Note: Clay Table Clearing is a recommended HGC process at Levels III & IV.

One of the most compelling urges below Level VI is the desire to achieve an incomplete purpose.

This will be found to be a remarkable dissemination factor.

Below Level VI one is striving to complete his or her goals. At Level VI, GPMs are run out. But before that can be achieved, one is thrust into the GPMs by the effort to accomplish.

Further, one does have wishes-to-do of his or her own having nothing to do with GPMs but only being blocked by them.

Usually someone wanted to attain an improvement when he or she came into Scientology. This wished-for improvement, until achieved, remains as a hidden standard (by which one judges whether or not he has improved). If the wish is attained, then one “knows Scientology works”. If the wish is not attained, then one isn’t sure Scientology works.

Wishes fall into two broad classes.

I. Mental achievement.

II. Physical achievements (including relief from illness).

The Clay Table Process most likely to give the preclear his wish to accomplish some purpose is Clay Table Clearing.

This is one of four Clay Table activities, the other three being Clay Table Definitions, Clay Table Healing, and Clay Table Track Analysis, the last being a training activity for Class VI.

One must differentiate amongst these four activities as they are not the same things.

Clay Table Definitions are done only in training and are not auditing. Clay Table Track Analysis is done in training for Level VI and again is not auditing.

The two Clay Table auditing activities are

I. Clay Table Clearing, used to achieve the pc’s rehabilitation and raised IQ in various fields, and

II. Clay Table Healing, used to get rid of physical discomfort of psychosomatic origin.

The above pair are the two HGC uses of Clay Table as of this writing. One does not use Clay Table Definitions or Clay Table Track Analysis in auditing sessions.

As one Scientology remedy for increased IQ and destimulation, Clay Table Clearing is audited by an auditor in a session. A meter may or may not be used depending on the training level of the auditor. But regardless of level, no metering is done during actual work on the Clay Table.

Where the auditing space is limited, the equipment used may be as meagre as a biscuit can full of clay and a two-foot square piece of linoleum to lay on the auditing table, the meter and auditor’s report being taken off the table, and the auditor’s report written on a clipboard in his or her lap during the auditing session. To end the session on the meter the linoleum is simply set aside and the meter put back on the table. More elaborate arrangements can be used as time and finance permit. But so long as one takes precautions not to get clay all over everything and everybody, the two-foot square lino scrap will suffice.

The entire effort by the auditor in a session of Clay Table Clearing is to help the pc regain confidence in being able to achieve things by removing the misunderstandings which have prevented that achievement.

To process only Scientology terms and call it Clay Table Clearing would be a gross error. The pc’s upsets with the mind seldom began with Scientology. If the pc, in answering the auditor’s questions, gets into Scientology terms, that is perfectly all right. But to sit down and concentrate on Scientology terms while calling it Clay Table Clearing would be an error for these two reasons:

1. Scientology terms are a training activity called Clay Table Definitions and

2. The pc did not become aberrated only after he or she got into Scientology.

Early on in an intensive one gets into Scientology terms now and then as these may be locks on an earlier misunderstanding with a similar subject.

Here is an example of this:

A psychologist has a terrible time understanding Dianetics and Scientology. In being run on Clay Table Clearing, the psychologist gives as his chief desire in life, gaining an ability to understand people. The first few terms chosen for Clay Table work may well be Scientology terms. But the auditor steers the pc back a bit, and lo! it was psychology the psychologist didn’t understand. And the Clay Table work would then be concentrated on psychology terms or childhood misunderstandings about people until the pc felt he had regained the ability to understand people – or, as such a pc would look at it, had begun to understand them. Now, with the first desire chosen (to understand people) flat, the auditor would search for a new zone where the pc wished to become able.

So you see, the auditor is handling the chief urges of the pc in Clay Table Clearing. The auditor is not trying to teach the pc a thing.

We have for long spoken of:

(a) “Ability regained”

(b) “Make the able more able”

(c) “Help the pc achieve his goals in life”.

These, and other aims in processing, are strictly processing aims, they are not training activites.

The action is de-stimulation of those things which bar the pc’s progress in life.

By handling broadly the pc’s bafflement about life we:

1. Unleash his theta by de-stimulating confusions, and

2. We eventually clear the pc.

We are directly removing the “Held Down Fives” (see Dianetics, Evolution of a Science) and clearing the pc’s ability to think, see and understand.

We do not remain long on Scientology terms if we get into them because of the evidence that the pc was not clear before he came into Scientology.

Further it is up to the pc to choose the zone to be explored. Just as you’d be in trouble setting goals for the pc, so you would be in trouble telling the pc what he wanted to do in life. He’s had too much of that from others to also get it from his auditor.

In using Clay Table Clearing we do not go into physical ills. These are handled faster by other processes. If these physical ills were the reason the pc wants to be processed then

1. You should have the pc given a competent physical examination as there may be some simple remedy for his condition or some condition present that needs physical treatment, and

2. If you process the pc and want to do Clay Table work, then you should be running Clay Table Healing, not Clay Table Clearing.

If you start to run a pc on Clay Table Clearing, and discover the pc is being audited only to be cured of something, not to be mentally improved, you carry on to an early point where you can gracefully shift over and end off Clay Table Clearing and begin Clay Table Healing. (How to do Clay Table Healing will be covered more fully in a later bulletin.)

STEP ONE: Find a subject or activity where the pc has desired to improve himself. This could be anything from athletics to “not to be frightened of goats”. In essence this is a stated goal. The pc’s auditor’s reports, if he or she has been audited before, will be found to abound with these. Further examination will discover that one is repeated very often. One may take up these earlier session “life and livingness goals” if the pc still wants to and does not have one on hand in which he or she is more interested. The current interest of the pc is the safest point with which to start. One establishes this by simple discussion of what the pc wants to do in life. This step is as brief as “What are you trying to do in life?” One finds something the pc wants to achieve or do, whether it is happy or unhappy, beneficial or suicidal, and one uses this. Do not linger on Step One once this is done. Do not challenge or question it. The auditor’s job here is to assist the pc to attain his goal and if it’s “to commit suicide”, that’s what the auditor uses. The auditor uses any sincere life and livingness goal the pc expresses as what he wants to do. Only one word of warning – do not accept a sarcastic or critical goal. That means the pc has an ARC Break, a PTP, overts or withholds or is being audited under duress and the auditor must handle the attitude with the usual means. But it is also an error to challenge a purpose the pc really has just because it sounds crazy or anti-social.

STEP TWO: Having established the purpose, the auditor now establishes something about it the pc didn’t understand. This will be some generalized idea usually. It will seldom be a word. It will be some idea expressed in several words or gestures. However it is expressed by the pc, the auditor accepts this as what the pc has not understood about 1 above. It may take a while to sort out this concept or idea but when it is sorted out, that’s it. Example: The pc has understood an afterlife in hell as a punishment for committing suicide. The question asked to get the pc to dredge up this idea would be something like, “What about suicide haven’t you grasped?” assuming the pc’s desire was to commit suicide. It’s always “What about __________ (the purpose expressed in 1 above) haven’t you __________ (grasped, dug, been clear about, etc)?” or even “What was there in (purpose expressed in 1 above) that baffled you?” When the pc has one go on to 3. It is a mistake to get the pc to try to clarify it any further than his first statement of what it is, as that isn’t accepting the pc’s answer and you must always accept a pc’s answer so long as it is an answer according to the pc. One gets the point of bafflement stated any old way by the pc and goes on to Step Three. It is a good idea to write the idea or concept the pc didn’t understand on your work sheet.

STEP THREE: Get pc to reduce that idea to a single term. This may be one word or a composite word. This step may involve a lot of groping or discussion. It may go on for quite a while. The purpose of the auditor here is just the auditing question, gently but firmly and even insistently put, “Put that concept about (the idea found in 2) into one word.” “Express that idea you had in a single term.” Coax, bully, insist, plead, but finally get it done. It is this step that tests the auditor’s comm cycle ability. For if the auditor has no control over the session, the pc will shift the idea in Step Two or try to discuss the whole subject of Step One. The pc will squirm, may try to beg off, may declare it’s impossible. But the auditor recognizes this action of the pc as charge blowing off and presses on with the command, “Express the idea (can be read off work sheet) in one word.” Eventually the pc will deliver up one word. And that’s one of the words in the original subject (as given in Step One) that the pc never understood and some of the reason why the pc has stayed confused about the subject (as given in Step One), with consequent aberration. You may not believe it at times while doing Step Three that the pc can do it. You may even be prone to agree it’s impossible to do so. But if you do, you’ll lose the session and may lose the pc. You must get the idea in Step Two expressed as a word in Step Three. And the pc must eventually be satisfied that the word he now gives does express the idea given in Step Two. The auditor must make sure of that. The question may be, “Are you satisfied that the word (give word pc has come up with) does express the idea (read the idea of Step Two off the work sheet)?” You’ll easily see if the pc thinks it does or doesn’t. Relief attends his realizing it does express the idea in Step Two. Vague confusion attends his feeling that the word he has given does not express the idea in Step Two. As this whole step borders on challenging a pc’s answer, care must be taken not to really ARC Break the pc. He or she can be driven very close to the brink of an ARC Break and very possibly may be by the insistence on an answer. But the by-passed charge is the lost word and as soon as it comes up and is given to the auditor the pc becomes all smiles. If a session ARC Break occurs, use the List One ARC Break Assessment List or, if it’s not a Grade III session, have a Class III auditor do the ARC Break Assessment. (You can see by this why Clay Table Clearing is really for HGCs or professionals.) The only major error the auditor can make in Step Three is to fail to get the pc to do the step and give a word for there is where the charge is on the word that represents the idea of Step Two. Sometimes Step Three is very easy. Often not. The greatest danger lies in an auditor going wishy-washy and letting the pc change the idea of Step Two, or just letting the session collapse into endless Itsa. In Step Three, as in Step Two, the auditor is there to get a job done and does it. Having gotten the word that represents the idea given in Step Two, the auditor goes on to Step Four. Caution: Don’t let pc choose a word that solves Step Two.

STEP FOUR. This is the true Clay Table Step. And one might say “this is where the fun begins”. This is usually the longest step by far. The auditing command is, “Represent the word (as given in Step Three) in clay.” The auditor’s purpose in Step Four is to (a) acknowledge the pc’s ideas and comments and protests, (b) understand (by questions where the auditor doesn’t really understand) what the pc is trying to do and (c), and chiefly (c), get the pc to represent the word’s meaning in clay and (d) make sure the pc is completely satisfied he or she has represented the meaning of the word in clay. The command “Represent (the word) in clay” may have to be repeated many, many times. If the command is executed the auditor must ask gently, “Are you satisfied you have done it?” The pc may do it over and over, or protest how it can’t be done and all that, but the auditor must get the pc to do it. The auditor may never suggest how it can be done, even when it is obvious. Truth is, it’s always obvious how to do it to the auditor, but the auditor isn’t aberrated on that point and the pc is. So the pc struggles until he or she really does represent the word in clay in a way that brings the dawn of comprehension, a lovely thing to see. Any word can be represented in clay. The auditor must realize that. Words that are confusing to the pc are harder for the pc to represent in clay. Again, the major mistake is to fail to get the pc to do it. Another gigantic error is to agree it can’t be done. And yet another error is for the auditor to fail to understand himself what the pc has done. If the auditor can’t understand it, the pc can’t either. Never be polite about not understanding what the pc means. Pcs ARC Break harder on a faked understanding than on repeated auditor efforts to understand. Pcs will explain for long periods when the auditor is still trying to grasp it. Pcs blow up when auditors fake a comprehension they have not obtained from what the pc said or did. To the auditor the clay representation and the pc’s explanation of it must be seen to easily represent the word found in Step Three. An added command is, “How does that represent the word?” This has nothing to do with art. It has to do only with good sense. There may be one or several clay forms that represent the word. What the pc does with it or some action with it may also be part of the representation of the word. When the auditor is sure the pc has represented the word of Step Three in clay and is sure the pc is sure, the auditor leaves this step.

STEP FIVE. Still keeping the subject found in Step One the auditor goes to Step Two and finds a new confused idea the pc has about the subject of Step One.

The subject of Step One is left only when the pc is very satisfied he has either regained his ability or confidence or has no concern about it. This may take many sessions.

Then one gets the pc to choose a new subject and proceeds with that, using the exact steps above with no shortcuts or failures to get the pc to do what he is supposed to do in each step. Don’t leave a subject chosen in Step One unflat by failing to clear the pc on that subject step by step over and over.

It may be supposed that Clay Table Clearing is the only process needed to clear a pc. This is untrue. Pcs have overts and withholds. They get PTPs and have had ARC Breaks with Life. They are sometimes too hard to control and need CCHs. And sometimes they are so bad off they “have no faults of any kind” and say so while sitting right there in a body.

But for the pc who can be audited on it, Clay Table Clearing is strawberries and cream, a soft berth, spring flowers and exit from the nightmare into life.