Chapter 19 - THE BATTLE OF THE SEXES

If there's any time that two and two don't equal four, it's in a marriage.
Add one 2.0 to another 2.0 and you don't get Cheerfulness (4.0). You get
fireworks!

A person's attitude about the opposite sex is dependent on his tone. Love
itself is not an emotional tone; but the energy of loving may raise, lower
or intensify one's tone. It can sit anywhere on the scale. We may see a
young man deeply in love who starves himself to death (a characteristic of
Apathy) or a young girl in love who manifests a dreamy enthusiasm which
makes her bloom.

Let's examine this "grave mental disease" (Plato's definition of love) on
a few levels of the scale.

At Grief/Apathy the person doesn't outflow much love; he wants to receive
it, but he worries so much about losing it that he is never able to have
it anyway. His "you don't really love me" needs constant reassurance.
Far too many marriages are based not on love but on the limp substitute,
Propitiation. The .8 or .9 usually marries someone who "needs" him.
The fearful person yearns and marries for security.

The 1.1, although incapable of true affection, will put on a good show
when it furthers his own purposes. He will charm, flatter and betray;
he'll undermine his partner's confidence; he'll point out faults (just to
improve her); he'll try to educate her into adjusting to her environment
("Stop being vital and alive"); he'll break his vows; he'll enjoy
clandestine affairs. It's all part of his game.

The 1.2 doesn't believe in love, but he may enjoy playing the cool Lady
Killer.

The 1.5 overrides and dominates his mate using blame and blunt
invalidations. He'll try to enforce affinity ("say you love me").
Antagonism mostly wants a sparring partner.

So, it's not love, but who's doing the loving that counts.

WHAT IS LOVE?

Fred Allen once said, "It's what makes the world go around with that
worried expression."

This too depends on tone. It's a natural instinct for man to seek
companionship and ultimately to select one person of the opposite sex as a
partner. The highest-tone love is based on strong friendship-one which
will survive as a friendship with or without the introduction of romantic
(or physical) love. Such a relationship requires the willingness and
ability to communicate easily and a fairly close agreement about the
things one considers essential goals and efforts. Together these produce
a strong attraction and understanding.

When two people disagree about most things, their understanding and
affection for each other are limited. Similarly, if they cannot
communicate easily, fondness and understanding are low. When you hear a
person say, "We can't talk to each other, but we're really in love," you
know somebody's kidding somebody. This isn't love (or even a decent
friendship) but some sort of aberrated attachment.

Below 2.0 on the scale, the individual tends to consider only the physical
universe or physical objects real. Therefore, the low-tone person is less
likely to choose a mate because of any shared understanding and is more
likely to fall in love with an object. This is evident when a
person's only comments about the sweetheart are like these:
"Wow! Is she stacked! He's groovy; he looks just like Tom Jones."
Later they say: "I just can't understand what he's talking about half the
time, but I'm crazy about him."
"She's got a dizzy mind, but in the dark who cares?" So they get married
and make a down payment on their wall-to-wall miseries. In a few years,
these same people will lean across a bar table and moan, "My wife (or
husband) doesn't understand me."

OWNERSHIP

After failing in love with an object, the low-tone person wants to own and
control it. The beginnings of most downscale romances are in the 1.1
band. He's plotting how to "make out," and she's eagerly reading the
articles entitled "How to Trap Your Man."

Following the initial stages, however, the low-tone lover tries to reduce
his mate to Apathy (where the person thinks he is a physical object and is
therefore as ownable and controllable as a vegetable). This is the famous
battle of the sexes: two lowscale individuals trying to own, dominate and
control each other. Each one, of course, resists such domination and
control, using the tools of his particular tone.

SENSATION

In addition to his need for companionship and understanding, man needs
sensation. High on the scale a person can experience pleasurable
sensation easily in many ways. In the low bands, the person needs more
impact to feel sensation of any kind. His love life reflects this
obsessive need for more impact in masochism, sadism, promiscuity,
perversion, orgies, preoccupation with pornography and the constant search
for variety.

IS THERE A HIGH-TONE LOVE?

Yes, Virginia, there really is a high-tone love. Brotherhood, friendship
and love are only possible above 2.0 where people aren't motivated to
trap, dominate or own one another. And they do not worry about losing
each other. They channel their mutual understanding into growing
together, rather than apart. We find constancy-the desire for a
monogamistic relationship. The partner is faithful, not because of
custom, enforcement or fear, but because he prefers to be.

The high-tone person is able to sublimate the sex drive, so his love is
not so dependent on the physical relationship. This doesn't mean he
outgrows lovemaking. On the contrary, the upscale person enjoys sex more
than any of the lower tones. However (some people will never believe
this), when two people share a high-tone spirit of play, this is a more
intense sensation than that of sex.

MIX AND MATCH

If I were to devise a computer program for mating people, the first step
would be a test for emotional tone. Once tones were matched, I would look
for compatibility in goals and activities. What does the person want to
achieve and what does he consider the most important way he can spend his
energy? If one partner thinks the ideal occupation is an unending junket
around the country on a motorcycle and his partner prefers puttering in
the rose garden, theirs is a rather slippery grip on a workable
partnership.

Two people within the same tone range will be well matched, which doesn't
mean they'll necessarily live happily ever after if they are below 2.0.
You can't sweeten lemon juice with vinegar and get good lemonade.

I knew one marriage where the husband started out at 2.5 and the wife at
1.5. He was easy-going, pleasant and content with a routine that was
uninspired and uninspiring. She was feisty and domineering. Most of the
time he simply ignored her, going his own way; but occasionally he dropped
to 2.0 long enough to deal with her. After several mellowing years of
marriage, they equalized out with a mildly antagonistic marriage which
consists of constant, shallow banter. They resolve most of their
differences by stubbornly going separate ways, which seems to satisfy them
both. This is a relatively compatible relationship which call
"individuated togetherness."

Another marriage between a Grief and a Sympathy appears to serve a mutual
need. She conjures up countless soupy problems which never completely
resolve, and he gives her constant fussy attention. Thus they maintain
their own kind of low-tone affection for one another. This marriage serves
another admirable purpose: it takes them both off the market so they can't
inflict themselves on higher-tone people.

The only danger to this type of compatibility occurs when one person moves
upscale (maybe he gets promoted or his bald spot grows back in). This
ruins the whole game.

When diverse tones mate up, the person in the lower tone demands more
affection and gives less. He wants more communication and contributes
less. He asserts his beliefs on less foundation and he expects to receive
more agreement than he gives. The high-tone person seeks to understand;
but the low one wants to be understood (even though he complains that
"nobody understands me").

The upscale individual with his tremendous capacity for loving finds it
wasted on the down-tone partner, who can only accept a limited amount of
love. This is much like trying to pour a gallon of water into a thimble.
You end up with only a thimbleful-and a big puddle.

The warped emotional dependence of a low-tone person sometimes traps the
upscale individual who thinks: "She needs me." But, as Ron Hubbard says,
"When any individual has to depend upon his emotional partner being low on
the tone scale, he's like a man dying of thirst who drinks salt water. It
is wet, but it will not keep him alive." (Science of Survival)

I observed a marriage between a Conservatism man and a Propitiation wife.
They owned a business which she dedicated herself to giving away. She
refunded to people who actually purchased the product from someone else (a
complete loss since the product was not resalable). She hired people who
lied to her customers, sold the wrong products and stole from her. Her
husband was kind at first; but he soon became alarmed by his wife's
one-woman welfare program, and he dropped to Anger where he put tight
controls on her spending. This didn't stop her, however. She developed
more covert ways of spending money without his knowledge. The last time I
saw them, she had written several checks without recording them, so when
the rent check for their business bounced, her husband, inarticulate with
rage, was ripping her checkbook to shreds.

OTHER EMOTIONS

There are a number of human responses that are generally described as
emotions. Some of them fall into one band or another as synonyms or
shadings of emotions; but some move across the tones. Hate is strongly
expressed in Anger; but a person may hate up and down the entire emotional
band. In fact, he may have been taught to hate many things (or that he
must love everything). So we could find a person in the paradoxical state
of "hating love" (especially when his darling runs off with another man).
A person who is quite free emotionally can actually enjoy a "good cry."
Another might hate having a good cry.

Sometimes courage and cowardice are described as emotions. Actually they
alternate like cake and custard on a napoleon pastry. We find true
courage at the top, then caution, indifference, and "Who's afraid of the
big bad wolf?" (at 2.0 and 1.5). Across the Fear band we get pure,
ungarnished cowardice. Toward the bottom (near Sympathy and Propitiation)
the whole issue gets cluttered with noble deeds. Grief of course, is a
limp coward. Making Amends may be prone to acts of heroic martyrdom
(people who burn themselves alive to prove some fanatic point), and in the
sub-basement, the fellow doesn't even know there's a threat.

Hope (often called an emotion) is high on the tone scale; but down near
Fear it becomes an escape mechanism and a little lower it turns into
gullibility. We find foolish optimism at .8 and .9. Below this, hope is
perverted into daydreams and delusions. And one daydreams only because he
has not been able to achieve real action.

Well, you get the idea. There are many so-called emotions, and they all
fit into the scale somewhere.

JEALOUSY

Jealousy is not an emotion, but the motivation for an emotion, so it can
erupt at many different levels of the scale. A person feels jealous when
there is a real, imagined or threatened loss of affection, and this
usually drops him down tone. He may become angry, fearful, covert,
griefy, propitiative or apathetic about it.

Jealousy actually stems from the desire for information. The jealous
person is wondering: "Does he still love me?" "Was he out with another
woman?" "Does she wish she had married the other guy?" "What are they
laughing about together?" The big question is: "Does he want to replace me
with someone else?"

The reason jealousy finds no foothold in a high-tone relationship is
because communication is free and open. Lower on the scale, where the
person thinks of his mate as an ownable object, there is a much greater
threat of losing the object.

Also of low tone is the person who deliberately provokes jealousy from his
partner; it's another covert method of attempting to own and control.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN BOYS AND GIRLS

The main difference between boys and girls is the same one you thought it
was back in kindergarten.

There are no differences in tone between men and women except those that
are introduced by the culture. Boys are admonished for crying. Such
training tends to produce the stereotyped rough, swaggering male; but such
a false tone will collapse under stress. When the bottom falls out of a
man's world and he cannot cry, he is forced into Apathy (which is probably
the exact reason there is a higher incidence of suicide and alcoholism
among men). On the other hand, girls are not supposed to be tomboys; they
must act "ladylike." For this reason, many women stay stuck below Anger as
gossipy 1.1s, clinging vines or soft-hearted Sympathy types.

High on the scale, the stereotypes fall away. A woman can be enterprising
and capable without sacrificing her graciousness. The high-tone man can
be both aggressive and compassionate-and he doesn't lose his masculinity.
Topscale people are neither confused about their gender, nor must they
assert it.

THE REBOUND

You should make no major decision (to marry, to separate, or to serve your
first baked Alaska when hubby's boss comes to dinner) while temporarily
downtone. This is where you find the familiar phrase: "Marrying on the
rebound." I knew a girl in college who broke up with her boy friend and
dropped to Grief. Before she moved up any further than Sympathy, she met
a young man in Apathy/Grief. They seemed to have so much in common and,
of course, he needed her. They married. The last I saw of them, he was
jealous, possessive, demanding; constantly whining his need for her, he
held this once-bright girl locked in the bottom band of the scale.
The trouble with rebound is that we don't bound back high enough before we
make decisions.

THE DEGENERATING RELATIONSHIP

We sometimes see a marriage start out high-tone and degenerate. This
occurs when either person drops downscale for any reason and doesn't
return. The emotional balance is destroyed.

One of the most frequent causes of this phenomenon is the broken
agreement. When an individual breaks the codes in his relationship with
another, he ceases to survive so well, because those codes were originally
devised for the survival of the marriage. The minute he breaks the
agreement, some of his freedom is gone. He must hide his actions from the
other person. This takes us back to communication. As long as we are
able to say anything to a person, we like that person and the relationship
thrives.

A partner who commits any non-survival act against a marriage drops
downtone. He may be gambling with the rent money. She may be gossiping
about him at her bridge club. Infidelity automatically drops a person
downscale. The individual who is keeping a secret becomes less talkative,
irritable, picky and critical of his partner. Eventually such a marriage
erupts with both partners unhappy, blaming and bewildered. They settle
into a low-tone relationship or they separate.

If either partner remains in Grief about the subject of love, he may go
off and write soap operas or country western music ...

FOR MEN ONLY

Girls, go freshen your mascara while I chat with the fellows for a minute.
Have you noticed that sometimes your charming, sweet-tempered gal turns
into an unmanageable vixen whose only purpose is to drive you up the wall?
There's a medical explanation: it's premenstrual tension, caused by
physical changes in her body. In most women, the symptoms occur four or
five days before the onset of menses. She goes berserk (griefy, jealous,
accusing, nagging, irritable or whatever) and strikes out at the nearest
target which, unfortunately, is usually you. Don't take it seriously and
don't confuse this madness with the tone scale.

What to do? Current medical research indicates that in the near future it
may be possible for women to take hormones and dietary minerals which will
reduce or prevent these symptoms. Meanwhile, you can try indicating the
source of her unhappiness. If there's a thread of reason left, she may be
able to get herself under control. You can tuck her in with a good book
and go play solitaire in the basement with as few words as possible
(anything you say will be used against you when you come up for trial
again next month). If all else fails, run for cover.

When two people don't understand this emotional paradox, they can get into
some ludicrous situations (if not the divorce court) as did some friends
of mine:

It was New Year's Eve. A violent snow storm raged outside as Marie and
George were spending a quiet evening alone in their second-floor flat.
All was well until the monthly uglies overcame Marie. She started
nagging, "Here it is the end of December and you never did put the storm
windows up. It's snowing like mad and we've still got screens on the
windows, for gosh sakes! I can't imagine what the neighbors think."
She kept picking at him until her bewildered (and normally good-natured)
husband stomped out into the storm. In a desperate attempt to please her,
he grabbed a ladder from the garage, climbed up the slippery rungs and
grimly began to replace each screen with a storm window. His frantic
wife, meanwhile, pranced from window to window, raising it up and
screaming, "What do you think you're doing? for gosh sakes, it's New
Year's Eve . . . George, you're out there in the middle of a blizzard ...
You're insane! George! What will the neighbors think?"

MARRIAGE

Before you decide you want to hang your wet socks on the same shower rod
with someone for the rest of your life, you should establish some mutual
purpose in marriage-one that includes the advancement of your own
personal goals (the goals needn't be the same, but they mustn't clash).
Too often a person sacrifices his own goals for marriage. She gives up a
promising career to become a housewife. The man abandons the invention he
wants to develop and takes a nine-to-five job for security. As millions
of disillusioned spouses can tell you, that marvelous loved one can never
fully compensate for the broken dream. For the sake of tolerable
cohabitation, marriage may require that you give up some of your mangier
personal habits; but when it asks you to abandon your aspirations, the.
price is too high. Marriage is not an end in itself. It should help
further your individual purposes.

To determine whether or not you are close enough in tone and other
important elements with a particular person, take stock of the assets and
liabilities in your relationship. As one of my sharp college friends puts
it: "What's the pain/pleasure ratio?" Is he (or she) giving you too many
moments of worry and torment, compared to the periods of fun, warmth,
inspiration and sparkling agreement? If the ratio is only 50/50, that's
too delicate; it could easily tip the wrong way. A good relationship
should be about eighty-five (pleasure) to fifteen (pain), which will give
you just about enough trouble to keep life interesting.

------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 20 - MEANWHILE, BACK AT THE OFFICE

I was shown into the sales manager's office. Briefly I described the
product I wanted manufactured, and asked for an estimate on price and
delivery. He seemed to be worried about how I was going to sell them all;
he asked me to repeat all the specifications again. He rambled on about
production problems. It took me more than thirty minutes, and much
persistence, to get him to tell me that it would take at least three
months (and possibly longer) for delivery. After juggling papers and
charts around for a while, he admitted he couldn't yet give me a rough
estimate of costs.

I left after extracting his promise to mail me price quotations as soon as
possible.

Whew! If the rest of his company operates in such a low tone band, I
thought, my product will die of old age on the assembly line. Better try
someplace else ...

I called on another business and was turned over to the company president.
I told him my requirements while he took notes. He asked one or two
questions, and said: "Fine. It'll take us three weeks to deliver them and
I'll have a price for you in a minute."

While I was recovering from this shock (three weeks; not three months!)
his fingers flew over the keys of a calculating machine on his desk. He
made a brief phone call, punched a few more keys and gave me the price.
Just like that.

Immediately, I placed my order with him and left the office fifteen
minutes after arriving-and everything was done. What a relief. And what
a difference from the first company. I'd found a topscale man, and there
are few experiences so gratifying. My trust in him was not betrayed. He
delivered as promised.

One week after my product was received and in distribution, I received the
price quotation from the first company I visited. It was twice the cost I
paid.

Just as an individual's tone relates to his survival, the tone of a
company's leaders influences the survival of an organization. Within a
year, the first company I called on was out of business; the other one is
still expanding.

I placed dozens of orders with this firm over the years. All were handled
with cheerful efficiency. At one time I spent a week working in the
company's plant on a special project connected with one of my products.
Observing the routine and the personnel I could see that the high-tone
leadership influenced the entire place. The staff was cheerful; but their
good-natured banter did not interfere with the output of work. On the
contrary, that's what high-tone is all about. When a person feels happy
and light-hearted he will accomplish twice as much as when he's down.
Whether you're buying or selling, whether you're stock boy or presidents
choosing the right people has everything to do with your success in the
business maze.

CHOOSING A JOB

When you take a job with an upscale company, work can actually be fun and
the climate will encourage the growth of your talents and ambitions.
An entire organization reflects the tone level of its leadership. So,
maybe you can't judge a book by its cover (especially these days when even
a treatise on the life style of an aardvark would sport a naked woman on
its jacket); but you can judge a company by its reception room.
In a high-tone firm you will see employees moving briskly; but there's
always time for a little in-joking as they pass through. When you see
staff members trudging by in grim silence, ignoring each other, bickering
or speaking in whispers, you can be sure the leadership is heavy-handed.
Employees who lounge through gossipy day-long coffee breaks are the result
of lax leadership (to use the word loosely), probably around Propitiation
or Sympathy.

Let those first impressions influence you. And remember that a high-tone
boss is worth more than a dozen fringe benefits.

AS THE BOSS

An application form can tell you almost everything you need to know about
a man except the most important: what is his emotional outlook on
life? When you're hiring, it's smarter to choose a high-tone person with
no experience than a low-scale one who knows every nut and bolt of the
business, because you can teach an upscale person anything (if he's
interested) more easily than you can teach the low-scale person to change
his tone. I'm talking about a person who is chronically low. He can be
raised up by a skilled professional, of course; but if you're trying to
run a productive business you don't have time to spoon-feed emotional
infants.

Efficiency experts claim that you can raise morale and production somewhat
if you paint the walls old swimming hole green, pipe in some lilting
supermarket music and install pretty blond secretaries. An aesthetic
atmosphere is certainly tone raising; but in the long run, it's better to
select upscale people right from the start and treat them well. No amount
of music and fancy paint will offset the destructiveness of a high volume,
low-scale person who's really working at it.

A talented woman started a partnership with a personable young man in an
advertising agency. She took care of getting new accounts while he
managed the administration. They became well-known and prosperous. She
frequently raved about his brilliant business acumen.

Later their partnership broke up and she assumed full responsibility for
the business. Sometime afterward, still bewildered by the experience, she
said: "He was so incredibly charming; but it was only a facade. He never
could follow through on things. He'd start a project and then he'd tire
of it and be off on something else. He was never around to follow up on
things he got going. When he wanted out of the business, I couldn't
understand it; but I bought him out because we had an agreement to do
that."

Only after he left did she discover how run-down the company was. Because
of poor management, they'd been losing money steadily for five years, and
she found it necessary to rebuild the company herself in order to recover
her investment. She started by cleaning out the deadwood-friends of her
former partner who were drawing salaries over fifty thousand dollars, but
contributing nothing.

Even when she first learned of the tone scale, she found it hard to
believe he was a 1.1 because he was so "brilliant." (Need I mention that
you shouldn't confuse intelligence with emotion?)
You could study most business failures and discover a low-tone person
somewhere on the scene.

There is one certain rule on the subject: You will never run an efficient,
cheerful and productive organization with a staff of low-tone individuals.
You'll spend most of your time handling personal conflicts, apologizing
to customers for goofs, replacing personnel, soothing disgruntled staff
members and trying to plug the holes in the sieve before all your profits
drain out.

THE LOW-TONE EMPLOYEE

Downscale types can do more to sabotage the success of your firm than you
can imagine in your wildest nightmares. They'll filch everything from
nickel blotters to million-dollar ideas. They may talk big deals with all
the confidence of lemmings racing over the edge of a cliff while leading
your company toward corporate suicide. They'll stop all the best ideas
from reaching you. They'll garble messages and orders. They'll misfile
important papers. They'll tell you everything is great when the place is
collapsing, and when things are picking up they'll paint such a picture of
gloom that you'll contemplate hara-kiri. They'll goof up jobs, delay
orders and enrage customers.

If a few downscale people in an organization only messed up their own
assignments they could be tolerated. But, unfortunately, they labor
diligently (both wittingly and unwittingly) to halt the production of
efficient people as well. For this reason, I consider it more efficient
to run a business on a skeleton staff of highscale people sincerely
working for the benefit of the enterprise, rather than a large staff of
low-tone people pulling in the opposite direction.

One upscale person is capable of incredibly high output - if he can maneuver
without interference. You can do any job more quickly and accurately when
you give it your undivided attention until it's finished. However, a few
low-scale types in the vicinity (dedicated to the destruction of your
goals), can find an abundance of methods for distracting your attention.
They call you when a memo would be more efficient. They check back to
confirm an order which already has been clearly stated. They drop in to
borrow a stapler (their own equipment always breaks down with alarming
ease) and try to stay for an hour of idle chatter. You ask them to type a
report and they come back to inquire about the size of the margins. They
bring you a problem that should be given to Jones.

When you're trying to complete your own tasks, just one low-scale person
can be real ulcer fodder.

CHOOSING EXECUTIVES

Most of the "secrets of success" books that catalog the characteristics of
self-made millionaires are saying (although they don't know it): be
high-tone. With the top tones goes a magnetic drive that never stays down
for long. We find responsibility, persistence, good humor and love of
work.

If you're in a position of hiring or appointing executives, choose with
the tone scale in front of you and your credulity locked away in the
bottom drawer.

That "nice" man everybody likes may be so understanding that nothing gets
done. And especially watch out for that brisk,
let's-get-things-moving-around-here Anger type who looks like a leader
but, with his low boiling point, only attempts to handle people by force,
threats and punishment. Man responds to being led, but not to being
driven. Heavy-handed pressure appears to work at first; but the
fear-ridden person loses all confidence and creativeness and becomes a
hopeless bungler. At best, he gets covert revenge by doing only the bare
minimum of work.

Some years ago a group of psychologists and sociologists studying behavior
of business people learned that performance was critically related to the
quality of inter-personnel associations, particularly the relationship one
had with his own superior. They found that people worked more efficiently
(and felt better) if their boss was not too officious, didn't interfere
with social alliances built up on the job and was not demanding production
in an impersonal and callous way. In other words, employees don't produce
well for bosses between 1.2 and 2.0 on the scale.

The psychologists decided to train the supervisors in one large company in
an attempt to instill the good traits necessary to greater efficiency.
Testing before and immediately after, they launched a two-week program in
which they tried to teach supervisors to show concern and consideration,
and to treat their employees as human beings. Immediately following the
course, most of the supervisors rated significantly higher in their
attitudes. However, when tests were made six months later (against a
control group), most of the men had not only reverted back to their
original behavior, but in many cases were less considerate than the
supervisors in the control group. Interestingly, the men who maintained a
more agreeable attitude were those who worked under better-natured bosses
themselves. Thus we see the contagion of low-tone (and high-tone)
leadership as it spreads down through the ranks.

So even though an individual can be brought upscale to some extent, he
won't stay there if he is under the influence of a downscale boss. He not
only doesn't stay up, the chances are pretty great that he won't even stay
with the company. Whenever you find an exceptionally high turnover in an
organization, or in one department, you can bet your slide rule there's a
low-tone boss in charge.

RESPONSIBILITY

You can predict a person's level of responsibility on a job if you examine
the quality of responsibility he shows in other areas of his living. The
responsible person takes good care of himself physically. He'll be clean,
well-fed and well-groomed. His personal possessions will be orderly and
in reasonably good condition. He does his best to adequately support and
assist his family and to provide them with a promising future. He's loyal
to any group he joins. Since he's concerned about the improvement and the
survival of mankind, he may belong to groups devoted to such causes.

His responsibility may extend to raising plants or animals because such a
person prefers living things in his vicinity. He never wantonly kills
other life forms, although he will use them when necessary for his own
sustenance (the person who will not kill for food he needs is actually on
the Propitiation/Sympathy level of the tone scale).

He'll revere and respect religion, whether or not he's an active
churchgoer himself.

INVESTING

Use the tone scale in all business dealings whether buying, selling,
hiring, firing and especially when you are shaking all your savings out of
the cookie jar to invest in a "can't lose" business venture. Your tone
scale evaluation will be more reliable than the apparent qualifications of
a fast-talking entrepreneur.

A number of years ago I knew a No Sympathy person who clawed, wheedled and
blackmailed his way to a high position in the entertainment field. Men
who were victimized by his chicanery maintained no illusions about this
man; but his prominence continued to open new doors for him. At one time
he convinced several moneyed men to invest in a restaurant chain which he
would run. They responded because he was well-known and "obviously"
successful (after all, everybody's heard of him). However, as usual, he
acquired more enemies than friends. The operation was soon doomed to
failure because of his petty feudings with everyone from his biggest
investors down to the customers he needed to survive. To the amazement of
those who originally trusted him, it was necessary to sell the operation
at a huge financial loss. That the weakness was not in the business
itself, was proven by the new owner who went on to build it into a
multi-million dollar operation.

RELAY OF COMMUNICATION

Nearly every function in an organization involves relaying of
communication in one form or another, and probably ninety-five percent of
an executive's headaches are caused by the break-down of these
communications.

The moment a salesman writes up an order, he starts a series of
communications that must be relayed from sales to production to shipping
to accounting and so on. There are multiple opportunities for mistakes
along the way (as any businessman can attest).

An individual's ability to relay communication is another aspect of tone.

The low-scale person garbles messages, introduces alterations or
negligently (some-times deliberately) fails to pass them on at all. If
you dictate a letter to your secretary, will she take it accurately?
Having done so, will she dispatch it without delay?

In my own business, I find it easy to identify a customer who employs
low-tone help. The customer sends an urgent order requesting immediate
delivery. We notice, however, that the order was not mailed until three
days after it was written. In one case we received an "urgent" overseas
order which was sent turtle-speed by surface mail instead of air. It
arrived six weeks after it was written.

Send a company representative to a convention and his report will depend
more on his tone than on the program. The low-scale person will bring you
all the bad news. He'll tell you about the companies that went bankrupt,
government cutbacks and new competition that will probably ruin your
market. He may entirely forget to mention the hot, new prospect from a
giant company. He may alter the report on a new product so thoroughly
that you fail to see its potential value. The Boredom person won't bring
you so much bad news; but he won't tell you anything exciting either.
He'll pass on amusing, but irrelevant, anecdotes. Mostly it's "just the
same old thing." Conservatism will give you a more valid report, although
he'll tone down anything extremely new and different.

Wherever he is on the scale, the person does not realize that he is
altering facts. Ten people witnessing an accident will give ten different
versions of it. The lower a person goes, the more imaginary his memory
becomes, although he believes it to be authentic. People at 1.1 get
reality and imagination so mixed up that even their small talk is
untrustworthy; but they will swear they are telling the truth. Of course,
the wildest perversions of memory occur down at the bottom of the scale
where we find fantasies and hallucinations.

AROUND THE CONFERENCE TABLE

The board meeting, sales conference or a brainstorming session are all
excellent opportunities to study the tone in an organization. If someone
presents an idea for a bold, new program, tones show up in the various
responses. A person at the Grief/Apathy level automatically considers the
whole project hopeless and, if permitted, he'll drag up old losses and
tell you how things used to be better in the old days. Propitiation or
Sympathy will probably profess some enthusiasm for your idea; but he'll
immediately offer plans for wasting it (perhaps by advocating a tremendous
amount of research or worthless advertising and promotion). The person in
Fear will introduce every conceivable worry, "we'll probably lose our
shirts." The 1.1 invariably pretends the idea is great, but will
immediately attempt to undermine it, "Well, the idea sounds good ... " The
1.5 usually tells you bluntly that it won't work (or he'll try to find
another way to stop it). Antagonism, of course, will want to bicker about
a few things whether he likes the idea or not. Boredom will shrug and
take the course of least resistance. Conservatism may try to delay it,
"Why don't we sleep on it? Let's kick it around a bit. We don't want to
be too impulsive." He probably won't stop it; but he'll have the brakes
on. if there's a 3.5 or 4.0 in the group, he may get fired up with the
idea (provided it was a good one) and offer constructive suggestions,
methods for implementing, additional uses, promotion and production plans.

THE SALESMAN

The salesman who understands the tone scale can correctly spot his
prospect and bring him up-tone to the point of interest where he makes the
sale. (This technique is discussed in a later chapter.) He not only gets
the sale, he leaves a happier customer behind.

A salesman also can save himself much stress by knowing when not to sell.
He's working in a shoe store. A Grief lady comes in; he shows her ten
pairs of shoes and she complains about every one of them. If he cannot
bring her upscale, he's better off not selling her. She'll be back within
a week complaining. Grief suffers a low pain threshold. Where someone
else might feel a little pressure, she says, "It's killing me; it's
excruciating." Grief considers most everything painful. That's the way it
is to her. Furthermore, she is only satisfied when she's been betrayed.
The Apathy customer will say, "It's hopeless; there isn't any product that
will solve my problem."

The best of salesmen run into a few unsatisfiables. If you do sell to
such types, expect most of them to come back with complaints and requests
for refunds or replacements. They not only consume time, patience and
profits, they frequently undermine the salesman's confidence in his
product. A smart salesman will simply skip these customers whenever he
can.

Everybody fumbles through an occasional day when he should have pulled the
pillow over his head and stayed in bed in the first place. Such a day is
particularly demoralizing to a salesman. After several turndowns he may
start to believe that the economy is pretty shaky these days, there's too
much competition, nobody's buying anything, or any of the other
consolation prizes with which discouraged salesmen reward themselves.
It's so easy to go one step further and say, "I give up."

The salesman who understands the tone scale, however, will recognize that
he has dropped tone and he won't take himself too seriously while in this
dark mood. The main difference between the successful salesman and the
failure is whether or not he believes the low-tone ideas which come to him
on the bad days.

Most important, the informed salesman will not decide (just because he's
in a slump) to quit and go get a job flipping flap-jacks at the nearby
beanery. Instead, he should push himself to call on one more prospect,
and then another, until he makes a sale. He (and everyone) should try to
quit the day on a win. Revitalized by a night's sleep and a sturdy
breakfast, he'll probably be courageous enough to get out there and pitch
again the next day.

The selling field offers unlimited opportunities to an ambitious person;
but it is essential that he sell only a superb product. He must be
convinced he's doing the customer a favor when he sells. Because man is
basically ethical (down beneath the flim-flam), he won't let himself
succeed if he thinks he is taking advantage of others. The salesman who
cons his way along may be able to acquire money, but he'll never enjoy ;,t
because he can't go uptone as long as he's being dishonest.

Sales managers will benefit by selecting high-tone distributors and sales
people. Many companies with salable products fail because of the common
belief that if you recruit enough people some of them will work out well
(this fallacy is particularly popular in the direct sales field). The
detrimental effects of a few low-tone representatives can cancel out most
of the benefits of this method because word-of-mouth advertising can also
work to bad-mouth a product. Mary tells her bridge club, "I just bought a
marvelous new Whoosh vacuum cleaner and I love it."

"Oh, no!" screams Phyllis, "My next door neighbor was telling me that a
friend of her cousin's ordered one of those from a salesman and she never
got it. He just took off with her fifty-dollar deposit and the comp any
says they have no record of her order and the salesman has quit."
Emotional tone being what it is, this bad news spreads faster than chicken
pox in a nursery school. Now the whole bridge club seeds the story out
through the city: "Don't get taken by those Whoosh vacuum cleaner
salesmen. They're a bunch of crooks."

Everybody forgets that Mary is happy with her machine. So one unethical
salesman can virtually ruin the entire market for the industrious men in
the same organization.

Low-tone people are predictably unethical. Some knowingly deceive both
customers and company. Others simply fail to learn their product well;
they make false claims (sometimes out of sincere but misguided
enthusiasm), tell unwitting lies, sell incorrect sizes and recommend the
wrong products. There are innumerable ways to lose customers-and
low-scale salesmen know them all.

"WORK"

Before we leave the office, we should make certain we take the curse off
the word work. Contrary to popular opinion, pleasure is not found in
idleness or wastefulness. An up-tone person finds work exhilarating. The
successful industrialist is a man who enjoys overcoming the obstacles to
management. The greatest pleasure a composer can achieve is in composing.
The pianist prefers playing the piano to doing anything else. The active
businessman only goes downscale if he's constantly stopped, distracted or
if he has some lowscale person trying to spare him (and thus destroy his
greatest pleasure) by telling him he should not work so hard.

SUMMARY

No person can be truly successful and low-tone at the same time. The
terms are contradictory.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 21 - GROUPS

Unless you're crouched in a cave somewhere under the ice caps of the North
Pole, you can hardly avoid being asked to join, donate to, endorse or
believe in some group or other. Today there seem to be more groups,
clubs, fraternities, lodges, associations, sects and societies than ever
before-or do they just make more noise? Anyway, they go all the way from
the Stone Skipping and Gepiunking Club of Mackinac Island, Michigan, to
the aggressive evangelists known as "Jesus Freaks" from California.

Few of us have the problem of a wealthy bachelor I heard of recently. He
wanted to will his money to a deserving cause; but he was unable to select
one with confidence. Still, it's understandable if we're in some dilemma
as to which groups most deserve our time, money and efforts.

We live in a culture that is changing with dizzying speed. More than ever
we need guidelines to determine which of our constantly shifting values
are healthy and honest and which ones are potentially suicidal to mankind.
Thinking based on worn-out platitudes and wild guesswork belongs to the
Stone Age of human understanding. We need reliable rocket-age judgment to
evaluate both old causes and new movements at their inception.

With this ambitious thought in mind, I worked out a five-point check
(based on the tone scale) that should help you decide the worth of almost
any group except possibly the neighborhood coffee-klatch:

1. What is the purpose of the group?
2. How does the group intend to accomplish the purpose?
3. What kind of leadership does it have?
4. What are its actual activities?
5. What are its past accomplishments?

PURPOSE

Although all of the individuals in a given group are not going to be at
the same tone level, the stated (or unstated) purpose of the group
generally falls somewhere on the scale. An upscale purpose is concerned
with survival. This may take the form of "halt destruction" (not to be
confused with the down-with everything groups), preserve, rehabilitate,
advance, educate or "let's enjoy ourselves." The highest tone purposes are
more concerned with enhancing the future on a long-term basis than
reviving the past or preserving the present.

Group purposes vary greatly in scope. Some clubs exist for the interest,
improvement or amusement of the individual members only (bridge clubs,
square dance clubs, etc.). Others gather for the improvement of families
or romantic relationships (PTA, child study groups, La Leche Club-and
there are even sexually oriented teams that unite for various unusual
activities that I'm not going to discuss here in front of the children).

Other organizations exist for the benefit of a whole profession or group
of people (union guilds, professional associations, ethnic groups,
woman's lib, gay lib, charities, government departments, political
parties, civic associations and many more). Some groups unite to preserve
or advance mankind (planned parenthood, medical research, etc.).. Others
have a common interest in plant and animal life (conservationists, SPCA,
Audubon). Some are trying to hold the whole planet together before it
self-destructs (peace groups, environmentalists, United Nations). Others
are exploring or explaining the unknown (flying saucer clubs, astrology,
psychic and spiritual groups). Lastly we find groups that unite for the
understanding and enhancement of man's spiritual existence and his
relationship to the entire universe (churches and religious philosophies).

A high-tone group with largest scope would be interested in the survival
of man and the whole universe-both physically and spiritually. While an
upscale person might join that stone skipping club just for the fun of it,
he will also belong to groups of larger scope.

HOW DOES THE GROUP INTEND TO ACCOMPLISH ITS PURPOSE?

Frequently we see an upscale purpose riding in tandem with a low-tone
solution. A militant group may claim to be saving the nation while its
solution is: destroy people and burn down all the buildings. There are
hundreds of charitable groups whose purpose is to help the unfortunate,
but whose solution is Propitiation (rather than rehabilitation). In the
long run their "help" is more detrimental than beneficial.

LEADERSHIP

Frequently the function of an organization depends totally on the charisma
of one powerful person.

It is important to evaluate the tone level of the leader and whether or
not the group is dependent on that leader for survival. Perverted,
unethical leadership will destroy the beneficial effects of any endeavor,
no matter how upscale the purpose and proposed solutions. If the
leadership looks good, but you aren't sure, look at the next two points.

ACTUAL ACTIVITIES

This is the question that exposes the frauds: What is the group actually
doing in relationship to what it is supposed to do? An organization can
have the highest possible purpose, an upscale solution and some convincing
leadership; but are the activities high-tone?

This question helps us unmask Mortimer Murkey, the glib 1.1 who heads up
the Society for the Aid and Betterment of Downtrodden Derelicts. On close
examination, we find that the derelicts are still downtrodden; but
Mortimer is driving a Ferrari and living in a twenty-room mansion-with no
(other) visible means of income.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS

Is the group accomplishing its goal without destroying more than it is
gaining?

Originally labor unions did much to bring about a financial balance
between the unscrupulous industrialists and the victimized worker. Today,
however, the pendulum often swings the other way and the results are
actually harmful (not always the case, of course).

Last year the U.A.W. called an untimely strike which nearly crippled the
faltering U.S. economy. They won a base pay of twelve thousand dollars a
year for their members; but a few months later they were pleading with
management for help in handling two mounting problems: alcoholism and drug
use-now considered to be the highest causes for absenteeism on the
assembly line. It is no surprise that a greater number of workers are
sinking into Apathy when they keep receiving more and more pay for doing
less. There is no opportunity to improve one's individual sense of worth
if his paycheck increases while his contribution does not.

THE IDEAL GROUP

The ideal group will be upscale in its purpose, solution, leadership,
activities and accomplishments.

* * *

I'm not going to attempt any extensive analysis of groups here; but
perhaps some comments on the more popular ones will make it easier for you
to use the five-point test to make your own evaluations.

CHARITIES

Many universities, medical research foundations, churches and clubs are at
least partially dependent upon the charity of the public for support. We
are bombarded constantly with requests for donations to one cause or
another, and thus many people are forced or shamed into Propitiation. I
realized one day that if I gave even modestly to every organization
seeking my contribution, I'd be on charity myself. So I now use the five
handy dandy points before responding to the fervor of any appeal. (With
slight modification these points could also be applied to an individual
you might wish to assist financially.) When a charitable organization is
propitiating without rehabilitating, I don't support it.

SOCIAL GROUPS

If they're fun and they raise your tone, why not?

DRUG REHABILITATION PROGRAMS

Today there are countless groups formed for the purpose of handling drug
abuse and they vary widely in effectiveness. The U.S. government recently
sponsored four drug treatment programs which a later report called "total
failures." According to the report, the plan failed because the solution
proposed by leaders of the group was abstinence, whereas the young people
participating did not consider all drug use harmful. Since there was no
agreement on the exact problem and solution, it's understandable that the
results were a bit fuzzy.

At the other extreme, one of the most successful drug programs in the
world was organized several years ago in the Arizona State Prison. Called
Narconon, the program was started by a three-time loser with a
nineteen-year history of heroin addiction. Using training drills (devised
by L. Ron Hubbard) as well as group study of religious and philosophical
material written by Ron Hubbard, the program produces more than an 80%%
cure of hard drug addiction. Rehabilitation efforts based on physical or
mental cures alone seldom achieve more than ten or fifteen percent cure.
Now used in several prison systems (for other inmates as well as drug
addicts), Narconon, addressing both the spiritual and mental health of the
individual, continues to produce enthused, well-oriented citizens who
return to society with upscale purposes. Since the group contains only
volunteers, there is obviously an agreement as to the purpose, and the
results confirm the validity of the solution and the leadership.

WOMEN'S LIBERATION

I've probably been a women's liberationist without banner most of my
life-especially during moments alone in front of a sinkfull of dirty
dishes or while listening to some dude with the I.Q. of an amoeba tell me:
"You know, you're pretty smart for a woman." However, when the women's
liberationists first started their public rampaging, I'll confess that I
was often less than proud of my own sex.

The purpose was certainly valid: women should have equal recognition and
opportunity. No upscale person will argue with that. However, the 1.5
leaders-loud, crude, militant and threatening-frequently reached a level
of madness that is out of place in any sane negotiations. I objected to
the sick "hate men" undertone as well as the implication that a woman must
sacrifice charm and grace to earn an equal paycheck.

While the earlier feminists were shouting their loudest, a lady in
California wrote a book which started another movement advocating a more
"feminine" role in which the woman is helpless, screams at spiders,
becomes a fragile dependent and uses tears, pouts, and whines to let her
man know that she is a woman.

Help!

Surely there's a solution someplace between the cigar-smoking, raging gut
feminist and the moth who flutters helplessly between Grief and Fear.

There is. The upscale woman.

Today many top-tone men and women are taking up the cause and working
(with much less noise) to level out the imbalances in both home and work
situations.

Before we can drop our mop pails entirely, however, we must quit blaming
men for the whole thing. After all, we females have done our share of
deceiving, conniving and playing downscale games.

The period of natural feminine outrage has won us a few (grudging) brownie
points to be sure; but it is now the responsibility of every woman to be
as ethical and high-tone as possible to justify the respect she wants.
Meanwhile, I hope the chronic Anger types don't go too far and ruin
everything, because when all the noise is over, I'll still be willing to
bake a batch of cookies once in awhile-in exchange for the luxury of
having members of the more muscular sex keep on slaying my dragons,
changing my flat tires and lending me a nice, firm shoulder to lean on now
and then.

It was never all that bad.

GAY LIBERATION

As long as we're on the subject of men and women, we may as well dispose
of the twilight zone. Gay Liberation groups have been popping up like
toadstools after a spring rain. They appear to be operating more openly
than we generally find with 1.1s. They gain strength by number, of course;
but the fact that they are no longer closet queens doesn't necessarily
mean that the hidden and destructive intent is gone. Let's examine their
purpose: they ask for understanding, acceptance, freedom and civil rights.
All nice, clean sounding words. We should notice, however, that they are
not asking for any help in curing their abnormalities (in fact, the worst
of them will not admit that their behavior is abnormal; they insist it's
just a matter of taste. You know, you prefer peas and I prefer
rutabagas).

Their solution is to bring public acceptance down to their level where we
would condone their promiscuity and perversions (not to mention their
propensity for spreading venereal diseases). They do not propose that
society help them come upscale where a man is content to be a man and a
woman enjoys being feminine (without being all hung up over the whole
thing).

In Science of Survival, L. Ron Hubbard said: ". . . man is relatively
monogamous ... it is non-survival not to have a well ordered system for
the creation and Upbringing of children by families."

I listened to a pair of Gay Liberationists who were guest speakers before
a social club. The end product of their movement, they said, would be
total sexual freedom for everybody. They advocated "smashing" (their
word, not mine) the roles of the family structure. Their objection to the
stereotyped roles (dominant man, submissive woman) contains some element
of truth; but when asked what would replace the family structure, one of
them merely waved a hand airily and replied that it would work out
"somehow."

A member of the audience asked how they accounted for the fact that most
straights considered homosexual activities repugnant. One of the gays
promptly replied: "People only react to homosexuality because they are
afraid of discovering it in themselves." (Does this mean that when you are
repulsed by seeing a dog eat garbage you really want to eat garbage
yourself?) This was a neat (and covert) method of silencing all possible
protests from anyone who has all of his hormones in the right place.
To analyze the social value of such a group, you need only observe that
there are no high-tone homosexuals.

Tolerance for nationality, race, religious beliefs, etc. is an inherent
characteristic of a high-tone society. Tolerance for a decadent condition,
however, contains an apathetic acceptance of the condition as
irreversible. Certainly homosexuals should not be abused or ridiculed.
But a society bent on survival must recognize any aberration as such and
seek to raise people out of the low emotion that produces it.

PROFESSIONS

We can use the tone scale (and the five points) to examine whole
professions as well as the individuals in them.

The president of the American Psychological Association recently called
for the development and worldwide use of drugs to help prevent the
powerful from exploiting the powerless. He said that human survival has
become a moral problem and that biochemical intervention may be the best
method for overcoming "the animalistic, barbaric and primitive
propensities in man . . . We can no longer afford to rely solely upon the
traditional, prescientific attempts to contain human cruelty and
destructiveness."

Let's hope that he was merely trying to provoke some constructive action,
because if this mind-boggling statement represents the final product of
the field of psychology, perhaps this profession should be placed to rest
in history books along with the other primitive remedies (like
bloodletting) that didn't quite make it.

SUMMARY

Many groups attract individuals of a certain tone. A Sympathy person may
join brotherhood groups and, though he appears noble, he's actually
hiding. Anger and Antagonism people are the first to join protest groups
because they love a chance to fight. Many Fear people will be following
right behind them because such groups help them become more alive.
Behind the scenes of organized violence we may find the cunning 1.1 or 1.2
at work. Recently a newspaper columnist reported seeing some secret films
of campus riots. The films revealed that the hardcore militants who
shouted the loudest for blood, quietly pulled back hen the violence
actually erupted. As professional agitators, they were quite adept at
ducking out on the turmoil they stirred up, thus avoiding arrest and
prominence.

The main thing to remember in choosing your group is that it falls on the
tone scale somewhere because of its purpose, its solution, its leader, its
activities and its final product.

Now that you have all that, you can be gung-ho where it counts.

-------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 22 - THE TONE SCALE AND THE ARTS

"For some reason I love this painting, but that one ... Ugh!"

"I never could dig most classical music; it's too depressing."

"Maybe it isn't good writing, but I enjoyed the book anyway."
Whether creative people like it or not, most individuals respond to the
arts emotionally because there's a definite relationship between the tone
scale and the arts.

Aesthetics forms a scale of its own going from the gaudiest dime store
glitter to the elegance of a masterpiece. This scale moves
(perpendicularly) up and down the tone scale. Therefore, we may find
flawlessly executed art that is depressing. Conversely, we may see happy,
upscale work that is less than perfect aesthetically.

When a person says, "I know it's supposed to be good, but it doesn't
appeal to me," he is objecting to the emotional tone of the work; he may
prefer something that is sad, schmaltzy, fearful, mysterious, gutsy or
unobtrusive, depending on his tone.

There are thousands of songs in the Grief band alone and they range from
quickly-forgotten novelty numbers to exquisite classics. Aesthetics has a
strong tone-raising value as you will know if certain books, paintings or
music fill you with excitement and pleasure.

MUST THE ARTIST BE NEUROTIC?

An artist who expects to interpret life truthfully must be able to view
all tones from Apathy to Enthusiasm with an equally detached viewpoint.
His own position on the scale needn't influence his creative ability.
Many of our most talented artists were or are low-scale. However, it
isn't necessary for the artist to be neurotic in order to be creative
(this is an idea that seems to get passed along despite the fact that it's
not valid). Although an artist may be able to produce when he's low,
he'll be more robust and adept if he moves upscale, and he needn't
sacrifice his form, style or talent in any way. No person gets worse by
going up-tone.

"A good poet can cheerfully write a poem gruesome enough to make a strong
man cringe, or he can write verses happy enough to make the weeping laugh.
An able composer can write music either covert enough to make the sadist
wiggle with delight or open enough to rejoice the greatest souls. The
artist works with life and with universes. He can deal with any level of
communication. He can create any reality. He can enhance or inhibit any
affinity."
-L. Ron Hubbard, Science of Survival

ON STAGE

The tone scale can be useful to the actor, playwright or director. An
actress doing a dramatic Grief scene will do it more easily if she
understands all the .5 characteristics, many of which can be conveyed
without words (expression, posture, movements and communication lag). A
Grief person droops; her eyes are downcast. She never gives fast, snappy
answers. She sighs heavily. She's so wrapped up in herself that she
finds it difficult to get interested in anything or anyone else.
An actor or actress in training could exercise by taking a few lines and
saying them in every tone on the scale.

THE WRITER

Countless writers survive (and even prosper) without formally learning the
tone scale. The best of them, however, actually do use the material when
they accurately observe and describe human nature. If you write about
people (whether real or imaginary), using the scale will make your work
easier and more believable.

If every political writer and historian knew the tone scale, it would be a
simple matter to determine whether any famous person was a great statesman
or a conniving scoundrel.

Recently I read about a popular but controversial man. Since he's quite
influential, I was eager to know his tone. Unfortunately, I couldn't tell
whether he was a 1.1 or top-scale because the writer intruded his own
emotion so strongly through innuendo and thinly-veiled criticism. Covert
Hostility types commonly do this to discredit a high-tone person. When I
finished the article I knew more about the writer than the subject of the
article.

Sometimes, out of admiration (or orders from the editor), a writer will
endow his subject with a falsely high tone. If enough direct quotations
are included, however, you can usually by-pass the author and make an
accurate evaluation.

"IN CHARACTER"

Probably since the first cave man scratched a hieroglyphic symbol on a
wall, student writers have been admonished to keep their fictional people
"in character," although they are seldom told exactly how to do this.
Today, however, the best interpretation of this ill-defined phrase lies in
the use of the tone scale.

Once you select the chronic tone of a fictional person, you can keep him
in character by sustaining that emotion until your plot introduces a
situation that justifies a rise or drop in tone. Meanwhile, you can
predict his reactions: When he's threatened will he be brave, pig-headed,
cowardly, or so low he's unaware of any threat? Will he be honest when
faced with temptation? Will he be generally liked or disliked? Will he
boost or depress others by his presence?

You can show the village drunk as easy-going or pugnacious when under the
influence. If you sober him up, however, he should be placed in
Apathy-morose and brooding.

The Angry prostitute (such as the one portrayed by Barbra Streisand in the
movie "The Owl and the Pussycat") has the same 1.5 characteristics as the
tough army general. The characters can be rich, poor, nauseatingly
intellectual, drop-out dumb, prudish, nicely moral, nicely immoral or
downright cheap. They can be chic or dowdy. They can be members of an
Indian tribe or the New York cocktail circuit. But if the tone is
constant it can be readily recognized by the jet set debutante as well as
the frazzled housewife in Hoboken ("I know somebody who's just like
that").

SOME FAMOUS CHARACTERS

One enjoyable way to practice the tone scale is by spotting people
(whether real or fictional) in books, articles, movies and plays. Let's
do a few for a warm-up ...

That famous, slinky creature, Long John Silver in Treasure Island was
definitely a 1.1, as evidenced by his sneaky trickery and his smiling
front.

Hamlet seemed to move around the scale; but when he delivered his famous
"to be or not to be" he was caught in the indecision of Grief. His uncle
(the King) exemplified the suppressive 1.1 by the devious skullduggery
which brought about the death of everyone around him.

In the The Love Machine Jacqueline Susann describes a No Sympathy person
in Robin Stone.

In the play Pygmalion, George Bernard Shaw also gave us a No Sympathy
person, Henry Higgins. Liza Dolittle, spunky and outspoken was mostly
Antagonism, with occasional fits of Anger. Higgins' lack of sympathy
shows up in his complete inability to perceive or acknowledge Liza's
feelings, although he sometimes uses the "coaxing cleverness" of the 1.1
or throws a fit of temper. After much exposure to each other, Shaw
(believably) settles out the relationship at mid-point (1.5): "She snaps
his head off on the slightest provocation, or on none ... He storms and
bullies and rides . ."

Thomas Berger in The Little Man sketches a 1.1 practical nurse in a few
succinct sentences: "... stout, over-curious, and spiteful ... one of
those people who indulge their moral code as a drunkard does his thirst
... and went so far as to drop certain nasty implications ... A more
sensitive person would have taken my murmur as adequate discouragement,
but Mrs. Burr was immune to subtlety."

In The Godfather by Mario Puzo we have the tone level of organized crime
(1.1 to 1.5). The Godfather himself, often unsympathetic, occasionally
angry, operated for the most part as a 1.1. "We're reasonable people. We
can arrive at a reasonable agreement but underneath the simulated
friendliness, there was a mutually shared knowledge that any person who
failed to comply would simply be destroyed. His frequent poses of
sentimentality and kindness were merely 1.1 devices for gaining control
over others. Despite his apparent love for his family, his activities
placed them under constant threat from both the law and rival underworld
gangs. We also see the exalted ego of the 1.1 as he demands "full
respect" from his underlings, constantly asserting his "honor" while
indulging in covert treachery, deception and betrayal.

Kurt Vonnegut in Slaughterhouse-Five brilliantly depicts Apathy in the
funny, pitiful, non-hero Billy Pilgrim.

VOLUME

The writer can also make excellent (and realistic) use of tone volume.
Some characters come on strong while others stay in the background-not
intruding too heavily in the story-just as they do in our lives.

We see a 1.1 who's amusing and likable-a charming, boyish, ladies' man
who's generally forgivable. Of course he's still unreliable, unfaithful
and unethical. Some of his jokes will have a bit of an edge; he won't
keep agreements; he won't persist on a job. He'll carry all the 1.1
characteristics, but his charm makes him socially acceptable (as long as
you don't need to depend on him for much). This is 1.1 on the low side,
lightly done. On the other hand, we meet a 1.1 with the volume turned up
and, although he still wears the plastic smile, he's so viciously
dedicated to destruction that he leaves nothing but tears and frustration
in his wake. The difference between them is volume.

One Apathy person may be practically invisible, while another sits in the
corner, saying nothing, but permeating the room with a heavy, suffocating
hopelessness.

REALISM VS. ROMANTICISM

For a number of years we have been bombarded with a level of creativeness
called realism. To this school, life is a garbage can. "Telling it like
it is" means depicting drunkenness, deceitfulness, addiction,
prostitution, crime, depravity, murder, unhappiness, sorrow, and every
form of spiritual slumming. Honest realism shows us the roses in the
garden as well as the refuse in the back alley.

There's usually somebody around to appreciate every tone of writing.
However, it wouldn't hurt any writer to notice the popularity of the
upscale invulnerables: Sherlock Holmes, James Bond, Tarzan, Superman, the
Lone Ranger and every hero who can shoot from the hip with his eyes closed
and never miss. There's pleasure in believing in the superhuman and, no
matter how mundane his own condition, man never tires of this vicarious
invincibility.

High-tone writing needn't be happy every minute. Erich Segal's Love Story
is an excellent example of an upscale story about a young couple who meet
on a mutually antagonistic level and, falling in love, move uptone to a
delightfully bantering, but meaningful, relationship. The Grief
(introduced in the last one-fifth of the book) depicts the way upscale
people would react in such circumstances. Critics of this book fall into
two camps: for or against. No one, it seems, is indifferent. Segal plays
sharply on the emotional responses, s o both high and low-tone readers are
deeply moved by this ten-Kleenex book. In the war of the critics,
however, the first shot was fired by the 1.2s. No Sympathy doesn't dare
let anyone tug this way at his atrophied heartstrings, so he fights back
by sneeringly labeling the work "romanticism." And the one who laughs when
everyone else is weeping is most likely the 1.1 in the audience.
If Mr. Segal were to look closely at those who attacked his book most
viciously, he would find them all at 1.1 or 1.2 on the scale. They're
saving their kudos for low-tone art that will contribute more to the
degradation and destruction of the human race.

THE TURNING POINT

Most fiction plotting requires at least one major turning point to add
interest and bring about the desired ending. The poor little waif makes
good. The tough criminal decides to go straight. The philandering
husband realizes he loves his wife after all.

People do make major decisions which change the course of their lives; but
writers go out of character more on this device than any other.
When a person experiences (or causes or witnesses) a big upset, loss or
misunderstanding, he's likely to make a decision that will change the
course of his life; but the choice he makes will be a downscale one. When
he drops to a low tone, it's impossible for him to make an upscale
decision or determine to be an upscale person. Any decision made in the
middle of a low-tone upset Will be a low-tone decision designed to keep
such circumstances from occurring again.

It is during such extremely depressed moments of life that a person
decides to have less affinity for his fellowman ("I'm never gonna love
anybody again"), less agreement ("You can't trust anybody"), less
communication ("You won't catch me shooting off my mouth again"). This is
when he will decide to quit school, leave town, get drunk, never trust a
woman, never believe anybody, never tell the truth or try to help anyone
again.

Let's say the tough, No Sympathy killer shoots at a cop and injures a
little girl instead. He immediately suffers remorse and tries to make it
up by lavishing the girl and her family with gifts and money. Society may
now consider him a "good" man but the author should realize that this man
is at Propitiation and the rest of his behavior should be consistent with
his tone. He'll still be unethical, weak and ineffectual.

If you want the character to go straight, you must plot the circumstances
to raise him uptone. After I gave a lecture in California, a young
playwright came up to me and said, "I've only recently learned about the
tone scale. I'm writing a new play that's nearly finished and I've
discovered my heroine is a Grief person. I don't want to end the play
with her still at this level; but if I change her tone completely I'd have
to rewrite nearly every scene. Is there any believable way I can raise
her up before the end of the play?"

"Yes," I answered, "Show a turning point of wins, not losses. Let her
succeed at something she's trying to do, perhaps by leaving someone who's
holding her down." A person at the bottom can experience a tremendous
upsurge with any minor victory: baking a cake that doesn't fall or getting
a balky car to start. I went on to suggest that he move her up through
the tones, stressing some more than others. "She could start by showing a
stronger interest in others, then she might become more courageous and
willing to fight anything stopping her. Keep giving her wins and you can
take her as high as you want."

This seemed to solve the problem because his face lit up like a launching
rocket: "Yes, I can do that. Wow! You've saved me six months of
rewriting."

REALIZATIONS

When you show a mean, angry character who experiences a devastating loss
and realizes that he should turn into a nice person, remember that his
decision was made in the middle of Grief ("I'd better be another. I'm too
painful."). If you insist on endowing him with the stereotyped heart of
gold, remember that heart is made of mush at .8 and .9 on the scale.
If you want a character to "realize" on his own that he's been a coward,
or a no-good, and you want him to become an upscale hero, you must devise
a way to move him up-tone before this realization takes place. People are
incapable of confronting the truth about themselves while in any low tone.
Near the bottom of the scale, magnificent realizations tend to be nothing
more than pretty delusions.

A low-scale person moving up will go through Anger, and it's a natural
turning point. At this time the former coward will say, "I've had enough
of this sniveling around. I'm tired of being everybody's doormat. From
now on I'm getting tough." Once he's capable of getting angry, he might
move on up. It's at Anger that a person insists on a showdown, a
face-to-face confrontation. Don't try to bypass Anger in taking a person
upscale. It's unreal.

We sometimes read true accounts of people who undergo some "awakening"
after enduring the darkest moments of their lives. There are two
explanations for this type of phenomenon. Such things can happen to a
high-tone person who suffers a loss and bounces back upscale, enriched by
the experience.

A Conservatism man experienced a nearly fatal automobile accident. During
his long recovery he found himself so weak and helpless that he considered
suicide. He managed to cling to some thread of sanity, however, and he
gradually regained his strength and moved back upscale. Today he's
higher-tone than before. If he meets a pretty girl he kisses her. When
he wakes up and the sun is shining, he considers it a beautiful day. If
it's raining, he still considers it a beautiful day. He's less inhibited
and has more fun: "I found out how good it is to be alive."

Many of the "breakthroughs" we hear about, however, are nothing more than
the person settling into philosophic Apathy. The determining factor is
this: what did he do afterward? Did he go out and become more effective
or did he develop a sedentary philosophy about the mystic significance of
a blade of grass?

There is an interesting and consistent phenomenon which I frequently
notice: when a person abruptly becomes interested in a mystic, occult, or
symbolic explanation for everything, this is a certain clue that some
ambition of his was shattered. He's wordlessly slipped into a peaceful
Apathy where everything is now explained by stars, numbers, or symbols-all
of which are mysteriously preordained and out of his control.

THE ENVIRONMENT OF THE ARTIST

High creativity cannot take place in an atmosphere of downscale criticism.
The artist should select his working environment, close friends,
instructors and critics with care.

The more successful an artist is, the more low-tone people gravitate
toward him. Use a pitchfork if necessary, but get rid of them. The
creative person needs a free mind and peaceful surroundings. If you share
your dreams with a low-tone person, he'll crush them. Look around you and
you'll find many friends with stories that were never written and songs
that were never sung because they aligned themselves with someone below
2.0 on the scale and soon gave up.

YOUR CRITICS

Better to blush awhile unseen than ask the wrong person to criticize your
work. The creative impulse is often fragile and the beginning artist is
easily discouraged if his embryonic creations are heavily punctured. Even
experienced writers are vulnerable.

A well-known author showed an unfinished manuscript to a friend. The
friend voiced some criticism and the author abandoned the piece for nearly
a year. After he recovered enough to finish the book it became a best
seller.

The critic you select may be well-published, heavily degreed, and wear a
stamp of "authority" from some lofty institution; but if you want to
survive as an artist, use his tone scale position as the first credential.
Although he may know his subject well, his comments come through his
tone. If it's low, his intention will be to stop you. Below 2.0 there is
no such thing as constructive criticism.

Over a period of several years, I encountered a variety of writing
instructors. In Freshman English it was a Boredom type whose literary
criticism consisted of correcting grammar and sentence structure. Neither
encouraging nor discouraging any possible talent in the class, she was
harmless.

The Antagonism instructor in the Composition Course loved to take a
philosophic question, toss it to the class and encourage hot debate.
Although we engaged in many stimulating verbal brawls, we learned nothing
about writing skill.

The next professor I met was pure Sympathy, who so thoroughly understood
artistic fragility that he never entered a single criticism or
constructive remark into his teaching. He didn't even give assignments.
His was a "free" class-even free from help.

The most discouraging instructor was a 1.2 who specialized in undermining
the confidence of his students. When asked for specific advice on a
piece, he curtly replied: "if you want to learn the art of simile, read
Georgia Portly Lament." He often referred to obscure writings, implying
that unless we knew them we were beyond hope. Criticizing with blunt
generalities, he left the students dissatisfied and discouraged with their
work and not knowing exactly how to improve it.

Eventually I found an uptone instructor (there really are some) and the
differences were remarkable. With no wish to hurt or discourage his
students, he praised as often as possible. On the other hand, integrity
to his job (and his own skill in the field) made him able to criticize
when needed. The important difference was this: he gave specific
criticism, not generalities.

I mentioned this to a friend of mine who is a University art professor and
he thanked me profusely. While acutely conscious of his students'
vulnerability, he was never able to work out exactly how to criticize
until I mentioned the word specific.

This kind of correction doesn't hurt (unless the student is on a low-tone
vanity trip) because the artist knows exactly how to improve his work; he
learns something.

Incidentally, this is the main reason a rejection slip is so discouraging
to the writer. It's a generality. There is no clue why his story didn't
sell. When the author knows the true reason (no matter how gruesome) it
is easier to confront than his own low-scale imaginings, and he may be
able to remedy the piece. I understand that some publications are now
using a rejection slip in the form of a check list, and I'm sure this
helps.

SUMMARY

Choose your art, your environment, your teachers and your critics by tone.
You need low-tone help about as much as you need a case of malaria.
There is every reason for the artist to be upscale and none for being
down. Ron Hubbard said that it is "the artists who, through grossness and
vulgarity, destroy the mores of a race and so destroy the race." (Science
of Survival

On the other hand, topscale artists are the most powerful people on earth,
for aesthetics is the quickest method of all for lifting large numbers of
people up-tone.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 23 - HOW TO HANDLE PEOPLE BY TONE MATCHING

How can you inspire discouraged salesmen? What do you do with the 1.1
who's trying to destroy you? How do you stop the antagonistic interviewer
from attacking you? What's the best way to get the indifferent customer
to buy? How do you cheer up a friend? What do you do when someone gets
angry at you?

In other words, how do you handle low-tone people? (High-tone people don't
need handling; they are to enjoy.)

If you're just interested in getting on with your job, and not doing a
major overhaul, you can try tone matching.

WHAT IS TONE MATCHING?

Tone matching means knowingly adjusting to the tone level of the other
person. We do this by going to the same tone or one notch above.
When you tone match with a person, he'll like you better and, if he's
regularly higher on the scale, you can lift him back up. If he's
chronically low, you may raise him, but it will be only temporary. In
such a case the person may develop a dependency on you-someone who
understands and gives him a lift. Unless you like carrying a load of
hitchhikers all the time, you will want to know how to bring him
chronically upscale so he can move on his own wheels. Naturally this is
what we want for those closest to us, so other methods of tone raising are
discussed in the next chapter. Meanwhile we need a way to cope
effectively with those short-term associates we meet daily.

FINDING HIM

If you're not sure where someone is on the scale, you can do a fast
conversational test to find out what he likes to hear and talk about. To
do this, you start with high-tone creative ideas. If no response, make
small talk about the weather, speak with Anger or Antagonism about
something, offer a rumor, mention something frightening, discuss some
poor, unfortunate souls, remark that things aren't like they used to be or
talk about the hopelessness of it all.

As you work down, the person will respond when you make remarks on his
tone level. In fact, it's seldom necessary to do this much talking, as
he'll usually display his tone in the first words he uses.

With this test, you are finding out what is real to the individual. Once
you converse on his tone level for a while, he will decide that you're a
pretty understanding person. He'll like you. If he moves easily on the
scale, you can go up a notch and he'll come with you. By shifting higher,
one tone at a time, you can talk him up the scale. Some people are so
rigidly immobile that they cannot move more than one step up from their
customary tone. Fortunately, they're not common.

In this chapter we'll give some examples of tone matching and, in some
cases, of tone raising, at the various emotional levels.

APATHY

If you're trying to reach someone who's in bed in deep Apathy (ill or in
shock), you'll find that verbal communications don't make it. Thoughts
are unreal to him; even the physical universe is somewhat unreal. To get
through to him, use a physical communication. Touch his shoulder or take
his hand in yours. He'll be more aware of your hand than anything you
say. After awhile, if he's responding to your touch and acting more
alive, start drawing his attention to various objects in the room. You
might mention a picture on the wall, a vase of flowers or get him to feel
the texture of the bed covers. Anything you can do to make him aware of
the environment around him may help to bring him a bit up-tone. Don't try
to communicate an idea or thought. Just cause him to be aware that he's
here.

The ambulatory Apathy person is often difficult to reach (especially if he
claims everything is fine). The two aforementioned methods are both
helpful-hand contact and getting him to notice and touch objects in the
environment. I sometimes break through this false serenity by discussing
the broken dream that put the person in Apathy. If you reach him this
way, expect tears, because it's Grief he's holding off. After he unloads
it all, he'll move on up.

I know one fellow who shook a girl out of Apathy by talking about imminent
death. This was so real to her that she responded. When he offered a bit
of hope, she moved up to Making Amends saying, "What can I do?" Soon she
was sobbing. Interestingly, several people in the environment were
perturbed because he "upset" her. On the contrary, he brought her up to
caring about her condition. A short time later she was actually upscale
enough to get into constructive action.

GRIEF

Most people instinctively go to Propitiation or Sympathy with a case of
Grief. When there's a death, we send flowers or bake a cake for the
mourning family. These are natural gestures, and they're real to the
person in Grief. He won't respond to any tone higher. (Don't tell a
person in Grief that it's "all for the best." It could push him into
Apathy.)

The response on this tone band is evident in a report from two
psychologists running a clinic for alcoholics. As part of the therapy,
the psychologists held regular group discussions with the patients. One
day one of the former alcoholics commented: "It's too bad you can't find a
single true friend in this world."

Someone else responded, apathetically, that it was kind of foolish and
hopeless to even look for one. The others joined in the discussion. A
few of them said that you might locate one true friend; but most of them
agreed there was no such thing. The psychologist suggested they agree on
a definition: "What do we mean by the term true friend?"

After a little deliberation, the group agreed on a definition: "A true
friend is a person who would give you the shirt off his back."
Here we see individuals who are in Apathy or Grief and the only kind of a
friend who would be real to them is one notch higher on the tone scale:
Propitiation.

To tone match with somebody in the sub-subbasement, your conversation must
descend to the sub-basement. To bring a Grief person upscale, do things
for him, then pour on the Sympathy until he's satiated: "Oh, you poor
thing. I don't know how you stand it. You certainly get all the bad
breaks. I can't imagine how you endure it all. It amazes me that you're
still going on." With any luck, he'll decide you re very understanding and
soon he'll say, "Oh, it isn't all that bad." After that, you should be
able to bring him on up to the point where he will receive constructive
help.

You don't always need to go this far of course (pouring it on so thick)
but the important point is this: don't tell him he has no reason to
grieve. It won't work. He'll only conclude that you don't really
understand him.

PROPITIATION

Blakely was a house guest with Mr. and Mrs. Porter when he accidentally
broke a chair in his room. Deeply apologetic, he asked his hostess to
send him the bill for repairs. "Oh, no," she insisted, "that chair was
already cracked. We should have fixed it long ago."

"I don't believe that. You're just trying to make me feel better. Please
send me the bill."

Mrs. Porter never did send him the bill, so Blakely mailed her a check
imploring her to fill in the correct amount. She eventually did; but she
felt guilty about it.

When two Propitiation people meet, they create a frustrating impasse.
Even when your sense of justice is abused, the best way to handle
Propitiation is to accept his offering and thank him profusely.
Otherwise, he'll be miserable. You can bring him upscale as you would a
Sympathy person, which will be described next.

SYMPATHY

I was talking to a chronic Sympathy woman one day. She planned to become
involved with a drug rehabilitation program because she was sorry for the
drug users. She possessed neither the training nor the ability to give
them any real assistance (in fact, I knew if she followed her intention,
she would soon be wallowing in Grief), so I started talking Fear, warning
her of all the possible consequences. Was she prepared to manage this
problem and that one? You'd better be careful ... To my relief, she said,
"You know, I'm afraid I'm not actually ready to take this on yet."
We started gossiping about the incompetents now running the group in
question. Eventually she reached an antagonistic determination to become
better trained so she could join in and "really do something." This was
considerably higher-tone than the compulsion to leap into a situation
where she could only lose.

FEAR

A 1.0 can be reached by discussing all the dreadful things there are to
worry about. If you want to lift him up a slot, suggest covert ways of
dealing with something that he considers threatening. If he's afraid his
house will be robbed, discuss alarms, booby traps and hidden weapons he
could use against intruders.

THE 1.1

If you just want him to like you, meet him on tone. Flatter him. After
all, he's putting on a show for your benefit. Why not enjoy it and let
him know you do?

High-tone people nearly always get angry in the vicinity of a 1.1
(especially if they're trying to get something done). It can serve a
purpose if you want to get him out of your hair. If he's mobile at all,
he'll feel that it's safe to come up-tone and fight back. If he's a
chronic 1.1, however, he'll retreat because he fears and respects Anger.
George was receiving repeated vicious, underhanded attacks from a business
associate. One day, fed up with the Covert attempts to do him in, George
confronted his adversary: "Why don't you just kill me and get it over
with?"

The 1.1 laughed, denying the charges; but he quit attacking. In fact,
George established a certain low-level rapport with the man by correctly
indicating the 1.1's true intentions.

NO SYMPATHY

Since this tone is part of the 1.1 band, it will also handle well with
Anger. Instead of a direct fight, however, you can also try aiming the
Anger at someone else.

A friend of mine (normally high-tone) was feeling hateful toward a
business associate. He was caught in a bottled-up silence so typical of
1.2. Taking his side, I began to talk angrily about his "enemy." This
brought some signs of life, so I continued. Soon we were plotting the
painful extinction of the other man; together we dreamed up schemes for
outrageous and vicious revenge. In a few minutes he was bored with
conventional ideas so our plots became more diabolical and ludicrously
funny. My friend was laughing uproariously when he finally said, "Oh, the
hell with it. I have more important things to do."

ANGER

You'll never get together with an Anger person by trying to soothe and
mollify him. If he's angry at you, you can tone match. That is, leap in
and have a real row. He'll love you for it. Remember that the person most
admired by the hardened commanding general is his opposite number - the
tough commanding general of the enemy's army.

A friend of mine spent years cowering and slinking away from her 1.5
husband. One day he stormed at her and she yelled back. They flew into
battle, raging at each other in the first major fight in their twelve
years of marriage. When they ran down, they looked at each other in
amazement and burst out laughing together.

There are times when you will need to turn off Anger directed at you by
directing it somewhere else. Several years ago when I was in the real
estate business, a client called me. He was so mad he was spitting
hornets. I had sold him some property; but my broker failed to deliver
the final papers. Repeated phone calls to the broker failed to get
results, so the client was taking out his mad on me. He blasted away for
about five minutes. I let him blast. When he finished, I said, "I don't
blame you for being mad. I'm going to find out what's going on down there
and, believe me, we'll get action. I'll call you within twenty-four
hours."

Before the day was over, I raised some dust myself, found the reason for
the delay and took care of it. The papers were on the way when I phoned
him the next morning. He responded on the cheerful side of Antagonism and
then moved upscale. "You know, I like that," he said, "somebody who gets
action instead of arguing with me."

so admired my treatment of his affairs that he referred three new buyers
to me within the next six months.

ANTAGONISM

Henry, a business executive, used Boredom successfully for turning off an
Antagonistic person. A reporter phoned Henry to say, "I'm going to write
an article about you. I'm investigating your outfit. What's your answer
to the charge that your company ... ?"

"Oh, that same old thing again?"

Henry's attitude dismissed the challenging question as unimportant. You
could almost hear the bored yawn in his voice as he chatted amiably about
some of his company's mundane and non-controversial activities. Soon the
reporter became bored himself. "Well, I'll call you if any more questions
come up."

"Sure, you do that. Any time."

The conversation ended so low-key that the reporter never wrote the
article.

Another method for handling Antagonism is to meet his tone, but aim it at
another target. A surly plumber came to replace a defective garbage
disposal for me. I asked him if he could put the new one in the opposite
side of the divided sink. He grumbled that it would involve too much work
and expense. Realizing that I shouldn't get his Antagonism directed at me
in this case, I said, "OK. I see what you mean."

Later I remarked, "You know, these builders are a bunch of idiots. You
see, they put the disposal on this side and the switch on that side. The
dish cupboards are all over here ... obviously this was installed by some
dumbbell who never went into a kitchen except to eat."

He was happy to have a ready-made enemy, so he started ranting on about
those "stupid builders." He worked up such a flap that he called the owner
of the building, complained about the lame-brained plumbers and obtained
permission to move the unit to the opposite sink.

You can also meet 2.0 head-on in direct combat. I once met an Antagonistic
attorney at a party. I tried some cheerful conversation with him; but he
was sour and rude-constantly contradicting, challenging and
interrupting-so I abandoned the niceties to play the game in his arena:

"Boy, you sure like to fight, don't you?"

"What do you mean? I'm a peace loving man."

"Don't give me that. You can't resist an argument."

"That's ridiculous!"

"No, it isn't. You never let anybody say anything without disagreeing."

"I do too," he protested.

"See? You even had to disagree with that. You won't let me say a thing
without contradicting it."

"Hey! You got me all wrong. I'm a lover, not a fighter."

"Don't kid me. You'd be bored to death if you couldn't fight with
someone."

This went on for some time (to the extreme anguish of some lower-tone
people in our vicinity), but my friend was getting more alive and
stimulated by our verbal exchange. Later, bright and cheerful, he said,

"You know, you're really OK."

"That's right."

We were both laughing as he said, "Hey! We agreed on something."

THE SALESMAN

A good salesman uses the tone scale naturally. A new prospect is often
apathetic about your product when you first approach him (after all, he's
lived this long without it, so who needs it?) But if you meet him on his
tone level and talk him up the chart until he's interested or
enthusiastic, you've a good chance for a sale.

Most salesmen use the technique of finding a subject that interests the
customer. He may be low-tone about business, but tremendously interested
in raising tropical fish, so you inquire about the health of his neon
tetras. As he talks of them, he'll become more enthused. After he's
upscale, you casually ask how many carloads of gidgets he needs today.

If you're a sales manager, you already know there's nothing more deadly
than the creeping contagion of salesman's Apathy. Suppose there's been a
long strike in the city; the economy is shaky; everyone's cautious and
waiting; orders are scarce. Your salesmen are thinking of going out on
the corner with tin cups. How do you boost their morale? If you call a
sales meeting, don't try to hit those boys with a pitch full of puffed-up
enthusiasm. Their thoughts and comments about you would be unprintable.
Tone match.

You can raise the tone of a group of dejected people by thoroughly
acknowledging just how bad things are: "Well (sigh) this has been quite a
month. I was waiting in line for lunch at the Salvation Army today and I
got to talking with the president of General Motors . .
"My wife and I held a garage sale last weekend. We cleared ten dollars,
which is twice my commission for last month. We celebrated by going out
to the Dairy Queen."

Take all the coveted grievances and blow them up to the point of gross
exaggeration. Misery loves company (that's what tone matching is all
about), and once they realize someone does understand that things are
tough, they can let go of the emotion. They'll soon be laughing and
coming upscale. When this occurs, you can outline the new advertising
program and start painting a brighter picture for the future.

COMPULSIVE TONE MATCHING

I stress knowingly tone matching, because we unknowingly do so all the
time-and it knocks us down. It's natural to seek communication with
others. So we adjust downward until we can find some area of agreement.
The trouble is, when we don't realize we're doing it we slip down-tone
ourselves.

If we admire an individual (or consider him superior in some way) we can
get clobbered even more thoroughly (if he's low-tone), because he's going
to use his expertise to sell us a low-scale attitude. We rush to the
brilliant engineer with our great new idea. We're going to build a
supersonic, computerized, better mousetrap with built-in Roquefort.
Enthusiastically, we spill it all out; but he fails to respond. Seeking
his agreement, we keep dropping downscale. Eventually (after all, he's an
authority, isn't he?) we concede that it's hard to come up with anything
new these days; nobody's making a fortune now, and the income tax boys get
you first anyway. We slump away wondering how we could have entertained
such a stupid dream. We go back to reading our comic books.

To successfully tone match we must be stably upscale. It's the only way
we can adjust to lower tones without losing the high-tone viewpoint.
That's the difference between knowingly tone matching and the compulsive
kind-you don't lose the upscale viewpoint.

HOW DOES THE LOW-TONE PERSON ATTACK?

To successfully deal with tones, we should know the three methods of
attack the low-tone person may use: 1) thought, 2) emotion and 3) effort.
A person in Apathy, using thought, will try to convince us that everything
is hopeless; we're failures; we can't hold a decent job; we've wasted our
lives and how could anyone love us anyway?

Using Apathy emotion with the volume turned up, he can drive us to the
bottom by just emanating the emotion itself. He can sit around feeling
that there's no hope for himself, for anyone or anything. The world is
doomed. Without saying a word, he permeates the atmosphere with so much
black gloom-that we collapse just from the fall-out.

Apathy efforts are equally devastating. If someone apathetically handles
the materials related to our survival, we are influenced. If your wife
insults the boss, wrecks the car, lets your home become filthy, fails to
feed and dress your children, you'll be driven down (or to the divorce
court). If an employee loses your orders, destroys your goodwill and
breaks down your machinery, your survival is threatened and it's a short
trip down to Apathy yourself-unless you fire him.

IF YOU CAN'T HANDLE

If continued attempts to cope with a low-tone person fail and you find
yourself coming unglued, break your connections. Why be a hero? Nobody
will appreciate it. Laugh and the world laughs with you; cry and you pull
in a Sympathy person to "take care of you."

Tone matching is only easy with the occasional acquaintance. Otherwise
it's a strain. To deal with people closer to us, let's find out how to
raise tone.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 24 - RAISING TONE

You may have been wondering why people drop down tone in the first place
and, even more importantly, what we can do about it.

The following notes will cover the causes for low-tone as well as a few
remedies.

There are five major reasons a person goes downscale -temporarily or
permanently:

1. His present environment (its tone and volume).
2. His general environmental background.
3. Genetic limitations.
4. His current activities.
5. Experiences of pain and unconsciousness in the past.

THE PRESENT ENVIRONMENT

Turbulent and unhappy surroundings will produce a disturbed individual.
You can't punish, beat, drug, shock or command a person into sanity; but
you can take him out of a low-tone area and bring him upscale.
Environment includes people, places and general health.

A person's marriage partner, family, friends, job and neighborhood are all
part of his environment. No matter how high he is basically, when someone
associates with unsane individuals, he eventually drops tone, at least
while in the vicinity of the lower-scale associates. A 3.0 will drop to
Anger or act like a 1.1 in a Covert Hostility environment. The 1.1 might
improve to a point of Anger in a high-tone environment. In marriage, as
we mentioned earlier, one tends to match the emotional level of the
partner, with the downscale person coming up somewhat, and the hightone
one coming down considerably.

When a person is in an atmosphere where he does not receive friendship or
love, is not talked to and where no one agrees with his ideas, he will go
down tone. Friendship, communication and agreement are essential to man.
If someone is living in squalid rooms or neighborhood, he drops downscale.
Clean, light, bright and orderly surroundings will boost an individual
somewhat (depending on how boostable he is).

The person's physical condition is another aspect of environment. Proper
rest, nutritious food, exercise and good health are all necessary
prerequisites to high tone. If someone is trying to subsist on three
hours of sleep and black coffee, he will find himself less stable; small
incidents can provoke a sharp drop in tone. If he suffers from a physical
malfunction, he can go upscale after a visit to the doctor and proper
medical treatment. A new pair of glasses can do wonders by restoring a
large portion of his communication with the world. It's low-tone to
neglect the care of the body.

The use of sedatives or stimulants (including alcohol) also has a tone
lowering effect. Hallucinatory drugs may do so slowly or quickly. I have
seen LSD users drop into deeply psychotic Apathy for months or years.
Even the so-called "harmless" marijuana lowers tone, especially after
prolonged use. The individual sinks into a chronic lethargy, suffers from
loss of memory and the inability to concentrate.

Three office girls were smoking marijuana on their lunch hour. When asked
why they were doing this, one girl replied: "Two or three joints and we
feel good. We don't care if it might be our last week on the job. We
don't care if the work is stupid. We can stand it then. When we go back,
it wears off after awhile and we go down again; but we've had it. We've
been up."

That's Apathy speaking, of course, which is why it's so hard to talk a
person out of pot smoking. He's in an emotion that dictates an
indifferent response to danger.

Marijuana is not yet widely recognized as harmful because few people
possess the means for measuring the subtle, corroding effects of this drug
on emotional behavior. Once you understand the tone scale, however, no
one who's high on grass will ever convince you that he's high on the tone
scale. Drugged euphoria is as honey as a carnival Kewpie doll compared to
the glow and warmth of a 4.0.

I personally discourage the use of any chemical crutches except where
prescribed by a physician for treatment or relief of a physical condition.
The way to get the most pleasant sensations is to raise tone. It's the
best "high" of all-and the side effects are wonderful.

BACKGROUND

The tone of a person's family, education and general background
environment may strongly affect his outlook for the rest of his life. He
may be suppressed down tone, he may copy tones he sees around him, or he
may be taught low-scale ideas.

If a child is punished or overwhelmed every time he loses his temper or
speaks his mind, he drops to 1.1 or below and he may stay there. A person
goes downscale under the influence of an overbearing boss, parent, older
sibling or teacher. If his communication is enforced ("Speak up!") or
repressed ("Don't say those things"), if viewpoints are forced upon him
("You listen to what I'm telling you") or his ideas are dismissed ("You
don't know what you're talking about"), if his natural friendship is
inhibited ("Don't play with Alice") or enforced ("Go kiss your Auntie,
now")-all these things will lower his tone.

Parents almost automatically teach their children social tone: be polite,
nice, kind and generous. Such Boy Scout goodness is fine if the rest of
the environment assures high tone. When overlaying a low-scale
atmosphere, however, it breeds an ineffectual person who stays below 1.5.
A doctor with twenty years' experience treating homosexuals says that as
children most of his patients were criticized for rough-and tumble
behavior with other boys. Furthermore, he says that he has never known a
homosexual who came from a family where open communication prevailed.
Mothers could raise the tone of children if they spent less time "taking
care of" them and warning of dangers. Better to let their children eat
what they want to eat, sleep when ready and even get their feet wet; the
youngsters would be healthier and happier.

A person who operates on low-tone attitudes taught to him in his youth can
sometimes improve by merely learning the tone scale. I once acted,
briefly, as a business consultant for a man whose company was on the edge
of financial collapse. It was soon evident that most of his difficulties
stemmed from his own emotional attitude of Sympathy. Although his
business was floundering, he still supported the many downscale
non-producers on his staff because Father taught him to be kind to those
less fortunate than himself. I started teaching him the scale to help him
spot the assets and liabilities among his personnel. The moment he
realized that his own Sympathy was harmful to his staff, his family and
his business, he moved upscale. Most of his employees were sales people,
so he immediately changed the salary structure to provide a low base pay
but extremely generous commissions. This soon separated the producers
from the flunkies, because the downscale people couldn't earn enough money
to subsist, whereas the high-tone people drew more money than ever before.
A natural selection took place: the losers left and he was able to
replace them with more upscale people.

Low-scale educational systems and teachers are also part of the background
which can destroy a person's confidence for life, Demanding that a student
memorize endless amounts of unrelated data, forcing him to study a subject
without getting him interested in it first, using low-tone and confusing
textbooks, grading on a curve, teaching too much theory without practical
experience are only a few of the detrimental practices we see in schools.

A person goes downscale to the degree that he cannot solve his problems,
so when education fails to provide the student with the ability and
confidence he needs to solve the problems of living, we see the foundation
for a low-tone life.

Speaking of background environment, a person tends to adopt a social tone
from his neighborhood. If he comes from a rough slum where dog-eat-dog
means survival, he may develop a tough 1.2 or 1.5 attitude which he wears
layered over his natural tone for the rest of his life.

GENETIC LIMITATIONS

A person may acquire a low-tone attitude because he was born into a
certain nationality or race, because he's too short, his eyes are crossed,
his nose is too long or he considers himself physically unacceptable in
some way. Any person drops down tone when he believes that his physical
shortcomings will result in no affection or friendship from others.
Around upscale people, who do not discriminate in this manner, he'll come
up, provided he is able to let go of his own ideas on the subject.

CURRENT ACTIVITIES

How a person spends his time strongly influences his emotional tone. If
he is idle, without goal or direction, he will go downscale. A person who
is "killing time" dies a little himself in the process.

Criminal actions or any activity that is detrimental to his fellow men
keeps a person chronically down-tone. Although he may get a lift
occasionally, there is no remedy that will bring him up on a permanent
basis (unless he ceases such activities, of course). A person engaged in
perverted activities stays down as long as he continues them. A
prostitute will have to change her profession to come upscale. A
businessman who is cheating his customers or taking advantage of his
employees will not move up-tone, no matter how many millions he acquires.
Many activities are detrimental without being illegal. If a person is
continually critical and unkind to others, he stays in the lower zones.
If a man is going out with someone else's wife, there's no chance of
raising his tone. If a person is leeching off of friends or taking
advantage in some other way, he holds his position at the bottom of the
pit.

An individual cannot hang on to a low-tone activity and expect to rise on
the scale. By definition this is impossible. High-tone people do not
engage in low-tone activities.

To take a person's attention off of some downscale temptation, direct him
to other interests. This could be sports, a hobby, or learning a new
skill. Anything that captures his interest and curiosity (and is not
detrimental to anyone) is a potential tone raiser. If he's sitting around
in the glums, he'll perk up if he does any physical job-washes the car,
cleans out a closet, plays a game of ball or goes to the mail room and
licks stamps. On a temporary basis, doing something is all that matters.
He improves even more by developing a skill in some area: learns to fix a
car, bake a cake, use a typewriter or play a musical instrument. Best of
all, the person will come upscale in any activity which embraces a
long-term goal.

Anyone moves up when he achieves an enormous success. A happy marriage
may raise him chronically. Acquiring a new job, getting promoted, selling
that story, recording that song, inventing something-any achievement which
is meaningful to the individual-can raise his tone.

If you assign a person command over more space, more objects or more
people, he will go up the scale. The more a person can control, the more
up-tone he becomes.

I once knew a man who nearly killed his wife by not allowing her to work
outside the home. Her family was grown up, the husband frequently was out
of town and she was miserable, tearful and complaining. Her husband
mentioned this to me one day, wondering what he could for her. She
sometimes expressed a wish to go back to work, he said, but he discouraged
this because there was no need for her to work.

I suggested that perhaps this wasn't a kindness after all, possibly she
needed more to manage. Why not encourage her to get a job and see what
happened? I didn't hear how this worked out until several years later
when I met the man again at a business meeting. He told me that his wife
did find a job, was happily working and getting promotions. She was
enthusiastic, more efficient in her housework and a more loving marriage
companion as well. Here was a lady who obviously needed more of an area
under her control.

It's also possible to give a person so much to deal with that he comes
apart at the seams. If promoted to a position outside of his skills (or
one he hasn't earned), he'll drop down-tone. If asked to meet impossible
standards, a previously upscale person drops down. He may become so
overwhelmed that he quits or for resorts to lies and cheating in an
attempt to cover his failings.

The greatest stimulation comes from having just enough work that we must
stretch a bit to keep getting things done.

Admiration is a great tone raiser. Everyone does something well. Find
out what it is, praise him and help him to do it even better.
The more you do for a person, the less he will do for himself. Too much
generosity begets Apathy. So always let - no, insist - that a person
contribute something.

Anything.

EXPERIENCES OF PAIN AND UNCONSCIOUSNESS

Although there are many immediate causes for low tone, all uncontrolled
emotions (temporary and chronic) stem from one basic cause: past
experiences of physical pain and unconsciousness. Because the content of
these experiences is hidden from the person's view, he is unknowingly
influenced by them. Even a bump on the head or a skinned knee produces a
moment of shock (a great loss such as a death causes a similar emotional
shock). Although he isn't passed out cold, a person's awareness is shut
down momentarily, at which time all perceptions (sounds, smells, sights,
etc.) are unconsciously recorded. These return later, under the stimulus
of similar perceptions (or words), and cause low tone and various
aberrations.

L. Ron Hubbard spent many years developing processes to help the
individual permanently erase the effects of these painful incidents (read
Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health for a complete explanation
of these experiences and how they influence us). His processes are
now administered by pastoral counselors in Scientology churches and
missions. Their first purpose is to lift the individual's tone
permanently, by eliminating the source of downscale emotions.

TONE RAISING IN GENERAL

Anything that raises a person's tone is a valid action. Going to a movie
he wants to see can lift a person up. In fact, using aesthetics is the
most effective channel of communication for raising a person without tone
matching or professional help. He will respond to beauty when nothing
else reaches him. This is why visual aids help in teaching and why
artistic advertisements sell products. A vase of flowers or a piece of
jewelry can lift a woman who's in the dumps. A sleek, new car can change
a man's whole outlook.

Primarily what you want to do in raising tone is rehabilitate the person's
ability to communicate. You do this by making it safe for him to say
anything he wants to say. If he's frightened, he should be able to
mention this without someone chastising him for it. He must be permitted
to shed his Grief. Most important, he must be in an environment where he
is free to get Angry. Since we live in a society that condemns Anger and
condones Sympathy, this is the most frequently suppressed emotion. When
someone is moving up, Anger is a sign of healthy improvement, not that he
is ing mad. The best way to help an Angry person is to let him rage.
When he stops, ask him if there's anything more he wants to tell you about
it. He'll move upscale after he says it all.

An individual stays in any one of the restrained tones as long as he can't
communicate the emotion above it.

The person who is thoroughly stuck in a low tone will seldom yield to a
"Hello, how are you," level of conversation. This requires professional
counseling (and perhaps considerable time).

SUMMARY

There are four valid methods for raising tone:

1. Changing the person's environment to one which is happier and which
improves his chances to survive (this includes nutrition, medical care and
recreation).

2. Education that more thoroughly acquaints him with the culture or gives
him the skills of survival. A person can be taught more easily as he
moves up. When a classroom situation is fun the student becomes more
confident and relays communication more readily and correctly (in this
case relaying refers to the application of material in the lectures and
texts).

3. Regulating the numbers and kinds of objects (people or duties) under
his control.

4. Scientology processing.
All four methods raise a person's tone by giving him better tools for
survival, improved conditions in which to survive and some valid reasons
for surviving.

A person who's progressing doesn't necessarily jet up to the stars and sit
there watching the rest of us inglorious souls flounder around in the
muck. He loosens up first. He hits peaks and valleys; but he's moving.
Best of all, he no longer takes the whole thing so seriously (even when he
wilts a bit). Gradually his highs get higher, steadier and more frequent.
That's progress, and it's worth any price.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 25 - YOU AND ME

No matter what grand thing we want to accomplish-from setting up a
lemonade stand in the front yard to cleaning up the world-it's going to be
easier and more achievable if we get ourselves as highscale as possible.
Besides it's more fun.

We can stop wars by making our leaders saner. We can stop environmental
destruction by raising the responsibility level of the inhabitants We can
stop discrimination by raising the understanding of the individuals.
Ultimately, the answer to our social ills lies not in developing better
systems, bigger programs, ideal philosophies, or in drugging our political
leaders into Apathy. The answer lies in lifting the tone level of the
individuals. When we make man saner, we make his families, his groups,
his races and his nations saner.

We start with you and me.

THE TRAP

While reading this book, you've probably groaned occasionally: "Oh, I do
that sometimes. I must be pretty low-tone."

It's a grim experience-seeing and hearing ourselves down there in the pit
somewhere. Be assured, however, that you are not alone. We all own the
emotional keyboard and we've played every note at one time or another.
The best way to get out of any trap is to thoroughly understand the trap.
So, having recognized some lowscale manifestations in ourselves, we are
already a couple of galaxies ahead of the poor soul who's caught in a tone
and believes it. He's saying, "Life is this way," and often he considers
the condition permanent and irrevocable.

If you experience one of those days when your wife won't talk to you; you
get a flat tire on the way to the office; you arrive to find that you've
lost two of your biggest accounts; the production line is shut down with a
mechanical failure and the big boss is in town on an unexpected visit-you
might heave a huge sigh and say, "I give up."

When you know the tone scale, however, you may be able to say (gulp) "This
is Apathy," in which case some part of you is not totally submerged. You
can take some control and drag yourself back into the day-awful as it is.
In this chapter we're going to examine some of the things we can do to
haul ourselves up and stay there.

BE SELFISH

Be selfish and industrious about raising your own tone. You owe it to
yourself, your future, your family, to your work and to mankind. It is
never noble to be less than sane. It is never better survival to continue
non-survival actions.

Anything which raises tone is worthwhile. As we mentioned in the last
chapter, this can include bettering our health, our environment, our
education, and-for permanent improvement-Scientology processing.

Notice your own tone fluctuations: What people, places, or activities drop
you down? Which raise your tone? Start orienting your life toward the
tone raising people, places and actions.

Pleasure and survival go together. Something that increases your pleasure
increases your survival and vice versa. Any activity you thoroughly enjoy
will be tone raising. This may sound self-indulgent; but only low-tone
people try to convince us there is anything honorable about being serious
and self-sacrificing.

The person who takes the necessary actions to improve his emotional
outlook becomes more tolerant and understanding, more able to solve
problems, more responsible and more persistent. He can live well and
freely; but still accomplish ten times as much as the drones who plod
heavily along because they "don't have the time" to enjoy living.

FLUCTUATIONS

The upscale person doesn't sit placidly serene while buildings collapse
around him. Nor does he leap through life in constant orgasmic ecstasy.
He fluctuates. He is not stuck. He responds with the right emotion for
the occasion, and most of the time he experiences a quiet excitement at
the simple pleasures of living.

THE SECRET OF POWER

One of the biggest mistakes we can make is assuming that we can associate
closely with down-tone people for a long time without sliding down
ourselves. Other than at gun point, there are only two ways to deal with
someone who is working relentlessly to knock us down: We handle him
(preferably by bringing him upscale) or we disconnect.

Although we needn't condemn a person for his low position on the scale
(who can cast the first stone?) we mustn't deceive ourselves either.
There's nothing more difficult to face than the destructive evil of a
chronic, high-volume low tone. There probably isn't one of us who
wouldn't rather pretend it isn't there. It's so much easier to "think the
best of people." That's the coward's way out, however, and it's a costly
mistake.

Most of us err in trying to help someone too long. If a person won't
permit himself to be helped, we must be willing to let go. When we keep
trying and failing and still insisting we "should be able to manage it,"
we drop downtone ourselves.

If there's a large hole in the bottom of the ship, you either repair it in
a hurry or you get out the life boats. Too many people struggle through
life trying to bail out their sinking ships with a teaspoon.
The secret of power is knowing how to handle and when to disconnect.

CHOOSE YOUR PEOPLE

Low-tone people, like poison ivy, are easier to avoid than get rid of.

So from here on you can save yourself much grief by choosing upscale
people right from the start. Even pick the highest tone businesses for
your patronage. When you choose trustworthy people, life is brighter and
you won't be complaining that "he gypped me" or "I was betrayed."

I even (I mean, especially) select my auto mechanics by tone. When I find
an uptone fellow, I give him all of my business and my trust, knowing that
if the motor in my car develops an alarming new plunk (because a bolt
needs tightening), he isn't going to tell me: "The whole flanastran must
be overhauled, and that'll run around three hundred dollars."

CHOICES

Knowing the high-tone characteristics, we find that there are many times
we can actually make a choice toward the higher attitude. it's more
upscale to trust than distrust. This doesn't mean we should become
gullible; but when there's a borderline decision, well feel better if we
permit ourselves to trust. (I've even known some low-tone people who
actually stretched their ethics upward simply because I let them know I
trusted them. This won't work with everyone; but if a person is mobile,
he'll reach up-tone more readily on trust than distrust. Do this with
children.) When we're debating whether or not to tell the truth, we find
that truth is much higher than deceptiveness. Understanding is higher
than ignorance; it's always beneficial to learn more. Causing is saner
than being effect, so don't sit quietly in the back of the room and let
the low-tone committee members run things. Speak out. Owning is higher
on the scale than considering one shouldn't own anything. Taking
responsibility is more up-tone than avoiding responsibility. It's higher
tone to fall in love than to be a cynical loner. It's more upscale to
communicate than to suppress communication.

GOALS

We may want to win a Nobel Prize, invent a substitute for food, learn to
telepath with chipmunks or merely get the flower bed weeded out this
afternoon. No matter what the job, it's easier to accomplish when we're
upscale. On the other hand, we mustn't sit around waiting until
enthusiasm strikes us before we tackle the breakfast dishes. The person
who accomplishes a great deal while still down-tone is of much greater
potential worth.

The most important single contributing factor to tone is pursuing one's
own goals. So if you're not working toward the goal that means most to
you, dust the cobwebs off that dream (the one you abandoned because
someone convinced you to be sensible and take up engineering instead) and
get on with it.

SOME TONE RAISING IDEAS

Someone once said, "Life is the thing that really happens to us while
we're making other plans."

This is true of the downscale person. Up-tone people enjoy the present as
they plan their future. Low-tone people only daydream about it (and some
merely wait to "see what happens"). Too often we hear people say, "Some
day I'm going to start my own business," "I'd really like to write a
song," "I intend to go back and finish school," "I want to take up skiing
sometime."

The difference between upscale planning and lowscale wishful thinking is
action. The high-tone person puts his plans into action in the present
time. Now. He isn't just thinking; he's doing.

We can raise ourselves, temporarily, on the scale by riding on the bubble
of wishful thinking. But, if we never act, the bubble soon bursts and we
must confront the mundane reality of our existence-and die in little
pieces.

When we're not working toward a major goal (or even a minor one), it's too
easy to "save" ourselves for some purpose important enough for our
attention. Saving ourselves is a sure way to drop downscale and stay
there. In such circumstances, find anything to do-whether or not it's
important.

Lethargy produces low tone and, tragically, low tone produces lethargy.
The longer we put off an action, the more deeply we sink into a pool of
inertia, and it's much more difficult to start up again from a dead stop.
Almost everyone must fight lethargy sometimes; but you conquer it by just
starting something. Once you're rolling it's easier to keep going and you
will move upscale.

Finishing jobs can give you a marvelous sense of accomplishment,
especially those jobs you're likely to postpone from year to year. Spend
a day or a week finishing any projects you have lying around and you'll
soar.

If your environment is in a state of chaos, the disorder grabs your
attention (and hangs on to it) every time you walk through the room.
Disorder itself is low-tone. Order is high-tone. So you can bring
yourself upscale by simply cleaning and organizing the nest. Afterward
you'll have a free mind to address more meaningful projects.

Another gambit for raising tone is to get involved. We all have choices
almost daily: "Should I go to the party or stay home?" "Shall I go see
what that job is all about or just forget it?" "Shall I attend the meeting
or take the evening off?" "Should I join that committee or let someone
else do it?" "Should I take that judo class or stay home and read?"
Assuming that you're considering an activity that's relatively high-tone,
you will usually find more enjoyment when you take the active choice
rather than the passive one. It's the person who's avoiding work,
avoiding risks, avoiding responsibilities, avoiding new situations who's
miserable. Always reserve the freedom to withdraw from a situation that
is low-tone (when you can't do anything about it). But get involved.

DON'T SUPPRESS EMOTIONS

If you learn nothing else from this book, you should learn that you never
reach high tones until you can experience all of them. To gain mobility
you must not suppress emotions.

When you feel like crying, cry or you slip into Apathy. If something is
fearful, go ahead and be frightened or you become a weak Sympathy and
Propitiation type trying to ward off all dangers and never helping
anybody-least of all yourself.

Don't bottle up Anger; let it go. When someone is doing something
objectionable to you, in your space or with your belongings, speak
immediately. We only covertly hate that person if we don't voice our
complaints. Simply state flatly and directly: "You did this. I object to
it. Don't do it again." The more you bottle up such feelings, the more
you pin yourself down in 1.1 or 1.2. Some people need to work up a high
volume of Anger in order to "tell someone off." This is undesirable
because uncontrolled Anger is usually destructive. It's the person who's
too cowardly to say something in the beginning who lets his grudges build
up until he explodes. State your objections immediately while the volume
is low, and they will not stay with you simmering under the surface.
Don't worry about hurting the other fellow's feelings. If he's taking
advantage of you or doing something harmful, it's a crime to let him
continue. If he's unable to improve, you're better off getting him out of
your environment anyway.

Of course, none of this justifies a person who is constantly critical and
invalidating to others. He's fixed between 1.1 and 2.0.

BAD NEWS

The top of the tone scale tells us that the upscale person doesn't absorb
and relay all the bad news. He cuts such communication lines. There are
many ways to do this and it will serve us well to use them.

If the newspaper makes you believe there's no hope for the world, quit
reading it. If a book is depressing (who cares how artistic it's supposed
to be?) throw it in the fireplace; it'll help the kindling along. Find
highscale entertainment. It can bring back a chuckle or a flow of warmth
for a long time afterward.

When you're talking with someone and the conversation drops low, change
the subject. Cut that communication line.

If certain people insist on giving you nothing but bad news, lies, gossip,
arguments, criticism, hopelessness or covert barbs, stop associating with
them. If you wouldn't tolerate people dumping their trash in the middle
of your living room, why let them empty their mental trash cans in your
mind?

I was at a party when a woman inquired about my religion. She smiled
slyly as she asked: "Oh, are you a convert?'
She leaned so heavily on the last word that I could see she anticipated
doing some covert sniping. I decided to cut this communication
immediately. Abruptly and firmly I said, "I don't even know the meaning
of the word."

I turned away from her and started talking with the others at the table.
She didn't speak again and, strangely, none of the other people at our
table of six spoke to her. The rest of us carried on an easy, laughing
conversation.

Later one of the men said to me: "I don't know how you managed to shut
Nancy up so effectively; but I'm glad you did. It's the first time I ever
enjoyed myself when she was around."

This may seem cruel treatment if you're programmed to preserve social
graces no matter what. It is actually more cruel to everyone when you
permit a 1.1 to direct and control the communication. It always goes
down.

GIVE AND TAKE

It is vital that we reach a balance between what we contribute and what we
receive. This principle applies to friendships, marriages, jobs, groups,
etc. If we're always helping others and taking nothing in return, we do a
disservice to those on the receiving end. We should find a way for others
to repay us.

If we are taking a great deal from someone else (care, food, shelter,
services, money), we should find ways to return the flow or we drop to the
beggar level of Apathy and Grief.

SUMMARY

Don't decide to get married, divorced, quit your job, leave school or
enter a convent when you are low-tone. Make your choices when you're at
the top.

If you suffer any kind of body ailments, get medical attention. Pain
drives a person down.

Select your associates, jobs, spouse, groups, bosses, employees and
allegiances by tone.

When you hit a temporary downscale attitude, don't take it seriously. It
is nothing more than the coat you're wearing today. It is not you.

Don't wait for others to give you a pat on the back for something you did.
Give yourself the pat and get on with the next job.

Don't try to arbitrate between two people who insist on playing a low-tone
game with each other. This is like trying to balance a canoe in a
ninety-mile gale while struggling with an epileptic hippopotamus.

Don't consign yourself to some constant drudgery that you despise. Direct
yourself toward a worthwhile purpose-something that interests you
strongly.

"Without goals, hopes, ambitions or dreams, the attainment of pleasure is
nearly impossible."
-L. Ron Hubbard, Science of Survival

Trust your own observations and don't believe lowtone gossip, reporting,
teaching, advice or news. Look at the source of the communication before
you absorb it or pass it on.

Don't listen or talk to low-scale people unless you feel able to control
the tone of the conversation. Above all, don't share your ambitions with
those at the bottom. They're leaning toward death and this includes the
destruction of dreams.

Watch out for all the clever ways we try to explain away our own low-tone
behavior. We're remarkably inventive about this.

Keep striving for higher levels of self-honesty. The more you are able to
see things as they really are, the more upscale you will become.

When you find yourself using tremendous effort to get something done, back
off and see if it's really the right action. If it is, do something to
raise your tone and the job will be easier.

"It isn't how hard one wishes (as they teach a child); it's how lightly
one wishes and how interested he is in having that for which he wished."
-L. Ron Hubbard,
Philadelphia Doctorate Lectures

Don't waste your time looking back and wishing things had happened
differently. Your future needn't be molded by the past. You can create
it today; you're the only one who can.

Don't be a weakling. When something needs to be done, do it. It is
higher tone to feel dangerous to your environment than to consider your
environment dangerous to you.

Don't let someone else sell you a goal. Follow your own personal
convictions.

Art can move a person out of despondency-provided he selects his own art.

So enjoy your kind of music, plays, decorations, paintings, books, movies
or whatever form of artistry makes you feel wonderful.

If you work so long that your job starts getting serious, go walk around
outside and notice things. Get reacquainted with the universe around you.
You will return to the job refreshed.

When you're spending a great deal of time on paper work or intangibles,
balance it up by doing things with your hands in your spare time. Dig a
hole in the backyard, build a bird feeder, go bowling.

Cherish each high-tone person you meet.

You can do something about your emotional attitude. Don't wait for
someone else in your environment to change first so you can move up. Take
definite, conscious steps to boost yourself. When you're able to
contemplate life in good humor (without being downright giddy about it)
you'll find it easier to tolerate the foibles of others. They'll want to
follow you anyway. So don't try to push from below; lead from above.
The venture is bound to include some down moments; but no low tone is such
a bad place to visit as long as you don't have to live there.
Just remember where home is: mobile, free, lighthearted, feeling,
communicating, understanding, winning, laughing, powerful, loved and
loving. Living to the fullest. That's the top of the tone scale.

Now you have the road map.

Godspeed, and good traveling.

A BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF EMOTIONAL TONES

4.0 ENTHUSIASM (Cheerfulness) A lighthearted soul with a free mind.
Flexible. A winner.

3.5 INTEREST (Amusement) Actively interested in subjects related to
survival. Doing well.

3.0 CONSERVATISM (Contentment) The conformist. Don't rock the
boat.
Resists changes. Not too many problems.

2.5 BOREDOM The spectator. All the world is a stage, and he's the
audience. Neither contented nor discontented. He endures things.
Purposeless. Careless. Not threatening; not helpful.

2.0 ANTAGONISM The debater. Loves to argue. Blunt. Honest.
Tactless. A poor sport.

1.8 PAIN Touchy. Irritable. Scattered. Striking at source of pain.

1.5 ANGER Chronic distemper. Blames. Holds grudges. Threatens.
Demands obedience.

1.2 NO SYMPATHY Cold fish. Unfeeling. Suppressing violent anger.
Cruel, calm, resourceful, acidly polite.

1.1 COVERT HOSTILITY The cheerful hypocrite. Gossip. An actor.
Often likes puns and practical jokes. Seeks to introvert others.
Nervous laughter or constant smile.

1.0 FEAR Coward. Anxious. Suspicious. Worried. Running, defending
or caught in indecision.

0.9 SYMPATHY Obsessive agreement. Afraid of hurting others. Collects
the downers. Sometimes wobbles between complacent tenderness and tears.

0.8 PROPITIATION (Appeasement) Do-gooder. Doing favors to protect
himself from bad effects. Intention is to stop.

0.5 GRIEF The whiner. Collects grievances and old mementos. Dwells
in the past. Feels betrayed. Everything painful.

0.375 MAKING AMENDS The "yes" man. Will do anything to get sympathy or
help. Blind loyalty. A mop-the-floor-with-me tone.

0.05 APATHY Given up. Turned off. Suicidal. Addict, alcoholic,
gambler. Fatalistic. May pretend he's found "peace."

================ http://www.clearing.org ====================
Sat Jul 8 06:13:13 EDT 2006
ftp://ftp.lightlink.com/pub/archive/minshull/min2.memo
Send mail to archive@lightlink.com saying help