One of my favorite essays by
L. Ron Hubbard is called "My Only Defense for Having Lived."
I think it is especially pertinent today -- International Volunteers Day -- as he expresses his views on contribution and helping others.
he only tests of a life well lived are: Did he do what he intended? And were people glad he lived?
People have often desired me to write an autobiography and while I would be perfectly willing to do so had I the time, I consider such a work, as I do myself, quite unimportant.
I have led an adventurous life and it would possibly be entertaining to read, but I doubt such a work would shed any background light on my researches and would not clarify my intentions or why I developed Dianetics and Scientology.
My motives have not been fame. I tried to give Dianetics, the entire work, to the American Medical Association and the American Psychiatric Association in 1949 and the AMA only said “Why should you?” and the APA said “If it is important we will hear of it.”
I tried to avoid, until July 1950, saying I had personally done the research but then owned to it when I saw that unowned, it could be lost in its original form.
My motives have not included amassing great wealth. The royalties of the first book, Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health, were given to the first Foundation. So it is not wealth.
Power has not been my motive. I only held office in organizations to insist upon correct usage of the work, and this having been achieved sometime since, I resigned all directorships and retained only an honorary post.
Further, one cannot have more power than he himself already has as a being; so power by reason of position I consider pointless and a waste of time.
My motives are so hard to understand because they largely omit me from the equation. And self-centered men are not likely to understand such a thing since they know they would not forgo fame, wealth or power and so conceive that another would not. >> continued
