From: Randall Randall (randall@randallsquared.com)
Date: Sat Jul 05 2003 - 19:35:22 MDT
On Saturday, July 5, 2003, at 08:50 PM, Lee Corbin wrote:
>
> Here is a true disconnect: I, as a committed non-rebel, cannot
> grok how when there is nothing important at stake, people can
> be so stubborn?
Oh, but there *is* something very important at stake: who you
are. If you force a person to repeat something over and over,
most will eventually come to believe it. All you have to do
is force someone to repeat, every day, that they deserved any
punishment that you mete out, to turn them into someone who
really believes that on some level. I'm 30, and I haven't
yet been able to completely throw off the deep belief that I
am not deserving of success, ingrained in me by years of being
forced to repeat after my parent that I was not deserving of
good grades, etc, since I hadn't done enough work.
I know, intellectually, that I'm capable, but there's something
very deep in me that is only satisfied if I'm very far from the
goal, and makes actually finishing any project harder than stopping
just shy of success. I often "come to" saying "What the hell am I
doing?" when I find myself playing a video game for hours on end
when I would otherwise have finished a weeks-long project that day.
This sort of programming can screw up your entire life.
> When an abusive, arrogant, stupid cop pulls
> me over in some case where obviously he's out for some entertainment,
> I do not resist: I let him write his ticket, and say what needs to
> be said to get myself out of the stupid situation. But I do *not*
> back down when principles are involved, as in a recent flare up on
> this very list (in some situations, I do not seem to be able to
> back down even when it would be prudent).
There's a difference between a minor inconvenience from someone who
fancies themselves in authority, and the horror of having that person
insist that you tell them that you believe that they are right, day
after day, for years. Eventually, you'll really agree that they're
right. You may think that you could resist that indefinitely, and
you might be right, but children are, by nature, far more malleable
than you are.
-- Randall Randall <randall@randallsquared.com> "Not only can money buy happiness, it isn't even particularly expensive any more." -- Spike Jones
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