Reference: DIANETICS: The Original Thesis
This paper presents Chapter 11 from the book DIANETICS: THE ORIGINAL THESIS by L. RON HUBBARD. The contents are from the original publication of this book by The Hubbard Dianetic Foundation, Inc. (1948).
The paragraphs of the original material (in black) are accompanied by brief comments (in color) based on the present understanding. Feedback on these comments is appreciated.
The heading below is linked to the original materials.
.
Auditing
The auditing technique consists of assisting the preclear’s analytical mind or some part of it with the auditor’s analytical mind. The auditor then functions during each successive period of auditing, and only during the periods themselves, as an extra analytical mind of the preclear.
The mindfulness auditing technique consists of concentrating on a clearly recognized aberration while letting the mind unwind through free association.
The job of the auditor is to help the auditee find the aberration that is real and ready to be concentrated on. He then encourages the auditee to apply the auditing technique as above. He simply listens to and acknowledges the auditee and does not interfere otherwise. In mindfulness meditation, the auditee is the auditor.
The reactive mind was received during the dispersal or inactivity of the analytical mind. The reactive mind is removed by “returning” the preclear to the engram, and laying its contents before the scrutiny of the analytical mind.
The “engram” is the clearly recognized aberration. The mind is allowed to freely associate all experiences related to that aberration.
This technique may be considered the lowest common denominator of a number of techniques. Anything which will serve this purpose and permit auditing to be accomplished efficiently is valid technique.
The optimum is purely personal affinity brought about by understanding and communication with the preclear on agreeable subjects. Another and almost useless method is narcosynthesis together with the various drugs and hypnotics used to produce sleep. Methods can be found such as faith healing, books on medical hypnosis, the techniques of Indian medicine men and so forth. It is pointless to delineate these methods here. They are currently available under the name of hypnotism but a caution should be enjoined that hypnosis as itself is not at all acceptable to Dianetics and indeed has extremely limited use. Briefly, however, it must be remarked that if hypnotism is studied to advance these techniques, all positive suggestion and post-hypnotic suggestion must be avoided as these suggestions depend for their effectiveness upon the already existing content of the reactive mind and will only form additional locks.
Drugs, hypnosis, faith healing, suggestions, etc., are not part of this procedure. The auditor never suggests anything to the auditee (preclear). He helps the auditee isolate the aberration through objective observation and discussion.
Any and all so-called hypnotic drugs have definite drawbacks since they, like so many other things, may be termed “shot-gun” methods. These paralyze not only the analytical mind but the remainder of the organism so that it is nearly impossible to obtain the proper somatic reaction in the preclear. They are not anesthetics but anesthesias. By using them the auditor instantly denies himself the main material which will lead him to the engram, which is to say, restimulated physical pain. Such restimulated pain is never of very great magnitude and is obliterated by the use of anesthesias.
Drugs may interfere with the free association ability of the mind. Free association is key to the success of this auditing procedure. Free association may bring up hard to face realities and physical pain, but it is never of great magnitude.
At no time should the auditor permit the preclear to be under the delusion that he is being hypnotized. This is mentioned because hypnotism is a current fad and the principles of Dianetics have nothing whatever to do with hypnotism. Both are based upon simple natural laws but have between them an enormous gulf. One is the tool of the charlatan and the other is the science of the human mind.
Regression in its simplest form, hereafter called return, is employed in dianetic auditing. It would be an extraordinary case which required revivification. Return is the method of retaining the body and the awareness of the subject in present time while he is told to go back to a certain incident. Dates are not mentioned. His size is not mentioned. Various means are used to restimulate his memory. Any of the perceptics may be employed to return him to some period of his past. He is told simply to “go back to the time when_________.” He is asked to recount what he can of the incident. He is told that he is “right there” and that he can “recall this.” Little else is said by the auditor save those hints necessary to return the preclear to the proper time.
Hypnotism and regression are a substitute for concentration of the mind. They are externally controlled procedures, whereas, concentration is exercised by the person himself. Dianetic technique of “return” also falls under the category of external control, and it is not allowed in the mindfulness auditing procedure.
The preclear is not allowed at any moment to revivify in that period since the data is drained as a surcharge from his time track to present time. He is told that he can remember this in present time since that will occasion the somatics to return to present time. Most of the data is located by observing some somatic pain in the individual or some somatic aberration and seeking to discover wherein it was received.
In free association the mental matrix associates the data elements in the present. Any past memory is reconstructed in the present. Free association is releasing the tension in the mind. Any effort to forcibly associate data only generates more tension in the mind.
The somatics are employed primarily because the motor controls possess a less disturbed time track than the sensory strip. Anything which tends to lighten these somatics is then antipathetic to auditing. It must be remembered that there is no aberration without an accompanying somatic. The somatics alone, being physical ills of one sort or another, hold the aberrated content of the reactive mind in place. The motor controls can be returned to a period although the conscious or analytical mind believes itself to be entirely in present time. By talking to the muscles or motor controls or various bodily aches and pains, the auditor can shift them at will up and down their time track. This time track is not connected to the analytical mind and speech, but is apparently a parallel time track with greater reliability than the sensory track. The precision of data contained in the motor control time track is enormous. Muscles can be made to tense or relax. Coughs, aches, and pains can be made to come and go simply by uttering the right words for the engrams, or the wrong words.
One may concentrate on the somatic aspect of the aberration, such as, “pain in the _______”. Somatic may be defined as part of a larger aberration which is a sort of confusion. Dianetics believes in controlling the attention and the autonomic responses of the auditee but that is not necessary to accomplish the purpose of auditing.
It is the primary task of the auditor to cause the time tracks of the motor strip and the sensory strip to come into parallel. That the time track exists in the strips has not been proven but they can so be considered for the purposes of this explanation. That they exist is extremely apparent. The motor strip time track can be asked questions down to the smallest moment of time, and the area of an engram can be so located and its character determined.
There is no simple time track. The primary task of the auditor is to help the auditee find the right aberration to concentrate on. The auditor does not do the auditing for the auditee. If the auditee runs into difficulty, the auditor’s task is to discuss the aberration objectively until the auditee understands what to concentrate on.
As an analogy, a dream may be considered as the reception by the remaining analytical mind of a distortedly reflected and indirectly received picture of the engrams. This applies only when the dream is specifically directed at the reactive mind. It will be found that a preclear with a large and active reactive mind does not dream to any great extent in normal sleep but that a release may dream pleasantly and consistently. A dream in its normal function is that powerful and original mechanism called the imagination compositing or creating new pictures.
The use of the dream is not highly technical and has little value in Dianetics. The auditor gleans data from the preclear by his own remarks about any subject, or by the preclear’s illogicalness on a subject. The auditor tells the preclear to dream about this data. When the preclear has had the dream he is directed to go back to the engram causing the dream. Quite often he will do so. If he does not, or if he becomes hostile, it is certain that an engram exists on the subject.
A Dianetic auditor observes what the auditee says and how he acts, to guess at the content of his engramic node. He then asks the auditee to concentrate on it. But this can get very complicated.
The Mindfulness auditor simply finds the area about the auditee that naturally draws auditee’s attention. The auditor then discusses it with the auditee to isolate what the auditee wants most to concentrate on. Only that aberration can be audited that is real to the auditee. The auditee may have a glaring aberration, but if it not real to him, it cannot be audited.
The lie detector, the encephalograph and many other means are of limited usefulness in determining both the character and the extent of the engrams since into these as into the dreams can be fed the restimulators of the preclear. A codified restimulator list can be created which will be found to be common to most preclears. It should include all types of illnesses, accidents, the common trite phrases of the society, and names of various persons who commonly surround a child during his childhood. Such a codified restimulator list would be interesting for experiment and every auditor can compose his own. These are best composed after auditing the individual preclear and after inquiry into his life to determine the various irrationalities of thought. In that engrams are identity thought, the remarks of the preclear about his engrams will be found to be included in the content of those engrams. When the preclear is asked to imagine a bad situation at certain ages and under hypnotic conditions, he will very often deliver up a complete engram. The auditor must realize that every remark that a preclear makes while he is going over his reactive mind is probably some part of the content of that reactive mind. That mind is literal. The words the preclear uses when referring to it must be literally evaluated.
Dianetics uses a lie-detector type instrument called “E-meter” as an aid in auditing. The auditor uses it to note the subtle reactions of the auditee, and to guide the auditee’s attention accordingly. The E-meter has been misused greatly by interpreting its reaction in such a way that it goes against what the auditee thinks and feels. Such a dependence on a mechanical instrument can greatly retard the progress in auditing and can even be harmful.
.
FINAL COMMENTS
KEY WORDS: Reverie, Returning, Repeater Technique
Hubbard was an accomplished hypnotist. It is obvious from reading his ORIGINAL THESIS (1948) that the Dianetics procedure is derived from his experience with the mind as a hypnotist. I have no doubt that Hubbard’s intention was to undo hypnotic effects using his knowledge of hypnotism. That is how the Dianetic procedure came about. But in spite of all his precautions the Dianetic procedure is not totally clean of hypnotic elements. The primary hypnotic element in Dianetic procedure is ‘returning’ that digs into the mind.
We know through mindfulness that the mind shall immediately present the data asked for, if it is available. Some more data may come up with contemplation based on free association. But if certain data asked for is not coming up then there is a reason for it. That reason has to do with mind’s self-protective mechanism. Some other data needs to be unwound first before this data could be made available.
Digging into the mind forcefully can upset the matrix of the mind, rearranging it in unpredictable ways that could be damaging to the mind. Dianetics procedure does require forceful probing. In defense, It is said that the E-meter tells the auditor if the data is available or not and this makes the Dianetic procedure safe. But there are innumerable accounts of misinterpretation of e-meter. The reaction of e-meter is not always what it is interpreted to mean.
.
