The Personal Responsibility of Self-discipline

     I harp a lot about personal responsibility and self-discipline.  You'd think I was an expert.  All I am, however, is a practitioner (and a novice at best).  This practice means that on a daily basis, regardless of my emotional states, the basic goal is to not blame anyone or anything for how my Life is going.  Instead, my daily intentions are to create meaningful connections by discovering and expressing an internal sense of freedom and contentment.  Granted, I'm not always successful at this endeavor, but I'm certain it's not even possible unless I practice the personal responsibility of self-discipline. 
     I think meaning, freedom and contentment are only possible if one fully understands and practices this collective reality of Life: all behavior is purposeful and internally motivated.  To us humans, this reality means it is hypocritical, self-defeating and a diffusion of responsibility whenever we blame others or otherness for our behavior.  Of course, I am not perfect and do catch myself blaming from time-to-time, mostly as an internal dialogue.  But therein lies the practice!  Catching my ego-self, that part of me that has been conditioned to firmly believe in a fundamental misunderstanding that external stimulus is controlling my reactions.  Such catching can then become new consciousness for how Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions factor into and influence my purposeful behavior.  (Of course, if the brain has some sort of physiological anomalies or outright trauma I still think behavior is purposeful and internally motivated but the factors of Life take on a whole new dimension of influence.  I am not addressing those situations in this writing.)  To practice the personal responsibility of self-discipline, therefore, means to understand the conditionings of my ego-self and then disempower those conditionings through a searching and fearless examination.  The result is that instead of going through Life blaming and reacting to everything, anxiously excusing my behavior in the process, I practice the personal responsibility of self-discipline and begin to Experience the freedom and contentment of consciously choosing my behavioral responses in every moment.
      I think that practicing personal responsibility results in consciously realizing and regulating the behavior of "How I Am" in accordance with the purposeful and internal motivations of that behavior - i.e., the physiological/survival, psychological/safety, social/belonging, mental/fun-learning, emotional/power and spiritual/freedom needs we are all challenged to fulfill every day.  Such conscious realization and regulating also includes awareness and examination of the factors and influences of genetics, family, community, peers, education, environment, temperament and calling.  Add to all that the originality, sexuality, imagination and mortality of "How I Am: Being Human" and it's easily apparent that the practice of realizing and regulating is not at all easy or straight-forward.  In the words of Paulo Freire, "Becoming human is a project." 
     I think that practicing self-discipline means to grasp how we are all consciously and unconsciously disciples - followers, learners and co-creators - of Internity, positive or negative.  That is to say we are each internally driven to have, to feel, to act, to love, to speak and be heard, to see and eventually to "know thyself" in the context of others and otherness.  And because I cannot be swayed from this collective reality of "How I Am: Being Human" - that all behavior is purposeful and internally motivated - I must seek full awareness of this discipleship.  Only by intentionally discovering, expressing, connecting and making meaning of my internal world can I take full responsibility for my Potentials, Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions in the external world.  
     The conscious challenges, choices and changes of Life push us all to become aware of what's really going-on with our Internity of beliefs/thinking patterns, values/feelings and emotional recordings.  In effect, to practice the personal responsibility of self-discipline means to be rooted in the understanding that the Potentials, Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions of and with others and otherness are the "here and now" conduits to my internal dialogue, not the reasons.  And that reality means that it's a fear-filled act of hypocrisy to blame others and otherness for presenting me what are ultimately the challenges, choices and changes necessary for the conscious Experience of being alive!
     I practice the personal responsibility of self-discipline because it has proven to be the path toward a better understanding of "How I Am: Being Human."  I also practice because I know that every moment of every day I am creating the psychological remains I'll be leaving behind.  Basically, I intend to die knowing that the personal responsibility of self-discipline I practiced in this Life will live on as a meaningful example of freedom and contentment for future Life.  

Life, Liberty and Vasectomies for All!

     For thousands of years men have appointed themselves as second-in-command to god.  This evolutionary and egotistical misinterpretation has resulted in nothing other than irresponsible hierarchy and its hypocritical manipulations of Life and liberty.  
     The hypocrisy stems, in part, from externalizing god into a literal man (of the same race and beliefs as the hypocrite) in some future place that promises pleasurable eternity but only if one can rigidly follow the ambiguity of "His will" now.  The manipulation lies in the fact that such a male-dominated mixture of literalism and ambiguity is only tenable if the self-appointed second-in-command controls all matters concerning the interpretation of "His will."  How this hierarchical belief system defines manhood is then evident in the religions, politics, economics and entertainment of most societies.  How this belief system results in behaviors of withdrawal, manipulation, rebellion or compliance from those not at the top of the hierarchy is also evident.  In effect, this power-driven set-up dehumanizes women and children and objectifies nature and the perceived enemy.  Fundamentally, the second-in-command is second to none unless he needs to beg forgiveness or justify mercilessness.
      Because men are going to hypocritically persist in appointing themselves as second-in-command to their own misinterpretations of god, and because this fabricated appointment has proven no other functional or psychological outcome than Oppression, Addiction, Trauma and Shame (we reap the OATS we sow), I'd like to suggest one simple change.  I'm proposing that every male born is automatically given a government funded vasectomy.  The thousand dollars or so it costs up front for a vasectomy far outweighs the trillions of dollars we spend dealing with those "crazy" women who've been abused; those "spoiled" children who've been abandoned; the ever-increasing heap of altered waste that comes from nature but can't return; and all the other patriarchal and objectifying tactics that result in the costly ruins of war.  (For example, consider that over 65% of males in prison for murder killed the second-in-command because he was hurting "my mom."  This type of murder is the unnatural behavior of a grown-up, testosterone-filled male child with conditioned beliefs about the violence necessary to attain godhood.  Such a boy is systematically trained to replace self-discipline and personal responsibility with the god-deluded values of "might makes right."  At the core of this conditioning, however, are the natural and archetypal needs to survive, be safe and to belong.  So, blinded by fear and rage, the now sizable boy is reduced to this ultimatum: stop mom's abuser or die trying.  This type of war is the emotionally desperate act of a truly "spoiled" child who kills to salvage his own psychology and protect the spirituality of the mother-child union.  The rub is that such an act only creates another violent man to take the place of the dead one.  His mom might be free from immediate harm but it's highly unlikely that the young man's godhood will result in safety or well-being for her or anyone else in his life.)  Hell, our entire "prison nation," is the systematic reaction to, and creation of, violent men.  Altogether, this system of crime and punishment perfectly reveals and reflects the sown OATS of god-deluded manhood.
     Of course, vasectomies aren't going to automatically solve the social norms of Oppression, Addiction, Trauma or Shame.  After all, this idea doesn't even dent the historic psychological and emotional armaments known as manhood.  And mandatory vasectomies will not automatically stop the dehumanizing sexual violence against women and children.  Attempts to control the environment and dominate the perceived enemy will continue as well.  Mandatory vasectomies would, however, stop the outrage of unwanted and uncared for children (as well as put an end to the hypocrisy and manipulation of the male dominated abortion debate).  Because that's what I think is at the core of what's really happening!  The sown OATS of god-deluded manhood bring children into society who are instinctually and emotionally outraged!!
     If the second-in-command was biologically unable to donate sperm until after he had worked through his egotistical god-delusions and acquired a sense of responsibility and contribution to family and community just imagine the lives we could salvage and the pile of money we could save on societal reparations.  If the hypocrisies and manipulations of god-deluded manhood were nipped in the bud we could stop poisoning the nature of what connects children to their God-given Potentials of calling: to have, to feel, to act, to love, to speak and be heard, to see and to know.  Such children could then stop turning into the next generation of grown-ups who are conditioned to blindly believe and perpetuate the hypocrisies and manipulations of patriarchal hierarchy.  Instead, such children could instinctually and emotionally become individuals who value and contribute to families and communities rooted in protection, empathy, nurturance and sustenance.  
     Basically, I want to take the hierarchical "god, the father" element out of parenting and society because such a deification is a dehumanizing trap either way you look at it.  As I've stated before, I'd like us all to acknowledge and realize the miracles of all Life.  Granted, mandatory vasectomies would be a drastic step.  But, at this point in his-story I see no other way to dethrone god-deluded manhood.  And once the second-in-command is dethroned he can begin to learn how children already see grown-ups as super-beings and that the role of parenting is to model how to become human beings.  Once dethroned a man could begin to understand that his own divinity is created by his active consciousness of divinity in all others and otherness.  If the second-in-command were dethroned manhood could be redefined as welcoming the sacrifice of diligent service to the well-being of family and community.  If men were dethroned the reality of "nature via nurture" could at last be the guiding force of parenting and being human.  If men were dethroned all perceived threats to Life and liberty could be responded to differently than the fearfully reactive "might makes right" hierarchy of our current disasters.  And once dethroned men can stop trying to justify the hypocrisies and manipulations of manhood and instead allow the emotions of "Being Human" to mature into the citizenship of adulthood.
     Once a man can demonstrate how the personal responsibility for love is partly an emotion that results in safe behavior but mostly behavior that results in safe emotions he can have his vasectomy reversed.  At that point in his-story he can genuinely begin to Experience the complex Relationships of divinity in men, women, children, nature and even those who threaten with their own patriarchal delusions of godhood.  And at that point in our collective story we will all begin learning how to participate with and take personal responsibility for authentic Life and liberty.

Life's Yearning

     I'll say it again - one's genuine callings and emotions must be acknowledged.  Then, whatever they are, these callings and emotions - Internity - must find a way to be lived.  In fact, calling and emotion are the core essence of "How I Am: Being Human" (to have, to feel, to act, to love, to speak and be heard, to see, to know).  And any attempt to diffuse ego-consciousness of this fact, or refuse personal responsibility for this fact, will sabotage Life's yearning in some way, shape or form.   
     Just look around and within.  The failure to acknowledge Life's yearning always results in combinations of physiological, psychological, social, mental, emotional and spiritual dis-ease.  Examples of this sabotage are also observed in the factors and influences of "How I Am: Being Human" (i.e, the genetics, family, community, peers, education, environment, temperament and calling of the personal and collective Relationships and Experiences).  In effect, the intentional acknowledgement or devout ignorance of one's genuine calling and emotion is revealed and reflected in the purposeful behaviors and internal motivations of Life's yearning.


Postscript: I finish these thoughts in the shadow of yet another mass killing, this time at a theater in Aurora, Colorado.  (Twelve people dead, which, averaged out, is approximately one-third of how many people die everyday from gun violence in this "land of the free."  Fifty-eight people wounded and traumatized for the rest of their lives.  A country fascinated by the horror of it all but only until the headlines change.)  My observations at this point are that the public response is appropriately focused on either the victims or guns.  What we also need to address, however, are the killer's purposeful behaviors and internal motivations.  How did the nature of his Life's yearning, his interiorization of community and his deepest callings and emotions get nurtured into such a desperate annihilation of Life?  And what measure of safety and fear do all the killers, all the victims, all the media and all the guns reveal and reflect concerning our personal and collective formulations of "How I Am: Being Human?"   

Images, Instincts and Emotions

     It makes sense to me that each and every one of us, always and everywhere, responds or reacts from within to the images, instincts and emotions of self/Self, others and otherness.  (I differentiate between responding and reacting with the idea that responding comes from an internal Perception of choices and safety whereas reacting comes from an instinctual or conditioned internal Perception of being unsafe.)  In other words, we all respond or react to others and otherness via the images, instincts and emotions of the ego-self and the deeper psychological Self (i.e., Internity).  This is because all conscious and unconscious formulations of ego and Self are internally rooted in the Life of the collective yet from there branch-out to absorb, filter and behave in symbolic expressions of individual purpose and internal motivation.  Therefore, all the images, instincts and emotions of "How I Am: Being Human" can only be accurately discovered, expressed, connected and made meaningful with this reality as the guiding concept: all behavior is purposeful and internally motivated.
     Fully comprehending and practicing this immutable reality of behavior completely shifts the discovery of consciousness, the expression of challenges, the practice of choices and the meanings of change.  In effect, the moment one refuses to explain behavior using the stimulus-response fantasy (blaming this or that person-place-thing from the recent or ancient past for "making me" do this or that behavior) one begins a more intentional experience of being alive.  But please don't misunderstand me.  I am not for a moment suggesting that one's past Relationships, Experiences or Perceptions can simply be ignored as if they didn't happen.  On the contrary, I think the archetypes of the collective unconscious and the emotions of the personal unconscious will independently demand attention (in dreams, physical illness, psychosis, neurosis and every other symbolic outcome).  Likewise, the powerful emotions and symbolic values/feelings and beliefs/thinking patterns of ego and persona cannot simply be cast aside, especially when there has been some level of trauma to one's fulfillment of the human needs.  I am convinced, however, that the "nature via nurture" Potential of all these internal realities can only remain open to the natural images, instincts and emotions of Life's yearnings by nurturing an understanding of all behavior as purposeful and internally motivated.

Unity, Separation and Reunion

     It seems to me that the "nature via nurture" of Internity is, in one way or another, formulated by conscious and unconscious sensations of unity, separation and reunion.  I mean, all Potential is discovered through complex and continuous circumambulations of what it means to be individually ("the hero's journey") and collectively ("participation mystique") unified, separated and reunited.  All Relationships are expressed via the internal joys and sorrows created by a sense of unity, separation and reunion (dependence-independence-interdependence-intradependence).  All Experiences are imagined and stored as emotional memories, feelings/values and beliefs/thinking patterns (oppressing or freeing) and connected in every way to unity, separation and reunion.  And all Perceptions are emotionally meaningful in terms of how they relate to unity, separation and reunion (fearful desperation creates the emotions of fight, flight, freeze or dissociate; and the fulfillment of desire creates the emotions of having, feeling, acting, loving, speaking and being heard, seeing and knowing).  The factors and influences of genetics, family, "the interiorization of community," peers, education, environment, temperament and calling (whoever is telling the story) all become "How I Am" schemas that get played-out in the theater of unity, separation and reunion.  Likewise, the purposeful behavior of "Being Human" - physiological health/survival needs, psychological health/safety needs, social health/belonging needs, mental health/fun and learning needs, emotional health/power needs and spiritual health/freedom needs - are all motivated by Internity's conscious and unconscious responses to unity, separation and reunion.  It also seems that consciousness, challenges, choices and changes are all evoked by and then result in fluctuating awareness and truth of unity, separation and reunion.  Additionally, the original, sexual, imaginative and mortal realities of personal and collective humankind are all part of the Life-Death-Rebirth mythologies that empower ideas of unity, separation and reunion.  The Love and Grief of "How I Am: Being Human," therefore, both center and revolve around the possibilities of Life's "participation mystique" with the "nature via nurture" realizations of one's Internity.  In effect, always and everywhere, sensations and formulations of Internity (conscious and unconscious), create purposeful and internally motivated behaviors in response to the safe or unsafe Potentials, Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions of unity, separation and reunion.

Psychological Remains

     The idea and reality of psychological remains are both created by the inevitability of Death a well as the fact that all any of us leave behind are the Relationships we bring to Life.  The sooner we all understand this idea and nurture this reality with intentional awareness the sooner we will all realize (make real) the natural discovery of Potential, expression of Relationship, connection to Experience and meaning of Perception.  When one's time on this Earth is finished, no matter if it lasts for minutes or decades, he or she will leave behind psychological remains that have been affected by people from the collective and personal past and will then ripple outward to affect the lives of people in a future one will never know.  In effect, the positive or negative behaviors toward self, others and otherness during this Life on this Earth is what creates the emotional Experience of an afterlife within the lives of others remaining on this Earth after one dies (regardless of any and all religious beliefs about an eternal afterlife)!  It seems obvious, then, that fully comprehending the idea and reality of psychological remains must become the guiding force of one's consciousness, challenges, choices and changes toward all Relationships in this Life!!    

Love and Grief

     I think intentional Relationship with the natural calling of one's Internity is what makes Life meaningful.  I also think this Relationship with calling is Experienced as a limitless combination of Love and Grief.  Obviously, the word "combination" implies that Love and Grief are separate.  But the reality is they are inseparable because they each create and define the other in a symbiotic union, like a lake and its shoreline.  And long before one's individual beginning, onward into unknowable future generations, Love and Grief call us all to awaken the emotional consciousness necessary for a full participation with "Being Human."
     The nurtured ego-consciousness of "How I Am" (i.e., the Potential factors and influences that form ego), also plays an essential role in awakening one's Internity of Love and Grief.  Put simply, the ego's Perceptions and Experiences are made-up of the discoveries, expressions, connections and meanings formulated by the emotional feedback circle of Relationships.  These integrations and complexes (positive and negative) then inform ego-consciousness and facilitate one's life-long interactions with the personal and collective unconscious.  In this way Love and Grief are always in a dance with mythological calling, biological birth, the psychological birth of ego, the Experience of being alive (conscious and unconscious), biological death and one's psychological remains.  This is why a healthy ego - the images, symbols, behaviors and emotions of individual consciousness - is so important to both the present moment and a Life well-lived.  Essentially, the longings and fears that comprise every individual's ego are always and everywhere participating with the ancient collective callings of Love and Grief.  
     In a previous post I describe Love as conditional and active in the context of being partly an emotion that results in safe behavior but mostly a behavior that results in safe emotions.  Under such circumstances, the intensities of Love grow in a trust for physical, psychological, social, mental, emotional and spiritual safety.  So, wherever there is safe behavior and emotion (e.g., the self-disciplined kindnesses of home), the healthy identifications of ego that are necessary for the Love of self, others and otherness are made possible.  The Perception of Grief, under these circumstances, is Experienced as a wave of longing and calling for the joyful Relationship that was created by safe behavior and emotion - Love!  Such a loss and its intensely emotional memory of well-being and a Life well-lived will fill one's heart to the breaking point.  But this fulfillment of Love then lives on with the power to open and transform Grief into a spirited awakening of discovered Potentials, expressed Relationships, connected Experiences and meaningful Perceptions.
     Emotional Experiences that result in unsafe behavior, as well as behaviors that result in unsafe emotions, are nonetheless subject to the intensifications of Love and Grief.  Under these circumstances, however, Grief comes not only from the ancient callings associated with losing people, but also from a sorrowful intuition that one failed to Experience the Potential of genuine Love in the first place - safe emotion and behavior.  In my estimation, this intensely negative and intuitive ego-awareness is the result of physical, psychological, social, mental, emotional and spiritual Experiences found in domestic violence.  Such unnatural and stressful angst then results in the wounded behavioral responses of withdrawal, manipulation, rebellion or compliance.  In effect, if one's ego is nurtured via unsafe behaviors and emotions he or she is likely to Experience Internity and the natural longings associated with self, others and otherness as unpredictable, insignificant or even dangerous.  Love and Grief, under these circumstances, become colored with the added intensities and complexities (conscious and unconscious) of shame.  And I am convinced that anytime the heart's natural desire for emotionally safe Relationship is sabotaged by the nurtured shame and fear of violent Experience the resulting intensifications of Love and Grief cannot help but reveal and reflect some level of violence toward self, others and otherness. 
     It seems obvious that the chronic violence of Oppression, Addiction, Trauma, and Shame (the OATS we sow in united states of consciousness), are all founded on the obsessive belief that Love must include some level of unsafe behavior and emotion.  Take for example our righteous insistence on equating the punishment of children with discipline.  Such a blatant misunderstanding of the difference between punishment and discipline has no other outcome than unsafe behavior and emotion at some level of consciousness.  And yet, after thousands of years righteously using "the rod" to prevent spoilage we sit in the Grief-stricken Hell of oppressed, addicted, traumatized and shameful self, others and otherness thinking we should have been using a bigger rod all along.  But sowing such O.A.T.S. only creates emotions that result in unsafe behavior and behaviors that result in unsafe emotions!  I think these historically rooted circumstances have vandalized the Internity of Love and Grief and are now being revealed and reflected everywhere one looks [e.g., the individual refusal of calling and general loss of imagination and creativity; the rejection of sacrifice and demand for instant gratification; the spiritually empty literalism of religions that are then forced by faith to refuse their historical companionship with science; the misreading of emotional desperation and consequent medication (self and prescribed) of its symptoms; the insatiable efforts to find fulfillment with nutritionally empty and sometimes utterly poisonous food and drink; the objectification and consequent pricing of self, others and otherness; the compartmentalization of education and its consequent removal from servicing the community's interior; the sexual and violent indoctrination of children as the accepted norm of socialization, economics and entertainment; the chronic diffusion of personal responsibility and its manipulations of freedom; the contrived resistances to adulthood, maturity and aging; and the systematic destruction of nature to support the whole dis-eased process; etc., ad nauseum]. 
     I think all of this points to the fact that the human race can no longer fear and avoid Internity's Relationship with the symbiotic union of Love and Grief.  The nature of human Life, which is Love and Grief, demands individually conscious choices to fully participate with the realities of mythological calling, biological birth, psychological birth, the Experience of being alive, biological death and one's psychological remains!  We can no longer ego-maniacally avoid participation with Love, Grief or Internity!  Therefore, it seems the challenge of our time is to change how we nurture the "How I Am" emotional ego-consciousness of Internity so we can then choose differently how to participate with the nature of Love, Grief and all Life.  Penultimately, I think it's time that our personal and collective egos learn about protection, empathy, nurturance and sustenance through the safe actions and emotions of Love for self, others and otherness!  Ultimately, if one safely awakens the natural qualities of Internity, I think he or she will hear the emotional callings of Love and Grief but then answer all Life with full consciousness and intentional participation in the challenges, choices and changes of "Being Human." 

The Psychology of Calling

     I think it was James Hillman who said something along the lines of, "No one is born who isn't called first."  No one.  Which means everyone is born to express, and as an expression of, anima mundi - the world's soul.  Which also means that everyone is born with purpose and meaning.  Every one.  But this soul, purpose and meaning, even though they are all part of individual Potential, neither belongs exclusively to the individual.  This reality makes the individual and the collective Experience of being alive a complex Relationship between the Perceptions of ego and the worldly intentions of calling.
     "How I Am" Potential in the context of otherness (i.e., ego), and the Potential of otherness in the context of "Being Human" (i.e., Self), are what define the psychology of calling.  For example, a newborn's calling is a sensory and emotional Experience of Self that lasts for many years before he or she begins to consciously discover, express, connect to or make personal meaning with ego's formulations.  But every newborn is having an immediate impact on the ego and calling - the Potentials, Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions - of at least two others (the parents) which then includes countless others (the family, the community, the state, nation and the world).  Simultaneously, the sensory and emotional affect of others and otherness on the newborn influences the awakening of his or her ego.  This makes it evident that throughout one's ego-Self Life it is vitally important to ask, "What's my calling?" yet, it's irresponsible to think "How I Am: Being Human" is separate from the soulful, purposeful and meaningful callings of others and otherness.  
     All otherness takes part in one's calling.  Likewise, one's calling takes part in all otherness.  And even though calling is part of the ancient past and the unknown future it's main quality is that it is always participating in the here and now.  This psychology of calling intends to open ego's consciousness to new Potential, new Relationships, new ways of interpreting Experiences and new Perceptions of others and otherness.  Most other psychological theories address the "developed" ego as the sole experiencer and creator of others and otherness - i.e. "reality."  But "the ego is only one member of a commune" (Hillman) and so not going further into the connections of the human psyche with the world's soul cuts a person off from calling.  Such a cutting-off limits discovery, expression, connection and meaning to the ego alone.  This type of "nature versus nurture" situation, as anyone can plainly see, is a disaster for the individual, others and otherness.  A "nature via nurture" psychology of calling, on the other hand, is always addressing the vital conduit between ego and calling, reinterpreting and reconnecting the immense Potential of Self with the immeasurable Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions of all others and otherness.


PS: I'm not going to go into it now but the complex Experience of grief is the most common way we all transform ego's discoveries, expressions, connections and meanings.  Calling, after all, becomes highly intensified when the Potentials, Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions of those left behind are awakened by the ancient emotions encircling death.    

Love

    Here I've been writing all this time about "How I Am: Being Human" and I haven't directly addressed the topic of Love.  Then again, I've been talking about both the presence and absence of Love all along.  I say this because I define Love as partly emotion that results in safe behavior but mostly I think Love is behavior that results in safe emotions.  
     What does this mean?  It means that when one is Experiencing positive emotions it's easy to behave in a loving manner.  But, more importantly, Love also means that when one is Experiencing negative emotions he or she still has the capacity to behave in ways that don't threaten the emotional safety of others.  And considering the covert and overt violence of so many Experiences, along with the normalized responses of withdrawal, manipulation, rebellion and compliance in so many Relationships (e.g., self-family-community), it seems to me that the meaning of Love in this society (like so many of our heralded beliefs and values) has been desecrated by falsehoods.  
     The heart of the matter - Internity - is that all the energies of emotion (conscious and unconscious) are formed, conformed, deformed, informed, reformed and transformed in a constant behavioral Experience of and psychological Relationship with the powerful nurture and nature of Love!  The Internity of Love's formulations then has the very human task of discovering, expressing, connecting and creating meaning for the spiritual conduit between ego and calling.  This conduit is both informed by the Experiences of ego but also transformed by the Relationships of calling (and all otherness takes part in one's calling).  The ease or dis-ease of this conduit, therefore, determines every individual's Perceptions, internal motivations and purposeful behaviors.  
     Love is conditional!  This is why I think we all need to quit giving mere sing-song lip service to the abstractions of Love and instead take a good hard look at our own emotional behaviors of Love.  To truly Love someone means to have ego's wild emotions with the result being safe behavior toward others nonetheless.  To truly understand Love in the context of calling means that one behaves in ways where the emotions of others remain safe, which then simultaneously inform and transform one's own emotional reality.  The nurtured behavioral Experiences of Love, after all, reveal to oneself and reflect to the world healthy or unhealthy emotional Relationships with the nature of Love's calling.  This Perception, that Love is partly emotion resulting in safe behavior but mostly behavior resulting in safe emotions, makes all the difference in the world when it comes to the conditions of "How I Am: Being Human."       

A Kundalini Christmas

     It wasn't long after the whole Santa Claus thing unraveled that "How I Am: Being Human" began drifting away from the bindings of formal religion.  It seems the power of Santa Claus and the literalism of Catholicism were totally dependent on the conditional and externalized concepts of "you better watch out" and "naughty or nice."  Throughout my formative years it was a bit nerve-wracking to know that God was keeping score of every one of my childhood failings.  And with Santa the stakes were even higher than eternal damnation - toys!  Christmas time was a psychological wrestling match.  ("In this corner, weighing in at fifty-five and a half pounds, the snotty-nosed trouble from the emotional rubble - John!  And in this corner, weighing in at an incalculable amount because the laws of physics don't apply, the white-bearded tag-team of gyrations from the imagination - the transcendent, co-dependent enforcers of repentance - God and Santa Claus!!")  In my childhood mind I figured the baby Jesus was a sort of kindred spirit because he also had to contend with the threatening surveillance of "you better watch out."  I still wonder if Jesus had to deal with the childhood curiosities that result in "naughty or nice."  Nowadays I understand it all as the physiological, psychological, social, mental, emotional and spiritual conditions of "How I Am: Being Human."  But back then, the season of Santa Claus and unrelenting Catholicism both did a fine job of conditioning the inadequacies of my budding ego.
     On the other hand, there was the comforting imagination and beauty of having a Christmas tree in the living-room.  I remember turning off all the lights except for the tree, fitting perfectly into the too big rocking chair and listening to the music of the season.  I still do this ritual today for no other reason than comfort, imagination and beauty.  The personal meaning of that tree, with all its multi-colored lights and storied ornaments, has always been an unconditional conduit (unlike God and Santa) for the memories of my Christmas spirit.
     It's obvious, then, that my annual task is to re-imagine the symbolism and reclaim the meaning of the whole story: the birth of the Christ child; the spirit of the season; the solstice and returning of light; and renewing enthusiasm for Life.  And because words are symbols I always think it's valuable to examine their deeper meanings.  
     "Birth" originally meant to bear, to carry or conduct oneself, to take responsibility for one's life.  The word "Christ" of course means anointed one.  "Child" originally meant to descend, to climb down.  And "infant" comes from Latin and means not able to speak.  Solstice is a combination of words that mean the sun (sol) being still (stice).  Spirit means breath and season originally meant to sow.  Enthusiasm means to be possessed by a god and inspired (inspiritus).
     I am enthusiastically writing these words today because of an unexpected image that came to me about a week ago.  It happened in a Kundalini yoga session where we had been working on the third chakra, fire in the belly, the solar plexus, conviction and action.  Our yoga instructor kept suggesting that we imagine the light and power of the sun growing within our bellies.  I, however, was still mentally struggling with my inadequacies in accomplishing the physical aspect of the exercises.  In other words, I was having "a bad yoga day" and my ego was refusing to be quiet.  In fact, my ego was giving me a psychological whipping equalled only by those given by God and Santa.  Needless to say my whining ego kept me from imagining anything but "getting-on with my certain to be lousy rest of the day."

     As always we finished the session with the stillness of "final relaxation."  Then I sat in meditation.  The others began singing the traditional "Long Time Sun" song to conclude the day's practice.  I wasn't singing but my ego-whining began to quiet.  With eyes closed I merely listened.  "May the long time sun, shine upon you, all love surround you, and the pure light within you, guide your way on."  In my mind's eye I unexpectedly beheld the image of a child standing in front of me.  At first the child melded between looking like my daughter and my son when they were little.  But then I recognized him as the short-haired round-faced kid I used to be.  He reached-out (I reached out?) and took my aged face in his hands.  He gazed at me as if he was studying some ancient truth that he already seemed to know better than anyone.  Without words he seemed to be asking me to remember someone I had forgotten.  I tried to smile at him but instead began to cry.  He held my cheeks in his little hands, unafraid of my sorrow and inadequacies, looking intently but without any judgment at all.  As the singing in the room came to its final phrases the belly in the little boy began to glow.  He smiled and then tipped his head back as if he was experiencing pure joy.  The glow in his belly spread from the red-orange of fire embers to a yellow-white as bright and sparkly as sunlight on rippling water.  Soon all that was left of him were his hands on my face.  Then they also became pure light and I filled my lungs and belly like it was the first breath of my Life.
     For me (for many years now), the annual Christmas symbols contain an idea - the birth of the soul, the daimon, the genius.  And I think we are all looking for a personally meaningful image to carry us beyond the conditionings and inadequacies of ego, especially at this time of year.  After all, the symbols of Christmas, if read correctly, all point to how each one of us has descended into this world to bear the anointed responsibilities and privileges of being alive.  To be enthusiastic in this effort we must all learn to sow the authentic and ageless soul found in the images and symbols of rebirth.  
     A good yoga teacher can help in this effort.  I know I can't express how grateful I am for my yogi.  She has guided me to consciousness of a deeply personal image that I think is powerful enough to wrestle with the likes of anyone, including God, Santa and my ego.  For this gift I am forever grateful.  Merry Christmas. 

Soulful Biology

     There are enough theories and research on the human project to make one's head spin.  And because of "How I Am: Being Human" I intend to continue learning.  Nevertheless, my main conviction holds firm: all behavior is purposeful and internally motivated.  This fact is the main key to understanding how humans embody Potential and interiorize Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions.  The how of this embodiment and interiorization becomes Internity. But let's be clear on this point: Internity can be the complex and separating contrivances of nature versus nurture or the complex and authentic cultivation of "nature via nurture" (David Lykken).  An intentional and genuine Life, after all, is about discovering, expressing, connecting and making meaning out of one's complex internal images, instincts and emotions - whatever they are.  It's this physiological, psychological, social, mental, emotional and spiritual project that becomes the behavioral energies of soulful biology.  
     Soulful biology, therefore, is the originality of mythological calling (the nature of genetics and temperament) taking form in biological birth and then being transformed by the continuous psychological birth of ego (the nurture of family, community, peers, education and environment).  This cyclical processing of Life's energies is "How I Am: Being Human."  Of course, the intentions of one's personal myth and one's purposeful behavior are often as contradictory and varied as human consciousness.  Both ego and calling, after all, are members of a psychological and archetypal commune (Hillman).  The task of ego, therefore, is to become the centering "I Am" point of intentional consciousness.  The eventual and ultimate task of ego, however, is to intentionally resume its Relationship with the characteristics of calling.  This is precisely why healthy ego formation and a living mythology are vital to becoming fully human!  The daily Experience of this Relationship between ego and calling (conscious and unconscious) is what creates the complex variations of "How I Am: Being Human."  And this inexorable Relationship between ego and calling, contrived or cultivated, will not be denied!  Granted, it can be consciously ignored but not without grave consequences.  The transformation and/or habituation of one's Internity then (consciousness, challenges, choices, changes), is always and everywhere a behavioral display of how an individual is discovering, expressing, connecting and finding meaning in the soulful biology of all Life.
     I repeat - the psychology of all the Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions of ego are of a secondary "nurture" and will never be able to completely detach from the original "nature" of calling's Potential!  In other words, human consciousness must be centered by ego but is simultaneously destined to respond, positively or negatively, to the calling's of Potential.  These destined responses reveal and reflect both the personal and collective Internity as either separating contrivances or authentic cultivations of image, instinct and emotion.  These responses also reveal and reflect how all behavior is purposeful and internally motivated.  
     Unfortunately, at this point in the human story, most of the beliefs, values and systems formulated to address the behaviors of ego and calling are ill-advised and separating contrivances.  No matter if it's physical health, psychological health, social health, mental health, emotional health or spiritual health I think our current oppressive beliefs (about manhood, womanhood, childhood, etc.), our values [making use of the contributions of the community for one's own myopic purposes without adding anything in return (Adler)] and our systems (media, economy, health, politics, religion, etc.) are precisely why too many individuals, families and communities have become air conditioned emotional nightmares (thank you Henry Miller).  I think it's painfully obvious that we are failing to acknowledge and integrate the deeper realities found in the Relationship between calling and ego.  In effect, the natural characteristics and callings of Internity get nurtured into emotionally desperate egos that then go about righteously and incessantly denying the natural characteristics and callings of Internity.  This ignorant and impossible act of diminishing the mythic call of one's Life into mere beliefs and values of one's ego has behaviorally and emotionally sabotaged both the personal and planetary atonement of soulful biology.      

Manhood

      I work with men who've been accused of domestic violence.  I say "accused" because I wasn't there and I don't really know what happened.  I do know, however, that these men often describe whatever happened as an "argument."  My usual response to that is, "It must have been more than an argument because someone got scared enough to involve law enforcement" (too often the 911 calls are made by children).  They will then try to explain the happening by starting every sentence with, "She..." or "Kids these days..."  And such a vehement diffusion of responsibility for something that supposedly "didn't happen" always and everywhere creates suspicion.  
     I perceive these diffusions of personal responsibility as emotionally desperate projections that only reveal the fear-based beliefs and unexamined values of too many men.  The resulting violent behavior and emotional vandalism - the verbal and non-verbal attacks intended to humiliate; the tactical threats intended to create and maintain an environment of fear; the indirect yet focused intentions of destroying property or hurting pets; using violence to intentionally cause physical pain; and/or the multi-faceted methods and intentions of sexual violence; etc. - display their images of "manhood" as nothing more than emotionally desperate beliefs and dehumanized functions of learned pathology.
    Manhood as pathology.  Men whose purposeful and internally motivated behaviors always and everywhere come from their own emotional desperation (even when they are putting on the mask of "nice guy" and "good citizen").  Men who reveal and reflect emotional weaknesses with enraged silence, righteous yelling or physical strength (typically such behavior is directed at a partner and the children he perceives as "his").  Men who are so rigidly attached to their impaired ego-needs that empathy for the emotional Experiences of others, especially their partners and children, becomes impossible.  Men who constantly blame their behavior on drunken circumstances, deny everyone else's perspective of their behavior and/or minimize the validity of all Experiences but their own.  Men who, consequently, are ignorant of the profound disconnect between how others perceive them and how they perceive themselves.  Men who fail to understand how any attempt to change everyone and everything but their own “stuff” always creates some form of violence.  Men who are conditioned by fear to think that creating fear in others equals respect and that punishment equals discipline.  Men who justify violent behavior without realizing the immaturity and pathos of their efforts.  Men who have beliefs about love but no actual experiences of it.  Men who, by means of their emotionally desperate egos, compensate for all these fears and weaknesses by defining, believing and maintaining "manhood" as the oppression of others, especially women and children.  Men whose internalized images are formed by chronic oppression, resulting in "pathological" Relationships of desperation, malfunctioning, defect and aberration.
     The men I work with have internalized the images and beliefs of themselves and "manhood" that they discovered as children in oppressive family and community environments.  In fact, I think society's oppressive efforts to "teach" have resulted in children "learning" the diffusion of responsibility (withdrawal, manipulation, rebellion, compliance) for themselves, each other and society as a whole.  And because the Experiences of being alive are submerged in such environments every obscenity becomes normalized, a way of Life.  In Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Paulo Freire points out how the struggle to "make" a different Life, one based on safety, love and freedom, begins with men's recognition that they have been destroyed.  Freire also explains how these men, "having internalized the image of the oppressor and adopted his guidelines, are fearful of freedom.  Freedom would require them to eject the image and replace it with autonomy and [personal] responsibility."  In my work I've come to realize that asking men to eject their learned images of "manhood" is like asking them to change how they walk.    
     Yet, "we make the road by walking" (Freire) and change can only come from the courage within.  But even the word "courage" cannot be understood from the perspective of "manhood" because it has less to do with bravery, strength or endurance and instead derives from the French word coeur meaning "heart."  And the men I work with have had their hearts damaged - physically, emotionally and spiritually.  From the very beginning of life too many are dehumanized.  They've been "made" into oppressors through a system of oppression and so their behaviors of courage are twisted around beliefs of conquering.  Nevertheless, they must learn to walk this world differently.  To do this they have to find the responsibility and courage necessary to "make" being and becoming more fully human an act of personal freedom.
      In working with men accused of domestic violence I am learning that "becoming human is a project" (Freire).  I also have to understand how these guys firmly grasp onto belief systems that force them to overcompensate for the lack of courage they've come to believe is "manhood."  And even though I describe their behavioral overcompensations as "pathology" I recognize that the desperations, malfunctioning, defects and aberrations come from the whole society's unexamined belief systems about men, women, children and the Relationships that "make" Life.  So, in a completely oversimplified nutshell, the work I do involves examining how the culturally supported dehumanization of too many men creates the pathology called "manhood" and how this travesty is at the root of oppression and the dehumanizing violence against women and children.  

RESPONSE-ABILITY

     It recently came-up in a conversation how this idea, "nobody makes me anything," (i.e., happy, sad, angry, behave in certain ways, etc.) is "completely impossible bullshit" (quote-unquote).  And, in spite of having righteously claimed it many times, I have to admit that, upon further examination, the idea seems impossible.  After all, how can anyone claim that "nobody makes me anything" when at the same time we are all "made" in Relationship with all otherness.  Yet, to believe that the personal and impersonal otherness totally "makes" us who and how we are steps perilously close to the edge of predetermination.  Such a belief threatens to absolve us of all personal responsibility for who and how we are in Relationship with all otherness.  Then again, to believe that every behavior is purposeful and internally motivated seems to threaten us with too much personal responsibility for who and how we are in Relationship with all otherness.
     Nonetheless, I still firmly believe that all behaviors are purposeful and internally motivated.  When I say this, however, I don't mean that the purpose is always consciously ego-driven.  For example, I love the story where a young man with a pregnant wife at home puts his own life at risk to physically restrain a drunken old homeless man from jumping off a bridge.  When asked, "What on earth were you thinking?" he couldn't explain other than saying he felt his own Life was completely dependent on the Life of that homeless man.  (Soon he would understand a similar feeling through parenthood.)  In a single moment the young man's purposeful, internal motivation transcended ego-consciousness.  I'm certain this happens all the time in military, disaster and other situations where the ego's wants and needs are overruled by deeper connections to all Life.  These connections, I believe, are purposeful beyond one's usual awareness and internally motivated even though completely connected to the external experiences of otherness.
     The critical understanding is that one is always consciously and unconsciously making purposeful and internally motivated responses to Life.  My claim today is that those who understand the RESPONSE-ABILITY of being "made" in Life as well as "making" a Life are having a different experience of being alive than those who don't.             

Consciousness

     Oh boy...  I can already picture my two readers anxiously manipulating their computers to find something of interest on Netflix, YouTube or Facebook.  "Please!  Anything besides a blog titled Consciousness."  I'm guessing I lost the other 11 readers back at the "Internity" post a few months ago.  But those are all forms of consciousness, too.  As far as we know there's no getting away from it because even the state of unconsciousness is another form of consciousness and vice-versa.

     Because this sort of pondering has been going-on for centuries all I'm going to say is that not long after birth, human consciousness begins to reveal and reflect ego coming forth from the limitless unconscious, the anima mundi, the world soul.  In other words, the moment the unconscious energy of animating Potential enters a baby's consciousness as images, instincts, sensations and emotions (mine, yours and the world's) it begins the Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions of a growing ego.  A healthy ego is precisely why children need the safety and good care of healthy adults!  After all, the healthiest aspects of "How I Am: Being Human" mean living an intentional life of intra-dependence between conscious and unconscious contents.  And the health or harm of this intra-dependence gets fostered or foiled in the generational cycles of mythological calling, biological birth, psychological birth, the experience of being alive, biological death and what's left-over as psychological remains.  

     It's the psychological remains, healthy or harmed, that become part of the unconscious animating Potential of the next generation's consciousness.  In this way “How I Am” right now tending to my consciousness, ego and the animating Potential of the limitless unconscious affects the images, instincts, sensations and emotions of the whole world!  So, the two eternal questions seem to be, "Is my ego consciousness healthy enough right now to be actively aware of its intra-dependence on the limitless unconscious, the anima mundi, the world soul?" and "How is my awareness and responsibility to this intra-dependence affecting the generations to come?"

     (Netflix, YouTube and Facebook, here we come...)

The Archetypal World of Internity

    One day a young songwriter "woke up, got out of bed, dragged a comb across [his] head" and recognized he had music in mind again.  But this time he felt that it was an already established composition, something he must have heard before, maybe from his musical father's generation.  He worked it out on the piano and assumed it must be a "standard."  He asked many others to help him identify the song but nobody could.  The song kept running through his consciousness (calling) and he continued to assume that eventually he'd realize what "standard" it was.  He hummed along with the melody but couldn't quite place the lyric.  So, he started singing gibberish until one day he sang, "Scrambled eggs..." and some other rhymes to go along with eggs.  One time, instead of "Scrambled eggs" the songwriter's gibberish came out as, "Yesterday..."  From that point onward the composition revealed itself in its entirety.  And it was, in fact, a standard waiting to be brought into the world and acknowledged as such.  In effect, the song used Paul McCartney as a conduit to make itself known.  The common emotionality of the song "Yesterday," as music does (and the rest of the arts do), revealed and reflected the shared pathways of human Potential, Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions from both our individual and collective mind.     

     It's these shared pathways of the mind, the psychic stirrings and callings of Internity, that I find so fascinating.  Jung described them by using the term "archetype" which I understand as an original image, ancient patterns, or "pre-existent forms...which can only become conscious secondarily and which give definite form to certain psychic contents."  (This is why the arts are vital to the experience of being alive: First, because they give conscious form to the psychic stirrings and callings of Internity.  Secondly, they point out hypocrisy, jingoism, cant, jargon, etc.  Finally, the arts abhor mediocrity.)  I understand archetypes as images, energies and emotions coming forth from the collective unconscious and made conscious through the use of symbol (the art and invention of imagination and image-making).  Another of Jung's claims is that "our souls as well as our bodies are composed of individual elements which were all already present in the ranks of our ancestors."  This claim, as it concerns our bodies, in spite of their own complexities, is not really that astounding for our scientific and evolved brains to comprehend.  But the idea that our souls - the images of the mind as well as our instincts and emotions - are also "composed of individual elements which were all already present in the ranks of our ancestors," makes me wonder even more about the transcendence of human Potential, Relationship, Experience and Perception.  Jung also describes archetypes, these psychic stirrings and callings, as "the mind of our unknown ancestors, their way of thinking and feeling, their way of experiencing life and the world, gods and men."  I think Joseph Campbell's research on the consistent and striking similarities of imagination and image-making throughout all mythologies is proof enough of ancient and shared pathways.

     The image below is how I've learned to think about the archetypes of the collective unconscious, the shared pathways of "How I Am: Being Human."  This is what I mean by the psychic stirrings and callings of Internity.   

The middle of the image is composed of the results - physiological, psychological, social, mental, emotional and spiritual - of all the individualized elements of the "How I Am: Being Human" diagram of previous posts.  This is the centering place of ego-consciousness where discoveries, expressions, connections and meaning of others and otherness take imagistic, instinctual and emotional shape as some level of awareness and Self-respect.  I think this centering place is what determines the level of guidance or hauntings from the psychic stirrings and callings of archetypes.  If the Potentials, Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions of "How I Am: Being Human" are given conscious form in protection, empathy, nurturance and sustenance then the archetypes have a better chance of making themselves known as purposeful behaviors guided by imagination and image-making.  Anything less makes one susceptible to purposeful behaviors based on the fear of archetypal hauntings (i.e., disconnected opposition).  In any case, consciously acknowledging the images of the mind (dreams, fantasies, memories, griefs, intuitions, half-baked ideas, unfinished songs, etc.), and the ancient instincts and powerful emotions of one's psychic stirrings and callings is an intentional step toward authenticity on the shared pathways of "How I Am: Being Human."
     My claim today is that the art of imagination and image-making is an instinctual and emotional relationship with the shared pathways of the collective unconscious.  Granted, there's only one McCartney, or Lennon, or Picasso, or Einstein, or Edison, or Leonardo da Vinci, etc., etc.  Nevertheless, we are all original in our divine capacities to discover, express, connect and make meaning out of the psychic stirrings and callings of "How I Am: Being Human."  My ultimate conviction is that every Potential, Relationship, Experience and Perception is symbolic of one's Self-respecting consciousness, ego, persona and personal unconscious in an ancient dance of atonement with the archetypal world of Internity.

And so I ask again, "How are you?"      johnmadowning@gmail.com                         

Self-respect

     I've written a lot about "How I Am: Being Human" but the essence of it all is encompassed by this idea: Self-respect is always and everywhere in the context of others and otherness.  "How" one tends to the complex tasks of Internity - the discoveries, expressions, connections and meanings of daily life - all reveal Self-respect.  The dependent, independent, interdependent and intra-dependent cycles of one's life each reflect realizations of Self-respect.  The healthy fostering of one's Potential physiology (survival needs), psychology (safety needs), sociology (belonging needs), mentality (fun and learning needs), emotionality (power needs) and spirituality (freedom needs) can only happen with Self-respect.  Intentional Relationship with one's genetics, family, community, peers, education, environment, temperament and calling is possible but only with Self-respect.  Original, sexual, imaginative and mortal Experiences contain the intensities of the heart's desire but can only be authentically honored and practiced with Self-respect.  Consciousness, Challenges, Choices and Changes can all be genuine and responsible acts of enlightened Perception but only through the lens of Self-respect.  To have, to feel, to act, to love, to speak and be heard, to see and to know all expose one's understanding and purposeful behaviors relative to Self-respect.  One's emotional integrity or disconnected opposition; one's empathetic or judgmental values and feelings; one's competent or overcompensating beliefs and thinking patterns; all display levels of Self-respecting awareness and guidance.  Both the awareness of, or dissociation from Self-respect present behavioral glimpses of one's interior story.  Self-respect, therefore, is a natural expansion of Internity - discoveries, expressions, connections and meanings - always and everywhere in the context of others and otherness - the "How I Am" of "Being Human."  So, I ask again...   

How are you?

    

     The Consciousness, Challenges, Choices and Changes of this question, "How are you?" live within the virtually infinite combinations of ego possibilities in the above diagram.  Self-evaluation is the main component and in the words of James Hillman, "The task is to find the gold in the volcano."  My main comment at this point is that each element can be considered singly but every element factors into and influences every other.  And as complex as all of that may be, keep in mind that there are no concrete answers - only clues to better questions regarding ego health.
     As vital as all the above realities are to healthy living within the world there are even deeper realities that reign within the divinity of "How I Am."  In my next posting I intend to address how "Being Human" gets more fascinating by looking specifically at the deeper psychological Self of the collective unconscious and its transformative Potentials, Relationships, Experiences and Perceptions.    

(Note: I don't have any directions on how to successfully respond to this blog.  I fail miserably when I try to respond to other blogs and when I do succeed I have no idea how.  If you wish to dialogue or comment or ask questions - which I think would be awesome - just e-mail me at: johnmadowning@gmail.com  Peace)

Common Sense

     Practically every day we are told to use common sense like it's the most valuable asset we have.  Yet, every day we also hear "there is no such thing as common sense anymore."  The "anymore" part is often added-on and implies that once upon a time there was more common sense than there is nowadays.  This, of course, is a perception and open to debate on multiple levels (consider that once upon a time it was common sense that the earth was flat).  Add to this the complication that what might be a common sense perception to one person or group or era seems absolutely crazy to another and vice-versa (consider that many people believe God is an elderly but muscly white man with white hair and beard in a white robe and a nasty mood who had a white son).  Or, what might be a common sense perception in one circumstance is carelessly stupid in another (think of speeding through town trying to get an injured child to the hospital versus speeding through town high on something like alcohol, amphetamines or godlike self-importance).  On one hand if enough people who have enough power support the merits of a belief or value then, regardless of its accuracy or consequences, whatever it is will be perceived and accepted as common behavior (think of racism).  On the other hand, sensible behavior is full of instantaneous transformations depending on the Potentials, Relationships, Experiences and resulting Perceptions of each individual story (think of Rosa Parks).  Add to all those circumstances the reality that whenever beliefs or values become common sense perceptions they are often blindly accepted as "just the way it is."  This chronic lack of examination always creates a slippery slope because it fails to serve both common and individual sensibilities (think of health care or the food pyramid).  It seems to me that the "common" element puts the individual into a constant relationship with otherness but the "sense" element originates in the moment with the interior formulations of the individual.  Common sense, therefore, exists as an untenable contradiction because common eventually leans toward biasing and obfuscating "sense" while the motivations of the individual eventually lean toward negating "common."
     These two words, "common" and "sense," though they can't logically be used together, are nevertheless both reliant on one essential quality: Self-respect.  Unfortunately, too many believe and value the societal norm that respect is achieved by creating some level of fear.  This belief is a prime example of how the common element biases and obfuscates individual sense.  The way I see it, Self-respect is impossible to attain by using fear as a tactic because fear causes emotional desperation.  And whenever there is emotional desperation one's original positive regard for relationship with Self and all otherness is poised to become withdrawn, manipulative, rebellious or dangerously compliant to the insidiousness of what's considered common and sensible.  These situations then mix together to cause one's ego-self (the daily interactions) and one's deeper psychological Self (character and calling) to become disconnected from and oppositional to each other.  This internal experience and relationship of disconnected opposition tends to create behaviors that are often perceived as "common" and "sensible" but at their core are emotionally desperate for Self-respect.
     I submit that disconnected opposition and the resulting emotional desperation is a painfully accurate description of common sense nowadays.  Without Self-respect the "common" is subject to become an undiscovered, unexplored, disconnected and meaningless waste of Potential (consider the violence of "screen time").  Without Self-respect the intuitive "sense" is no longer trusted making one subject to emotionally desperate and destructive belonging needs (think of suicide bombers, gangs and cults).  Those resulting behaviors are then judged by those wielding power as lacking "common sense."  This perspective then justifies further attacks on Self-respect in an unexamined and violent effort to change behavior and enforce respect (think of the rampant uses of punishment).  But that hypocritical approach is exactly what caused the emotionally desperate and destructive behavior in the first place!  Under the circumstances, it seems the most common and sensible effort we should all be making - as individuals, as families, as communities, states, nations and citizens of the world - is an intentional reexamination and resistance of the mindless contrivances known as common sense.

(Note: I haven't posted in a while because I've been busy working on other projects.)

Razing Children

     I think of Life and people with these ideas in mind: mythological Calling - biological birth - psychological birth - the Experience of being alive - biological death - psychological remains.  Each complex cycle of this human project is full of discovery, expression, connection and meaning, especially during childhood when emotions absorb and record every experience.  These core experiences characterize every element of one's personal life which then interacts with the otherness of life and creates Potential, Relationship, Experience and Perception.  All these individualized variations of this emotional human project - to have, to feel, to act, to love, to speak and be heard, to see and to know - begin during childhood.  In this way the generational oats we sow - i.e., the images, energies and emotions of children - symbolize the health of families, communities, nations and all the Earth.
     That being so, it is no longer possible for me to ignore how too many of the OATS we sow - Oppression, Addiction, Trauma and Shame - are negatively affecting the behaviors and emotions of "Being Human."  We know this negative affect is happening because we can see (if we learn how to name) and sense (if we still trust our instincts) the fear around us and within us.  After all, we live in a society of multi-leveled violence and this emotional state has, unfortunately, become the biggest influencing factor and most consistent personal response.  For example, the interior lives of too many are formed on barely "having" enough to get by; too many are merely medicating how they "feel;" too many believe punishment is the only "act" that gets results; billions believe "love" is about getting and doing instead of giving and being; billions more refuse to "speak" because they are convinced they won't be "heard" or fear they will; all of us are taught to judge and compete with who and what we "see" instead of understanding the interdependence of it all; and lots of us "know" years of formal and impressive information but are deeply ignorant of ourselves and the impact we are having on all of our exterior Relationships.  These fears result in personalized forms of withdrawal, manipulation, rebellion and shoulder-shrugging compliance.
     Such a state of affairs then creates an environment where too many wide-eyed children are vicariously living through media and technology, desensitized by sexual violence, their brains stimulated by flash-second imagery and instant access, their attempts at fulfillment conformed to pointless consumption and their imaginations disengaged from kinesthetic activity.  In effect, emotionally unhealthy children are now somewhat invisible because they are the accepted norm in society.  I say "somewhat invisible" because their purposeful behaviors are attempts to be seen.  As a society, however, we continue to "treat" the "symptoms" of unhealthy children (because there's a lot of money to be made) but we have yet to really see the new norm or name it for what it really is - the consequence of Oppression, Addiction, Trauma and Shame.
     Meanwhile, the always purposeful behaviors continue: obesity, bulimia and anorexia, attention deficit, hyperactivity, violence, promiscuity, loss of self-respect, "what's in it for me" attitudes, carelessness for the future, self-destructive devotions, emotional desperation, a general disdain for responsibility and an attraction to the anonymous and easily vicious behaviors afforded by group identity.  And yet it almost never fails that whenever the subject of "kids these days" comes up most grown-ups (as opposed to adults) absolve themselves of any responsibility for the situation.  They simply think and actually believe the solution is sowing more effective Oppression, causing more Trauma ("as long as you do it with love") and creating more Shame.  But dehumanizing individuals into submissive objects whose sole purpose then becomes avoiding the soul's purpose is at the core of what causes the various forms of Addiction, no matter whether the narcotic is alcohol, medication, the media, anarchy, political power or religious ideology!!  It's all wrong and it's all disastrous to the Relationships within us and around us.  The OATS we sow, these "four horsemen" - Oppression, Addiction, Trauma and Shame - have always and everywhere been the problem, not the solution.
     The solution is rooted in concepts of shared humanity - interdependence - throughout the generations (i.e., the physiological, psychological, social, mental, emotional and spiritual health of self and others).  In effect, "we don't so much build communities as we are already built into them.  Just by being here in the world our life is with others [and otherness]." (Hillman)  At this critical point in our shared story the Earth is demanding that we commit ourselves - as individuals, families, communities, nations and the Earth's consciousness - to raising fully awake and emotionally healthy human beings.  Of course, to begin this task we need to Change how we "have, feel, act, love, speak and hear, see and know."  Then and only then will we begin to create the emotional health necessary to stop the practice of razing children.
  

The Fear of God

"The world and the Gods are dead or alive 

according to the condition of our souls."  

(James Hillman)

  
     One of my earliest psychological births was in the mid-sixties at Catholic school.  I was formally taught to believe that God lived somewhere else and he was madder than hell at me for what a couple of my dubious ancestors did (something about not sharing apples).  As a child this dogmatic guilt by association, and my being "a sinner" because of it, didn't make much sense to me but it was a perpetual concern for the nuns and priests.  They often said, "God loves you" and "suffer the little children" but in reality some of them hated us "sinners" and were hell-bent on making us suffer.  To them the whole world was evil and the devil was three-and-a-half feet tall, had a bad haircut and wore a polyester sweater vest.  Too many of us imaginative and loving children took this abusiveness to heart and soul where the Potential of our world and the Gods began dying in agony.

     I still love learning but by the second grade I already had emotional reasons to be confused and hate school.  Fortunately, there were many adults in my life who weren't violent, even on school days when they found me hiding-out in the alley unable to verbalize my fear.  These adults practiced self-discipline and the Freedom of Responsibility so I trusted their love and loved them in return, even when they firmly held my hand and walked me to school where they mistakenly believed I belonged.  They didn't really know what was going-on other than hearing "his conduct is disruptive, he doesn't listen, he daydreams, he won't sit still, he teases the girls, he doesn't work up to his potential, he doodles pictures when he's supposed to be doing math" etcetera, ad nauseum.  (This report was actually saying, "From our perspective your son's main problem is that he's a child and a sinner and we're going to fix him good.")  It wasn't until many years later around the family table when the real stories of cruelty had their cynical telling.  The elders were confused and outraged but by then my ego was flooded with shame for instincts and distrust of my own Potential.  For almost three decades the condition of my soul drowned in the intoxicating hatred I fostered for the world and the Gods.  However, these experiences were also a "compare and contrast" push toward enlightenment.  To this day I thank the fates for sending me home from school to many loving and Responsible adults who used religion to guide instead of justify their behavior.  I can well imagine the shame in the hearts and minds of those children who experienced psychological fear and cruelty at home as well as school and to this day still think they deserved it.

     Enlightenment and healthy psychological birth are cyclical experiences of naming the world, intentionally holding one's Internity up to the light of solemn examination.  The purpose is to make some meaning out of it all.  And many psychological births later I now have empathy for those nuns and priests who were vicious.  I suspect they were systematically and maybe even ritually scared and hurt during their formative years.  There's no other way to explain how the condition of their rigid souls could have become so fearfully nailed to the crosses of their own neurotic dogmas.  They must have been scared to death of us children because as children they had been scared to death.  I now understand their behavior for what it was: projections of, and overcompensations for, their own unexamined fears being presented in the black and white costume of religion. 

     Righteously scaring and hurting children has been a terrible idea for too many centuries.  Throughout history and all around the world today - within individuals, families, communities and nations - the evidence of this common practice is found in atrocious acts of all kinds and all dogmas.  I am convinced that whenever people claim to know "God's will" they are actually revealing the unexamined, mean-spirited conditioning of their own damaged egos and dying souls.  The natural condition of a child's soul, on the other hand, allows for the whole world and all the Gods to be inspirational and alive.  To meet this truth with sanctioned cruelty has always been and will always be a fundamental act of terrorism against the psychological birth of the world and the Gods.