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From: israel@umcp-cs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.singles
Subject: Re: Experiential processes (what a name for it !)
Message-ID: <7504@umcp-cs.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 14-Jun-84 17:58:54 EDT
Article-I.D.: umcp-cs.7504
Posted: Thu Jun 14 17:58:54 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 16-Jun-84 00:35:46 EDT
References: <353@kpnoa.UUCP>
Organization: Univ. of Maryland, Computer Science Dept.
Lines: 237

Well, I decided to once again jump into the fray.  BANZAI!!!!!

	From: sharp@kpnoa.UUCP

	>What I notice in these responses are that the people who are
	>saying, "don't" are the ones who haven't been there and the
	>ones who are saying "you might want to" are the ones who have.
	
	 Well, of course !!  Once you've been brainwashed you're not
	going to be nasty about the people who did it.  That's
	elementary even for the KGB [:-) :-)].

Oh, excuse me!  I didn't realize that I had been so brainwashed that I
couldn't make judgements for myself!  This point of view of yours is of
course based on the "obvious" fact that everyone who hasn't, didn't
because they were smart enough to see the ridiculousness of the
courses, and that those who didn't were too stupid initially to detect
it, and now are too brainwashed to make honest judgements.  And, in
actuality, they must be pretty lousy brain-washers, since both Steve
and I have said positive things about the courses and the philosophy,
but negative things about the organizations and a lot of the people
involved with it.  You'd think that they would at least brainwash us to
appreciate and revere the people who brought the word of God, as it
were, to us.  [ :-) ]

	  Yes, I *do* know a whole lot about it.  In particular, I
	think I probably know more about it than most and part of that
	is that, *since* I have not experienced it, I can evaluate its
	effects without the handicap of a preformed opinion shovelled
	ready made into my skull by certain well-paid advocates.  (You
	don't need to tell me they're not well-paid - even donations
	and other "appearance fees" are real money.)

Nobody has denied that these people are not well-paid, after all it is
a business, after all.  If they were losing money on the deal then they
wouldn't be around too long.  Let's not have stricter standards for
businesses like these than we would hold for IBM, GM, DEC etc.

							My knowledge is
	based on considerable reading and considerable observation of
	people in both before and after states.  I have to admit that I
	was hoping to irritate by lumping such extremes together, but,
	for the sake of the point, it is a difference in degree but
	*not* in kind.  I wonder which way your "basket-case" continuum
	goes - perhaps I'm better off being further down [:-)].  As I
	remarked originally, I am not especially enamoured of my life,
	and know that I am susceptible to such courses, but I prefer my
	own methods to paying large chunks of my meagre salary to
	professional con-artists.

First of all, I don't believe reading about courses like this gives one
much useful knowledge.  You can learn a little about the methods and
philosophies behind them, but only at an intellectual level.  And if
you dis-believe such things at an emotional level (and for some strange
reason, I get the feeling that you do), no amount of intellectualizing
in the world is going to change the way you feel.  For example, I'm
reading a very interesting book on communications skills called "People
Skills" and in it, the author says that one way of improving ones
skills is via something he calls reflective listening, summarizing what
you percieve the person's communication is and what his feelings are
i.e. "You feel mad because she dumped you".  To me, it sounds too
structured and forced, and all the author's rationalizations (which I
have accepted intellectually) have not convinced me.

Observation of people will give you some more information, but still,
you are trying to evaluate their internal experience via external signs,
and as we all know, that is very difficult.

The impression that I get of you is that, because you feel you are
susceptible to such courses (how did you ever figure that out,
anyway?), you feel that everyone else is also, and as a result any of
us that claim benefits from such course say so because of the
brainwashing involved, and not through actual recognition of real
benefits.  Besides, I believe that anyone has enough control over their
own mind so that they can go into one of these courses and not be
affected if they choose not to be.  (Of course, this is given the
structure of these courses;  I'm not saying anything about such
techniques like the Viet Cong used, such as lack of food and sleep
coupled with confinement and physical abuse).  After all, these courses
are only four or five days long, 45-50 hours total, and you can go home
each night in between sessions.

	>Ahem...quite to the contrary, my dear Nigel, the point is not
	>"it's not your fault", but more concisely, "what was in the
	>past is past and it doesn't matter who was to blame.  What you
	>do about it now is completely up to you.  If your life is not
	>exactly the way you want it, then it's up to you to make it
	>that way."  What is in the way for most people is FEAR.
	
	   This appears to be the result of our different perspectives.
	It seems to me from the outside that the way people who have
	been through such trainings respond is the way I stated - they
	have been taught that whatever went wrong was not their fault.
	They are certainly, and very healthily, urged to put it behind
	them.  Brooding on the past is a well-recognised way to make a
	mess of your present.

As a matter of fact, these trainings try to get away from the word
'fault' and instead use the words 'accountability' and
'responsibility'.  Did I hear someone say "there's no difference!"?
The word 'fault' implies blame, and is used for engendering negative
emotions, not necessarily for correcting the situation,  Responsibility
implies changing the situation, but doesn't have the negative emotions
attached that allow you to wallow in guilt.  And as you said, it IS
unproductive to brood.

	>The workshop provides an absolutely safe environment to get
	>past some of the obstacles we put in our way.  No one is
	>forced (explicitly or implicitly) to participate in sharing
	>personal experiences if that is agonizing to them...there is
	>an explicit agreement about confidentiality.  In the workshop
	>I was in, no one was forced to do or not do anything including
	>leaving the room to go to the bathroom.  It was made
	>sufficiently difficult because people tend to find reasons to
	>avoid particularly difficult parts of the workshop.
	
	Occasionally, obstacles must be tackled.  It is wrong to teach
	that *all* obstacles should be side-stepped.  This is a minor
	point.

HUH??????????  Who said anything about side-stepping obstacles?  I
consider this to be tackling the obstacles, not avoiding them!
Besides, these aren';t real obstacles that we're talking about here,
these are imaginary obstacles that we put in our OWN way such as fears
and self-limitting beliefs.

		I think you underestimate the force of peer pressure.
	By making people stay for the difficult parts, you are
	certainly forcing them.  It is a rare individual who can stand
	up against the behaviour of a large crowd, and such individuals
	are not likely to be found in such courses.  How many people
	were looking around to see how others behaved ?  This is all
	force.

Oh C'mon!  We're not talking about being forced to do physical things
here!  We're talking about changing your attitude.  Noone has to stand
up and say anything about yourself, and plenty of people never do.  Since
only one person stands up at a time, it's easier to stay seated than to
stand up anyway.  And, in terms of the other excercises, peer pressure
can't force you to do too much there either.  When the trainer is
talking, how does peer pressure force me to listen istead of thinking
what I am going to do with my girlfriend next weekend?  How can peer
pressure force me to actually go through a closed-eye guided
visualiaztion instead of taking a snooze?

	   If you like yourself, and someone else doesn't, it's their
	problem.  But if you choose to live in a society, for the
	benefits that has, then you must take the rough with the
	smooth.  One of the rough parts about living in any group is
	that you have to take notice of other people's opinions, *even
	if you/they don't like them/you*.

Well, you don't HAVE to take notice, but it does help to do so.  Notice
that we are both saying "take notice of" and not "get bent out of shape
over".  Neither Lifespring nor EST (from what I know of it) say that
you should ignore others' opinions, just that you should not let others'
opinions be so important to you that you let your whole world revolve
around them.  When all is said and done, the only opinion you have to
count on is your own.  If you let the opinions of others matter so much
for you, then you open yourself up to manipulation by others (for
example:  Bruce: "Nigel, If you don't take Lifespring, then I won't like
you!"  Nigel: "Oh no, Bruce won't like me!  OK, where do I sign up?",
or alternatively, Nigel: "Bruce, you are an jerk for doing Lifespring.
It's a crock."  Bruce: "Oh no, Nigel thinks that Lifespring is a crock!
OK, goodbye, all my Lifespring friends.  Everybody else, don't take
Lifespring!  It's a crock!")

						To refuse to acknowledge
	that other people have as much right to an opinion as you do is
	to argue that they are lower forms of life.

And me being forced to acknowledge other opinions is to argue that their
opinion is more important than my own.

I DO have the freedom to acknowledge or not acknowledge others'
opinions, as I see fit, without that action making any judgements on
the other people.  And, depending on the circumstances, I will or won't
pay attention to their opinions.  If I am going out on a first date with
someone, I am NOT going to put on my grungy, filthy clothes on the basis
that I should not take her opinion into account.  On the other hand, if
a bum on the street comes up to me and tells me that I should invest
all my money in a certain financial plan, I don't have to give much
or any consideration to that suggestion (and probably won't).

						If you think they
	are misinformed, try to inform them.  Again, this is based on
	how people have reacted.  Nice people end up nicer, and very
	few of the people I've met have been excitable types - after
	all, if the other person's opinion doesn't matter, there's no
	reason to get upset or angry - but you have to deal with other
	people, not necessarily friends, every day of your life.

You certainly do, and for that reason it is a good idea to be pleasant
to others.  But this is consideration for others' feelings, which is
a different issue.  Personally, my experience in Lifespring has taught
me to appreciate the uniqueness of the human individual and spirit, and
as a result I try to treat others with kindness even if there are no
direct benefits to be gained, and I may never even see them again.
	
	>The truth of the matter is, I haven't got a clue!
	
	Hear, hear !  Neither have I, and I refuse to take someone
	else's reality.

I refuse to automatically take some else's reality, also, but that doesn't
mean that I not open-minded enough to listen to other points of view and
adopt the ones that I like or that work for me, and discard the others.

	Well, "my dear Moira", this is interesting.  Our local est
	people have given up even arguing with me (I think they'd
	dearly like to convert me), so I have to try to convert the
	rest of the world to my way [:-) what a way !].  

Yes it has been interesting.  I think that Moira may have given up
arguing also, since I haven't seen a reply from her in the four or five
days since I saw your article.

							 I stick by my
	"friends rather than psychiatrists" line, and I have the 'phone
	bill to prove it.  I am happy to say that I have never yet been
	let down by my friends to the extent of psychiatry (and I
	*really am* weird), but who knows what tomorrow may bring.  But
	I'll face it as myself.

I agree with that line myself, but then I consider Lifespring and EST
to be more of an educational experience than to be psycho-therapy.  I
like to use friends for that reason myself.  I would suggest, however,
that you make friends that you can confide in like that in your own area
of the country.  It helps a lot on the phone bills.  I don't understand
your closing line, though.  Are Steve, Moira, and I not facing tomorrow
as ourselves?  Who are we facing it as?
-- 

Bruce Israel

University of Maryland, Computer Science
{rlgvax,seismo}!umcp-cs!israel (Usenet)    israel@Maryland (Arpanet)