Thousand Yard Stare

[Woof-a-Doof]

Lemme set the scene; 2pm’sh…after lunch. A guy that works with me approaches me; he is about 62-63yo, Vietnam Vet. He knows of my military service…and that’s it.

He says to me, “Where did you see combat? Bosnia?â€

[Anonymous]

I think of it more along the lines of unintended meditation. Usually when this happens there's a reason, so I don't question myself. If someone comments on it or interupts me I don't think you need to say anything except maybe " what did you say?"

[Deprogrammed]

Woof,
I totally know what ye mean, although I usually do just say"What did ye say?"
I do know what ye mean, though, especially when someone notices it, and then proceeds to point it out to you drawing attention to it. That can not only be annoying but it can definitely feel invading.
In the program "in my head" is all that I had to even keep myself sane. It was all I had to still keep a part of myself that I refused to let them steal, so people don't often notice it too much with me b/c I had to get really good at hiding "in my head" due to that friggin place. The only people that really catch me at it is the people that love and know me the most, which would be my mother, my children , and my significant other. That probably being in part b/c I feel the most confy around them, and I trust them the most with my emotions etc...

I also think it is completely understandable that it pisses one off especially when approached by someone about it that barely knows you, whom you don't get along with, as well as don't like at all.
That would've pissed me off to just because I would have totally felt like, "Hey, that's just none of your business!"

Keep your chin up and put that co-worker on ignore if ye have to.
warm regards to you and yours,
-DP 8-)

[Anne Bonney]

I completely get that and yes, its very invading.  I usually come up with some brilliant response like, "Huh?" or at least a very terse and exasperated, "What?!?!".   I can't tell you how many times I've lost time driving.  I think to some extent its normal, but I've driven from here to my dad's about 80 miles north of me and not remember the trip at all.

I hear and am aware of the person speaking to me, repeating my name but it'll take me a while to come out of it.   I like being where ever it is that I am.  Love it when I've been smoking.  Its almost like how dreams help you sort through or figure out shit.  Reflection but a much deeper form.  That's why it was so important for Straight to use thought stopping techniques like those fucking nursery rhymes they'd have us sing between raps.  No time to think, no time to reflect, no time to figure out what the fuck is happening to you.  Bastards tried to steal everything.  Every precious moment, every thought was invaded or polluted or corrupted.  It's all a part of the thought reform, behavior mod process.  That kind of thought control with the isolation meant we had no reference point anymore.  No system of checks and balances for what was real or acceptable or even humane after a while..  It was all very much by design.

Now I seek out those times. I love to sit by the water and stare off into nowhere.  Now that the weather might be turning a little (I swear I felt a tiny hint of fall today  )  it'll be nice to take in a lot more sunsets.

Shades are essential.   No matter where you are or what time of day.
 :smokin:

[Dr Fucktard]

The staff just wanted to keep your druggie asses involved with the group since you were there to focus on your drug problems, and not sit and stare vacantly into space like drooling, catatonic stoners.  :evil:

[RTPChristSupertzar]

Getting into my head, as it was referred to at Straight, was probably THE only way I was able to effectively resist the indoctrination, to whatever degree of success I achieved.  I would generally "rock out", remembering forbidden rock songs in my head (Pink Floyd's "The Wall" was a favorite), and I spent a lot of time designing starships for simulated combat based on a board game I played pre-Straight (Star Fleet Battles for those of you that are keeping track of those things), or make up adventures for a Dungeons and Dragons campaign.  Hey, I was a 16 year old geek, whattya want?

Since then, I've turned it into an art form.  I can space out and still make people I'm with think I'm listening to them---a girlfriend busted me doing that once or twice.  I think I said "Uh-huh" and kept spacing.  

It's a great skill to have when I want to tune out the world and get lost in my head for a while.  Like Anne said, it's awesome after smoking grass, and driving is really fun on autopilot.

Just my two cents.

[85 Day Jerk]

Liz Cassidy was the one to christen me with the nickname "Bob the Blob" around my 17th day in the program.  When it came to getting into my head, I was a fucking Kung Fool Master.  I remember one rap, I'm sitting on the front row in Milton Roy holding my left fist on my leg with my right hand wrapped around the left thumb pretending it was the joystick of a Grumman F-4U Corsair with six .50 caliber machine guns and a full rocket load and I was flying around overhead all over Park Street/Tyrone straffing the staff member's cars and bombing the shit out of staff offices.  My eyes were all glazed over from the effects of dehydration and sleep deprevation to the point that I did'nt even see M. Ward's fire hazzard puffy red hairdoo not more than 6 inches from my face as she began screaming at me from the top of her lungs.  "What the fuck are you doing Bob?"  I swam up out of my daydream and groggily asked her,  "Do you drive that little yellow Datsun outside?"
"Yeah, what's it too you?"  I slipped back into my head, banked the Corsair over Cross Bayou, flew back towards the building alongside the Bay Pines Bridge and dropped a 500 pounder right on top of her damn car.  I gotta hand it to "Big Red", she showed great restraint in the fact that she did'nt grab hold of me and shake me, I came out of my daze and all my ears registered was a shrill tone, like you get when a firecracker blows off a little too close to your head.  I just see this angry young staff trainee screaming at me at high volume, spittle flying into my face, and all I could think about was what it would be like to be married to her.  In a weird way, it sort of turned me on....... I mean I got this bitch screaming and if you closed your eyes you really could'nt tell if she was really angry or just having some real good sex.  This was the seed that got planted that had a lasting effect on the first few phases of my program as far as the girls were concerned.  From that day forth, I did'nt feel comfortable having girls talk to me.  I did what ever it took to get them worked up enough to start screaming at me, then I felt at peace, like I was finally getting through to them.  Thanks Woof, now I have something new to talk to my shrink about for a change.

[Sam Kinison]

It's great that Woof and 85 DJ started and contributed to this post.In order to deal with all the ridiculous crap at that place,that's where I spent almost the entire year and a half,especially the open meetings,where I decided that I just didn't give a crap and sort of let staff and the 4th phase know it in the carpeted room at Morgan Yacht.I couldn't whip them,joined them as far as my stomach would allow me.All I could do was think about what I'd be doing if I wasn't there.What a comforting place to be.My head.Nobody could knit pick me up there.I could have sex and touch girls there.The most focused I became there was when I made a commitment to finish the program after nine months on fourth phase.I remember Woof going through the same pattern on fourth phase.They called it going into the woodwork.If only we could have been so lucky.It was this non committed going through the motions saying we don't want to be here,but we know that we don't have anywhere else to go.The monotony on 4th Phase was unbearable.If you didn't feel like coming in on your days off,somebody would always try to make you feel guilty.After a year on these forums,my greatest regret about Str8,after being there at all is not having the courage or resolve to discuss withdrawel from the program with my parents before my senior year in high school.I found out years later that if I pushed for it,I could have had it.They were tiring of it as well and felt that my progress had peaked out.I'm still trying to figure out what that progress was.If I have a thought about woulda/coulda/shoulda and Str8,that's it.Well,I didn't and the rest is history.By the way,Bob,how you could find Marie Ward erotic in any form boggles my mind.I still remember her and Nancy Minton walking around like the thought police in the newly formed Seven Step society.Every time she tried to get into my head,I just told her that girls made me shy.I guess that was nicer then telling her she made me nauseous.I want to keep this thread open.This one is fun.

[85 Day Jerk]

Correction-  I found the screaming erotic, not necessarily where it came from, but with Marie, she could not resist the opportunity to vent, and that would bring out the dominatrix in the whole girls side not to mention the main target of my ambitions, Terri Morgan, Jr. Staff.  Now that chick was HOT!!  Her jeans looked like they were spray painted to her ass, and how she got away with the outfits she wore escapes me.  She quit staff in late July, shortly after the famous Gong Show and then by late August of '78, we had moved en mass to the Morgan Yacht Building.

Anyway, and maybe Woof can attest to this, I was such a fuckin jerk, that the girls would damn near be in a state of RAPTURE when they got the royal chance to let loose and scream at me.  Some of them would even get nipple erections which was the absolute coolest given the circumstances of our captivity.  It damn near made the place bearable.  One of my favorites was a fourth phase "Wood Work" girl named Trish V. something, who turned eighteen and pulled herself three days shy of the big move.  Pity
 :cry2:  :cry2:  :cry2:

[Rachael]

I think in AARC they used the term "in your head" a lot less specifically. It seemed to be applied not just when daydreaming but anytime you seemed to be thinking.

I was told over and over and over to "get out of my head" whether I was not talking enough or not talking about something in the right way. I most commonly got it when I was trying to tell someone something (whether an incident or trying to relate to someone or giving feedback). This was also tied with intellectualizing. I spent my whole time in there trying to figure out how to get out of my head and apparently failing. I would talk over the voice in my head - trying not to think, just to let things come out of my mouth. I would desperately ask for help when I let things get out of control and a thought popped into my head. I would do mindless repetitive things like counting the number of each letter in each step (then all 12 steps and then the traditions) so that a thought wouldn't come into my head unbidden. At night, I would wake up my oldcomers to help me stop thinking. They just kept telling me over and over that if only I could get out of my head I would get my step one - and I would have done anything to get my step one, because it meant I would eventually get out.

I learned how to stop thinking, and I've been working on forgetting how to stop thinking since.

[Botched Programming]

For me getting into my head was my only escape. It was worse than being in jail or prison (at least you when you are getting out of these places). While I sat in my blue chair whether I was conforming or misbehaving, being in my head gave me hope and kept me from going totally insane. I would think of rock song lyrics, remember the teenage sweetheart, fun stuff like climbing Crowders Mountain to the top and smoking a big doobie.

The thing that bothered me the most was when someone would stand up and put on the waterworks crying stating that they were playing head games over stupid shit.

Once while I was misbehaving there was a guy who was moaning and whining about playing head games about wanting to smoke a cigarette....... I jumped up out of my chair and started singing "Head Games" by Foreigner. Needless to say staff did not appreciate my sense of humor and had some big kids 5 point restrain me.

At least in this position I could be in my head all I wanted.

[Rachael]

When I was starting to really lose it in there, I did all sorts of things to try to keep from drowning. Like I said, I would count how many a's there were in each step and all together, then b's, then c's. And I'd keep the numbers memorized. I'd try to take the square roots of the digits from that down to the 15th decimal point. At one point I forgot pi further than 3.14, so I started trying to calculate that out of some formula I made up. I think I was so obsessed with memory because at that point I had forgotten so much. I'd forgotten many of my friends' names and so many memories from trying to supress all the good parts from my "using". And being out of school was so painful as it had always been the only thing to keep me safe and away from home. So I retreated into this bizarre made up world of numbers and other things that made sense. I also spelled out words in sign that I wanted to say when I wasn't allowed to "intellectualize" or use words more than two syllables. I played piano with my fingers all over everything at first, till I got confronted about it. When I was first in, I was a normal, sane person. But by a few months in, I was twitchy, confused and really losing my grip on reality. I developed habits like scratching my arms and legs till I bled without noticing. I'd rock back and forth all the time. I shook and twitched all the time and I flinched when people came near me. I was no longer the person I'd been. I was rendered a small, cowering, terrified animal in a cage.

[Sam Kinison]

Sorry about that Bob,I was getting ready to fax your psych to change your meds from Lithium to Thorazine.Terri(Tucker not Morgan)probably got away with a lot because she was Rick Batchelor,Jr.´s girlfriend.Look under the names of some of the early directors and you'll see the name of Rick Batchelor,Sr.Talking about the stare,nobody who posts will remember this but I was reknown for this catatonic state I put myself into for my first month.I would turn my head to face the person relating to avoid the 2nd Phase knit pickers avoiding the raps by messing with the newcomer,but from that point on,it was anywhere else but Str8.When they would stand me up,Marci(Butch)Moore would ask me if I had a name,I would just say ¨Yes¨.If she would ask me do I speak,I would just say ¨Yes¨.A form of passive resistance to cope within the day to day existence of front row.Marci Moore was an interesting story.She was Sr. staff when I came in,but neither went through Str8 nor the Seed.She was a Seed sibling.I guess we could call that convenient flexibility from the inflexibles.Thinking about such asininity,actually referring to going to the bathroom as a privilege.Remembering my stepfather,an extremely large man capable of obstinence as well as violence one time had another parent try to chastise him for going to the bathroom during an open meeting.He told that person flat out that he would like to see somebody try to stop him from going if he had to.Every newcomer who got sent out the bathroom before he could go because he was on some higher phaser's shit list should have went on the floor and explained why later.Maybe somebody would have got the point.

[Rachael]

They had two non-AARC, non-KIDS grads on staff. One was a sibling (and a fucking dork with no life), and the other was "doctor" Vause's stepdaughter. She was dating Andy Evans - an AARC grad who just killed a prostitute in Vancouver a couple weeks ago.

[85 Day Jerk]

Thanks S.K., its weird how that name just snaps into place once it is mentioned.  All these years I thought she was the daughter of Laura Morgan, the treasurer.  There was also a chick named Kathy on staff when I first came in.  She looked like an anorexic Milton Burle in drag.  She was so ugly, and looked so bad, every time she pulled out her lighter, I thought she was gonna fire up a joint.  I remember how they used to let everyone smoke in group.

Were you in the program prior to June '78?  I heard that the 4th phasers (5th had not yet been invented) brought in plastic wiffle bats and would put some stank in it hitting people upside the head for not paying attention.  I remember Jimmy Cassidy talking about it in a rap and Liz screaming at him to shut up about it.  I heard it stung like hell and they quit doing it after a newcomer left his seat and broke a chair over the 4th phaser that popped him one.