Television is a superficial medium made so by the short attention span of a peripatetic audience. One reaction to painful early experiences leads to an easily depressed personality. An individual may find it more tolerable to organize its misery in terms of one’s own badness rather than in terms of the badness of the World around. The individual then experiences the frustration of one’s need as one’s own fault for having those needs. One organizes one’s experiences in terms of one’s own demandingness, unreasonableness, lack of merit, unlovability, and so on. This is a sad cast of mind for, besides the disappointment, the individual now also feels guilt and constant self-belitting. The Anti-Libidinal Ego—the Internal Savotuer—is constantly attacking the Libidinal Ego. It may be that inner conflict and trouble will eventually arise when the individual can no longer resist very strong evidence that not oneself but the actual guardian or the actual environment is at fault, uncaring, or hostile—a very depressing discovery full of further guilt. However, when the evidence can no longer be ignored (that is selectively perceived and disowned), a person may be forced to make a more realistic assessment of what is happening. Such a depressed reaction leads to a more integrated personality-structure than does the schizoid. #RandolphHarris 1 of 21

The schizoid reaction to painful early experiences is simply not to integrate. People who have left much experience unintegrated will experience both bad moments and good moments, but the connection between moments or experiences or events is only tenuous, and is not integrated with their total experience of themselves and of life. Their wanting something is not strongly connected either to getting it or to not getting it. No experience of wants, needs, or wishes is strongly associated with other experiences of the self; neither is the experience of being frustrated or angry or hurt strongly associated with any other self-structures. Nor is the experience of wants, needs, wishes strongly associated with experiences of attachment figures or other people of tings. There are dynamic organizations, but they are fragments: Libidinal, Anti-Libidinal, central. Having the separate and not much in communication with each other enables a person not to be constantly in touch with misery and frustration and rage. There is a sense of futility and emptiness which goes with the schizoid structure, and this is associated with the environment’s lack of appropriate response to the individual’s expression of oneself: lack of appropriate response does give a sense of futility to one’s doing. #RandolphHarris 2 of 21

Much of what used to be diagnosed as hysteric behaviour in the nineteenth and early twentieth century, the empty-feeling person, looking for a relationship to fil that emptiness, may in fact have been schizoid, the personality-structure being tragically such that no ordinary responsive and loving relationship could heal the split which maintained the empty feeling. The schizophrenic reaction would take these splits a stage further. There has been drastic depersonalizing. Fear of, love for, hate toward, bliss from, are experienced with no coherent connection to either self or other. “My” enjoyment is not mine, I do not feel it is “I” who is enjoying. “My” relationships—of fear, love, hate, and so on—are not “mine”; I do not feel that it is “I” who is fearing, loving, or hating. Objects float around without any constant handles of “enjoyable,” “hateful,” terrifying.” Yet there is enjoyment, fear, hate. Is it yours? Or yours? Or theirs? Or mine? It is hard to know for sure. In aggression, we are emotionally hardened, and aggression is a choice. A biologically adaptive type of aggression is instrumental aggression, which has the aim of obtaining that which is necessary or desirable. The aim of instrumental aggression is not destruction as such; this serves only as an instrument for attaining the real aim. #RandolphHarri 3 of 21

In this respect it is similar to defensive aggression, but in other important aspects it is different. It does not seem to have a phylogenetically programed neuronal basis such as that which programs defensive aggression; among mammals, only animals of prey, whose aggression is instrumental to obtaining food, are endowed with an innate neuronal pattern that impels them to attack their prey. The hunting behaviour of hominids and Homo is based on learning and experience, and does not seem to be phylogenetically programed. The most important case of instrumental aggression is war. It has become fashionable to consider war as caused by the power of human’s destructive instinct. Instinctivists and psychoanalysts have given this explanation of war. To reason with great skill and peaceful cooperation is as natural and fundamental a tendency in human relations as fight. Yet war is essentially a psychological problem. The riddle of war lies…deep in the unconscious, and we consider war an inexpedient form of instinct adaptation. War is not caused by human destructiveness, but its cause is realistic conflicts between groups which always have been solved by violence, since there was no international enforceable law according to which—as in civil law—the conflicts could have been solved peacefully. #RandolphHarris 4 of 21

There is only an auxiliary role attributed to the factor of human destructiveness, which facilitates the readiness of people to go to war once the government had decided to wage war. The thesis that war is caused by innate human destructiveness is plainly absurd for anyone who has even the slightest knowledge of history. The Babylonians, the Greeks (for a very telling example see Thucydides’ description of the Peloponnesian War), up to the statesmen of our time, have planned war for they thought were very realistic reasons and weighed the pros and cons very thoroughly, even though, naturally their calculations were often erroneous. Their motives were manifold: land for cultivation, riches, slaves, raw materials, markets, expansion—and defense. Under special circumstances, a wish for revenge or in a small tribe the passion for destruction has been among the factors that motivated wars, but such cases are atypical. This view that war is caused by human’s aggression is not only unrealistic but harmful. It detracts attention from the real causes and thus weakens the opposition to them. The thesis about the innate tendency for war is not only repudiated by the historical record but also, and very importantly, by the history of primitive warfare. #RandolphHarris 5 of 21

We have shown previously that in the contact of aggression among primitive peoples that they—particularly the hunters and food gatherers—are the least warlike, and that their fighting is characterized by its relative lack of destructiveness and bloodthirstiness. We have furthermore seen that with the growth of civilization the frequency and bloodiness of wars have increased. If war were caused by innate destructive impulses, the reverse would have to be true. The humanitarian tendencies in the eighteenth, nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries brought about reductions of destructiveness and cruelty in war which were codified—and respected, up to and including the first World War—in carious international treaties. From this progressive perspective it seemed that civilized humans are less aggressive than primitive humans, and the still-existing occurrence of war was explained as caused by stubbornness of the aggressive instincts, which refuse to give in to the beneficial influence of civilization. However, in fact, the destructiveness of civilized humans was projected into human’s nature, and thus history was confused with biology. The first World War was motivated by the economic interests and ambitions of the political, military, and industrial leaders on both sides, and not by a need of the various nations involved to give vent to their dammed-up aggression. These motivations are well known, and need not be described here in detail. #RandolphHarris 6 of 21

By and large, it can be said that the Germans ais in the 1914-1918 war were also its main motivations: economic hegemony in Western and Central Europe and territory in the East. (There were, in fact, also the aims of Adolf Hitler, whose foreign policy was essentially the continuation of the Imperial government.) The aims and motivations of the Western Allies were similar. France wanted Alsace-Lorraine; Russia, the Dardanelles; England, parts of the Germany colonies, and Italy, at least a small part of the booty. Had it not been for these aims, some of which were stipulated in secret treaties, peace would have been concluded years earlier and the lives of many millions of people on both sides would have been spared. Both sides in the First World War had to appeal to the sense of self0defense and freedom. The Germans claimed they were encircled and threatened, and furthermore, that they were fighting for freedom by fighting the czar; their enemies claimed that they were threatened by the aggressive militarism of the German Junkers, and they were fighting for freedom by fighting the Kaiser. To think that war owe it origin to the wish of the French, the German, the British, and the Russian populations to discharge their aggressiveness is untrue and serves only one function, that of detracting attention from those persons and social conditions responsible for one of the greatest slaughters in history. #RandolphHarris 7 of 21

However, a small number of people do like to engage in wars as a mixture of group narcissism, instrumental aggression, and the wish to make a career and to gain power within and through this nationalistic movement. In fact, the Germany population definitely did not want war (the generals were also reluctant), the went into the war without resistance and fought bravely until the end. The psychological problem lies here, not in the causation of the war but in the question: What psychological factors make war possible even thought they do not cause it? There are a number of relevant factors to consider in answering this question. In the first World War (also, with some modifications, in the second World Warr) once it had started, the German (or French, Russian, British) soldiers went on fighting because they felt that losing the war would mean disaster for the nation. The individual soldiers were motivated by the feeling that they were fighting for their lives, and that it was a matter of killing or being killed. However, even these feelings would not have been sufficient to sustain the willingness to go on. They also knew  that if they ran away, they would  be shot, although even these motivations did not prevent large-scale munities from occurring in all armies; in Russian and Germany they le eventually to revolutions in in 1917 and 1918. #RandolphHarris 8 of 21

Another important factor for the possibility of war is the deeply engrained feeling of respect for and awe of authority. The soldier had traditional been made to feel that to obey one’s leaders was a mortal and religious obligation for the fulfillment of which one should be ready to pay with one’s life. It took about three to four years of the horror of life in the trenches and growing insight into the fact that they were being used by their leaders for aims of war that had nothing to so with defense, to break down this attitude of obedience, at least in a considerable part of the army and the population at home. Even if it entails risks for one’s life and much physical suffering, here are other, there are other more subtle motivations that make war possible and have nothing to do with aggression. Even if it entails risks for one’s life and much physical suffering, war is exciting. Considering that the life of the average persons is boring, routinized, and lacking in adventure, the readiness to go to war must be understood as a desire to put an end to the boring routine of daily life—and to throw oneself into an adventure, the only adventure, in fact, the average person may expect in one’s life. War also removes the free-rider problem. #RandolphHarris 9 of 21

 Where the public is large and includes many individuals, there is a temptation for each person to try to avoid doing one’s shared. This is because whatever one person does one’s action will not significantly affect the amount produced. One regard the collective action of others as already given one way or the other. If the public good is produced, one’s enjoyment of it is not decreased by one’s not making a contribution. If it is not produced, one’s action would not have changed the situation any way.  A citizen receives the same protection from foreign invasion regardless of whether one paid one’s taxes. Therefore in the polar case trade and voluntary agreements cannot be expected to develop. It follows that arranging for and financing public goods must be taken over by the state and some binging rule requiring payment must be enforced. Even if all citizens were willing to pay their share, they would presumably do so only when they are assured that others will pay theirs as well. Thus once citizens have agreed to act collectively and not as isolated individuals taking the actions of others as given, there is still the task of tying down the agreement. The sense of justice leads us to promote just schemes and to do our share in them when we believe that others, or sufficiently many of them, will do theirs. However, in normal circumstances a reasonable assurance in this regard can only be given if there is a binding rule effectively enforces. #RandolphHarris 10 of 21

Assuming that the public good is to everyone’s advantage, and one that all would agree to arrange for, the use of coercion is perfectly rational from each person’s point of view. Many of the traditional activities of government, insofar as they can be justified, can be accounted for in this way. The need for the enforcement of rules by the state will still exist even when everyone is moved by the same sense of justice. The characteristic features of essential public good necessitates collective agreements, and firm assurance must be given to all that they will be honoured. War, to some extent, reverses all values. War encourages deep-seated human impulses, such as altruism and solidarity, to be expressed—impulses that are stunted by the principles of egotism and competition that peacetime life engenders in modern humans. Class differences, if not absent, disappear to a considerable extent. In war, humans are humans again, and have a chance to distinguish oneself, regardless of privileges that one’s social status confers upon one as a citizen. To put it in a very accentuated form: war is an indirect rebellion against the injustice, inequality and boredom governing social life in peacetime, and the fact must not be underestimated that while a soldier fights the enemy for one’s life, one does not have to fight the member of one’s own group for food, medical care, shelter, clothing; these are all provided in a kind of perversely social system. #RandolphHarris 11 of 21

The fact that was has these beneficial features reduces the free rider problem. If civilian life provided the elements of adventurousness, solidarity, equality, and idealism that can be found in war, it may be very difficult, we may conclude, to get people to fight way. However, many people are very proud of America, and even if they are wealthy or well taken care of, they love their country so much, and as said before, see it as a religious and moral duty to defend its honour. However, when the country is doing relatively well, the stock market is breaking record high, unemployment is at all time lows, and Americans are involved in far less wars in the recent past, that is what causes division. People start fighting their own people, become divided politically, religiously, and you even see a break down in the family and community because there is no bonding national moment. After September 11, 2001, many American sat back in horror and watched the events unfold, but they, for the most part, did bond as a nation and becoming more humanitarian and prouder. Now, that they have had it so good, people are fighting each other because they do not have an enemy to stand up against. #RandolphHarris 12 of 21

The problem for governments in war is to make use of this rebellion by harnessing it for the purpose of war; simultaneously it must be prevented from becoming a threat to the government by enforcing strict discipline and the spirit of obedience to the leaders who are depicted as the unselfish, wise, courageous humans protecting their country from destruction. Major wars in modern times and most wars between that states of antiquity were not caused by dammed-up aggression, but by instrumental aggression of the military and political elites. This has been shown in the data about the difference in the incidence of war from the most primitive to the higher developed cultures. The more primitive a civilization, the less was do we find. The same trend can be seen in the fact that the number and intensity of wars has risen with the development of technical civilization; it is highest among the powerful states with a strong government and lowest among primitive humans without permanent chieftainship. For instance, the number of battles engaged in by the principal European powers in modern times shows the same trend. From the year 1480 to 1499 there were 9 battles, from 1500 to 1599 there were 87 battles, from 1600 to 1699 there were 239 battles, from 1700 to 1799 there were 781 battles, from 1800 to 1899 there were 651 battles, from 1900 to 1940 there were 892 battles. #RandolphhHarris 13 of 21

What the authors who explain that war is caused by human’s innate aggression have done is to consider modern war as normal, assuming that I must be caused by human’s “destructive” nature. They have tried to find the confirmation for this assumption in the data on animals and on our prehistoric ancestors, which have had to be distorted in order to serve this purpose. This position resulted for the unshakable conviction of the superiority of present-day civilization over pretechnical cultures. The logic was: if civilized humans are plagued by so many wars and so much destructiveness, how much worse primitive humans have been, who is far behind in the development toward “progress.” Since destructiveness must not be blamed on our civilization, it must be explained as the result of our instincts. However, the facts speak otherwise. Depictions of violence often glamorize vicious behaviour. They offend the Spirit and make you less able to respond to others in a sensitive, caring way. They contradict the Saviour’s message of love for one another. When we pollute our minds with harmful, violent materials, whether or not such material causes us to commit violent acts, the Spirit is offended. #RandolphHarris 14 of 21

I believe the entertainment industry, who the TV news media is now trying to compete with for ratings, cannot portray on film people gunned down or ran over in cold blood, in living colour, and not have it affect the attitudes and thoughts of some of the people who see it. I believe that the desensitizing effect of such media abuses on the hearts and souls of those who are exposed to them results in a partial fulfillment of the Saviour’s statement that “because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.” So, it is not only that the American people are doing relatively well and living in peace, but the media has also become far, far more violent and it has an impact on people. Now, the children of light, a Biblical term to say that they have the basic nature of light: that light is their parent and has passed on to them its nature, as any parent does, are not perfect people and do not live in a perfect World—yet. However, they are remarkably different. The difference is not one of a pose they strike, either from time to time or constantly, or of things they do or do not do—though their behaviour too is very different and distinctive. Where the children of light differ is primarily and most importantly on the “inside” of their life. It lies in what they are in their depths. Thought life: When we get to know their inner life is wat they think about, and what is on their mind that is perhaps the first thing that comes to our attention. #RandolphHarris 15 of 21

Simply stated, children of the light think about God. He is never out of their mind. They love to dwell upon God and upon his greatness and loveliness, as brought to light in Jesus Christ. They adore him in nature, in history, in his Son and in his saints. One could even day they are “God-intoxicated” (Acts 2.13; Ephesians 5.18, though no one has a stronger sense of reality and practicality than they do. Their mind if filled with biblical expressions of God’s nature, his actions, and his plans for them in his World. They do not dwell upon evil. It is not a big thing in their thoughts. They are sure of its defeat, but they still deal with it appropriately in specific situations. Because their mind is centered upon God and oriented with reference to him, all other good things are also welcome there: Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise,” their minds pinder those things (Philippians 4.8). Thy are absolutely, realistically so, based upon the nature of God as they understand it. Feelings: And then perhaps we notice—and small wonder given what has already been observed—that the emotional life of these children of light is deeply characterized by love. That is how they invest the emotional life of their being. They love lots of good things and they love people. They love their life and who they are. They are thankful for their life—even though it may contain many difficulties, even persecution and martyrdom (Matthew 5.10-12). #RandolphHarris 16 of 21

The children of light receive all of it as God’s gift, or at least as his allowance, where they will know his goodness and greatness and go on to live with him forever. And so joy and peace are with the even in the hardest of times—even when suffering unjustly. Because of what they have learned about God, they are confident and hopeful and do not indulge thoughts of rejection, failure, and hopelessness, because they know better. Will (spirit, heart): Looking a little deeper we find that these children of the light really are devoted to doing what is good and right. Their will is habitually attuned to it, just as their mind and emotions are habitually homing in on God. They are attentive to rightness, to kindness, to helpfulness, and they are purposefully knowledgeable about life, about what people need, and about how to do what is right and good in appropriate ways. These are people who do not think of themselves and what they want, and they really care very little, if at all, about getting their own way. “Let each of you regard one another as more important than oneself; do not look for your own personal interests, but for the interest of others,” reports Philippians 2.3-4. These are easy and good words to them. They are abandoned to God’s will and do not struggle and deliberate as to whether they will do what they know to be wrong. They do not hesitate to do what they know to be right. It is the obvious thing to do. #RandolphHarris 17 of 21

Body: That, of course, involves their body. They body has come over to the side of their will to do good. It is constantly poised to do what is right and good without thinking. And that also means that it does not automatically move into what is wrong, even contrary to their resolves and intentions, before they can think to not do it. It is no longer true of them that their “spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak,” reports Matthew 26.41. They know by experience that these words of Jesus are not a declaration about the inevitable condition of humans, but a diagnosis of a condition to be corrected. The Spirit has substantially taken over their “members.” Consequently, we do not see them always being trapped by what their tongue, facial expressions, eyes, hands, and so on have already done before they can think. For their body and its parts are consecrated to serve God and are habituated to be his holy instruments. They instinctively avoid the paths of temptation. The bodies of these people look different. There is a freshness about them, a kind of quiet strength, and a transparency. They are rested and playful in a bodily strength that is from God. He who raised up Christ Jesus from the dead has given life to the bodies through his Spirit that dwells in them. Social relations: In their social relations to others, they are completely transparent. #RandolphHarris 18 of 21

Because they walk in goodness the children of the light do not have use for darkness, and they achieve real contact of fellowship with others—especially other apprentices of Jesus. “If we walk in the light as He Himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin,” reports 1 John 1.7. And “The one who loves one’s brothers and sisters abides in the light and there is no cause of offence in him,” reports 1 John 2.10. They do not conceal their thoughts and feelings (nor do they impose them upon everyone). Because of their confidence in God, they do not try to manipulate and manage others. Needless to say, in their social contexts they do not go on the attack or on the hunt, intending to use or other others. Moreover, the children of the light are completely noncondemning, while at the same time they will not participate in evil. They pay it only attention absolutely required in social setting, and beyond that, patient and joyful nonparticipation is the rule. They know how to really “be there” (wherever “there” is) without sharing in evil, as was true of Jesus himself. (Of course, as with him, others may disapprove of the “being there, and there are always some occasions where one should just step away). However, the children of light do not reject or distance themselves from the people who may be involved in such situations. #RandolphHarris 19 of 21

The children of the light know how to “love the sinner and hate the sin” gracefully and effectively. Soul: Furthermore, as you come to know these people—though those who know only the human powers of the flesh will never be able to understand them (1 Corinthians 2.14)—you see that all of the above is not just at the surface. It is deep, and in a certain obvious sense, it is effortless. It flows. That is, the things we have been describing are not things the children of light are constantly trying hard to do, gritting their teeth an carrying on. Instead, these are features of life that well up out of a soul that is at home in God. This is the outcome of spiritual formation in Christlikeness. Again, it does not mean perfect, but it does mean we have here a person whose soul is whole: a person who, though the internalized integrity of the law of God and the administrations of the gospel and the Spirit, has a restored soul. Such a soul effectively interfaces God and the full person and enables every aspect of the self to function as God intended. God, you have given all peoples on common origin. It is your will that they be gathered together as one family in yourself. Fill the hearts of humankind with fire of your love and with the desire to ensure justice for all. By sharing the good things you give us, may we secure an equality for all our brothers and sisters throughout the World. #RandolphHarris 20 of 21

May there be an end to division, strife and war. May there be a dawning of a truly human society built on love and peace. We ask this in your name. Lord, please bring us safely and without detour to your Kingdom, to the landing place before the great city where the Lord of Love rules. Bring us before one who sits on his throne. Make our names known to You and your angels. Please make smooth the way, please open the doors, please clear the path, unlock the gates. We are on a great journey. Stand by us until we are safely home! Sing unto the Lord with thanksgiving, sing praises upon the hard unto our God. God covers the Heavens with clouds, He prepares rain for the Earth, He makes grass to grow on the hills. God gives to the beast its food, and to the young ravens when they cry. God delights not in the strength of the horse; nor takes pleasure in the vigour of humans. The Lord takes pleasure in them that revere Him, in them that hope for His mercy. Glorify the Lord, O America; praise thy God, O America. For He has made strong the bars of thy gates; He has blessed thy children within thee. God makes peace within they borders; God gives thee abundantly of the fat of wheat. God sends out His commandment to the Earth; His word goes speedily forth. For redemption of our souls, Lord hear our prayers. #RandolphHarris 21 of 21

Cresleigh Homes

This Owner’s Suite looks more like an Owner’s Sweet to us. 😉 A #BrightonStation Residence 2 home is designed with 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, spacious Owner’s retreat, and a three car garage. It’s no wonder everyone in this community loves living here! 😍

Take a virtual tour on our website to see more: https://youtu.be/AY7u1-i5M8I

More than just a residential development, Brighton Station is a modern community reminiscent of a great American small town. Boasting one-of-a-kind amenities, home sites featuring desirable open floor plans, well-designed kitchens, and more. There is also ample opportunity for outdoor recreation.
#CresleighHomes