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The following first appeared in the private email list IVy-subscribers,
which is available to all those who subscribe to the
printed magazine, International Viewpoints.
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The Tone Scale and communication
by Phil Spickler
3 Aug 00

Hello to all you no ones out there --
        I'm sure you'll agree by now that being no one is a fine relief from
the pain and suffering of being someone; a nice chance to step off the wheel
(of life),  a chance to extrovert from the game, so to speak, and best of
all, an opportunity to truly experience pan-determinism, to have the full
feeling of what it's like to be all efforts and counter-efforts, all emotions
and counter-emotions, all thoughts and counter-thoughts, and to not be an ego
that is threatened by the ideas and actions of every other ego, even
sometimes the ones that are supposed to be on your own team.

        Such a state, though, should be reserved, on a permanent basis, for
just a very, very few of us, since the rest of us are chomping at the bit to
get back into the fray, or the game, if you will, and enjoy the big gamble to
see if we will win and succeed or lose and fail.

        Anyhow and howsomever, I feel it's a very good thing to possess the
ability to be someone or no one at will, and definitely an ability that
should get frequent exercising, lest you start to bore your audience with the
endless repetition of a single part in the big play.

       Scientology, as has been mentioned many times before, has gone through
many cycles of two major forms of approach to that which we call "the tech:"
and enough of that history is well-known that it can be picked apart and
analyzed and understood (or misunderstood -- take your choice).  The two
major thrusts have been the type of tech which places the greatest emphasis
on the guy finding out for hisself (herself) what is in the mind that may be
preventing optimum function across the 8 dynamics; or plan B, or the second
approach, which is "I, L. Ron Hubbard, at great risk of mind and spirit, have
blazed a trail into the unknown areas of the mind, (very dangerous areas, I
might add), and at great personal expense have found out what is there that
is keeping you from being everything you ever thought you would like to be,
or preventing you from optimum function across Ye Olde 8 Dynamics."  "I have
also extrapolated from my own experience" says LRH, "that which is common to
all folks hereabouts, and I'm keeping what I found out a closely-guarded
secret (so it won't kill you), but if you plank down enough money you can
enjoy this great discovery of mine, and you'll be in fantastic condition
thereafter.  And also, if that doesn't work for you in the long term, I shall
at great personal risk find something else that you don't know about that is
keeping you from getting those great gains that you've always wanted, and
I'll sell you that for even more money," etc. etc. etc. ad infinitum ad
nauseum.

        Well, there you have it, folks, the two main themes, starting with
Book I Dianetics and the notion of the guy and his file clerk, and with the
help of his file clerk the guy finding out what's wrong with him and fixing
it up.  Now as my friend pointed out today, everybody pushing a body around
has experienced some form or another of birth engram.  That never meant in
early Dianetics that you said to the guy, "By the way, everybody has a birth
engram, and that's what's wrong with you, so that's what we'll run out now,
and you'll have to pay extra and keep it a secret because L. Ron Hubbard, who
conceived of Dianetics, ran his own birth engram at great risk to his health
and sanity and will now provide you with the exact sequence of events, which
will be exactly the same as his, to run that there engram."

       Well, folks, I'm here to tell you as a fairly early Book I auditor,
that if anyone had come up with that sort of horse manure in 1950 or '51,
he'd have gotten laughed off the block.  However, Ron set the stage for this
idea of tech finders or pathfinders going ahead of us merely immortal folks
and finding out all these great pieces of stuff that we're too dumb and
unable to find for ourselves and then selling this pre-canned goop to us with
the idea that it'll totally fix us up.

        And so if you plot the history of Scientology in particular, you'll
see that at any given time one or the other of these approaches holds sway.
But after about 1967, the main approach was "We have all the answers; just
sign up and pay up here."  And the amounts of money that could be extracted
from any one person became astronomical.

        My own evaluation of these two approaches still falls heavily on the
side of helping another person to find out the answers for themselves -- that
was the most basic notion to begin with, and it remains the cleanest and most
honest, since it is not tainted by the ideas of Big Business and Big Money,
and has strongest appeal to the idea of each individual and their universe as
being unique.

         One other aspect of Scientology tech that isn't getting much mention
these days is all that nice stuff like what's to be found in _Creation of
Human Ability_ and other places that simply has to do with exercising the
abilities of a being, interior or exterior.  Things like that and Certainty
Processing and a whole bunch of other stuff is also conducive of allowing the
individual to make giant strides through their own perceptions and their own
possibilities.

        Now we found out long ago, when it comes to making things read on an
E-meter, that you can get a being (and the being's beings) to get anything in
the world to read on an E-meter.  Beings can create any read on any subject
or item they want, especially anything that they believe is supposed to be
there and that they're supposed to run.  Many very humorous experiments have
been done to prove this point, whether it's with hypnosis or just general
levels of agreement about what is; but you could probably, if you know what
you're doing, get your pc or client to charge up the item "Catching catfish,"
or the goal "To catch catfish," get it to rocket-read as a goal, find its
opposing goal, and build a whole GPM out of it with all its reliable items,
with the pc putting all the significence into the item and all the charge
into the item and then running it out as if it were there to begin with.

        Yes, when you surround this discovered tech with all kinds of mystery
and money and ethics and so forth, by the time the guy gets to it, he's also
created enough charge to run it for the next 10 years or 20, as he sets up
the thetan machinery to automatically create and charge up items.  So don't
ever let the idea just because it read on a meter, because someone told you
it's supposed to be there and it's supposed to read, convince you that it's
the same as you finding something by your own looking and your own
realization that there's charge there.

       Well, enough of that, although we are talking about some of the stuff
that's used by folks to keep themselves mocked up; but I'll get away from
that idea as being unpopular with those who are afraid that they won't ever
get another self if they lose the one they're currently failing with.

        Well, just a few words in closing on the subject of the Tone Scale and
communication.  Many years ago, when I had the pleasure of doing short
lectures for new people on some aspect of Scientology, I inevitably found the
Tone Scale to be quite popular.  One of the reasons, I think, is that it's so
easy to illustrate: for example, if you take someone that's at or around
Death on the Tone Scale and you suggest going dancing, you probably won't get
much of a response.  If you present that idea to a very angry person, they're
likely to destroy the idea, refuse to do it altogether, and make you feel
like you've harmed them for suggesting it.  But if you happen to present it
to someone who's feeling enthusiastic or exhilarated, you'll probably be out
on the dance floor before you know it, having the time of your life.

         This is a rather crude and simple but effective description of how
many differences there can be in things, just depending on the tone level of
either the originator or the recipient.  And of course tone level has a lot
to do with how things are perceived.   For example, if you offer a fearful
person the idea of going skydiving, they're going to see the idea as a very
dangerous, frightening, potentially lethal activity.  Someone who is pretty
high-toned might look on the same activity as a wonderful chance to
experience a fairly exciting and beautiful activity.

       So of course people at different tone levels can be looking at the same
thing and seeing it and feeling about it quite differently; and this is never
more evident that it is out here in cyberspace on the old Internet, and
specifically on IVy-subscribers.  And of course these differences can get
people out of ARC with each other and wrangling in the most ridiculous ways
about next to nothing.  Just try asking a brutally antagonistic person for
help some time and see what comes back in your face.  Or ask such a person
what their idea of help might be -- you might find it very shocking.
Low-toned people are often perceived as very nice and sweet, simply because
they don't have enough motion or emotion to have the kind of negative impact
that the higher tones are capable of, and let's face it, they're a lot easier
to push around.

         But best of all in the field of communication is the person who has
enough understanding of these matters to be able to duplicate the tone level
of the source that one is receiving communication from, and respond either at
that tone level or perhaps slightly higher or lower in order to stay in
reality.

       In my own communications on the IVy list and elsewhere, I disregard all
these possibilities, which were really invented to get people somewhat
started on the idea of what civilized communication could be all about.  I've
been at it so long I like to communicate outside considerations concerning
the distances that are provoked by ARC and simply get inside my customers and
tickle their thetans.

         See you soon, with lots of tickling --
          Phil