OK folks I need your help.
I've started to re-write my story for a whole bunch of reasons - when I started this, I was still very much a Scientologist even tho' I'd "left." What you got was my story not written by the real me, just an emotional retard who was ashamed of being a human being as he was "OT."
I want this to be accessible to someone who's barely heard of this toxic cult, and take them through the journey so that they understand how easily we were taken in just because we were vulnerable and human.
Comments welcome. I hope you enjoy this taste.
“Excuse me....”
The crowd on Sydney’s Broadway parted and flowed around the earnest young man with the clipboard.
“Excuse me, I’m doing a short survey....”
It was a Friday afternoon, late summer 1979, everyone gearing up or the weekend. No-one wanted to stop for this guy.
“Excuse me I’m doing a short survey. It’s only three questions.”
Why not? I’ve got time to kill – train won’t be in for another 25 minutes. So I stop. Earnest young man has on a collared shirt and business trousers, both old but clean. He makes strong eye-contact with me and smiles.
“If you could be anything what would you be?”
Hmmmm, weird question, but I’ll try to answer. I muttered something.
“Thank you.” Scribbles something on clipboard.
“If you could change anything, what would you change?’
There’s a world of injustice and stupidity to pick from – this is a hard one.
“If you could have anything, what would you have?”
Million dollars? Self-sufficient farm and a happy hippy lifestyle? I came up with something.
“Which of these answers is the most important to you?”
I found something and went to leave.
“Can I show you something about that?”
Ah, what the hell - I’ve got nothing important happening. I’ll play along. This may be interesting.
He sets off down the street, into the tunnel under the road and up on the other side, making small-talk all the way. He stops at the entrance to a rather shabby building. I glance up at the aged brickwork and see how dirty it is. Inside it’s a bit dark and cluttered and definitely not opulent. Looks like most of the furniture is second-hand and the receptionist is similarly dressed in out-moded clothes. None of which bothers me – I’m covered in cement dust and clay from a day working outside digging up streets in the sun.
I sign in and get sat at a table and given a “personality test” to do. I’m assured it won’t take long, so I start on it, and soon get lost in the questions, thinking hard about myself for the first time in a while. I finish it, and take it to a girl about my age named Kerri and she says she’ll have it marked really quickly so I can just sit over here and look at this for now. It’s Scientology, and apparently Chick Correa’s one. He’s cool. So is the Incredible String Band. John Travolta – couldn’t care less about him or his disco followers. Other names I have no idea of or they just don’t interest me.
I look around the place and it’s fairly busy. There’s other people doing the test too. Seems like quite a few staff in here, all with a “reformed hippy” type of dress code. There’s a few ill-fitting suits but mostly it’s semi-casual. Busy. Friendly – at least to me.
Soon the girl has me come over and sit at her desk. She lays this graph out in front of me and shows me me as I am, as I am with others and as I am with work. She’s so certain it must be correct. And some of these home truths about my screwed-up life hit me pretty hard.
$30 – try this and see how it goes. It will help you with these messed up areas of your life. It’s only going to get worse if you don’t do something so what have you got to lose? $30 for 5 nights.
I finally agree. Then she fixes me with a glare and says “Do you take drugs?”
Well yes, I’ve been doing LSD every fortnight and got some great home-grown marijuana. Haven’t had any speed or heroin for a while. Pretty pleased with that.
“Don’t – not while you’re doing this. It’ll stop it working.”
OK, OK, I got the message. A week straight is probably just what I need anyway, especially since I’ve just been shown how much of a basket-case I am.
I get walked up some stairs into another room with second-hand furniture and get introduced to Jan. She’s more laid-back than Kerri. She tells me she won’t be here when I turn up on Monday but a girl called Barbie will be. OK I’m coming in Monday night, 7 pm. Jan seems cool, so does Kerri. They seem like honest girls. They seem to want the best for me. They reckon this stuff works well.
I walk out of there and there’s still plenty of daylight. No alcohol nor drugs this weekend, come back in Monday at 7. It’s definitely weird, but some of my mates have been in here and told me about it, and they all walked away from it after a while. $30 is no big outlay, especially if it does something for me. Maybe I got out of the truck early this afternoon for a reason. Sometimes things are meant to be.
I turned up Monday night and got introduced to some other guy who’d just started like me. We sat opposite each other and he asked me the same question over and over again for a while and then I did the same to him. Then it was nearly 10 o’clock so we went home.
Came back in Tuesday night and did the same thing. Same on Wednesday. It was interesting. Sorted some stuff out for myself and it was interesting to listen to someone else’s problems as well as just download me.
Thursday was different. It started out the same, but then I realized that I could solve all my problems. Totally. I didn’t need to fear problems, I could solve them just by tackling them logically. It was quite amazing. Probably had something to do with being off drugs for a whole week but I was told it was these amazing techniques developed by this guy Hubbard who started Scientology. And I’d given up the drugs before and never had this happen to me so it must be true.
Friday I turned up and didn’t do much apart from run these techniques on some girl staff member who was pretty new to the scene – her name was Jo. She seemed to have a great time and told me I’d make a great “auditor” – that’s someone who “runs” these “processes” that Hubbard came up with. Someone who sits there and listens to another unburden. I’m told I don’t need any more as I’ve reached the goal of all this the night before, and I’m pretty happy with that. Life beckons. Maybe I’ll be able to stay off the drugs now.
But there’s people I need to see apparently, and so I get taken to see them. I write up what happened and someone asks me some questions about it while I’m hooked up to this thing called an “E-meter.” That’s up on the second floor, Then I get taken somewhere else and asked some more questions, then meet someone else. It was all a bit of a blur.
I just know that at some point I agreed to come back and see this guy called Paul on the next day. I wasn’t sure what for but it seemed important. Somehow I could become a really great auditor for just $400, or was it $600? This would let me get far far bigger wins than I’d just had and I could do it with someone else without any extra costs. IF I wanted to buy this stuff done by professionals, it would cost me thousands to have someone else do it. I didn’t have thousands, but I did have just under a thousand dollars in my bank account. Somehow I agreed to this – yes it’s $600. I was going to save up for a decent car but it’s more important to fix me up I guess. And I can save up more while I’m doing this study. I mean, I won’t be spending it on drugs and alcohol any more now, so it’s really a bit of a bargain.
I get the money out of the bank and go back and see Paul with it. There’s this teenage girl there who sneers at me. She’s obviously a disco person – dresses like one. I’m a scruffy, bearded hippy in clothes with holes in them and I don’t care. But Paul’s happy to see me and treats me like a good friend. He takes me off to meet a whole new bunch of people in this rabbit warren of a building, all sitting at their second-hand desks. Lot of people don’t like the look of me, but that’s fairly usual. Most try to be friendly.
Finally I get to the courseroom where I’m going to be studying and I meet various people then wait to meet the supervisor of it all. His name is Allen and he’s a bit scary. I HAVE to be on time and make sure I don’t talk to other students and I HAVE to be on time and I need to put my hand up if I have any problems and I HAVE to be on time and I have to look up any word I don’t know and “clear it” – use it in made-up sentences and I HAVE to be on time - I definitely don’t want to make an enemy of this man.
I start, and begin reading this thing called “Keeping Scientology Working” out of the folder of stuff they gave me called the “Student Hat” – some course that’ll help me study, and it’s free. I dropped out of uni several years earlier because I couldn’t study – that, and the drugs. So maybe this’ll get me able to go back there and finish that degree some day.
I finish wading through the pages of this thing and put my hand up. Allen asks me the definition of a word and I can’t define it, although I’m sure I sort of know what it means. He shows me the dictionary. I have to read it again.
I dunno how many times I read that thing and got flunked, but I sure learned a bunch of words I thought I knew but really didn’t. At the end of the night, they all gave “wins” that sounded pretty wacky then all stood up and applauded this big picture of Hubbard in a sailor’ hat. Seemed like Chinese applauding Chairman Mao’s picture to me, but I went along with it. When in Rome, ....
I caught the train home late that night wondering a bit what the hell I’d gotten into. It was interesting, but definitely different. All a bit weird. I didn’t really care – it was better than going and getting drunk and/or stoned and certainly cheaper. And there were some good-looking girls in there. Friendly too. I was 22 years old.
I would be 52 years old when I finally left Scientology and began to critically examine what the hell had just happened to me.