SCI
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What to do with free time. Which station to watch on television. Which
way to walk when taking a walk. Many times I was afraid to make a
decision out of fear that I would make the wrong decision, even when
there was no wrong decision.
Learning to waste time is still a problem for me after living for so
many years in the time-structured world of Scientology, where we had to
graph our production every hour of the day. It is still hard for me to
waste time, watch television, read a book for pleasure, go to the mall,
go to a movie. There is still a feeling of guilt, but it is diminishing
all the time.
Trying not to think or speak in Scientologese was another hurdle in
recovery. There are still some words that have no suitable English
equivalent, like "ARC break," or "comm lag." Every once in a while I
revert to a word in the cult language, but this habit also seems to be
diminishing with time.
My confidence was shaken by my experience with Scientology. After
all, if I could be that wrong once, why couldn't it happen again? I am
much more conservative about my beliefs now than I was while in the
cult, and much less likely to share them with others.
Scientology threatened my life when I first decided to initiate a
lawsuit, and there is always the fear of retribution. I cannot take my
personal safety for granted, and I frequently have dreams -- nightmares
-- about the cult.
It is very hard to explain my experience in the cult to people who
ask me things like, "You're so smart. How could you ever have gotten
involved with a group like that?" Trying to explain the complexities of
mind control in Scientology to someone who has had no equivalent
experience is difficult, if not impossible.
I had to deal with guilt feelings after I found out for myself that
Scientology was wrong, because while in the cult I had persuaded several
other people to become involved, including one who signed a billion year
contract to work for the Sea Org.
There were other problems. When I came out of Scientology, I was
twelve years behind my peers in terms of finances and career. I had the
equivalent of a Ph.D. in Scientology. After I had snapped out of
Scientology, I burned all my Scientology certificates. Starting back in
school with much younger classmates intensified my feelings of
alienation and failure.
There is also the syndrome of being "elite no more." In Scientology,
as in many other cults, we believed we were the elite of the planet.
Coming back to reality was a humbling experience. I had also believed in
Scientology that I would be immune from diseases and from a normal death
(I believed that on the "OT levels" I would gain the ability to leave my
body at will at death). Becoming an ordinary, vulnerable, mortal human
being was also an adjustment.
And there is the dilemma of what to put on job resumes for the years
spent in the cult. It is not something one can tell most employers.
When I snapped out of Scientology, my problems were by no means
over. I had to deal with a tremendous amount of anger toward the cult. I
also found that in many ways I was, emotionally, right where I had been
when I joined the cult. All those adolescent problems were right there
where they had been twelve years ago -- family problems, identity
problems. Emotionally, the years in the cult were a period of arrested
growth.
Most cult members face a spiritual and ideological void when exiting
the cult. The cult provided answers for a great many questions.
After as spiritually intense an experience as Scientology, it becomes
necessary to fill the void with something else, a process that can take
some time.
I think what made recovery from my cult experience the hardest was
the fact that so few people, and especially professionals, were able to
understand what I was going through I am sure it is not too different
from the feelings of a veteran returning from Vietnam, or the victim of
a rape. The people who were best able to understand and to be supportive
were other former cult members.
When I first came out of Scientology, I thought it was an experience
I would never be able to live with. I thought that my life had been
irreparably destroyed. The real victory for me now is that my experience
with Scientology has become an integrated part of my life. It no longer
dominates my life or my thinking. It has become an accepted part of my
past.
There are other victories. Sometimes when I am in the bookstore in
the mall, I see someone picking up a copy of the Dianetics book. I go up
to them and tell them, "You don't want to read that book. That book is
about Scientology, a destructive and satanic cult. I know. I was in it
for twelve years. I don't want you to go through the nightmare I've been
through."
Usually they are happy for the advice, and they put the book back on
the shelf.
In the few cases where they don't, I see them walk out of the store
with the book, and I know that just as my nightmare ends, theirs is
about to begin.
But the greatest victory of all for me is that no matter how tough