Good Side effects of A Sea Org Upbringing---FIRE AT WILL!

[Reasonable]

I know I will have my head handed to me for this so before I start I want to say I am not a Hubbard Sympathizer and I know there are many more bad things in Scientology than good things. The disconnection, child labor splitting up of families etc. But here is an interesting observation:

I am thinking of Jenna Hill but it also applies to many ex Sea or members. I find ex sea org members to be very competent. They leave the cult and in a few years they have good jobs a house and a family. That is not easy to do.

I think that when you compare years of the Sea Org to civilian life the Sea Org is much harder. In the Sea Org you learn incredible discipline, you don’t complain, you work until you get a product and you feel that you are working in service of others. They learn how to persevere. In my opinion perseverance is probably the most important quality driving success.

Call them TR’s or something else, the idea that you can repeat a command until you get compliance works well in the real world and the idea that you can get yelled at all day long and still hold it together also works well in the real world.

While there is no education in the Sea org I personally think there is a lot to the idea of looking up words in a dictionary, knowing correct grammar, making demonstrations and learning on a gradient. I don’t care if Hubbard stole it or made it up himself. These ideas are good.

I know that she probably didn’t have no “fancy book learning” but a person like her could probably teach herself math or physics or computers, because she probably has incredible confidence in herself.

When I see Jenna Hill talk she is very well spoken and focused. Also just a few years out of the Org she really has things together. She even wrote a book. How is that for getting a product?

I know it is terrible to separate a child from her family and work them for 7 days a week. In her interviews she basically said that the children actually built The Ranch.

Compare this to my very protected childhood. Everything was done for me, no child labor, lots of fun. But really I can’t much hang a picture much less build house. I bet Jenna could build a house if she needed to. Yes I got a higher education but it took me many years to build a real work ethic.

If I were to hire someone I would definitely consider an ex Sea Org member much the same as I would consider a person who grew up in a Russia or a third world country and had to fight to survive. If you live that kind of adversity and live it makes you stronger.

A Sea Org upbringing reminds me of the raising of a Russian gymnast. They are taken away from the family by the state; they don’t see their parents for years at a time, lots of yelling and no complaining. I am sure that even if these people ever got a job later they would be hard workers. And in reality if that Russian gymnast doesn’t make it as a gymnast she really has nothing to fall back on except her strong will and work ethic.

The Sea Org is paramilitary and one thing people get in the military is discipline, which is a good quality.

Once again I am not trolling (whatever that means). I am not apologizing or advocating that the sea org is good. It is bad because people are tricked into, manipulated, and brain washed, it or are in it against their will and threatened if they leave. I get that. I just think that one side effect is that these people who get out are often competent, non complainers, well spoken, perseverant, survivors.

FIRE AT WILL!

 

[ChuckNorrisCutsMyLawn]

This should propbably be merged with the Good Side effects of being a Prisoner in a North Korean Labor Camp, if there happens to already be a thread on that subject

 

[anonomog]

I know I will have my head handed to me for this so before I start I want to say I am not a Hubbard Sympathizer and I know there are many more bad things in Scientology than good things. The disconnection, child labor splitting up of families etc. But here is an interesting observation:

I am thinking of Jenna Hill but it also applies to many ex Sea or members. I find ex sea org members to be very competent. They leave the cult and in a few years they have good jobs a house and a family. That is not easy to do.

I think that when you compare years of the Sea Org to civilian life the Sea Org is much harder. In the Sea Org you learn incredible discipline, you don’t complain, you work until you get a product and you feel that you are working in service of others. They learn how to persevere. In my opinion perseverance is probably the most important quality driving success.

Call them TR’s or something else, the idea that you can repeat a command until you get compliance works well in the real world and the idea that you can get yelled at all day long and still hold it together also works well in the real world.

While there is no education in the Sea org I personally think there is a lot to the idea of looking up words in a dictionary, knowing correct grammar, making demonstrations and learning on a gradient. I don’t care if Hubbard stole it or made it up himself. These ideas are good.

I know that she probably didn’t have no “fancy book learning” but a person like her could probably teach herself math or physics or computers, because she probably has incredible confidence in herself.

When I see Jenna Hill talk she is very well spoken and focused. Also just a few years out of the Org she really has things together. She even wrote a book. How is that for getting a product?

I know it is terrible to separate a child from her family and work them for 7 days a week. In her interviews she basically said that the children actually built The Ranch.

Compare this to my very protected childhood. Everything was done for me, no child labor, lots of fun. But really I can’t much hang a picture much less build house. I bet Jenna could build a house if she needed to. Yes I got a higher education but it took me many years to build a real work ethic.

If I were to hire someone I would definitely consider an ex Sea Org member much the same as I would consider a person who grew up in a Russia or a third world country and had to fight to survive. If you live that kind of adversity and live it makes you stronger.

A Sea Org upbringing reminds me of the raising of a Russian gymnast. They are taken away from the family by the state; they don’t see their parents for years at a time, lots of yelling and no complaining. I am sure that even if these people ever got a job later they would be hard workers. And in reality if that Russian gymnast doesn’t make it as a gymnast she really has nothing to fall back on except her strong will and work ethic.

The Sea Org is paramilitary and one thing people get in the military is discipline, which is a good quality.

Once again I am not trolling (whatever that means). I am not apologizing or advocating that the sea org is good. It is bad because people are tricked into, manipulated, and brain washed, it or are in it against their will and threatened if they leave. I get that. I just think that one side effect is that these people who get out are often competent, non complainers, well spoken, perseverant, survivors.

FIRE AT WILL!

I have read similar thoughts in people's stories. I have no doubt many highly competent, talented people exited and went on to build great lives.
But the cost is too high for those good side effects. The emotional and spiritual payments never stop falling due.

 

[Purple Rain]

I know I will have my head handed to me for this so before I start I want to say I am not a Hubbard Sympathizer and I know there are many more bad things in Scientology than good things. The disconnection, child labor splitting up of families etc. But here is an interesting observation:

I am thinking of Jenna Hill but it also applies to many ex Sea or members. I find ex sea org members to be very competent. They leave the cult and in a few years they have good jobs a house and a family. That is not easy to do.

I think that when you compare years of the Sea Org to civilian life the Sea Org is much harder. In the Sea Org you learn incredible discipline, you don’t complain, you work until you get a product and you feel that you are working in service of others. They learn how to persevere. In my opinion perseverance is probably the most important quality driving success.

Call them TR’s or something else, the idea that you can repeat a command until you get compliance works well in the real world and the idea that you can get yelled at all day long and still hold it together also works well in the real world.

While there is no education in the Sea org I personally think there is a lot to the idea of looking up words in a dictionary, knowing correct grammar, making demonstrations and learning on a gradient. I don’t care if Hubbard stole it or made it up himself. These ideas are good.

I know that she probably didn’t have no “fancy book learning” but a person like her could probably teach herself math or physics or computers, because she probably has incredible confidence in herself.

When I see Jenna Hill talk she is very well spoken and focused. Also just a few years out of the Org she really has things together. She even wrote a book. How is that for getting a product?

I know it is terrible to separate a child from her family and work them for 7 days a week. In her interviews she basically said that the children actually built The Ranch.

Compare this to my very protected childhood. Everything was done for me, no child labor, lots of fun. But really I can’t much hang a picture much less build house. I bet Jenna could build a house if she needed to. Yes I got a higher education but it took me many years to build a real work ethic.

If I were to hire someone I would definitely consider an ex Sea Org member much the same as I would consider a person who grew up in a Russia or a third world country and had to fight to survive. If you live that kind of adversity and live it makes you stronger.

A Sea Org upbringing reminds me of the raising of a Russian gymnast. They are taken away from the family by the state; they don’t see their parents for years at a time, lots of yelling and no complaining. I am sure that even if these people ever got a job later they would be hard workers. And in reality if that Russian gymnast doesn’t make it as a gymnast she really has nothing to fall back on except her strong will and work ethic.

The Sea Org is paramilitary and one thing people get in the military is discipline, which is a good quality.

Once again I am not trolling (whatever that means). I am not apologizing or advocating that the sea org is good. It is bad because people are tricked into, manipulated, and brain washed, it or are in it against their will and threatened if they leave. I get that. I just think that one side effect is that these people who get out are often competent, non complainers, well spoken, perseverant, survivors.

FIRE AT WILL!

It depends on your idea of success. Any monkey can be trained to perform athletic feats, work hard, do tricks and obey orders. Like Harry Harlow's infamous monkey experiments however, the trauma of being orphaned is seldom considered a benefit. Fuck Hubbard the child abuser, his rotten Sea Org, and all the pigs that perpetrate the abuse to this day. Survival, of course, is always a benefit, even if it takes the rest of your life to deal with the post traumatic stress.

 

[Techless]

"I would definitely consider an ex Sea Org member much the same as I would consider a person who grew up in a Russia"

I must say Reasonable: you have done well to equate Russia with Scientology! Very well done.

I do see how some of the things you have mentioned can be very admirable qualities and can help one in life. I also have seen within my life starting somewhere back around 1960, cold-war well in progress, and then that silly missile crisis thing, had caused me and my loved ones (actually the entire western hemisphere) to really become concerned about anything having to do with Russia. I guess though that this is because I was born in the western hemisphere and that there have been very serious 'human' problems that have occurred between the east and the west - probably mainly due to the all that 'communist verses the capitalist' thing.

I've learned since that both do not really work - and Russia has shown that their version didn't work well before the other as it is apparently gone (that government system). I've also since learned that everyone on this planet gets to deal with the same human silliness, regardless of language, color, race, religion or whatever and however anyone choose to divide it all. I was just very happy when the best of folks from both sides - scientists, artists and such, did eventually get together and work towards a common good for everyone - and that had nothing to do with 'Us and Them'.

I do hope that that is what you are talking about too?

So, thank you again for equating Sea Org to Russia. I think you have nailed it on the head.

Best to you.

TL

 

[degraded being]

:

The OP is victim bashing by inference. It holds SO victims up to some stupid, idiotic notion of success that they (by inference) should be able to attain; not in spite of being a Scientology Sea Org victim, but BECAUSE of it.

AFAIK many SO victims are left high and dry in all sorts of ways and cannot measure up to the OP's ridiculous ideas. If they want to point this out to the OP they have to then defend themselves for not being like Jenna Hill - or whoever.
This is a very nasty way to treat scientology SO victims.

My message to the original poster is;
If its so damn good for you, go and join the SO yourself and leave the world a safer place for people outside the SO.

 

[Mike Laws]

Some years ago, as I was just starting to leave the COS, I attended an Anthony Robbins seminar. One thing that stuck with me was the statement that we cant change what has happened to us, we can only change what it means to us.

I have had over 40 ex SO come through my home in the last 5 years. Some have built exceptional lives, most are definitely struggling still, or only unsatisfied with what they have been able to accomplish since, or some were somewhat unrealistic about their worth and abilities in the real world and angry and frustrated that they can't materialize what they feel they deserve.

Each person I personally know who has done well stripped their live down to brutal raw basics and rebuilt themselves as the type of person they wanted to be, taking the best of their past and rejecting the worst.

Though I will most definitely be flamed for this, LOL, a common denominator and thread between the more successful ones is the personal concept of refusing to be victims, using the past, no matter how bad, to energize positive things being created in their life. In the case of people like the Hadleys, they built the foundation of their life around competencies learned in the COS, or perhaps they were natural competencies. Not to be cruel, but the most successful seem to drop the idea that they were owed or had their lives taken from them, and focus on the now and future with regard life and careers.

I have spoken to rape survivors who have done well and helped others, they seem to embrace the same concept.

 

[Good twin]

If you get flamed for that Mike Laws, I will stand by you with a fire hose.

 

[Purple Rain]

Some years ago, as I was just starting to leave the COS, I attended an Anthony Robbins seminar. One thing that stuck with me was the statement that we cant change what has happened to us, we can only change what it means to us.

I have had over 40 ex SO come through my home in the last 5 years. Some have built exceptional lives, most are definitely struggling still, or only unsatisfied with what they have been able to accomplish since, or some were somewhat unrealistic about their worth and abilities in the real world and angry and frustrated that they can't materialize what they feel they deserve.

Each person I personally know who has done well stripped their live down to brutal raw basics and rebuilt themselves as the type of person they wanted to be, taking the best of their past and rejecting the worst.

Though I will most definitely be flamed for this, LOL, a common denominator and thread between the more successful ones is the personal concept of refusing to be victims, using the past, no matter how bad, to energize positive things being created in their life. In the case of people like the Hadleys, they built the foundation of their life around competencies learned in the COS, or perhaps they were natural competencies. Not to be cruel, but the most successful seem to drop the idea that they were owed or had their lives taken from them, and focus on the now and future with regard life and careers.

I have spoken to rape survivors who have done well and helped others, they seem to embrace the same concept.

Each person is an individual and has their own journey. To look down on people who have been traumatised and are finding recovery tough as inferior to others is ridiculous and further abusive in my opinion. That's what Scientology says to people who have been raped or abused - "Don't be a victim. No case on post." The problem is with the abusers NOT the abused ALWAYS. I can't believe people are trying to say that it's healthy to be abused. It affects your life chances immensely. That some people flourish in spite of that in no way casts it as a benefit or desirable. Imagine what they could have achieved WITHOUT that.

 

[Mick Wenlock]

I know I will have my head handed to me for this so before I start I want to say I am not a Hubbard Sympathizer and I know there are many more bad things in Scientology than good things. The disconnection, child labor splitting up of families etc. But here is an interesting observation:


I think that when you compare years of the Sea Org to civilian life the Sea Org is much harder. In the Sea Org you learn incredible discipline, you don’t complain, you work until you get a product and you feel that you are working in service of others. They learn how to persevere. In my opinion perseverance is probably the most important quality driving success.

Call them TR’s or something else, the idea that you can repeat a command until you get compliance works well in the real world and the idea that you can get yelled at all day long and still hold it together also works well in the real world.

I have cut out a lot of your post because I specifically wanted to address these couple of points. First off I aint about to flame you.

Sea Org members do not learn "incredible discipline" what they learn is to submit. There is a big difference. One thing SO members have when they get out is the idea that a day off is an awesome reward.

But it's not discipline except in the most controlling of senses and you don't actually make a case for how it helps.

And no they don't persevere until they get a product (where do you get that fiction from?)- strange though this will seem - most products produced in the SO are either complete crap or are overdone - they are very rarely just simple products. I do think that those who work in the Sea Org at disciplines that have applicability outside of it do come out of the SO with both a skill and the willingness to work long hours which does have its own rewards.

There are those who come and do very well and the ones I know who I admire the most were well qualified when they got in, they stayed in the SO for a while but got out in time to create a whole new career for themselves using the qualities they had when they came in and did pretty well. When I say pretty well - they have awesome families.

What part of the real world does repeating a command until you get compliance work well? I have had several jobs and worked in different countries and have yet to see this happen - I have also yet to see anyone yell at someone else all day either.

I consider that my wife and I have done well since we got out and we enjoy our life very much. I have never had to repeat an order to get compliance, I have never shouted at a colleague and no colleague has ever shouted at me. We live where we wish to live and do the things we like doing.

 

[Anonycat]

The Sea Org doesn't make you able to be an author, but it too often qualifies you to be one.

 

[ChuckNorrisCutsMyLawn]

Sea Org members do not learn "incredible discipline" what they learn is to submit. There is a big difference.

Mick, you nailed it right there.

The different between conditioning yourself for perfection and striving for conformity, and it's a huge one.

The difference between a quest for greatness and slavery.

 

[Boojuum]

Fair enough, Reasonable. The discipline of the SO does give undisciplined people a sense of directness and eagerness that is useful to living a good life. Scientology isn't all bad. The hard work wasn't all bad.

Listening to Jenna's story, I wasn't horrified at the fact that she had to carry stones or had a job handing out vitamins when she was a kid. I thought it sounded like a kid was given a job and meaning to her life and a sense of responsibility. Farm kids learn similar lessons. Doing chores for 4 hours a day doesn't really make the news. I know many, many people raised with the responsibilty of chores that are proud of what they had to do. In Jenna's case, being separated from her parents was a big deal and terrible. Skipping the socialization of high school I think is a bad thing, but not a crime. Being snookered into a cult at age 12 is disgusting. I blame the cos for this. I blame LRH for that.

Scientology taught many people how to work hard. That wasn't a bad thing. The problem is the brain washing and the mind control that went with it.

 

[Reasonable]

It depends on your idea of success. Any monkey can be trained to perform athletic feats, work hard, do tricks and obey orders. Like Harry Harlow's infamous monkey experiments however, the trauma of being orphaned is seldom considered a benefit. Fuck Hubbard the child abuser, his rotten Sea Org, and all the pigs that perpetrate the abuse to this day. Survival, of course, is always a benefit, even if it takes the rest of your life to deal with the post traumatic stress.

Yes they do also have post traumatic stress. Much like in the army. Discipline, gets things done and post traumatic stress. I am not saying that is is worth the trade off I am just saying that many of these people have some of these good qualities.

 

[degraded being]

Some years ago, as I was just starting to leave the COS, I attended an Anthony Robbins seminar. One thing that stuck with me was the statement that we cant change what has happened to us, we can only change what it means to us.

I have had over 40 ex SO come through my home in the last 5 years. Some have built exceptional lives, most are definitely struggling still, or only unsatisfied with what they have been able to accomplish since, or some were somewhat unrealistic about their worth and abilities in the real world and angry and frustrated that they can't materialize what they feel they deserve.

Each person I personally know who has done well stripped their live down to brutal raw basics and rebuilt themselves as the type of person they wanted to be, taking the best of their past and rejecting the worst.

Though I will most definitely be flamed for this, LOL, a common denominator and thread between the more successful ones is the personal concept of refusing to be victims, using the past, no matter how bad, to energize positive things being created in their life. In the case of people like the Hadleys, they built the foundation of their life around competencies learned in the COS, or perhaps they were natural competencies. Not to be cruel, but the most successful seem to drop the idea that they were owed or had their lives taken from them, and focus on the now and future with regard life and careers.

I have spoken to rape survivors who have done well and helped others, they seem to embrace the same concept.

It sounds very cultish to me. The ones who are doing well (exceptionally well?)
are doing things the Mike Laws way and those that are not doing well.....they just do not apply the Mike Laws tech.

 

[Purple Rain]

Yes they do also have post traumatic stress. Much like in the army. Discipline, gets things done and post traumatic stress. I am not saying that is is worth the trade off I am just saying that many of these people have some of these good qualities.

Lots of people work hard - see Protestant work ethic. One does not need to be exploited to learn this lesson. Also, working hard is not always a virtue - see life/work balance and Boxer in Orwell's Animal Farm. People who work hard are attracted to the Sea Org. It isn't the other way around. The lazy do not make it through the EPF. The Sea Org doesn't make people hard-working. Be careful about making a causal connection from an unestablished correlation.

 

[Techless]

"...many of these people have some of these good qualities."

Yes, I'm totally sure of - very true - from what I've seen these qualities were there before - especially all the celebs who have been used. I wonder where they'd be now had they not gone through major life interference land.

Really - ?

 

[Techless]

"...a common denominator and thread between the more successful ones is the personal concept of refusing to be victims, using the past, no matter how bad, to energize positive things being created in their life."

This is such a completely TRUE statement - and has yet nothing to do with Scientology... IT'S life.

It's a common denominator in all of life, no matter who you BE. It does work. By why have to go through some illusion of being victim when you don't really have to do that? It's actually easier to do without Scn creating the victim: 'you', and by which you then have to struggle ridiculously to not become one. Especially if you never were one in the first place. Make sense?

HHmm?

 

[NoName]

I know a couple of ex-SO members, some of whom worked directly with LRH. I came to know them after my brief involvement with the cult. The one thing that I've liked about them, which is probably the same thing that drew me to the cult, is that they are all very bright, driven, and focused. I don't know which came first though - the SO or being bright, driven, and focused? I also know some second generation Scn's who are total doormats.

I guess if we're going to look at the traits of the outspoken Ex-SO's like Jenna, Karen, the Headleys, etc., we're going to see poised, intelligent, articulate people. They're not that way because they were in the SO, but because they self-selected for the job of being the public face of ex-SO. For every Jenna, Karen, Marc, and Claire, there might be a half dozen or more ex-SO who are suffering quietly with panic attacks, agoraphobia, etc. Maybe they're also poised, intelligent, articulate, and successful, but not on such a grand scale - I have no idea. But I don't think you can make meaningful conclusions based on people who have chosen to become public figures and speak out against Scn, because these people have had to overcome overwhelming odds to reach the point they're at now.

 

[BunnySkull]

The mental turmoil and anguish caused by SO life completly overtake the benefit of any high pain tolerance, discipline and endurance people learn in the SO.

I would also think there is a big difference between those who chose to join the SO as adults and the 2nd generation SO who were sacrificed to the cult by their parents. (I've always been particularly disgusted by the parents who give a kid to the SO to help their bridge progress or to make some amends with the cult, putting their "spiritual pursuits" above the lives and well being of their own children.)