AboutLaurie Hamilton Expertise I am able to answer questions regarding Scientology practices and procedures, belief system, donations, religious rites, management, administrative and staff matters.
Experience I am a second generation Scientologist whose parents began in Dianetics in 1950 and studied directly with L. Ron Hubbard. I have been personally active in the church for 40 years, have eleven years former staff experience in both technical and administrative areas, and extensive technical and administative training and counseling. I am "clear" and "OT." I come from an extended family of many religions, but my spouse and children are Scientologists, as are my siblings and their spouses, several cousins, nieces, nephews, an aunt, and an uncle. Between us we have had every good and bad experience one might go through in the church at every level.
I was reading an answer you wrote to a question about the rebirth of OTs. In your answer you stated that the physical development of a past life OT in a new life might only be slightly faster than it'd be for a non past life OT. And you also said that conscious recollection of past life events without this-life processing would probably be minimal.
I don't mean to sound hopeless, but with all of the odds against permanent spiritual gains, what (in your opinion) makes the lifelong pursuit of enlightenment worthwhile/significant?
ANSWER: No one has reached full OT yet. People who are called "OT" in this life are in fact "pre-OT."
OT 8, the highest level yet released, is only the first of the full-OT levels.
The point of spiritual enlightenment, in part, is to escape the trap of the endless cycle of death and rebirth. As more people actually get to full OT (many levels remain unreleased, until there are enough OT 8's and people on OT 7 to justify the release of 9 and levels above that), I would expect there will be more people who will not be returning again and again.
As it is, people who are past-life "OT," (pre-OT in fact) in my experience, tend to fly through lower level auditing - and some discover they don't even need Dianetic auditing. While much past life gain is latent in this life, it seems to be very rapidly recovered. I have a daughter whom I would judge to be an example of this.
So there is a point to it after all.
---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------
QUESTION: You make an interesting point Laurie. I guess that to someone who hasn't rached OT, clear or even (don't laugh) done purif yet, the idea of being free from being reborn is somewhat unfathomable. But I guess one's view changes as one climbs further up the mountain. Your words always fascinate and intrigue me. They open up my mind to new ways of thinking.
In another reply to a question about interference, you said other practices are especially harmful if the "gains" they produce are actually restimulations of manic portions of the reactive mind.
I have experienced some of the best feelings I've ever felt during meditation. The best way to describe them would be bliss. Are these manic restimulations? I think euphoria is a part of mania so I feel they might be.
If they are, how does that affect the case? Does it make the person harder to audit or does it make one more prone to reactive thinking?
Answer It's impossible for me to say what the source of your good feelings from meditation were. Optimistically, it could have been a state of release, which separates you temporarily from your reactive mind without doing anything to HANDLE or reduce the reactive mind. Pessimistically, it could be a restimulation kicking in of some old artificial high from this or a prior lifetime, wherein drugs or some other form of intoxication made you feel better - or even a simple key-in of some manic engram which contained verbal content like "I feel great" or whatever.
One cannot say. I know nothing of WHICH of the hundreds of different kinds of meditation you practiced. I know nothing of what your case looks like - what content is there to be keyed in, etc.
Short answer is: I don't know.
As I mentioned in the other answer, one peril in processing is the attempt to duplicate a prior good feeling from an earlier practice.
