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From the person who has let verbosity get the best of him comes a thread so unoriginal that the bulk of it is not even old news but is way past that - bordering on the historical sleep-inducing effectiveness of sleep aids like ZzzZZZzzz zzzZZZ Quil , Fentanyl-and-All, Darvon-and-On, Huff-N-Glue-How-Bout-U, Sniff-N-Paint-Dignified-It-Ain’t, and of course PFAL and PFAL Today in any dosage. Are you still there, Grease Spotter? Good! I know I have at least one fan out there… anyway …this is just another thread on the con artist wierwille. His con game was dishonest tricks to gain the victim's confidence…Thinking about his tactics a funny word kept coming to mind – “switcheroo”. I looked into its origin, and this is what I found: The "old switcheroo": Where did the "-eroo" suffix come from? Michael Quinion, Ologies and Isms: Word Beginnings and endings (2002) has this entry for the suffix -eroo: -eroo Also -aroo, -aroonie, and -eroonie. An informal and often humorous intensifier of nouns {A fanciful formation of uncertain origin} This ending is most common in North America, Australia, and New Zealand. It appeared in the U.S. in the 1930s, but its origin is not known. It may be that it was influenced by the older buckaroo, a cowboy, which derives from Spanish vaquero; its acceptance in Australia and New Zealand may have been helped by the model of kangaroo, wallaroo, and other words. It sometimes implies something sizeable, overwhelming, remarkable, or unexpected. Among the words that Quinion cites as examples of -eroo/-aroo/-aroonie constructions are boozeroo, jackaroo, flopperoo, smackeroo, and smackeroonie. From: English Stack Exchange: where did eroo suffix come from in the world “switcheroo”? Besides liking the sound of it – I was especially drawn to the above sentence “It sometimes implies something sizeable, overwhelming, remarkable, or unexpected.” That seems like an apt description of wierwille’s con game. So, without further ado or a don’t let’s get to it. 1. “Switcheroo” a definition First, a definition of switcheroo along with typical usages from the internet: Switcheroo - slang - a surprising, unexpected, or deceptive swap, change, variation, or reversal. “I'll distract the guards while you make a switcheroo with the fake diamond.” “The politician had been campaigning for months against the legislation, only to pull the old switcheroo and start putting her support behind it at the last minute.” “Wait a minute, you're Lisa, not Linda! Ah, you've pulled the ol' switcheroo on Grandpa.” from: Idioms The Free Dictionary In my opinion, a concise version of wierwille’s switcheroo strategy is on page 23 & 24 of The Bible Tells Me So, in the chapter Are You Limiting God? wierwille says: ".. . We frequently limit God in ourselves by our wrong believing, by accepting the knowledge that comes to us through our senses. Our reason says, 'That just cannot be,' and so we confess the negative, when all the time His spirit within us is crying out, 'Sufficiency in everything.' We have been so schooled to revere the knowledge that comes to us through our five senses that we fail to recognize the knowledge that comes from the higher realm, the spiritual where the Word of God, and not reason, has first place. Both realms or worlds are here: the natural world is factual; the spiritual world is true. As there are four kingdoms in this world, and one supersedes the other: the plant kingdom, animal kingdom, kingdom of man and the Kingdom of God; so, there is a natural world and a supernatural or spiritual world. The natural world and everything in it comes to the mind through or by way of the natural senses. The truths of the spiritual world are absolutely not dependent upon the senses, but rather on the spirit from God in man." End of excerpt * * * * * * 2. perception For a lie to work it usually must have some truth or fact to it. wierwille said “The natural world and everything in it comes to the mind through or by way of the natural senses. The truths of the spiritual world are absolutely not dependent upon the senses, but rather on the spirit from God in man." I would agree that the natural world and everything in it comes to the mind by way of the 5 senses BUT I would also include the truths of the spiritual world too. Why? Because I can use my eyes and read John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. I can use my ears and mouth to follow what someone says about Romans 10:9 If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. And why limit myself? I can investigate, read, or discuss metaphysics outside of my Christian perspective. But that’s just me – I love exploring! Alas, back then the befuddlement of wierwille’s fundamentalism did a number on my curiosity. I should have challenged his idea. Where in the Bible does it indicate the truths of the spiritual world are absolutely not dependent upon the senses? I would venture to say there are some noteworthy metaphysical experiences recorded in the Bible that have vivid elements of physicality: Moses and the burning bush , Paul’s conversion , Peter understood the vision of unclean animals to mean he should go to a Gentile’s home , and Paul's mind-blowing experience that 5-senses-wise he couldn’t make heads or tails of the experience so he puts it as Paul’s “whether in the body or out of the body” caught up to the 3rd heaven , and of course John writing of the sights, sounds and feelings of being in the Spirit – supernaturally transported out of the material world . Our brains have no direct contact with the outside world. Our only information about what is going on outside of our bodies comes to us from our five senses. Perception in psychology is defined as the analysis of sensory information within the brain. Through perception we obtain a description of our surroundings, and our minds must then process what the descriptions mean. we usually assume that our perceptions are reality…well…it is our own interpretation of reality anyway. As a survivor of a harmful and controlling cult that indoctrinated me to an extreme degree, I now believe it’s important to respect the perceptions of others – they might be more accurate than mine on some things or might add more details or different perspectives from their own experiences. And that’s the challenge of being an adult in a free world – I can use my ever-developing cognitive skills to figure out what’s what, consider all the options I am aware of as well as the counsel of others and then choose the best course of action. You see for 12 years the TWI-mindset had whittled away at my self-confidence and bull$hit detector. I learned to only trust other people and other information to the degree it all lined up with what wierwille taught in PFAL. When I left TWI in ’86, it took real courage to admit I was deceived and was wrong on a lot of things! Sometimes it’s advantageous to seek out validation from experts or at least from other credible people who are outside of our circle of friends or whatever group we’re in. The argumentative atmosphere of Grease Spot Café is great in that regard – since it’s often given to expressing divergent or opposite views. From what I’ve read online, some experts think our beliefs are somewhat like a software program always running in the background as we take in information and examine its source – checking for compatibility or conflicts with our existing beliefs. Our beliefs help form and/or modify a mental model for understanding the world, our self, and others. And our beliefs - along with experience, observations, and reason even attempt to predict the future…To summarize – for better or worse our beliefs help us make sense of the world and help us navigate in it. …My own somewhat sarcastic reinterpretation of wierwille’s maxim “believing equals receiving” is believing equals perceiving…You see what you want to see. Bertrand Russell once said, “believing is the most mental thing we do”. It has also been said that our thoughts, feelings, actions, and reactions, respond not to the world as it actually is ( for we never know reality directly) but to the world as we believe it to be. Our beliefs tell us who we think we are and mark our place in the world. Our beliefs are essentially an ongoing personal narrative that anchors us to various places, situations, and events across our lifetime. Our memories are a composite of objective reality and subjective reality – what is actually there and what we perceive to be there. see objective vs subjective reality and take the test inside the link...also another good read is Blog musings on the nature of reality and Quora: What is the difference between objective reality and subjective reality? Are they both reality? and Mental Health at Home: perceived vs objective reality * * * * * * 3. Sidestepping reality wierwille had a knack for sidestepping any real issues folks might have had with his extraordinary claims and empty promises of success. With the unnerving tenacity of an old dentist drill wierwille repeated over and over and over and over again that we should not go by our five senses or worldly logic…he made it sound like that was part of our Christian duty in the spiritual battle... When I first got involved with TWI, being young and naïve I bought into all that – wierwille’s biblical sounding ideas provided a means to easily rationalize away logic or reality…I think “successful” con artists have a real knack for embedding the process of self-deception in devoted followers. Thinking back on my TWI-daze, wierwille and other upper leadership seemed to have had an endless number of pat answers for why I was not "manifesting the more than abundant life" – that’s code for “the idealized lifestyle of a Way-believer”. Many other TWI-leaders following the example of the big dog cult-leaders would often say things to build hype for some program, class or simply to encourage behavior and attitudes that were acceptable to the group. It all depended on how imaginative TWI-leadership could be and how proficient they were at pronouncing their supposedly spiritually-informed and biblically sounding diagnosis of my “dilemma”, using pretentious ministry jargon …more nonsense to sidestep reality…more switcheroos. The ideology of PFAL is nothing more than the old wierwille switcheroo…a clever swapping – an especially surprising and deceptive exchange – to defer to wierwille’s interpretation of the Bible, facts, and even his intuition - which is basically however he felt about the subject...and for goodness sakes if you're going to quote wierwille make sure you get the context right when an where he said it. You gotta understand how the double-standard works with hypocrites. If he’s talking in an open meeting, or speaking in a class like PFAL – it’s all prim and proper. But in a meeting with the way corps and he’s showing his favorite porn video – to uhm...to prepare us for counseling porn stars I guess – then that's okay too - cuz he loves us and wants the best for us - after all anything done in the love of God is okay. wierwille discouraged people from using their five senses, logic, emotions, gut-feelings, instincts, intuition and basically whatever you want to call the ability to understand something immediately, without the need for conscious reasoning. In place of all that wierwille suggested we use “The Word” and “walk by the spirit”. Oddly enough this amounted to employing our five senses to take in TWI teachings and classes – all variations on PFAL themes of course…and read, watch and listen to only TWI-approved material, and use TWI-“logic” (cognitive dissonance) to analyze anything or to make decisions and determine priorities…We were to practice TWI-cultured-imagination and TWI learned behavior to further absorb, imitate and reinforce PFAL…and ultimately so that we continued to lallygag in wierwille ideology. …oh, here’s a good one on learned behavior – imagine this – you’re a TWI-branch leader and you’ve momentarily stepped out of an intense meeting to gather your thoughts. The meeting is about some major snafu by several of the class crew at a PFAL class that’s now up to session 10. When you reenter the room, it’s escalated to a lot of loud arguing and blaming…But you’re cool, calm, and collected – you’re the branch leader for Pete’s sake - so you just say “alright, who’s speaking in tongues here?” and schwoooom !!!!!! the room goes silent…this really happened ! when I was a WOW – I was in a branch of 7 WOW families in D.C. and we sure were a noisy bunch! Fortunately, our branch leader knew how to whip us into shape. PFAL is a class in which wierwille’s skewed interpretation of the Bible becomes “The Word” and ideally YOUR ONLY rule for faith and practice…On the difference between instincts and learned behavior and being manipulated by unscrupulous people see some interesting hyperlinks in section # 7 Instincts, learned behavior, perception, switcheroos, and other control tactics If you really think about it - wierwille’s plethora of pontification in the chapter Are You Limiting God? is an affront to any Christian and any serious student of the Bible. How does one hear about…learn about…read about what God is like? How does one discover the life of Jesus Christ and what it means to them personally? How does one explore the power of prayer? How does one investigate the risks of temptations and the dangers of unrepentant sin? Do you think the five senses and cognitive skills are involved in any of that searching? Would you check out books besides the Bible to search for some answers? Would you check out other religions and various philosophies for what they say about metaphysical things? Would you talk with others – maybe even debate with others to unpack those subjects? Or do you prefer having all the work done for you? If so - you probably think PFAL is just peachy keen…that’s okay – you’ll get a chance to express yourself following the brief instructions in section # 7 extra credit. * * * * * * 4. Theory and practice In most systems of learning there’s a combination of theory and practice . Most subjects consist of theory as well as a practical part, but I think when it comes to subjects that are vocational in nature (such as a medical degree or a technical degree) there needs to be some learning through first hand practice…Do you remember how practical the benefits of PFAL were said to be? Makes life meaningful…Enables you to separate truth from error…increases prosperity…develops more harmony in the home…disciplines the mind by believing…who wouldn’t want that stuff? But be honest – how much of PFAL lived up to the hype? TWI heavily promoted the law of believing – which in my opinion must be the ultimate theory of impracticality. It’s been discussed many times on Grease Spot…but for brief review here - it’s the idea that one can influence the outcome of specific events by doing something that has no bearing on the circumstances or similarly that personal thoughts can influence the external world without acting on them. By far the most cunning method for dealing with “unsatisfied customers” is to use the old-tried-and-true-blame-it-on-their-lack-of-believing-ploy. Something I learned from more seasoned TWI-leaders was that if you can’t nail "delinquent" believers on anything else – the simplest and surest method of disarming someone is to call their believing into question. Since the essential qualities of the law of believing were so nebulous – there was ample room for debate anyway. Believing is something so amorphous – it’s almost magical. see also: Harvard Law Today: From the Dean - Theory and Practice, at the Same Time PDF on relationship between theory and practice the difference between theory and practice * * * * * * 5. Magical thinking A concise definition of magical thinking is given in an article by James R. Beck, Ph.D., a licensed clinical psychologist and a professor and the chair of the counseling department at Denver Seminary – in the book Baker Encyclopedia of Psychology and Counseling, 2nd Edition published by Baker Academic , on page 708: "Magical thinking is present when a person views an internal thought as having external significance and power. A thought, although private and unobservable, becomes a substitute for action. The logic of magical thinking says that thoughts are powerful, and therefore thinking certain thoughts will cause various consequences to occur in the outside world. Magical thinking is not confined by normal barriers between thought and actions, between private thinking and public knowledge, between what is internal and what is external. Nor is it limited by the logical connections that normal thinking posits between ideas. The best-known example of magical thinking is the young child who, when angry, will close his or her eyes with the thought of making the disciplining parent disappear. The logic in this childish behavior is: If I can’t see, I can’t be seen. Magical thinking is common and considered normal in young children…Magical thinking is considered pathological when it persists beyond the age of its normal occurrence…Primary process thought patterns, including magical thinking, are thought to dominate the unconscious thought of neurotics…Obsessive-compulsives also indulge in magical thinking when they feel their thoughts can cause harm to others. The defense mechanism of undoing is predicated on magical thoughts, since wishing something makes it so…For example, the child who first hits an adult and then kisses the same person is convinced that the second behavior will undo the first; hence it is magical thinking." One common definition of magical thinking is “the belief that unrelated events are causally connected despite the absence of any plausible causal link between them, particularly as a result of supernatural effects.” from: Wiki – magical thinking In PFAL the law of believing is described as a power that works for saint and sinner alike - which to me sounds like someone is describing The Force in "Star Wars". Basically, the concept takes God out of the picture. Sometimes people want to argue that God made the law of believing or they try to shoehorn him into the equation by saying he’s actually the one doing the miracles – and that’s even weirder because it reduces God to being a genie in a lamp who answers to whoever rubs the lamp. The essence of magical thinking is the disconnect from the real world of cause and effect – which is exactly the opposite of what the scientific method is all about – which is a lot of experimentation and observation - there isn't a whole lot of guesswork involved. Magical thinking is another deceptive switcheroo – it’s like procrastination and busy-work…there might be a lot of mental activity going on but nothing of real value is accomplished. * * * * * * 6. Instincts, learned behavior, perception, switcheroos, and other control tactics As a subset to analyzing wierwille’s switcheroo and tangents, I’ve included some appropriate hyperlinks along with some stuff that relates to manipulative tactics used by unscrupulous people: Researchpedia: difference between instinctive and learning behavior Quora: how does an instinct and a learned behavior differ? The Invisible Gorilla: A Classic Experiment in Perception (you ought to try this out !) Psychology Today: How to Spot a Sociopath in 3 Steps 20 Diversion Tactics Highly Manipulative Narcissists, Sociopaths And Psychopaths Use To Silence You The 8 Most Common Narc-Sadistic Conversation Control Tactics How to Become a Cult Leader in Seven Easy Lessons * * * * * * * 7. extra credit For those interested in extra credit to boost your score on this thread: Write an essay (or post a reply on this thread ) around the idea that a good con artist will sell you the shirt off your own back. Write an essay (or post a reply on this thread ) around the idea that when facts are indisputable, a con artist will find a way around them. Write an essay (or post a reply on this thread ) to argue for or against any of the ideas I’ve presented here.