Author Geir Isene

OT 8 – follow-up

Geir Isene 1,345 Comments

This is a follow-up to my previous post, “OT 8”

Imagine this:

You have a problem in life. To you it is a big issue that you really would like to get handled.

You come across the Church of Scientology, where they promise you a better life, spiritual freedom and a permanent fix to your problem.

You embark upon a journey up through many levels of counseling – called The Bridge to Total Freedom.

You finish level after level. Your communication improves, you get more self-confident, become more spiritually aware, other areas of your life improves.

Your main issue in life, however seems to be a tough one to handle. But you push on as you are told that some next level will handle it.

All the way to the top you go. To OT 8. Each level has its own specific end result. On OT 8, it is:

“I now know who I am not, and am interested in finding out who I am”

And that is the end of the road. You don’t get to know who you are, what you are or anything positive. You get to know who you aren’t – and you are interested in finding out who you are. That’s it.

Although I got great gains from doing OT 8 myself, partly because I have a different take on the rationale behind the upper levels in Scientology. But imagine getting to the end of the road, still possibly having major issues you’d like to have handled. I would imagine some people could get quite confused, spinny, mad or feel fucked over by such a brush-off end result. Parked out in nowhere and asked to contribute their lives to get the next level released – at the whim of the Church’s management. All the while being demanded to uphold a perfect facade of a happy opinion leader to the rest of the foot soldiers. A perfect exterior, interior in shambles.

I am not saying this is how the majority of OT 8s feel after completing the level. I didn’t, and I know others who have justified the level in a satisfactory way. But I know of several that have had some serious issues and even contemplating suicide after reaching such a spiritual dead end hostage situation – where you get the next fix only if you give your heart and soul to a greedy management. Mad much? You bet.

Letting anyone halt at the end result of OT 8 is cruel. If anything, the church should have waited with the release of OT 8 until they had the rest of “finding out who you are” canned. It’s like doing a surgical operation half-way and leave the patient.

If you were in such a situation, would you do everything the church asked of you in the hope of a new level released? Or would you revolt? Or what?

Update: Maria commented that the EP of OT 8 is in fact that the person completing the level is now interested in doing the Enemy condition.

My current quests

Geir Isene 139 Comments

…or at least two of them are:

  1. Remove my expectations in life
  2. Remove my labels in life

In the first quest I seek to rid myself of any expectations. I have yet to find a good and solid business case for having expectations. They are great for generating disappointments, but not for much else. They detract from fully experiencing the here and now by putting some of my attention into the future. I would rather live here and now.

In the second quest, I seek to observe situations and people without labeling. Seeing people for what they truly are instead of seeing them through filters such as “Wog”, “Gay”, “Terrorist”, “Strange”, “Jerk”, “SP”, or some such.

I still have expectations and I still use labels. These are quests. I am a work in progress 🙂

What are your quests in life?

Harmony

Geir Isene 69 Comments

I used to feel most harmonious alone. Away from the intentions of others to change me, shape me or nudge my ways just the slightest in some direction. Away from explicit of unspoken criticism, silent treatments or looks of disapproval.

I have since a long time now felt great alone. Total harmony, no issues, no unwanted (by me) thoughts or behavior. Great bliss.

alone

I am a rebel, yes. But with a cause. Not conforming to certain norms or set behaviors. Not using the fork correctly, talking to the right people at the right times or utilizing the appropriate phrases at conservative social gatherings. All true. But in turning the table, I wouldn’t care. It didn’t matter to me if people were conforming, if they were socially odd or spent too much time playing Lego with the kids instead of talking to the right people at the wedding party.

Very seldom did I feel that I could be myself fully. Nowhere was this more true than in the Church of Scientology. One step out of the party-line, and it was straight into an interrogation interview with the Ethics Officer. And as I progressed up through the upper spiritual levels of Scientology (the OT levels), the demands for conformity grew beyond that of the old East Germany, the DDR.

I got fed up of the frowning or disapprovals. I quit the church. I got new friends. And tolerance became a most wanted quality in people I spend time with.

As I write this, there are a few people that I feel I can be completely free, myself and in harmony around and with. These are the people that when I am with them, I feel on par with being alone. Brendan and Anette are such remarkable people of tolerance. Grand and generous.

I will continue to seek out the grand and generous – an ongoing quest.

Would you like to share the qualities you seek in others?

A bunch of rules for happy living

Geir Isene 146 Comments
  1. Get up in the morning
  2. if you feel like it.
  3. Get enough sleep.
  4. Sleep with the right person.
  5. Eat
  6. drink
  7. but not too much of either.
  8. Don’t get drunk all the time.
  9. Play
  10. but not only with yourself.
  11. Laugh your ass off
  12. often
  13. Go bat-shit crazy
  14. now and then
  15. or often.
  16. Challenge the status quo.
  17. Challenge yourself.
  18. Drop the arrogance.
  19. Care.
  20. Get enough sex
  21. but not all the time.
  22. Eat chocolate.
  23. Get a telescope.
  24. Get an HP-41 calculator.
  25. Play with it.
  26. Listen to music.
  27. Get carried away.
  28. Exercise your free will.
  29. Be a rebel.
  30. Make trouble.
  31. Avoid permanent damage.
  32. Swim naked.
  33. Tumble in the snow.
  34. Tell wild fairy tales to the kids.
  35. Lose yourself in their games.
  36. Cry during movies.
  37. Love
  38. lots.
  39. Feel
  40. a lot.
  41. And disregard rules.
  42. Make your own understanding of Life, the Universe and Everything

Happy New Year!

Geir Isene 1,240 Comments

The craziest year in my life is nearing the end.

Never been this happy 🙂

Thank you all for inspiring me and letting me inspire you.

We just turned 25000 comments on this blog since its inception 2,5 years ago. But the quality of your comments easily outshines the quantity.

Love you guys & gals.

Have a crazy-good 2013!

Why is it important to some that Scientology doesn’t work?

Geir Isene 344 Comments

Having waded through some 1100 comments on my OT 8 blog post over at ESMB, a question rose to mind:

Why is it so important to some that Scientology must not be seen to work?

Some seem hell-bent on proving that there cannot, must not be any shred of workability to the subject. Some goes quite nuts when another tells about gains they got from Scientology. As I happen to have gotten lots of gains from my 25 years of active involvement, I seem to tick off a few stuck records. Funny that.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Geir Isene 49 Comments

I wish you all a Merry Christmas. May you have a wonderful holiday together with those you love. Take care of yourself, your family and the love you share.

Thank you all for keeping me company on this blog. I appreciate your company and your contributions – from the straight and rationals to the quirky and strange. You are all unique human beings that deserve the best in life.

And thanks to all the readers.

I am a man of conciseness. So I leave it at that. For now.

Love,

Geir

Parking tech

Geir Isene 150 Comments

Here’s a rather funny post from a nick called “HelluvaHoax!” over at ESMB.

It’s quite an inside joke but reflects craziness among several people I’ve met in Scientology.

ParkingTech Deconstructed:

  1. OT is looking for parking spot.
  2. No spots are spotted.
  3. OT postulates a spot.
  4. OT’s postulate works, a spot appears. OT parks.
  5. OT writes OT Success Story.

WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED:

  1. OT is looking for a parking spot.
  2. Someone was finished shopping, leaves and OT parks.

WHAT SCIENTOLOGISTS THINK HAPPENED

  1. OT postulates a spot.
  2. Someone is suddenly “controlled” (against their free will) to go to their car.
  3. Despite the fact that they were not done shopping, they could not resist the tone 40 postulate.
  4. They move their car out of the parking spot, surrendering it to the senior being (OT)

You WOG!

Geir Isene 115 Comments

You lowly wog, down-toned, 1.1, downstat, no case gain, rock-slammer, stage 4, ethics bait, ethics particle, theetie weetie, suppressive person.

I, a Homo Novis, upstat, in-ethics and up-toned OT see you for what you are – a degraded being that should be disposed of, quietly and without sorrow.

Labels. Stickers. Classifications.

You get why people hate Scientology?