Understanding – Part 2
Scientology 1.0.0 – chapter 29
“Self-actualisation is possible only as a side-effect of self-transcendence.” – Viktor E. Frankl
Click here to bring up the scale in a separate window for ease of reference.
Descriptions of emotions
Natural law embeds emotions, accurately dictating and/or reflecting all actions—or inactions.
But… getting stuck in an emotion or experiencing an emotion inappropriately is different. In Scientology 1.0.0 this is called “misemotion.”
In Scientology 1.0.0, misemotion is the same as the psychological term “emotional dysregulation.” Wikipedia defines emotional dysregulation as “an inability to flexibly respond to and manage emotional states, resulting in intense and prolonged emotional reactions that deviate from social norms, given the nature of the environmental stimuli encountered. Such reactions not only deviate from accepted social norms but also surpass what is informally deemed appropriate or proportional to the encountered stimuli.” In fewer words, misemotion means an emotion that don’t match the circumstances.
We fallible humans are in a game, and all games come with penalties for incorrect moves or mishaps. Although there are certainly unfortunate events in anyone’s life, all tones from 3.0 down also represent error and are like red flags correlating to whatever has gone awry, the emotion indicating what kind of mistake might have occurred and what to do about it.
A caveat: some people, like athletes, experience specific physical and spiritual impacts as part of their work. In these cases, such professionals view emotional suffering not as something that shouldn’t happen but rather as tools for honing skills; or, as simply part of the game. A lesson many of us could learn better.
Below are short explanations of some of the emotional tones, briefly sketching their appropriateness and inappropriateness. Again, they become inappropriate when a person becomes entangled (stuck) in them or experiences them in an irrational way, a condition that could also be called “chronic.” Emotions are generally synonymous with sanity, while misemotions always represent degrees of insanity.
These are descriptions in my own words; for a full and proper definition and description of all tones, read Science of Survival.
Also, a point of terminology. Personae, such as the “anger personality” or “fear personality,” are formed when one becomes stuck in tones below 3.1.
Aliveness
0.0, Body Death is the death of the body, not the essential nature of you.
But is death an emotion? I mean, if you’re dead, how can you still be emoting?
0.0 simply means that there are no obvious bodily motions or actions. However, 0.0 is still a vibration, albeit a very low one. On this scale, 0 does not represent “no vibration,” but rather “not alive as a human being.”
Objectively, no one can say for sure what a deceased person is experiencing, but Scientology 1.0.0 is all about man’s non-corporeal nature, his essential immateriality. Scientology 1.0.0 adopts this assumption, in part due to its proven ability to facilitate personal betterment. Therefore, even after one’s body dies, one continues to exist in some way. But there it is, in any case: death! (Although everybody at 0.0 is dead, not everyone dies at 0.0.)
Here’s the thing, though: the Tone Scale is a scale of emotions, and emotions reside in the material universe, with the body acting as some form of resonator and receptor. Being intimately connected to the body as we are, we experience these vibrations regardless of our immateriality, apparently even when the body dies.
That’s why the 0.0 to 8.0 section of the scale (there’s more scale above and below as will be shown eventually) is a scale of human “aliveness.” At the bottom, one isn’t. Alive, I mean. However, at the top, one is truly and spectacularly so.
In terms of the misemotional aspect of the scale, 2.0 (antagonism) is the threshold between being more alive and being less alive.
When one’s aliveness falls below 2.0, élan vital becomes insufficient to manage life effectively. Like a scuba diver’s buoyancy compensator, once the surrounding pressures exceed the volume of the compensator’s bladder, you slowly begin to sink, faster and faster, until Davy’s Locker finally claims you (though this can take many years). A person chronically below 2.0 is being beckoned by death, and it’s at 1.9, hostility, that the danse macabre begins in earnest, and that’s why body death is on the scale; at death, this dance finally ends. Or seems to, anyway.
However, the death of one’s body can and often does provide relief, such as when one has suffered from an injury or illness that to endure further will serve no good purpose.
0.0 as the point where body and “spirit” seem to separate is not desirable, though. 8.0, at the other end of the scale, is.
0.05 Apathy
Apathy can range from a state of near total inaction to catatonia (no motion, but not dead). When an individual experiences a severe illness or injury, apathy can allow for the body to recuperate. Induced comas, for instance, have saved lives.
When stuck in apathy, an individual adopts the mindset of “Why bother?” When confronted with life-improvement projects, they frequently respond, “Pfft.” “It’s a scientific fact that people can’t change; nobody can get better.” The apathetic personality will resist all attempts at improvement, whether for themselves or others, because to them, betterment is either impossible or pointless.
0.1 Victim
Victim, a somewhat more active emotion than apathy, manifests when an individual experiences a less catastrophic impact or injury than that which would cause apathy.
The chronic victim focusses solely on the injustices inflicted upon them by “oppressors” or “perpetrators,” who are typically numerous, often ambiguous, and always multiplying, either in number or size. In the pursuit of “equity,” the victim personality often takes on the role of “the oppressed,” aiming to deprive perceived “oppressors” of their supposed power over them. Politically, victims also become obsessed with the ever-expanding roster of individuals who qualify as such in a competition over seemingly finite resources, ultimately causing them to dwindle. Recently, this phenomenon has come to be termed the “victim Olympics.”
0.375 Making Amends
Making amends describes situations in which a person must relinquish control. Injuries or impacts less serious than Victim but more serious than that which would cause grief, say.
0.375 when a misemotion is being unreasonably burdened with enormous guilt. While giving up their own possessions, they will consistently give away everything that belongs to others as well (if they can), striving to atone for countless sins and transgressions, many of which are imagined. For example, one can rely on these individuals to endorse every tax hike, no matter how steep, and vote away all protections from governmental overreach.
0.5 Grief
Grief is the emotion that processes loss.
Millions of people experience chronic grief. For the grief personality, everything that was ever good is in the past, and anything that might be beneficial in the present will soon be lost forever; “Just wait and see!” As a result, people stuck in grief will be reluctant to build anything that can be relied on for long-term survival because “it won’t last.” The Grief personality will also support any and all welfare programs, regardless of how expensive. Many grief personalities are also depressives (depression begins at 0.5), and many take medications for it, some side effects being the emotions of victim and apathy.
0.8 Propitiation
Propitiation is the act of buying something or someone off in order to avoid a threat. Bribing a border guard in order to escape a dictatorship, might be an example.
Chronic propitiation is the higher-toned cousin of Making Amends. The propitiative personality is a prime target for individuals or groups in the higher 1.1 to 1.3 band. Malevolent salesmen, with their bleached dentine smiles, can easily persuade the 0.8 to sign away their house, car, savings, and kid’s college funds. Maybe even the kids too. However, if there are no 1.1s or 1.3s available, the individual stuck at 0.8 will magically attract them. To exist at all, cult groups and dictatorships rely on a fairly significant number of people, chronically 0.8, to be among their membership or citizenry.
0.9 Sympathy
Sympathy is the emotion one visits to communicate with someone who is in a lower frequency.
As a chronic tone, sympathy can be baffling because empathy is a good thing, right? Then why is it so far down the scale? Because the person enmeshed in sympathy will only communicate with lower tones—not to help a person, no no, but to keep ’em there. This stunt is somewhat similar to Munchausen’s syndrome by proxy (although anyone pulling that off is more likely to be stuck at 1.1, Covert Hostility, and only acting sympathetic). Social welfare departments, hospitals, and hospices are full of sympathy personalities, which might be fine for those who are ill. But get discharged as quickly as you can before you get parked.
It’s also intriguing to note that humour, which is present, at least in some form, in all tones above sympathy, completely disappears at 0.9. Sympathy is where humour “goes to die.” There are no comedians from 0.9 down.
1.0 Fear
The emotion when facing overwhelming odds. Overcoming this urge, when useful to do so, can be the very definition of courage.
At a high level of intensity, misemotional fear is running away or cowering down in fright from things that either aren’t threatening or ought to be fought. But that’s exhausting, you know? Extreme emotions require energy, and the body, like a battery, cannot sustain them for long before it wears out. So people stuck in fear typically experience a constant, low-volume kind of fear. They are easily identifiable due to their fixation on who has power and their need for leadership, particularly all-powerful governments or any authority figure or group that promises salvation, safety and security from an endless list of usually imagined or invented dangers.
If fewer citizens were in fear, there would quite likely be nearly none of the governments extant in the world today. The modern state, social media, and mainstream media capitalise on all the tones below 2.0: creating fear, for instance, is a multi-trillion-dollar industry. People stuck in fear are some of Big Pharma’s best customers; invest now! (Just kidding.)
1.1 Covert Hostility
Covert hostility is the chameleon tone. It’s when one pretends to be a friend while moving through enemy territory.
As regards someone stuck in this tone, if you find them to be hostile but are doing it with a smile, then that is not a person in covert hostility. Any sign of hostility is overt hostility. No, the individual stuck in covert hostility typically needs to be exposed; usually you will never have guessed it without their being caught red-handed. Many psychopaths are at 1.1 on the scale (psychopathy runs in the 0.0–1.5 bandwidth). If you can’t readily discern a person’s tone, but they “just seem off” or provoke “unreasonable” anger in you, it’s likely that they’re at 1.1 on the scale.
The 1.1 is particularly skilled in influencing all tones from 1.0 down, especially those at victim (0.1). The covertly hostile personality excels at convincing others that they are victims of various “oppressors,” promising to eliminate them if given the authority to do so; welcome to totalitarianism!
Unlike 1.5, Anger, the 1.1 is not so much against things but often for things, which would be fine if the things they are so much in favour of, which at first glance seem reasonable, didn’t so thoroughly destroy societies.
You can outsmart the covertly hostile personality, though, and expose them. Put them in close proximity to anyone at 1.5 or above, and their heads practically start spinning like Linda Blair’s in The Exorcist.
1.2 No Sympathy
No sympathy means not feeling other people’s pain. This tone’s aloofness is beneficial in performing duties that are required from time to time if one needs to inflict suffering, such as being a competent doctor while sawing off somebody’s leg without anaesthetics. Or being a boss or parent.
No sympathy as a misemotion is not merely an inability to be sympathetic to those in grief; the person stuck in no sympathy is utterly tone-deaf to everyone and everything. Some people in professions that require them to inflict distress or pain on others, such as surgeons or therapists, might inadvertently fall into this tone, more or less permanently, because they don’t want to experience their patients’ discomfort and pain all day long. Who would? However, it’s the inability to effectively communicate with others and a refusal to understand them that makes the no-sympathy personality a threat to both themselves and society.
1.5 Anger
Anger is the attack emotion, which is useful when defending against an enemy or object that could be dealt with by a quick, energetic strike. The overt hostility band, 1.2–1.9, uses different energy levels to deal with various kinds of emergencies.
Chronic anger involves reacting and lashing out at things that do not require this response. But like high-intensity fear, that too is exhausting, so the anger personality settles into their own special groove: they are rarely for anything and seem to be interested or active only when acting or speaking against things. Unless they are advocating for something harmful, such as starting a war, establishing a police state, or enacting laws to enforce obedience, their focus seems to be much more on stopping things rather than creating anything. 1.1-1.9 is the “activist” band: all too often, hostile people support legislation that only creates more problems.
People stuck in 1.9 down to 1.1, are hostile towards all other tones, including those in their own bandwidth, irrespective of any appearance of friendliness. Hostility towards others begins at 1.9 and persists in one form or another all the way down to 0.0. Add resentment to that once an individual hits 1.3; even the 0.1, Victim, 0.05, Apathy, and 0.01, Dying are seething with resentment towards not just others but life itself.
If you want to see fireworks, by the way, put anyone in the overt hostility band in proximity to a 1.1, sit back and enjoy the show; nothing excites a mongoose more than a snake. This is what one is seeing right now in Western politics.
Anger personalities thrive on instilling fear and depend on 1.0s to 0.8s to provide a strong base. The business of creating fear is a multi-trillion-dollar industry. Invest now! (Just kidding.)
1.8 Pain
Pain. This is the emotion one feels when a fairly serious error has occurred.
All emotional pain starts at 1.8, as all the emotions below pain are painful in one way or another—except 0.94, Numb, which only masks feelings, sort of like emotional anaesthesia.
2.0 Antagonism
Antagonism is useful for keeping any threats at a safe distance. You know, “speak softly and carry a big stick.”
People stuck in antagonism frequently fail to accurately identify friends; they tend to keep everyone at an emotional arm’s length, which is an iffy survival strategy. A person parked at 2.0 isn’t having much of a difficult time though. It’s not a painful emotion.
In terms of survival attributes, antagonism is a sort of “null” tone, neither striving to do better nor attempting to do worse; it’s the middle point between an individual attempting to thrive and actively succumbing.
2.1 (no label for this tone) up to 2.8, Contented
The tones 2.1 to 2.7 are the “no interest” band.
Working towards one’s purpose and making progress will maintain one’s interest in life. While individuals below 2.0 may become very interested in destructive pursuits, those above 2.0 consistently gravitate towards constructive goals. However, if an individual is anywhere on the scale between 2.1 and 2.7, then something’s gone wrong.
The key to understanding tones 2.1 to 2.7 is that those experiencing them have either done something too long or weren’t interested in it in the first place. Or, much more likely, they’re unproductive. The statement, “Production is the basis of morale,” accurately reflects this. When an individual is not working to be useful, they first get bored, and then, minus 2.0, here they come! This sort of problem happens all the time, so these tones should be seen as serious red flags.
Long before children reach puberty, parents often mishandle these warning signs, which is one of the reasons why teens frequently fall below 2.0 and turn rebellious.
These tones are considerably less sticky than the tones below 2.0, but people can still get parked in any of them, causing them to experience a kind of low-level discomfort, up to 2.8, that is.
2.8. Contented is the first point on the scale at which actual harmonious pleasure is beginning to be experienced and where the first glimpse of thriving appears.
3.0 Conservatism
This one is a bit tricky because almost no one labeled a “conservative” is one. The word is spoiled by its political associations where most “conservatives” are actually between 1.5 and 1.9.
Conservatism is an appropriate emotion that arises when one encounters unknown factors but lacks the attention (energy) to tackle them properly. Sort of like the old-style warning light on pre-computerised cars that alerts you that something’s gone wrong and you need to hit the mechanic’s soonish (car’s still running, not a real emergency – yet). No life lived is without miscalculations, and conservatism signifies the necessity for fostering creativity, a return to “thinking beyond conventional boundaries,” and maybe a nap or bite to eat.
Those stuck in conservatism are nervous about creativity, energy, time, and space—all things that seem unlimited to people higher up the scale. They exercise far too much caution when dealing with resources that higher tones understand are abundant, and they experience worry when faced with any form of innovation. While it’s beneficial for the individual in conservatism to oppose destructive changes brought about by lower tones, it also obstructs changes from higher ones. This leads the individual in conservatism to gravitate towards excessively conventional methods and too well-worn grooves, which is unwise in a dynamic, non-static universe. Dangerous, actually.
Tones ranging from 0.01 (dying) to 3.0 (conservatism) are relatively easy prey for the psychopath. Because an industrious person stuck at 3.0 will often have access to expendable resources or credit, they are a particularly toothsome target for predators.
This failure of the 3.0 to so often misunderstand the true goals and tactics of the lower tones makes the chronic 3.0 often complicit. They will vote to keep the roads clean and the trains running on time, ignoring the fact that the guy who accomplished this stuff also wrote Mein Kampf.
Enthusiasm
The beginning of wisdom. Also the beginning of the ability to sublimate.
Enthusiasm is the sense and feeling that the things one is doing are not just going well; they’re going to get better. The word comes from the Greek: enthousiasmos, from enthousiazein, “be inspired or possessed by a god” (based on theos, “god”).
Wisdom is not just about what you know, but how you use it. In this tone, the ability to reason fully enters the picture. Reason is the ability to think, understand, and form logical judgments; wisdom is reason in action.
Sublimation is the diversion or modification (of an instinctual impulse) into a culturally higher or socially more acceptable activity. The alchemic definition is the transmutation of forms. This means that anyone at 4.0 or higher begins to demonstrate the ability to transform any of the lower vibrations into higher frequencies. So, if you suffer a massive loss, it is not that you wouldn’t grieve; you would, but you would not grieve overlong at 0.5, where such a tone can have a poor effect on health and so on, but soon sublimate the emotion into a frequency more compatible with survival.
Enthusiasm is the start of enlightened responsibility. Enlightened responsibility is understanding life well enough to ensure correct responses to life situations. Same as wisdom, really.
This is also where the individual’s ability to effectively communicate with all tones below 4.0 becomes evident, as it marks the onset of authentic empathy.
4.0 is the mid-point between death and being truly alive at 8.0.
Self-determinism (Chapter 5) is also now completely in the picture, and therefore marks the beginnings of self-transcendence, true meaning in living, and pan-determinism.
It’s also intriguing to note that 4.0 is the first tone level at which a person has the best chance to thwart a psychopath without becoming one themselves, provided, of course, that they have undertaken the extensive training and practice one needs to sustain this tone. People high on the scale are not immune to attacks from those in lower tones; in fact, they are more likely to receive them (more on this later); they’re just potentially better at dealing with them.
At 4.0, life does become easier in one sense: one no longer has to do battle with oneself, unlike in tones below 3.1. But things get more knotty as one goes higher than 3.5 because much greater skill in surviving is required. You want a real challenge? Live your life at 4.0 or higher.
6.0 Aesthetic
Aesthetics is about beauty. Beauty is about truth.
Living at this level, an individual sees the world through the lenses of true and false without resisting or rejecting the latter. This is the yin-yang level: truth shows that things are this way and that way, what in Scientology 1.0.0 is called “is-ness” (see Scientology 1.0.0 – addendum 2).
8.0 Exhilaration
The awe! emotion. Exhilaration is the first peek into the realm of genuine wonders. 8.0 opens the door to higher levels of being, and once someone experiences this, they tend not to doubt the existence of such states.
It is a higher degree of pan-determinism because the exhilarated individual can see much, much more of what’s going on.
8.0 is the highest level of enlightened responsibility for a human being.
For the spiritual being, there are levels beyond 8.0.
Next: two drives and the components of understanding
Arthur Ronald Conway Hubbard 