1950
Hermitage House Publishing contracted L. Ron Hubbard to write Dianetics, and in the first week of March, he completed Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. He also wrote Dianetics: The Evolution of a Science for magazine publication to promote and accompany the release of Dianetics.
On 9 May 1950, L. Ron Hubbard released Dianetics, and on 18 June 1950, it appeared on the New York Times bestseller list where it remained for 28 consecutive weeks, thus launching a national movement that quickly became the fastest growing movement in the U.S.
On 7 June, L. Ron Hubbard delivered his first recorded lectures on Dianetics in Elizabeth, New Jersey, where the Hubbard Dianetics Research Foundation was formed.
On 10 August, after moving to a new residence in Los Angeles, California, L. Ron Hubbard delivered a Dianetics lecture to a sold-out crowd of over 6,000 people at the Shrine Auditorium.
Through the remainder of the year, LRH continued to tour and speak in major cities. By the end of December, he had delivered over one hundred lectures while crisscrossing the country.
On 10 August 1950 L. Ron Hubbard made his first public appearance in Los Angeles, California, where he spoke to a jammed house of over 6000 enthusiastic people. The following Monday, professional level courses started under L. Ron Hubbard’s personal direction at the Los Angeles Department of the Hubbard Dianetic Research Foundation.
Dianetics Lectures and Demonstrations
Immediately following the publication of Dianetics, Ron began lecturing to packed auditoriums across America. Although addressing thousands at a time, demand continued to grow. To meet that demand, his presentation in Oakland, California, was recorded. In these lectures, Ron related the events that sparked his investigation and his personal journey to his groundbreaking discoveries. He followed it all with a personal demonstration of Dianetics auditing—the only such demonstration of Book One available by Ron.
The Dianetics Professional Course
Following six months of coast-to-coast travel, lecturing to the first Dianeticists, L. Ron Hubbard assembled auditors in Los Angeles for a new Professional Course. The subject was his next sweeping discovery on life—the ARC Triangle, describing the interrelationship of Affinity, Reality and Communication. Ron delineates the best description of the ARC Triangle to be found anywhere is in these lectures.
1951
In 1951, LRH wrote six books outlining his discoveries in the field of the human mind and giving practical technology to improve human existence. In addition to the printed word, he delivered more than 100 lectures on the subject of Dianetics.
After completing the book Science of Survival in Havana, Cuba, he opened the first Hubbard College in Wichita, Kansas. It was dedicated to delivering lectures and conducting courses.
In the fall of 1951, having discovered that man is most fundamentally a spiritual being, he began a new line of research to determine what could be done to help an individual regain natural abilities. These discoveries formed the basis of Scientology.
The October Midwest Conference Lectures / Thought, Emotion, Effort
With the codification of the Axioms came the means to address key points on a case that could unravel all aberration. Basic Postulates, Prime Thought, Cause and Effect and their effect on everything from memory and responsibility to an individual’s own role in empowering engrams—these matters are only addressed in this series. Here, too, is the most complete description of the Service Facsimile found anywhere—and why its resolution removes and individual’s self-imposed disabilities.
In the fall of 1951, the world was riveted by a new war in Korea. Both the United States and China had entered the fray and conflict threatened to spiral out of control. American headlines urged national readiness for an impending Russian attack. Man was at peril of forces beyond his control. Yet quite another kind of explosion was about to occur—one that would radically change this perennial view of ‘Man, the victim.” Its epicenter was Wichita, Kansas, and specifically, 211 Douglas Street, the busy hub of a growing and vital Dianetics movement. Students came from all corners of the United States to learn auditing and attend LRH’s much-anticipated weekly lectures. Revealed therein were the results of his ongoing research, which, in the 17 months since publication of Dianetics, had unlocked even more secrets of the human mind.
In October, codifying this knowledge into the Logics and Axioms, Ron unveiled them to a specially convened conference of auditors. Through a series of ten lectures, The Logics and Axioms, he not only clarified all preceding discoveries, but set a bold new direction for what was to come. For among his breakthroughs, one factor shone forth above all others: SELF-DETERMINISM. Thus, Man was not a leaf blown about by the winds of chance. The hard, cold fact emerging from the Axioms was that a being became aberrated only through his own consent. So came a whole new dimension to the handling of cases. While the stimulus-response mechanisms of EFFORT had been explored in Dianetics, and the complexities of EMOTION charted in Science of Survival, one factor was found to underlie both and hold aberration in place: THOUGHT. To address all three points, THOUGHT, EMOTION and EFFORT, Ron developed the “Fifteen Acts” of Advanced Procedure and, in November, published his complete findings in a new book, Advanced Procedure and Axioms.
Next, he announced a Professional Course to be held later that month where he would instruct on application of all contained in the text. Applicants were told to present themselves in person at the Wichita Foundation—and did so in force. So commenced the Professional Course and the eleven lectures comprising the Thought, Emotion and Effort series. Paramount amongst the breakthroughs LRH revealed is the original and most complete definition and description of the SERVICE FACSIMILE, detailing the mechanisms by which a being postulates his own illnesses and disabilities. Here, then, was the how and why of this dramatization and all that lay behind it—from POSTULATES and PRIME THOUGHT to the anatomy of FAITH and the route to FULL RESPONSIBILITY.
In short, here in this lecture series is the complete evolution from the codification of the Logics and Axioms (the lectures, The Logics and Axioms),to the techniques of Advanced Procedure employing the breakthroughs of those axioms (the book, Advanced Procedure and Axioms), to the Professional Course instructing on their full use and application (the lectures of Thought, Emotion and Effort). Here, then, are the breakthroughs which formed the turning point form Dianetics to Scientology and from EFFECT to CAUSE.
Editors note*: The October Midwest Conference Lectures. October 8th, 1951 found the Foundation (Wichita, Kansas) host to a number of interested Dianeticists coming together from all over the country to gather information on latest developments in Dianetics. The lecture series’ name was altered by the COS in order to provide a more “marketable” name to “Thought, Emotion and Effort” in the early 2000’s.
First Annual Conference of Hubbard Dianetic Auditors / Chart of Human Ability Lectures
Underlying the development of the Tone Scale and Chart of Human Evaluation was a monumental breakthrough: The Theta-MEST Theory,containing the explanation of the interaction between Life— theta —with the physical universe of Matter, Energy, Space and Time— MEST. In these lectures, delivered to students immediately following publication of the book, LRH gave the most expansive description of all that lies behind the Chart of Human Evaluation and its application in life itself. Moreover, here also is the explanation of how the ratio of theta and en(turbulated)-theta determines one’s position on the Tone Scale and the means to ascend to higher states.
Man has long puzzled over the behavior of his fellows. Why do people act as they do? How can one know who to trust? Who to watch out for? Who to depend on? It was the fall of 1950, LRH was crisscrossing the country, from Elizabeth, New Jersey, to Los Angeles to Kansas City, providing guidance and instruction to the rapidly growing Dianetics movement. Yet at the same time, he was also continuing his search for the “better Bridge” called for on the final page of Book One. His next step in engineering that Bridge was to widen and strengthen it to accommodate all cases—specifically, to provide the means to access and crack any case at any level. The key to this lay in Book One itself—the “Graph of Survival,” revealing a scale from death and ultimate pain at the bottom to potential immortality and ultimate pleasure at the top. With this as his point of departure, LRH commenced an investigation into the underlying principles monitoring a being’s level on the scale—thus providing the means to raise it.
His ensuing research, conducted in early 1951 at his Palm Springs, California home, soon yielded a discovery of sweeping importance. In fact, it was there and then he revealed an entirely new view of Man as a Life Force(designated by the Greek letter theta) enmeshed in the physical universe of matter, energy, space and time (MEST). From this pivotal Theta–MEST Theory, all else began to rapidly unfold, revealing the complete manifestations of human emotion, character and behavior at every level.
Soon, that simple Graph of Survival had expanded to encompass all facets of human action and reaction, and thus came the monumental Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation. Next, Ron authored the comprehensive, all-encompassing text – describing in detail every column of the Chart and its use: Science of Survival. Here, then, were not only the “simpler, faster Dianetic techniques” he had searched for, but a breakthrough that would provide a new direction for the subject resulting in gains beyond even those envisioned in Dianetics.
To spearhead this advance, Ron established a centralized headquarters, accessible to both East and West coasts, in Wichita, Kansas. Dianeticists from across the nation joined him at the new Foundation located at 211 Douglas Avenue, which featured twenty-six rooms and a large lecture hall.
On 25 May, that hall was filled to capacity with professional course students eagerly awaiting Ron’s first lecture, “Theta–MEST Theory.” In this monumental address, he described in full the central breakthrough from which the Chart and the entire technology of human behavior derived. Then in further lectures he built upon this foundation, exploring the ramifications of the Theta–MEST Theory in both life and auditing. Conveying a new perspective on the Reactive Mind by defining aberration in terms of ARC and the dynamics, he detailed how the discovery of the Theta–MEST Theory had entirely shifted the auditor’s emphasis. Instead of attacking entheta, the aim was to validate theta.
To illustrate the new technique, he ended with a demonstration session that provided a glimpse of its potential—relieving a preclear of a persistent headache that had been troubling the man for almost a month.
Next, following these initial lectures, he then wrote to all Hubbard Dianetics Auditors announcing the formation of a national practitioners’ group to both assist them and enforce the highest standards of auditing, the HASI. To just that end, he convened the First International Conference of Hubbard Dianetics Auditors, in June, and at that Conference gave another landmark lecture on the Chart itself, “The Chart of Human Evaluation.”
Editors Note*: The First Annual Conference of Hubbard Dianetic Auditors was held by the Hubbard Dianetic Foundation at Wichita, Kansas, June 25-30,1951. L. Ron Hubbard lectured to the conferees every day of the conference. The Lecture series originally contained a dozen lectures but was released under the SOS title with only 4 lectures in the early 2000’s. Should we find these lectures, they will be added to the series.
Special Course in Human Evaluation
In the last chapter of Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health, LRH spoke of the broad application of Dianetics to the Third Dynamic, with the ultimate aim of a world without war, where Mankind could aspire to higher goals. By the fall of 1950, and with hundreds of Dianetics groups and organizations expanding into a very aberrated planet, the need for such technology was acute. Thus began Ron’s codification of the fundamental laws of Group Dianetics.
Thereafter, research into both the First and Third Dynamics progressed in tandem, with each study illuminating the other. The discovery that Life Energy existed as separate and distinct from the physical universe further illuminated the true nature of a group as a life entity in itself—quite distinct from MEST. Moreover, just as with an individual, a group was attempting to conquer the physical universe, and with each failure came consequent enturbulation and drop in tone. These findings were summarized in a series of watershed essays detailing how to create and maintain a high-toned group. Included among these: “An Essay on Authoritarianism.” and “An Essay on Management.”
But given group survival is dependent on both group and individual tone level, LRH provided something more. It followed from the fact that just as an auditor must be able to evaluate the case state of a preclear, a group must be able to evaluate the state of its members and so predict future behavior. Thus in early 1951, at his home in Palm Springs, California, Ron began mapping out the complete manifestations of human emotion, character and reaction at every level of survival. This work culminated in the landmark Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation and its comprehensive text, Science of Survival.
With this technology at hand, he next scheduled a Special Course in Human Evaluation, to be held at the newly formed Dianetics Foundation in Wichita. In addition to Foundation students, and in evidence of the sweeping demand for this technology, many Wichita civic leaders and industrialists were also present.
Commencing on 13 August 1951, Ron revealed all he had discovered encompassing human behavior on both the First and Third Dynamics: the nature of life force and its role in the physical universe, the interaction of the Eight Dynamics, the vital importance of group ARC and the application of the Tone Scale and the Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation across every dynamic.
Editor’s Note*: Originally there were 11 lectures in the given lecture series. Should we find these lectures, they will be added to the series. Many of the titles of the lectures have been altered by the COS from their original names.
On the Wichita Foundation Auditor’s Course, LRH gave the following lectures to the Hubbard Dianetic Auditor Course students at the Foundation in Wichita, Kansas, in October, 1951.
The Second Annual Conference of Hubbard Dianetic Auditors
As 1951 drew to a close, Ron’s research into the human mind was advancing by exponential leaps. Having isolated the three case factors which hold aberration in place, THOUGHT, EMOTION and EFFORT, he had developed the processing regimen to address them: ADVANCED PROCEDURE.
With this, the subject had entered what Ron called a “second echelon,” one dealing not with the mechanics of mental image pictures, but with the postulates and decisions of the individual.
At the Dianetics Foundation in Wichita, Kansas, letters flooded in from auditors applying these new breakthroughs, all telling the same story: a significant increase in auditing success. With results in hand, LRH turned to the next task—how to make this technology broadly available to preclears at a whole new order of magnitude. In other words, how to audit the numbers requisite to speed planetary clearing. By December, his plan for this next phase was in place.
So came Ron’s invitation to Dianetics auditors for a conference in Wichita between Christmas and New Year’s Day. With enrollment exceeding the facilities at the Foundation, the Crystal Room at Wichita’s Shirkmere Hotel was secured for the occasion. And on 27 December, Ron began the Second Annual Conference of Hubbard Dianetics Auditors with what was to be the textbook of the Conference and the heart of his plan—Handbook for Preclears, a companion to Advanced Procedure and Axioms, for use in self-processing.
Behind the workability of the Handbook and woven into every process was a newly discovered phenomenon and concept—”The Life Continuum”, a mechanism by which an individual carries on the life of another who has died, departed or failed, by assuming their attitudes, illnesses and aberrations. So remarkable was this discovery in application that the Foundation was soon abuzz with daily miracles.
Moreover, and quite in addition to the miracle results the book provided, its centerpiece was another milestone development applicable to all processing—the Hubbard Chart of Attitudes, plotting one’s attitudes and reactions to life, and postulating an Ideal State of Man. As a character index chart, one could now spot a person’s attitudes and thus rapidly find their position on the Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation in Science of Survival.
Finally, after detailing exactly how auditors could disseminate the Handbook on a massive scale to the result of widespread application, Mr. Hubbard next gave attendees a glimpse of where his research was now heading. That is, having found the Life Continuum and why a person lives the lives of others, he was now exploring the many earlier lives on the whole track—thereby moving into a “third echelon,” beyond the realms of one body, one life.
Thus, this pivotal event stands as LRH’s first introduction to the subject that would embrace this vast new horizon – The Subject of Scientology.
Editors Note:* The original title of this lecture series was The Second Annual Conference of Hubbard Dianetic Auditors.It was held in Wichita, Kansas, from the 27th to the 30th of December, 1951. Lectures, demonstrations and seminars evolved around LRH’s latest book, Handbook for Preclears, introduced at this meeting, and Advanced Procedure and Axioms. The title of the lectures was changed by the COS to make it more marketable in the early 2000’s.
1952
In 1952, L. Ron Hubbard moved to Phoenix, Arizona, where he opened his office and established the Hubbard Association of Scientologists International.
In September, he traveled to England and established the Hubbard Association of Scientologists International in London. In late November, L. Ron Hubbard returned to the United States. In Philadelphia, he delivered a 62 lecture Doctorate Course in Scientology over the course of 18 days. Known as the Philadelphia Doctorate Course Lectures, these lectures provided an extensive analysis of human behavior.
After that, he traveled back to England, where he began planning for a research trip across Europe.
In addition to delivering 190 lectures on subjects including emotional tones, communication, and creativity, LRH wrote of his further research on man’s spiritual potential in four new books including Self Analysis in Dianetics—a Handbook of Dianetic Theory, Scientology: 88, Scientology 8-80, and Scientology 8-8008.
The Summary Course Lectures/Milestone One
By early 1952, Mr. Hubbard’s investigations had led him to an altogether new view of human history. This trail of discovery began in the summer following the release of Dianetics, sparked by auditors’ reports that preclears were contacting incidents which could only be explained in terms of past lives. “The further one investigated,” he wrote, “the more one came to understand that here, in this creature Homo sapiens, were entirely too many unknowns.”
Through the ensuing twenty months, Ron carefully investigated those unknowns, corroborating his own research findings with information supplied by auditors in the field. Of paramount importance in this investigation was the development and use of the first E-Meter, enabling him to uncover and map long-hidden incidents and, in turn, leading to the startling discovery that life force, or theta, had its own time track, independent of a body and extending back millions of years. Moreover, as he also discovered, certain incidents on this theta line were common to all cases.
In consequence, a new and revolutionary picture of Man emerged, not as a limited flesh-and-bone animal, but as an immortal being whose roots stretched back to the very beginning of time. As Mr. Hubbard said at the time, “Finding out where Man came from, finding out where he is going, finding out why he knows what he knows and what he’s trying to do is, of course, the greatest adventure that Man can have.”
A Western Union telegram received at the Wichita, Kansas, Foundation offices gave no hint of that adventure to come. “Am giving a series of lectures,” it simply stated, “as the Professional Course tapes, beginning Mar 3. This series to cover the whole of Dianetics as it exists to date.” But the gathered students knew they were moving into new territory when L. Ron Hubbard began the first lecture with six words that would change the world forever: “This is a course in Scientology.”
Thus began the first course ever given on this brand-new subject. And, in the more than twenty lectures that comprise this series, he not only described Scientology, its vast scope and where it was headed, he detailed whole track discoveries, exploring in depth one particular incident common to all beings—an incident diabolical enough to extinguish OT abilities and degrade a race of powerful thetans. He called it Facsimile One.
By course’s end, what lay before the graduates were wide-open horizons. The lie of “one life” had been vanquished. As Mr. Hubbard said, “It’s like taking a condemned man out of a cell and saying, ‘There’s sunlight!’”
Editor’s Note*: The Summary Course Lectures. During March 1952 L. Ron Hubbard gave the following lectures to professional course students at the Hubbard College. Much of this research would contribute to the the OT levels resaerch 14 years later at Saint Hill Manor, LRH’s home in England at the time.
The Technique 80 lectures/Route to Infinity
The year was 1952 and Ron moved from Wichita, Kansas, to Phoenix, Arizona, opening the first Office of L. Ron Hubbard. There, on the edge of the desert at the base of Camelback Mountain, he began the first instruction of Scientology at what was to be the center of Scientology activities for many years. Here was the nucleus of what would become the first worldwide organization, The Hubbard Association of Scientologists.
The month was May and Ron had just completed his research with the first E-Meter, isolating and detailing the key incidents and implants on the whole track. And so came the need for and development of an auditing technique far in advance of previous procedures only addressing the current life.
He released his discoveries in what were quite literally open-air lectures, given nightly amid the orange groves, providing the most highly advanced procedure to date: Technique 80.
Rather than looking through all the tangle and confusion in the preclear’s bank, he had discovered a new approach: “Technique 80 is the practice of beingness on each dynamic successively, and the practice of beingness on a dynamic until you can be that whole dynamic.”
In these lectures, Ron bridges the gap between the current scene and the ideal.
Editor’s Note*: The Technique 80 Lectures. Transcripts were rewritten as Professional Course Books 28 through 31. These lectures, given in May 0f 1952 were the beginnings of the creative processing concepts in auditing. The title of the lectures was changed by the COS to make it more marketable in the early 1990’s.
London Professional Course/Command of Theta
In the fall of 1952, LRH was deep into an intense and sustained exploration of the nature, abilities and potentials of the human spirit.
The discoveries were astounding. Drawing on all tools of research including the technologies of twentieth-century science, Ron had moved far beyond anything even conceived of by past investigators, not only identifying the actual energy of life itself, but precisely measuring the electronics of human thought. In England to establish Britain’s first professional school, he detailed these breakthroughs in a series of evening lectures.
Yet so rapid was the pace of his research at this crucial period that even as he gave those lectures, he was already advancing into a new phase of discovery, one that expanded and further clarified all previous developments. And in one pivotal statement to students enrolled on a new Professional Course in London in November, he explained why, for the first time, the material transcended even the scope of survival.
What followed was a journey of adventure, step by step and breakthrough by breakthrough, into a wholly new and uncharted realm. Encompassing everything from Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health to Scientology 8-80, here was an introduction to the universe of theta itself. And whereas these revelations crossed a new frontier of discovery, they also formed the prelude to all LRH would unveil the following month in the Philadelphia Doctorate Course. Indeed, he was concurrently at work on a new book, Scientology 8-8008,whose aim embodied the central theme of all he taught during these London lectures: to reduce the importance and seriousness of the MEST universe and its authority and to increase the ability to build and create a universe of one’s own.
Here, then, is the moment that defines a permanent shift in orientation in life from MEST to theta and to the threshold of OT. Containing the technology that bridges from Scientology 8-80 to Scientology 8-8008, these lectures not only provide a comprehensive introduction to the universe of one’s own true beingness, they contain LRH’s first full exploration of Cause.
Editor’s Note*: The title of this lecture series was changed in the Mid-1990s by the COS to make them more marketable.
The London Lectures/Source of Life Energy Lectures
What is the energy of life? Where does it come from? How do you increase it? For centuries, philosophers, scholars and scientists, blinded by their own fixed ideas, could find no answers.
A case in point was an early 1950’s experiment at a prominent American university to measure energy fields surrounding the human body. If their “man from mud” theories were correct, those fields would emanate from individual cells. Yet they did not. The energy had a mysterious single point source. And while those results were hastily swept under a scientific carpet, their significance was not lost on one man.
The year was 1952. L. Ron Hubbard, then residing in Phoenix, Arizona, had just completed his investigations into the full scope of Man’s past and published his findings in Scientology: A History of Man. Using the first E-Meter, he had charted the whole track, establishing that Man was not a limited one-life being, but an immortal spirit whose past stretched to infinity.
Yet while religion had spoken of the soul or spirit for millennia, no one had ever isolated and measured the energy of life—its kilowatts, ohms and amperes. Accordingly, Mr. Hubbard began his investigation into the electronics of human thought and beingness. By September 1952, he had the answers.
Before departing for England to establish the first European Scientology organizations, L. Ron Hubbard presented Phoenix Scientologists with a limited manuscript edition of a new book, Scientology 88.
Next, reaching London in mid-September and establishing Britain’s first professional school at 163 Holland Park Avenue in London, he began 20 hours of evening lectures. The textbook was the completion of the work that had begun as Scientology 88, now published as Scientology 8-80, The Discovery and Increase of Life Energy in the Genus Homo Sapiens.
Through the course of his lectures, Mr. Hubbard revealed all he had learned about theta as the Source of Life Energy—exactly how a thetan creates energy, forms matter and postulates space and time. He also detailed all of the energy phenomena of the thetan—flows, dispersals, ridges, explosions, wavelengths, tractor and pressor beams.
While to cap it, he further explained his overriding method of research—the method with which he had arrived at every discovery of Dianetics and Scientology: The Q List, the highest echelon of knowledge from which all else is derived, and the Logics, methods of thinking and the organization and alignment of data. In sum, these formed the linchpin to an understanding of both Scientology and life itself.
Editor’s Note*: The lectures given by LRH in London, England originally had no title to them, the “Source of Life” moniker was added by the COS in the Mid-1990s./
The Philadelphia Doctorate Course Lectures
Throughout history, mysticism, philosophy and religion have postulated the existence of the human soul or spirit. In Eastern thought, an individual worked to attain a state of personal enlightenment, free from the material world. Christianity itself was based on the hope that the spirit of Man could transcend death.
Yet despite Man’s theories and hope, he had no proof. And in our modern era, where the rationality of science became preeminent, the very existence of the soul came into question. After all, no one had seen it, measured its dimensions or monitored its energy output. And so Man doubted. And the human spirit became a thing of superstition, of mysticism, of faith. And the new priests of materialism could dictate that Man’s hopes, dreams, creativity and ethics were simply the product of chemical interactions in the brain.
It was into this world that LRH stepped—and not lightly.
Trained both in the spiritualism of the East and the uncompromising practicality of the West, he dedicated himself at an early age to finding out the truth of exactly what Man was—whatever that truth might be.
His relentless research in Dianetics had at last unlocked the secrets of the human mind. The phenomena of mental image pictures and their hidden impact on Man had been tested and documented in case after case. Yet still questions remained, pieces of the puzzle that did not fit into the overall picture.
For one thing, in the search for aberrative incidents, preclears sometimes slipped into past lives. And, perhaps even more surprising, the aberrations then resolved with fast and dramatic results.
In his landmark 1951 book Science of Survival, LRH postulated a life force, which he designated by the Greek letter theta, as a type of energy different from the physical universe of matter, energy, space and time, or MEST. Following this, he began intensive research into the exact nature and potentials of this life force, not through belief or faith, but through strict scientific induction. Ron said of this search: “We are studying the soul or spirit. We are studying it as itself. We are not trying to use this study to enhance some other study or belief.” Key to his research was finding a way to quantitatively measure mental and spiritual phenomena, which only became possible with his development of the first electropsychometer, or E-Meter, an instrument sensitive enough to detect minute fluctuations in resistance caused by mental image pictures. Armed with this research tool, he began to track that most elusive of entities, the spirit of Man.
This research revealed that both the age and the potentials of the spirit had been vastly underestimated—as had the complexity and viciousness of the incidents which had aberrated and trapped the being in a body. With whole track recall stretching back into trillions of years, the number of aberrative incidents to be run stretched into the multibillions. Attempting to address these with Dianetics engram running would be a daunting task. So Ron began looking at the problem from a different angle: why do such facsimiles stick to a spiritual being in the first place? Could the isolated parts of Man—spirit, mind, body—be pried apart from each other?
Testing revealed that the separation of the spirit from the body was a surprisingly simple process. It could be accomplished, in about 50 percent of the cases, with the precise command to “Be three feet back of your head.”
With this, in one pivotal moment, he isolated the human spirit, not as an entity or force separate from the individual, not as a “soul” that one “sent to heaven,” but as the personality and beingness which actually is the individual and is aware of being aware. This theta being, or thetan, he found, is immortal and is possessed of capabilities well in excess of those hitherto predicted for Man.
By exteriorizing the thetan from the body, the long-sought goal of religion—spiritual existence independent of the body—had been accomplished, rationally and systematically.
This exterior state, however, proved to be unstable, as the factors that aberrated the being were still there to trap him. At the London Lectures (Source of Life Energy) in November 1952, Ron told students, “You’ve been in that state many times and you didn’t know enough to go on in that state. You didn’t think it was possible to. You thought you had to have a body. You thought you had to have this. In other words, this whole thing was booby-trapped.”
What was needed was a thetan who knew enough to handle the problems of the MEST universe, knew enough about universes to handle and protect his own and who knew enough of the track and what happens in the MEST universe so that it could not happen to him again.
In sum, an Operating Thetan.
Bridging from Homo sapiens to the state of Operating Thetan, or OT, required a firm foundation of knowledge—both of one’s own spiritual abilities and the anatomy of entrapment.
Accordingly, in late 1952, he began preparations for a comprehensive course, commencing in Philadelphia on 1 December 1952. In his letter to the Hubbard Foundation of Philadelphia, he committed himself to an extensive lecturing schedule to cover the breadth and scope of this material, up to 5 lectures a day for a total of 45 lecture and demonstration hours. In fact, he would well exceed even this, giving a total of 62 lectures over an 18-day period, with 14 supplemental lectures given the following January in London.
As the textbook for the course, Ron wrote Scientology 8-8008. The numbers in the title encapsulated his goal: “The original definition of Scientology 8-8008 was the attainment of infinity (8) by the reduction of the apparent infinity (8) and power of the MEST universe to a zero (0) for himself, and the increase of the apparent zero (0) of one’s own universe to an infinity (8) for oneself. …It can be seen that infinity stood upright makes the number eight. Thus, Scientology 8-8008 is not just another number, but serves to fix into the mind of the individual a route by which he can rehabilitate himself, his abilities, his ethics and his goals.”
Knowing that the information he was about to deliver would need to be disseminated from Philadelphia to the rest of the world, rapidly and without abridgement or alteration, he also arranged for the lectures to be professionally recorded. One of the Philadelphia Foundation students was also a recording engineer for RCA and provided then-state-of-the-art recorders and microphones to make what would be the first-ever high-fidelity tapes of his lectures.
It all culminated on December 1, 1952, when Ron arrived in Philadelphia, the first manuscript copy of Scientology 8-8008 in hand. The thirty-eight selected students eagerly crowded into the course room at the Foundation offices at 237 North 16th Street in downtown Philadelphia. As one student recalls, “None of us, even those who’d heard him lecture many times in Wichita and Phoenix, were prepared for the fantastic pyrotechnics of the evenings.”
In his opening address, he told them: “I don’t think this subject has ever been taught here on Earth before. There have been some wild subjects taught here…but no subject as wild as this.” And so Ron proceeded to lay out, in detail, the results of his research into the nature, abilities, potentials and capacities of the thetan.
The scope of the material was vast, encompassing the entire range of human and spiritual activity. He described in detail the relationship of a thetan to a body and exactly how a body is controlled and run by a thetan using energy flows and motor controls. But even more fundamental, he explained why a thetan has a body in the first place and how, step by step, the spirit got attracted to, interested in and finally dependent on a body.
In lecture after lecture, he detailed the thetan’s relationship to the material universe of matter, energy, space and time while further revealing a gradient scale of beingness, from the lowest state of being completely in agreement with and controlled by the MEST universe, to the highest states where a being creates his own universe.
By the end of the course, Ron had delivered a total of 62 lectures, each lecture an hour in duration, with a total of 54 accompanying charts, hand drawn during the course of these lectures. The following month, another 14 supplementary lectures were delivered in London, making 76 lectures and comprising a monumental body of knowledge on the full potentials of a thetan.
The Philadelphia Doctorate Course and its text, Scientology 8-8008, stand today as the largest single body of work on the identity, character and potentials of the spirit of Man ever assembled. Ron was to devote the next thirty-four years to the full development of The Bridge to Total Freedom, providing the step-by-step route anyone could travel to achieve their full spiritual potentials described in this course—Operating Thetan.
Editor’s Note*: the original description of this course was the following: – The Philadelphia Doctorate Lectures were given in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from Monday, 1 December, through Friday, 19 December 1952. The material covered included a wide analysis of human behavior, the handling and control of Homo sapiens, the highest level of atomic and molecular phenomena, a complete coverage of Standard Operating Procedure, Issue Five, and a full expansion of the new professional course textbook, Scientology 8-8008.
The Summer Sessions/Technique 88 lectures
In 1952 a new development arose, dispelling the darkness with the light of hard, cold facts:
TECHNIQUE 88.
The place was Phoenix, Arizona. There, in the shadow of Camelback Mountain, LRH was concluding his two-year investigation into past lives. This phenomenon had reared its head before the ink was dry on the first copies of Dianetics, it accelerated with the development of Advanced Procedure and became a focal point with the release of Handbook for Preclears.
He established early in his research that past life incidents had to be addressed. When they were ignored, the preclear bogged. When they were taken up, gains were swift and dramatic. Whether one “believed” in past lives or not, it was impossible to argue with results in processing.
Crucial to Ron’s exploration of this realm was his development of the first E-Meter. With it, long-buried incidents and hidden charge could not only be brought to light, but checked and cross-checked in scores of preclears. In just that way, he began charting the incidents common to all cases, establishing the principal incidents to be found in every human being.
In early 1952, LRH published the results of this research in a new book, What to Audit, now known as Scientology: A History of Man. Its opening words revealed a new processing regimen, Technique 88, specifically designed to locate and audit the thetan, the “I” of the individual.
In June, auditors from across America gathered for a summer session of lectures at the 22-acre Hubbard College, then located on Indian School Road in Phoenix. There, in an outdoor theater built for that purpose, Mr. Hubbard delivered the legendary Technique 88 lectures.
What followed was an adventure far beyond anything those auditors had ever imagined.
To further assist auditors in their own explorations of this new territory, he provided them with compass and map: two companion publications to A History of Man. One was Electropsychometric Auditing, the first manual on the use of the E-Meter. The second was the Individual Track Map, to chart the incidents run on a case.
For the first time, Man could close the long chapter of past entrapment and chart his course to freedom.
Editor’s note*: lecture Series original Description – The Summer Session – The Technique 88 Lectures. Nearly a hundred auditors attended the Summer Session in Phoenix, Arizona, June 23rd through June 28. Those attending the session were given twenty-two hours of lectures by LRH on the developments of Scientology in the field of processing regarding the whole track incidents delineated in the book History of Man. A watershed moment for all who attended the lectures.
Procedure for Theta Clearing Congress
The Standard Operating Procedure for Theta Clearing Lectures. The material in these lectures given by LRH to the professional course in London, England, in October, 1952, was incorporated into the professional auditor’s courses then being given in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Phoenix, Arizona.
1953
Motoring across Europe to Barcelona, LRH followed World War II invasion routes to study the effects the devastation had on populations. He also researched European university systems.
He returned to Phoenix, where he released breakthroughs that enabled individuals to explore their past and improve their reactions toward life. During this period, he also researched the basics of organization and developed principles that any group could use to survive and prosper.
He delivered 232 lectures and wrote two more books by the end of 1953.
The London Spring Lectures / The Factors
It was the spring of 1953 and having returned to London from Philadelphia, Ron was soon extending special invitations announcing a new Professional Course.
It was an astonishing announcement for more than a few reasons. 1952 had already seen an unrelenting wave of breakthroughs and new technology. Beginning with the first course on Scientology, it had already advanced to the whole track, electronics of human thought and the very anatomy of theta and Operating Thetan. In point of fact—and if only to emphasize the new plateau that had been reached—was LRH’s legendary Philadelphia Doctorate Course of December/January 1952/1953.
Yet if that course did, indeed, embrace the vast scope of the very essence of life itself, it also opened the gate to something even greater: The Factors: Summation of the Considerations and Examinations of the Human Spirit and Material Universe. Here was far more than merely the “next level of advance.” he had brought the entire subject to such a level of precision and cohesion that his 30 statement summation was no less than monumental,providing the very laws of the theta universe which are, quite literally, Universal Truth. Moreover, that truth could not only be known, it could be experienced.
Then, too, while those Factors unlock the riddle of creation, the final breakthrough that made it possible was no less universal. While as for the power of that universal solvent, Ron further describes how, with admiration alone, one could make MEST disappear and, theoretically, even make the universe go boom—to say nothing of one’s own case. And that is why the lectures he was about to deliver were something virtually nobody could have expected: a postgraduate to the very Doctorate Course, the course of YOU.
Then, too, came the expansion of Scientology 8-8008, not only amplifying what the book already contained, but providing no less than eight new chapters—The Factors, Universes, Behavior of Universes, Terminals, Logic, Assist Processing, Communication and new technology of Certainty Processing.
Editor’s Note*: These lectures were originally entitled the London Spring Lectures. LRH gave the lectures in March and April of 1953, to students in London, England. The lectures were retitled by the COS in the Early 2000’s to be more marketable.
The First International Congress of Dianeticists and Scientologists Lectures
In the three whirlwind years since publication of Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health, the technology had advanced to miracle level. Ron had solved the problem of human aberration and psychosomatic illness. More than that, he had demonstrated for the first time, with certainty, what Man had only speculated on and hoped for: the true nature of every individual as a spiritual being.
Having discovered and mapped out the full potentialities of a being at Operating Thetan in the Philadelphia Doctorate Course, Scientology 8-8008 and The Factors, Ron now faced the task of making those potentials a reality. Auditing techniques had to be codified, books had to be written and materials to train auditors required assembly. Thus he set to work, in Europe, preparing the needed curriculums and texts.
Upon his return to America in late September, nearly 400 delegates** gathered in Philadelphia for the First International Congress of Dianeticists & Scientologists. Throughout five days of lectures, seminars and meetings, they received not only an overview of research from the earliest days, but the growth of Dianetics and Scientology in society.
To bring that goal to fruition, Ron emphasized the need for smooth organizational action and cooperation. He enumerated the functions any Scientologist ought to carry forward in society, functions which, through action,answer the question, “What is a Scientologist?” This Congress, then, spans the breadth of Ron’s research from techniques that exteriorize a being as given in Standard Operating Procedure 8 (SOP 8), to the means by which a Scientologist can instill into society the finer qualities of cooperation, love, goodness, mercy and justice.
Editor’s Note*: The original description of this Lecture Series – The First International Congress of Dianeticists and Scientologists Lectures, given September 30 through October 4, 1953 to nearly 300 delegates attending, at the Broadwood Hotel in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Note the increase in delegates from 300 to 400.**
First American Advanced Clinical Course
With the completion of the Philadelphia Doctorate Course, Scientology 8-8008 and The Factors, LRH had discovered the potentials of Operating Thetan and the route to its accomplishment. But no matter the heights he had now achieved, his next step of research and development was to be even more momentous. Specifically, the refinement and simplification of procedures and processes until they could be applied by any auditor to the achievement of those potentials by every being.
To that end, he set up eight offices on the second and third floors of 726 Cooper Street in Camden, New Jersey, for what was initially called a Special Course in Advanced Technique. In fact, it was a course so special that out of a deluge of applicants, only the twelve best auditors across the planet were chosen to attend—literally handpicked by Ron himself.
And so it was that on that historic day, in October 1953, LRH gave the opening lecture of the very first Advanced Clinical Course. Over the next six weeks he instructed auditors in his watershed discoveries on exteriorization and its relation to rehabilitating a being to native state. Detailing its exact theory and mechanics, as well as its application through the techniques of Standard Operating Procedure 8 (SOP 8), he made it clear that exteriorization is not a process, but the natural condition being restored to every preclear.
Having established SOP 8 as the means to exteriorization, Ron covered the theory and application of what underlies each of its seven steps, including such monumental breakthroughs as:
- Making space—the principles intrinsic to a being’s ability to operate as a thetan exterior;
- Anchor points—and their relationship to maintaining the preclear’s space between himself and the body as well as the auditor’s role in rehabilitating the preclear’s ability to create, vary and vanish that space;
- Pervasion—the true nature of how a thetan knows. And with that, how pervasion relates to beingness, havingness and the ability of a thetan to generate enough energy to do virtually anything;
- And, the factors of subjective auditing versus objective auditing—defined and detailed with the why and when each is employed.
But there was more. Ron opened a clinic right on the premises and throughout the ACC—and under his direct supervision—the students audited preclears ranging from new public having no previous knowledge of Scientology, to the most “impossible” of cases. This provided him with a testing ground to research and further refine his techniques. And it was in just this way that he was to discover the means to plumb and resolve the greatest depths of human aberration by applying the discoveries and techniques of the very highest levels of beingness.
Therein also lay the story of what would unfold over the next year. For notwithstanding the fact that the Advanced Clinical Course was already in progress (and also notwithstanding his insistence that he would only train a select few) auditors world over were no longer just “applying” to enroll—they were demanding. And just how Ron responded is now the stuff of legend: No less than eight different Advanced Clinical Courses over a period of 12 months, comprising more than 500 lectures, and which would culminate in the route to exterior OT ability.
So began the first Advanced Clinical Course in Camden, New Jersey, on October 6, 1953.
Editors Note*: Here is the Original Description of the First ACC – The First American Advanced Clinical Indoctrination Course Lectures, given in Camden, New Jersey, 5 October to 14 November 1953, proved so popular that a 2nd Advanced Clinical Course had to be immediately scheduled for the 17th of November, just 4 short weeks away.
The Second American Advanced Clinical Course
Having commenced the Advanced Clinical Course, LRH had embarked on an intensive period of research and development to refine processes and training procedures. His goal was the simplification of auditing and the standardization of training so that the breakthroughs of Operating Thetan could be accomplished on a widespread basis.
Because of the rigorous nature of the training,Ron had limited the number of auditors to a mere dozen. However, and despite his initial intentions, word began filtering out to the field. And, in turn, it soon resulted in a lot of word flooding back in to Hubbard Association of Scientologists Training Center. Namely, overwhelming numbers of requests by auditors demanding to participate. So great, in fact, Ron soon decided he had no choice but to widen the doors of enrollment.
As a first step—and one which was absolutely mandated to cater to the volume of requests for application—he located new quarters at 507 Market Street, in Camden, New Jersey. They provided lecture halls, classrooms, student auditing rooms and, most important, recording studios to record the latest breakthroughs.
Then, and within just four days after graduating the first class, he began the 2nd American Advanced Clinical Course on the 17th of November 1953 to the 22nd of December. And if those new students had heard training was rigorous, they were now experiencing it. The schedule said it all: Ron lectured in the morning, afternoon and evening, while in between students were immediately put in session co-auditing under his direct supervision on the procedures he had just lectured on. And in just this way, he was able to make the first breakthrough on his program to discover barriers to auditor training. Specifically, the discovery that lack of successful auditor performance could be traced directly to a lack of understanding of the basic definitions of Dianetics and Scientology. Auditing results soared.
Yet if fundamental understanding of basic definitions was a breakthrough that was to change the shape of all future training, there was still another that would do the same as regards auditing itself—all as announced in a lecture of legendary significance, “The Granting of Beingness.” For contained within those words is not only the description of the finest thing a thetan can do, but also the answer and explanation of the “only one.” And where such a trait existed within an auditor, no preclear could even hope to make gain. In total, it was a lecture of such paramount importance that it was not only duplicated for broad distribution to all auditors, but was required study by students of every subsequent Advanced Clinical Course.
However, and notwithstanding the magnitude of these discoveries, the 2nd ACC is marked by an even bigger story with a technical development no less than milestone. For this is where LRH codified and taught the materials that form the foundation of entrance to all cases: The Rehabilitation of the Human Spirit and Standard Operating Procedure 8-C (SOP 8-C).
Amongst the multitude of breakthroughs and developments that comprise SOP 8-C was a process that was a virtual panacea: Opening Procedure of SOP 8-C. With this process, Ron had the key for auditors to unlock the entrance of every case: The willingness of the preclear to receive directions from an auditor and, hence, the preclear’s ability to actually do a process and free himself through auditing.
More to the point of future research, results of Opening Procedure were of such magnitude that Ron made the decision to devote his efforts to the full-time training of auditors. After all, having unlocked the entrance to all preclears, he’d also accomplished the very same for all auditors.
1954
In recognition of the spiritual nature of L. Ron Hubbard’s philosophy, a number of Scientologists in Los Angeles, California formed the first Church of Scientology in February of 1954.
LRH further researched and developed the religious philosophy of Scientology in Phoenix, Arizona, where he delivered more than 460 lectures and continued to write extensively on Scientology. 1954 would prove to be his most proflific year in number of lectures given and miles traveled in so doing.
The Third American Advanced Clinical Course
Such was the intensity of the demand from auditors living in the West to be personally trained by LRH that shortly after the commencement of the first Advanced Clinical Course in Camden, New Jersey, he scheduled what he termed a “Western Clinical Course” for early 1954.
While two of his staff traveled ahead to Phoenix, Arizona, to prepare for both the Clinical Course and the Congress that would precede it, Ron completed delivery of the 2nd ACC, leaving Camden shortly thereafter. Given that he had not been to Phoenix in two years, the western Dianeticists and Scientologists were exuberant. But little did they know just how well-founded their exuberance was. For while the talk of the Scientology world was Standard Operating Procedure of 8-C (SOP 8-C), he had already advanced its use to unimagined heights, very much including a special form of SOP 8-C for auditing a group.
But if students first learned of that breakthrough at the Western Congress, it was but a foretaste of what awaited them when the 3rd American Advanced Clinical Course opened on January 4, 1954. For here Ron taught not only SOP 8-C to accomplish Theta Clear, but the full application of Standard Operating Procedure 😯 to achieve an even higher goal: Operating Thetan. Addressed to the thetan exterior, SOP 😯 marked the development of a procedure intrinsic to the restoration of a thetan’s ability to handle energy and to grant life.
“The problem has two halves and one of these problems is this: he believes the mest universe is dangerous to him. You disabuse him of that. That’s the first half of SOP 😯 and the other half is jolly well convincing him he’s damn dangerous to the mest universe.”
While SOP 😯 stands at the forefront of the 3rd ACC, Ron instructed the students on a wide range of related skills, phenomena and discoveries concerning the native abilities of a thetan and the auditor’s role in achieving them, including:
- How a preclear can endow mest with life—with his own endowment of livingness;
- How disendowment and endowment of the past, present and future are the best things an individual does;
- How the injection of livingness and beingness into an individual is effected through Livingness Processing;
- How Courage Processing relates to serenity;
- And, how Opening Procedure of 8-C is used with the next-to-the-last list of Self Analysis on both lower-level cases and exteriorized thetans.
But for all else the 3rd ACC signified in terms of technical advance, it also marked a turning point in organizational establishment and the widespread dissemination of new discoveries. For while continual demand for his personal instruction had already resulted in acquisition of new quarters twice over in New Jersey—it was here that he found the ideal locale and quarters to carry him well into the future. To just that end, and with a complex of offices across several buildings, Ron moved all operations and saw to the permanent establishment for the headquarters of the Hubbard Association of Scientologists in Phoenix, Arizona.
The Fourth American Advanced Clinical Course
It was 15 February 1954 and Ron was about to deliver an ACC like none other. So great was the advance of technology, so intense the excitement generated by the miracle results from graduates in the field, that applications for enrollment could hardly be met.
The 3rd ACC had just completed and, with the Hubbard Association of Scientologists now established as a permanent base in Phoenix, Arizona, LRH scarcely paused before starting delivery of the 4th American Advanced Clinical Course three days later, at 616 North 3rd Street. With a planetary population numbering billions of preclears, his focus remained as before: to undercut the level of training to enable any auditor to handle anycase, and to undercut auditing techniques so that even “impossible” cases could be cracked by any auditor. – To just that end, he had already made another milestone breakthrough contained in a single powerful word which yet had vast ramifications—Beingness.
What followed was brand-new data he discovered on how to remedy beingness in the preclear with Beingness Processing—processes to enable a preclear to be or unbe anything.
“There is the ability to be things in a self-determined, certain fashion. That’s one kind of beingness. Anybody can benefit by running this processing solely on a self-determined basis. He gets great certainty he can be this, he can be that, he can be something else. The next thing you know he’s freer and freer and freer to observe the environment, to be in the environment, he has less and less things which he has to fight.”
Then again, of no less significance were the breakthroughs as regards training. For what LRH sought to instill in the auditors attending the 4th ACC was far more than the ability to rotely execute a process (even when that rote execution did bring results). Crucial was the auditor’s understanding—that he knew not only whathe was auditing, but why.
As for how Ron would accomplish this, it was a training approach not one of those ACC students could have expected. Because rather than pure theory instruction, he instead processed the group in order to relay the data. That meant 48 sessions on subjects including the Second Dynamic, imagination, changing ideas, exteriorization and ownership. Hence, the students learned by receiving the processes and achieving their results, thereby gaining subjective reality that enabled them to use what they had learned to audit others.
In fact, so important were these Group Processing sessions to future research, Ron insisted on no unseen variables that could obscure an analysis of case results. Therefore, instead of the customary practice of twinning students who were in need of repair or simply desired more auditing, he even set up rooms with newly acquired tape players so the students could replay the recordings of Group Processing sessions and receive them again—straight from him, a first.
Then, after each series of group processes, he gave an overview of the theory that lay behind the auditing he had just given. Case in point: In his legendary lecture, “What Your Preclear Is Trying to Do,” he detailed the basic motivations of a thetan and how, by understanding them, an auditor remains in command of the session.
Nor was that everything this ACC represented in terms of the application of technical advances. For in the very first lecture, Ron instructed those auditors in something that is today an integral part of standard auditing procedure—a basal metabolism test. He used a small meter, the E-AR-400, to demonstrate the test while explaining the relation between the thetan and his body as it affects metabolism—data so fundamental to every successful session that no auditor or pc can be without it. More to the point of this ACC, that E-AR-400 sat in a room for every student to check and/or handle their metabolism before group sessions.
When the 4th ACC concluded on March 26, some 30 select auditors streamed back into the field and eagerly put to use the auditing skills they had acquired. The impact of LRH’s breakthroughs reverberated throughout the Scientology world, generating miracle success after miracle success into his Phoenix headquarters even before the next ACC began three short days later.
While as if to put an exclamation point on the advances made, this ACC marked yet another milestone that truly stands as the most historic date in Scientology’s history: the 18th of February and the incorporation of the first Church of Scientology.
The Fifth American Advanced Clinical Course
With the successful completion of the first four Advanced Clinical Courses, wins were pouring in from the field in an ever-widening stream. A partially deaf preclear regained his hearing after just a few auditing commands. A woman unable to walk from a severely injured foot, with a doctor predicting a six-week recovery, instead sought out an auditor and two days later strode forth for a new hairdo. Then there was the store manageress incapacitated by migraine, chills, fever and a host of other ailments, about to shut up shop when a customer arrived. Forty minutes later, she had reopened and was on the phone lining up business—it just so happened her customer was an ACC graduate.
So when, on March 29, 1954, LRH arrived at 616 North 3rd Street, Phoenix, to begin delivery of the 5th American Advanced Clinical Course, a select group of auditors waited in anticipation. Their expectations would soon be fully realized. Because if each previous ACC had been marked with yet another milestone advance—exteriorization, livingness, beingness—what was about to unfold was every bit as significant. Specifically, the subject of Universes.
And while Ron’s definition of a universe as “a whole system of created things” was very much on point, he had now crossed the threshold of a new breakthrough, developing and codifying auditing techniques that addressed the preclear’s ability to directly observe all three universes—their own, the other fellow’s, and the physical universe.
As those auditors on the 5th ACC soon discovered, what LRH was imparting to them represented a major breakthrough in their ability to crack cases. For as he revealed, the creator of a universe is the “god” of that universe, and one who enters another’s universe is subject to its postulates and laws. And that is exactly where most of their preclears were to be found—in the universes of others.
Thus, Ron instructed auditors in an arsenal of techniques whereby preclears could not only regain dominion in their own universe, but win the breadth of understanding and breadth of awareness that comes from certainty on all three universes.
With the spectacular results from these technical advances, expansion—so as to bring it to others—became a key priority. Thus, despite his rigorous lecture schedule and the white-hot pace of research, Ron drove dissemination into a high roar, with books distributed by the thousands, field activities springing up from Auckland to Boston and word of mouth increasing by the day from the countless stories of lives changed for the better.
And if that was the word on the organizational front, he was also going directly to the broad public. For despite the intensive schedule, and in between lectures, it was during the 5th ACC that Ron delivered a series of 15-minute radio broadcasts on the fundamentals of Scientology. Case in point: his perennial classic, “Is It Possible to Be Happy?” originally aired as one of that memorable series of talks. Today it appears as the first chapter of Independent Scientology: A New Slant on Life—a testament to the enduring effects of LRH’s technical developments in setting the future course of dissemination.
The Sixth American Advanced Clinical Course
It was now May 1954. LRH had delivered the first five ACCs at a scorching pace: 317 lectures and Group Processing sessions in 147 days, back to back. Auditing results continued to climb. Yet, given the magnitude of the task that lay ahead—the clearing of a planet—he had a greater target in view.
That was the challenge he faced as the 6th American Advanced Clinical Course began on May 10, 1954, once again at 616 North 3rd Street, Phoenix. And from the point he found the answer, neither auditing nor training were ever quite the same. In fact, the discovery represented something so basic that it would reverberate through all subsequent advances in the training of auditors and the development of processes.
The answer was—Duplication.
And, most important in regard to auditing, perception depends on duplication, communication depends on duplication, and erasure occurs through duplication. Or, to give it an even more fundamental expression, no being can go free unless he is able to duplicate.
As to why duplication had proved problematic for auditors and preclears, it is no less than the discovery of an axiom as revealed in SOP 8-C:
“In the mest universe, the single crime is duplication.”
The immediate solution, released by him to a select group of auditors attending the 6th ACC, was called Procedure 30. It actually consisted of three processes: Problems and Solutions, Granting of Beingness and what was soon to become one of the most famous in all of Scientology, Opening Procedure by Duplication.
Procedure 30’s immediate and obvious benefit was in speed of auditing: per LRH’s estimate, the amount of time saved was in terms of scores, if not hundreds, of hours.
Yet if this remarkable ACC is renowned for the release of Procedure 30—capable of accelerating preclear gains into the stratosphere and multiplying the numbers who could receive those gains—it also included something embracive of all Scientology. Because, now from a perspective of everything that had been accomplished since the start of the first ACC in October 1953, Ron delivered a comprehensive overview of the theory, principles and mechanics of Scientology fundamentals.
And if these technical advances reflected the highest levels of processing and beingness, without breaking stride and yet seemingly stretching time itself—his ground level programs were just as unrelenting.
First, to provide all Scientologists these latest breakthroughs, and in the midst of this ACC, he delivered the Universe Processes Congress, releasing the first Group Auditor’s Handbook and delivering these most up-to-date breakthroughs as Group Processing—even including Opening Procedure by Duplication.
Then, reaching out across the local community he launched “Operation Phoenix,” with ACC students—now Scientology Ministers—visiting local hospitals and homes to deliver the latest processing to invalids and the then rampant cases of polio victims. And all of it resulting in case histories that stand today as miracles—no less than the lame soon walking, the blind now seeing in some cases.
With all the above to fill his days and nights, LRH nonetheless kept the security and the growth of Scientology at the forefront. To that end, the HAS in Phoenix became the Hubbard Association of Scientologists International, now working in partnership with HASI London to forward the global dissemination of Scientology. And as soon became clear—those advances were about to dovetail in the 7th ACC which would culminate in what stands as the very foundation of Independent Scientology today.
The Seventh American Advanced Clinical Course
For nine packed months through six Advanced Clinical Courses, Ron had been undercutting and refining the procedures and processes of Scientology to put their application firmly within the grasp of every auditor. Yet that statement alone does not convey the full significance of what was unfolding throughout that intensive program of lectures, drilling and auditing in those Phoenix course rooms. For as breakthrough built upon breakthrough, each on its own significant and together momentous, the hundred or so auditors selected to receive this advanced training came to realize they were part of something truly historic. That is, no less than the accomplishment of the goal of religion expressed in all Mankind’s written history, the freeing of the soul by wisdom.
Thus, when he convened the 7th American Advanced Clinical Course on the 23rd of June 1954 before a chosen complement of auditors at 616 North 3rd Street, Phoenix, excitement was at fever pitch. And with good reason. For with the benefit of everything learned since the start of the first ACC in October 1953, he now isolated every drill and process that had proved most workable in the hands of auditors other than himself and distilled them into a single processing regimen. Called Intensive Procedure, it was a step-by-step program whereby a preclear could achieve exteriorization and exercise his abilities—as a thetan and independent of a body.
Notwithstanding the obvious ramifications of a procedure that could be applied by any auditor—virtually providing a checklist of steps to undercut the level of every case and then move them upwards to full exteriorization—was the entire change of approach. Rather than concentrating on the eradication of disability,the accent became an increase of ability which, in turn, handled disability as a matter of routine.
Indeed, here was an entirely new plateau not only for auditing, but the subject of Scientology itself. For what underlay Intensive Procedure and these new processes were the very Axioms of Scientology. And, indeed, the processes themselves were drawn right from those Axioms and, most particularly, the singular importance and power of Communication. As L. Ron Hubbard was later to describe, it was no less than one of the great discoveries of Scientology.
In testament to accomplishment of those goals, before the 7th ACC had concluded LRH had not only expanded Intensive Procedure, but authored a text so embracive in its application that it was titled the Auditor’s Handbook. Later to be known as The Creation of Human Ability, it stands as the broadest statement on Scientology itself—both in 1954 as well as today. He then proceeded to ensure its application by all Scientologists with a series of lectures specifically tailored to accompany the book and in combination forming the curriculum of a new Professional Course. From the history and heritage of Scientology as a religion, to the application of Axioms in auditing, and from the Four Conditions of Existence, to the Dynamics and Operating Thetan—each of such paramount importance they were forever to be known as the Phoenix Lectures.
The Eighth American Advanced Clinical Course
It was one year almost to the day since the launch of the 1st ACC. Having released the Auditor’s Handbook in the 7th ACC and established a new Professional Auditor training curriculum, procedures now existed whereby anywell-trained auditor could restore to a being abilities and freedoms only dreamed of prior to Scientology. Of equal significance, the road was now wide open for dissemination and application of those breakthroughs. For let there be no doubt as to where LRH’s central focus had been during that twelve months. Not on the discovery of processes that worked—even pre-1950 processes worked perfectly in Ron’s own hands—but on processes that, in his own words, could be taught.
Toward that end, on 4 October 1954, he opened the 8th American Advanced Clinical Course. It was an ACC of which he stated:
“The Eighth Unit is getting a different kind of treatment. We now know how and exactly what to teach to make auditors.”
The students who entered the course room at 806 North 3rd Street, Phoenix soon learned what that meant, for he immediately informed them they would be taking an eight-week course in the first two weeks of the new ACC. And, in a break from customary ACC practice, that concentrated two-week study would consist of taped lectures. Specifically, lectures selected by him from the full breadth of the Advanced Clinical Courses (and which would soon comprise a new Professional Course and later be issued as the Phoenix Lectures) encompassing the vital fundamentals and breakthroughs to accompany a study of the Auditor’s Handbook.
And when speaking of the Handbook, it was a course text vastly expanded from the original 29 processes. Affectionately known to ACC students as “The Book,” and soon to be published as The Creation of Human Ability, it had grown to more than 70 processes by the time the course ended. And with the 26 lectures he delivered specifically for this ACC, he was making sure, with intensity, that every auditor knew their data cold.
Specifically, Route 1 and Route 2 of Intensive Procedure—processes to enable a preclear to operate exterior. Those who had practically no communication lag and could exteriorize easily went straight on to Route 1, then did the entirety of Route 2 while exteriorized. Preclears with a long communication lag were put first on Route 2, a series of processes designed to bring about exteriorization. When Route 2 was completed, those pcs moved on to Route 1.
Given the emphasis on application, that the program was exacting could only be expected. A late October 1954 edition of the Journal of Scientology described the 8th ACC as it rolled forward:
“The day’s activities start at 8:00 A.M. when the students arrive at the school on a dead run with a cup of coffee in one hand and a donut in the other. They collapse into a chair, ready to start the day’s schedule, which breaks at 11:30 A.M. for lunch and picks up again at 12:30 P.M. for some more instruction, auditing or demonstrations. At 2:00 P.M. they dogtrot it to the main lecture hall, some distance away, for the lecture given by LRH. After the lecture they make a dash to the Snappy Grill for coffee—1 minute, 45 seconds flat. Then on with the schedule, which ends at 5:30 P.M., and resumes at 7:00 P.M. for tapes until 10:00 P.M., when the students drag themselves home.…Make no mistake about it, the Advanced Clinical Course is rugged, but the students are proud to be a part of it.”
For, in the final analysis, what LRH was teaching those ACC auditors was certainty.
And if the schedule was intense, the training more rigorous than ever before, Ron yet continued with his parallel programs to expand Scientology into the public sphere. Starting in October and continuing all the way to the following May, he delivered a vast array of public lectures and Group Processing sessions. In point of fact, it was during these lectures that he gave his classic statement on responsibility, “The Wrong Thing to Do Is Nothing.” And while the word of mouth from those lectures made the addition of several new buildings necessary to handle the expansion, the 8th ACC also led to something far greater than new quarters—namely, the breakthrough that was to mark the 9th ACC, and the full discovery and codification of the crucial element that underlies all successful auditing.
The Phoenix Certification Course / Cause Distance Effect
It was the fall of 1954. The international headquarters of Scientology in Phoenix, Arizona, was ablaze with activity. In the space of a few months, LRH had delivered the 8th American Advanced Clinical Course,launched a series of weekly public lectures and Group Processing sessions and incorporated a new Hubbard Dianetics Research Foundation. And as if that were not enough, he was simultaneously writing the final chapters of a new book, Dianetics 55!
Yet, above all, Ron’s researches during the previous year had been directed toward auditors—specifically, the training of auditors. To that end, he had opened a Hubbard Professional College in Phoenix, which was now delivering its first Professional Course, designed to instill in students a full understanding and mastery of the six most basic processes of Scientology.
It was called the Phoenix Certification Course. Running six days a week, the course included demonstrations from Instructors and co-auditing between students. Thus, on 16 November 1954, when Ron stepped to the podium to deliver the first lecture, the predominant mood was one of excitement and anticipation.
Soon the students were fully engrossed, for he wasted no time in relaying a startling new discovery: An inability to recall is caused by scarcity of past.
Thus, the astonishing datum: Nobody in the last hundred thousand years had been able to remember at will anything on the time track.
The solution lay in Straightwire. For Straightwire, he explained, is not just an attempt to have somebody remember:
“You should realize that Elementary Straightwire does not mean remembering actual incidents. That’s a shock to you, probably.
“Straightwire was called ‘Straightwire’ because the auditor is stringing a straight line between Cause and Effect.”
For as he elucidated, the auditor is recovering the preclear’s ability to be at Cause.
It was a crucial datum. And Ron continued by detailing not only the integral role Straightwire played in Six Basic Processes, but fundamental advances in auditing techniques:
- Two-way Communication—a basic part of every step of a process an auditor does, and how to maintain it in any circumstance;
- The Communication Formula—how Straightwire applies to the Distance part of the communication cycle;
- Communication with a Group—how to put up anchor points to address and thereby get into communication with a group;
- Opening Procedure of 8-C—it unjams the bank by locating the “when” and “where” of present time;
- Opening Procedure by Duplication—how it blows apart the consideration it “must not happen again”;
- Remedy of Havingness—its underlying theory and mechanics in relation to the Know to Mystery Scale;
- Spotting Spots in Space—how it makes a preclear more capable of locating things and increases his ability.
Moreover, as part of all he taught those auditors, he demanded their application of the knowledge and skills they had now acquired. To that end, they set out as ministers to visit hospitals, jails and people’s homes to bring the miracles of Scientology to the local community. It was called “Operation Phoenix” and miracles in abundance there soon were—from a woman abandoned by doctors who recovered from a severe hemorrhage, to a four-year-old boy scheduled for an operation to repair a withered arm whose limb was so restored after five hours of auditing that the operation was cancelled.
But for all the astonishing results these auditors now produced with others, the greater miracle concerned the resultant effect on themselves. For, as LRH had announced when inaugurating the training school:
“Today’s auditor can be secure as to his own case. For we have found that to be well it is a demonstrable fact that one must be able to make others well. It is not enough to only be well and happy oneself. The confusions and upsets of life are such as to retard anyone’s case. The auditor, succeeding uniformly with cases, becomes better in ability and health than the best preclear on whom he practices. And this is a processing fact.”
Here, then, is what stands as a landmark on the road towards greater auditor certainty.
The Ninth American Advanced Clinical Course
It was December 6, 1954. The site was Phoenix, Arizona. And with those words, LRH began what would become the preeminent ACC on the subject of Communication, its application to exteriorization and the making of Clears.
This was not just another Advanced Clinical Course, but the culmination of an entire era of development that began with the 1st ACC and now embraced the crucial component that would monitor all auditing into the future.
Having launched from the standpoint of exteriorization (Scientology 8-8008 and the Philadelphia Doctorate Course), Ron’s track of research had been oriented to two distinct goals:
- The attainment of exteriorization and overcoming barriers to its accomplishment by every being.
- Not only the development of processes to that end but, more importantly, ones that auditors other than Mr. Hubbard could apply with success.
And it was a key point. For LRH had long noticed that what he could accomplish in auditing did not necessarily match what other auditors were capable of accomplishing. Whether they should have been able to achieve his same results mattered little to him. Planetary clearing required more than one auditor. And so the intensity of his research, in both training auditors and developing processes they could apply, was every bit as important as researching the beingness and capabilities of Man himself.
The first plateau had been reached with the 7th Advanced Clinical Course and the codification of all those processes he’d now found workable in the hands of other auditors. First releasing these materials as Intensive Procedure and then as the Auditor’s Handbook, Ron had now expanded its text to the fully comprehensive The Creation of Human Ability. Then, to accompany the book, he handpicked specific lectures from the Advanced Clinical Courses that corresponded with a study of the book. Issuing them as the Professional Course Lectures (and then later under the embracive title the Phoenix Lectures), he now had the curriculum comprising basic Professional Auditor training.
Next, to see to its dissemination and application, LRH conducted and supervised the 8th Advanced Clinical Course encompassing a full study of The Creation of Human Ability, the Phoenix Lectures and further lectures which, point by point, detailed the application of every technique and procedure.
Yet his work was not done. For while he had codified the route that was Scientology, he also had the link to even greater application for every case from the very bottom to the very top. More specifically, while the goal could now be summed in a single word—Exteriorization—another word was the singular factor of importance in its accomplishment: Communication.
So it was that, while conducting the 8th Advanced Clinical Course, he had been simultaneously writing another book. In that regard, even its title bore great significance. For having advanced the subject from Dianetics to Scientology, the previous two years (1952 through 1954) had solely addressed the latter subject. However, with the breakthrough of communication, he now had the crucial link to unify both subjects—Dianetics and Scientology—into a combined whole. And therein was the content of the landmark Dianetics 55!
A Congress was scheduled for broad announcement of these discoveries and invitations were sent the world over, to both Dianeticists and Scientologists. Meanwhile, and in preparation, Ron immediately convened the 9th ACC to teach Professional Auditors the skills and processes of the forthcoming Dianetics 55!now rolling on the printing presses.
Here, then, is the 9th American Advanced Clinical Course—an in-depth professional study of Dianetics 55! And where, throughout thirty-four lectures, LRH elaborates upon and demonstrates its underlying theory, formulas and processes with emphasis on application by auditors.
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1955
In March of 1955, LRH moved from Phoenix to Washington, DC, where the Founding Church of Washington, DC, was formed with him as Executive Director. He drafted organizational policies and intensified his work in developing an administrative technology to allow Scientology churches to run smoothly and expand.
During October, L. Ron Hubbard returned to England to deliver lectures in London, while further establishing the London organization. During 1955, Mr. Hubbard delivered over 200 lectures on subjects from counseling techniques to education and alcoholism.
In December, he traveled to Ireland to initiate the formation of an Irish organization in Dublin, and then subsequently returned to England.