Unconditional or Conditional?

منگر اندر ما، مکن در ما نظر ... اندر اکرام و سخای خود نگر
- مولوی

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طفل را گر نان دهی بر جای شیر ... طفل مسکین را از نان، مرده گیر
چون که دندانها برآرد بعد از آن ... هم به خود، طالب شود آن طفل نان
مرغ پر نارسته چون پران شود ... لقمه هر گربه دران شود
چون برارد پر، بپرد او به خود ... بی تکلف، بی صفیر نیک و بد
- مولوی

یکی‌ را که خواهی‌ نماییش مهر ... بزرگیش جز پایه پایه منه
اگر بی‌ حسابش بزرگی‌ دهی‌ ... نه‌ ارج تو دارد نه‌ قدر مهی
- فردوسی

Persevere or Revenge?

Imagine a person who is truly faithful to her partner and being faithful is a core value in her belief system. However, her partner turns out to be cheating on her. Three scenarios are imaginable for this person who’s been hurt by being cheated on:

1. Witnessed and experienced the pain that occurs to a cheated partner, this person discovers being faithful more valuable than even before. Therefore, she not only perseveres being faithful, but also puts it into action more rigorously and responsibly. This scenario requires this person to have high personal integrity and act consciously.

2. The pain of being cheated on is so deep and intense that this person finds revenge as the only way to overcome the pain. When the cheating partner is not accessible, this person replicates the cheating on her next partner to ease the pain on herself by feeling “even” inside.

3. The third scenario is the extreme case of the second one. In this case, the pain is so severe that the person urges to protect herself from any sort of such pains in the future. Not to go through the pain of being cheated again, she turns to a cheating partner herself. It’s similar to “escape forward” strategy: The act of moving forward misrepresents proactive act of victory; however, it’s indeed a passive act of escape.

Unlike the first scenario, the second and third scenarios are probably chosen, consciously or unconsciously, by weaker personalities who lack a solid belief/value system. The deviation of the action (cheating) from the internal value (being faithful) causes internal irritation, which tends to be reduced by this group of people by different justification mechanisms: “everyone does it”, “don’t be such a naïve”, “let’s be real”, “be smart and mature”, etc. The level of deviation from the values is closely related to the level of pain we experience.

This mechanism of breaking our values to protect ourselves from pain and regrets can be also traced in many other situations. For example, if a seller lies or hides the defects of merchandise, we may not hesitate to do the same thing to others when we sell it later although this behavior is against our values.

Traditional or Modern Society?

Which one is more valuable?

1. Your friend sends you a birthday note because:
a) S/he remembers it, or
b) S/he has entered hundreds of names and their birth dates into a system, and set the system to alert the birthdays.

2. Your friend wishes you a happy new year by:
a) Calling you or writing you a letter/email, or
b) Sending you one of those fit-for-all Happy New Year emails.

3. A couple gets married because:
a) They simply love each other, or
b) They make a decision that is polluted with an unlimited list of desires, likes, and dislikes, which are shaped by ever-changing criteria.

4. A couple is separated and the son is living with his mother. The father pays for the son’s education because:
a) He cares about the future of his son, or
b) He’s obligated by the law to pay for his son’s education expenses.

5. A white guy hangs out with a black guy because:
a) The two guys are truly connecting as friends, or
b) It’s in rhythm with anti-racism culture and laws, which helps both sides to survive in the society.

And the list can continue for ever …

We benefit from a modern society by all its technology and law enforcement features; however, it also destroys many meaningful values and attitudes inhabiting in a traditional society, or replaces them with shallow or worthless ones.

So, once again, instead of the 2-way lousy solution of "either keep all the old values, or totally replace them with new ones", we need to get to know both sides thoroughly to find the third solution: Refine our values by keeping the good-old ones, and replace the bad-old with good-new ones.

Gut Feeling or Rational Thinking?

Think of a golf player. To make a good shot, a series of decisions (sweep strength, ball hitting point, direction, etc.) should be made based on some pieces of information (distance, topography, wind, etc.). A professional player is much better off if he follows his intuitions to sweep the club. On the other hand, an amateur player has to go through every step of analyzing the situation and his movements; otherwise, he may even not hit the ball!

Gut feeling and rational thinking are two powerful decision making tools that are required to be correctly understood to be properly applied to the related situations. Some people are so in love with fastness, easiness, and “coolness” of making decisions based on their gut feelings that they forget about its underlying limitations, while some other people immerse themselves in analysis so deep that they cannot recognize that they may have selected an inefficient and erroneous decision making tool.

Gut feeling is not a magic, gifted talent, chance, or the result of an extraordinary IQ. It is a smart recognition and decision making tool that is trained based on rational thinking. When we practice a series of logical analysis regularly for a long period, the procedure is programmed in our unconsciousness. After a while, we can take advantage of the “shortcuts” provided by an expert system (gut feeling) that is deeply trained over time.

Most analytical people don’t rely on their intuitions because they believe they need to spend a reasonable amount of time on some sort of analysis to reach a good decision. They are not aware that gut feeling automatically applies the most efficient and accurate analysis based on its years of training. The training might be conscious (a sport player), unconscious (the effect of environment) or even transferred from generations (evolution).

Located in unconsciousness, gut feeling automatically includes factors such as internalized values and feelings in decision making process. Rational thinking, on the other hand, may miss counting in these factors due to high concentration on analyzing information. Such ignorance may lead to regrets and unhappiness later after making a choice when the dust settles down and the ignored long-term existed values start to show up.

I think there is only one, but major drawback with gut feelings: We may make disastrous decisions if we overestimate the training, and thus, correctness of our gut feelings.

ReAlItY or rEaLiTy?

Imagine that “ReAlItY” and “rEaLiTy” are written on a paper and presented to a person with no knowledge of English language and Latin alphabets. Lacking the knowledge, the person considers the “forms” as the only source of information; thus, assumes that the two words have different meanings. On the other hand, a knowledgeable person knows that, despite differences in forms, the two words refer to the same concept.

To perceive higher levels of reality, we need to gain more knowledge, which I think, requires us to make it to a level that we can recognize the similarities beyond the “forms”.

To elaborate above statement, let me explain the two steps that, I think, are required to take us from the state of no-knowledge to ultimate-knowledge. We gain knowledge through investigating differences in the first step, and similarities in the second step.

Step 1- Separation: Transition from oneness to forms
Think of a new born baby as an example of the state of no-knowledge. The baby perceives the whole world as “one” entity – she sees no differences, say, between people and objects. However, after a while, the baby extends her knowledge by differentiating people from objects; her mother from other people; and her bottle of milk from other objects. It’s a recursive process that continuously separates items based on their differences, creates new forms, and shapes a knowledgebase of categorized forms. So far so good! But here is a problem: Sometimes we’re so busy with counting the leaves that we miss the tree; we’re so involved with the forms that we miss their roots and underlying similarities.

Step 2- Unity: Transition from forms to oneness
Now, think of knowledgeable people, distinguished in recent, say, century. We know that each branch of knowledge (science, art, religion, etc.) has been divided to uncountable number of sub-disciplines (“forms”); however, most of such eminent people are recognized due to their multi-disciplinary achievements. For example, Albert Einstein’s discoveries are cited in fields of physics and mathematics as well as philosophy. Observation of such trends, I think, suggests that the second step of extending knowledge requires another approach: Uniting forms by discovering their underlying similarities. Applying this procedure recursively, the ultimate knowledge is achieved when there are no forms anymore; the world of forms transcends to the world of oneness.

I think that Yin-Yang symbol brilliantly illustrates the concepts of separation and unity. At the first glance, we see the world of forms where black is separated from white. Looking deeper, we recognize the world of oneness where black and white are united. It also shows that oneness is not possible unless the forms correctly interrelate.

Strength or Weakness?

I think the positives and negatives of many characteristics are so interrelated that it’s hard to distinguish one as a strength or weakness. Here are some examples:

1) Self
- Think of a self-disciplined and stable person. Isn’t s/he also a little boring as a person who takes life too serious?
- Think of a playful and spontaneous person. Isn’t s/he also a little indecisive or driven by superficiality?
- Which one relies more on internal values, and which one on external?

2) Friendship
- Think of a reliable and caring friend. Isn’t s/he also a little controlling or demanding?
- Think of a fun and popular friend. Isn’t s/he also a little irresponsible of his/her actions or undependable in crises?
- Which one advances friendship in depth, and which one in width?

3) Communication
- Think of a person who has the patience required for a meaningful and logical conversation with deep attention to details. Isn’t s/he also a little self-righteous or so rigid with principles that s/he ruins the joy of a casual conversation?
- Think of a person who enthusiastically makes mutual exciting and joyful conversions with anyone on any topic. Isn’t s/he also a poor listener or an unsympathetic person who speaks before thinks?
- Communication networks consist of nodes and connectors. Which one is a node, and which one a connector?

4) Progress
- Think of a purposeful and committed person. Isn’t s/he also trapped by perfectionism that slows him/her down by setting unrealistic or pointless goals?
- Think of an energetic person who voluntarily jumps into all exciting projects. Isn’t s/he also an uncommitted person who overvalues immediate results and ignores long-term achievements?
- Which one is more successful with long-term projects, and which one with immediate or urgent ones?

As you see, each strength (X or Y) is associated with a weakness (A or B). Here is again the old question, rephrased: How can we substitute lousy 2-way Black & White solutions such as: “Either gain strength X to the cost of weakness A, or strength Y to the cost of weakness B” with a profound one as the third solution: “Gain strengths X AND Y to bypass weaknesses A AND B”?

Self-disciplined or Stubborn

The behaviors of self-disciplined and stubborn people may seem to be similar because both groups persist on their own set of principles, which are created based on some internalized values. However, I think, the source of internalized values, which could be internal or external, differentiates self-discipline from stubbornness.

Internal values, such as respect, love, care, competence, honesty, integrity, physical and mental health, intellect, etc are associated by human nature. When the principles are rooted in internal values, I refer the insistence on the principal to self-discipline. As internal values seldom change over time, the self-disciplined people usually hold on their principles for long periods.

External values, on the other hand, are coupled with egoistic motives, which are emphasized by external sources such as public eye. I think egoistic motives can be summarized as: “prove” myself or others that “I am right”; while the righteousness can be translated to being respectable, lovable, worthy, competent, smart, knowledgeable, etc.

When the principles are rooted in external values, the persistence is closer to the stubbornness side of the spectrum. External values are frequently changed in nature or priority based on the feedbacks that a person receives from external sources; therefore, the principles, continuously replaced or modified, do not get the opportunity to mature. As a result, the principles that a stubborn person persists on usually lack solid grounds.

From outside, I don’t see a clear line between self-discipline and stubbornness. But, I think that examining the source of values, internal or external, that a person utilizes to create his principles can locate him on the spectrum of self-discipline and stubbornness.