> >But at basic, overts are always comitted to solve something,
> >so the prior confusion tech undercuts and works even if
> >you are in the middle of a GPM.
>
>      Please everyone, define confusion as you understand it.
>
>      Homer

I'll take a stab at that.

A confusion is a failure to predict, a protest, a mass, and a postulate
that resolves the failure.

The "leading edge" of confusion is a shock: the moment you realize
prediction has failed. Something happened that was not allowed for in
your estimation of the possible futures.  This can be as minor as when a
person suddenly asks you a totally off the wall question -- one that you
can answer, perhaps -- but the asking of it at that time was so
completely unanticipated that you are momentarily shocked and must take
a moment to realign your reality to include it.  Or it can be as major
as sudden death.

Following the shock is a period containing a bundle (or mass) of
misemotion.  This mass may include fear (of bodily injury, inability to
cope, whatever), self-doubt, anger (at self or others), protest,
helplessness, etc.  It also strongly contains NEED OF CHANGE.  I'd guess
that the main thing charging up the mass is huge protest.

It may be that need of change proceeds from avoidance of the unpleasant
emotions; it may be that we just have a very strong need to feel we can
correctly anticipate the future.  We need to get our predictor working
again.

From Idenics, comes the idea that this is the area where new identities
are often created -- to resolve a major confusion.  Basically we have to
QUICKLY figure out what to do to get things back on track.

We've got a failed prediction situation -- we KNOW we've either got bad
data or have misevaluated our data.  Hence, we're real vulnerable.
ANYTHING could happen.  We know it's imperative to get our data
reevaluated, realigned and to do so rapidly.

Ron said that it's possible to handle a confusion by picking one "stable
datum" and aligning everything around it.

When we're sitting in a confusion, we often do something similar to this
which is not quite correct: we kind of ask ourselves, "what hypothesis
could explain the observed data?"  We answer that question (in a hurry)
then, because we're in a hurry, and all the data fits the hypothesis of
course, we assume the hypothesis to be true.

"I was SURE I would make my sales quota this week!  What went wrong?"
Hypothesis: "I'm just not good with people."
That would explain it. That's it! ( I feel better already.)
Solution to better prediction?  Easy:
    Find a job where I don't have to work with people so much. (Whew!)
Now I know life will be better.  I've resolved the confusion, figured
out my failure to predict, and have a plan to set things right.  Life
should be more predictable from now on.  And, of course, it might --
particularly if I hadn't just latched on to the first explanation that
aligned all the data.

[ When these "hypotheses" are acceptable to others, and are general
enough to "explain" other failures, they can become habitual and move
into the Service Fac. category.]

Because we're often making these decisions hastily and while sitting in
the middle of a bunch of charge, with stable data blown, the decisions
are often way screwed up.

This accounts for the postulate found in engrams because nearly all
engrams come about because of a failure to predict, contain the shock of
that failure and the urgency to figure it out and get things back on
track.

So, the leading edge of a confusion is shock, in the middle is protest,
a bunch of misemotion and hasty realignment of data, at the trailing
edge is the postulate:  the decision to do, be or have that we figure
will get things back on track.



-----

Speculation:

What is prediction?  What if it is not so much the attempt to foresee
the future as the attempt to create the future?  Should this be so, then
the shock becomes the moment we realize that somebody just stomped all
over a bunch of our postulates.  Or it could be the ARC break with
others when we discover that the agreement we THOUGHT we had has been
broken.

Hmm.  If we are continuously cocreating a consensus reality with our
fellow gods, how could we really fail to predict reality?  Seems we
would already have to have gone out of communication to some degree with
our fellows.  Maybe trying to not know the consensus and enforce our own
vision?

We like Games, Opponents, and Surprise.  To have surprise and opponents,
we have to not know what our opponents will do.  But, to have a
consensus reality, we have to know every bit of what our opponents will
do in order to see that it all gets mocked up properly.

If the PU is about having games, opponents, and surprise, and if there
is no, "Big Thetan," keeping it all mocked up for us, then a requirement
for participation must be the ability to divide our knowingness so that
we can, simultaneously, both know and not know.

It would seem that we cannot get past compulsive not know unless we are
willing to give up surprise and opponents.  Maybe LRH was on to
something with that pandeterminism stuff.  :)
--
Gary F. York
5422 So. Franklin Ave.
Springfield, Mo. 65810
(417) 823-7251
gfyork@ix.netcom.com



--
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Homer Wilson Smith     The paths of lovers    Art Matrix - Lightlink
(607) 277-0959               cross in         Internet Access, Ithaca NY
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