Showing results by author "L. Ron Hubbard" in All Categories

It betrays the brightest hopes of individuals, drives families apart, incites organizational turmoil, and pitches nations into chaos. What malignant seed grows in the human mind that not only prevents individuals from “thinking straight”, but forces them to act out their irrationalities? Man’s failure over many millennia to find the cause of aberration has exacted an incalculable toll in personal unhappiness and ruined lives. But were the answer found, the horizons would be unlimited.

How does one increase a person’s confidence, improve his ability to communicate with others and heighten his interest in life? The answers all start with help, and they are contained in a series of techniques so effective they can practically “awaken the dead”. Indeed, help runs so deeply in human beings that even disabilities, accidents, criminality, and social disturbance can be understood within its frame of reference.

Since the deployment of the first atomic weapons, people everywhere have lived with the possibility that everything they hold dear - their lives, their families, their careers and even the human species itself - could be extinguished in a few moments of devastation. Such consequences would be so overwhelming that, for many, the only defense is a hope it will never happen.

It is upon the individual that the success of an organization and, indeed, the civilization depends. Those who accomplish more with less effort are more willing, more capable and, in fact, more efficient. They suffer less emotional stress and strain. They are better suited to make key decisions. And as efficiency increases across whole industries, so the whole of society benefits. Such is the subject of Increasing Efficiency, wherein Ron reveals discoveries that provide a wholly new perspective on efficiency.

In his lifelong quest to uncover the answers to life and Man, Ron discovered that all life forms, from the lowest to the highest, are motivated by a single command: Survive! Yet questions still remained. What exactly is life and how does it accomplish its purpose of survival? Is life merely live matter? Or does it contain another quality altogether? Thus Ron set out to isolate and identify the very essence of life itself.

The Second Dynamic has long been a source of mystery and confusion, in no small part because previous studies of Man erroneously targeted sex as the sole reason for existence, and simultaneously, the primary cause of irrationality. Not knowing about the Eight Dynamics, these practitioners led many people to fail - not only in regard to the Second Dynamic, but in life itself. That their theories were not workable is evidenced by today’s incidence of failed personal relationships, broken homes, and troubled youth.

The single word “liberty” articulates not only basic rights, such as freedom of speech and religion, but many other vital concepts: opportunity, choice, security and even happiness. Indeed, it is a word that symbolizes the dreams and goals of every human being. Yet its very power makes it liable to abusive ends entirely opposed to its true meaning. In consequence, both individual and national freedoms can be eroded in a manner that escapes detection.

No civilized culture has failed to recognize the importance of education. And it is widely acknowledged that in today’s fast-paced society, success depends on the ability to swiftly understand and use information. What lies behind the crisis in education? Are some subjects simply hard to teach? Are some teachers just not good at imparting knowledge?

It has been bought and sold in a thousand dramas. It has been preached about from every pulpit - debated, contested, condemned, and exalted. And with no means to accurately measure or quantify it, the physical sciences either ignored it or denied its very existence: The human soul. Here, then, is a discovery all the more remarkable for being grounded not merely in faith and belief, but in proofs as irrefutable as any in science. Using the most exact tools of thought to isolate the most inexactly understood aspect of a human being, Ron established that there is, indeed, a soul.

An extraordinary drama played out across thousands of years, Man’s long search to penetrate the mystery of “the other fellow” - and thereby to know himself - found its expression not only in philosophy and religion, but even in war and conquest. Yet in spite of, or perhaps because of, the crucial intensity of this quest, its continuing failure down the centuries accumulated ever-deepening problems for Man. Hence, in desperation, he eventually abandoned the search entirely - in 1879, to be precise.

To overcome tyranny is to win freedom as a people, a nation or even Mankind. Yet to benefit fully from their liberties, each man and woman must also be free - as individuals. In regard to freedom as a nation, here is the remarkable story of how one man, the Athenian statesman Pericles, envisioned a better futurefor Mankind - a future free from tyranny.

From the dawn of time, Man has cherished the hope he could achieve a greater freedom. That hope, articulated by the greatest religious leaders across the centuries, has time and again renewed his strength to face the future. But with no practical means to convert hope to reality, the goal of a greater freedom remained, for most if not all, a distant and unattainable dream. Then, with the onset of the 20th century, came the rapid and unprecedented advance of the physical sciences.

Every human being seeks to know the truth about himself and to resolve to his own satisfaction the mysteries of life. And therefore, for many thousands of years, countless philosophical and religious teachings have sought to enlighten people with answers. But where their practitioners insisted - indeed, demanded - that their answers must be the answers, they blocked the road to greater freedom for millions of people.

Everyone performs certain routine tasks automatically. Driving a car would be awkward indeed if one had to think newly of every tiny procedure. But what happens when someone puts a whole field of thought and action "on automatic"? His education, for example? Or his work? Or even his entire life? The answers are here and they open a completely new perspective on the mind. To the degree an individual has withdrawn from participation in an area of life, he substitutes an automatic mental mechanism for himself.

Here is a story that begins with Ron's immersion in a deeply spiritual, deeply traditional Asia, where he met and befriended - among other savants - the last of the great magicians whose predecessors served in the court of Mongol emperor Kublai Khan. Yet notwithstanding the feats that testified to remarkable powers, here was a land where wisdom was deemed sacred - so sacred, in fact, these Oriental holy men declined to use their considerable abilities to solve the real and urgent problems of living.

Your mind: It is your constant companion. You live with it 24 hours a day, every day of your life. Yet Man has known practically nothing about how it works. And from marriages that end in divorce to careers that wind up in frustration, from tensions that interfere with work to conflicts that divide nations, virtually every human crisis can be traced to Man's ignorance of the mind.

When still a young man attending university, Ron observed that those working in the humanities had no training in the exact sciences. Believing that the precision of the scientific method might furnish a solution to the problems of life and livingness, he urged faculty members of the psychology department to apply the principles of physics to the field of the mind. It was an entirely novel approach. And when no one took up the challenge - either then or in later years - Ron undertook the task himself.

Today weapons exist powerful enough to annihilate whole nations. And violence has become commonplace, often in disregard of human life. Why has there been such a lessening of moral responsibility and, most important, what can be done about it? In providing the answers to these questions, Ron explores the history of Man's research and investigation in the field of the human spirit.

From his adventurous youth in a rough-and-tumble American West to his far-flung trek across a still mysterious Asia; from his two-decade search for the essence of life to the triumph of Dianetics and Scientology - such is the story Ron recounts in a lecture so legendary, it has been heard by millions. How could one man discover the source of all human aberration and provide an actual technology by which Man could rise to greater heights of honesty, decency and personal freedom?

What motivates life? What motivates Man? Those were the questions Ron posed when seeking workable answers to the problems of both the individual and society. After examining the whole of life in its variety and complexity, he isolated a common denominator to all living things - the Dynamic Principle of Existence: Survive! Here was a watershed breakthrough in Man's understanding of Man.