CHAPTER 25
JUSTIFICATIONS AND RESPONSIBILITY

Here we are going to address various things that are concerned with compulsive action or the avoidance of action.

Especially important at this stage is to address the willingness to be responsible. This does not mean being to blame for things. It means being at cause over things.

25.1 Justification Process

When someone does things that he considers to be wrong, whether intentionally or by mistake, there is a tendency to try and justify these actions both to oneself and others.

This not only perpetuates the harm but it also forces the person to hold various ideas fixed in his mind because they are necessary to support these justifications. It distorts his view of the world and interferes with his thinking. It also leads him into undesirable actions which are undertaken to support or prove his justifications.

a) What has another done to you

b) How did they justify that

c) What have you done to another

d) How have you justified that

e) What has another done to others

f) How have they justified that

25.2 Excuses

a) What do you use as an excuse

b) What do others use as an excuse

c) How could you survive without excuses

d) How could others survive without excuses

25.3 Improvement

a) What are you willing to improve

b) What are you willing to have another improve

c) What would another be willing to have you improve

d) What would another be willing to have others improve

25.4 Responsibility

a) What could you be responsible for

b) What could another be responsible for

c) What would it be all right to be irresponsible about

d) What would it be all right for another to be irresponsible about

Then also run

a) spot a time when you were made to be responsible

b) spot a time when you made another be responsible

c) spot a time when another made another or others be responsible

Then run

a) spot the joy of responsibility

b) spot the joy of irresponsibility

Continue this last process until any feelings of gleeful insanity have dissipated.

25.5 More Responsibility

Walk around outside. Spot things for which you would be willing to be responsible.

When you feel good about this, then spot things for which you would be willing to share responsibility with others.

25.6 Domination and Survival

We have been at each other's throats for a long time out of a mistaken idea that there will be only one victor, only one who will survive, with all the others crushed beneath him.

Altruism does exist, but conflict has been the order of the day.

Let's take some of the weight off of this.

The idea here is simply to confront your actions without justification or regret. And to balance the weight of this, we will alternate it with spotting positive things.

25.6.1

a) How have you dominated others

b) Spot a way to enhance others

25.6.2

a) How have you stopped others

b) Spot a way to help others expand

25.6.3

a) How have you inhibited others survival

b) Spot a way to aid others survival

25.7 Superiority

The basic game of this universe is one of superiority and domination.

It is not the only possible game, there are much higher level games available, but it is part and parcel of a universe where physics and force dominate over aesthetics and reason.

Each of us has something by which we prove that we are superior to others. It will be some basic characteristic that we have worked on to the exclusion of other things, and so you will be good at it.

It will be something like being holy or good or strong or intelligent or some similar thing by which you make yourself better than others.

Even the enlightened beings who have managed to pull out of this game of domination will have this item, the difference is that they choose not to use it against others.

And please note that this is a self-destructive game. Your best characteristic, which you use against others if you choose to play this game, will eventually deteriorate because of the harm that you are doing with it. And so eventually you must abandon it and shift over to something which is not so badly deteriorated.

As a result, this item will only stretch back for a limited number of lifetimes. If you go back early enough, you will find some other thing which you once used and have since abandoned.

In this special case, therefore, we are only going to consider your current lifetime.

DO NOT DO THE REST OF THIS STEP UNLESS YOU ARE

A. FEELING GOOD

B. DID WELL ON THE EARLIER PROCESSES IN THIS CHAPTER

C. FEEL INTERESTED IN AND READY TO FIND THE ANSWER.

If the answer to any of the above is NO, then leave this one for a better time or for a second pass through the book.

In this step, you will be listing out answers. Write them down in a clear and legible manner. If you start feeling heavy or tired (do not run this when you are already feeling tired), then you have already listed too many answers and will find that the basic answer is already on the list. If you feel irritated or annoyed or charged up, it is an indication that you need to list more answers.

Write down answers until you either hit THE ANSWER or you have a comfortable feeling that you have put down enough answers and feel good about it. If you have the answer, then you are done. If not, you look over the list considering each one and putting an X next to any that now seem like they are not the item.

At some point while considering the answers, you may suddenly realize which is The Answer, and then you stop. If it comes down to two or more which you can't choose between, then you probably need to add more answers.

If at any point, the list seems to be incomplete, then you can add more answers.

The list is not expected to be very long. You may realize the correct answer right off the bat.

If you are trained in professional Scientology listing techniques, then use those instead.

The question is:

25.7.1 In This Lifetime, What Makes You Superior To Others?

Once you get it, write the answer again in big bold letters and highlight it in your notebook.

Now take the item found and fit it into the following process

25.7.2

This is a simple alternating process.

a) How does ___ make you superior

b) How could you use it to make yourself right

c) How could you use it to make others wrong

Once this process cools down, we want to get exactly what it is about others that you are or might be using against them.

So lets do another list.

25.7.3 In This Lifetime, What Is It About Them That Makes Them So Wrong?

This might or might not get you back to the exact thing that you use to make them wrong. If you felt good about the answer but it seems like it was not quite basic enough, then also do the following list.

25.7.4 In This Lifetime, What Do You Use To Make Others Wrong?

By this point, you should have a fairly basic answer such as "They're stupid" or "They're irresponsible".

This is sometimes called a "Service Computation" because the being mistakenly thinks that it is of service to him. But that is only a short term apparancy, in actual practice, use of this "Service Computation" on a regular basis will cause the positive ability to deteriorate.

Because early Scientology thought of this as a mental picture rather than a concept, it is also sometimes called as Service Facsimile (a facsimile being a picture or copy of something) or Serv Fac for short.

We want to erase this negative side. Note that you do not erase the positive ability (intelligence or strength or whatever) but only the negative action of using it against others (making them stupid or weak or whatever).

So run the following, fitting the service computation found above into the blank.

These are not simple alternating commands. Instead, stay on one command as long as you are getting answers and then shift to the other and get many answers for that one and then shift back to the first command, etc.

Note that it is fine if these pickup things from earlier lifetimes since you may have been using this for awhile. Just run whatever wants to come up.

25.7.5

a) Spot ways that ___ would make you right

b) Spot ways that ___ would make others wrong

25.7.6

a) Spot ways that ___ would help you escape domination

b) Spot ways that ___ would help you to dominate others

25.7.7

a) Spot ways that ___ would aid your survival

b) Spot ways that ___ would hinder the survival of others

This set of processes should be continued until the obviousness of the service computation falls apart. In other words, when you first lay your hands on it, this thing probably does seem like the absolute reason that people really are wrong. As such, it is a fixed idea that could never really be true all the time (people might be wrong, but never all people always for the exact same reason).

If you finish the above 3 processes (25.7.5 to 25.7.7) without that happening, then run these 3 again. Having run the other two will let the first one run deeper, etc. Keep it up until you really do get free of this thing, because it is one of the strongest factors that causes abilities to deteriorate.

25.7.8

Now lets strengthen the positive ability while at the same time pulling out of the destructive game of domination.

Go to a crowded place. Spot people and for each one, postulate an improvement of the positive ability identified in 25.7.1 above.

25.7.9

Work to improve this positive ability in others in the course of everyday life instead of using it to make others wrong. Doing this will improve the ability for you as well as for others.