The Empirical Manifesto

I struggle. There is so much still I want to say; to experience. Info-dumping is one of my ADHD-fueled traits and I must be aware of it - attuned to those around me. Dialogue is not effective without the sender and receiver both on the same frequency of communication styles. The process can be arduous but wholly fulfilling once reached. At the same time I am fighting a measured, internal conflict of ensuring everyone's needs are always met - including my own - while attempting to adjust for psychology and the linear construct of time while operating in a veritable vacuum. I am heavily influenced through data gained via empirical evidence and input. When there is none to be had (or it is slow coming), my fallback is to rely upon my own past experiences adjusted for any present variables in the given scenario. It would probably be easier if I were kinder to myself in this regard, but in an information blackout, I often feel helpless.

Which is where my acknowledgment and acceptance of timing comes into play - I have absolutely been there myself so I understand the rapidly changing emotional storm and what is required to quieten it. Loosely, time itself. In other words the thing I most desire, if returned too quickly would be suspect given my knowledge of these things and I've experienced firsthand the damage that can cause when you're completely unaware of it. Likely easier for those who are not datapoint-driven! Push too hard and lose everything. Don't push enough - same result? I don't know. It's a balancing act. The Middle Path would be easier without chemically-induced synapses firing far too often.

The contradiction for me personally, is my seemingly limitless capacity of patience. Which is a godsend. But I seem to require data to process in order to maintain it. As long as the data is coming in, I find it easy to adjust. Without it, I am lost. I mean, to a point. I do understand this is a situation of my own creation and impacts more than just myself in a myriad of ways, some of which I am probably not even aware. I look forward to meeting those challenges with aplomb, I do. But its difficult to prepare for that which you're unaware, which is where stoicism seems to help - reminding myself I can only change my own attitude and reactions, and must be ready at all times to accept any eventual conclusions.

Thankfully no outcome will mar who am I, or how I behave. I will always be my friendly, loving, gregarious self no matter what. Perhaps in a modified guise until that too becomes the norm. Thus is life <3

I don't embarrass myself often, but this one was an absolute doozy. You see, I fell head-over-heels in love with my wife's best friend.

While it's true my wife would often joke of "grooming" her friend as our Sister Wife, it was (almost) always tongue-in-cheek. When we finally made it down for a week-long visit, I admitted to her BFF I was infatuated with her - but nothing more. And honestly, I had no idea I could fall this hard in love a mere two days later. Yet that's exactly what happened. Like I said, embarrassing.

And now, at 50-years old, my bloodstream is flooded with the entire cocktail of chemical imbalance one would expect from a post-pubescent lovesick teenager. It is absolutely infuriating that I can (mostly) identify all these discrete emotions and their subsequent chemical excretions messing with my otherwise optimally developed brain while simultaneously being held captive by them - there is nothing I can say, do, or think, to get them to subside. It's been a week now with no signs of slowing.

Honestly, all this would be awesome if the timing were right, but it is absolutely not - by any stretch of the imagination - which leads me to make all the proper logical moves to ensure a best-scenario outcome for everyone involved (including myself). The only problem? Brain chemistry doesn't appreciate logic which runs contrary to emotion. Thus the brain starts dumping even more chemicals directly into my blood to regulate as what it sees as balance, restarting the cycle. My brain is literally holding me hostage.

My wife on the other hand is loving all the residual NRE washing over her in waves. The three of us went to dinner together one evening and afterward she stated it felt like a double-date. This hostage situation is benefiting her in ways she struggles to condemn. Want to know what she put in my head tonight? She's now downright giddy for me to sleep with her BFF and described it to me in such painstaking detail - and why she wishes this - I now have new and different chemicals pumping through me! Surely there's a ratio limit which will be reached at some point to trigger a failsafe in my kidneys to start filtering all of this out of my body.

I have decided, at the very least, that the knowledge all of this is still functioning properly is a good indicator I haven't actually been in love since I met my wife, or when our relationship modified four years later to such an extent we both experienced another bout of NRE. So yeah, I guess I've got that going for me.

Stay tuned, as it was my wife who suggested that "blogging" might help me cope. Yay.

Change isn't nearly as funny as people are about change. "I knew that would happen," they say when something unfolds as they predicted, as if imbued with magical gifts of precognition they call, "common sense." What is fascinating is what they say when they're wrong. Nothing. Unless pushed. Then excuses. Never ever a change to their rigid paradigms which may require updating.

My own predictions are made with far fewer inflexibilities. Not because I'm smarter than anyone else. On the contrary, I seem to shoot about average on predictions, as do the majority of us. Mostly because I'll make a guess and then sit back to see what I've learned in its unfolding. Even if I have a dog in the fight, I can learn from either outcome. Unlike those with "common" sense, I often fail to account for irrational, inapplicable results. And then, because they are irrational, and shouldn't seemingly apply to each and every scenario, I'm often surprised by them again. My bad. One can certainly anticipate an outcome which benefits them, but should not expect it. That would be short-sighted and successively problematic.

Our own ideas about things are often based on too little information. Which is why I cringe when nearly anyone suggests they have the answer to complex social issues. Here's an rather comprehensive chart on money. Just one aspect of multiple interrelated and equally complex systems that have to function together to properly work. And yet I hear advice all the time from coworkers and pizza delivery professionals both who "know" the answer to the worlds problems. Sadly, they fail to take into consideration that other people might feel differently than they do. The only thing I know for certain is that I can't grasp every thread of every relational system. Also, just because I may disagree with with something doesn't mean I think it's wrong or that it won't work. I even get accused of being "too complex" when I raise the point.

Election Day I saw a political advertisement where Obama concluded his ideas for a prosperous nation with the statement, "...and ask the rich to pay a little bit more." I'd quipped on a friends blog that the sentiment sounded great! However, Obama and I disagree on what is considered "rich" and our definition of "a little more." For my 2013 benefits election my employer moved to a "salary based" cost-structure in which my healthcare costs doubled.

Which brings me to disbelief. When facing a situation, "I can't believe this is happening" is not an acceptable answer for a workable solution. Furthermore, why not? We are each responsible for maintaining a general understanding of causality and the role we play in it, or at least the recognition that we could all be faced with situations in which we were not prepared. It would be foolish to coast through life thinking things would never change. The fact that we weren't expecting it is not a sustainable end-game when repeated ad nauseum. Personally, I can believe a whole lot of things, though I usually want to know why - the motivation and intent. That said, everyone copes.

I don't know what's going to happen with my benefits next year, next election, or what the general face of healthcare is going to look like in a decade. As long as I'm employed, I'll consider it a win. Besides, I'm well aware that something far more consuming than healthcare could become a new priority that we'll have to face and adjust for.

As for me, I'm not making any predictions.

When you're deprived of all freedom...you still have the most important freedom of all, which no one can take away from you: that is the freedom to choose what kind of person you want to be.
― Ingrid Betancourt

Having discussed Tony Robbins "Personality Needs" in HEXAREQUISITE, its time to address the last two, what he calls Needs of the Spirit. I don't put much stock into that voodoo that you do and I roll my eyes at the new age passivity of the public face of peace. I marvel openly at those who practice both individual spirituality and organizational religion - as well at those who do not, and I giggle to myself when anyone attempts to instruct me on their polar vies of politics much as an armchair quarterback confidently critiques a televised billion-dollar glamour industry play in four-quarters. I am gentle with my children when they need me to be and hard on them when required. Knowing that many different people do many different things for many different reasons isn't enough. Knowing why unlocks compassion. The "golden-rule" is flawed, but its a fantastic starting point. Sociology isn't in the knowing that cultures differs, its in endeavoring to know why. Only through knowledge can we begin to understand not only ourselves, but others - and this solves a whole host of both existing, and potential problems.

NEEDS OF THE SPIRIT - unlike personality needs, which we all find a way to fulfill in one form or another, while essential to human fulfillment, not everyone finds a a way to satisfy these, although they are necessary for lasting fulfillment:

1. GROWTH:
   The first one is growth, which is one of the most powerful needs. Simply said, if you are not growing you are dying. Unused muscles and neurons, atrophy; unused knowledge and skills, forgotten. If you help others to be fulfilled, you will be fulfilled. Friedman (2005) observes:
   

   
   “When you have a pathway to be The Man or The Woman, you tend to focus on the path and on achieving your dreams. When you have no pathway, you tend to focus on your wrath and on nursing your memories.”
   

   
   Yet, it is also true that with reflection — the analytical examination of our memories, we can choose the right pathway to fulfilling our dreams, otherwise we could only be repeating the same mistakes we made, never really learning the lessons we ought to have learned. Problems, adversities and challenges make us grow strong, but it is the decisions we make that are the bedrock of our own individuality. It makes us, who we are!^*
   


2. CONTRIBUTION:
   Robbins’ second primary need is the need for contribution. Often, we will do more for other people than what we will do for ourselves. To meet this need on a higher level we need to be willing to consistently give to others that which you wish to receive. A possible rewording of The Golden Rule: do unto others what you like others do unto you? Thus, to have a rewarding life, we need to go from being “culturally successful”, to being fulfilled. To help others when and while we can is even more rewarding than helping ourselves to fulfill own desires, wishes and dreams while trampling the humanity of others.^*

When our needs for love, growth and contribution are satisfied, they tend to encompass all our other needs. When we focus on something beyond ourselves, most of our problems and sources of pain become less significant. Contribution is the human need that effectively regulates your other five needs - If you are focused on contributing to others, you have the certainty of being able to contribute (there is always a way); you have variety (contribution is highly interactive); you have significance because you know you are helping others and improving their lives; the spiritual bond created when you help others gives you a deep sense of connection; and you grow by creatively helping others.^*

It would seem that while the entire population of the earth is understandably at different levels of needs, in order to have a fulfilling, intimate relationship with someone - mutual understanding - it is imperative that the parties involved understand and acknowledge their own levels of need. Someone who's priorities are meeting personality needs will be unable to reach intimacy with someone who's goals are fulfilling needs of the spirit. Not necessarily incompatible, but as we learned about personal values this is reflected in behavior and when individuals engaged in relationships are striving for dissimilar needs, obvious conflict would deny each party fulfillment of their own needs and render them unable to meet the needs of the other.

This is not wrong, simply problematic. Seek relationships with those who's needs mirror your own, otherwise fulfillment - a rewarding life - will never be met. This is not to say that we need to strive to find people who believe everything we do and only agree with our beliefs, rather finding people who have a desire to pursue growth and contribution no matter ideologies over the pursuit of tangible goods or self-serving personality needs.

As Tony Robbins himself infers, not everyone will ascend to fulfillment because "People at the lower levels of moral reasoning tend to come up with simplistic solutions. When these solutions don't work or backfire, they become baffled.^* Given that intimate relationships are based on the mutual cooperation and understanding to equally fulfill all needs of self and all needs of others, someone in a "mixed" relationship who pursues personality needs may be incapable of balancing their own needs along with the needs of others, one of the earmarks of post-conventional values.

It is very hard to get to this level if a persons values the other human needs before contribution. Again paradoxically the easiest way to fulfill all the human needs in a positive way is to focus on the needs of the spirit first. By valuing these needs the highest you will experience love because you will be in a state of love...which will elicit the experience of love for others. There will be great variety as this is what is required of growth and you will feel significant because you are contributing, having a positive influence on those around you.^*

It all comes back to intrinsic motivation. Those of us who eschew material pursuits do so because we do not require them to make us happy - our happiness comes from who we are and out ability to positively illicit conflict resolution through a genuine understanding of ourselves, our needs, and understanding and meeting the needs of others - though I cannot resolve meeting the needs of those who's primary goal is solely having either their needs met (pre-conventional values) or only meeting my needs (conventional values). It conflicts with the symmetry and balance of post-conventional values.

If a person doesn’t value growth highly enough then the motivation won’t be there to go through the necessary challenges that come along with the journey in the new direction. When a person refuses to meet the challenges of life they develop what are called safe problems. These are lingering issues that lie within a persons control to change...They are called safe because they stop having to deal with the quality problems that require growth.

The reason why growth is often experienced as painful is because it flushes up all the old conditioning from childhood that is buried in the subconscious. This is exactly why growth is so important for a happy life because by flushing up these old, outdated patterns and beliefs they can be cleared from the mind which allows the life energy to flow freer within a persons energy system. Having access to the energy of life puts a person in a different state, a state where problems are challenges which can be solved easily and creatively.^*

In revisiting why defining values is so very important, I turned to Steve Pavlina's dissertation where he explains, "The ultimate goal of living your values is to eventually bring them into alignment with universal principles. As you experience living with different sets of values, you'll learn what's truly important to you. Your values are your current estimations of truth. They represent your answer to the question of how to live. Some sets of values will fail to produce the results you want. They may leave you feeling restless and unfulfilled. Other sets of values bring you closer to a feeling of congruence. When you act with integrity to values that are themselves aligned with universal principles, you get the best possible results."

Who EVER wants to settle for "restless and unfulfilled?" We all strive for "the best possible results." To that end I took a second look at his list of 413 values and attempted to craft my own personalized prioritization of values:

Transcendence
Curiosity
Symmetry
Knowledge
Open-mindedness

For me, these feed into each other, and through them I will gain accesses into other equally important endeavors, such as the welfare of my children. In my mind, I would be unable to focus effectively upon their welfare without first employing the above five. Ensuring their needs were met without also meeting my own would be doing them a disservice. Open-mindedness is required to absorb knowledge, knowledge assists in balance (symmetry) through which I discover by way of my insatiable curiosity: Transcendence, the ability to overcome these human trappings and become more than I am - to instruct my children in the very tangible lessons of happiness and positivity through personal development.

Personal Development^*

• improving self-awareness


• improving self-knowledge


• building or renewing identity


• developing strengths or talents


• improving wealth


• spiritual development


• identifying or improving potential


• building employability or human capital


• enhancing lifestyle or the quality of life


• improving health


• fulfilling aspirations


• initiating a life enterprise or personal autonomy


• defining and executing personal development plans


• improving social abilities

What is in your list? Perhaps more importantly, why? Are you waiting for it to happen to you, or are you fighting for it - joyously seeking it every moment of every day?

Live life fully while you’re here. Experience everything. Take care of yourself and your friends. Have fun, be crazy, be weird. Go out and screw up! You’re going to anyway, so you might as well enjoy the process. Take the opportunity to learn from your mistakes: find the cause of your problem and eliminate it. Don’t try to be perfect; just be an excellent example of being human. ~Tony Robbins^*

I recently watched Guy Richie's Sherlock Holmes and its magnificent sequel, and will admit to being downright smitten with the intimate relationship Holmes and Watson share in this particular interpretation - what is it in the psychology behind the homosociality of bromance buddy-films that endears us to them?

Imagine observing two house painters whose brushstrokes seemed to be playing out a duet on the side of the house. They may be shocked to think that they were engaged in an intimate activity with each other, however from an experiential point of view, they would be very intimately involved.^*

Nancy Sherman's [philosophy professor and author] elucidation on Aristotle's intimate nature of friendship helps define the importance of the empathetic "singleness of mind" for a truly intimate relationship - through sharing in argument and in thought. Not just thinking alike, but arriving at similar conclusions through similar processes:

The point is that the friends “share” a conception of values not merely in that there is significant overlap between the values of the one friend and those of the other, and not merely in that this overlap is maintained through the influence that the friends have on each other. Rather, the values are shared in the sense that they are most fundamentally their values, at which they jointly arrive by deliberating together.[Friends have] the project of a shared conception of eudaimonia [i.e., of how best to live]. Through mutual decisions about specific practical matters, friends begin to express that shared commitment. Any happiness or disappointment that follows from these actions belongs to both persons, for the decision to so act was joint and the responsibility is thus shared.^*

It wasn't just the antics Holmes and Watson found themselves embroiled in, nor was it their inherent trust in each other to play to their strengths - it was their attitude in the acknowledgement that the relationship existed; something I used to endeavor to understand about myself and my friends when I was younger, even up to a decade ago - most recently the relationship I had with my hetero-lifemate drax0r which I now understand to have also been a very intimate one by the many and varied definitions of both intimacy, and friendship.

So just what are some of those definitions of intimacy? As already mentioned there is experiential intimacy - a sharing of activities without communicating thoughts or feelings - but being actively engaged with one another nonetheless; unique in the choice with whom we choose to share these activities with, and for what reason. Emotional intimacy is where two or more people can comfortably share their feelings with and/or empathize with each other much as intellectual (cognitive) intimacy is an exchange of thoughts and ideas enjoying similarities and differences between opinions. Both emotional and intellectual intimacy are separated from casual conversations/relationships by a level of comfort in that communication which allows for trust building, introducing vulnerability.

The meaning and level of intimacy varies within and between relationships. Intimacy is considered the product of a successful...process of rapport building that enables parties to confidently disclose previously hidden thoughts and feelings. Intimate conversations become the basis for "confidences" (secret knowledge) that bind people together.^*

In short, without first exposing oneself wholly (vulnerability) and without opaque motivation (transparency) and having it returned (reciprocity), intimacy will never be experienced. Ever. No matter how much sex takes place - the lowest common denominator of one possible intimacy which most people confuse as the physical act of penetrative intercourse itself. We all want our cake, and want to eat it too.

Sex is the icing on the cake. Intimacy is the cake.^*

My first post on intimacy postulated that dialog, transparency, vulnerability & reciprocity would take on different characteristics upon each level toward self-actualization; transparency behind communication during periods in which someone is fearing for their life would differ from those trying to win the respect of their peers, for example. In comparison, this thesis will be on defining the different levels of intimacy, and attempting to structure an order behind them so we can discover why a foundation is so very important to growth and what that growth looks like once it reaches maturation. To that end, I've manifested a illustrative graphic:



Network giant CISCO's Get Intimate at Work presentation uses a common intimacy pyramid to convey how to build trust in a client relationship from a business perspective, but the steps they outline to get there are all the same. In order to advance through the levels, we must first have an authentic foundation. But what is authenticity and how do we identify it? The answer to that was surprisingly found in the periodical Shambhala Sun concerning the nature of being truly genuine:

To be genuine you have to be honest with yourself first, and then with others. Don't make anything up. Just do it. Just be it. Its's pretty straightforward. But being honest with yourself is is not so easy. There's a little think called self-deception that gets in the way.^*

Starting at the top, reciprocity is giving and taking selfishly and selflessly - a [mutually beneficial] cycle of Randian ethics; abject communication without repercussion - having individual needs fulfilled while fulfilling the needs of others. Needs cannot be met without exposing one's self to another. To be vulnerable we must be willing to place ourselves in harms way, to acknowledge the potential to be hurt. And this takes mature amounts of emotional fortitude and personal responsibility. This is the same mindset which must also occur at the lowest level - likes, interests & sex. If we cannot be genuine and open at the lowest levels, we will never even reach the higher levels. All pyramids of ascending aspirations work on this principle.

Over time, we deny our needs and replace them with defenses. Then when someone values us, we have to reject him or her. To let ourselves be cherished for who we really are would be to violate our parents' edict that we are flawed, and to arouse our fear that if we do, feel, or think certain things, we'll be neglected and abandoned—in the most primal sense, left to die. So to receive love is to risk death.^*

But in attempting to articulate how very unlikely it is the majority of us can honestly self-evaluate, I ran across an interesting psychoanalytical term, alexithymia - a state of deficiency in understanding, processing, or describing emotions. So while the majority of us probably succumb to some degree of self-deception unconsciously, therefore preventing us to be honest even with ourselves - others of us aren't even capable of comprehending our own emotions to evaluate. We must at all times be mindful of what we are feeling.

To end self-rejection, you have to learn to love in another what you hate in yourself.^*

Honesty about our likes, dislikes, interests and yes, sex is all about laying a foundation of authenticity, something from which to build on. Its what makes the next level, expressing personal goals and aspirations so fulfilling - genuine interest in each other - a test of compatibility and genuineness. While rejection can come from any level of the pyramid, trust (intimacy) ascends with it, in essence a self-strengthening process, bolstered by honesty of the previous success and anticipation of the next. Fears & challenges then is the first introduction to vulnerability, albeit on a much safer scale. Its the baby-step of climbing the intimacy ladder - topple this and trust topples with it. Yet succeed, and dialog - true back and forth exchange of ideas and information - becomes possible. What are you going to discuss?



Dialog however, is merely the gateway to the transcendent meta-intimacies. That said, I have attempted to structure them to aid in comprehension. Transparency is a complete accountability of self and declaration of motivation - its the "why" behind the facilitation of dialog. Revealing incentive is the first step to vulnerability because it exposes us to criticism. That exposure - even prior to feedback - builds trust, inherent to intimacy. If being transparent is accepted with genuine honesty, full-on vulnerability is a natural progression. I define vulnerability as allowing the true me to be unabashedly judged. For those who can push through the self-deception and self-rejection, for those who can honestly self-evaluate - that's an enormous step. But only by empowering someone else with that knowledge are we truly vulnerable.

When we start shading what we say to keep our relationship calm, we destroy intimacy and desire and diminish our sense of security and self-worth.^*

Like every other character-building ground we may gain, it will absolutely require continual, aggressive reevaluation without provocation as a matter of preventative maintenance. Never hitch self-worth to that which can be given or taken away. Those who cannot bear to be judged should never open themselves up for judgement. But for those who can withstand judgement, the gifts are immeasurable.

The highest values [in life] are not learned, they are discovered.^*