[Today's guest post is by Bruce Hines] What was it like to be a Flag auditor? I imagine that most people would have no interest in finding out. But I figured I’d write something so there can be some record of it, possibly for future historians (tip of the hat to Chuck Beatty). It is an account of one aspect of the inner workings of the Church of Scientology. While there are many people who shared a similar experience to mine, I have seen very little written about such things. Here is my depiction of the day-to-day life of a person who became an auditor in a unique organization within the Scientology network.
AM ALWAYS interested in reading Bruce Hines. I trained as an auditor but couldn't cut it. Hated pink sheets and crams and ethics handling, etc. Thought it was too punitive and too many stupid rules. I think Bruce was gone by the time miscavige changed the definition of an F/N. Would be curious to know what Bruce thought about the 3 swings protocol. As a PC, I thought it was grueling.
I did training at the Flag Land Base and audited in the Flag HGC. This will not be a popular post but I have to weigh in. The trainees sent to train at Flag are (or were) generally the best auditors in their area. Whether their skills are top notch, THEY think they are and that is the first rude awakening. LIke an episode of Top Chef where every chef is the cock of the walk, these auditors come to Flag with a preconceived notion of how great they are. Then they audit some sessions.
Flag preclears are tough. Often they have been audited in another organization and are not winning. They are stuck. Their case may need some very specific handling or they just need a good auditor. They are paying a lot to be audited and are quick to complain or ask for a different auditor if they are not satisfied. (As I said, not writing this for popularity)
The C/Ses that work at Flag are the best in the world. They can spot a faulty communication cycle or bad session on paper, and could even before everything was videotaped. They can take apart your auditing, fix your bad habits and make your preclears jump for joy but you have to work with them. You have to do the required drills, relearn things you have been doing for years, etc. Not every auditor is willing to do that. Slowly the real stars/auditors of the HGC start to emerge. People who can't make it or have survived at home with false reports start to drop out. The better auditors get tougher and tougher preclears.
When I audited at Flag, I could feel a whole team pulling together. Often someone would come for auditing who believed it didn't work on them and this was their last hope. Their case was in a knot and many remedies had been tried. The admin staff, the C/S, Senior C/S and the auditor all banded together with the goal of helping this person and somehow this worked. I have seen totally impossible cases turn around in a few sessions. The directions given certainly helped but I also felt it was that certainty that the problem could be fixed. As an auditor used to working in a place where there was not much support, this was comforting and made me try harder.
There are many other aspects to the Flag Internship. It is long and grueling. I remember when I finished mine, the people in the HGC did not want to let me go back to my organization and kept assigning preclears. I finally blew up and was allowed to go back to my organization where they had one auditor and no C/S.
I did this training many years ago. When the climate of Flag became political and pc's were scrutinized more on the basis of "what would DM do if he saw that session" rather than "how can we reach this person" I lost my taste for the subject.
Jeff Walker notwithstanding, I think Flag did produce some top notch auditors. Sadly now it seems closer to a bot farm where robots would probably fare much better than actual scared outer organization trainees who have a genuine wish to help their preclear.
For those who think the is blasphemy, hey your ex may have been a tool but not all your memories are bad, right?
The most important part about this story is the part where you state the absolute truth that auditing is not counseling. Anyone who expects to get their problems handed in scientology needs to understand that everyone gets asked the same questions and the entire handling is tracking down your response to those rote questions. There is absolutely nothing personal about auditing.
You've filled in some gaps for me and thank you for that. Most of my time at Flag was pre-1983, and if my auditors were under pressure, I didn't see it: we'd chat before and after session and, in a unique way, became friends. I had no idea about the Board-in-Charge! I only knew I was happy when I was told I was "next up". It hadn't occurred to me that my auditors didn't have the time between sessions to "write them up" ... and yet, as you've explained, it should have been obvious! Many of the names you've mentioned are people I knew before they got to Flag (either from ASHO or AOLA) or during my time there (between 1979-1986). Anyway, you've given me an interesting peak behind the scenes of what was, so often, a smooth experience until the "harsh" handlings began to happen. I was shocked when I first overheard a reg-cycle escalate to the point where the registrar was loudly yelling at a newly declared OT7, belittling him for not coming up with the money to pay for his next step. I can't imagine the impact that kind of thing had on staff.
Thanks Bruce! Fascinating to hear more about the inner workings at Flag. I also had no idea Gaiman grew up in Scientology - curious how that experience + Hubbard’s writings has influenced his sci-fi work
Bruce and Karen delaCarriere are thankfully unique for revealing so much of the Flag mystique of auditing and exorcism and what goes on.
Scientology is such a layers and layers of details, how the practice is done. So many details. Bruce really gets right into intense weeds history of Flag. Names names, and boy, people like Spike, who I think is deceased, Spike's history would have been good to have told, some startling things happened, I saw Spike do some dreadful mistreatment of a loved and famous fellow Sea Org member, Waldo (Bob Waldman) at Int Base for which I can almost not forgive Spike's later nasty nasty behavior to Waldo I witnessed. Bruce mentioning Brian Patrick, and Carl Carlson, I so wished Carl had succeeded when Carl was CO FSO, I thought he was the type of leader that was sane and responsible, more like a Tony Dunleavy type of leader, rational, not one to have to raise their voice to supposedly "get things done." Brian Patrick, as CO FSO, he did get into that whole notch of irrate wrathful behavior that is uncalled for, but it's LRH's menu, it's straight out of the "Ethics Presence" policy that says "wrath is effective". but only when used "in moderation". The in moderation clause is never crammed out of the bad execs. But even having any degree of "wrath" to be used by executives in a religion, is LRH's massive fault to even allow that, and one reason I think all blame goes on LRH. He allowed so much wholesale irreligious behavior in Scientology it is sickening to outsiders. LRH had a crashing misunderstood word on the word "religion" but worse, like almost all smart outsiders see instantly, LRH was a charlatan and mentally unbalanced to begin with, and LRH had no business even starting the quackery practice of Dianetics and not to slither Dianetics into the Scientology quackery therapy practice.
I'd love to have Bruce and some of the other exorcism experts in Scientology history (the NOTs Class 9 auditors/exorcists) really dive deep into the OT 5 exorcism rundowns someday.
Scientology for sure is fixed lists of questions asked of the recipients of the auditing and exorcism.
But the theory overall, is just people have soul memories, and Scientology's questions that the auditors give to the recipients, get the recipients to dredge up soul memories and try to dissipate the negative "charge" in those targeted soul memories.
And then the exorcism steps have vast steps aiming at souls and spirits that co-habit or orbit around us, and try to detach those souls and spirits and thus lose any ESP soul bad trauma those souls were leaking onto us.
It's all soul memories that are the target, either our own soul memories, or the soul memories of the surplus souls and spirits around us, that are targeted and dissipated.
Negative soul memory dissipation/elimination, to alleviate, supposedly our soul "case".
And the whole administrative huge organizations surrounding the Bruce's and the Karen's, just shovel the paying Scientologists into the little rooms where Bruce and Karen did their Hubbard soul memories dissipation on them.
A whole lot of people have played their roles in the Hubbard organizations and echelons and in the hierarchy upkeeping the selling and delivering of the soul memories alleviation activities.
Hubbard built a vast intricate staff beehive for delivering all of Hubbard's neatly proscribed soul memories delving and alleviating pseudo-therapy and exorcism.
In the end of the day, Miscavige isn't a religious leader, he is more like a nasty tyrannical manager playing advanced deck chairs management to Hubbard's vast built up administrative bureaucracy to Scientology.
Ray Mithoff was the last person who was the "religious" (spiritual practices expert) leader of Scientology.
Hubbard is at fault for the whole Scientology wacked out framework, and leadership setup.
AM ALWAYS interested in reading Bruce Hines. I trained as an auditor but couldn't cut it. Hated pink sheets and crams and ethics handling, etc. Thought it was too punitive and too many stupid rules. I think Bruce was gone by the time miscavige changed the definition of an F/N. Would be curious to know what Bruce thought about the 3 swings protocol. As a PC, I thought it was grueling.
I did training at the Flag Land Base and audited in the Flag HGC. This will not be a popular post but I have to weigh in. The trainees sent to train at Flag are (or were) generally the best auditors in their area. Whether their skills are top notch, THEY think they are and that is the first rude awakening. LIke an episode of Top Chef where every chef is the cock of the walk, these auditors come to Flag with a preconceived notion of how great they are. Then they audit some sessions.
Flag preclears are tough. Often they have been audited in another organization and are not winning. They are stuck. Their case may need some very specific handling or they just need a good auditor. They are paying a lot to be audited and are quick to complain or ask for a different auditor if they are not satisfied. (As I said, not writing this for popularity)
The C/Ses that work at Flag are the best in the world. They can spot a faulty communication cycle or bad session on paper, and could even before everything was videotaped. They can take apart your auditing, fix your bad habits and make your preclears jump for joy but you have to work with them. You have to do the required drills, relearn things you have been doing for years, etc. Not every auditor is willing to do that. Slowly the real stars/auditors of the HGC start to emerge. People who can't make it or have survived at home with false reports start to drop out. The better auditors get tougher and tougher preclears.
When I audited at Flag, I could feel a whole team pulling together. Often someone would come for auditing who believed it didn't work on them and this was their last hope. Their case was in a knot and many remedies had been tried. The admin staff, the C/S, Senior C/S and the auditor all banded together with the goal of helping this person and somehow this worked. I have seen totally impossible cases turn around in a few sessions. The directions given certainly helped but I also felt it was that certainty that the problem could be fixed. As an auditor used to working in a place where there was not much support, this was comforting and made me try harder.
There are many other aspects to the Flag Internship. It is long and grueling. I remember when I finished mine, the people in the HGC did not want to let me go back to my organization and kept assigning preclears. I finally blew up and was allowed to go back to my organization where they had one auditor and no C/S.
I did this training many years ago. When the climate of Flag became political and pc's were scrutinized more on the basis of "what would DM do if he saw that session" rather than "how can we reach this person" I lost my taste for the subject.
Jeff Walker notwithstanding, I think Flag did produce some top notch auditors. Sadly now it seems closer to a bot farm where robots would probably fare much better than actual scared outer organization trainees who have a genuine wish to help their preclear.
For those who think the is blasphemy, hey your ex may have been a tool but not all your memories are bad, right?
Some of the worst auditing I ever had was at Flag.
The best auditor I ever has was my first auditor at a tiny little mission.
The most important part about this story is the part where you state the absolute truth that auditing is not counseling. Anyone who expects to get their problems handed in scientology needs to understand that everyone gets asked the same questions and the entire handling is tracking down your response to those rote questions. There is absolutely nothing personal about auditing.
You've filled in some gaps for me and thank you for that. Most of my time at Flag was pre-1983, and if my auditors were under pressure, I didn't see it: we'd chat before and after session and, in a unique way, became friends. I had no idea about the Board-in-Charge! I only knew I was happy when I was told I was "next up". It hadn't occurred to me that my auditors didn't have the time between sessions to "write them up" ... and yet, as you've explained, it should have been obvious! Many of the names you've mentioned are people I knew before they got to Flag (either from ASHO or AOLA) or during my time there (between 1979-1986). Anyway, you've given me an interesting peak behind the scenes of what was, so often, a smooth experience until the "harsh" handlings began to happen. I was shocked when I first overheard a reg-cycle escalate to the point where the registrar was loudly yelling at a newly declared OT7, belittling him for not coming up with the money to pay for his next step. I can't imagine the impact that kind of thing had on staff.
Spike Bush .... a student along with me at ASHO in the early 1970s when ASHO was still on Temple St in LA.
Thanks Bruce! Fascinating to hear more about the inner workings at Flag. I also had no idea Gaiman grew up in Scientology - curious how that experience + Hubbard’s writings has influenced his sci-fi work
Bruce and Karen delaCarriere are thankfully unique for revealing so much of the Flag mystique of auditing and exorcism and what goes on.
Scientology is such a layers and layers of details, how the practice is done. So many details. Bruce really gets right into intense weeds history of Flag. Names names, and boy, people like Spike, who I think is deceased, Spike's history would have been good to have told, some startling things happened, I saw Spike do some dreadful mistreatment of a loved and famous fellow Sea Org member, Waldo (Bob Waldman) at Int Base for which I can almost not forgive Spike's later nasty nasty behavior to Waldo I witnessed. Bruce mentioning Brian Patrick, and Carl Carlson, I so wished Carl had succeeded when Carl was CO FSO, I thought he was the type of leader that was sane and responsible, more like a Tony Dunleavy type of leader, rational, not one to have to raise their voice to supposedly "get things done." Brian Patrick, as CO FSO, he did get into that whole notch of irrate wrathful behavior that is uncalled for, but it's LRH's menu, it's straight out of the "Ethics Presence" policy that says "wrath is effective". but only when used "in moderation". The in moderation clause is never crammed out of the bad execs. But even having any degree of "wrath" to be used by executives in a religion, is LRH's massive fault to even allow that, and one reason I think all blame goes on LRH. He allowed so much wholesale irreligious behavior in Scientology it is sickening to outsiders. LRH had a crashing misunderstood word on the word "religion" but worse, like almost all smart outsiders see instantly, LRH was a charlatan and mentally unbalanced to begin with, and LRH had no business even starting the quackery practice of Dianetics and not to slither Dianetics into the Scientology quackery therapy practice.
I'd love to have Bruce and some of the other exorcism experts in Scientology history (the NOTs Class 9 auditors/exorcists) really dive deep into the OT 5 exorcism rundowns someday.
Scientology for sure is fixed lists of questions asked of the recipients of the auditing and exorcism.
But the theory overall, is just people have soul memories, and Scientology's questions that the auditors give to the recipients, get the recipients to dredge up soul memories and try to dissipate the negative "charge" in those targeted soul memories.
And then the exorcism steps have vast steps aiming at souls and spirits that co-habit or orbit around us, and try to detach those souls and spirits and thus lose any ESP soul bad trauma those souls were leaking onto us.
It's all soul memories that are the target, either our own soul memories, or the soul memories of the surplus souls and spirits around us, that are targeted and dissipated.
Negative soul memory dissipation/elimination, to alleviate, supposedly our soul "case".
And the whole administrative huge organizations surrounding the Bruce's and the Karen's, just shovel the paying Scientologists into the little rooms where Bruce and Karen did their Hubbard soul memories dissipation on them.
A whole lot of people have played their roles in the Hubbard organizations and echelons and in the hierarchy upkeeping the selling and delivering of the soul memories alleviation activities.
Hubbard built a vast intricate staff beehive for delivering all of Hubbard's neatly proscribed soul memories delving and alleviating pseudo-therapy and exorcism.
In the end of the day, Miscavige isn't a religious leader, he is more like a nasty tyrannical manager playing advanced deck chairs management to Hubbard's vast built up administrative bureaucracy to Scientology.
Ray Mithoff was the last person who was the "religious" (spiritual practices expert) leader of Scientology.
Hubbard is at fault for the whole Scientology wacked out framework, and leadership setup.