TRs are always good! TRs are always bad!

[Veda]

Simplistic and incomplete descriptions of "TRs" are here to stay.

Descriptions of "TRs" as a conveyance, or means, that can have a positive OR negative application, or result, are almost non-existent.

Those who insist that "TRs" are *always* sinister will never admit that anyone has ever benefited from doing "TRs," or that "TRs" could ever be used in a positive way.

Those who insist that "TRs" are *always* good, will never admit that "TRs" can sometimes be subtly overwheming and manipulative.

The cult of Scientology uses everything to serve its ends. "TRs" would not be part of Scientology if they did not serve Scientology's ends. Yet, are "TRs," in themselves, inherently and automatically evil?

Scientology exploits many things. It exploits hope and idealism. Are hope and idealism, in themselves, evil?

Years ago, L. Ron Hubbard Jr. talked about the development of "TRs" (around 1957). Ron Jr., a severe critic of Scientology, didn't seem to think that "TRs" were, in themselves, sinister and evil. It's hardly ever mentioned, but Ron Jr. - during the time that he was briefly active again (1983-1986), actually audited people. How could this be? After all, Ron Jr. had - and in my opinion, accurately - described his father's Scientology as being "rotten at the core."

To make things all the more confusing, the Scientology cult, with its "Bernie Family" (fake "moderate critic") project and web site, has sought to muddy the waters further.

And it goes on and on.

We've all seen the classic "total certainty" Scientology member. For some, just walking into an "Org," receiving approval from others, and hearing slogans, was adequate to solidify him or her into the cult mind-set.

Yet, others have been exposed to the same approval and the same slogans without succumbing to the cult mind-set, and some of these have gone on to read Hubbard's books, and to experiment with auditing, and, somehow, they did so without surrendering all personal sovereignty.

And there are many other variations.

IMO, L. Ron Hubbard crafted his Scientology "Church" to "assert and maintain dominion over the thoughts and loyalties of individuals," however, is every idea, and every action or technique, used along the way, inherently bad? Or is it more complicated than that?

 

[Royal Prince Xenu]

I was about to start a thread on TRs and found this one. I don't know if they're inherently good or bad, but I think the principles are reasonable if people get it right.

When I first read TR 0 where it said "no blinking" I hit the roof and insisted that I was not going to risk my eyesight by overriding the biological requirement to blink. That's when I was shown the "Blinkless TRs" bulletin that said "normal" blinking was permissible. I later heard of people doing Pro TRs who were forced to do 2 or more hours of a drill with no blinking at all. Did anyone else experience this for real?

I guess my 'natural' TRs were strong enough to ensure that I didn't have to do Pro TRs. If I had been ordered to not blink for two hours, someone else would have had at least one very sore eye.

Of course, I saw my share of bad TRs as well. I called them Plastic TRs, and noticed it mostly at Exams, when the examiners would "put TRs in". They would go all plastic and I used to really get annoyed with the Meter TR that required the Examiner to look at me instead of the meter. "You're needle is floating." "How the @#$% do you know? You haven't looked at the meter!" That must really put unsuspecting public right off...

I also love that description about staring pop-eyed scientologists which LRH decried as a lie. Why didn't he see it for what it was: TRs that were unflat?

I never drilled the ashtray TR, but I do find 8C very helpful outside the org. When I was doing security it came in very handy. The best story was when I was on duty with another guard who was about to eject a drunk and I warned him "Don't engage him in conversation, you'll be stuck there all night." I then looked directly at the drunk, about ten yards away and said very quietly, "You were just leaving, weren't you?" The other guard thought I was nuts, but within two minutes the drunk stood up, and walked unwaveringly to the exit. Once outside we both saw the drunkenness hit him again, and he looked around wandering what had happened. That's only one of many 8C stories, but that damned ashtray still won't stand up under its own power...

 

[Dulloldfart]

When I first read TR 0 where it said "no blinking" I hit the roof and insisted that I was not going to risk my eyesight by overriding the biological requirement to blink. That's when I was shown the "Blinkless TRs" bulletin that said "normal" blinking was permissible. I later heard of people doing Pro TRs who were forced to do 2 or more hours of a drill with no blinking at all. Did anyone else experience this for real?

The first thing I did in Scn was a Hubbard Apprentice Scientologist course, at a cost of £5 in 1972. It was supposed to be a Div 6 course, but it was pretty much a Hard TRs course. I was on it for 3 weeks full-time and got up to TR-3 or something before I joined the SO. Great course!

Anyway, I was living in London at the time, and after a train journey I took about an hour to walk home. Not understanding much of anything at the time, I thought it would be useful to practise "blinkless TRs". So when I started my hour's walk, through the dusty, windy, gritty South London streets, I forced myself not to blink. It wasn't TR-0 at all, but it was blinkless, despite the huge discomfort from the grit etc.

What I found very interesting was that after half an hour or so of acute discomfort and almost unbearable urges to blink, it became easy to do. The urge to blink went away, and the discomfort disappeared, despite the grit etc.

I was very surprised, as that result was not what I would have predicted. Sitting in a clean courseroom maybe, but not walking windy London streets.

Paul

 

[barky]

I never had a problem with any TR course I ever did. I never took formal auditor training, I'm just talking HQS, Student Hat, etc. level TRs.

The term "blinkless" was horribly misunderstood IMO. The goal is to stop unnatural blinking, that type of blinking that nervous people do when under the microscope (the Nancy Pelosi blinking ).

 

[Alanzo]

I never had a problem with any TR course I ever did. I never took formal auditor training, I'm just talking HQS, Student Hat, etc. level TRs.

The term "blinkless" was horribly misunderstood IMO. The goal is to stop unnatural blinking, that type of blinking that nervous people do when under the microscope (the Nancy Pelosi blinking ).

Hey!

I like Nancy Pelosi a lot!

She may have a "Stepford Wife" kind of misfired circuitry look occasionally while talking, coupled with "those lights....they're so...so bright.. wha is it?" deer in the headlights look, but hey - she's the first woman Speaker of the House!

(Actually, really, I do like her. She is a badly needed counter-anchor to Bush.)

 

[lionheart]

The first thing I did in Scn was a Hubbard Apprentice Scientologist course, at a cost of £5 in 1972. It was supposed to be a Div 6 course, but it was pretty much a Hard TRs course. I was on it for 3 weeks full-time and got up to TR-3 or something before I joined the SO. Great course!

Anyway, I was living in London at the time, and after a train journey I took about an hour to walk home. Not understanding much of anything at the time, I thought it would be useful to practise "blinkless TRs". So when I started my hour's walk, through the dusty, windy, gritty South London streets, I forced myself not to blink. It wasn't TR-0 at all, but it was blinkless, despite the huge discomfort from the grit etc.

What I found very interesting was that after half an hour or so of acute discomfort and almost unbearable urges to blink, it became easy to do. The urge to blink went away, and the discomfort disappeared, despite the grit etc.

I was very surprised, as that result was not what I would have predicted. Sitting in a clean courseroom maybe, but not walking windy London streets.

Paul

I did mine in London a little before you. TR's were done hard in those days with no compromise for raw public. I always disagreed later with soft TRs and thought they were a violation of LRH's order that TRs are never softened for the public. Later, when I ran courses I never softened them, despite getting crammed once by the Org for out-gradient. Happy days! Oh no! the planet never got cleared!

Was Yvonne Malpass your course Super? She was great! Bags of ARC, but uncompromising. All her students at the time seemed to do great on the hard TRs. Even the old guy who used to come in every evening and go to sleep for two hours! He did that course for months (yikes! maybe he's still on it thirty-five years later! )

 

[Dulloldfart]

Was Yvonne Malpass your course Super?

It was a guy called Phil. I don't remember his last name.

Paul

 

[Terril park]

I did mine in London a little before you. TR's were done hard in those days with no compromise for raw public. I always disagreed later with soft TRs and thought they were a violation of LRH's order that TRs are never softened for the public. Later, when I ran courses I never softened them, despite getting crammed once by the Org for out-gradient. Happy days! Oh no! the planet never got cleared!

Was Yvonne Malpass your course Super? She was great! Bags of ARC, but uncompromising. All her students at the time seemed to do great on the hard TRs. Even the old guy who used to come in every evening and go to sleep for two hours! He did that course for months (yikes! maybe he's still on it thirty-five years later! )

The name Yvonne Malpass rings a bell associated with good memories,but I can't recall her face or anything really. Long blonde hair? The old guy was probably called Sid and he was an illegalPC if its the same guy. Gadzooks! we may have been on course together at some time.

 

[Dulloldfart]

The old guy was probably called Sid and he was an illegalPC if its the same guy. Gadzooks! we may have been on course together at some time.

Sid Batten was the name that sprung to my mind when I first read about the old guy, but apart from a quick flash of his appearance along with the name I couldn't remember a thing about him, including where I had come across him, so didn't add him in to my previous reply. Same Sid, bb?

Paul

 

[lionheart]

The name Yvonne Malpass rings a bell associated with good memories,but I can't recall her face or anything really. Long blonde hair? The old guy was probably called Sid and he was an illegalPC if its the same guy. Gadzooks! we may have been on course together at some time.

Sid Batton was the man! Used to shuffle in, be given a twin and sit there and snooze all evening. What a guy! I think he was put on TR's to make him eligible or something. As far as I know he never got off the HAS course and may well still be there, snoozing in a chair!

If I remember correctly this was before OTTR0 was on the comm course. But Sid just intuitively did TR0 eyes closed!

Yes, Yvonne had long blonde hair. Funny, I never heard a bad word about her. Saw her name years later as an editor of Source mag or something. What a waste of a wonderful person with the right public PR presence.

Interesting historical note: A guy came on our Comm course, and each night, along with Sid shuffling in, this guy would bring another of his house-mates in until there were about eight of them including David Banks and his wife who ended up before Justice Latey in the custody ruling.

 

[Royal Prince Xenu]

I always disagreed later with soft TRs and thought they were a violation of LRH's order that TRs are never softened for the public.

I never heard a thing about hard vs soft. Is this solely around the "blinkless" issue, or was there something else involved?

 

[Sky]

There is a Tech Film called, "The Different TR Courses and Their Criticism". It goes over how there is a difference in the level of skill required for a pass from the Success Through Communication Course to the TRs and Objectives Co-audit Course to the Pro TRs Course.

When I did the Pro TRs Course there was an HCOB which stated that blinking is not a flunk on Pro TRs. I believe the name of it was "Coaching TRs 0-4". Although later in the bulletin it states that although blinkless TRs are not a requirement for a pass, any truly competent auditor can do them. That always bugged me.

There's also one other bulletin that addresses cycling through the TRs, getting tougher each time. When I was Supervising, this was the way it was done on the lower TR courses (TRs and Objectives Co-audit, Therapeutic TRs, etc.) But on the Pro TRs Course one would do each TR until it was perfect, and then move on to the next one.

 

[lionheart]

I never heard a thing about hard vs soft. Is this solely around the "blinkless" issue, or was there something else involved?

In my day there was supposedly only one standard for TRs (hard, tough, thorough) but according to LRH others kept softening them. Based on his track record it was probably him who kept softening them, then blaming others for softening them.

Anyway he wrote an issue (was it called "Hard TR's"? - not sure , it's a long time ago) Anyway that said that TR's should never be softened for the public and that the public always liked tough TR's. That confirmed my experience on the Comm Course in London 1970.

It wasn't a blinkless standard. Just doing them per the HCOB until one could just be there. The two hours was an arbitrary, but from what I remember the issue did state or imply being able to do it for hours. Then some sort of pro-Tr's came out where a timer was set for two hours and if the person flunked the timer was reset for a further two hours.

Although the HCOB said no blinking, flinching, etc. another issue came out saying blinkless was an arbtrary. Like all things LRH there were contradictions that were, of course, all correct because all LRH data was right!

In my experience, thorough, uncompromising comm courses for public tended to produce longer-standing Scientologists, whereas soft TR courses where the drills tended to be run only to a win, like quickie grades earlier, tended to produce Scientologists who quickly blew or faded away.

 

[programmer_guy]

I finally did blinkless TR0 while on the Comm Course. (Wow, my eyes got really dried out when I did that.)

After the time of my joining staff we stopped pushing that.

Yes, it's supposed to be "unnatural" or excessive blinking that is flunked. It was up to the coach (ultimately the sup) as to what was perceived as excessive blinking. IMO, this judgement call was subjective.

Now, I think that a person with certain allergies would need to blink more often. (Oops! Maybe they are using an allergy to confront. Ha.)

Funny:
To really do this right, one would need to do some medical lab work-ups on each individual (tear duct production and probably other stuff) and then diagnose the minimum blinks per minute needed for each individual - case by case. Then flunk them when they exceed this. This would be the scientific way of doing it. Students and staff would need to carry their medical lab sheet with them to show their TR coach before drills.
:jawdrop: