Great Excuses for Why Scientology Does Not Work by Lana Mitchell on Milestone2 blog

out-2dYesterday, on February 22nd, Lana Mitchell of Milestone2 blog, wrote a post about “criminal and out-ethics” types who have come to her for help with Scientology technology and no progress was made with them.

So instead of seeing that the tech did not work in those instances, she dismisses these people as criminals.

Lana is a smart person and a very clear and sensible writer. But she has let Scientology do her thinking for her for so long she has blinkered herself from being able to confront the real results Scientology technology.

Here is her post:

“by Lana M.

Ethics is a personal thing. It is the choices that a person makes in day to day life which influence their survival or hinder it.

There are no absolutes, and the gradient scale of right and wrong are something that every person on this planet has to personally weigh up, when going about life.

Should I pay for this item, or quietly walk out with it in my pocket?

Should I keep my vows with my spouse, or have some fun on the town without him/her knowing?

Should I gamble with my salary, invest, create a savings account, or stash the money under my mattress?

Should I work — and where — and what role of responsibility will I take for my place of work in seeing to their ongoing survival?

When I screw up or make a mistake, should I be honest and own up, or try to cover it up so no one finds out?

So many questions, and only you can make the choices and decisions.

I have met many people in recent years who I care for deeply. Really good friends and people I will go out of my way to assist and help. I open my house up to people and routinely have people living here for days, weeks or even months.

I love being able to help a person along and get them flying — but every once in a while I run into a person who despite the best of intentions, simply continues on a down-ward spiral. There are problems, there is a woven mess of personal, marital and organizational issues that seem impossible to unravel. And as we get one sorted out — another pops up as unresolving.

And in each case where an individual in this situation has shown up, there has been an underlying ethics situation that is continuing in present time and prevents any change.

I don’t use this as a label or way of outcasting a person — but a simple acknowledgement that the person is making decisions in their life that are not improving survival for them. They are involved in things that are actually dishonest, illegal, unfair or out-exchange — not because I say so, but because they KNOW so and have not been willing to look or admit to it. There is a continued push pull of wanting to achieve things, but then pulling themselves back so they do not continue to cause harm.

And until they sit back and look at, and take responsibility for what they are doing with their own hands, there is no moving forward on the Bridge. It is not that I, or another auditor closes the gates — but because THEY stop themselves from making gains. Actively.

We could not push them up The Bridge or audit them regardless of their scene, as the tech won’t go in, they won’t make the gains, and they are not honestly in session as they are too busy trying to withhold or not be discovered.

When I worked in the Sea Org I had a theoretical view of Ethics, and would apply it to a fair degree in a rote manner, but my own capacity to confront and direct another person has come way up since that time. Recently I have had a several criminal-types who have ended up at my door, and no matter how much help is offered them, until they actually confront and take responsibility for what THEY are doing (not what has been done to them), there is simply no change, no movement on the Bridge and continued unhappiness.

This has brought home to me the importance of a field auditor and group having strong Ethics lines. Writing a report on a person and sending it to them and to their file is a simple basic ethics gradient that has to be used. Calling an Ethics Hearing when a person blows. Getting a PTS Rundown standardly completed, or a thorough confessional. Pulling the withholds becomes vital, and the use of conditions formulas give a person the way to pull themselves up by their own boot straps.

I care for people and it unfortunately worries me when I see a person unhappy, caught up in personal messes and seemingly unable to resolve them.

The truth is however that I cannot get another person to make the survival choices in their life. I cannot (and never will) try to force a reality on another person “for their own good”. Ethics only works as a personal thing. It requires the person themselves sitting back, recognizing that the only way things will improve is by them taking responsibility for what they have done and are doing, and then CHANGING those things.

Another person cannot do it for them.

Only they can.

And though it may not be a pleasant personal journey, the person themselves realises that the light at the end of the tunnel is not an oncoming train, but is actually the way out. And life improves. And things go well.

I extend my hand to persons who are in such circumstances. I will help people who want to lead an honest life (not honest in my view, but honest in theirs).

“DISHONESTY CAN PREVENT CASE GAIN.

“Case gain depends entirely upon the person’s ability to view the truth of something in order to bring about an as-isness. (Ref: The Axioms of Scientology, Booklet: Axioms and Logics)

“This ability is gained or regained on a gradient scale. The Grade Chart is designed to assist one to view gradiently larger areas of truth at each level. As one progresses up the Chart his ability to view the truth of things improves and expands. The accumulated masses and burdens and problems and falsities of a lifetime or lifetimes are dissolved and vanished, leaving the being free and clean and in control of his life and environment.

“But to receive help as a pc or pre-OT, one has to be honest with his auditor.

“Dishonest people have withholds, and withholds stack up mass and bring about stupidity. They cut the person’s reach and his ability to perceive. They hold in place the masses that imprison and pin the being at the level of Homo sapiens-and a miserable Homo sapiens, at that! Who is such a person really fooling?

“Thus, one can bar his own way up the Bridge by dishonesty.

“I always feel a bit sad when I see somebody doing himself in this way. It is so pointless.

“One sees this in those who, for whatever irrational reason, cling knowingly to withholds and wind up critical, nattery and generating hostility. If one finds himself feeling hounded or persecuted, he should ask himself what his condition is on the first dynamic instead of going around persuading others to do him in.

“How precious, after all, are one’s dishonesties, withholds and falsities in the face of the real freedom there is to be gained?

“One CAN be honest. He will find it a happier, more comfortable existence when he is.

“And more important-he’ll find the route to stable case gain is now open to him.

“HONESTY OPENS THE DOOR TO CASE GAIN.

“That is the route to sanity. It is the route up the Bridge to OT and real freedom. With honesty, one can make it and make it all the way!

“Why settle for anything less?”

LRH, HCOB 1 MAY 1985, C/S Series 120, HONESTY AND CASE GAIN

Excuses, excuses Lana!

When did you become so reasonable with the tech?

Alanzo

9 thoughts on “Great Excuses for Why Scientology Does Not Work by Lana Mitchell on Milestone2 blog”

  1. I know from experience that “the tech” doesn’t achieve its stated purpose, you hang around though hoping that the next level will be the one which does it for you.  It wasn’t just me either, I spoke to quite a few people who said that the lower bridge levels hadn’t really done much for them, yet they were still hoping for big changes on the ot levels. According to the hubbardisms that Lana is regurgitating we all must have been out ethics criminals – the perfect excuse for why the wonderful tech didn’t work. Sounds very much like another control technique to me – ethics are supposed to be a personal thing, yet over and over l ron tells you what to think and how to behave, hence you all start to behave like each other and keep any personal thoughts to yourself to avoid ethics action – sounds just like a totalitarian regime.

  2. I forgot to add a wonderful observation I found on John P Capitalist’s blog: In analyzing an email he had been sent by a reader John pointed out that data was being treated as fact, when in fact it is simply hubbard’s unproven opinion – http://www.johnpcapitalist.com/2013/12/a-certain-minimalist-quality/

    I wonder how many of us fell into this trap? We only have one person’s word that any of this “data” is true, sure there may be some evidence to support it as a theory, but to state it as fact?

    • Anyone in Scientology has fallen for this to greater or lesser extent.

      There was no “research” outside of Hubbard’s ow  troubled mind and what he could pull out of his ample buttocks.

      ‘Assertion is All’ was his Maxim, or in simpler, Parent-speak: “Because I said so, that’s why (plus “research”)

  3. Lana would benefit from reading Jeff Hawkins new book, where he dissects the Introduction to Scientology Ethics book.  No thinking person, after reading this book, could ethically recommend Hubbardian Ethics to anyone.

    It’s ironic how you can state “Man is basically good”, then spend so much time and effort convincing the person how he is bad or unethical because the “tech didn’t work.”  The whole “ethics must be in, before tech can go in” never quite added up for me.  Again, this is taken as an uninspected “fact.”  But, what exactly does this mean, in real-life practical terms.  We are told that man’s unethical behavior is pushing him towards succumb, while the auditor feverishly works pushing him towards survive.  That these two forces work against each other, effectively cancelling each other out.  And that “out-ethics” leads to a hasty demise.

    But, in real-life you don’t have to look too hard to find examples that disprove this theory.  Charles Manson is over 80 years old and is still kicking, while Mr. OT died at 74.  Oops.  Or, I’m sure you could find a non-pedo priest or nun who lived a selfless charitable life, who died suddenly at a young age.  Doesn’t add up.

    My gut instinct on this is the vast majority of the people on this planet are not committing continuous overts, that they are basically good, and are simply trying to survive.  Subjecting them to Hubbard’s advanced ethics technology only serves to introvert them and make them have a lessor opinion of themselves.

    The only thing that does make sense is what Hawkins concluded in his book, that Ethics exists as a form of thought/mind control.  And exists almost solely for the benefit of Scn itself – not the individual.

    • 100% in agreement with your recommendation of Jefferson’s book.

       

      OTOH, I would argue that “Clear” Charles Manson (300+ hours of auditing!) probably adhered to Hubbard’s principles of ‘ethics’ at least as well as LRH, probably better. He was certainly less of a hypocrite.

  4. On its face, the ethics tech seems to be designed to make self right and others wrong.

     

    Is MS2 an OSA op? Or is this divide, hate and conquer just scientology standardly applied?

    • I’m pretty sure MS2 is not an OSA op, Lana Mitchell is one of the main site administrators and has written some pretty damning things about DM – I believe she posted on Marty’s blog a few times and can be found on the scientology-cult website. Lana believes that scn’s problems began when DM took over and that it will therefore work if we follow in LRH’s footsteps. This is not a feeling I share as I’ve just seen too many lies and contradictions created by the “great man” himself.

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