Dianetics of L. Ron Hubbard

June 1, 1950

For Huna Research Associates
Covering the experimental approach to the use of Huna in HUNA and related religious and psychological fields.
From Max Freedom Long
P.O. Box 2867, Hollywood Station, Los Angeles 28, California, U.S.A.

THE BOOK, DIANETICS

The book by L. Ron Hubbard, which was mentioned in a recent bulletin, was released – all 450 pages of it – and Ye Cigbo scratched faithfully to find $4.14 to buy his HRAs a copy. He might as well have bought us a stick of dynamite. Hubbard’s book is just as highly explosive to the world of psychological thought. Half of those whose interests lie in this direction will blow up sky-high, while the other half will cock a weather eye and settle down to sort through the author’s findings, claims and theories to see what of value or bright newness is to be found. I think that the HRAs„ for the most part, will belong to the second half, although our final evaluations may show wide variance.

One HRA, after reading his copy of the book, phoned to tell me that he believed that Hubbard had figured everything out exactly right. The method given for finding and draining off complexes sounded workable, simple and marvelous.

Plans were already being made with a friend to begin following instructions while trying out the system. He promises to report back later to tell what the results may be.

Another HRA, one who is well acquainted with all the angles of psychology, reported looking through his copy and wishing that he had his money back. A third remarked after reading the magazine article on the book, “Just to rename psychology and call it “Dianetics” will not work – he’ll have to have something very good to justify the claims being made.”

Still another HRA, this time one who has been a practicing psychologist and doctor for some years, after a study of the magazine articles, wrote, “It would appear that what he has discovered is our old friend abreaction or traumatic recall. This is fine, and it produces amazing results. It needs more public awareness, but does not justify coining a lot of new words to add to an already confusing mass of terminology. If he has discovered a new technique that is very speedy and a hundred per cent effective, then, of course, he has something to contribute. However, many psychotherapists have succeeded in producing these abreactions (draining off of the complex) in from one to fifty sessions. They are spectacular in their results, but are not something new except to a person just learning about them.”

My own reaction to Dianetics is a mixture of the several points of view given above. I look with delighted interest on Mr. Hubbard’s effort to write 450 pages about psychology and psychotherapy without using more than a half-dozen of the commonly accepted words. He has, as he says, begun from scratch and reconstructed the entire science in an effort to make it fit exactly with what he found and what he was able to observe in his studies in the field. But what delights me most is the fact that I find that Huna fills in most of the gaps which he has had to straddle, and that he may have simplified for easy general use a process by which we can get along without a kahuna to find and drain off our fixations for us – be able to do it for one another. The inability to get at our fixations and UNBLOCK the “path” to the Aumakuas, without the aid of a kahuna, has been one of our major obstacles for over two years of HRA experimentation.

To say the least, one is slightly startled when beginning to read Mr. Hubbard’s book to find that on the first page he proclaims “Dianetics” to be the science of mind, making no mention of the term “Psychology” which dictionaries have described as the “science of mind” for years. After the first startled moment, one begins to lift an eyebrow in amused questioning as one reads the boast that Dianetics, in being created, is comparable to the finding of fire, and the use of the wheel and arch. In the second paragraph, in italics, we are given the great news that the concealed sources of all bodily or mental ills caused by psychic disturbances have been “discovered” and ways for their unfailing cure found.

As we hope to be able to put to good use some of the methods which the author presents, it ill behooves us to refuse him the privilege of doing what we might call “talking elephant.” It is, heaven knows, BIG talk, but it is not without a certain charm in its brag-strut-and-swagger. One becomes almost willing to permit Mr. Hubbard to claim the invention or discovery of what he will, be it our old prenatal traumas and later fixations, dressed up and freshly described as “engrams,” or be it a recording instead of a memory. It might be said that we have before us a written record of one man’s conclusions concerning his own experiences and observations – but not in any way a standard text giving the general findings and conclusions of the majority of workers in this field. The book is a thing to place under the microscope of interested examination while its claims are inspected – much as we might look a bug over for two heads. If we can find the second head, and it will really chew better than the first, and see what the first cannot see, that will be well worth the effort. In a nut shell, Dianetics, after giving its ideas concerning the fixations, their origins, the force behind them, and the way they fade out when brought to light and subjected to the action of reason, goes on to describe the presently used method of treatment.

Almost all major fixations are said to be originated during the prenatal period. At almost any time after conception – be it only a matter of hours – the zygote (or later the embryo or fetus) may record and fix a memory of discomfort suffered by pressure or other conditions and, at the same time, may actually remember what was said by the father or mother or both. The things said at a time of pain and resultant “unconsciousness” (this may be complete or only a slightly lowered state of the consciousness) are not rationalized, to use the familiar terms, but are held as illogical fixations. For instance, the mother may have said, “I simply can’t have a baby now!” And, years later, the infant grows to be a woman with a fixation that she “simply can’t have a baby now,” and so performs perfectly unreasonable acts to prevent bearing a child of her own.

No report is made on finding memories and fixations going back even beyond the time of conception, although this has been reported in the writings of other investigators.

In terms of Huna, it is not a “primitive cell memory” that is able to record and, at some point on the way, understand the literal meaning of the words, but is the Aunihipili in its aka body – the Auhane not yet being directly-attached to the budding body and not able to offer “rationalization” for any impressions forced into the memory.

Mr. Hubbard reports cases in which, during periods of unconsciousness after an accident or when under the influence of ether during an operation, words spoken and also other sensory impressions have been remembered but not rationalized, thus causing fixations. Again we find in Huna an explanation. The Auhane has stopped functioning, but the Aunihipili, forced from the body, is there in the aka body, all its senses picking up impressions and registering them as hidden memories which may later be the concealed sources of fixations or blockages.

Later on, the fixations, when brought into action by some stimulation, show an ability to cause the conscious or Auhane to be cut off from getting its usual supply of mana to make into the “will” with which it could normally control the Aunihipili and its reaction to the fixed and illogical idea-memory. With the supply of low mana cut off from the Auhane, the Aunihipili seems to double the mana or low will-force and use it to command the illogical reaction to the fixation. This reaction may be such that it is momentary or it may be so continuous that it acts as a steady pressure to cause a continuous mental defect. It may upset the glands or other parts of the body and cause some form of illness – psychosomatic illness, which may be behind about 70% of our mental and physical ills. (I am using our own terms to get the materials condensed for our quick inspection.)

Before going on to the Dianetic Reverie method of getting at the fixations and draining them off by subjecting them belatedly to the rationalization of reason, there are several points brought up that are part and parcel of the exciting set of benefits which we are promised will come from the use of the methods to clear away all the fixations and blockages of the individual.

The author says that he has observed that the force which is wasted in driving the fixations through to make us respond to them, is added to our mental and physical power and drive once the fixation is found and removed. He calls a person who has been freed of all fixations down to the very earliest, a “clear,” and tells us that a “clear” has an amazing increase in powers. He is invariably “good” and in all ways much more of a model man. His health is as good as it is organically possible to make it. His mind works much more swiftly and accurately. He is free from fears which are ungrounded, and his capacity for enjoying life is greatly enhanced. (This is the part of the “talking elephant” that I like. If he can make good on a fraction of these items, he can claim to have discovered or invented whatever he likes and have my blessing, want it or not.)

Dianetics, in its first stage of growth, has not taken up such things as the fixations or “blocking of the path” which the kahunas found preventing the successful contacting of the Aumakua and the sending along the aka thread of contact the mana flow carrying the thought-forms of the prayed-for conditions. However, in our work with Huna, there is no reason that the fixation caused by impressions originating in “guilts” should not also be found and drained off by using the same methods. Unfortunately, the act of making amends for hurts done others does not remove guilt fixations always. The kahunas knew this and took steps to find and clear away the fixation which was no longer justified.

Dianetics proposes, as one of its next steps, to find ways of treating the insane who are organically sound. Such things as spirit attack and obsession fall entirely outside of the scope of the present set of theories, but just might be included later. While Huna is inclusive of human states of consciousness in both life and death, it is still alone in the width of its scope. The insane, whose attention cannot be attracted and held, and whose cooperation cannot be obtained, will hardly respond to the methods used for those suffering from compulsions or who are ill because of mental blockings.

Only in Huna, of all the many religious or psychological systems, do we find a clear-cut division between the high magic and the low. Dianetics deals only with the low magic of Huna – that which brings about healing through work with the Aunihipili and Auhane, and the fixations, spirit attacks and obsessions. This is psychology at its task. In the high magic we have the instant healing of the kind known at shrines and as performed by the best kahunas. In this, the parts of the body which have been injured or destroyed are restored, as we say, “miraculously.” In the high magic of Huna we find in use, in addition to the things used in the low magic, the Aumakua and the high mana, also thought-forms used as patterns and the aka body used as a mold into which to cast restored tissues to bring about instant healing. The low magic is something we can use for ourselves. The high magic demands the cooperation of the Aumakua as well. It is important that we keep these differences always in mind. The ideal practice is to combine the low and high magic so that a complete train of beneficial results may come from making amends for hurts done others, and from the following finding of fixations and the removal of them. There are three parts to the picture, (1) the low magic or psychological approach, (2) the high magic or combined psychological-religious approach, and, (3) the approach necessitated by the part the spirits may play in our lives, be it for good or bad. Not until all three elements have been considered and efforts made to take advantage of the Huna knowledge of each, is one justified in passing on the workability of Huna.

The Dianetic Reverie is a relaxed state in which one muses in a day-dream state. The conscious mind relaxes its hold on the subconscious and invites it to go back through the life of the individual to recall such incidents as it may.

In order to allow the patient to let go almost completely with his conscious mind or Auhane, a friend acts as “auditor” and takes the place of the Auhane, giving gentle orders to go back along the “time track” and often to repeat going through a part of the past that is recalled and which seems to hold a fixation. By letting the auditor give all the instructions or orders, and also be the one to use his reason actively to try to decide what is or is not related to a hidden fixation, the patient is able to relax more fully. His body is relaxed in a chair or lying down. His Auhane relaxes and lets go, but can take over at will. Thus allowed a free hand, the Aunihipili happily sorts through memories of all kinds and times, telling what they are as they are recalled and the moments lived over in thought. Often the sounds, sights and smells return as if actually coming from the original experience, The pain, emotional or physical, or the uncomfortable sensations accompanying the origin or making of a fixation, will return. At such times the Aunihipili may tend to back away from the remembered situation or to lose a degree of consciousness – also drawing farther away from the Auhane which has temporarily given over its control. At this point the friend who is acting as auditor and also substituting for the Auhane of the patient, must ask that the experience be recalled again, and often it takes some urging to get the patient to go back to a painful or shocking experience. In this experience many things may be hidden, but eventually these are recalled, one by one, until the whole of the incident is brought to light, with phrases heard and the sensations felt as real. If ills have resulted from that fixation which has blocked out a part of the normal memory, these will perhaps be intensified. But, once the complete details of the experience have been found by the Aunihipili and told, and once they have been explained and rationalized by the auditor, they begin to vanish – the draining off has begun. More going back over the same steps will drain off the complex completely and permanently. The ills vanish and the physical and mental powers of the patient increase because of the freeing of the force tied to the fixation.

Mr. Hubbard tells of finding that the very first or original fixation, usually possible to trace back to a prenatal incident or to some incident connected with birth, may serve to set off a series of reactions which result in related but rather different fixations formed later in life at times of unconsciousness (partial or complete) if accompanied by enough physical or mental pain to upset the control of the Auhane for a time. The progress back to the first or earliest fixation may be fast or slow. It may be a matter of going back from one fixation to the one before it, draining off parts of them, and going on back. Many sittings may be required and the same ground may have to be covered repeatedly. But, without fail, the Aunihipili will eventually work through all the blackings and give over the memories which have never been accessible to the Auhane. Progressive improvement in health and mental tone is noted, and when the work is completed, the patient then is “clear” – he can recall all parts of his life and nothing is hidden. No longer is there a blocked part of his time track or memory. No longer is part of his mana wasted in the illogical obeying of fixation compulsions which are in the hands of the momentarily uncontrolled Aunihipili.

The auditor is necessary for the simple reason that if one tries to work on himself, his conscious or “analytical mind” is tossed out of the window whenever the memory of the fixation-causing incident is approached. Being tossed out, it has no power to apply its power of reasoning to the situation. It is robbed of mana and so of “will,” as we would explain it. Here the auditor must act for it.

There are pages and pages spent in the book going over and over various aspects of the method and giving illustrations. There are instructions, advice and warnings. One is told to begin acting as auditor by telling the relaxed friend that he will close his eyes at the end of the count of seven, and when eyes are closed, the auditor must say that anything he orders done during the sitting will be canceled when the word “canceled” is spoken, that is, in so far as any slightest hypnotic suggestion or influence is concerned.

That is it in a nut shell. In Dianetics, we may have another oversimplification of methods such as the “Every day, in every way,” cure-all. We may see a similar vogue. Be that as it may, a few HRAs are sure to study the method with care and to try it out. In due time we will have reports from these and eventually we will be able to form an opinion as to whether Mr. Hubbard’s work will give us a substitute for the fixation-removing kahuna or not.

IN THE MEANTIME, for those who lack the time or opportunity to experiment with the Hubbard method in which an auditor is needed, I urge that individual HRAs join me in a test I have already begun in my few spare moments – a test easy to make and which already seems workable to a promising degree. It is a test which I find is well adapted for the use of those of us who are not in the class with the “200 cases” which Mr. Hubbard reports working on, and which (although there is a complete lack of details as to where the cases were found, whether in institutions or amongst those found unfit for army duty, or just selected friends who were suffering from troubles caused by fixations) should fit the needs of those of us who are only slightly complexed – perhaps mainly in the realm of old “guilt” or fear fixations. (Of course, any illnesses which we, as individuals, may have, may be partly or entirely caused by some train of fixations and so be psycho-somatic in their nature.)

After three sittings of about twenty minutes each, sitting relaxed in the Study, I found that I could say aloud, in a commanding way to my Aunihipili, “I am now going back in my life to hunt up the memories of times when I was frightened or under much emotional stress in any way connected with prayer.” This is my Auhane giving a strong command to my Aunihipili.

The next thing is to relax mentally and physically and begin going back from one time in the past to another. I found that things I had forgotten for years began to come into my mind in a daydream form, giving me stronger and stronger reproductions of how I felt at the times recalled and how things were in my surroundings. In doing this, I discovered a strange little indicator in the pit of my stomach that began at once to tell me when I was getting into parts of the memories of incidents in which fear or discouragement fixations were formed. The word “discouragement” may be used in our testing for any blocking of faith, any doubt, anything that prevents us from praying and acting in full faith and confidence and with full use of our energies. (This is not my “discovery.” It is good Huna. In the language of the kahunas, mana ka means “discouragement, faintheartedness, laziness and indifference to undertaking some action.” The literal or root meaning is very significant. It is our familar mana plus ka which is to “finish or end” or to “throw out, as water in bailing a boat.” Basically it means when we have a lack of mana, and in this case it is the lack caused by the blocking or fixation. The kahunas knew this well. Mr. Hubbard depends on the releasing of this force to strengthen the drive of the individual when “cleared.”)

The indicator in the pit of the stomach is a slight or a strong “sinking feeling” or sudden automatic reproduction on a small scale of the reaction experienced in times of fear, emotional shock or danger, perhaps at times not yet recalled. I think we must all have some type of reaction peculiar to ourselves. The kahunas knew that the Aunihipili had the seat of its reactions in the midriff region. They said that the Aunihipili had its thought center in the naau, which means the “intestines” and also “the mind.” (The roots na and au give “quiet” plus “self,” which is a good description of the Aunihipili in its automatic and hidden activities which go on out of sight of the Auhane. This word for “mind” also means “affections” and “the moral nature” – in other words the EMOTIONS, and these, as we know, are something which only the Aunihipili feels. The Auhane can only share in the emotions and can never create them by itself.)

In attempting to set the Aunihipili moving back along the “time track” of my life, as Mr. Hubbard calls it, I followed the steps to be found in the words of the kahunas. I commanded the naau self, or Aunihipili, to act, as explained above. I then relaxed in body and mind, which is na na, or “to quiet.” Then, to the “quiet” state I added action and began to perform na na`o (note the added “o”), which means “TO THINK DEEPLY, TO PENETRATE, AS INTO THE MIND,” also, “TO THRUST THE HAND INTO SOME UNKNOWN AND DARK RECEPTACLE TO SEARCH FOR SOMETHING,” which is to be “seized hold of, as (with) the mind”,  “to be drawn out”. But the thing to be drawn out is described in a still further set of meanings for the word – see Andrews Hawaiian Dictionary, page 411, with meanings numbered 1 to 4, from which the parts in quotes are taken – “4. To be slippery, to be led astray, to be turned aside.”

In the three meanings of  “4” just given, we see that the hidden memories which have never been rationalized but have become fixations, are concealed in the “dark sack” of the Aunihipili, that they must be sought for after quieting the mind and by the relaxed or quieted Aunihipili part of the mind. When found, they are “slippery” to grasp, but are grasped by the mind instead of the symbolic “hand.” In trying to find and bring out these memories, the Aunihipili may often “lead us astray” and will repeatedly “turn aside” as the fixation memory is approached and show every sign of wishing to avoid bringing the original fixation-forming situation up to the light of reason so that it may be rationalized (which sometimes takes several times of doing over) and so “drained off.”

A known incident which one may suspect is part of a fixation, be it large or small in the reaction it causes, makes a good place to begin hunting memories. In my experiments I went back and began to try to recall (by relaxing and expecting while idly observing what memories came and then drifting here and there or back and forth in them as more and more details were given by the Aunihipili) everything connected with times when I prayed because I was afraid or in the midst of grave difficulties. (I wanted to see what fixations might be the cause of my Aunihipili shying off from prayer unexpectedly at times. I think perhaps some earlier prayer period experience is to blame.)

One of the earliest experiences formed a starting point. I thought back to the age of seven when a visiting aunt brought the family news of a wonderful prophesy giving the time of the end of the world as almost upon us. She read about it from a paper and, with my small sister, I listened and was convinced by all the glib arguments based on Bible prophesy, and, by my aunt’s apparent belief. On the evening of the night on which the “end” was to come, my mother put sister and me to bed, nervously telling us not to be afraid. But we were both badly frightened. To make matters worse, three or four very wicked deeds which I had done earlier, remained fixed in my mind and even as I prayed in a panic to be “caught up into the air” instead of being “left to burn,” I was all but sure that my sins would prevent my prayer from being answered. (It was not until the end of the third sitting that the sins were partly identified. One was remembered very suddenly – a participation in a four-boy job of drowning a batch of unwanted kittens for the hire of 5¢ each. The kittens were my first “kill” and the one I had held under water had haunted [me]. It was about there in the procedure that, at the thought of praying for mercy, my stomach “turned over” slightly but unmistakably. And, right there, I found a blankish and confused spot in the memory, and I found that I disliked very much remembering either the struggling kitten or the little boy who struggled to forget it and to pray.

Having discovered the first probable fixation point, I ended the work for a moment, thought it over, and then took charge with the Auhane, again commanding myself to go back to that moment and recall it, live it all over and bring the whole memory to the light. Again I relaxed and made the approach. Again the signal came of its own accord from the Aunihipili and in the pit of my stomach. Oddly enough, the blank spot cleared hardly at all, but an earlier and deeply hidden or forgotten incident suddenly came to mind. It was of my return from the expedition to the canal with the kittens. I came into the house still shaken, and there saw my beloved father who had been off on business for some weeks. Ordinarily I would have rushed joyously to his arms, but now, weighted down with a world of guilt, I pretended not to see him and tried to slip away. I recalled again the puzzled and hurt look from my father as he rose and came uncertainly after me. It was very bad. I remembered that, but even now there is a blank space after father reached me and asked what was the matter. I have still to penetrate this blank in later sittings and learn what I did or said. I recall dimly that I clutched my guilty secret to my heart and just suffered dumbly.

A second one of the three guilts standing that night of the “end” in the way of prayer was the unconfessed crime of having, at the age of from five to six, spent on candy the penny given me for the collection at Sunday school, and later lying miserably to explain to the teacher that I had lost my penny on my way. (Again a tiny twinge in the stomach at this recall and vivid reliving in memory.) The third memory seemed tied in with the second – it was the unconfessed theft of two pieces of candy from the box which my aunt had brought with her on her visit and which had been passed around, then closed and placed in her room. One piece was for my sister, and I feel that when the full details of the night of the “end” are recalled, it will be found that the theft weighed heavily on both of us. On the far side of the period of fear and inability to pray without my terrible sins rising mountain-high before me, lies the memory of the next morning with the vast relief at finding that nothing had happened.

I will continue this delving, coming up for air with any remembered experiences which impress me as being part of a fixation chain, and rationalizing them, then relaxing and living them over and over to complete the rationalization. To show how hard it is to do the rationalizing, I must admit that I am still squinging at the reapproach to the sickening physical sensations and sounds keyed in with the kitten incident. I am sure that the stronger the fixation, the harder it is to force oneself to face and reface the memory of its origin.

I urge all of you who can, to try out this method as I am doing and to let me know what you learn. Already I have come to a far better understanding of my Aunihipili and how it works behind the scenes. I am sure that we will all find this a splendid training and that it will enable us to become “auditors” for others if we wish to do so. In your experimenting, watch for what seems to be a deep-seated desire on the part of the Aunihipili, even back in early childhood, to be punished for evil deeds – perhaps because punishment has usually come as the price of parental forgiveness and the return of parental love. In this I begin to glimpse the origin of later troubles and ills. MFL