the cold stones. Living is hot, it’s fast, it’s often brutal! It has a terrific gamut of emotional reactions. If you are really willing to live, you first have to be willing to do anything that consists of living.”
The above wouldn’t appeal to the “BE” person that Eckhardt described – and, more than likely, neither would a path like Scientology.
Gerard, rather philosophical subject for me to discuss at 3.00 am here.
I see you are mingling reality with truth. You wrote a couple of times “reality (truth)”
Let’s clear up this one first. Do you see Reality as being the same as Truth?
From the Tech Dictionary
TRUTH, 1. truth is the exact consideration. Truth is the exact time, place, form and event. (PXL, p. 183) 2 . that which works. And that which works most broadly to that which it is applied. (PDC 19) 3 . by definition—is what is. (Class VIII, No. 4)
REALITY, 1. is, here on earth, agreement as to what is. This does not prevent barriers or time from being formidably real. It does not mean either that space, energy or time are illusions. It is as one knows it is. (COHA, p. 249) 2 . that sequence which can, we say this person is suffering from reactive conduct.
He has a reactive mind. In other words, his association has become too
blatantly in error for him any longer to conceive differences and we get
identification: A=A=A=A. (5702C28)
Because if you do then obviously we have different definitions and imply different things by those words. The meanings I am using are as above. Which is your definition of “Reality (truth)” then. Do you take Reality as being Truth, and no need of a parenthesis there? Because then we understand in different ways those words and use them differently.
The Ultimate Truth would be total as isness. Per definition. Thus we get to harmonics of “truth” and those contain lies. We don’t care WHO put the lies. They are still lies. It’s not what it is really. But as we can see those lies help bring about through alter isness a state of is ness, which persists. And that’s what I call realities.
As to group thinking or collective thought, that’s another deep subject and I am not sure I can write in a very accurate way about it at least for now. But as I see it you don’t accept that there can be a reality which is formed by the average agreements of each individual. Actually that’s our physical universe. It’s the average coming out from the agreement of each of its inhabitants.
In any case I got what you said but it looks like the subject is too deep for me to go into it and make any decent discussion about it for now. Thanks for your views though.
Second sentence should read: “Now I don’t think that IS the case.”
“I would think Marty, while allowing discourse and comments open to all, will learn or gain as we all do, hopefully, from the variety of opinions.”
You made a better point than I did. And yes, our thanks to Marty. He’s been giving us all pretty free rein! 🙂
I agreed with Oracle about there being too much jumping to conclusions.
You know “problem children” is an interesting topic. Once someone sent their kids to live with me, they instantly ceased to be a problem. Instantly.
I would pick them up from the airport or bus station, take them to my apartment, hand them a key to the apartment and say, “sink or swim”. They just opted to get it together real fast. I put their life in their hands. You take a kid that is raising hell in some small town, and park them in the middle of middle of New York City and they calm all down real quick.
There was one cousin though that was really out of control. She was 15 and into drugs and had a rap sheet from here to the wall starting when she was 13. In two years her parents were down over a million dollars in legal fees and law suits. New cars as she kept wrecking them driving and drinking. She lied, stole, robbed, she had victims spread four cities wide. Her parents called me and begged me to take her and I said, “Let me come over there”. I flew down south where they were and all had a nice little family reunion type of dinner and the daughter wanted to hit the local beer joints so I said, “O.K. let’s go!”
We go out and she is banging back drinks, talking about how my Aunt and Uncle are real f$%^ks. How they let her down. (She was very, very spoiled by two rich parents and an only child. She already had a kid she dropped of on their door step for them to raise) But, she was a real beauty. And she was taking it to the limit. She caused a few fights in the bar trying to pick up guys that were there with other women. By the time we left there had been four or five fist fights due to her social activity. All during this time she doesn’t mention this little buy she had that her parents were raising.
She is driving a brand new car even though she has been driving and wrecking cars on a driver’s permit for months. And, there had been this guy at the bar she was flirting with when he was with his girlfriend. And she looks over to her left and sees this guy alone following her now. In his car and he is motioning to her to come over. She slams on the brakes and exits the car.
I am sitting in the passenger’s seat, and it is the middle of an intersection, and a mack truck is heading right for me. It slams on the brakes and keeps heading right for the passenger door. It manages to stop about four inches from me. I live!
I climbed over and out of the driver’s door. Got out of the car and beat her silly on the street. Walked the rest of the way back to my aunt’s house.
Next morning my aunt wakes up and my cousin comes in the front door. She had her own home already two blocks away from a marriage already.
She looked like she had been hit by a mack truck.
My aunt was of course devastated. And, it was only right that I packed up and left.
But two days later that cousin checked into AA. She has been sober and drug free and criminal free, since. She ended up raising her son. My aunt and uncle of course, forgave me.
She married one of Florida’s most notorious criminals and con men a few years later. Unbeknownst to her. She got taken for a ride, But they had a daughter. And that little girl is a straight A student and a Jazz musician prodigy at age 11. And I am her Godmother. And I am her mother’s best friend.
Everyone matters to someone else somehow. In some way. Everyone matters.
You mattered. You mattered a lot to that kid and you still do. Don’t invalidate that.
Good on you, Joe.
In spite of the current blog post, Marty has come across as rather extreme himself. But I came to see that he probably feels this approach is necessary based on his views about scientology. So, like you, I can grant him his viewpoint now.
(I’m still working on Alanzo’s approach, though. 😉 )
My concept of an OT is basically someone who operates, to one degree or another, as a spiritual being rather than as a “machine,” which would be operating mechanically, in a stimulus-response manner. In other words, an OT is a being who makes his own decisions and is self-determined instead of being other-determined by the reactive mind. But it’s a relative thing, and some are more OT than others.
I don’t have a problem thinking in terms of the reactive mind construct – or, as Eckhardt Tolle describes it, “the pain-body,” which he too says is a “storage” of negative emotions. In both methodologies, his and scn, the aim is to be cause over this “psychic entity.”
Eckhart’s method of handling it is to simply “be there” with the pain-body. He basically has people do TR0 on it, per my understanding. And they get better and better at staying in present time, and thus are less and less the effect of their pain-body. Those people would be OT too, and obviously there are others who are also.
In that case, such people are not, by L Ron Hubbard’s definition, Scientologists. To argue otherwise is to present a false-equivalence. Such people are also practising fraud if they hold out that whatever they do is “therapy”.
How was it for you? 🙂
All the “standard tech” to be found in Scientology and Dianetics can be found in the Bible. In fact not only the tech. but also the missing tech.
For instance it is never delineated what the difference is between A THETAN and THETA, whereas scripture clearly states “For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” Hebrews 4:12- NASB
Whether one accepts it or not our creator has left us with an instruction manual for living optimally in this three dimensional world, the words of which are “the same yesterday, today and for ever”.
Love and ARC
Pip
Yes, simply opposing is not the answer. The answer is in resolving for yourself the inconsistencies that you see.
Alanzo is a wonderful person. I call him my brother. But he is hiding under this compulsion of saving others from Scientology. That compulsion is making him attack Marty’s stance of the reasoned middle way.
You cannot save others by making such “attacks”. Change that Alanzo wants will take place, but it won’t happen overnight. The thing going against Scientology’s excesses is Internet. I just hope that Internet is here to stay.
You can only put the correct information out there. The Internet makes it easier for others to get that information. Let others decide for themselves what to do.
There is incompetence also in the way the Tech is laid down by Hubbard. It is scattered all over the place. The research has not been consolated. Contradictions abound. On top of that there is KSW.
One wonders if Hubbard was confused himself. Idenics is much better consolidated. KHTK is trying to consolidate even that.
I have been studying Remote Viewing recently. It mentioned the Silva Method so I am curious about it. It seems to be looking deeper into oneself not at any particulars like in Scientology, but to calm one’s mind.
I think it talks about the Beta, Alpha, Theta and Delta levels of the mind. Remote Viewing also talks about these levels. I find the theory underlying remote viewing to be consistent with A Model of the Mind.
Thanks, Windhorse.
Alanzo
Dianetics works like a charm when it is done with mindfulness. HSDC was run on me in 1969. I ran it with mindfulness which I took TR0 to mean. It was a great success. The rapid deteriorization that I was suffereing from ankylosing spondalytis suddenly stopped. In a way, it save my life and pulled me out of utter despeartion.
I believe that what got Dianetics go off the rails was getting fixated into the significances of the incidents that were generally run. This made one depart from mindfulness. It doen’t matter if the incident seems to come from prenatal period or from past lives. Just run it without reading anything into it.
The success of Dianetics came from getting away from psychoanalysis, and simply letting the “file clerk” bring up the incidents to look at. Resolution came from looking at the incident thoroughly. Sometimes, the incident extended in time and “earlier-similar” worked great.
The error was to think that a “past lfe” incident meant that “one has lived before” and then getting into all kind of speculations about one’s existence. That is not mindfulness. When one speculates one gets away from mindfulness.
The correct use of Dianetics is to run the incident and be done with it. No need to attach any further significance. No need to get into some kind of analysis. No need to speculate.
Occlusion of memory came about because the “file clerk” principle was violated. Hubbard tried to compute the incidents in a rush to get to the engram in the fastest way possible to obtain a Clear. That is where Hubbard himself went off the rails.
.
marildi: there is the datum that pcs can be PTS to themselves .. yes, but have you ever worked out how it goes .. you should do that, but be aware that is not easily to confront ..
But basically is every SP to himself PTS .. but see, this do not work out, it is not really true that a PTS is ill and makes failures .. he can become ill as everybody .. he makes failures as everyone ..
You have to go a certain way before you can become PTS to yourself .. if you find out (not so complicated) .. you will thereby find out that every scientologist is at risk for that ..
For my knowingness there was nobody there who has ever given data about PTS/SP .. only LRH did. Before this data were given at the nearly end of the SHSBC, no scientologist was confronted with such indications but later everybody was suspected for it ..
The best what I have read last times, was that you can have suppressive BTs. If you make a demonstration of it to you, you will say “oh my dear” there is no way out .. but better you learn why an SP is an SP and why you are able go PTS to him ..
The “file clerk” principle is the most important principle in Dianetics. It supports mindfulness.
George wrote:
Very curious about your handle “Hexagonal Thetan”. I had the thetan idea pegged as a pentagon myself
Lol.
Here in central Illinois, Nauvoo is less than two hours away. Nauvoo, IL is where Joseph Smith took the Mormons after they were run out of some other places by the locals, and it’s the nearby Carthage, IL jail where he and his brother were murdered by an angry local mob.
The Mormons have a whole tour that they take you through of the Nauvoo settlement, all dressed up in costumes of the day, and they even take you up into the actual jail cell where Smith and the others were dragged from to be murdered.
Learning about Joseph Smith and the Mormons is a very fruitful parallel study to LRH and Scientology. It puts a lot of things into context as data of comparable magnitude, and it puts many similarities between Smith and Hubbard into greater relief.
When Mormon missionaries come to my front door, I always invite them in and sit them down at my table and have long conversations with them, sometimes lasting up to two hours or more. So too with the Jehovah’s Witnesses who come by. I know that the people who are sitting across the table from me are just like I was when I was a Scientologist.
I am fascinated by how religious ideas can seize a person and give him all kinds of feelings of fulfillment and even euphoria, and have absolutely nothing to do with the truth.
I think Smith and Hubbard had the same fascination.
Alanzo
I see what you are saying, Grasshopper.
A gem in a turd is something that can be washed off. It’s not something you are actually going to eat, but to carry around in your pocket.
LRH, of course, wanted you to consume Scientology completely. He said that you can’t be half in and half out of Scientology.
But you are saying – who cares what LRH said?
I get it.
There is a problem in this in that you yourself, probably, took LRH’s advice and consumed Scientology whole, then like us all, had to spit it out when you tasted something nasty on it.
So you agree that Scientology, as it is presented by LRH, has to be taken completely away from L Ron Hubbard to be safely dealt with.
Am I right?
Alanzo
PS From the perspective of delivering gems and raisins in a turd wrapper, it’s no wonder that it was the Food and Drug Administration which had to raid Scientology!
Objectives and lower grades work like a charm too when the “file clerk” (the mindfulness principle) is followed. However, this principle of “file clerk” is violated when one starts to think that one can override the file clerk as a thetan.
The concept of thetan restricts one’s view narrowly to self, and to the belief that it is superior to everything else. It acts against the viewpoint of pan-determinism based on overall reality. The “file clerk” is that pan-determined viewpoint of reality.
The fixation on Thetan pervades the definitions of ARC and corrupts it. Reality is looked upon as agreement among Thetans. Thus, thetan is made senior to reality. Basically, it is putting egoistic “self-determinism” above the “pan-determinism” of reality. The “file clerk” is decimated by the concept of Thetan.
This is also where the conditioning of Scientology starts. This fixation on self and its superiority (Thetan) is the germ that has destroyed the principle of “file clerk”, and which has made Scientology so disgusting today.
.
Dan wrote:
“I have argued with Alanzo on his silly turd analogy before. As a metaphor, it’s crap”.
Literally Dan-o!! (:>
“Scientology is diamonds. The crap that’s dulled it’s brilliance are other inventions. I don’t know what to call them, but it does not seem right to call them Scientology.”
Why?
I do not think this is healthy, or intelligent.
You see diamonds there. But also is there not danger in forgetting the dangerous parts by ignoring that it is Scientology?
And what if you are a new person who does not have the experience of the destruction those other parts of Scientology causes that you have? Shouldn’t any approach to Scientology include huge warning signs that it’s not all diamonds – some of Scientology is dangerous shit that is destructive to your system?
Why or why not?
“What brought us together was Scientology and its real value; what’s torn us apart and individuated us from the rest of the world is this other stuff.”
Here’s where the raisins in the turd analogy is useful.
It demonstrates the amount of effort required to separate the raisins from the turds, and what you have left after you take off the surgical gloves and the goggles, and put away the bleach, disinfect your sink, and throw away the chopsticks you used.
All that effort for some raisins which are easily obtained down at the grocery store – and which have never been delivered in a turd.
See Dan-o?
The raisins I’ve personally gotten, just from Buddhism and ancient Greek philosophy, is so far superior to anything I got in Scientology – why would I ever eat those raisins?
And what kind of instructions and warnings should I give to a new person before they spread those raisins on their morning cereal?
Alanzo
Dan, your number #3 talks about indoctrination, but where does that indoctrination start? It starts with the concept of Thetan taking over the concept of the FILE CLERK. It starts with “self” thinking itself to be superior to reality.
A lot of people on this blog, whether pro or con, are still infected by this conditioning and oblivious of it. It is because this is an ancient conditioning that has been lying dormant. Scientology simply activates it in a big way.
It is interesting that you do not see this connection of #3 with the dwindling spiral in #1 and #2. That is the beauty of Hubbard’s sleight of hand. You delve in rising rhetoric, but you miss the why completely.
.
In #4, it is not just Ron’s case, it is everybody’s case. It is the human-centric desire to put “self” above the reality, and not recognizing reality for what it is.
This case was very active in Ron. In other’s it was activated by Ron to various degree.
Self is part of reality. It is an aberrated belief that self is separate from reality and superior to it. That is just a complex.
vinaire: you err a little bit here .. not so much .. it is true that Jesus did not figure out Christianity .. it was nevertheless his idea to go his way with 12 Jünger (Apostel) .. and ordered them to write down what she have seen
So Jesus did initiate that his sense of life goes around the world .. why he did that .. and why did LRH went a way with much wider PR ..
Siddhartha Gautama (Buddha) did it another way .. all of him was written years later .. all meanings about .. but it seems he was a good guy ..
Why LRH promoted himself as Metaya (whatever) as the reincarnation of Buddha .. makes no good sense,
My old rule is this: Buddha told Truth. Jesus told Love. Mohammed told fight. It is my view, must not be shared .. it means only that you have to have some truth .. then you can create some love .. and then you have to have the potential to fight ..
I mean a fanatic Moslem is only for fight .. and has no truth and love in his blue pen .. a fanatic Buddhist would also only fight for truth (this one comes close to LRH) .. Christianity did mix up all of this .. means fight for truth and fight for love (which is the reason why Mohammed came up as a relegion leader) ..
LRH can not be assorted in this line of religion leaders. Why? Oh this has various reason in my view. One is that he gave the impression that he found out about the human mind and the tragedy behind .. and it is quite normal that he found tragedy after tragedy after tragedy .. which is again normal because of his public .. means, it is a hippie culture religion, and lots of them where drug influenced or simply bad off ..
Jesus was probably born from a virgin. Against all discussion about it is not impossible. So on, he has never said something about his state he was a normal person .. but intended to work out something, and so he were lost for about 18 years .. and then he created his name Jesus .. he did his work .. he called 12 Apostel as witness .. and all of them wrote her own book .. the Bible ..
I think it was in the intention of Jesus that this happens .. surely he did not think about Christianity .. he thought only that truth and love can come together in every man ..
So why he did produce wonders? I think he himself has never a thought about wonders. It was simply intention to have what he wanted ..
Why he was cruzfied with all this powers .. look the Monty Python Movie .. always looking at the bride side of life .. that’s funny .. it may be the words of Jesus too .. he was killed by others .. LRH killed himself with his fiction of drama 5.00.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000 billion years ago ..
I said once, can it be 1 year more ..
As regards #5, simply stop focusing and believing in the concept of “thetan,” and get back to validating the concept of “file clerk” and you will do fine. The “file clerk” represents that “pan-determinism” associated with reality. It represents “seeing things as they are” of mindfulness.
When you do that you will easily separate yourself from all the confusion in Scientology.
Exteriorization is not some “thetan” separating from the body. Exteriorization is simply the attention no longer fixated on the body.
OT powers come from fully understanding the reality and not from feigning superiority over reality by force. LRH operated by persuasion through force just as DM is doing. That is not OT power, otherwise Mafia bosses and MEST universe would be OT. LRH had a totally screwed up concept of OT. It was based on the human-centric concept of thetan.
When you look at this fixation on thetan you are looking at the turd that Alanzo talks about.
The key to resolution is the viewpoint that FILE CLERK represents. It is viewpoint of reality as a whole. It is mindfulness.
.
Does exteriorisation result in being more kind, compassionate and loving towards one’s fellow man? What makes it an experience worth pursuing?
Joe, that is just living with cognitive dissonance. I am glad you can do that.
it was nevertheless his idea to go his way with 12 Jünger (Apostel) .. and ordered them to write down what she have seen
Where did you get that from? I thought New Testament was put together by people almost 100 years after Christ. They used the names of Apostles.
Please see An Analysis of Scientology Axiom # 1
There are lot of reversals and contradictions in Hubbard’s writings. But it ultimately goes back to Scientology Axiom #1.
.
Xenu is in The Bible?
So an “OT” or “spiritual being” is someone who operates “rationally”, without compulsion, using only “positive emotions”?
What Ekhart is recommending is mindfulness.
This is just more collateral damage with this whole scenerio, that the biological parents have been put into a state of worry and concern. The things that are being said on the Internet would do that to someone. There is no evidence of abuse or neglect. Kids are beings too. They very much have everything to do with their destiny. They are usually where they want to be.
There is a body of data that can be evaluated, datum by datum. With a little intelligence this information can be sifted through and worked with. You categorize this information in regards to value, and whether it is fact, fiction or speculation.
“Start – Change – Stop” – Pretty easy to work with and think through and determine it’s usefulness or lack. Work with it and experiment and see if it gives a benefit or not.
“Goodness and badness, beautifulness and ugliness are alike considerations and have no other basis than opinion.” – Pretty easy to evaluate and test.
“This is a deadly serious activity. And if we miss getting out of the trap now, we may never again have another chance.” (and a hundred other bits of similar indoctrination designed to make people think that all of humanity is on a degrading death slide that only Scientology can rescue it from) – I think most people at first whiff would sense the odor of something in some state of defecation here. Anyone studying basic Scientology would understand that the being is immortal, that pain is a by product of protest and resistance, and that the perception of agony is a consideration and opinion.
Most of the stuff that has been objected to in the consideration of Scientology is a by-product of the game, movement or campaign of Scientology. It’s an overlay to the subject itself, and is not the subject.
There are core philosophies and there are organizations that attempt to promulgate those philosophies. The organizations and the philosophies are two separate things.
There’s self-determinism and there’s the Republican party that apparently promulgates that philosophy. Diamonds delivered by a poopy party.
There’s some very interesting philosophies that came about at the eve of the French Revolution, and then there were the horrors of the Reign of Terror. Many diamonds (or raisins) in those philosophies, but the atrocities surrounding them should not be considered to be a product of the reasoning of these philosophers.
America’s own independence brought about considerable bloodshed; that does not mean the ideals were wrong. Could these ideals have been brought about through communication and without that war? (An early Dianeticist or Scientologist would argue so!)
So, in discussions of Scientology I still maintain that it’s good to break it up a bit and “define our terms”. When talking about Scientology and evaluating its good or potential for harm, are we talking about the Axioms and Logics and all that might be extrapolated from them and them alone, or are we talking about all this other stuff that got added in: Hubbard’s assertions about our shared whole track history; his conclusions about the general degradation of man (“degraded beings” outnumbering “big beings” by 18 to 1, etc.), the behavioral psychology influence in the policies (rewards and penances, offenses and penalties, etc.) and other things that fully contradict the basic premises of core Dianetics and Scientology. This latter stuff is not a natural extrapolation of the original premises; it’s an overlay, an additive, a political bending of it to Ron’s not fully disclosed personal purposes.
Most of Christianity is wonderful as a philosophy, but there’s been a lot of pain experienced in its various campaigns. Christianity as a philosophy should not be taking all the hard knocks it gets due to the anti-Christian acts of the people who have been placed as its leaders. There are interpretations of Jesus’s own life where its been assumed that he may have fallen short of his own ideals.
Perhaps the Quakers or similar best exemplify Christian values in their peaceful policies, but then hawk Richard Nixon was a Quaker who had not managed to figure that all out.
It’s just a distinction that I like to make and I think others may benefit from it as well.
Friend: “For my knowingness there was nobody there who has ever given data about PTS/SP .. only LRH did.”
From what I have learned, there were many others who gave that data, using different words, but it was the same phenomena.
Here’s a video where Tom Campbell talks about “negative entities” – which he says can be either physical or non-physical, another interesting similarity to scientology.
Watch the last couple of minutes of the vid, starting at 6:00, where Campbell answers a question about negative entities. Basically, he says they do exist but that we are mostly left alone, and that most negative thoughts are just ours – a good reflection of ourselves. This is similar to what LRH says about PTSes – that they have overts on the SP.
Campbell also says that if you’re a positive person, you get left alone – UNLESS you’re in a position of power or authority. Then you are more likely to attract negative influences who want to use your authority in a way that creates chaos and difficulty – in other words use your authority “with ego” for negative purposes. He says they select out and push on people who have LEVERAGE This might be what happened to LRH, considering how much he changed over time.
Here is a similar description:
LDW asked me:
“What were a couple of things you had to say about Hubbard or scientology that you thought were good or beneficial?”
OK, LDW.
I didn’t mean to blow you off. It’s just that I have written about the good in Scientology so many times, and I get accused of never doing that so much, that I let myself not answer you fully.
Below is a link to one of the greatest wins I have ever had using Scientology, and there is no dispute that Scientology helped produce it.
I know, I was there. And I helped to produce it.
http://www.alanzosblog.com/charles-lakes-olympic-thetan/
Keep challenging me to remember the good in Scientology.
Because as I said, the truth about Scientology is both the good and the bad.
Alanzo
Alazno wrote:
” I am fascinated by how religious ideas can seize a person and give him all kinds of feelings of fulfillment and even euphoria, and have absolutely nothing to do with the truth. ”
In 2010, I had a steady stream of Jehovah Witnesses, a few Mormons and some Scientologists. It was a revealing experience.
The JW’s would wander in a group and knock on doors or ring bells.
They were all polite and well dressed. However, they could never get me on their “do not call list”. They came back every few weeks. Finally, I got an elder and explained the situation. He said they have a “do not call list” but they only honor it for less than a year in most cases. He said they want to
get every house in the event the family moves. This did not work so I finally got a remedy that has totally worked. When the next group of JW’s came to
our home, I invited them to our meditation hall where we have a statue of the Buddha and some pictures. I invited them to attend meditation classes in our meditation hall. We have not seen them since that time. One of the female JW’s was visibly upset and I think that they did not want to deal with it all.
We had a Scientologist who came and knocked on our door three times
during a six week period.
She had a person waiting in a car in the street. When I finally answered the door, she made a movement to enter the house without an invitation. I thought this strange and spoke though a six inch space between the door and the frame. Her eyes were scanning the inside of the house.
She wanted to see my wife and would not take no for an answer. I told her this was not possible. She insisted that I give her a message. I gave her my cell phone number and she left. I told her to call me. When she called, I told her that “she was totally on the wrong path.” She listened to my words but said nothing. I told her to call back for more information. She never called back. We were declared shortly after that.
The have a Mormon Temple a few miles from us so we did get house calls.
The Mormons were very polite and almost even seemed disinterested in even talking about religion. I later found out that the young men had to do this as a duty.
GMW
Vinaire, what exact cognitive dissonance do you think I am living with?
Alanzo, I like your full analogy with this excerpt… “And what kind of instructions and warnings should I give to a new person?
Simple and most sense, since it all falls under the one name, scientology and written by one person.
Yes Marildi I thought the same too. “there was a time when I thought scientology was for everyone. But now I don’t think that is the case.”
I’m only just looking at that now and I wonder why I felt that way. The way it disconnected me from others, made me feel superior and sad for them, even tho I worked with the public to make money for my bridge.
I continued believing in Ron’s tech and the group until after going clear and wanting to help the organization even more in ’79. Then agreeing to move, go under cover and spy on enemies told they were needed to handle. That lasted 4 years, was retired and I didn’t go back. Eventually I had realized they weren’t quite enemies as I was originally told and I found myself in a catch 22.
When I returned in ’11 to straighten it all out, it was completely fruitless, as they refused to see my moral issues, being contrary to doctrine.
After one years experience back, it lead me to do Internet research on policy and the department I had volunteered for. And eye opening to a lot more.
I can say that I’m now happy through education, self examination and new friends. Finally, after suffering many years I got my self respect and honor back, regarding the subject of Scientology and it’s many facets.
In the ‘living’ quote you gave, I see no warmth, peace or love mentioned and that’s a missing key. Note “terrific gamut of emotional reactions.”
Yes, one starts out Being, but then Doing wrong actions to others is destroying. That’s why they are failing and they can’t stop it, because it was written as such by the founder and is consistently used to this day.
🙂
E.O., you kind of got me with that accusation that I had inadvertently victimized you somehow. I stuck on that a bit. But looking through your posts on Dis, I see that you yourself, have a history of fair gaming children on the Internet .
Oi, the Jada and Willow and Gammie vid… Christ almighty, what are they thinking putting that on youtube?
And does that child, apart from the outrageous hair-do and piercings for her age, have a tattoo on her inner left wrist??? *shakes head*
Sweet Xenu she looks like her Daddy with no hair too… gave me the willies, I have to admit.
vinaire,
“The most valuable contribution by LRH has been the introduction of RELATIVITY in a universal manner including the mental and spiritual spheres. He did that by using infinite gradients when describing dichotomies in terms of SCALES.”
Do you refer here to the Tone Scale, the Know to Mystery scale and others?
Can you expand on this point?
Maybe not on topic, but there were some comments about the e-meter, including my own. Once, about 15 years ago .. I took LRH literally and fouled around with the e-meter. Made some experiments .. wanted to find out whether the given statements about are true, half-true or wrong ..
The basic problem for analysis was that I had since a certain time on my bridge always a low TA .. no auditor could ever solve that .. it made no sense to me .. there was another why than that which was given from LRH
I did set up the e-meter .. put both cans in my hands, and said One, and got a rise .. then I said Two, and the needle came back .. then I saif Three, and the needle did fall .. I repeated this several times, means some days always the same procedure .. a week or so .. no difference et al ..
It should be mentioned that the TA at start was always around 2.0 .. then for about half or an hours .. repeating One, Two, Three .. nothing else .. for my meaning and education, it should bring up some change, but it did not happen ..
I wrote down my meanings about One (which meant as the Top Item only single or alone) .. Two did mean (together, not alone) .. Three did mean (influenced by others) .. with that my needle reaction made sense to me .. it was simply a generell feeling about my own view about my environment in reference to myself ..
I looked at times where I was overwhelmed by being alone .. self auditing if you will call it this way .. but I did not auditing anything about, made only a table of persons involved (also a list – selflisting is forbidden in scientology) but I wanted only to know if there were occurences where I refused to be alone .. feeling alone to some degree ..
I gave the cross to auditing and auditor and church. It was the only thing in my life where I felt often overwhelmed and alone. Believe me or not, my TA went up to 3.0 .. stable, checked it a full week .. no difference ..
But the formula (idea) of One, Two, Three did still work .. it could still produce rise, fall or free needle .. but now with TA at 3.0 ..
I did not work longer on this project, because I have found what I have tried to find. I have only tried one thing later .. I gave myself the feelings of being there with certainty .. and the needle started to go from the left to the right side (it did need some time before the needle came back onto scale) and back and forth in slow motion .. my wife (who is solo auditor) said to me you have caused you a floating TA .. nice!
Why I am telling that? I will share my experiment at first, and then that I am the only one who found out about my unhandled low TA situation .. and in a final analysis it says that auditing and the e-meter is a farce if you are pushed into a procedure which doesn’t really belong to you really ..
Lets say a final word to it. In my case is “No auditing” the real answer and the solution .. but have you ever seen a person who acknowledge that as a truth? No, the church is always right .. when you go into “No Auditing” it is only your fault .. nothing else ..
Anyway .. maybe sorry for this comment ..
Good point.
Scientology has not yet (and perhaps never would) devolve into a violent, homicidal cult of death like ISIS, the Taliban, or Hamas.
But any fanaticism that disallows viewing dissent as a fully human quality; that maintains the intolerant hatred and superstitions of OSA and CCHR; that combines the dual pathologies of delusion and certainty to evoke dark conspiracies thatvexplain the failures of Scientology, are genuinely troubling and do not portend well for the future.
Its that thing or time and place that really, really got to you and made an impression on you. Maybe you felt it in your solar plexus or your hair stood on end.
Hiram, thank you for this very visceral description of what it can feel like. My world has become very abstract and detached (I never see the recipients of my work, for example). The way you wrote this has helped me look beyond my current feeling of being dead inside to a time when I did feel something akin to the quote above. I feel deeply for animals, and might be able to do something along those lines.
christianscientology: For instance it is never delineated what the difference is between A THETAN and THETA .. one auditor explained me that it would be the difference between one thetan and all thetan or the basic idea of all thetans .. do not know where he got his data .. but he was convinced that all thetans are theta .. so on ..
Wow. Thanks for sharing.
Yup. Thanks de.
Tone Scale does not refer directly to a dichotomy like good-evil or survive succumb, nor does the Know to Mystery Scale.
These two scales were arrived at through empirical observations. If the points on these scales could be related to motion then we may be able to establish infinite gradients. This will require some research.
I hope this makes sense.
If you can hold on to contradictory viewpoints at the same time then, per definition, it would generate cognitive dissonance, which may be suppressed.
The viewpoints of Alanzo, Marildi and Marty are quite different in many ways. If you can have all these viewpoints without resolving the inconsistencies between them, then it must generate cognitive dissonance, which has to be suppressed.
I understand your reasoning, Dan.
But you are forgetting something: You started out as a new Scientologist and you adopted all the things you now consider to be poop from LRon into your own thinking. LRon offered it and you swallowed it whole – never suspecting that adopting these *Scientology teachings from L Ron Hubbard* would ever lead you astray.
You joined the Sea Org, endured brainwashing and re-education and abuse in Scientology, and even “willingly” served a stint the RPF.
You have fled those people who follow all of Scientology and are speaking out about them today.
Hubbard never said anything like “the logics and the axioms are real scientology and the rest is just an overlay” to you, or to anyone else.
In fact, he repeatedly said the opposite in the Scientology materials, writing and saying things like “standard ethics will keep you on the straight road, standard policy will blah blah(can’t remember what he said), and standard tech will take you to states of being where nothing can strike you down.”
Hubbard’s writings not only do not make the distinction you are making, they make it a high crime to make this distinction that you are making.
So if you are going to say “the axioms and logics are the only Scientology – everything else is not even Scientology” then that’s fine for you to say – after you’ve endured all the abuse and exploitation you have experienced by listening to L Ron’s Total Poo-Poo Platter.
What about new people?
What about people who do not have your experience where you learned – the hard way – where the big steaming piles are in Scientology?
You’re a Div 6er, Dan. Just like me.
Why have you developed a handling that totally forgets about the danger that Scientology poses to new people who do not have your experience?
Alanzo
Yes – I agree – for myself, it has taken a long time (years) to “straighten” out my thinking to a point where I do not take an extreme on either side. This is a very interesting phenomena – sometimes when spending time with people who are fresh out of the cult it is frustrating to listen to all of the blah blah as they try to devolve all of the angst. I am so over it and do not need to be talking about Miss Cabbage’s crimes all of the time like I used to…
To me, THETA would represent plain awareness that has the outward form of simple MOTION, such as that of light.
As this awareness and motion gets more complex as “wave function” then we start to get clumps of awareness (particles of motion). As it gets increasingly complex, we may get awareness clumped in the form of THETAN that has a “complex motion”, which appears as HUMAN BODY.
.
Friend, for all practical purposes you may be totally clear. I don’t like the idea of OT.
Is there anything that still fixates or disperses your attention?
Scientology was not the first religion to introduce PTS/SP data. Here is PTS/SP data from Qur’an:
QUR’AN: THE COW
.
I think one thing in the Scientology sandbox that set the whole business up for sabotage, was the ideas on children . Children can be SP’s too, children are thetans too, no thetan was ever the parent of another thetan, there is no place for children in this race to “save earth”. Children’s sec checks, children need to “put in exchange”, and a host of other notions that fizzled up to children being outlawed and fair gamed in the most intense devotee environment. They were more or less considered “other fish to fry”. Raised in deplorable conditions in the Sea Org and even with people on staff as the Orgs failed to provide adequate exchange with the staff. The fact that one of Hubbard’s own committed suicide was a screaming red flag something was amiss in this environment.
It was easier to “convert” people into Scientologists than to grow them. Children became viewed as liabilities and present time problems. The handbook most parents used when I was public and first came in was “miracles for breakfast”. Which promoted enforcing stats keeping in young children and ser facing on them about “exchange” and conditions. I heard the author had serious failures with her own children.
The cancelling of parent time in the Sea Org was a tremendous betrayal upon the staff that were there already with their children. And a declaration that children were other fish to fry, and Miscavige was more deserving of people’s time than their own children. Expulsion as an ethics sentance to women that became pregnant, a telling indicator of the attitude.
Most “religions” are born and grown around the family unit and this dissemination encouragement has been the only guarantee of that religion’s immortality.
The Church of Scientology has a morbid dislike and resentment towards that approximates death sentences in it’s highest devotees.
If no thetan was ever the parent of another thetan, then surely no thetan is ever truly the Chairman of the Board either.
These attitudes about children have carried through three or four generations and have become so ingrained in that society and people that have traveled through it, there seems to be almost no awareness for responsibility of family or children. Especially when folks are asked to disconnect from their own family members who might become a distraction from the Church.
The children that do pop up on the landscape, are expected to be surrendered to David Miscavige for his personal pleasure / use. And become Sea Org staff. There they taught to have attitudes of revulsion about sex, and what deadly consequences it can bring to their career and the karma of any potential children.
As the dissemtiation cycle of the Scientologists has been cut, so has been it’s future. With out constant new converts, the orgs become still and they rely on begging and beggars and donations to put a roof over their head.
The idea that children and family come last or not at all has been the ruin of the church. The viewpoint that family and children can be fair gamed for a “good cause”, may take another two generations to overcome. This border lines sociopath.
I personally do not think there will be a Church of Scientology twenty years from now. And I think the main failure will be the anti family anti children attitudes born in that culture. The family unit is a dynamic that is irrepressible on this planet. Unless you are a member of the Church of Scientology.
Thanks, Alanzo 🙂
What a terrifying stoiry – it makes hell seem pleasant by comparison. I wonder, if those who kill must suffer being killed, some other good person must do the killing, and thus be on the receiving end at some point. This is no way to live or die, and no way to end any cycle.
I will finish the story tomorrow, when I have a little more time, but for now this seems like another narrative of invisible and intangible things that I cannot know of until it is too late.
What if all we are is all we are?
Eric,
I am glad it worked for you to enjoy life 🙂
I am still dead inside, for whatever reason, but I can see your point, and have gently been coming to that conclusion myself as well. I am beginning to look at the good, the fun, the glowing embers of life. Always easier said than done, of course. Words are nothing against a torrent of emotion.
Brené Brown quoted someone (I forget who), saying “Comparison is the thief of joy”. After a long talk with my mum I suddenly saw I’ve lived my whole life in the shadow of several ideals – Hubbard, bridge, cleared theta clear, other people’s patches of greener grass, etc.etc.
A hard knock life 😉
So to hell with that. Time to live.
After reading the first chapter of Rober Lifton’s Psychology of Totalism, I asked the following question: How does confession open the door to reform?
Do you know an answer?
Perhaps the question would be better worded as: What if what we seem to be is all we are?
A notable example of the idea is contained in the writings and teachings of Gurdjieff, who decribed what he called ‘the Hasnamuss individual”. This is a person with an extreme egocentricity (“only one” attitude) with no regard for truth, who endlessly invents false data and strives to make himself an aithority or opinion leader in society, causing widespread destruction under the guise of progress.
The “hasnamuss individual” has many of the characteristics of the “only one” as a psychopathic, covertly hostile individual.
Google yields many links. Here is one with a list of detailed characteristics as desribed by Gurdjieff:
http://gnosticteachings.org/glossary/h/2399-hasnamuss.html
Dee, what do you mean by you “knew about eternity before scientology”? That you knew of the concept or that it was subjectively real to you?
Here is th elist from the above article. It seems to overlap with some of the 12 characterisitics as outlined by LRH:
Gurdjieff described these qualities of the Hasnamuss:
1. Every kind of depravity, conscious as well as unconscious
2. The feeling of self-satisfaction from leading others astray
3. The irresistible inclination to destroy the existence of other breathing creatures
4. The urge to become free from the necessity of actualizing the being-efforts demanded by Nature
5. The attempt by every kind of artificiality to conceal from others what in their opinion are one’s physical defects
6. The calm self-contentment in the use of what is not personally deserved
7. The striving to be not what one is.
vinaire, if I have understood your viewpoint correctly in the past then awareness and matter are emergent and interdependent properties, and the self does not survive death and does not ever resurface as an indepent unit in a new body. Against this backdrop, there is no time track because there is no one there to have a time track. If this is the case, what is the point of spirituality?
Hubbard seemed to be very much into directing people’s attention. How do we know what Hubbard was really looking at?
Thanks for refreshing this kind of viewpoint here. +++
I believe that scientology contains the seeds of genocide, and that in the right environment they might flourish. It already makes ample use of subtle degrees of ostracism while championing human rights. In an extreme environment, death could be come to be seen as a kindness and a necessity.
After all, a being, once forcefully ejected from their body, might “snap out of it” and return to pick up a new one without dramatising so much.
Rational means ” having the ability to reason or think about things clearly.” So yes, an OT would operate rationally, because the inherent ability to do so would no longer be blocked by automatic compulsive thinking. But here again, this is a relative thing since people differ in their native abilities.
But as for “using only positive emotions,” per Ron, negative emotions can also be analytical and appropriate to the situation. If a person lost his best friend, responding with some sort of positive emotion wouldn’t generally be analytical – meaning, stemming from the analytical mind.
In my first post, I should have included, as part of being OT and thinking rationally, that it isn’t just a matter of freedom from the stimulus response of the reactive mind. To think and act rationally, a person also has to have accurate information along. This is why in the early years, such as in SOS, education was emphasized. And on the Chart of Human Evaluation, at the highest point of 4.0, it states:
“Search for different viewpoints in order to broaden own reality. Broadens reality.”
Then in later years, Ron wrote that training gave 50% of the potential gains in scientology. TR-0, as an example, would enable a person to act rationally under very emotional circumstances. Actually, that is basically what Eckhart Tolle says too, in this youtube vid:
Thanks mate
Yes, but somewhere he laughingly said that he hesitates to use the word “mindfulness” because it gives the impression that the mind is full. 🙂
When I was in Scientology (from 1988 to 2000) I had some thetan-form stages. In the early days I had the idea that a thetan must have been circle shaped then after I switched to a sphere shape. But the fact that according to LRH a thetan was without shape left me in same confusion.
How can a thetan be without shape when LRH himself teached on the meter essentials that the thetan was bigger than the body? How can be something without shape, dimension and position be bigger than a body?
So when I left I decided that a thetan – if something like that does exist -has to be flat like a leaf and Hexagonal shaped.
Speaking of Smith I have the feeling that he was much more loyal, friendly and sympathetic to his followers than Hubbard.
Al, how long ago did you write that? Because in the last couple years I’ve only seen your posts on TR-0 that say it is nothing but hypnosis. So I still don’t see that you have anything positive to say about scientology.
Another icky and sticky mantra in the Scientology sandbox that gave birth to three generations of Scientologists beholden to sacrifice in every manner was: “You are only as valuable as you can serve others”.
This forbade any purposes of SELF HELP.
Yet you see the church just begging straight up for donations now with out any emphasis on helping others beyond what is printed in the brochures about them “saving the planet”.
They are not saving the planet. They can’t even think about saving themselves. When they do they are called dilettantes with other fish to fry.
“Yes, one starts out Being, but then Doing wrong actions to others is destroying. That’s why they are failing and they can’t stop it, because it was written as such by the founder and is consistently used to this day.”
My thought on this is that independents are free to use better judgement.
Nice post! I enjoyed reading your personal story. 🙂
Dan, excellent post.
Pingback: Scientology Top Management | Moving On Up a Little Higher
Also in more recent times, there are lists of the characteristics of psychopaths that are quite similar to LRH’s list of the SP.
Welcome, matey.
Marildi wrote:
“Because in the last couple years I’ve only seen your posts on TR-0 that say it is nothing but hypnosis. So I still don’t see that you have anything positive to say about scientology.”
Looks like you’ve missed every single time I’ve also said that a hypnotic state is not a state of lowered consciousness, as Hubbard taught you, but a state of hyper-focus and hyper-awareness onto one thing to the exclusion of other things in the environment.
And you seemed to have missed every time I said that hypnotic states are some of the most therapeutic states humans can have: Prayer, meditation, etc – all hypnotic states.
Ring a bell?
Alanzo
Letting Go wrote:
“Perhaps the question would be better worded as: What if what we seem to be is all we are?”
Then that’s our lot as human beings – a completely meaningless existence in a completely random world.
The more I’ve embraced that idea, and sat with it, and become comfortable with it, the more it fell apart and disintegrated, and finally made me laugh my ass off.
Our immortality is so blatantly obvious to me now that I don’t even consider it any more. I see it everywhere.
But that’s just me.
Alanzo
Letting go, if by “dead inside,” you mean not having emotions, the 6-minute Eckhart Tolle video posted below talks about that. It’s very short – 6 minutes. Here’s the link: https://markrathbun.wordpress.com/2014/10/14/the-scientology-sandbox/#comment-323512
Letting Go wrote:
“I will finish the story tomorrow, when I have a little more time, but for now this seems like another narrative of invisible and intangible things that I cannot know of until it is too late.”
The thing I like about it is that it is tied to purposes for lifetimes, and character, fate, and destiny – all ancient Greek ideas which gave meaning to me after the stilts were knocked out from under my life by Scientology.
Alanzo
What I got from you was that some induced hypnotic states were detrimental – and that you included scientology in those.
Are you now saying that the “hypnosis” in scientology is actually therapeutic?
Spacial, dimensional thinking. Interesting.
LRH’s metaphors were not always that accurate or applicable. Not always, but occasionally, they were an indication of his own lack of complete understanding.
Pay attention to life around you and it becomes pretty clear which phrases to discard.
Mark.
Subject clearing will help.
Near the end of his life he was desperately struggling with BTs.
That’s correct. There is no independent spirituality.
Spirituality exists only as an aspect of existence. All properties constitute spirituality, whereas all forms constiture materialism. Both are aspects of existence.
This is not a materrialistic viewpoint which believes that spiirtuality is a product of materialiasm. That is not the case.
Nor is it a spiritualistic viewpoint which believes that materialism is a product of spirituality. That is not the case either.
Marildi asked:
“What I got from you was that some induced hypnotic states were detrimental …”
It was Hubbard who said that hypnotic states were detrimental. Not me.
” Are you now saying that the “hypnosis” in scientology is actually therapeutic?”
What I said was that the problem with hypnotic states is that they make the person susceptible to suggestion.
It is the reason that licensed hypnotists are licensed.
Implanting someone’s mind with suggestions, especially as deeply as Scientology invades a person’s mind, is dangerous if you intentionally use suggestion against a person’s own interests, as L Ron Hubbard did.
Licensed hypnotists always tell their clients they are undergoing hypnosis. Hubbard lied to Scientologists and told them that they were undergoing the OPPOSITE of hypnosis, and then applied hypnosis to them, and implanted them with suggestions.
L Ron Hubbard was the most unethical hypnotist in world history.
Alanzo
As I said – you have nothing good to say about scientology.
Letting Go “…… knew of the concept or that it was subjectively real to you?”
I guess both as I was sensitive to life after death and got to belive the soul didn’t die. I’ve had some subjective reality, but then some one could call it coincidence or imagination, still it is real to me. I read many books on the subject earlier in life as it was of interest to me. Finding past lives in scientology was OK and was useful for awhile, tho I feel I had a great imagination. I could be anybody or do anything and probably did, but so what?
I believe Hospice has many books on life after death available for free in their library and they do a nice training for volunteers, with no pressure. They treat people with much compassion, are on the spiritual, psychological side and allow individual ideas.
Hope that answers it a bit.
Alanzo “But that’s just me.”
I’m with you on that friend, as I had long looks at it too and ended up with no doubt.
Marildi, Mind full LOL.
Glad you liked it. I don’t quiver inside from fear when I write about it now. The programing of “never, ever tell anyone, ever” has ended. 🙂
“My thought on this is that independents are free to use better judgement.”
I agree and when they get another name for it, they will have more success in the future.
Excellent post.
My current POV: Cof$ is much ado about nothing. No real influence on society except to enturbulate a miniscule portion of it. A portion that I’m not part of…nor is anyone I know part of within oh, three states…
I’m back on my original path, the hot mess adolescent goal I had back in the ’80s that made me perfect for Cof$…making a difference in people’s lives. For real and forever.
You are exactly right, The Oracle. Our children are our future.
And unlike the Cof$ model, that includes my family, my children and my friends, my man and myself…not just “OTHERS” or “MANKIND”.
Well, I am on record as saying that:
1. Scientology should be “Open Source”
2. That we each own Scientology 100% – meaning we, each of us, decide what is and what is not Scientology.
3. That Scientology is incomplete
4. That Ron never really defined an “end game.” You’re OT – what now? You are operating completely sans a meat body – what now?
5. That Ron made some serious mistakes, including the entirely of the Sea Org.
That is just one aspect. We still do not know (and likely never will know) how he viewed them, and whether he truly focussed to the point he no longer saw what he was doing before that.
I like that 🙂
If we are eternal in any way, then it is almost hilarious how we grasp at ways to confirm it, and that it only falls apart after letting go of the need.
But then what is the point of spirituality? Better, what is the point of spiritual “progression”? If spirituality is emergent, then it simply is and will continue to develop (if it does) due to its inherent nature, and any idea that “we” can do anything to advance it is merely an illusion. Correct?
Dan is still swallowing “the being is immortal” bit.
<i)Dan: "When talking about Scientology and evaluating its good or potential for harm, are we talking about the Axioms and Logics and all that might be extrapolated from them and them alone, or are we talking about all this other stuff that got added in: Hubbard’s assertions about our shared whole track history…"
Yes, we are talking about axioms too. Please check out
An Analysis of Scientology Axiom # 1
.
Dan: “It’s just a distinction that I like to make and I think others may benefit from it as well.”
Let all this data be out there on Internet. Let people figure Scientology out by themselves.
We need not try to convince anybody about anything.
.
Marildi: “In my first post, I should have included, as part of being OT and thinking rationally, that it isn’t just a matter of freedom from the stimulus response of the reactive mind.”
I think it is just a matter of spotting and resolving inconsistencies as one comes across them.
.
Confession should come from “seeing things as they are.” Confession should come from mindfulness, else it is ineffective.
Letting Go, with that question, I think, you are about to reach enlightenment. 🙂
Alanzo: “Our immortality is so blatantly obvious to me now that I don’t even consider it any more. I see it everywhere.”
Who or what is being immortal, Alanzo?
.
“The Absolute Truth is that there is nothing absolute in the world, that everything is relative, conditioned and impermanent, and that there is no unchanging, everlasting, absolute substance like Self, Soul, or Ātman within or without.” ~ Buddha
The whole idea of thetan is ridiculous. There is only the spirit, the essence, and that grows and changes and mutates in living beings.
People who got swamped by Scientology were those who never had a datum of comparable magnitude.
You don’t find many Indians in Scientology. Scientology has been unable to grow roots in India.
Greeks had differences too. Check out
Ground State of Universe – History
.
Alanzo, The way I applied TR0 was same as mindfulness. I did not see it as “a state of hyper-focus and hyper-awareness onto one thing to the exclusion of other things in the environment.”
But your strident behavior does remind me of “a state of hyper-focus and hyper-awareness onto one thing to the exclusion of other things in the environment.”
The whole point is that it is an amusing puzzle to resolve, if one can get to see it that way.
Both Spirit and matter has been misunderstood quite a bit. They are not separate. Chapter 1 of The Tao of Physics is quite enlightening in this respect. You can find the link to the book here.
Ground State of Universe – History
.
Read Scientology Axioms, Factors and Logics. Really, really, study them very, very carefully!
.
Certainty is Scientology.
vinaire: Is there anything that still fixates or disperses your attention?
Yes! It is maybe stupid and foolish, but my family, also my wife and my sons, dramatize the failure of being a scientologist .. one son makes me guilty for his sea org time .. my wife blames me for unwanted meanings, but she was already on OT VII when I met her ..
My personal point is that my life did ruin with scientology .. I said once as my last statement to my auditor (nice guy): I sit more or less always between two chairs, scientologist dislike me for my no progress and others dislike me for being a scientologist .. it is a stupid game which makes no sense .. so it is my ruin ..
When I came into scientology I had no ruin, but they delivered me one and that good in the fixation to handle my ruin ..
I have surely grasped something very good on my objectives, but the church has then tried to destroy it. So when you say, I don’t like the idea of OT .. this is true to myself, nobody will ever become OT in scientology, but it doesn’t say that is impossible to become one .. but hanging around with a ruin .. is a bad place to start from ..
I think that the Church of Scientology may soon be recognized as the front group for Mafia.
Hi Twilight!
He sure is! One thing we can be sure of with this Xenu character is that he is a liar and if Ron is to be believed he is a murderer. So what does the Bible have to say about LIARS and MURDERERS?
“… the devil…… He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies”. John 8:44 NASB
Xenu is not my personal nemesis, but if he was real for Ron Hubbard so be it.
Love with ARC
Pip
Hi Vinaire
Thanks for your reply. For me THETA would be AWARENESS of AWARENESS and it has no MOTION.
Awareness of awareness is that which has the ability to CREATE. Light would be one of Theta’s creations. Incidentally a THETAN does not have to have a HUMAN BODY.
Love with ARC
Pip
In my opinion, the universe started with simple awareness which evolved into subjectivity (awareness of awareness) at human level..
Thanks, I can think with that.
I don’t know Hospice – would you mind posting a link to the site? When I typed Hospice and library into Google, there were many to choose from.
I did find one, Hospicenet.org, but did not see any books of that nature (life after death).
Marildi wrote:
“As I said – you have nothing good to say about scientology”.
That’s so unfair.
I said that L Ron Hubbard was a snappy dresser, and that he looked good in a sailor hat.
My god.
What more do you want?
Alanzo
That’s funny, Al.
And I bet you were the kind of kid who usually managed to duck out of trouble by cracking a joke.
Just answer LDW’s question – is there anything in scientology you think is good or beneficial?
Prolly. 😀
Don’t you do it too, Vinnie?
Hi Friend
I think you were given some skewed information. Theta and a Thetan are two separate things. Theta is GOODNESS, a thetan is not necessarily good. Fundamentally a thetan has separated from theta and is basically “doing its own thing”.
In the Bible it says “God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them”. Genesis 1:27 NASB. It also says “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” John4:24 NASB. So God made man spirit but it goes on to say “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a LIVING SOUL.” Genesis 2:7 KJB. And as such chose disobedience. Hence it is only through REPENTANCE (change of mind) that we can be re-united with God-Source-Theta.
There is a datum that states “Pure+Pure =PURE, Pure+Impure=IMPURE. So however many Thetans there are does not add up to Theta (purity).
Love with ARC
Pip
“Just answer LDW’s question – is there anything in scientology you think is good or beneficial?”
Read this, especially Flaw #3:
http://www.alanzosblog.com/hindsight-bias-ex-scientologists-deadliest-disease/
Alanzo
In the church I was born into, it said “God created Man in his own image AND LIKENESS…..” This would mean, fundamentally, that if God is Good, then Man is also basically Good.
When it comes to convincing, I back off. I tell people this is how I see it for such and such reason. Now it is up to you to work it out.
It’s a good read, Al. I would recommend it to anyone who has been or still is, in scientology.
Scientology tech destroys real awareness and independent, self-determined perception of other people and replaces it with superficial labels (SP, squirrel, DB… etc.). This is specifically related to 1960’s “era” of the Overt-Motivator Sequence, Security Checks, PTS/SP tech… and a slew of hate filled, authoritarian views in the OEC volumes.
You can see that these people confronting “Marty” at the airport do not even “see” Marty as a real person in front of them. Instead it is some “identity” stamped into their foreheads that they are taking some action against. This a good example of what insanity looks like and is really something that is widespread among Scientologists using that kind of “technology.”
I was referring to the video in the next post:
https://markrathbun.wordpress.com/2014/10/19/scientology-top-management/
Maybe so, Val, but were you abel to get a specific answer to the question of what Al thinks is good or beneficial in scientology?
I thought Dan was doing the same thing. You seemed to imply he wasn’t.
Friend, I am having difficulty in understanding you. If you did not have a ruin why did you go into Scientology?
There must have been something that you were trying to sort out. Was there some inconsistency that you were attempting to resolve through Scientology?
.
Alanzo,
Thanks for posting that link – great story!
I am one, I guess of many, that only seem to remember the negative
postings of yours. So this was very good to see.
I confess that I have not followed this blog in a while so I may also have missed many of your ‘positive’ postings.
Greta
Oh! Then I take my comment back.
My only wonder would be about him not getting into a mindful discussion about the logic of thetan and file clerk.
.
marildi, I had to mull this one over. I don’t think Tolle is talking about what I meant, although it gave me an opportunity to examine matters more closely. I’d say it feels more like when you’ve had a tooth pulled, and you worry the spot continuously with your tongue because something that was there suddenly is no longer. It nags at you – something is definitely missing, and you cannot say whether it is really good or bad. Perhaps a better description would be that I seem to be gradually wanting less. Does that make sense? It bothers me somehow, like the wanting should be there because it always was. Probably it intersects with depression and other states, but I am not sure it is entirely the same thing.
I wonder what makes think that awareness was fully evolved right from the beginning, material went through an evolution.
Something here is inconsistent.
But are you interested in spotting inconsistencies and resolving them for yourself? Or, are you in apathy about it?
LG, I got it better now.
Maybe this one will help. It’s only 3 minutes, worth a shot:
If I was in “apathy” about it, I would not be asking questions. Incidentally, I wrote apathy in quotation marks because I do not believe the concept of apathy that was communicated in scientology really reflects the actual state. It is commonly used to mean lethargy or an unwillingness to do something about life. From my own experience, I believe the concept of illness in scientology seriously misses the mark. The same goes for emotional or mental states. Witness its helplessness in the face of real emotional or mental problems. A long detour to show you another of my hobby horses.
That would be appropriate.
It does, thank you. As it so happens, I have the book 🙂
I haven’t read it yet. Lifton’s moved up my list when I read Sociopath next door. I really want to understand what might have happened. Probably I will return to the spiritual books with a new understanding after a solid diet of science and psychology.
Good. Then you are moving closer to enlightenment.
Sounds like a plan!
I’m glad you have the book too. Btw, I find it very peaceful watching his videos, because of his presence. I think that in itself can help a person understand his teachings and become fulfilled. JMO 😉
I agree 🙂
I find he possesses a wonderful clarity.
I’m not looking for such an answer.
Yes! He keeps it very simple. That’s one thing that makes it so appealing.
That people put the time and effort into trying to understand and legitimize this convoluted mess of a belief boggles my mind. What a waste of human intelligence.
Letting G. Look up ‘the suncoast hospice. org’ and other links. Hospice is in most cities. A library or book store you may find many books on death, dying and afterlife… Ask for help and they’ll show you. See what resonates with you.
Okay. However, he denies that he is an extremist but apparently can’t state one single thing he thinks is good or beneficial about scientology. If he feels that way, I think he should just admit it.
But this is what he usually does when I have tried to get any kind of a straight answer out of him – he disappears.
I really don’t know why he thinks it is necessary to be evasive on the question, other than the fact that he has argued throughout this whole thread that there is no such thing as a scientology extremist. Anyway, crickets speak louder than words. 🙂
Yes! He keeps it very simple. That’s one thing that makes it so appealing.
Why do you have to prove anything about Alanzo, Marildi? Can’t you see the is-ness yourself? Can you have others see the is-ness for themselves? Just put your observation on the blog and be done with it.
Do you have to be just as intense as Alanzo? I am really happy to see Valkov becoming so calm. 🙂
I guess for the same reason you feel the need to point out so many things. Such as what you wrote above. 😛
Here’s a quote from taht part of Al’s blog: “I knew the ARC triangle, granting beingness, the tone scale, auditing, how Scientology got me off of drugs, and gave me more discipline and hope for my own future than I ever had before.”
I think to wonder about “why” another person feels or acts as he does, like in your post, “I really don’t know why he thinks it is necessary to be evasive on the question……”, says it all. You don’t know why, and neither does he. That’s par for the course, as far as understanding between people goes, as far as I’m concerned. There is no “reason” involved in this situation. You either duplicate what he says, or you don’t. There is no “why”? Asking “why”, to me, is a person projecting his/her own bafflement. A “Why” is just an intellectual justification; it does not lead up and out. Now, that question may eventually be productive for Al. I’m not saying it could never be. I’m just not really pursuing it. The main issue I see is, whose benefit are you pursuing it for?
Here how Ram Dass put it:
http://www.ramdass.org/the-i-behind-the-i/
I wrote the above because it is an inconsistency to me and I want to look at more closely.
Is your reason the same?
Valkov: “Here’s a quote from that part of Al’s blog: ‘I knew the ARC triangle, granting beingness, the tone scale, auditing, how Scientology got me off of drugs, and gave me more discipline and hope for my own future than I ever had before.'”
Yes, he says things like that – but then he wipes it all away soon thereafter by saying things like “If good things occurred for you, it’s ONLY because YOU did it yourself – not scientology. And furthermore, you later lost those gains anyway – on top of having had a lot of harm done to you at the same time. Which you are still too blind to see.” (Roughly paraphrased.)
So as for “You either duplicate what he says, or you don’t” – when Al sings a different tune depending on the current “weather,” I think he’s doing a disservice to people, because it’s misleading. And I don’t think he’s doing himself a favor either if he isn’t striving for intellectual integrity. That’s how I see it.
See my reply to Valkov.
For someone being a science fiction writer, he sure has a lot of influence over people. It scares the shit out of me.
You’re crazy, and brainwashed.
Interesting!
Too long.
There are several freely available dictionaries available on the internet. Go ahead and look up those unfamiliar words. Don’t be scared.
You started a comm cycle and now you tell me “too long”? It wasn’t that long
– not even as long as most of your posts. Or is this an Alanzo caper? 😀
Valkov: “I think he is striving for that, by the way. He has changed some since years. Actually, it was LRH he trusted. It takes as long as it takes. His baggage goes back to the 1950s, I believe.”
Okay, maybe you’re right.
I got an email notification of your comment, quoted above. But I see my reply ended up here at the bottom of the page – and your comment is missing.
Strange things are happening with WordPress, it seems. Comments are disappearing, and sometimes re-appearing.
We still gotta lotta work to do. I’m havin’ fun, how bout you?
Mark
PS: Had to drop the Jet Ski manufacturing project. Startup costs rose to over $350K. After 100+ hrs on the phone and 1500+ hrs in design and E-mail, I could see that it would absorb the rest of my life. But the whole project was enjoyable.
Good schooling.
The sci-fi writers of that age were some of the brightest folks of those generations. That is actually still true of today’s writers. Many are scientists as well as visionaries. Calling him a “science-fiction writer” is a compliment, considering the company he was in. Many were self-educated, when that was still recognized as a virtue, as it indicated an intelligence, curiosity, and an uncommon breadth of vision. These were not not the products of today’s assembly-line education.
What does that have to do with my post?
Thanks, I get it now. I had thought you meant a particular hospice website, not a physical location.
I read it but it didn’t directly answer my question. I didn’t see any point in speculating over it.
Thanks, Valkov, for that quote from Ram Dass.
And, Marildi, the answers are within you. Don’t wait for Alanzo to answer them for you.
God with humanlike (or even more sophisticated) awareness is assumed to be at the beginning of all evolution, whereas, human awareness obviously evolved in this process much later.
You talk about God being fundamentally good. The whole idea of a humanlike God seems to me a human-centric view of the whole process of evolution.
Very nice Alanzo – It read more like a fable with the succinct lesson, uncontaminated raisins are easily obtained at the grocery store.
It is the essence of Scientology…whatever the raisins, they are buried in excrement.
It was more like I was using his own method on him – the Socratic method. 😀
But what would we all do without Vinnie’s continuous sage advice. 🙂
I am sure that sooner or later Alanzo shall attain his own balance. I think he should be allowed to do so. It will happen faster if nobody interferes with him.
>
Thanks again, O wise one. 😀
The same applies to me, you or anybody.
Let us fully apply the Auditor’s Code or Discussion Policy to our conversations.
Discussions and what needs to be avoided
Okay. Why don’t you start by applying the point of not evaluating for others. If you need examples of what not to do, just look upstream at your comments in this exchange alone. 😛 🙂
Yup! I ‘ll be handling myself.
Vinnie, I really like you right now. 🙂
“Thanks again, O wise one. :D” I second that! However talking to him as a person and getting an answer is impossible, more like talking to his blog.
Oh, a wise blog I’m sure!
So true, Dee. But I had to admire him a lot where he wrote above: “Yup! I’ll be handling myself.”
And if he is following the Auditors Code, that means he’ll need to answer originations better. 😉
“he’ll need to answer originations better. ;)”
We shall see won’t we? I am hopeful to his own handling. Hey, anyone can change and it will be nice to hear his personal perspective as opposed to chatter and a link!
Hi Vinaire
Thanks for your opinion, only life itself is capable of awareness, so even by your thinking life preceded the universe. Most humans are not up to being aware of awareness, this was an attribute of a thetan before he/she fell from grace. That is what makes Scientology very unique, it postulates there can be awareness of awareness.
Love with ARC
Pip
Hi Valkov
That is absolutely right, man was created in God’s image and LIKENESS, but as with God that meant that man had FREEWILL. The ability to express God’s qualities or to choose not to, which is the meaning of “the two trees at the centre of the Garden of Eden.
God never said that man could not eat from the “tree of life” but he did warn him if he ate from the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil” he would forfeit his life. Every time we assert our rightness and another’s wrongness, we die a little, this is the mechanics behind the’ service facsimile’ and the root of all the ARC breaks in the world.
In disobeying our creator we exchanged our true nature LOVE, for FEAR (False Evidence Appearing Real). In our effort to overcome this fear we created a mind independent of God which started the “downward spiral”. It was never God’s intention that we should create a mind in opposition to his MIND and it is our natural mind that stops us operating from our hearts.
So yes we were each created good but now have a bias that however good our intention, tends to lead towards the opposite. This applies as much to L. Ron Hubbard as to each of us.
Thanks for your reply.
Love with ARC
Pip
Dear Vinaire
There is no inconsistency here, yes material evolves but material is the result of awareness. THETA (awareness of awareness) acts through THETANS (awareness) to animate MEST for its own purposes. The more a Thetan is aware of theta, the more harmonious the resulting creations.
Love with ARC
Pip
Dear Vinaire
No-one is saying God is “human like”, in fact most humans exhibit the opposite attributes to God. As a result of exercising our freewill we are 180° removed from what we were originally intended to be.
Evolution from a spiritual perspective would see physical evolution as the exact opposite, a degradation from spiritual to soulish and finally to animal. Until we recognise our Creator as Source the downward spiral will continue. The answer to our predicament does not lie in the mind but IN THE HEART.
Love with ARC
Pip
I think that heart also evolved over time.
I do not see material as the “result” of awareness. The basis of material is motion. Motion and awareness go hand in hand as one and the same phenomenon. Awareness is the essence of motion. Motion is the outer form of awareness.
THETA-MEST is a dichotomy of static-dynamic, It is a scale of motion. Relative motion exists throughout this scale changing in infinite gradients. Neither end represents an actual absolute. Hubbard only postulates a theoretical Static at one end, and a theoretical dynamic at the other for the sake of convenience. He then does make the error of treating them with binary logic instead of infinite logic.
Since motion exists throughout the THETA-MEST scale, so does the awareness. Motion-awareness simply gets more complex as it goes from one end to the other. Human awareness is very complex and appears on the far end on the right on this scale. Intelligence is the result of such complex awareness. Intelligence exists near the MEST end of the scale and not at the THETA end.
Please see further explanation at
An Analysis of Scientology Axiom # 1
With the pleasure coming from motion-awareness,
Yours,
Vinaire 🙂
This is an excellent example of the human-centric logic.
Hi Pip,
In my opinion, the whole universe is aware.
Awareness lies in the property of motion, and it evolves in complexity as motion evolves in complexity. Each atom consists of motion and awareness. A stone has awareness to the degree it has inetrnal motion.
To measure awareness from human standards is a human-centric bias.
With motion-awareness,
Vinaire
The thing is, Vin, I cannot find any definition of “awareness” anywhere in any dictionary, that works in the sentences you hve been stringing together about “awareness is motion”. So you lost me way back there, when you put it that way. Ditto for “consciousness”, “perception” etc.
My understanding is that many people went into scientology not because they perceived themselves as having a “ruin”, but because they perceved others as having ruins they wished to help those others with, or went into it just to extend their own knowledge.
I hope to get an answer From friend, but your answer is quite interesting too, Val.
Something tells me the underlying the urge to help others is the urge to help oneself. Again, underlying the urge to extend knowledge, there is an urge to help oneself.
It all adds up to free oneself. Maybe, one cannot feel totally free until those around one are free also. Desire to extend knowledge goes along with the desire to see everyone free.
.
Val, we seem to be probing here beyond what is known. So you wouldn’t find this stuff about awareness in the dictionary. But you may find it within yourself.through meditation.
I have been looking for a while for the interface between Physics and Metaphysics. I feel convinced that this is it. Motion is awareness at the most fundamental level. It gets complex as it evolves.
I shall continue with the effort to explain it more clearly. See Awareness and Motion
.
Very astute comment, Oracle. I completely agree. The attack and neglect of the incredibly deep communication lines of family and children are sowing the seeds of final destruction for this “Church”.
vinaire: Some days are gone, and I hve not read this blog .. so I was not aware that you asked for a response ..
No, there was nothing what I wanted to sort out. I had no ruin, for what I should have one. Ruin is on the awareness scale -7 .. and it means that you hang up on something which you never again will confront or some similiar decisions ..
It is not my art of life to do such things .. the possibilty of ruin is not given, because of my character .. I would never blow from something ..
Okay, if you understand that good .. you may realise why I did stay in the church for so long a time .. it made no sense to me what they have tried to handle, and they have never handled anything .. this simply because I had nothing what I wanted to handle ..
Lets say, there is a question on the progress program: What do you try to handle with auditing? My continous answer to that was “nothing” .. means really, that I had never at any time an idea what I should or must handle about myself .. it means further, that I was always able to communicate about everything with everybody without shame or regression .. I felt myself completely free in my life and my doing .. last not least, I was in my heart aware that I can handle anything ..
I had nothing to resolve. But yes, there was some inconsistency, I have always won (not the highest price) .. and I did not get clearly why others tried to reduce it .. I mean it was not good for them to do so ..
So I came into scientology for understanding and helping others to come on a better way .. very religious and with a good heart ..
So what happened? The church (staff) found always reason why my help was not proper done. Downscale help .. would try to held others down ..
It was not my intention to do that, but the church (staff) tried to convince me that I would only try to protect my own reactive mind .. it means in basic: everybody had to have bad impulses .. otherwise he would not be on planet Earth ..
I had no bad impulses or intentions .. so I became blamed for putting me up as an angel and that I must heavily failed once .. otherwise I would be not on planet Earth .. big point anyway – but only speculation ..
When I asked myself, why I am on planet Earth .. it is called selfauditing in the church (you should never ask yourself something) it is complete out tech to do something like that .. everything must be discussed in a live communication with professional scientologists .. otherwise it is only bank dramatization ..
For the question why I am on planet earth .. I had an easy answer: It is a nice planet. Not so bad to be here. A lot of pieces to enjoy. Very great population of animals and plants .. and in addition man likes music ..
But telling that made me to a monster. I promoted planet earth as a good place to stay .. for scientologist it was the deepest down planet in the whole universe .. have never really asked why they think so .. was not interested to get an answer ..
Later I found out that scientologist think what LRH has said .. which is a weak statement of self .. but I have learned that if you question LRH or today David Miscavige .. you will run the way which I did from the start of my bridge to the end ..
Finally for an answer to your question what I wanted to resolve: I think I have tried to become as idiotic as I can become .. and I think that I have tried to understand why and especially how one can go down to a state where one fights another as enemy ..
Doesn’t matter how deep I went finally in all the years .. I went very deep with scientology .. but I have not found the idea of enemy .. it seems as an impossible view for me .. my greatness is still alive .. and it means, you cannot supress a good spirit ..
My plans and goals were all good, but scientology did not deliver it in good sence .. the most of all failures I realised is that the church or better LRH did create enemies .. but this is the wrong way ..
The essence of my comment is .. I did not want to be an enemy, because I was not .. so I tried to clear that up .. it didn’t work out .. okay .. now I am declared as a SP ..
Friend. SPs are special people who can think for themselves. So wear the badge of SP with honor. 🙂
>
Scientology will destroy itself. When people blindly follow psycho leaders, it always ends badly.(Jones town, wako texas,& Hitler). The LA x video shows how psycho those people really are. Good job scientology. How many new members did scientology get from the video? Lol. Great work shooting the video. Jill
The LAX video showed leaders of scientology being psychos.when people blindly follow pyscho leaders, it always ends badly.(hitler,wako texas,jones town. J us t wait it won’t be long, they’ll be hold up with hostagess. Thinking people will want to join. LOL
Thanks for this post, very well written and thought-provoking. And while it resonates quite wholly with me/my experiences as an ex-s.o. kiddo I have to add my (humble) 2 cents; it completely ignores the fact that the wins/growth achieved by members is, ultimately, the draw back (“fix”, conversely) to Scn again and again, despite the creepy bubble parallels they likely endure for the sake of itself.
Honestly, it (almost) sounds like you are insinuating it’s more or less a placebo effect, similar to mob mentality…?
Not to mention the existential(ism) element: the microcosm (human) of enlightenment can only advance so far in proportion to the macrocosm (humanity), in reference to adolescent stage of evolution.
(uh oh..ok, maybe 3 cents)
Lastly, I would hardly call “saving the human race” or even “enlightenment” a trivial commonality bonding each other…
Re: “overemphasizing some relatively trivial commonality as a symbol of shared identity”-Fowler.
Again, thanks for post and great insights into your journey, Mr. Rathbun.
Um. yeah, thats a bit of a stretch. Corporate greed to genocide? really? oh, and try not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Yes, thank you for stating that, “we all get there eventually”. Thats the attitude I resonate with. Has an air of non-attachment and co-operation. I sorely wish this was more practiced in Scn.
No doubt, Scn has helped some people along the way. And so has mediation, prayer, etc. Good God, there is a rabbit hole of methods and potions, as there are layers to peel away.
Interestingly, “pity” is so taboo in scn.; the no sympathy thing. I never liked that. It suppresses a sense of empathy and compassion, which is, imho, is part and parcel to enlightenment.
vinaire: “If one has attention on being exterior, he is not exterior, no matter what it seems like. There is simply a delusion”
I, actually, found this opinion / eval / statement (blah blah blah) rather comforting and reasonable. Being in the “zone” (a meditative state) during an activity simply means you are truly in the moment. Reminds me of that saying: “As soon as you think you are happy u no longer are” ..ugh. I’m sure I just butchered that lovely saying. Lol
You got it kiddo!