book 1 of the Narco program was basically exercises to get you comfortable with yourself. Or as they put it "comfortable in your own skin". The first exercise is sitting perfectly still with eyes closed. Next is sitting with eyes open, looking directly into someone else's eyes. You cannot flinch, change expression, even look away. Any movement and you start over. At one point in the program you have to sit there for 2 or 4 hours straight in order to graduate. The eyes closed isn't so bad, but the eyes open is definately a challenge. The next drill was sitting directly across from a partner, look them directly in the eyes and say, exactly "do birds fly?" The other person could say anything, mostly they would try to be funny and try to distract the student asking the question. So if I was the student I would say "Do birds fly?" The other student would say, "Shut the hell up and quit bugging me. I would have to say again "Do birds fly?" over and over until I get some kind of an answer. Often the answer would be something stupid like "Only out there into the sand where they all die a bloody death". To that I reply, "Thank You" and repeat, "Do birds fly?" Until the instructor says stops the exercise. We did that one every day.
The next TR was a little more active. The student took his partner into the kitchen. The kitchen was more like a little hallway. We would stand at one end, I would put my hand on the other students shoulder or arm and say "Do you see that wall?" then I wait for a response, "Yes" next I say "now walk over to it" and I lead them over to the wall across the kitchen. It is only about 8' away. We stop at the wall. Next I say "Now touch the wall". After they touch the wall I instruct them "Now turn around" then I help them turn around and then it all start over again, "Do you see that wall?" The whole time the other student is "Bullbaiting" or trying to distract the student running the drill. My best tactic to make the student trying to lead was to sing "The sun will come out" from Little Orphan Annie, either in a British or an Asian accent. I would sing it really loudly. I was actually one of the best at making the other's laugh. The instructor would often have me be the subject when a student was trying to pass that one off. You see, we would practice these drills every day, but we all had to pass them off to an instructor to graduate. Most people would talk really dirty or use extremely foul language. Believe me, nothing was off limits in the classroom at this place.
During Book 1, I noticed other students pairing off and going into the back bedrooms. One student would have a notebook and a pen, it was wierd. I finally asked Stew about it. He was in charge of the classroom. He said "Don't worry about it yet, soon you will begin auditing and then you will be an auditor". I also saw a bunch of students making big, huge displays out of clay. The more questions I asked, the less they let me know. Stew said I had to learn in correct order or it wouldn't do me any good. Everything was based on the teachings of L. Ron Hubbard, and he had the ultimate system for learning. They claimed that with his learning system everyone could learn. Even those with learning disabilities could get through school at grade level with no medication. In fact, if someone used all of L. Ron Hubbard's theories they would never need any medication for any reason. That is why Tom Cruise freaked out on Brooke Shields about taking medication for depression. Scientologists believe that there is something wrong in your life and you need to fix it, if you fix it what ails you will go away. So anyway, his big learning system. It is based on Misunderstood Words. L. Ron said that if you read something, anything, and you come across a word that you don't totally understand and keep reading that eventually you will become bored, or distracted, or even get a headache. If you keep reading after you pass a Misunderstood Word it's hard to understand the rest of what you read. You can even read the same chapter twice, if there is MW's in the text you won't understand what you have read. When in the Narco classroom, you must have a dictionary with you at all times. If anything is wrong, say you have a headache or need a drink, the instructors will say "Find the word and clear it." It got so annoying. They made us look up so many words. If we were reading something the instructors would come up to you and ask you how many words you have cleared and make you show them. Then they would look at what you were reading and ask you what a bunch of words mean. Stupid words, that are obvious, but you don't really know how to explain it. However, it actually works pretty well. It is just hard to sit there and look up all the words. But you sure learn a lot.
After Book 1, and after the Sauna, we spent a ton of time on Misunderstood Words. There is a whole book on it. It was probably the most important concept, next to the sauna treatment, in the Narconon program.
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