Relational Paradox

One key to understanding life’s paradoxes is to see how “First-Person Experience” is different from “Second-Person Experience” in relationships.

For example, if you, in the First Person, genuinely don’t care about “getting respect” from others, then mature people, in the Second Person, will actually respect you more. But if you, in First Person, seek and strive to “get respect” from others, then mature people will lose respect for you in the Second-Person.

If you, in your First Person experience, genuinely humble yourself with no agenda within your social group, mature people will delight and want to lift you up in their Second Person experience of your self-humbling. But the moment you, in First Person, strive to lift yourself up above others in your social group, mature people, experiencing that in Second Person, would rather you to be humbled.

If you, in First Person, choose to be appropriately vulnerable in a safe setting, mature people will delight in how courageous you are in their Second-Person Experience of your vulnerability. But if you, in First Person, choose to be inappropriately invulnerable in a safe setting, mature Second Person observers will see how fearful you actually are.

Self-Flattery Gives Others Power Over You

When you idolize yourself, you have an image of yourself that is perfect. You become attached to that glowing, shiny image of yourself. When this happens, the slightest remark from someone that challenges that image torpedoes your nervous system. Hence, you end up giving immense, superhuman power to other people’s slight remarks. They end up having superhuman punching power on you. Ironically, idolizing yourself ends up giving power to the words of others over you.

Eternal Flow. You Know You Want It.

Only eternal flow will satisfy your soul. And an eternal God can provide it. But you have a part to play.

In order to feel this type of flow pumping and coursing through you, your whole mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical being must be immersed. Here, you’re met with a meaningful challenge that’s much bigger than yourself. With assistance from another realm, you push the boundaries of your uniquely developed gifts to match the challenge with an energizing momentum. Lightning from another world strikes the water of your efforts, producing liquid electricity. You feel intriguing paradoxes like being part of a movement that is both effortful and effortless at the same time. Your soul is fully concentrated while your mind is relaxed. You feel like you’re in control while your next actions are “automatic” with a “life of their own”. Time feels fast and slow like The Flash’s slow-mo. “Everything clicks” while you’re at one with the environment. That’s why your facial muscles smile on their own. For reasons you don’t fully understand, the deepest parts of you breathe the conviction “this is what I was meant for”.

Comfortable, lazy, and undisciplined people will never experience this. This is one of many reasons why complacency leads to soul-gnawing misery.

Discernment Training

Word archery keeps your soul discernment sharp. Only a direct, precise hit will pin the unconscious assumption. If your articulation is off, just a little bit, resonance deflects and the soul won’t feel a bullseye.

***Archer pins one assumption behind a mundane coping mechanism***

Seems easy? That was the warm up.

***Raw defense mechanism unleashed with multiple hidden assumptions activated***

***Archer trainee stunned***

The discernment armoury. Specialty Questions. Each one has a specific purpose.

What does this one do? 

Dream Symbolism Questions - bridge the conscious with the unconscious (e.g. “What is the most vivid image in the dream?” “What does [dream symbol x] represent to you?”) 

Emotional Time Traveling Questions - connect present day triggering to past significant events (e.g. “When you feel [disproportionate emotion], who else from your past is in the room?” “What message would you emphasize to your kids? Did you hear [that message] enough from your parents?”)

Meta Motivation Questions - expose the unconscious/shadow motivation pulling strings of conscious thoughts (e.g. “Do you want God to exist?” “If you could mind control [person x], what thoughts and feelings about you would you want them to have?”)

These questions are tools. If you rely on them too much, they become crutches. Then why use them? To potentially avoid 20 sessions of psychoanalysis chasing red herrings.

Weakness vs Vulnerability

 There is a difference between weakness and vulnerability. Vulnerability acknowledges one of many sides to your paradoxical and multidimensional self is tender and hurtable. Acknowledging this makes you human. Denying or disavowing it makes you unhuman. This understanding of vulnerability can coexist with courage. For it takes a lot more courage to fully reveal who you are and no courage to not reveal who you are. On the other hand, weakness has a very one-dimensional view of “a lack of strength”. It simplistically defines itself as the opposite of invulnerability. This leads to a very one-dimensional view of oneself, others, and the world. And it leads to an unhuman experience of life. And it takes away the kind of courage that coexists with vulnerability.