Here's the original Phil Spickler article:
Date: Sat, 4 Jan 2003 00:35:58 EST
Greetings, my fellow IVy-ans!
First and foremost, my thanks to Pat Krenik, Ray Krenik, Ron Blouch, and
Bernie Wimbush for kindly writing to the list re: my latest and unworthy
communication. I have long suffered from a condition known as verbal
diarrhea, which turned out to be the cure for an earlier condition called
communication constipation. Anyhow, here's some more. Please exercise your
inalienable right to accept or reject any or all of that which follows.
It has been said somewhere in the Scientology Axioms that total affinity,
reality, and communication would cause a cessation of the mechanical
conditions of existence, which in simple and plain language means that in the
presence of total ARC there would be nothing. However, less than total ARC
often elicits in many of us a yearning for such a state, versus that thing
called Life, which humorously and actually is based on an ARC break, which is
to say in simple language, a falling away from total ARC.
Moving on to tonight's poor excuse for an entertainment, I should like to
begin by saying that somewheres back in the early 1960's, that modern-day
Aristotle, namely L. Ron Hubbard, acquired a fairly large property located in
Sussex county, near the wee hamlet of East Grinstead, south of London in that
beautiful and amazing isle called England. The estate at one time had
belonged to none other than the Maharajah of Rajpur, and was called St. Hill,
and was a rather beautiful and wondrous place. It was at this location that
Ron created a course for professional Scientologists called the St. Hill
Special Briefing Course, which was designed to bring professional
Scientologists up to date on all the existing technology, as well as briefing
them on the latest developments. And although it was originally posited to
be a 6- or 7-week course, for one reason or another it was not uncommon to
spend as long as a year attempting to complete it.
Several things came out of the 1960's period at St. Hill: the creation or
notion of an ethics technology came to pass, a chart of organization, which
came to be known as the Org Board, was designed and invented, to provide a
picture of all the different parts that should exist and operate in an ideal
organization; a grade chart, which gave a series of steps leading from
beginning states of improved awareness all the way up to and including Clear
and later of course even beyond that were developed; and the other side of
the chart had a route that could take one from beginnings up through advanced
degrees of professional practitioner or auditor. And it was about this time
and shortly thereafter that Scientology and Dianetics, under L. Ron Hubbard's
guidance, became a business, ultimately a big business. And all the factors
necessary to attract customers, to sell them something, and to keep them
coming back for more, was/were now in place.
In fact, it was during this period that Ron wrote something called
"Keeping Scientology Working," a Policy Letter that was implanted into the
mind and soul of every Scientologist who could possibly be implanted with it,
and at one point in the body of this Policy Letter, to the horror of many of
us, Ron Hubbard said the following fateful words: "Scientology is a deadly
serious business." These words still chill my soul when I remember them and
repeat them.
So it wasn't enough, you see, to turn this glorious idea into a business,
a money-making business, it was also to be a deadly serious business. Well,
it's hard for me to imagine any more lethal blows that could be delivered to
the shining diamond, the beautiful pearl, the glowing emerald that was
Scientology and Dianetics, that would cause the jewel to shatter. But it was
on that road with those few words and what came to follow them.
One of the more odious or disgusting things that came out of this period
was to standardize the tech and to engrave in stone something called The
Bridge or the Bridge to Total Freedom, which was a wonderful marketing ploy
for a business, because no matter what a customer achieved, as soon as they
had achieved it you could point out to them all the things that remained on
the Bridge to Total Freedom that they needed to buy as soon as possible, in
fact immediately.
This was a far cry from the idea of a person, an individual, coming to a
field auditor or a group and saying, "I heard from a friend that Scientology
and/or Dianetics can do good things for a person, and there's a few things
that trouble me and there's a few things that I'd like to be better at -- can
you help me?" And taking care of these matters for the person, and then
letting them get back to their life and livingness. But Scientology the
Business couldn't have that -- no matter how happy the person was with their
results, and no matter how anxious they were to get back to life, the
business pointed out to them that there was much more that they needed to do
and accomplish, and here was this whole Grade Chart, and let's get you signed
up for your next service now. And that's what making Scientology a business,
with money in" of prime importance, did to affect and shape the movement, the
tech, and its delivery.
And just as we had the Standard Grade Chart, we wanted to have the
Standard Person who had the Standard Case, in which everybody needed
everything on the Grade Chart and then some. And even if they had enough
money and time to do it all, they still needed more if they had any money
left and it was up to Mr. Hubbard to keep creating things that could be sold
for more and more money -- big-ticket items. And as far as I know, right
into present time, this deadly serious business is still in operation, doing
its deadly serious things with those who come under its thrall.
Dianetics was a great idea, and I'm happy to report to anyone listening
that I have, a number of times over the years, used it with and for people
who had never heard of the word "Dianetics," in which there was no mention of
anything called an engram, or the file clerk, or the somatic strip, or any of
the terminology of Dianetics -- in other words, without "educating" the
person at all, achieving the same or better results than having them read the
Dianetic book or telling them anything about the reactive mind and what's
supposed to be in it.
I've also found that it's quite possible to give a Scientology session,
using processes that had become part of what are called the Grades or used in
Life Repair, without ever mentioning the word "Scientology," "ARC break,"
"session," "preclear," "auditor," or any of the other nomenclature and
terminology connected with these subjects, and achieve wonderful results. My
address to people first and foremost lies under the idea of help, and second
of all that they shall be the explorer and the discoverer, and I shall make
sure that that gets acknowledged.
One of the problems that was mentioned by L. Ron Hubbard in a
professional course called the Philadelphia Doctorate Course, which resulted
in that amazing series of lectures called the Philadelphia Doctorate Course
Lectures, was how it is possible to use agreement, on a gradient, to pretty
much enslave another being or beings without them noticing how they got
there. He gave a marvelous lecture on this subject, and pretty well pointed
out how it's done just a little at a time. Part of what happened to many
Scientologists was that as time went by, their ability and willingness to say
"No," their ability and willingness to question, their willingness and
ability to say, "That's not true for me," was gradually and systematically
eliminated, until it reached the point that Ron could say, "Blank blank," and
without knowing how it was done, folks would simply create Blank blank, put
the significance and mass into it and charge it up so well that it ran on a
meter (an E-meter, that is) like dynamite, while the guy imagined that it was
something that had been lying around in his reactive mind for ages and he
just hit upon it, instead of doing what any thetan or being can do,
especially when there's lots of beingness or beings around that are not only
already in a hypnotic state or case level but are easily hypnotized.
Why, a clever lecturer can sometimes get a whole audience of people in
such a high degree of agreement with and about what that lecturer is
discussing that afterward, with a very few exceptions, you could take each
member of the audience and get what the lecturer was talking about to run on
an E-meter with each person achieving what would be thought to be case gain.
Anyway, I don't want take this particular line too much further, but I
think it's fair to say that Ron achieved a state in the minds and hearts and
souls of many of his followers that made it possible for them to unknowingly
create and audit his discoveries as promoted and described to them. And that
is a business you can't beat. And of course, keep them coming back for more
is the motto of almost all businesses, second only to profit as a motive.
Well, this seems to be a sad story, but in fact it really isn't, because
there's a great deal to be found in both Dianetics and Scientology that is
truly and absolutely wonderful, and that can be used outside the profit
motive or the enslavement motive to definitely and without question help and
improve the life and livingness of just about any human being. And I think
as long as one keeps one's attention on these possibilities, there's still
quite a bit of fun and joy and aliveness to be experienced.
I'd like to ramble on and talk more about hypnosis, but I think I shall
save that for another outpouring. Hoping to hear from others, I remain . . .