The following are my opinions, and thus not subject to lawsuit from Hawkins or his publisher*.
My first surprise in Power vs. Force was to find L. Ron Hubbard's 1950's emotional tone scale (the main Scientology "scale" in use for judging people) slightly re-hashed as a scale of "levels of consciousness". To trust and be hugely taken in by a faulty belief system is devastatingly painful, and the recovery is slow. Now I know how all those ex-Scientologists felt, their lives ruined when their unworkable belief system finally failed them completely. Then there was the glaring error in Hawkins' explanation of his version of the scale being "logarithmic" where he shows "three-hundred to the tenth power" in figures as ten to the three hundredth power.
In the spirit of seeking truth, I rationalised these and other things and forged ahead. But the fact is Applied Kinesiology is phenomenal as a diagnostic tool, but Hawkins' version is not really AK and does not work for finding universal truths. This is (in case you also wondered) why, in the sixteen years since Power vs. Force first appeared, the world has not adopted his method for use in science, law enforcement, justice, business, preventing wars, &c. His anecdotal examples of his method solving crimes, finding missing people, and ferreting out information that could prevent a war can all be better attributed to the latent psychic powers of his testing teams. Unfortunately, these are not available to everyone, although investigating muscle testing as a way to access them might be a worthwhile research project.
If you find yourself thinking you're a little dense because you don't understand his science, it may be because his use of cutting-edge scientific terms is hardly more than dodgy analogy.
Nevertheless, I opened myself trustingly, reasoning that my concept of truth might be entirely faulty. Just be wary that you don't open yourself to be programmed with a bogus belief system of which you will eventually have to labouriously divest yourself.
If you must read a Hawkins book, go straight to Truth vs. Falsehood: How to Tell the Difference while you still have some discernment left. It will dissuade you on its own, and if you're already hooked on Hawkins, it will de-program you. It seems that his "trilogy" was intended to relieve you of whatever you believed in, and this book is meant to then reprogram you as a neo-con. Between its beginning and last token spiritual chapters you will find something surprisingly like the Pravda ploy, the old marketing trick of naming your product as that which it lacks the most ("Pravda" means "truth" in Russian).
He pushes Yay America, the only worthwhile country the world has ever seen, all other countries are inferior and not worth mention except to denegrate and condemn. America is at its greatest only when the Conservative Republicans are in power. And G.W. Bush was one of the noblest, sanest, and most honest Presidents and world saviours the world has ever known; the [physically impossible] official story of the 9/11 attack is "integrous"; and the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq were the wisest possible courses of action, supposedly to prevent evil low-consciousness Islam from getting nuclear capabilities from Pakistan (which is itself an Islamic country, meaning the evil, sub-animal Muslims already have nuclear weapons of mass destruction). I should think if that were the real reason, it would have made more sense to infiltrate (or invade, if you must) Pakistan and take their nuclear capabilities away from them.
Anyone who questions authority or thinks very far outside the conservative Republican box is very mentally ill, according to Hawkins. In fact, the whole thrust of the book is highly judgemental in the way that a psychiatrist-gone-mad would project all of the mental illnesses in the book upon anyone in the world who doesn't share his views.
If you believe there was ever an object that moved through the air that was not identified (the definition of "UFO"), guess what, you're wrong. This one "calibration" is unequivocally erroneous (and was thrown into a chart of belief-system calibrations rather than being presented as a true/false, fact-or-fiction type of calibration). Beyond the supposedly delusional belief that "UFOs are real", he questions no further on the subject of intelligent life in the universe, let alone whether any of them might have visited us.
There is plenty more of this sort of highly bias-producing selectivity and manipulation of his "data". Glaringly of note is the fact that he actually gives very few calibrations to support his commentary (his opinions). It even begins to appear that his commentary is the real content of the book (and there's lots and lots of it), with an occassional rating number he simply made up himself and called a "calibration". I should think he would make his database of calibrations (if there is one) available to the world in the interests of truth and let it speak for itself.
And more glaringly, he completely omits even the slightest mention of the most pressing issues in life that would be truly illuminating and helpful. Probably none of the things you're really "dying to know" will be found in this book. And if you think there might be some truth to world conspiracies, you are a low-consciousness and sick person. He never calibrated whether there are any such conspiracies, but only the derogatory term "conspiracy theory" (again, calibrated as a belief system rather than fact or fiction).
He never explains how a "logarithmic" scale of consciousness can be adequately used as a truth scale, nor does he add a column of levels of truth to the scale. Wouldn't a simple zero-to-100-percent scale be better, with 50% being the true/false delineation?
He stresses the importance of context (though in his concept of what context is there is no context). And then he doesn't give any clues as to what different contexts his calibrations were made in.
As his teachings slowly crumble away from me, leaving me feeling bereft but refreshingly released, I realise he never said anything about enlightenment that hasn't already been said by the true teachers and leading-edge researchers, some of whose works he has read and referenced. The great hope that kept me going was that someone who claims to be fully enlightened and who has had an infallible truth-detector for thirty-five years would have found the very best expression of spirituality that would shed all error and make it all enlighteningly clear in one simple and elegant statement, or book, or even three books. He didn't.
Perhaps he had the enlightenment experience, but like many, it left him, or like some, it precipitated a psychotic break, or maybe he is only a fraud who was commissioned by the powers-that-be to attempt, under the banner of "infallible truth", to stem the tide of rising consciousness that can see through them.
* Hawkins' publisher is reportedly very litigious and has apparently even used threats to get wikipedia's page on him removed - yet litigiousness calibrates at 140, as does narcissism (all on page 202 in this book). He diagnoses all the most evil people in the world (mostly Muslims) as having a malignant narcissistic messiah complex . . . but it seems like that's what he has. But his isn't malignant and he doesn't advocate killing Americans, only Muslims, so that must make it all right.
I rated it five stars because the crisis these books precipitated provided me with a few valuable revelations.
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the power of ideas always outlasts the force of violence
The founder of behavioral kinesiology, Dr. John Diamond, was a very spiritual man, believing that all human wellness originated from an inner Life Energy akin to the ancient Chinese concept of Qi. He saw that all of us humans are connected via an all-encompassing metaphysical structure of humanity. A spiritual ‘whole,’ that once realized, can be truly metamorphosing. In 1957, Diamond graduated from medical school in Sydney, Australia, with a degree in psychological medicine. It was there that he developed a lot of his theories on human consciousness and connectedness. In the late 1970’s, he founded the field of behavioral kinesiology, the synthesis of his time studying psychological concepts in science and spiritual concepts in life. This connection between body and mind is the basis for Hawkins’ further exploration of these same concepts in Power vs. Force.Our mind and body perform in tandem in all endeavors; our thoughts affect how our body operates and our body’s relationship to our mind affects it considerably as well. If we think negative thoughts, our body will ‘feel it.’ This is exemplified by the numerous studies done on the impact of stress on the body: it has been proven that mental stress can have profound and long-lasting physical health effects. Similarly, if you force yourself to smile, you will indeed feel happier. Walking into a room with your shoulders back will make you feel more confident in the presence of others. The mind and body work off of each other in both positive and negative ways.The single practicable idea posited in this book is the ability to ‘test’ ideas as they are received by the body. The test itself is simple: one person holds their arm out straight, parallel to the ground, and a second person applies pressure to their wrist in an attempt to push the arm back down to the first person’s side. When ideas like love, compassion, reason, acceptance, willingness, and courage are held in mind, they will ‘test positive,’ and the first person’s arm will stay strong in the face of resistance. When pride, fear, anger, grief, apathy, or shame are thought of, they will ‘test negative’ and their arm will succumb to pressure and be easily pushed down. It’s that simple. It is not about physical strength, as bodybuilders and grandmothers alike are susceptible to this test; it is the body’s manifestation of ideas in its physicality. “The body can discern, to the finest degree, the difference between that which is supportive of life and that which is not.” This is also true for physical stimulants as well. Putting organic sugar under one’s tongue will test positive and the arm will remain strong, for example, whilst processed sugar will test negative and the arm will go weak.Once we have accepted this premise, the further differences between power and force can be explored. “Power appeals to that which uplifts, dignifies, and ennobles,” Hawkins says of things that test positive. Force, on the other hand, is descriptive of conflict and condemnation. “Force always creates counterforce; its effect is to polarize rather than to unify.”Napoleon Bonaparte, looking back over his years of conquest, is reported to have said: “Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne and I have built great empires. But upon what did they depend? They depended on force. But centuries ago Jesus started an empire built on love, and even to this day millions will die for him.” The difference between power and force is the difference between Jesus and Napoleon. Napoleon built an ‘empire’ via force, whilst Jesus created a following based on the powerful uplifting sentiments of love and peace. Napoleon came and went in the span of decades. Jesus’ lessons have survived millennia. The same comparison can be made between Hitler and Churchill. Hitler amassed the largest military force the world had ever seen, yet was foiled by the power expressed by Winston Churchill, “who unified the will of his people through [the] principles of freedom and selfless sacrifice.”Power and force are the two main overarching tools used by those who desire to change the world. The powerful change the world via ideas whilst the forceful change the world via violence. When the two meet, power always eventually succeeds; on a long enough timeline, the power of ideas always outlasts the force of violence. This is because power originates in the mind, whereas force can only manifest itself in the physical world. Through this lens, we can see that the pen is indeed mightier than the sword. Force creates opposition. Power creates unity. It is not a secret which is more effective, and which we should prefer.By testing our body’s responses to different stimuli, we can gain a tremendous amount of information both individually and collectively. Holding a specific relationship in mind, for example, can produce surprising results: perhaps our significant other makes us go weak, indicating a problem. “By testing, we can prove that a false premise such as ‘the end justifies the means’ is operationally negative, yet this is a routinely accepted justification for much of human behavior.” While it is not a definitive test, it can tip us off to parts of ourselves we were unaware of. The benefit of realizing that an idea is not as foolproof as we first thought is important. This field of behavioral kinesiology is the crossroads between biology and spirituality, between mind and body, and we would be wise to tap into this knowledge.
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