kroeran wrote:
Montana wrote:
<Hands on hips/> What I really want, of course, is a protocol of simple solutions that will work on every occasion, that's all~ </hands>
Montana
maybe try to get to the bottom of the motivation on each side. For example, two brothers I know are not on speaking terms. I could get involved, but I think one of them is using the dispute to create separation from his much more successful younger brother, and I see why he needs to do that, especially as he also has the ego pressure of a more "successful" wife, who I do not believe is handling the situation sensitively, which is a challenge for an "old school" male. So, sometimes disputes of separation are actually profitable, as he already has an unprofitable stress load in his life. So I let it be.
Disputes of engagement (rather than separation) are generally about property of some kind. Rather than retreat, two FWAUs get locked in an interactive conflict dynamic. These disputes can be parsed into petty disputes, and materially existential disputes. The economics of petty disputes strongly suggest turning the other cheek, giving the man your cloak who asks for it, forgiving social loans and minor property line offenses.
Then there is the job of selling this frontal cortex thinking to the person you are trying to help ...that the dispute is not worth the emotional cost, and that they should bury the hatchet if in a forced situation of interaction (collegues) and or retreat to unfriendly separation if possible, apart from the question of you personally having any credibility with the target helpee. Humour/silliness of course is a tool to manipulate their mental state toward profitability and to interrupt an egoic/entropic pattern.
The target may form the Intent to dissipate the dispute, but not know how to go about doing this. One trick I learned with my wife was "pretending that nothing happened". Shortly following a dispute, within a tense emotional climate, I would simply pretend nothing happened, by saying something like "should we start a grocery list". This is something you could propose to a target. They could simply start interacting with the other disputer, as if a dispute was not taking place. A more extreme action would be to drop off a case of beer as a peace offering.
The higher message is that one's decision space in PMR is dramatically impacted by the proverbial "who you know"...and from a purely PMR selfish point of view, other FWAUs in your friend/acquaintenceship network are far too valuable to waste on petty disputes of property, political views or perceived social offenses. This is normally a concept bridge too far.
The Preppy Handbook, possibly the most important book of the 20th century (MBTOE was published to launch the 21st century), goes into how a preppy handles a situation of conflict, vs a non-preppy. The example is a car fender bender. The non-preppy perceives the fender bender as a great personal offense, and there is much yelling and gestulating. The Preppy sees the event as a networking opportunity, and the other car owner becomes a friend and business contact. This illustrates why Preppies rule your town and the planet.
If someone is stealing your house or retirement fund, it becomes more clouded, but for those not yet syntropically perfect, you hire a lawyer or call the cops, but maybe moving a little slower and reluctantly than a high entropy dude.
A rarer but intriguing scenario is the asymmetric situation of the naive victim and the effective sociopath. This involves releasing the dogs of war on the sociopath, something a lower entropy advisory FWAU is not normally skilled at (remember "The Equalizer" TV show?), and the naive victim is completely incompetent at, or most often, a strategic retreat is called for - eating the loss and swallowing your pride, and creating an unfriendly great distance from the sociopath, not even making eye contact. Personally, I think it might be fun to establish a tribe of highly effective, low entropy equalizers. At the macro scale, I see America as this role.
The role of peacemaker is deeply tied to Judeo-Christian teaching and values and should be explicitly adopted by TOEism. One of course can take courses in dispute resolution and actually make a profession out of this. One tool for figuring out the profession you should be in is to ask yourself, what do I impulsively give away for free, and can I figure out how to pay the rent by doing it.
One problem however is that these sorts of professions don't pay very well, so I normally recommend being the best brick layer you can be, working your way up to honest brick layer contractor (with no socialist guilt), and then continuing to give away the other stuff for free, following the convenient example of our dutch uncle.
I said SIMPLE solutions!!!! :-) Of course, I was being self-mocking.
"maybe try to get to the bottom of the motivation on each side." That's certainly seems like it ought to be a part of it. But, you know, when you look into it, with a poorly integrated personality, many of the features of which have been formed in reaction to ugly circumstances / environment in which the personality was originally formed, the attribution of motivation gets to become applied to a complex set of features each with their own history, vision, and future. That becomes less abstract and more graspable if we take a metaphoric snapshot of some social group... oh, say, 'The Catholic Church (the membership as well as the administration) or a political party, or the local PTA: One can
sort of attribute motivation to the aims and activities of these groups as such, but just beneath the surface are either various subgroups or individuals each with its own aim and direction (and clarity or lack thereof).
..... and when you really look into it, the song in the center of all the various beings and levels of being might be said to be "I'm just trying to incarnate!" ... or, as often as not "I'm just trying to incarnate,
gahdammit!"
The Preppy sees the event as a networking opportunity, and the other car owner becomes a friend and business contact. This illustrates why Preppies rule your town and the planet. I like the idea, of course, but data from the real world seems to conflict with this last statement. Practically speaking, waving a wand and getting people to drop out of unproductive trance-states and stop 'running old tapes' and focusing on central existential issue ("Where am I now, and where do I want to go?") is still beyond my skill set. Think of battered, bruised, shredded egos hatched out of crusty archaic belief systems, a sense of real self esteem so withered as to feel alien should it begin to operate ... and well, imagine if it was YOUR kid: that's what it feels like, for me, albeit without any of the patronizing conception or tone that might easily occur with being the actual physical parent.
you hire a lawyer or call the cops,
Generally, these last resort tactics are an indicator that what has been being done has failed. At any rate, for many applications, these systems have lost most or all of whatever efficacy they ever had.
"This involves releasing the dogs of war on the sociopath," Apparently,
some sociopaths are people too. Labeling and treating them as 'the enemy' or some form of toxicity further marginalizes them. It (marginalization) may of course be necessary to preserve the integrity of other beings. Still, it means effectively acting as brutish as they do. And one prefers
not to go there:
NOT because one supposes ones' self to be above that sort of thing, too evolved etc etc, but because it is
horrible to do so.
At the macro scale, I see America as this role. This
may have been somewhat true at one time (depends greatly on whose history you are reading). However, America, whatever it was, is over. The Rubicon is crossed, the rule of law prevails only in some areas and times, Corporatia has effectively seized control of all essential operations, and presto! .... we are effectively once again dealing with the issue set that faced 'the people' and 'the ruling royalty' of several centuries ago. Some (royalty) are benign, others vicious. But it really is the case that humanity is once again at the level, politically, that it was centuries ago. I should make clear that that is my conclusion: I don't wish to 'make others believe it'.
...and should be explicitly adopted by TOEism... I suspect that 'helping one another' in all its various forms is as natural, more so, really, than space itself.
I guess you could say that it all comes down to the question "Where might I best be doing my advocating, if any advocation is to be done at all?"
Montana
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