Mind Control in Schools

In most schools where Mind Control is taught, teachers are urged to take it too for the benefits such as the teachers become less flappable, more patient, and far easier for students to spend time with.

A teacher who expects less from students gets less. One who expects more gets more.

The teacher trained in Mind Control experience with what in Chapter 14 Jose calls the “cosmic Bill of Rights,” with its humanity-wide jurisdiction.

No teacher with this training can ever again scoff at anyone’s “mental eqquipment”.

• He knows the vast scope of every human mind too well for that.
• He is a better teacher as a result, even if his students have never heard of Mind Control.

However, when the students and the teacher are Mind Control graduates, great things happen in the classroom.

One grade-school teacher in Buffalo teaches her students to “tune in” to George Washington and other figures of the past to help them study history. It also helps them later when they take tests. They tune in to her and find confirmation of their answers.

A college teacher has her students tune in to philosophers for explanations of points they find obscure in their writings. “It works!” she says.

Mrs. Joe Lytle, a Mind Control lecturer in Virginia Beach, takes special delight in teaching youngsters from ages 7-17.

Some of her experiences were reported in the Ledger-Star of Norfolk (July 16, 1975) under the headline “Students Excel After Course in Mind Control.”

One of her students was on medication for hyperkinesis. The mother of this overactive youngster is quoted as saying, “The changes were absolutely fantastic after the course. My son was able to stop taking the medicine and his grades went from C’s to A’s.

Mind Control gave him the knowledge that he had the power to change.”

Another student’s grades in junior high school jumped from C’s before the course to A’s after it.

Still another was failing her spelling tests. After the course she made A’s on all her spelling tests, and in one year her reading ability jumped from fourth to ninth-grade.

There was no practical way to compare those who chose to take the course with those who did not, or to measure the difference between the two groups after- ward, because at the three high schools where Dr. De Sau conducted the before and after tests virtually all the students signed up for Mind Control.

This opportunity came, however, at the University of Scranton, in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Professor Donald L. Angell of the Department of Human Resources of- fered the course to graduate students in Rehabilitation Counseling.

Enough students decided not to take the course to permit him and Dr. De Sau to study some differences.

They gave a test similar to the one used at the high schools—though designed for adults—to 35 students who took the course and 35 who did not.

Differences between the two groups showed up even before the course. Those who elected to take it were, according to test results, more open to experience and more inner-directed.

Those who did not want the course were more traditional, rule-bound, and practical.

A month after the course, the two groups were tested again and, while the original differences re- mained, other significant ones had cropped up: The Mind Control group was more emotionally stable and mature, more self-assured, more relaxed than the other. In short, this study suggests that those who choose to take Mind Control are different from those who do n o t and that once they take it they benefit While a boost to self-esteem is important to every- one, it can be of life-saving importance to the drug addict fighting his way to freedom from this addiction. Mind Control has limited experience with drug addicts, but the experience has proved instructive. Paul Grivas, co-director of the Mind Control Center in Manhattan, wanted to see what Mind Control could do for the addicted. He volunteered to start with four addicts, two of them on methadone, two still on heroin. The two on methadone found the course useful but it did not free them from methadone. Methadone is highly addictive and is used in many drug programs to free the addicts from heroin. To withdraw from methadone Your Self-Esteem Will Soar I 145 is physically painful and the pains, these addicts said, were so severe that they could not concentrate on their Mind Control exercises.

One of the addicts still on heroin faced a family crisis the first day of the course and dropped out.

The remaining one was able to detoxify himself—to become free of the drug for several months after the course.

Then he telephoned Mr. Grivas to report that he was back on heroin. He asked to repeat the course. Mr. Grivas spent a day with him to reinforce his Mind Con- trol training, and again he became free of the drug. Months later he was still free; then he moved away and Mr. Grivas lost touch with him.

The second effort to help addicts through Mind Control was at a community project in the Bronx, with 18 former addicts, some of whom were adminis- trators and staff of the project itself. Those who took the course said they felt far more in control of themselves than ever before, and several of them, months later, reported they were even able to pass on some of their training to their families. Reliable testing before and after was not possible because three months later many of the original eighteen were no longer available. Has anything been learned from these two experi- ences? Yes, says Paul Grivas. While there is not yet statistical proof, his experience indicates two things: First Mind Control should not enter an addict’s life for forty-eight hours and then leave the rest up to him. For most of us it is a permanently transforming ex- perience, but for the addict with years, perhaps a life- time, of strong negative conditioning to overcome, plus a mental and physical addiction, a greatly extended period of frequent reinforcement is necessary. “Give me a drug rehabilitation program where I can do this,” Grivas says, “and I’m sure 111 get results.” Second, difficult as drug addiction is to overcome,146 the addict takes more easily to Mind Control training than do many others. The reason, Mr. Grivas believes, is that Mind Control involves an altered state of con- sciousness. While most people have never altered their consciousness, the drug addict has done it often. What he has not done before is enter a useful level of mind where he gains control instead of losing it.

This is where Mind Control holds special promise for the addict

Although there have been no extensive studies in this area, there are frequent enough success stories from individual graduates to suggest that Mr. Grivas’ con- fidence in Mind Control is well founded. Here is one from a graduate who cured his own ad- diction in 1971. He is still “clean.” I knew I had a serious problem: an addiction to heroin. How a course called Mind Control, which claimed among other things to help people elimi- nate undesired habits, was going to help me when I had already tried most drug rehabilitation methods was beyond my present level of understanding. Skeptical as I was, after going to psychiatrists, psychotherapists, methadone programs, and hos- pitals, I was willing to try anything! I was con- vinced I would not stay alive the three more years to my thirtieth birthday unless I stopped heroin use and the lifestyle it required to obtain up to $200 a day worth of drugs. “A habit is nothing more than impressions on brain cells that have been reinforced by repeti- tion,” said the Mind Control instructor. “Change •the programming at the cause level, the subcon- scious mind,” he continued, “and you change the behavior patterns at the effect level, the outer con- scious dimension.” It made sense to me logically but my emotional levels were telling me I needed Your Self-Esteem Will Soar I 147 to use drugs to desensitize myself to life and the negative feelings I had about myself. Then the in- structor gave us a technique for changing our self- image from a weak, no-willpower, ineffective person to a confident, self-reliant, healthy-self- imaged human being. Still skeptical, but with a glimmer of hope, I began to change myself in my imagination at the “Alpha” level. I programmed myself three times a day, morning, noon, and night, that by July 20, which was thirty days from the date of my initial programming, all desire for drugs would disappear forever. During the thirty days, I continued to use drugs but decreased the amount used slowly, plan- ning it so that I would be off drugs completely by my target date. On that great day in July I stopped using drugs and have never used them since. It was not at all like the many times before, when I would stop using drugs only to return a few days or weeks later. This time my “gut” feeling was I genuinely had no desire for drugs. No willpower, no substitu- tions, no suppressing of feelings and desires. It worked! Free at last! Alcoholism, another addiction, is far more wide- spread than drug addiction and darkens many more lives—millions of them in the U.S. alone. Its victims also have a desperate need to overcome feelings of helplessness, failure, and guilt, to build self-confidence and composure to ease their return to health. These needs were met when IS alcoholics took Mind Control in 1973 as part of a research project at a half- way house where they were under treatment. The re- sults were measured by Dr. De Sau. He administered the same personality test he had used earlier with the148 graduate students at the University of Scranton and, as in the earlier study, he gave it once immediately be- fore and again a month after the course. The sharpest contrast between these 15 persons be- fore the course and after it was in manipulative be- havior. There was a shift in the group profile away from sly control of events toward greater candor and open- ness in the pursuit of goals, a shift which chance would produce only one time in a hundred times. Other changes generally followed the pattern seen among the high-school and graduate students described earlier. They had greater ego strength and self-assurance, were more relaxed and open to new experiences—all qual- ities of priceless value to anyone struggling for freedom from alcohol.

One of the most significant changes was a reduction in “threat sensitivity,” or anxiety. Dr. De Sau wrote, T h e area of threat sensitivity, with its high autonomic tenseness and overactivity, may be of considerable im- portance in understanding the behavior of the alcoholic. It is very possible that alcoholics use alcohol as a means of attempting to balance out their mental/physical symptoms. Alcohol as a response to balance the mind/ body in a threat situation could provide relief from that anxiety level. An improved self-concept and ability to handle anxiety would seem to be a meaningful al- ternative to alcohol." The director of the halfway house reported how each of the 15 new Mind Control graduates was doing six months later. (To preserve their privacy, they are simply referred to as “subject,” or “S,” rather than by name.)

Subject 1: No relapse since undergoing a 90-day rehabilitation program. S since taking the Mind Control course has progressed from a very passive, withdrawn individual to an affable, outgoing, and dry-witted humorist

Subject 2: Since taking Mind Control, S has not experienced any relapses and has left the residency and treatment program at the halfway house. It seems that S is developing a sense of well-being and confidence in self.

Subject 3: No relapses since undergoing rehabilitation treatment in hospital program. Since the Mind Control course S has experienced definite progress in A.A. program.

Subject 4: No relapses since hospitalization prior to taking Mind Control. The Mind Control course has very definitely reinforced his therapeutic treatment program.

Subject 5: No relapse has been experienced by S since discharge from hospital rehabilitation program.

Subject 6: No relapses. The S’s sense of well-being is very definitely improving. Improvement is reflected in an apparent stabilization of his entire family. His grades in college have also improved.

Subject 7: To date S has not experienced any relapses. After Mind Control course, S discontinued A.A. program.

However, it is evident that he is living the A.A. philosophy. Family relations are also seemingly improving.

Subject 8: No relapses since taking the Mind Control course. Family relations have vastly improved. S has changed from a caustic, angry type of individual to an affable “Love thy neighbor” temperament

Subject 9: The subject, a female, has had no relapses and is presently employed. Subject 10: No relapse. S is now goal-oriented and has definitely altered self-imposed limitations and is looking for opportunities for higher achievement

Subject 11 : Since taking Mind Control, S has stated150 his life has progressively become better, which is evident in the sense of well-being exhibited by his family and in his work record. No relapses have been experienced byS.

Subject 12: Twelve years in A.A. program. Since taking Mind Control, S has had one brief relapse of less than one hour’s duration. No subsequent relapses.

Subject 13: No relapses since discharge from hospital rehabilitation program. Since Mind Control, S is pro- gressively “getting it all together.” Improvement is noted in areas such as work, family, etc. Subject 14: Since taking the Mind Control course, S has had several relapses, from all of which he has recovered on his own. He has not been hospitalized for any of these relapses as was the case prior to taking Mind Control. Subject 15: Eight years on and off A. A. program. Hospitalized four times prior to taking the Mind Con- trol course. Intermittent slips or relapses during this in- terim. Since taking the Mind Control course, S has experienced four relapses, two of them requiring brief hospitalizations. Mind Control was obviously a powerful boost in the struggles of all but the last of these 15 alcoholics. This one small study, of course, is not enough to prove that Mind Control should now be accepted as an integral part of the alcoholic’s treatment. However, the improved sense of well-being that has turned up so uniformly in before and after tests on students and psy- chiatric patients clearly suggests that those looking for better ways to help the alcoholic should give Mind Control a try. There is another condition that involves shattered self-esteem, not as self-imposed as drug or alcohol ad- Your Self-Esteem Will Soar I 151 diction, but even more widespread—poverty. Causes of poverty and the remedies for it have been debated for as long as there have been human societies. Mind Con- trol does not enter this debate, but it can be of im- mense help in persuading the poor to rally their strengths and help themselves. This may sound to some as if the debate has already been entered—as if in persuading the poor to help themselves we are assuming that they are to blame for their own poverty. This is obviously untrue, but every poor person can help himself break out of bis confines when he finds in Mind Control what all others find, greater ability to control his own life. The first serious effort to find out how useful, if at all, Mind Control might be as part of a rehabilitation program in social work was a study of 41 men and women on welfare. It is well known that a person who finds himself out of work suffers a blow to bis self-esteem. This makes it more difficult for him to think and act his way out of his problem. A defeated, self-deprecating job applicant conducts lackluster interviews that prolong his unem- ployment, in turn lowering his self-esteem even more. This may ultimately lead to welfare. If something could intervene in this downward spiral and provide a real- istic boost to self-esteem, the person would be in a more powerful position to help himself. This, roughly, was the reasoning of Larry Hildore, director of the Ottawa County Department of Social Service in Michigan. He had taken the course himself and knew what the training could do. The only question in his mind was whether the results could be measured and what the measurements would look like.

To design the research project and do the testing, he and Dr. De Sau turned to Dr. James Motiff of the psychology department of Hope College in Holland,152 Michigan. For the test, they chose the widely used sixpage hundred-question Tennessee Self-Concept Test, which measures five aspects of a person’s opinion of himself: physical self, moral/ethical self, personal self, family self, and social self. The test was given twice, once before the course and once after.

This alone might lead some to see the results as mere “Hawthorne Effect,’’ In the mid-20’s and early ‘30’s, Western Electric Company launched a far-reaching research project to study various changes in work- ing conditions that might improve employee morale at their Hawthorne Plant in Chicago. No matter what the company did, morale soared. They put something in; morale soared. They took it away; morale soared again. The conclusion was that folks are simply glad to be noticed, and this shows up in improved morale. To measure this possible “Hawthorne Effect,” Dr. Motiff tested another group of welfare recipients, who did not take the Mind Control course.

They were tested twice, but unlike the Mind Control group, they experienced nothing special between the two tests. There was no “Hawthorne Effect”

Those who received Mind Control training wound up with radically different views of themselves—changes which in some cases exceeded chance by odds of millions to one. Changes were dramatic in all categories: The new graduates saw themselves as far better persons than they had earlier thought they were, and felt a new confidence in their ability to solve their own problems.

The degree of change led Dr. Motiff to exclaim that the data “are the most significant I have ever seen.”

A report on the study said: There had been some concern as to how receptive a . . . [welfare] mother in the depths of her misery would [be] to a sudden input of Mind

Control, with its optimistic “better and better” philosophy. That concern was quickly washed away . . . on the second weekend. One hundred percent of those originally enrolled returned to finish the course, and the original shy silence had been replaced by a buzz of animated conversation that threatened to turn the session into a full scale revival meeting.

Almost everyone had something constructive to report . . . a new closeness to their children . . . a chronic headache gone . . . decreased frustration . . . lost weight. One radiant young mother used the Mirror of the Mind technique to find the answer to employment and saw only a hand writing a check. The next day she got the job she’d always wanted.

It is generally a state of mind, a damaged self-image, that puts a person in prison, and that coarsens and brutalizes him while he is there; and it is a state of mind that often ensures his quick return once he is “free.” The kind of freedom that Mind Control could be expected to give a prisoner is the kind it can give the rest of us: the smashing of mental confines that are manifested to many of us “on the outside” as headaches, ulcers, insomnia, and failure in life’s work, and to the prisoner as walls and bars as well.

Mind Control’s limited experience in prisons indicates that it results in an environment that is less brutal. Time spent there is no longer empty hours snatched by law from a person’s life, but a rich part of life itself—hours of growing and self-discovery.

Mind Control may not make prison a happy hermitage, but it can make it a more civilized place in which to grow.

Although statistical studies have not been made, the personal experiences of the prisoners and their instructors are far more eloquent. Lee Lozowick, when he was Mind Control’s area coordinator in New Jersey (he resigned early in 1976 to establish Hohm, a spiritual community), taught the course seven times at Rah way State Prison—four times to a total of some sixty inmates, and three times to prison staff.

‘There is no question,” he said, “about the benefits the inmates and staff received from the course.

You could see it in their faces.” Officials were so impressed with Mind Control that prisoners who were studying for a college degree were given academic credit for the course.

Ronald Gorayeb, who succeeded to Mr. Lozowick’s Mind Control post, offered the course to ten inmates at the Passaic County Jail in New Jersey.

One man dropped the course when he was released from jail and wanted to return to complete it—prison officials had to say no. Another requested solitary confinement after the course to help him meditate—prison officials said yes. Still another, using the mental screen technique, programmed a job on the outside. He found one—all he needed for parole.