This paper presents Section 50 from the book SCIENTOLOGY 8-8008 by L. RON HUBBARD. The contents are from the original publication of this book by The Church of Scientology (1952).
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.
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Creative Processing
The whole of the data covered in this volume is utilized in creative processing. When one has mastered the component parts of the mind and the inter-relationships of space, energy, items and experience, he will find creative processing surprisingly easy to apply and productive of very swift results. The goal of this process is the rehabilitation of as much of the thetan’s capability as possible to permit him to utilize or be free of bodies as he chooses and, even in lesser magnitude, to rid the preclear of psychosomatics, eradicate compulsions, obsessions and inhibitions, to raise his reaction time and intelligence level. This process does whatever has been previously intended by earlier processes—utilizing a knowledge of these in order to assess the state of the preclear, and in order to parallel this difficulty with creation, change and destruction of mock-ups.
One should be able to visualize all the components of the mind and inter-relationships of space, energy, items and experience based on the principles provided in the book Scientology 8-8008. Creative processing is visualizing different scenarios on a gradient in the area of difficulty, whether it appears real or unreal. A person should be able to expand his viewpoint beyond that of the body.
Gradient scales are vitally necessary in the application of creative processing. The term “gradient scale” can apply to anything and means a scale of condition graduated from zero to infinity. Absolutes are considered to be unobtainable. Depending on the direction the scale is graduated, there could be an infinity of wrongness and an infinity of rightness. Thus, the gradient scale of rightness would run from the theoretical but unobtainable zero of rightness, up to the theoretical infinity of rightness. A gradient scale of wrongness would run from a zero of wrongness to an infinity of wrongness. The word “gradient” is meant to define lessening or increasing degrees of condition. The difference between one point on a graduated scale and another point could be as different or as wide as the entire range of the scale itself, or it could be so tiny as to need the most minute discernment for its establishment. The gradient scale of the creation of a being could be—but in creative processing generally is not—concerned with time. In creative processing, the gradient scale, as it would refer to the creation of a person, could be, first, the envisionment of an area where the person might have been or might be; then the envisionment of an area the person commonly frequented; at last, the creation of a footprint the person had made, and then perhaps some article of apparel or a possession such as a handkerchief. The creative steps would then continue until more and more of a person was established, and at last the entire person would have been created. Likewise, in the destruction of a person, the gradient scale could, but generally would not, begin with blowing him up or making him grow old. If the auditor finds the preclear diffident about destroying an illusion of some person, the environment can first be diminished slightly; then perhaps the person’s shadow might be shortened, and so on until the entire person could be destroyed. The essence of gradient scale work is to do as much creation, change or destruction in terms of illusion as the preclear can accomplish with confidence, and to go from successful step to greater step until an entire success in destruction, alteration or creation (or their companion states of experience, such as start, change and stop) is accomplished.
Gradient scales are vitally necessary in the application of creative processing. The word “gradient” is meant to define lessening or increasing degrees of condition. The term “gradient scale” can apply to anything and means a scale of condition graduated from zero to infinity. The essence of gradient scale work is to do as much creation, change or destruction in terms of illusion as the preclear can accomplish with confidence.
The mind works easily if led through successive successes into a complete confidence. The mind can be confused and set back enormously by demanding that it do too much too fast. The same “too much” can be accomplished by requesting of the mind that it do small portions of the task; this does not mean that processing should go slowly or that illusions which are easy to create, change or destroy should have much time spent on them. It does mean that as soon as an auditor has established a disability on the part of the preclear in creating illusions of certain places, persons, conditions, things, colors or any other thing in this or any other universe, he approaches the subject gradually by gradient scale and by accomplishing repeated successes with the preclear of greater and greater magnitude, finally achieving a complete banishment of the disability.
As soon as you have discovered a disability in creating illusions of certain places, persons, conditions, things, colors or any other thing, you approach the subject gradually by gradient scale and by accomplishing repeated successes of greater and greater magnitude, finally achieving a complete banishment of the disability.
The reason a preclear cannot alter a postulate, or change or start or stop, lies in the influence upon him of his agreements and experiences in the MEST and other universes. To run out these agreements and experiences as such would be, in part, to agree with them over again. The mind is actually quite free to alter postulates and change its own condition, if permitted to do so at a speed that it finds comfortable. The mind will not take wide divergences which seem to it to tend toward its own diminishment or destruction. It was by a gradient scale of agreement that he came at last to accept and very nearly succumb to the MEST universe itself. The build-up of illusion was so slow and insidious that only the closest assessment would reveal to the preclear and the auditor how far these tiny steps of agreement led at last.
The mind is actually quite free to alter postulates and change its own condition, if permitted to do so at a speed that it finds comfortable. This is a valuable principle.
The motto of the MEST universe could be said to be: “Thou shalt have no force nor illusion, nor thine own space, nor self-made energy or thing, for all illusion is mine and with that thou shalt agree. If thou art, I shall not be.” By a series of minute agreements, the preclear has at last given up all his own belief in his ability to make a universe, or even to create and maintain minor illusions. He does not know or even suspect that he is capable of producing illusions sufficiently strong to be observable by others, and if he thought this were true, he would attribute it to some mysterious thing and, so short and final are the punishments of the MEST universe, he would tend to shy away from this; but upon his ability to create illusion depends the very existence of all his hopes and dreams and any beauty he will ever see or feel. In truth, all sensation which he believes to come from these masses of illusory energy known as the MEST universe, are first implanted through agreement upon what he is to perceive and then perceived again by himself, with the step hidden that he has extended his own sensation to be felt and perceived by himself. He is fully convinced that the MEST universe itself has sensation which it can deliver to him, whereas all the MEST universe has is an enforced agreement which though of no substance, yet by a gradient scale came to be an illusion which seems very masterful to a preclear.
Hubbard’s “MEST universe” is actually the reactive mind, which bypasses the person’s thinking and controls his actions. The person’s “own universe” is the fully assimilated mental matrix that is completely rational. The person has his own rational desires and goals that he must accomplish. His own energy is diverted by the reactive mind, which makes think that there is another power.
To prove the reality and solidity of the MEST universe, the preclear could pound his fist upon a desk and demonstrate that his fist had met something. He is making again the error of implanting sensation and not knowing he has implanted it, for the fist which he pounds on the desk is a MEST universe fist consisting of MEST universe energy, which is itself a MEST universe agreement, and it is meeting a desk which is MEST universe; he is only demonstrating that when the MEST universe is perceived to impact upon the MEST universe, one can then implant a realistic impact and perceive it for his own wonderful edification. Reality, then, is a delusion because it is one’s own illusion which has been disowned by one and is then received by one as being another thing. Only by shedding all responsibility for one’s own energy can one fall into this covert trap. If one is unwilling to be responsible for energy, he is capable of using energy and then not perceiving that he uses it. One who blames others continually can be discovered to affect most of the things for which he is blaming other people.
There is only one power, and that is his understanding of the reality out there, and not just some twisted idea of what may be out there. Understanding requires taking responsibility for what is going on. One drops that responsibility the moment he blames other people.
In such a way, an individual with the “very best MEST universe, Mark 10,000 ears” takes no responsibility for having implanted the sensation of sound in order to receive the sensation of sound. A preclear as he comes up the tone-scale more and more often catches himself doing this, and even though he does not know the principles involved (for no preclear has to be educated in Scientology to receive benefit from it), he recognizes that even in the case of a loud crash, his continuation of association from his environment permits him to perceive with others that a crash has taken place of objects which he with others continuously recreates solidly, and that he must actually cause for his own perception the sound of the crash. In that the beingness of an individual is actually extended for miles in all directions around him, if not much further, any idea or thought or past thought (as there is no past) is part of his beingness, and so he must continually strive to be “faithful to his agreements with the MEST universe.”
What we put out there is what comes back to us transformed. We just have to understand the principles by which it got transformed. We become increasingly aware of this as we go up the tone-scale. It is only after understanding these principles fully that one can mold reality into desirable forms.
To undo this state of affairs it is only necessary to rehabilitate the awareness of the preclear that he himself is capable of creating illusions. As he rehabilitates this faculty, the preclear, without any coaching or evaluation on the part of the auditor, begins to recognize that his viewpoint is expanding and that he is becoming all-pervasive, but that he can collect his awareness at any point, and that the “brutal reality” all around him is continuously manufactured by himself out of agreements and association with other viewpoints. So long as he is fixed in a condition where he is in agreement with all spaces and viewpoints, he sees and feels automatically with all other such viewpoints. He is above the level of energy, if one can use the term, on the same wavelength with all other beingness, a condition which does not permit differentiation. As he rehabilitates his abilities in independent creation, he can change this “wavelength” at will, and can go into or out of agreement with all other points of beingness. The matter of perceiving, then, becomes entirely a matter of self-choice. It is, for instance, quite startling to a preclear to discover that as soon as he is free of the ridges of the body (which is to say, when he has discovered he can change his viewpoint) that he is already partly out of agreement with other viewpoints, and that the MEST universe becomes slightly jumbled. He is apt to be very anxious about this, for it is in conflict with the agreements to which he is subject. He immediately may struggle very hard to regain a state of affairs whereby he can view the MEST universe as everyone else views it. Indeed, the auditor must continually be on guard to prevent the preclear from attempting to re-assume these agreements.
We must realize that we ourselves are capable of creating illusions. The “brutal reality” all around us is continuously manufactured by ourselves out of agreements and association with other viewpoints. The matter of perceiving is entirely a matter of self-choice at higher levels of understanding. Effort to just be in agreement with others around you is what causes aberration.
A badly trained auditor can always be identified by the fact that he shares the preclear’s anxiety that the preclear view the environment as the environment “should be.” The reason why a non-cleared auditor does not do well with these processes is that he is very anxious for the preclear to continue agreement with all others and to perceive the surroundings as exactly when exteriorized as he did when he was looking through MEST eyes and perceptions (which is to say, when the preclear was at his exact, agreed-upon point of viewpoint). The ability to perceive the MEST universe is the ability to agree. The preclear’s accuracy of perception of the MEST universe is of no consequence. An auditor can act to permit or even encourage a preclear to try to see, feel and hear the MEST universe when exteriorized long before the preclear is prepared to do so with equanimity. The auditor when doing this, is dramatizing his own urge to agree with viewpoints and perceive. A preclear who exteriorizes readily may find with a shock that he is not perceiving the MEST universe as he commonly supposes it should be perceived and quickly go back into his body to reassure himself that he is “keeping his contract of agreement.” If the auditor demands that the preclear perceive the environment when exteriorized, then the auditor will discover that the preclear will drop in tone and that, when he has gone into his body once more, a great deal of patient auditing is necessary to regain the preclear’s confidence in himself. The preclear exteriorizing may find himself in all sorts of space and time cross-ups, for he has insufficient command of space and energy to independently sort out viewpoints when unassisted by the orientation of the MEST body itself, which is, of course, in debased and degraded agreement of a very set nature.
When person moves beyond the frame of reference provided by the body he sees things differently from others around him. He must realize this and assess his own reality. He should not simply get back into agreement with others again.
There are two “shuns.” These are invalidation and evaluation. The auditor must eschew them vigorously. The major invalidation which could be practiced in using Scientology 8-8008 would be a demand that the preclear see the environment as it is seen through MEST perception or to criticize him for not being able to do so. The majority of the preclear’s perceptions may be correct but some percentage of his perception is going to be enough “off wavelength” with other agreement viewpoints to cause him to perceive strangely. After a very large amount of auditing, when the preclear has regained his ability to create with considerable solidity his own illusions, it will be found that the preclear can at will perceive the MEST universe and can do so with accuracy. He can further, without the aid of a body, move objects and do a thousand other “interesting tricks” which could very well be viewed with considerable awe, for they have not been seen on earth in recorded history but have lived in legend.
There is nothing wrong with seeing things differently from how others see them. Others may have their illusions. Hubbard is setting up expectations, such as, moving objects without the aid of the body. This could simply be his illusion. A person must gain his own certainty on laws of the universe and seeing things as they are.
Using Standard Operating Procedure, Issue 3, as given in this volume, the auditor yet takes a very thorough assessment of his preclear with an E-Meter. He discovers, in accordance with information in this book, what the preclear is unable to start, change, stop; create, alter, destroy; be, do or have; differentiate, associate or identify; on each and every one of the eight dynamics and their component parts. The auditor makes a complete list. This is the Can’t list. Exteriorized, if possible, or interiorized as in the later numbered cases, the preclear is then made to “mock-up” illusions about each one of these Can’ts and to change the size, character and position of the illusion or any part thereof in space, shift it in time simply by knowing it has been shifted by him, until at last the preclear is able to handle the whole object of the Can’t with complete facility.
Can’ts may be an inability to destroy women or snakes or specific persons, or create machinery, or write legibly. The preclear is requested to accomplish by illusions the smallest gradient of the Can’t with which he can successfully start; and, under auditor direction, by moving this small portion of the whole here and there in space, tipping it this way and that and making it, in particular, disobey “natural laws” in the MEST universe, the preclear is led to an ability to create, change or destroy the Can’t.
The above explains how creative processing is done in Standard Operating Procedure, Issue 3. When doing it yourself simply start with your most obvious difficulties. Visualize those areas, on a gradient where you find yourself resisting, avoiding or suppressing the various factors listed here.
The person is looking very closely at what he is resisting, avoiding or suppressing by visualizing the smallest gradients of it. There may be a natural law underlying it that satisfies the requirements of continuity, harmony and consistency. Or, there may just be an illusion of some assumption or fixed idea being natural. One may visualize how it is that way, or not that way until it seems to fit in the larger context of reality.
The Can’t is also the Must. Can’t is an inhibition; Must is an enforcement. What must the preclear do and what must be done to him? By whom? By creative processing and gradient scales, he achieves mock-ups until each one of these musts becomes a “Can if I want to, but don’t have to.”
For Can’ts in an area, the person should look for what he must do and what must be done to him? By whom? Using creative processing, he should then reduce each of these musts to “Can if I want to, but don’t have to.”
There are also the Desires. These are the cravings for sensation or possession or identification which brought the preclear into and made him continue agreements. Behind every case the Desires are paramount and of greater importance than the Can’ts. Why does he desire bodies? Why is his second dynamic aberrated? Why does he feel he cannot be free? Can he differentiate between his own actual wantingness and the wantingness of MEST itself which is trying to have him? The desires are resolved by creative processing wherein the preclear does mock-ups of the necessary acts which he desires or the necessary behaviors which brought him into agreement until he can at last laugh at them.
For desires, differentiate between your own desire and the overpowering desire of a reaction. The desires are resolved by creative processing wherein the preclear does mock-ups of the necessary acts which he desires or the necessary behaviors which brought him into agreement until he can at last laugh at them.
In that creative processing does not take long in terms of time, the assessment list can afford to be very broad and to cover every possible phase through the system of the dynamics and the cycles of action.
One can simply apply Creative processing in real time as one is assessing. This is mindfulness meditation.
This is a list of things the preclear must be able to do with an illusion:
Create the condition, energy or object
Conserve it
Protect it
Control it
Hide it
Change it
Age it
Make it go backwards on a cycle of action
Perceive it with all perceptions
Shift it at will in time
Rearrange it
Duplicate it
Turn it upside down or on the side at will
Make it disobey MEST laws
Be it
Not be it
Destroy it.
A situation that is resisted, avoided or suppressed is an “Illusion”. It is persisting because it has not been grasped fully. If you visualize that situation and consciously change it around in realistic and unrealistic ways in different iterations, then, sooner or later, you will grasp it and it will stop persisting.
In order to accomplish these things, if the whole of any condition cannot be fulfilled by gradient scale some tiny portion of the condition must be fulfilled. When a small condition has been fulfilled, the condition is then enlarged until the whole condition can be fulfilled.
It the whole situation is difficult to visualize, then visualize some tiny portion of it. Start enlarging that tiny portion on a gradient until you can visualize the whole situation.
That preclear who cannot get even a shadow of an illusion so that he can perceive it in any manner must be coaxed to see white spots, black spots, of his own creation, and to change those in space and time, enlarge and contract them, until he has a certain command and control of black and white. This must be done with such a preclear without regard to the number of hours it takes or the patience of the drill. It can be done with the eyes open or closed, whichever the preclear finds best.
If you cannot visualize anything then you may try to visualize just white and black spots and change them in all different ways until you can do so with confidence.
When the preclear is discovered to be trying to prevent a motion or condition, the auditor should magnify that very condition with new mock-ups related to it, i.e., if objects keep rushing in on the preclear, mock up objects rushing in until the action is enormously magnified but under the preclear’s complete control. If the preclear cannot start something, make him stop it. If he cannot reverse a direction, make him change the nature of the object which he is trying to reverse enough times to permit him to reverse the original disability. If the preclear cannot create something, have him create anything even vaguely associated with it, and by association at last have him mock up the actual thing.
If you are trying to prevent a condition such fear of heights, then visualize yourself being at a height that you are comfortable with, then gradually increasing that height making sure that you are comfortable after each gradual change. If you cannot start something, such as a car, then visualize stopping it. If you cannot create something, such as a painting, then visualize creating anything even vaguely associated with it.
The essence of creative processing is moving objects in space when they have been mocked up. They are moved near and far, to the right, left, behind the preclear, below his feet, above his head and in front of him. He must know that he has changed the location of the object. If he cannot make a large change, have him do a small change of location. If he cannot do a small change of location, have him alter the object by turning it different colors, or by enlarging or contracting it, or by pushing it away or bringing it near him, until he can make it move sideways. In failing to do this, have him do a change with some allied object.
The essence of creative processing is moving objects in space when they have been visualized. You must know that you have changed the location of the object. The idea is to obtain greater facility of thinking in the area of difficulty.
The essence of creative processing is a continuation of success. Be careful not to give the preclear things which make him fail. Do not let his failures mount up. Estimate the preclear and pay attention to what he is doing; find out from him continually the condition of his illusions, if you yourself as an auditor cannot see them. Putting objects into yesterday or tomorrow or well into the future or into the past is vitally necessary to processing.
The gradient is used in Creative processing to ensure that there is no failure of visualization. Any visualization requires the elements of understanding, certainty and confidence. One must understand what putting objects into yesterday or tomorrow or well into the future means.
Control of the illusion is the essence of commands. The preclear must be able to create, grow, conserve, decay and destroy; start, change and stop; be, do and have; differentiate, associate and identify; handle in space, with energy and in time, any object, actual or mythical, in all the eight dynamics, and with high preference given to anything which disobeys “natural laws” of the MEST universe.
You are using visualization to create, grow, conserve, decay and destroy; start, change and stop; be, do and have; differentiate, associate and identify. With visualization, you are practicing how to handle an object in space with energy and in time. That object can be actual or imaginary. It can relate to any aspect of life. You deliberately visualize violating the supposed “natural laws” to develop the ability to think outside the box.
That auditor with a high order of imagination who is himself clear, finds mock-ups very easy to “think up” and request of the preclear, but it is not necessary to have such an imagination, as a routine assessment will discover immediately that the most ordinary things fall into the Can’t, Must and Desire brackets in the preclear’s life.
In visualization one focuses on the pressures of Can’t, Must and Desire that one encounters in an area of difficulty. Imagination helps.
The preclear will be discovered on the first dynamic, quite ordinarily, not to be able to create, change or destroy, especially destroy, his own body or bodies in which he thinks he is encased within his own body (old time-track bodies such as a Fifth Invader Force body). He will be found to be incapable in many directions with facsimiles, communication lines and other matters on the first dynamic alone. On the second dynamic, many incapabilities will come to view, and so on along all the dynamics. On the fifth dynamic, he will quite ordinarily be found incapable of handling snakes, spiders, vicious fish, bacteria, wild animals and domestic pets. On the seventh dynamic he will be discovered unable to handle other thetans, even in the most elementary fashion of bringing two dots of light into proximity and then separating them (an exercise which blows head ridges in many preclears quite explosively). On the eighth dynamic his limitations quite ordinarily become too obvious for comment, but on each and every dynamic he must be able to do or fulfill any of the above cycles or conditions.
The body here means the body’s viewpoint that one is using in evaluating things. A thetan is basically mind’s viewpoint. You deal with many such viewpoints around you.
Standard Operating Procedure tells how to exteriorize a thetan. Creative processing, rising-scale postulate changing, postulate processing, are then necessary to bring him toward a state of a cleared theta clear. The state of theta clear simply demands that the preclear remains outside his body when the body itself is hurt, and the state is adequate to prevent his being trapped again by a body except in unusual circumstances. There is no guarantee of long continuance in the condition. The state of cleared theta clear is, however, another thing, for it means a person who is able to create his own universe; or, living in the MEST universe, is able to create illusions perceivable by others at will, to handle MEST universe objects without mechanical means and to have and feel no need of bodies or even the MEST universe to keep himself and his friends interested in existence.
The Standard Operating Procedure tells how to move beyond the fixed viewpoint of the body. Then one moves beyond the fixed viewpoint of the mind through creative processing, rising scale postulate changing and postulate processing.
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FINAL COMMENTS
It is interesting to note that Hubbard first focused on recovering traumas in Dianetics. Then, in Scientology, the first thing he focused on was visualizing “Can’ts”, “Musts” and “Desires” in the areas of difficulty using the gradient scales.
The basic problem is the unassimilated nodes in the mental matrix. These nodes are built around traumas that are deeply buried and cannot be recalled easily. Their signposts are the difficulties one is having in life.
In scientific terms, these traumas are deep programming in the mind that could even be genetic in its origin. To access this programming is not an easy task.
By visualizing and/or modeling the difficulty in ways that are normal and/or out of the box, one may be able to get glimpses of this programming and modify it per one’s basic nature.
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