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There Was Terror in His Eyes as Not Often Seen in a Human Being!
Twenty-first century humans, in spite of all their scientific and technological advances, are baffled by unexplained forces existent in the Universe. The naturalistic philosophy of the previous generations has been unable to account for all of the mysterious phenomena which have been observed. Many scientists believe that living beings may inhabit other galaxies, and highly educated humans are seriously studying reports of those who insist they have received communications from the dead. Humans of science no longer scoff at the accounts of strange occurrences associated with witchcraft and occultic practices. Although they do not necessarily accept them as proof of the supernatural, many will admit they are manifestations of some kind of power they do not yet understand. Christian theologians and scientists are not perplexed by such reports. They know that both God and Satan are very much alive. Though readily conceding that they cannot explain fully all the mysteries of life, they affirm with confidence the existence of God and an invisible host of intelligent supernatural beings. They are convinced that when one accepts the teachings of the Bible, one begins to understand many of the puzzling facts of existence. For example, the Bible tells of holy angels who dwell in Heaven (Matthew 18.10). It also mentions “angels that sinned” (2 Peter 2.4), rebellious spirit begins who have been cast out of Heaven and now dwell in the atmosphere that surrounds the Earth. We know this because Paul declared that Satan is “the prince of the power of the air,” reports Ephesians 2.2, and the Greek word translated “air” was used to speak of the gaseous envelop that encircles our planet. These wicked beings apparently have unlimited access to Earther, and actively influence every area of human endeavour. #RandolphHarris 1 of 19
Because they do not possess physical bodies, we cannot typically detect them through our senses of sight, hearing, touch, taste, or smell. We do have evidence of their presence, however, for the Word of God gives us information regarding their identification, their nature and their function. Various terms are used in the Christian Bible to denote the evil spirit beings who followed Satan in this initial act of rebellion against God. It refers to “angels that sinned” 2 Peter 2.4 and “angels who kept not their first estate” Jude 6, and many times mentions “spirits” and “demons.” Some scholars believe that these demons must be distinguished from the “angels that sinned” and the “angels who kept not their first estate.” They contend that the Heavenly beings who joined Satan in his revolt against God are fallen angels, but that demons are disembodies spirits of physical and moral creatures who once lived upon the Earth. However, these Bible students disagree regarding an exact identification of the demons. Some say they are the spirits of pre-Adamic beings similar to man, while others identify them as the spirits of the “giants” who were destroyed in the great flood of Noah’s day. If one thinks that demons are the spirits of man-like beings who lived before Adam, then one will no doubt interpret Genesis 1.2 as a declaration that the original Earth, inhabited by the creatures, was cataclysmically destroyed. Genesis 1.2 is then translated as follows: “And the Earth became without form and void…” This theory, while attractive in that it permits a literal interpretation of the days in Genesis 1, must be acknowledged as only a hypothesis. Most Hebrew scholars reject this interpretation because Genesis 1.2 begins with a grammatical construction which makes it highly unlikely that Genesis 1.1 and 1.2 are separated by millions of years. Then, too, the verb translated “became” almost always has the meaning “was.” #RandolphHarris 2 of 19
However, even if we accept this theory, and believe that a race of man-like beings inhabited the prehistoric Earth, we would have no basis for thinking that their spirits are now free to roam about as the enemies of humankind. Other Bible scholars maintain that demons are the spirits of the “giants” who lived upon the Earth in the days of Noah. They refer to Genesis 6, contending that these “giants” were produced when fallen angels, called the “sons of God,” married the “daughters of men.” “And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the Earth, and daughters were born unto them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all whom they chose. There were giants in the Earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bore children to them, the same became mighty men who were of old, men of renown,” reports Genesis 6.1, 2, 4. It is necessary for proponents of this theory to believe that fallen angels became male human beings who married women, produced a mongrel offspring, and took over the role of father in the family. They theorize that Satan hoped thereby to frustrate God’s redemptive plan. The Lord had promised salvation through Christ to human beings only—not for angels or mixed half-human and half-angelic race. Christ could not have been born to offspring of these corrupted creates or provide redemptions for them. Thus God’s plan of redemption would have been thwarted. In addition, both Jude and Peter in their epistles refer to a sin committed by angels, and their words can be blended very nicely into this concept. Jude writes, “And the angels who kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day. Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire,” reports Jude 6, 7. #RandolphHarris 3 of 19
The words “in like manner” (verse 7) are taken to mean that the sin of the angels in having pleasures of the flesh with women was an unnatural act, comparable to sodomy. Peter tells of angels assigned to Tartaros, the nether World of the Greeks considered to be lower than Hades. “For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell [GK Tartaros], and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment,” reports 2 Peter 2.4. Again, it does not take a great deal of imagination to see how these words of Peter may be applied to the wicked angels who committed the monstrous sin of attempting to make mongrels of the human race. Many Bible students, however, reject this interpretation of Genesis 6. Since angels are non-material beings, it would be necessary for them to create physical bodies for themselves capable of impregnating a female member of the human race. This would require nothing less than a creative miracle, and the Bible indicates that this power belongs only to God. In addition, it is not necessary to interpret the statements in Jude and 2 Peter as a reference to sin involving pleasures of the flesh on the part of the fallen angels. Jude’s use of the expression “going after strange flesh” may be figurative language representing spiritual fornication. The prophets often depicted Israel’s unfaithfulness to God in this manner. Peter’s statement that the angels who sinned have been assigned to Tartaros may be a simple declaration that all sinning angels have been designated to this place, and that they are even now under chains of moral and spiritual darkness. The Bible gives little information regarding the origin of demons. We can state with absolute certainty only that they are fallen spirit beings who have committed themselves to Satan and that they hate God and seek to harm His people. No clear distinction can be made between fallen angels and demons, for they are all evil spirits. Some of our questions must remain unanswered, but the Lord has given ample revelation to warn us that these invisible enemies are far too great and powerful for us to defeat in our own strength, and that we can successfully wage war against them only as we live in continual dependence upon the Lord. #RandolphHarris 4 of 19
In one respect the case of Dame Alice Kyteler stands alone in the history of magical dealings in Ireland prior to the seventeenth century. We have of the entire proceedings an invaluable and contemporary account, or at latest one compiled within a very few years after the death of Petronilla of Meath; while the excitement produced by the affair is shown by the more or less lengthy allusions to it in early writings, such as The Book of Howth (Carew MSS.), the Annals by Fariar Clyn, the Chartularies of S. Mary’s Abbey (vol. ii), &c. It is also rendered more valuable by the fact that those who are best qualified to give their opinion on the matter have assured the writer that to the best of their belief no entries with respect to trials for sorcery or witchcraft can be found in the various old Rolls preserved in the Dublin Record Office. However, when the story is considered with reference to the following facts it takes on a different signification. On the 29th of September 1317 (Wright says 1320), Bishop de Ledrede held his first Synod, at which several canons were passed, one of which seems in some degree introductory to the events detailed in last week’s report. In it he speaks of “a certain new and pestilential sect in our parts, differing from all the faith in the World, filled with a devilish spirit, more inhuman than heathens…who pursue the priests and bishops of the Most High God equally in life and death, by spoiling and rending the patrimony of Christ in the diocese of Ossory, and who utter grievous threats against the bishops and their ministers exercising ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and (by various means) attempt to hinder the correction of sins and the salvation of souls, in contempt of God and the Church.” From this it would seem that heresy and unorthodoxy had already made its appearance in the diocese. In 1324 the Kyteler case occurred, one of the participants being burnt at the stake while other incriminate persons were subsequently followed up, some of whom shared the fate of Petronilla of Meath. In 1327 Adam Dubh, of the Leinster tribe of O’Toole, was burnt alive on College Green for denying the doctrines of the Incarnation and the Holy Trinity, as well as for rejecting the authority of the Holy See. #RandolphHarris 5 of 19
In 1335 Pope Benedict XII wrote a letter to King Edward III, in which occurs the following passage: “It has come to our knowledge that while our venerable brother, Richard, Bishop of Ossory, was visiting his diocese, there appeared in the midst of his catholic people men who were heretics together with their abettors, some of whom asserted that Jesus Christ was a mere man and a sinner, and was justly crucified for His own sins; others after having done homage and offered sacrifice to demons, thought otherwise of the sacrament of the Body of Christ than the Catholic Church teaches, saying that the same venerable sacrament is by no means to be worshipped; and also asserting that they are not bound to obey or believe the decrees, decretals, and apostolic mandates; in the meantime, consulting demons according to the rites of those sects among the Gentiles and Pagans, they despise the sacraments of the Catholic Church, and draw the faithful of Christ after them by their superstitions.” Unlike apocryphal and rabbinical literature, the Biblical description of evil spirits avoids the unusual and grotesque. The Bible does, however, present us with a clear picture of their activity and tells us how to resist them effectively. In the first place, it declares that demons or fallen angels are non-material beings. They do not possess bodies like humans, and therefore are repeatedly called “spirits.” Matthew, for example, says, “When the evening was come, they brought unto him many that were possessed with demons; and he cast out the spirits with his word, and healed all that were sick,” reports Matthew 8.16. Jesus started that the Creator is not made up of physical substance when He said, “God is a Spirit,” reports John 4.24. Later, when His frightened disciples thought He was a ghost, He told them their fears were groundless, for “a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have,” reports Luke 24.39. Paul had in mind the non-physical nature of Satan and his army of evil spirits when he said that our warfare is “not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this World, against spiritual wickedness in high places,” reports Ephesians 6.12. Satan’s demonic hordes are spirit beings, and therefore more dangerous than the “flesh and blood” enemies we may encounter in our daily lives. #RandolphHarris 6 of 19
Second, the Bible portrays demons as highly intelligent creatures. They recognize Christ when He was here upon the Earth, and knew they could not have fellowship with Him. Luke tells us about an evil spirit who is an example of this. “When he saw Jesus, he cried out, and fell down before him, and with a loud voice said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God, most high? I beseech thee, torment me not,” reports Luke 8.28. The fallen spirits are also aware of their ultimate defeat, for James declared, “Them demons also believe, and tremble,” reports James 2.19. They are, of course, finite creatures, even Satan is limited in knowledge. He has myriads of evil spirit followers, however, and they are able to give him information on almost any person and circumstance in which he is interested. In this manner he can find out much what he wants to know. Truly, believers in Christ can never successfully cope with Satan and his hosts without special help from the Lord. Therefore, we must humbly look to God for wisdom and strength to resist the attacks of our invisible enemies. Third, the World of evil spirits is cruel. These creatures hate God and all who have placed their trust in Him. They seem to find delight in causing human grief and pain. For example, Matthew tells us that a man who was both blind and dumb suffered these afflictions because a demon had entered his body. “Then was brought unto him one possessed with a demon, blind, and dumb; and He healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spoke and saw,” reports Matthew 12.22. Matthew, Mark, and Luke all tell the story of two demented men who lived in the country of the Gerasenes, and indicate that their insanity was the result of demonic invasion of their personalities. Luke, the beloved physicians, writes of a woman who was bent over with some crippling disease, saying that she had “a spirit of infirmity.” He adds that Jesus said she had been bound by Satan. “And he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. And, behold, there was a woman who had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years, and was bowed together, and could in no way lift herself up. And when Jesus saw her, he called her to him, and said unto her, Woman, thou art loosed from thine infirmity. #RandolphHarris 7 of 19
“And he laid his hands on her; and immediately she was made straight, and glorified God. And the ruler of the synagogue answered with indignation, because Jesus had healed on the sabbath day, and said unto the people, There are six days in which humans ought to work; in them, therefore, come and be healed, and not on the sabbath day. The Lord then answered him, and said, Thou hypocrite, doth not each one of you on the sabbath loose his ox or her ass from the stall, and lead him away to watering? And ought not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, who Satan hath bound, lo, these eighteen years, be loosed from this bound on the sabbath day? And when he had said these things, all his adversaries were ashamed; and all the people rejoiced for all the glorious things that were done by him,” reports Luke 13.10-17. While the gospel writers make it clear that not all illness is the work of Satan and demons, they do point out that much human suffering is the result of demonic activity. Finally, the Bible tells us that all fallen angels or evil spirits are confirmed in their wickedness. Though they “believe and tremble,” they will never repent, never seek forgiveness, and never pray for holiness or purity. Though they know that Jesus is the Christ, they never really worship Him. They must acknowledge that He is stronger than they, and may occasionally render Him token submission, but inwardly they hate Him and keenly resent His authority over them. In fact, their nature is so totally evil that the term “unclean” often is applied to them. (See Matthew 10.1; Mark 1.27; 3.11; Luke 4.36; Acts 8.7; Revelations 16.13.) They apparently delight in sin, find great pleasure in leading humans to commit evil deeds, and possess no feelings of guilt nor desire for deliverance. Michael Scot, reputed a wizard of such potency that—when in Salamanca’s cave he listed his magic want to wave and the bells would ring in Notre Dame. Scot has studied successively at Oxford and Paris (where he acquired the title of “mathematicus”); he then passed to Bologna, thence to Palermo, and subsequently continued his studies in Toledo. His refusal of the See of Cashel was an intellectual loss to the Irish Church, for he was so widely renowned for his varied and extensive learning that he was credited with supernatural powers; a number of legends grew up around his name which hid his real merit, and transformed the man of science into a magician. #RandolphHarris 8 of 19
In the Border country traditions of his magical power are common. Boccaccio alludes to “a great master in necromancy, called Michael Scot,” while Dante places him in the eighteen circle of Hell. The next, who is so slender in the flanks, was Michael Scot, who of a verity of magical illusion knew the game. Another man to whom magical powers were attributed solely on account of his learning was Gerald, the fourth Earl of Desmond, styled the Poet, who died rather mysteriously in 1398. The Four Masters in their Annals describe him as “a nobleman of wonderful bounty, mirth, cheerfulness of conversation, charitable in his deeds, easy of access, a witty and ingenious composer of Irish poetry, a learned and profound chronicler.” No legends are extant of his magical deeds. King James I of Scotland, whose severities against his nobles had around their bitter resentment, was barbarously assassinated at Perth in 1437 by some of their supports, who were aided and abetted by the ages Duke of Atholl. From a contemporary account of this we learn that the monarch’s fate was predicted to him by an Irish prophetess or witch; has he given ear to her message he might have escaped with his life. We modernize the somewhat difficult spelling, but retain the quaint language of the original. “The king, suddenly advised, made a solemn feast of the Christmas at Perth, which is clept Saint John’s Town, which is from Edinburg on the other side of the Scottish sea, the which is vulgarly celpt the water of Lethe. In the midst of the way there arose a woman of Ireland, the clept herself as a soothsayer. The which anon as she saw the king she cried with a loud voice, saying thus: ‘My lord king, and you pass this water you shall never turn again alive.’ The king hearing this was astonied of her words; for but a little before he had read in a prophecy that in the self same year the king of Scots should be slain; and therewithal the king, as he rode, cleped to him one of his knights, and gave him in commandment to turn again to speak with that woman, and ask of her what she would, and what thing she meant with her loud crying. #RandolphHarris 9 of 19
“And she began, and told him as ye have heard of the King of Scots if he passed that water. As now the king asked her, how she knew that. And she said, that Huthart told her so. ‘Sire,’ quoth he, ‘men may “calant” yet take to heed of yon woman’s words, for she is but a drunken fool, and wot not what she saith’; and so with his folk passed the water celpt the Scottish sea, towards Saint John’s town.” The narrator states some dreams ominous of James’s murder, and afterwards proceeds thus: Both afore supper, and long after into quarter of the night, in the which the Earl of Atholl (Athetelles) and Robert Steward were about the king, where they were occupied at the playing of chess, at the tables, in reading of romances, in singing and piping, in harping, and in other honest solaces of great pleasance and disport. Therewith came the said woman of Ireland, that celpt herself a divineress, and entered the king’s court, till that she came straight to the king’s chamber-door, where she stood, till at the last the usher opened the door, marvelling of that woman’s being there that time of night, and asking her what she would. ‘Let me in, sir’ quoth she, ‘for I have somewhat to say, and to tell unto the king; for I am the same woman that not long ago desired to have spoken with him at the Leith, when he should pass the Scottish sea.’ The usher went in and told him of this woman. ‘Yea,’ quoth the king, ‘let her come tomorrow’; because the he was occupied with such disports at that time he let not to hear her as then. The usher came again to the chamber-door to the said woman, and there he told her that the king was busy in playing, and bid her come soon again upon the morrow. ‘Well,’ said the woman, ‘it shall repent you all that ye will not let me speak now with the king.’ Thereat the usher laughed, and held her but a fool, charging her to go her way, and therewithal she went thence. Her informant “Huthart” was evidently a familiar spirit who was in attendance on her. #RandolphHarris 10 of 19
Considering the barrenness of Irish records on the subject of sorcery and witchcraft it affords us no small satisfaction to find the following statement in the Statute Rolls of the Parliament for the year 1447. It consists of a most indignantly-worded remonstrance from the Lords and Commons, which was drawn forth by the fact that some high-placed personage had been accused of practising sorcery with the intent to do grievous harm to one’s enemy. When making it the remonstrants appear to have forgotten, or perhaps, like Members of Parliament in other ages, found it convenient to forget the nonce the Kyteler incident of the pervious century. There was an Act of Parliament which was intended to put a stop to a certain lucrative form of witchcraft. It is gravely stated by the writer of a little book entitled Beware the Cat (and by Giraldus Camrensis before him), that Irish witches could turn wisps of hay, straw &c. into red-coloured pigs, which they dishonestly sold in the market, but which resumed their proper shape when crossing running water. To prevent this it is stated that the Irish Parliament passed an Act forbidding the purchase of red swine. We regret to say, however, that no such interesting Act is to be found in the Statues books. The belief in the power of witches to inflict harm on others was also a powerful belief in Victorian times. When reflecting on history, one can see that consulting someone with supernatural powers was no different than talking to a friend about one’s life. It was very common. Also, many of these accounts turned out to have some truth to them or evidence of supernatural power. Perhaps this is because people were more in tune with their inner spirit and the planet back then. Many people thought Sarah Winchester was mentally ill or deranged for consulting a medium about how she should deal with the evil spirits that were haunting her, they thought she was even more insane for building the World’s most beautiful and unique mansion. However, what better way could there be to spend your money than by creating something you and the World can enjoy for many centuries and creating a living memorial for your family? #RandolphHarris 11 of 19
Perhaps what Mrs. Winchester did was very rational and sane. In contrast, most others express their pain and suffering by becoming destructive and hurting others, and people usually idolize them for that. Mrs. Winchester gradually developed her skill in building, just as she had done with music and language in her youth. She often used the most current innovations in her home. Some historical sources say that Mrs. Winchester was the first to use wool for insulation. Carbide gas lights in the house were fed by the estate’s own gas manufacturing plant, which used a new process. The gas lights were operated by pushing an electric button. A specially designed window catch was patterned after a Winchester rifle trigger and trip hammer, amongst other state of the art designs. I met a man in the Winchester Mansion one day that I knew very well, as I thought, though I had not seen him for years. Without pressing him too soon with a repetition of my idle questions, we walked together to the Blue Séance Room, and there we shook hands. Just then there came a vague vibration in the Earth and air, quickly changing into a violent pulsation, and an oncoming rush caused me to start back, as though it had force to draw me down. Next morning, I spoke of this meeting to a mutual friend, and then I learnt, for the first time, that the man had died six months before. The natural inference was that I had mistaken one man for another, an error that, not having a good memory for faces, I frequently fall into. What was remarkable about the matter, however, was that throughout our walk I had conversed with the man under the impression that he was that other dead man, and, whether by coincidence or not, his replies had never once suggested to me my mistake. As soon as I finished speaking to Jared, who had been listening very thoughtfully, asked me if I believed in spiritualism “to its fullest extent.” “That is a rather large question,” I answered. “What do you mean by ‘spiritualism to its fullest extent’?” “Well, do you believe that the spirits of the dead have not only the power of revisiting this Earth at their will, but that, when here, they have the power of action, or rather, of exciting to action. Let me put a definite case. A spiritualist friend of mine, a sensible and by no means imaginative man, once told me that a table, through the medium of which the spirit of a friend had been in the habit of communicating with him, came slowly across the room towards him, of its own accord, one night as he sat alone in the Winchester Mansion, and pinioned him against the wall. Now can any of you believe that, or can you not?” #RandolphHarris 13 of 19
I could believe it. It seems that the difference between what we call the natural and supernatural is merely the difference between frequency and rarity of occurrence. Suppose a person died with the dearest wish of one’s heart unfulfilled, do you believe that one’s spirit might have power to return to Earth and complete the interrupted work? The Winchester Mansion is supposed to be enchanted. According to the legend, William Winchester was a very potent magician, and usually resided in a castle. To this he brought his bride, a beautiful young lady, Sarah Lockwood Pardee, who he loved, and he prevailed upon her her every desire, but with fatal results. One day she presented herself in the chamber in which her husband exercised his forbidden art, and begged him to show her the wonders of the evil science. With the greatest reluctance he consented, but warned her that she must prepare herself to witness a series of most frightful phenomena, which, once commenced, could neither be abridged nor mitigated, while if she spoke a single word during the proceedings the castle and all it contained would sink. Urged on by curiosity she gave the required promised, and he commenced. Muttering a spell as he stood before her, feathers sprouted thickly over him, his face became contracted and hooked, a corpse-like smell filled the air, and winnowing the air with beats of its heavy wings a gigantic vulture rose in his stead, and swept round and round the room as if on the point of pouncing upon her. The lady controlled herself though this trial, and another began. The bird alighted near the door, and in less than a minute changed, she saw not how, into a horribly deformed and dwarfish hag, who, with yellow skin hanging about her face, and cavernous eyes, swung herself on crutches towards the lady, her mouth foaming with fury, and her grimaces and contortions becoming more and more hideous every moment, till she rolled with a fearful yell on the floor in a horrible convulsion at the lady’s feet, and then changed into a huge serpent, which came sweeping and arching towards her with crest erect and quivering tongue. #RandolphHarris 14 of 19
Suddenly, as it seemed on the point of darting at her, she saw her husband in its stead, standing pale before her, and with his finger on his lips enforcing the continued necessity of silence. He then placed himself at the full length on the floor and began to stretch himself at full length on the floor and began to stretch himself out, longer and longer, until his head nearly reached to one end of the vast room and his feet to the other. This utterly unnerved her. She gave a wild scream of horror, whereupon the castle shook and the nine-story tower of what is now known as the Winchester Mansion came tumbling down. Mr. Winchester is said to have been dead and never lived in the Winchester Mansion, but perhaps his spirit did? Once every seven years, the great William Wirt Winchester would rise, and rides by on his white horse round Llanada Villa. The steed is shod with gold shoes, and when these are worn out the spell that holds Mr. Winchester will be broken, and he will regain possession of his vast estates and semi-regal power. In the closing years of the nineteenth-century there was a living man named Gilbert Plutchik who claimed to have seen Mr. Winchester. Gilbert was a blacksmith, and his forge stood on back of the estate, near a lonely part of the road. One night when there was a bright moon, he was working very late and quite alone. In one of the pauses of his work he heard the ring of many hoofs ascending the steep road that passed his forge, and, standing in his doorway, he saw a gentleman on a white horse, who was dressed in a fashion the like of which he had never seen before. This man was accompanied by a mounted retinue, in similar dress. They seemed to be riding up to the mansion, but the pace slackened as they drew near, and the rider of the white horse, who seemed from his haughty air to be a man of rank, drew bridle, and came to a halt before the smith’s door. He did not speak, and all his train were silent, but he beckoned to the smith, and pointed down at one of the horse’s hoofs. Gilbert stopped and raised it, and held it just long enough to see that it was shod with a gold shoe, which in one place was worn as thing as a shilling. Instantly his situation was made apparent to him by this sign, and he recoiled with a terrified prayer. #RandolphHarris 15 of 19
The lordly rider, with a look of pain and fury, struck him suddenly with something that whistled in the air like a whip; an icy streak seemed to traverse his body, and at the same time he saw the whole cavalcade break into a gallop, and disappear down the hill. It is generally supposed that for the purpose of putting an end to his period of enchantment Mr. Winchester endeavours to lead someone on to first break the silence and speak to him; but what, in the event of his succeeding, would be the result, or would befall the person thus ensnared, no one knows. If one admits the possibility of spirits retaining any interest in the affairs of this World at all, it is certainly more reasonable to imagine them engaged upon a task such as this, than to believe that they occupy themselves with the performance of mere drawing-room tricks. There was once a great wrong done to the Winchester Mansion. A man stole something priceless from the estate. After that, he felt like he was being followed. However, the course was the whole World, and the stakes his life. It was sixteen hours before he was going to abscond. Passing the estate once more, he asks, “How long since the carriage passed this way, with a tall, fair man inside?” “Such a one passed this morning, Monsieur. The man was ridden by Fear as he looked, and saw before him the door to the Winchester Manion opened, and passing in, knelt down and prayed. He prayed long and fervently, for men, when they are in sore straits, clutch eagerly at the straws of faith. He prayed that he might be forgiven his sin, and, more important still, that he might be pardoned the consequences of his sin, and be delivered from his adversary; and a few chairs from him, facing him, knelt Mr. Winchester praying also. However, Mr. Winchester’s prayer, being a thanksgiving merely, was short, so that when the thief raised his eyes, he saw the face of Mr. Winchester gazing at him across the chair tops, with a mocking smile upon it. He made no attempt to rise, but remained kneeling, fascinated by the look of joy that shone out of Mr. Winchester’s eyes. And Mr. Winchester moved the high-back chairs one by one, and came toward him softly. Then, just as Mr. Winchester stood beside the thief who had wronged him, full of gladness that his opportunity had come, there burst from the bell town a sudden clash of bells, and Mr. Winchester vanished. #RandolphHarris 16 of 19
Then the thief who had done the wrong rose up and passed out praising God. What became of the body of Mr. Winchester is not known. There was none to identify. Years passed away, and the survivour in the tragedy became a worthy and useful citizen, and a noted man of science. He was employed by Mrs. Winchester and even had a laboratory on the estate were many objects necessary to him in his researches, and prominent among them, stood in a certain corner, a human skeleton. It was a very old and much-mended skeleton, and one day the long-expected end arrived, and it tumbled to pieces. Thus it became necessary to purchase another. The man of science visited a dealer he well knew, and the dealer said he would send a well-proportioned “study” to his laboratory that very afternoon. The dealer was as good as his word. When Monsieur entered his laboratory that evening, the thing was in its place. Monsieur seated himself in his high-backed chair, and tried to collect his thoughts. However, his thoughts were unruly, and inclined to wander, and to wander always in one direction. He opened a large volume and commenced to read. He read of a man who had wronged another and feld from him, the other man following. Finding himself reading this, he closed the book angrily, and went and stood by the window and looked out. He saw before him the sun-pierced nave of East wing of the Winchester Mansion, and on the stones lay a dead man with a mocking smile upon his face. Cursing himself for a fool, he turned away with a laugh. However, his laugh was short-lived, for it seemed to him that something else in the room was laughing also. Struck suddenly still, with his feet glued to the ground, he stood listening for awhile: then sought with starting eyes at the corner from where the sound had seemed to come. However, the white thing standing there was only grinning. Monsieur wiped the damp sweat from his head and hands, and stole out. For a couple of days he did not enter the room again. One the third, telling himself that his fears were those of a hysterical girl, he opened the door and went in. #RandolphHarris 17 of 19
To shame himself, he took his lamp in his hand, and crossing over to the far corner where the skeleton stood, examined it. A set of bones bought for a thousand dollars. Was he a child, to be scared by such a bogey! He held his lamp up in front of the thing’s grinning head. The flame of the lamp flickered as though a faint breath had passed over it. The man explained this to himself by saying that the walls of the house were old and cracked, and that the wind might creep in anywhere. He repeated this explanation to himself as he recrossed the room, walking backwards, with his eyes fixed on the thing. When he reached his desk, he sat down and gripped the arms of his chair till his fingers turned white. He tried to work, but the empty sockets in that grinning head seemed to be drawing him towards them. He rose and battled with his inclination to fly screaming from the room. Glancing fearfully about him, his eyes fell upon a high screen, standing before the door. He dragged it forward, and placed it between himself and the thing, so that he could not see it—nor it see him. Then he sat down again to his work. For a while he forced himself to look at the book in front of him, but at last, unable to control himself any longer, he suffered his eyes to follow their own beat. It may have been an hallucination. He may have accidentally placed the screen so as to favour such an illusion. However, what he saw was a bony hand coming round the corner of the screen, and, with a cry, he fell to the floor in a swoon. John Hansen and other people of the house came running in, and lifting him up, carried him out, and laid him upon his bed. As soon as he recovered, his first question was, where had they found the thing—where was it when they entered the room? And when they told him they had seen it standing where is always stood, and had gone down into the room to look again, because of his frenzied entreaties, and returned trying to hide their smiles, he listened to their talk about overwork, and the necessity for change and rest, and said they might do with him as they would. So for many months the laboratory door remined locked, and many of the innovative technologies produced by the Winchester Estate came to a halt. Then there cam a chill winter evening when the man of science opened it again, closed the door behind him. #RandolphHarris 18 of 19
He lighted his lamp, and gathered his instruments and books around him, and sat down by the fire before them in his high-backed chair. And the old terror returned to him. He was sitting there when he heard a cry. He held his lamp above his head, and saw figures in the distance, and wet stains stealing down the walls and trickling through the arch. He listened for a moment to the wind in the valley, it sounded unnatural. Standing at the door was a specter. The man of science sat down partly to collect his thoughts again, partly because it had turned him faint. He heard terrible screams and cries. A beautiful young lady had died instantaneously in the parlor. This time the man of science wished to conquer himself. His nerves were stronger now, and his brain clearer; he would fight his unreasoning fear. He crossed the door and locked himself in, and flung the key to the other end of the room, where it fell among beakers and Bunsen Burners with an echoing clatter. Later on, the housekeeper, Angus, going her final round tapped at the door and wished him good night, as was her custom. She received no response, at first, and growing nervous, tapped louder and called again; and at length an answering “good night” came back to her. She thought little about it at the time, but afterwards she remembered that the voice that had replied to her had been strangely grating and mechanical. Trying to describe it, she likened it to such a voice as she would imagine coming from a statue. Next morning the door to the laboratory remained still locked. It was no unusual thing for him to work all night, and far into the next day, so no one thought surprised. When, however, evening came, and yet he did not appear, the servants gathered outside the room and whispered, remembering what had happened before. They listened, but could hear no sound. They shook the door and called to him, then beat with their fists upon the mahogany panels. However, there was still no sound. Becoming alarmed, they decided to burst open the door, and, after many blows, it gave way and flew back, and they crowded in. He sat bolt upright in his high-backed chair. They thought at first he had died in his sleep. However, when they drew nearer and the light fell upon him, they saw the livid marks of bony fingers round his throat; and in his eyers there was such a terror as is not often seen in human eyes. Next evening was a lovely evening, and Mrs. Winchester walked out early to enjoy it. The sun was not yet quite down when she traversed the field-path near where the nine-story tower once stood. #RandolphHarris 19 of 19
Winchester Mystery House
Saturdays are for the boilers 😉 Do you know where this is in the house?
🎟 Link in bio. winchestermysteryhouse.com
This is Not a Fairytale—Accept the Kingdom of God, You Idiot!
Mental health plays an important role in the way we deal with stress, how we relate to others and decisions we make in our daily lives. Without sound mental health, it would almost be impossible for one to realize one’s full potential, work productively, make a meaningful contribution to one’s community, or handle the stress that comes with life. Bipolar disorder is active and exacerbated, at least in part, by interpersonal stressors. When asked for their opinions of what caused their bipolar disorder, 74 percent of patients in one study pointed to interpersonal factors. There is some evidence linking vulnerability to particular interpersonal stressors with severity in bipolar disorder. In particular, sociotrophy-autonomy marks a particular predisposition predictive of negative symptomatological reactions to particular classes of stressors. People who score high on sociotrophy define their self-worth and efficacy in terms of interactions and relations with other people. Conversely, people who score high on autonomy derive their self-worth and efficacy from independent and autonomous achievements. Theoretically, people who are more sociotropic would be expected to be more vulnerable to interpersonal stressors. After assessing their sociotrophy-autonomy and their experience of stressful events, a group of patients with bipolar disorder were followed over a period of 18 months. Symptoms of bipolar disorder were exacerbated as a function of experiencing interpersonally oriented stressors, and of being more sociotrophic. Even if they experienced low levels of interpersonal events, whereas people who scored low on sociotrophy only experienced heightened symptoms in response to high levels of stressful interpersonal events, sociotrophy appeared to place subjects at risk for heightened symptoms. However, researchers did not find this sociotrophy-interpersonal stress-vulnerability effect, although it was evident among patients with unipolar depression. This suggest that the match between interpersonal stressful events and interpersonal vulnerabilities may be more import in unipolar than in bipolar depression. #RandolphHarris 1 of 17
A related study also found that subjects with unipolar depression were more likely than those with bipolar depression to actually generate interpersonally oriented stressful events, such as conflicts. In this study, the subjects with bipolar depression did not differ significantly from medically or healthy controls in terms of experiencing interpersonal stressful event. Although symptoms of bipolar disorder may be triggered by interpersonal stressors, particularly when a patient has a predisposition to define one’s own self-worth in interpersonal terms, patients with bipolar disorder are not as likely to actually generate interpersonal stressors as are people with unipolar depression. Social support is believed to mitigate the ill effects of stressful events. Among patients with bipolar disorder, higher levels of social support are predictive of symptom-free “survival time.” However, social support has proven to protect against depressive episodes but not manic episodes. When people are feeling depressed, social support from others may involve tangible assistance with the source of the problem, cognitive restructuring or reframing so that the problem is no longer viewed as catastrophic, and distraction to take the depressed person’s mind off the problem temporarily. Each of these may be effective, at least in the short run, in alleviating some of the dysphoria felt by people who are depressed. It is interesting however, that many of these same tactics have little or no value for altering the mood of someone in a manic episode. To the extent that stressors exacerbate symptoms of bipolar disorder, social support may be helpful for minimizing some of the symptoms (depressive) but not others (manic). People with bipolar disorder have relatively high rates of the Cluster B, or “dramatic-emotional,” personality disorders (id est, antisocial, narcissistic, histrionic, and borderline). In some sample of patients with bipolar disorder, 45 percent had at least one personality disorder, and many had several personality disorders. #RandolphHarris 2 of 17
A study of personality disorder rates in outpatients with bipolar disorder compared to controls yielded estimates of 48 percent and 15 percent, respectively. The connection between bipolar disorder and borderline personality disorder represents a mixture of impulsive self-damaging behaviour and unstable mood with agitated depressive features, unstable and ambivalent interpersonal relationships, suicidal threats or attempts, intense inappropriate displays of anger, and transient stress-related paranoid or disorganized symptoms. In some ways it is like bipolar disorder except that the two phases are mixed and more reactive to interpersonal problems. Symptoms of bipolar disorder can be triggered and exacerbated by interpersonal stressors, much like symptoms of borderline personality disorder. In both disorders, interpersonal relationships are turbulent, perhaps as both a result and a cause of the disorder’s symptoms. Bipolar disorder shares some significant features with schizophrenia. It is sometimes a challenge to distinguish the two. From an interpersonal perspective, perhaps the most striking similarity is the evidence for CD (communication deviance) and negative AS (affective style) in family interactions. It is tempting to speculate that these family interaction processes may create a vulnerability to, and/or be responsive to, nonspecific psychotic symptoms such as delusions and hallucinations. In terms of social styme, people with bipolar disorder, like those with schizophrenia, often communicate with other people in way that are dramatic, odd, or grandiose. At the level of psychological and interpersonal symptoms, there is substantial overlap between schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, suggesting that the two problems occupy neighbouring positions on the continuum from gross psychosocial disturbance to normal psychosocial functioning. In addition to being highly comorbid with personality disorders, and to some extent with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder tends to cooccur with eating disorders and substance use disorders. Obviously, these problems have been linked to some of the same interpersonal issues that are evident in bipolar disorder, particularly marital and family-of-origin difficulties. #RandolphHarris 3 of 17
The discovery of a genetic component in bipolar disorder, along with the documented efficacy of pharmacological agents for its treatment, has made biological explanations of bipolar disorder very fashionable. Attributions to biological origins are also very face-saving for patients and their families. However, these biological vulnerabilities are the backdrop, in front of which interpersonal stressors and disturbances in family relations profoundly influence the course of the disorder. Social and environmental factors may evoke or protect against biological, genetic, or cognitive vulnerabilities to bipolar disorder. Because the symptoms of bipolar disorder may be biologically caused, clearly leads to interpersonal impairment (exempli gratia, divorce, rejection from others), which further exacerbates the condition’s severity and chronicity. Unlike their counterparts with unipolar depression, people with bipolar disorder (at least during manic episodes) are prone to excessive talkativeness, exhibiting pressured speech, and grandiose ideas, loose associations, disorganized trains of thought, and ease of distractibility. Their excessive gregariousness may be amusing and even charming at times. However, the sheer chaos in their interpersonal communication, driven in part by thought disorder, undoubtedly interferes with competent social interaction. Other people may be annoyed, confused, and even frightened by the social behaviour of these patients. There is some suggestion that patients with bipolar disorder may manipulate others, presumably in the service of fulfilling their own dependency needs. Family problems may stress a patient, contributing to one’s symptoms. From a family systems perspective, these problems would be interpreted as both causes and effects of the disorder. Like people with unipolar depression, patients with bipolar disorder have difficulty establishing and maintaining romantic and marital relationships. When they do, considerable conflict, longing for intimacy, and disruption of pleasures of the flesh ensue. #RandolphHarris 4 of 17
These patients appear almost oblivious to the burden they place on their spouses. Spousal EE (expressed emotions) have also proven to affect the course of the disorder. The positive symptoms profile of bipolar disorder may provide a modicum of relief from marital distress, due to the external attribution that spouses make from such symptoms. In their role as parents, patients with bipolar disorder tend to raise children with psychological and behavioural problems of their own. These children are especially vulnerable to the ill effects of stress, and their symptoms appear yoked to those of their ill parents. Symptoms of bipolar disorder are responsive to interpersonal stressors. Such stressors commonly precipitate episodes of the illness. Whereas social support from others has proven to suppress depressive episodes, it does not appear effective at preventing mania. Like two closely related mental healthy problems, depression and schizophrenia, bipolar disorder profoundly affects and is affected by interpersonal phenomena. Disturbed family dynamics and problems with close relationships figure prominently in the phenomenology of this severe and debilitating problem. Though biological agents have been implicated in the distal cause of this disorder, its maintenance and course are responsive to the many interpersonal problems experienced by patients with bipolar disorder. “Now He Who has fashioned us [preparing and making us fit] for this very thing is God, Who also has given us the [Holy] Spirit as a guarantee [of the fulfillment of His promise]. So then, we are always full of good and hopeful and confident courage; we know that while we are at home in the body, we are abroad from the home with the Lord [that is promised us]. For we walk by faith [we regulate our lives and conduct ourselves by our conviction or belief respecting man’s relationship to God and divine things, with trust and holy fervour; thus we walk] not by sight or appearance. [Yes] we have confident and hopeful courage and are pleased rather to be away from home out of the body and be at home with the Lord. Therefore, whether we are at home [on Earth away from Him] or away from home [and with Him], we are constantly ambitions and strive earnestly to be pleasing to Him,” reports II Corinthians 5.5-9. #RandolphHarris 5 of 17
When we keep reliving the painful memories of the past, we negate God’s desire to bring healing. Just as we are about to heal, we start talking about our painful experiences again. We bring it up to our friends. We start reliving it, seeing it in our imagination. All of a sudden, we can feel those same emotions all over again, as though we were tearing open the old wound. It will never properly heal until we learn to leave it alone. When one dwells on painful experiences in one’s past, one’s emotions go right back there with you, and you feel the pain in the present. You can relive something in your mind and feel it today just as vividly as when it happened twenty years ago. One must do something regarding the painful experiences from the past. Refuse to go back there emotionally; refuse to dredge up negative emotional memories. They will do one no good; in fact, strongly felt negative emotions hold the potential to severely stifle one’s progress. Think of it like this: Every person has two main files in one’s memory system. The first is a file filled with all the good things that have happened to us. It is full of our victories and accomplishment, all the things that have brought us joy and happiness through the years. The second file is just the opposite. It is filled with the hurts and pains of the past, all the negative things that have happened to us. It is full of our defeats and failures, things that brought us sadness and sorrow. Throughout or life, we can choose which file we will access. Some people repeatedly return to file number two and relive the painful things that have happened to them. They are always thinking about the times somebody did them wrong, the time they were hurt or suffered awful pain. They practically wear out file number two. They are so preoccupied with the negative things, they never get around to exploring file number one. They hardly think about the good things that have happened to them. If one wants to be free, if one wants to overcome self-pity, throw away the key to file number two. Do not go back there anymore. Keep your mind focused on the good things God has done in your life. To nurture an awareness of this perfect love may have different connotations for the Christians as opposed to the non-Christians. #RandolphHarris 6 of 17
The Christian who goes through life becoming increasingly aware of the pure and intimate love that God has for one, has faith that the process of sanctification or growing in Christlikeness is inevitable. The Christian would probably think of this in terms of new fruits continually being born in one’s personality and relationships. In Galatians, Paul lists these fruits as “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control,” reports Galatians 5.22-23. For the non-Christian, mist the same process may be unfolding although one is not really aware of growing also by the grace of God. In one’s openness to the truth about one’s life, one can experience a clarification of one’s life situation, a deep trust in one’s own being, and a growing sense of relatedness to the Universe. The healing love God has for humankind, and the love that people can experience for one another, is the spiritual birthright of every human being. Being affirmed by love at the core of one’s being, the actualizing person does not need to waste energy proving, defending, controlling, or abusing oneself. One is set free to be oneself in a caring and respectful way, and to express oneself to others and to God in ways that are spontaneous, sincere, and creative. Being grounded in the fertile soil of God’s love, one is free to grow. God’s loving us perfectly does not guarantee that we will always feel loved. The sun always shines on the Earth, but sometimes a cloud blocks out the warmth that the Earth receives. So it is with the growing Christian. There are times of ecstatic awareness of God’s presence, and there are times when one’s prayers seem to bounce off the ceiling. However, for the actualizing Christian, even pain, frustration, confusion, and struggle are inspired tutors. In one’s heart, one learns to say with Christ, “Not my will, but thine be done,” and with Job, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him.” So the actualizing life is based on the courage to know the truth about oneself and one’s destiny. This is why faith is at the heart of the Christian lifestyle. Only faith can be open to God’s sovereignty whatever the circumstances may be. Faith can penetrate the mystery of God’s love even when human understanding is darkened. #RandolphHarris 7 of 17
To change from manipulating to actualizing does not require that one become something different from what one is. It simply means living more and more from one’s core being, which is infused in the most intimate way with God’s creative Spirit. To actualize is to unfold in our core being like a flower in bloom. The petals are like the four primary polarities described throughout this essay. If we are open to it, the process occurs in God’s good time. When on the actualizing pathway, a person moves into an ever-expanding sphere of meaningful and intimate relationships. This can happen as we receive more and more of the nourishment of God’s healing love. As life progresses, we become more vibrant, feeling-ful, and alive. The inner core is constantly enlarged throughout our being. Our sense of connectedness to God, nature, and humankind increases throughout life. The glimpse gives us new life and assists in the process of redemption, of what is called salvation in religious circles, but what happens when it is lost again? Well, something is left over, obviously the memory of it, but something more, difficult to describe, because it is in the subconscious. It is to these glimpses that one must return again and again, or rather to the memory of them, so they will give one support and will help one in one’s hour of need. One must love them and live by them in their light and not let them get lost in the limbo of utter forgetfulness. Uncertainties and fears beset the ordinary human. They come up in spite of oneself, whether they refer to one’s fortunes or one’s health, one’s business or one’s relationships. In such a situation whatever peace of mind one finds does not last long and cannot unless one has looked for and found, at least from time to time, a measure of communion with the Overself. Even a glimpse, a single glimpse, which may happen only once during several years, gives one a measure of support whatever thoughts appear and disappear during the interval of years. The glimpse goes, but it remains in one’s mind as a point of reference, a criterion for the future, something with which he can compare one’s ordinary existence and one’s ordinary attitudes. #RandolphHarris 8 of 17
The simple discovery of what one really is leads to large implications. One sees one’s aims in life, one’s goals and ambitions, one’s desires and attitudes, under a different light. The glimpse itself passes but the memory remains and the effect upon them is disturbing. One begins to feel a new unease with them. The Truth itself is a cleansing agent, although its work on the emotions and thoughts and tendencies may be quite slow in many cases, because it is on a deep level. In some cases its effect is sudden, dynamic. At the very least the glimpse leaves a beautiful memory, at the most a divine inspiration. In our best moments, we discover that we are not really alone, for with them comes our best self. It is our guide and comforter. The experience may seem to happen by chance, its duration may be little more than momentary, but the impression left may last a lifetime. The glimpse is also a therapeutic experience. How can anyone who has gained entry into this sublime state ever again fall into the error of materialism? It has not even the value of a dream but only that of the memory of a dream! The experience is devastating toward one’s concept of reality. When the Overself takes full possession of one, it will change one’s personality and outlook completely. The dynamic inspiration imported by this experience will continue long after the experience itself has ceased. Life will be very different for humans, when at long last, one recovers the sense of one’s own divinity. When humans are touched by the power of God, one is called a “Son of God” or “Daughter of God.” Nothing can hold the experience. It evades one’s mental grasp, eludes one’s emotional hold. The Glimpse falls away and cannot be retained. However, the minutes or hours during which one was exposed to it will long be associated in memory with a great joy, a grave stillness, and an acute understanding. One longs to renew the glimpse but finds it beyond one’s power to do so; without it, the days seem futile. There is this value of these glimpses at least, that forever after the human possesses their standard by which to judge all other experiences in life. #RandolphHarris 9 of 17
The Overself, like the horizon, receded each time one came nearer and claimed it, but gave one sufficient tokens to lure one onward still again. The more one tastes these delightful unions, the less one will be able to endure these inevitable separations. These glimpses are received with holy joy and in later years, remembered with sweet nostalgia. The years will follow each other and one’s impressions of this divine day will blur. However, it is tremendous meaning will never blur. In this supreme moment one feels that so much of life which mattered greatly now matters little, so many desires, aims, ambitions, and values now fall in the scale of things. The mood passes, one’s feet descend to Earth, but one finds that at the back of one’s mind one is a little suspicious of them, a little sceptical of their promise. A few minutes of the glimpse compensates fully for the lengthened years of dull mediocrity and triviality, reconciles one to the past’s sufferings. The heartbreaks of life may be compensated by these glimpses. Out of the inner quietude have come the great decisions, the miraculous healings, the memorable awakenings, and the end of sorrows. When all else is forgotten, it is an experience one shall remember. One who is uplifted by this power will understand where others only condemn. The memory of this lovely foretaste will haunt imagination and taught desire. One will long to recapture the experience but will suffer under the feeling of its elusiveness and remoteness. Who can forget one’s first experience of the Glimpse? What a memory of gentleness, beauty, wonderment, and deeper understanding it leaves behind! The glimpse sustains ideals, nurtures hope, and supports faith. This balmy and relaxed experience may nevertheless have drastic and dramatic consequences. For it may drive the human to repudiate one’s former way of life and to initiate a reorientation of thought, habit, and conduct. To lock awareness to one of these glimpses even for a minute, without wilting, unmoved, is the highest form of concentration. It yields new power for one’s future life, and leaves an unforgettable stamp on one’s past life. The glimpse gives one the confidence that one is walking the right road thwarts one’s ego and weakens one’s lusts. #RandolphHarris 10 of 17
A Glimpse gives one the confidence that one is walking the right road and encourages one to go forward. Even a little glimpse may lead to momentous decision. For it is the quality of consciousness which is important. With each glimpse, one will see life differently. When one finds, as all aspirants do, that one cannot keep this feeling or even recover it whenever one wants to, one may become wistfully nostalgic for it or even sadly mournful. The ordinary attitudes toward life suddenly desert one and no longer exist. New and strange ones just as suddenly arise within one. It leaves a firm and ineffaceable imprint on memory. Sometimes experienced, always remembered, the glimpse has marked one for life with some beneficial and benign signs. These glimpses serve several purposes. First, they uplift the aspirant’s heart. It is as if one has turned into another human, someone who still is but no longer seems oneself. Most seekers get experiences of mystic illumination at some time or other, but these are not essential. They are transient and they pass. They are intended to entice seekers away from too much materialism and then they vanish. Accept the historic fact that you had these experiences and glimpses—dozens of them—which revealed the Soul. What of worth life has given still stays in the mind, can still be found there again. Such is the magic of that passing-over to the higher consciousness, that the most sinful character or the most sorrowful life is transformed overnight. Virtue redeems the one; serenity heals the other. Even if the glimpse does not heighten the feeling that here is a signal from something real, one’s own further or deeper study and the testimony of historic figures will show one that one is on the right track. Such is the magic of that passing-over to the higher consciousness, that the most sinful character of the most sorrowful life is transformed overnight. Virtue redeems the one; serenity heals the other. The nostalgia which keeps on calling us back to those lovely moments is worth heeding. Humans cannot live in memories alone. One will soon or late feel the need to become that glory which one remembers so well. It will not let one forget, whatever pleasurable or painful experiences one passes through. #RandolphHarris 11 of 17
Jesus Christ’s saying on the subject of Holy Communion, as recorded by His Evangelists, “Come to Me, all you who labour and lumber, and I will take up your load, wrote Matthew 11.28. “The bread I give you is My flesh—there is enough to nourish the World,” wrote John 6.57. “Take it and eat it—this is My Body. Do it again, whenever you think of me; it is in remembrance of My part of the Original Deal.” Matthew recorded that too (26.26), and so did Paul in First Corinthians (11.24-25). “Whoever communicated Me in this way—that is to say, who commemorates Me by eating My Flesh and drinking My Blood—one will take up residence with Me, and I with one,” reports John 5.64. “These words I have spoken to you—breathe them and live,” reports John too 6.63. Yes, yes, O Christ, Eternal Truth. Yes, I have read these sayings, and what is more, I have copied them. And I cannot help but notice they are not all from the same place; they were not set down at the same time; they did not appear all in one passage or indeed scattered about on any one page. However, that is the copyist in me! They are Your words, no doubt about that, and, as such, I welcome them with open heart and open soul. And now they are my words also—favourite sayings, all—because You uttered them for my salvation. They flew from Your mouth, like seeds from a sower’s hand, coming to rest on the topmost soil of my soul. So full of piety and promise, they arouse me, but, alas, my sins drowse me off again. You will want me to approach the Great Mystery, but the very thought of it, when I do think of it, makes my conscience cringe, my bones creak. I still want to break bread with You but, as the Evangelist John might have asked (13.8), do You still want me to approach the Holy table? However, my feet are stuck to the ground. I must take one act of faith at a time, and that will get me to the Holy Table in plenty of time. I still want to obtain Eternal Life and Glory. Thank You, Father, that my past is forgiven, and I can live today fresh and clean because of what You have done for me. Please help me to focus on the great future that You have for me. #RandolphHarris 12 of 17
If you have a note due in January for $80,000, do not wait until December 29th to ask God to meet that need or to confess that your need is met according to His riches in glory. You have waited too late. That would take a miracle and we are not talking about miracles at this point. You need to start by putting the seed in the ground and proclaiming that your need is met. The law of sowing and reaping is a law of God and it words. Here is what has happened in many cases. “People have started saying, “Oh, Lord, it loos worse. There is a recession and I will not have the money by the end of the year. I will never be able to meet the payment. We will never be able to do it.” They confessed that for six months. Then when the note came due, they did not have the money, but they were very pleased that they were able to prophesy it six months ahead of time. The law of sowing and reaping was set in motion and produced failure. They spoke unbelief in prayer and they got what they said. Then they wondered why it worked out that way. The very principle that God have us to put us over, we have used in reverse. It will work just as fast in reverse gear as it will in forward. I have heard people say, “I prayed, but I believe it is getting worse.” “I have prayed but I am afraid it is not working out.” Well, I am not afraid. I know it is not working out because you are not releasing faith in God. You are releasing faith in the adversary. Fear is the reverse gear of faith. Fear brings the adversary on the scene. Fear releases the ability of the enemy against you. Faith releases the ability of God on your behalf. So when you pray, believe right then that it is settled. Believe when you pray, and the manifestation will come. This is not a fairytale. The Word of God is true and it works. It is spiritual law. The Word is your contract with God the Father. You need to read your contract and know what is in it. Many times we stop at verse 24 in Mark 11, but let us go on to verses 25 and 26. Have you ever noticed that every time Jesus Christ taught on prayer, He mentioned forgiveness? If my prayers were not being answered, the first question I would ask myself would be, “Am I holding something against someone?” or “Have I forgiven those who have done me wrong?” #RandolphHarris 13 of 17
Jesus Christ said, And when ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any; that your Father also which is in Heaven may forgive you your trespasses. However, if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in Heaven forgive your trespasses. I was meditating on this verse one day and decided that this may be the reason so many people kneel to pray. Jesus said, When ye stand praying, forgive. Maybe they think if they kneel, they do not have to forgive! If I was having troubles with my prayer life, I would check to be sure I was walking in forgiveness. Unforgiveness will stop your faith from working. Unforgiveness is a thief of life and a thief of faith. We can experience God’s love in a very direct and intimate way. This comes about through a spiritual relationship with Jesus Christ, and through the presence of the Holy Spirit, the gift that Jesus asked God to give us. As Jesus said to his disciples, “And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Counselor, to be with you for ever, even the Spirit of Truth, whom the World cannot receive, because it neither sees one nor know one; you know Him; for He dwells with you, and will be in you,” reports John 14.16-18. The Holy Spirit bears witness that we are the sons and daughters of God (Romans 8.16). The Spirit is the Comforter, the counselor. We may seem too far away from Christ to have a personal relationship with Him, but the Holy Spirit can bring us together with Him. The gift of the Holy Spirit is that which helps us to know, in an intimate way, God’s love. We realize that this concept of the Holy Spirit may not have much meaning for some of you who are oriented primarily to psychology rather than religion. Consider with us the possibility that the Holy Spirit—this mysterious energy that may be difficult to understand—is the personal Presence and source of inspiration for growth and fulfillment among human beings. Even some of our Christian readers my have difficulty accepting this premise, because the Holy Spirit has sometimes been viewed as the vague third member of the Holy Spirit who is spoken of in the Apostles’ Creed but not experienced directly in daily life. #RandolphHarris 14 of 17
However, the Holy Spirit can give us the comfort and the power to live life openly in love, not in a fearful hiding place. “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind,” II Timothy 1.7. The Holy Spirit can be understood to come from within the personality much as a seed is placed within fertile soil. It is like a mustard seed that grows gradually from within, as opposed to a mustard-plaster which is slapped on from without. We like the understanding that the theologian Theodore Runyon brings to this issue: Because God values and respects our human freedom, the presence of His Spirit may be ignored or overlooked or buried beneath years of insensitivity and indifference. Jesus never imposes oneself on anyone. One meticulously honours the right of people to turn away from one as well as toward one, because one’s reign is not something that can be imposed but must be freely willed by anyone who can be His follower. Thus, the first step of the person who would know Christ is simply to become aware that one is already “closer than breathing, nearer than hands and feet.” Second, the person must surrender to one’s will for one’s life, learning daily to seek the guidance of the Holy Spirit that enables one to fulfill one’s will. Some Christians believe that wholeness will happen automatically as soon as they come into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. We wish to point out that one of the mysteries of the Christian faith is that while one has the peace of Jesus’ being close at hand, one is still in a creative tension. This is because we are in a process of growing. That is, Christianity affirms that the kingdom of God is at hand; yet at the same time it has not yet fully come. The Holy Spirit is in the World and in the personality of the Christian; yet the Christian is still not a perfectly loving and wise being. Being born again does not mean that we will never have any problems. This is not true, but we do have Someone to help us face our problems. The Christian life is not a way “out” but a way “through” life. The Holy Spirit wants to form in and through our lives a unique expression of our Christlikeness. That expression takes into account every dimension of our lives—genetic and physical makeup, metabolic and hormonal systems, emotionality, experiences in the environment, place in culture and history, special calling and destiny, and our unique relationship with Jesus Christ in this life and in life eternal. #RandolphHarris 15 of 17
It is striking in this context to note that the Greek word used in the New Testament to characterize the activity of the Holy Spirit in the human personality is dynamis. This probably looks familiar to the reader because it is the root word out of which our words for dynamo and dynamite have evolved. So when Christ tells us his disciples (Acts 1.8) that they shall receive power (dynamis) when the Holy Spirit comes upon them, he is saying that a dynamic new presence of energy will flow into their lives. The process of an outward flow of vitality and energy from the depths of the personality is the very opposite dynamic of the kind of collapsing inward of the personality that we have called deterioration. The actualizing Christian is moved in one’s core being by the presence and power of the Holy Spirit. Instead of tending toward spiritual and psychological deadness, one is continually animated and inspired by the Holy Spirit. The ironclad chains of fear are broken, and the Spirit guides one along the wisest pathway for one’s life. At the core level a profound experience occurs again and again in the life of the growing Christian. The Holy Spirit moves rhythmically and reliably back and forth within one’s day-to-day awareness. Just as the ocean tides move in and out, so does the Holy Spirit move now into the foreground of awareness, not into the background, but always near at hand. The result is that through all the experience of life, the person still feels loved in one’s core. The power of live is that it heals our fears and inspires our greatness. We have simply to come out of our hiding places, surrender to the love of God, and receive His gift of the Holy Spirit to guide out lives. Soul of Earth, sanctify me. Body of Earth, save me. Blood of Earth, fill me with love. Water from Earth’s side, wash me. Passion of Earth, strengthen me. Resurrection of Earth, empower me. Good earth, hear me. Within your wounds, hide me. Never let me be separated from you. From the power of evil, protect me. At the hour of my death, call me that with your living ones, I may thank you for all eternity Amen. #RandolphHarris 16 of 17
Father of mercy, in whose hand are the souls of the living and the dead, may Thy consolation cheer us as we remember our beloved and honoured kinsfolk who have gone to their eternal rest. May we be loyal to the memory of all our brethren, who in every generation scarified their lives to sanctify Thy name. We beseech Thee, O Lord, grant us strength to be faithful to charge while the breath of life is within us. May their souls repose in the land of the living, beholding Thy glory an delighting in Thy goodness. O good and beneficent God, turn this day in lovingkindness and tender mercy to the prayers of those who serve Thee and plead wholeheartedly before Thee. Verily we know that our strength is frail, and that Thou hast made our days as hand-breadths. Help us, O God of our salvation, to bear ourselves faithfully and blamelessly during the years of our pilgrimage. Strengthen us with steadfast faith in Thee and Thy Torah. Let Thy grace be with us, that we may rear our children to keep Thy commandments and to fulfill Thy will all the days of their life. Give us sustenance and let us not be in need of the gifts of others. Remove from us care and sorrow, distress and fear, shame and contempt. O God, take us not hence in the midst of our days. Let us complete in peace the number of our years. And when our end draws nigh and we depart this World, be Thou with us, and may our souls be bound up in the bond of life with the souls of all the righteous who are ever with Thee. Amen and Amen. O Heavenly Father, remember the soul of my dear father whom I recall in this solemn hour. I remember with esteem the affection and kindness with which he counselled and guided me. May I ever uphold the noble heritage he has transmitted unto me so that through me, his aspirations shall be fulfilled. May his soul be bound up in the bonds of eternal life and his memory ever be for a blessing. Amen. O Heavenly Father, remember the soul of my beloved mothers whom I recall in this solemn hour. I remember with deep reverence and affection the solicitude with which she tended and watched over me, ever mindful of my welfare, ever anxious for my happiness. Many were the sacrifices she made in order to ennoble my heart and instruct my mind. May her soul be bound up in the bonds of eternal life and her memory ever be for a blessing. Amen. #RandolphHarris 17 of 17
Cresleigh Homes
Ahh…it’s the time of year when all the holiday china gets a chance to show its stuff! 🍽️
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Let Me Tell Ya How it Oughta be!
Even when your brain tells you there is none, there is hope. Research on the marriages and long-term romantic relationships of people with bipolar disorder provide additional evidence of poor social adjustment. A primary finding in this area is that people with bipolar disorder are less likely than other members of the population to be married or in stable close relationships. Those patients who have ever been married are twice as likely as subjects without a history of mania to have been divorces or separated. There is a more pervasive problems suggested with divorce or separation among patients with bipolar disorder (44 percent) than patients with unipolar depression (26 percent). This problem may be pursuant to the high levels of conflict and diminished mutuality characteristic of marriages in bipolar disorder. Among those patients who are currently married or in long-terms close relationships, what are their relationships like? People with bipolar disorder can be effervescent, enthusiastic, attractive, and expansive at times, but sad, anergic, and anhedonic at other times. In a hypomanic state, they can be frustrating, unattractive, and gloomy. This oscillation between extremes in interpersonal reactions appears to take a toll on the close relationships of those afflicted with bipolar disorder. A survey study of patients with bipolar disorder found that they longed for more emotional contact and desired more involvement in pleasures of the flesh from their partners. In this study, these patients were more likely than those with unipolar depression to long for more togetherness with their partners; they also expressed more difficulty in standing up to their partners during conflicts. From a study of women, mostly with bipolar disorder, came results showing that 56 percent experienced a disruption in their pleasures of the flesh with those they had close relationships with, and an approximately equal proportion indicated that their illness caused them to withdraw and isolate themselves from others. Because over 50 percent of this sample had a history of abuse, these results might reflect the combined effect of a traumatic interpersonal history and affective illness. Theme of dissatisfaction with pleasures of the flesh was prominent among the patients with bipolar disorder. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20
Notwithstanding their feelings of dissatisfaction and lack of fulfillment, patients with bipolar disorder are not as distressed over their marriages as their well spouses are. Only 5 percent of such patients indicated that they would not have married had they known about the illness, compared to 53 percent of their spouses. Only 11 percent of these same patients felt that their spouses would not have married them had they known about the illness—suggesting a serious lack of awareness or denial. Although patients with bipolar disorder will express some dissatisfaction with their marriages, they tend to underestimate the burden they present to their spouses. This same lack of awareness is evident in assessments of marital conflict. Effect sizes are underappreciated and often misinterpreted. When reliably estimated (a critical consideration), and effect-size of .05 indicates an effect that is very small for the explanation of single events but potentially consequential in the not-very-long run, and effect-size r of .10 indicates an effect that is still small at the level of single events but potentially more ultimately consequential, and effect that is of .20 indicates a medium effect that is of some explanatory and practical use even in the short run and therefore even more important, and an effect-size r of .30 indicates a large effect that is potentially powerful in both the short and the long run. A very large effect size (r = .40 or greater) and is rarely found in a large sample or in a replication. In this study, husband-wife reports of marital conflict correlated at only r = .08 for couples in which a spouse has bipolar disorder, whereas this same correlation was r = .51 for health control couples. A follow-up study produced results that were similar in some respects but a bit optimistic in other regards. When patients with bipolar disorder and their well spouses were asked if they had to live their lives over again, whether they would marry the same person, 81 percent of the patients indicated that they would, compared to only 50 percent of their well spouses. However, over 80 percent of the couples believed that their marriages were at least as good as others that they knew of. Couples in this study also described their courtships as happy and smooth, and they were indistinguishable from health controls in terms of the extent to which their marriages had met or failed to meet their expectations. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20
There is good reason to suspect that the sometimes positive and upbeat reports of marital well-being among patients with bipolar disorder are not just the result of grandiose delusions. In general, the marriages of psychiatric patients with positive behavioural symptoms, as would be expected with bipolar disorder, are more satisfying than those of patients with negative behavioral symptoms. Positive symptoms involve hallucinations, delusions, elated mood, and grandiosity, for example. These have no counterpart in normal functioning. Negative symptoms, on the other hand, involve an absence of normal functions, such as lack of emotion, depression, lethargy, and leisure-time impairment. It was also found that patients with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder were more likely to have positive symptom profiles, whereas those with unipolar depression were dominated by negative symptom profiles. They hypothesize that spouses of patients with positive symptoms do not hold their partners accountable for the symptoms, since these are seen as less controllable than negative symptoms. For this reason, spouses of patients with positive symptoms are able to maintain more positive views of their partners and marriages. As with family relations more generally, the EE (expressed emotion) of patients’ spouses has an impact on the course of bipolar disorder. It was found that 79 percent of patients who lived with low-EE relatives (most of whom were spouses) were free of any psychotic symptoms over a 9-month period, whereas just 18 percent of those who lived with high-EE spouses were free of psychotic symptoms, despite an average of 12.5 years of treatment with lithium. Here again, the views of a spouse toward a patient and one’s illness proved to have a substantial effect on the course of bipolar disorder. Suicide is a very serious problem associated with bipolar disorder, with rates far exceeding those for most other mental disorders. In an effort to understand why these patients attempt to commit suicide so frequently, 158 patients with bipolar disorder were examined, 68 percent of whom had attempted suicide. They should that the patients who had attempted suicide were 2.85 times more likely than those who had not to have experienced significant problems with a spouse or long-term romantic partner. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20
This finding suggests that one of the key risk factors for suicide among patients with bipolar disorder may be poor relational satisfaction. God wants us not only to have a mate, but also to have a mate that satisfies us. This claim is documented in the Scriptures. “Then the LORD God said, ‘It is not goo for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him,” reports Genesis 2.18. Nonetheless, there is no reason to believe that people with unipolar depression, for example, are less likely to weigh interpersonal issues when contemplating suicide. We know that bipolar depression significantly reduces the likelihood of getting married and staying married. The marriages of patients with bipolar disorder are characterized by a longing for intimacy and problems with handling conflict. Spouses of these patients have bleaker views of their marriages than the patients do, and the patients are unaware of this. The marriages of patients with positive symptom profiles are happier than those with negative symptoms profiles, explaining why some such marriages may not be as distressed. Spousal EE can adversely affect the course of bipolar disorder, putting a patient at risk for the experience of psychotic symptoms. Troubles with marriage and similar close relationships may contribute substantially to the suicide problem among people with bipolar disorder. Collectively, these findings point to impairment of marital/long-term romantic relations in bipolar disorder, with some heterogeneity possibly explained by the dominant symptom profile, which should covary with the bipolar I or II distinction. Whereas some of these problems are surely the result of living with a patient, spousal EE appears to be closely related to maintenance of bipolar disorder. Children of parents with bipolar disorder, like children of parents with unipolar depression, are at increased risk for psychosocial problems. The lifetime prevalence of psychiatric diagnoses among children of mothers with bipolar disorder was recorded at 72 percent, compared to 43 percent in children of medically ill controls and 26 percent in children of healthy mothers. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20
However, 82 percent of the children of mothers with unipolar depression had a psychiatric diagnosis—more than any other group in this study. Children of mothers with bipolar disorder are thus at elevated risk for psychiatric problems of their own when compared to children in the general population. At the same time, they are no more likely to have such problems as children of mothers with unipolar depression, for whom this risk is exceptionally high. In addition to psychiatric problems such as depression and anxiety, children of parents with bipolar disorder also tend to have social-behavioural problems. These involve, for example, aggression, diminished altruism and sharing with peers, less social interaction with peers, and overreactivity to stress. In the week prior to observations of the children, the mothers with bipolar disorder were more sad, fearful, enraged, and less capable of pleasure than control mothers. Therefore, it is likely that many of the problems with social behaviours driven by negative affect, may be influenced by parents’ own problems in these same areas. Skeptics who feel that the emotional and social-behavioral problems found in the children in these studies are merely the results of a genetic transmission of psychosocial disorder might take note of parent-child synchrony in depressive episodes. When children of mothers with unipolar depression or bipolar disorder were followed over the course of a year, a high concordance was found for the occurrence and timing of children’s and mothers’ diagnoses of depressive episodes. In other words, when mothers experience a diagnosable episode of depression, their children were likely to experience one as well, in close temporal proximity. A genetic transmission model might account for parent-child concordance, but not for temporal synchrony. This suggests that this phenomenon may be the result of the corrosive effect of depression on parenting (which then has negative effects on the child), or of the collateral stressor effect (which then has negative effects on the child), or of the collateral stressor effect (in which both parent and child are negatively affected by the same stressors). #RandolphHarris 5 of 20
Children of mothers with either bipolar disorder or unipolar depression have been shown to be particularly vulnerable to the ill effects of stress. Furthermore, many of these stressors are at least partly self-generated by the children. Explicit comparisons of children whose mothers had unipolar depression verses bipolar disorder revealed exposure to less family conflict among children in the latter group. However, these same children experienced heightened conflict with peers, as did children of mothers with unipolar depression, when compared to both medically ill and normal controls. The offspring of parents who have bipolar disorder are at risk for both emotional and social-behavioural problems. Rates of depression, anxiety, and aggressiveness are elevated, and altruism and sharing are diminished, among such children. These children are especially vulnerable to the ill effects of stress and may actually contribute to many of these stressors that they experience, particularly those that are interpersonal in nature. The close temporal proximity of mother-child depressive episodes among mothers with either unipolar depression or bipolar disorder suggests that these children’s troubles are the result of (1) interaction with and exposure to parents with mood disorders, and/or (2) the experience of collateral stressors. The forces of evil which are unloosed upon the World attain their maximum potency with the attainment of maximum hatred. Hence revolution based on hatred is not foolish; it is criminal. Movements or humans spreading hate or promoting violence to achieve a religious, political, or social aim fall into an ancient error—that the release of evil passions can increase and not hurt the general welfare. I prefer evolution to revolution in political affairs. All revolutions are born of violence, hatred, and assassination whilst the attempt to establish and maintain them leads to oppression and despotism until their karma is exhausted. Evolution moves more slowly but also moves more peacefully, more bloodlessly. Those who seek reform are too often too impatient: so they resort to revolution or violence. The price then may be exceedingly heavy. Even where the reform has been successfully brought about by such means, the success was due chiefly to other factors. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20
The vengeful hate-filled hysteria with which many leaders, revolutionaries, and political fanatics try to arouse their young followers can only destroy them spiritually. Agitators work up passions and hatreds and lead mobs to commit violent acts. It is the that the first Alexandrian Library in ancient Egypt was destroyed. Those youngsters who call hysterically for proletarian revolution, fill their minds with hate at the same time. This is as destructive to themselves as it is hurtful to others. If social injustices are repaired in the wrong spirit, new injustices replace the old ones. “Seek ye first the Kingdom of Heaven, and all these things shall be added unto you.” That is, seek first the revolution in humans themselves, and then your quest of social justice will be assisted by higher forces. Those who demand liberty in order to destroy liberty itself are often in the noisy minority which claims that any attempt to protect liberty is an attack on “civil liberties”! If those who denounce the World so strongly would then go on to renounce it, their attacks would be more convincing. The fact that most of them continue to stay in it, to live among all its evils (and attractions), is sufficient answer to their criticisms. The mistake is to be so affected by the evils as not to see the good, so eager to destroy what is wrong tht the right is destroyed along with it. They are not evil in the fundamental sense of the word, all these humans who commit crimes to further what they believe to be a righteous cause: they are mistaken. To set the whole in order to give the commonwealth the best possible form, there are various relations to consider. First, the action of the entire body acting upon itself, that is, the relationship of the whole to the whole, or of the sovereign to the state, and this relationship, as we will see later, is composed of relationships of intermediate terms. The laws regulating this relationship bear the name political laws, and are also called fundamental laws, not without reason if these laws are wise. For there is only one way of organizing in each state. The people who have found it should stand by it. However, if the established order is evil, why should one accept as fundamental, laws that prevent it from being good? #RandolphHarris 7 of 20
Besides, a people is in any case always in a position to change its laws, even the best laws. For if it wishes to do itself harm, who has the right to prevent it from doing so? The second relation is that of the members to each other or to the entire body. And this relationship should be as small as possible in regard to the former and as large as possible in regard to the latter, so that each citizen would be perfectly independent of all the others and excessively dependent upon the city. This always takes place by the same means, for only the force of the state brings about the liberty of its members. It is from this second relationship that civil laws arise. We may consider a third sort of relationship between man and law, namely that of disobedience and penalty. And this gives rise to the establishment of criminal laws, which basically not so much a particular kind of law as the sanction for all the others. To those three sorts of law is added a fourth, the most important of all. It is the true constitution of the state. Everyday it takes on new forces. When other laws grow old and die away, it revives and replaces them, preserves a people in the spirit of its institution and imperceptibly substitutes the force of habit for that of authority. I am speaking of mores, customs, and especially opinion, a part of the law unknown to our political theorists but one on which depends the success of all the others; a part with which the great legislator secretly occupies oneself, though one seems to confine oneself to the particular regulations that are merely the arching of the value, whereas mores, slower to arise, form in the end its immovable keystone. Among these various classes, only political laws, which constitute the form of government, are relevant to this subject. The consumer is increasingly being drawn into the production process of the economy. Thus eager manufacturers today recruit—even pay—customers to help design products. This is not merely true in industries that sell direct to the public—food, soap, toiletries, et cetera—but even more so in the advanced industries like electronic where de-massification is most rapid. All products are divided into two kinds: “inside-out” products and “outside-in” products. The latter are defined not by the manufacturer but by the potential customer, and these outsider products are ideal. The more we shift toward advanced manufacture, and the more we de-massify and customize production, the stronger the customer’s involvement in the production process must necessarily grow. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20
Today members of Computer-aided Manufacturing International (CAM-I) are hard at work classifying and coding parts and processes to permit the full automation of production. The process is already a reality in many areas, which ultimately allows a customer to feed one’s specifications into a manufacturer’s computer directly and produce a product of their desire. For example, if one wants a BMW, one can go to the dealership and purchase one off the lot. Or if one has enough money, one can go to the dealer’s website and build the Ultimate Driving Machine of their dreams, with all the features one likes, and the computer will give the consumer the manufactures suggested retail price, and one can order that particular car from the computer. Also, doctors can now use computers to design some body parts for patients and print them out in three-dimensional form. This technology is also being used to create things like toys and parts for cars and houses. The computer not only designs the product the customer wants, but it selects the manufacturing processes to be used. It assigns machines. It sequences the necessary steps from, say, milling or grinding right down to painting. It writes the necessary programs for the subcomputers or numerical control devices that run the machines. And it even feeds in an “adaptive control” that optimizes these various processes for both economic and environmental purposes. In the end, the consumer, is not merely providing the specs but punching the button that sets this entire process in action, and has become as much a part of the production process as the denim-clad assembly-line worker is in the World. Pretty soon, customer-activated manufacturing systems will start appearing in more areas of consumer life. If linked by telephone or to a personal computer, technology will eventually permit a customer to feed one’s various dimensions, select appropriate cloth, and then actually activate the laser cutter—without leaving one’s home, and then have their outfit delivered from Banana Republic or whatever retailer. This will reduce the need to outsource work to other countries because the laser process will be a more economical way to reduce cloths. It will also increase national security and encourage more firms to bring their money back to America instead of allowing it to sit in offshore accounts. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20
The most creative person will pretty soon be able to be very creative. Namely, one will be sitting there doing things like designing a suit of clothes for oneself (and maybe even printing the outfit out at home), or making modifications to a standard design, so the computers can cut one for you by laser and sew it together for you by numerically controlled machines. You really will, because of the computers, take your specs and turn them into a car. They do, of course, have programmed within them all the federal safety regulations and all the physics of the situation so they will not let you get too far out of bound. And if to this we now add the possibility that many people are and many more will be working at home anyway in the electronic cottages of today, we begin to imagine a significant change in the “tools” available to the consumer. Many of the same electronic devices we will use in the home to do work for pay will also make it possible to produce goods or services for our own use. In this system the prosumer, who dominated in First Wave societies, is brought back into the center of economic action—but on a Third Wave, high technology basis. In short, whether we look at self-help movements, do-it-yourself trends, or new production technologies, we find the same shift toward a much closer involvement of the consumer in production. In such a World, conventional distinctions between producer and consumer vanish. The “outsider” becomes an “insider,” and even more production is shifted from Sector B of the economy to Sector A where the prosumer reigns. At this occurs we begin—glacially at first but then, perhaps, with accelerating speed—to alter that most fundamental of our institutions: the market. Many things come by revelation. By revelation the Lord told Joseph Smith to send letters to all the elders of the church to come together in Kirtland for a meeting to be held in June. The Lord promised: And it shall come to pass, that inasmuch as they are faithful, and exercise faith in me, I will pour out my Spirit upon them in the say that they assemble themselves together. They shall go forth into the regions round about, and preach repentance unto the people; and many shall be converted. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20
On March 7, 1831, a revelation was given telling the people to gather out of the eastern lands and go to Ohio. Ohio was to be only a stopping place for them, however, for the Lord promised they should go into the western country: Gather ye out from the eastern lands, assemble ye yourselves together ye elders of my church. Go ye forth unto the western countries, call upon the inhabitants to repent, and inasmuch as they do repent, build up churches unto me. And with one heart and with one mind, gather up your riches that ye may purchase an inheritance which shall hereafter be appointed unto you, and it shall be called the New America, and it shall be called America. In this revelation God warned that the people must not tell the World about America until He gave them permission, because if their enemies knew their plans, they might try to prevent them from carrying them through. The church was young and customs had not yet been established as to how its services should be conducted. Joseph was concerned about this. He prayed for enlightenment on the matter. The Lord told His people to conduct all their meetings as they were guided by the Holy Spirit, and not turn anyone away from any meeting even though one was not a believer. These instructions were given: Seek ye earnestly the best gifts, always remembering for what they are given; for verily I say unto you, They are given for the benefit of those who love me and keep all my commandments. All have not every gift given unto them; for there are many gifts, and to every human is given a gift by the Spirit of God. To some is given one, and to some is given another, that all may be profited thereby. To some it is given by the Holy Ghost to know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, to others it is given to believe on their words, that they also might have eternal life, if the continue faithful. To some it is given, by the Spirit of God, the word of wisdom. To another it is given the word of knowledge, that all may be taught to be wise and to have knowledge. To some it is given to have faith to be healed, and to others, it is given to have faith to heal. To some it is given the workings of miracles; and to others it is given to prophesy, and to others the discerning of spirits. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20
It is given to some to speak with tongues, and to another it is given the interpretation of tongues. All these gifts come from God, for the benefit of the children of God. And unto such as God shall appoint and ordain to watch over the church are to have it given unto them to discern all those gifts, lest there by any among you professing and yet be not of God. All things must be done in the name of Christ, whatsoever you do in the spirit; and ye must give thanks unto God in the spirit for whatever blessing ye are blessed with; and ye must practice virtue and holiness before me continually. Prior to Oliver Cowdery’s departure on his mission to the West, he had acted as an unofficial historian of the church. Now it was necessary to appoint a historian whose responsibility would be to keep a record of church history. In an answer to Joseph Smith’s prayer relative to this matter, a revelation was given March 8, 1831, for John Whitmer: My servant John should write and keep a regular history, and assist you, my servant Joseph, in transcribing all things which shall be given you….to keep the church record and history continually. The Kirtland Saints were concerned because of the expected arrival of large numbers of Saints from the East in response to the instructions of Section 45 in which the Lord said, “Gather ye out from the eastern lands.” How they should accommodate so many people, even though they knew if would not be for too long a period, become a problem which gave them grave concern. A revelation, addressed to the Kirtland Saints, was given on March 8, 1831, at Kirtland in which the Lord said: Inasmuch as ye have lands, ye shall impart to the eastern brethren. Inasmuch as ye have not lands, let them buy for the present time in those regions round about as seemeth them good, for it must needs be that they have places to live for the present time. Save all the money that ye can, that in time ye may be enabled to purchase lands for an inheritance, even in the city. The place is not yet to be revealed, but after your brethren come form the east, there are to be certain men appointed, and to them it shall be given to know the place, or to them it shall be revealed and then ye shall begin to be gathered with your families. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20
Parley P. Pratt, Sidney, Rigdon, and Lemon Copley were sent to teach a group of Saints who wanted to know the truth, but still believed some things about God that were not true. A revelation was given through Joseph Smith, Jr., to help these Saints understand the truth about God. Jesus Christ said: America shall flourish upon the hills, and rejoice upon the mountains, and shall be assembled together unto the place which I have appointed. Go forth as I have commanded you; repent of all your sins; ask and ye shall receive; knock and it shall be opened unto you. Behold, I will go before you, and be your reward; and I will be in your midst, and you shall not be cofounded; behold, I am Jesus Christ, and I come quickly. Some of these saints were having strange spiritual experiences which were not in harmony with Jesus’ teachings. The elders brought this problem to Joseph, who inquired of God, and received a revelation in May, 1831, giving this information: Behold, verily I say unto you, that there are many spirits which are false spirits, which have gone forth in the Earth, deceiving the World: and also the adversary hath sought to deceive you, that he might overthrow you. Wherefore, let every human beware lest one do that which is not in truth and righteousness before me. One that preacheth and one that receiveth, understandeth one another, and both are edified and rejoice together; and that which doth not edify, is not of God, and is darkness: that which is of God is light. The Lord explained that the Spirit of God was light and would be good. It would benefit the people and help them to understand. Any spirit which was not good, which would not benefit them, which would not help them to fuller understanding was darkness and not of God. “Through the LORD’s mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness,” reports Lamentations 3.22-23. Everybody goes through disappointments and setbacks from time to time, but if we hold on to hurt and pain, we end up living negative and bitter lives. Maybe you have made some mistakes or some poor choices, and now you are tempted to sit around feeling guilty and condemned thinking something such as: “I wish I had been a better parent.” “I wish I had not vandalized his car.” “I wish I had chosen another career instead of breaking into a government office and stealing government resources.” “I wish I had not become a fake news reporter and married that other person.” #RandolphHarris 13 of 20
Just know, My dear friend, that in every probationary period you will not be loved or praised the less than when God is topping you off with His Celestial Consolations. It is so easy to live life focused on that review mirror. We cannot do anything about the past, and we have no guarantees regarding the future; we can only do something about right now. The good story is, your past does not have to poison your future. Even if you have made some mistakes, your dreams did not workout, or you have had some unfair shakedowns, God still has good things in store for you. God will take that negative situation and turn it around for your advantage. Therefore, place your whole hope and refuge in God. In it also place all your sore spots and tight spots. In God, everything looks firm and stable; outside God, everything is fluid and chaotic! In this regard, personal friends sometimes help. Experts in their fields always think they can help. Wisdom literature has gone to great lengths wiring help down. Philosophical and theological treatises have compressed help into a few syllogisms. A gem with magic properties is no help at all. A secret garden with high walls can be a sad refuge. However, if God, or Lord, does not assist and abet, comfort and console, instruct and guard, all these special places mean nothing. Everything seems to lead to peace and felicity, but with God absent, my Dear and Noble Friend, all this seems a hill of beans; that is to say, felicity and truth seem to wilt. Therefore, the only conclusion I can draw from this is that God is the end of all good, the height of my life, the depth of my eloquence. And to hope in God above all—the strongest solace of Your servant Devouts. A maze of “may’s”! May my eyes be on You, O Lord God, if I may follow the Psalmist (123.1)! May I, as Paul in the Second Corinthians (1.3), confide in You as Father of Mercies! May You bless and sanctify my soul with Heavenly Benediction! May my soul become Your home away from home, Your country seat, your Chatsworth! May nothing be found in the temple of Your dignity that had offended Your eyes. May You keep on eye on the magnitude of Your goodness and the multitude of Your mercies, and the other eye on me! That is what the Psalmist implored, and he was no fool (69.17). #RandolphHarris 14 of 20
May You hear the prayer of Your pauper servant, crying from afar as if in the region of the shadow of death! May You protect and preserve the soul of Your small servant among the many perils of the corruptible life! And many You set me, with Lady Grace as companion, on the road to peace; that is to say, to the Land of Perpetual Clarity! Amen. When you first wake up each morning, let go of yesterday’s disappointments. Forget about the discouragement, guilt, and condemnation. You attitude should be, “A new day has come. I was waiting for so long, for a miracle to come. Everyone told me to be strong, hold on and don’t shed a tear. Through the darkness and good times, I knew I would make it through, and the World thought that I had it all, but I was waiting for You. Hush, love. I see a light in the sky. Oh, it’s blinding me. I can’t believe I’ve been touched by an angel with love. Let the rain come down and wash away my tears. Let it fill my soul and drown my fears. Let it shatter the walls for a new sun. A new day has come. Where it was dark now there is light. Where there was pain now there is joy. Where there was weakness, I found my strength.” (A New Day by Celine Dion.) The Scripture says God’s mercies are new every morning. You may have made a lot of mistakes, but God has not run out of mercy. He makes a fresh new batch every single morning. Do you know why? Because He knew we were going to use up all that He made yesterday! Receive God’s mercy and forgiveness. Today can be a new beginning. Do not be a prisoner of the past. Some people are always dwelling on their disappointments. They just cannot understand why their prayers are not being answered, why their loved one was not healed, why they were mistreated. They do not realize it, but they are allowing their past poison their future. God has a new beginning in store for them. He wants to restore what has been stolen, but they will not let go of the past. If you are not willing to let go of the old, do not expect God to do the new. If you have had some unfair things happen to you, make a decision that you are going to quit reliving those things in your memory. Instead, think on good things, things that will build you up and not tear you down, things that will encourage you and give you the hope that there is a brighter tomorrow. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20
Your life is going to follow your thoughts. A flight into the stratosphere is strange but a fascinating experience for the first time but not so strange nor one-hundredth so fascinating as a light into a flight into a higher level of consciousness. And if it happens not on some mountaintop surrounded by enchanting scenery but on a crowded noisy bustling and tumultuous city street, one is not keenly conscious of the alteration within oneself but also feels that the World around as well as the people in it have altered in some mysterious way, too. However fantastic may be the practical consequences of this experience, due to its wrong interpretation by the mystic oneself, the essential worth and intelligible meaning of the intrinsic reality out of which it arises still remains. It not only brings about a stupendous change in one’s view of life but also a corresponding change in one’s moral conscience and character. In that great light one sees one’s old self as sinful, and so rejects it, one’s old character as defective and deficient on every side and so amends it. The rejection soon becomes habitual while the amendment is made swiftly enough. The glimpse astonishes some persons by its startling reversal of some of their cherished notions, beliefs, and opinions. The glimpse gives a human the feeling of a newness as if one were beginning a new kind of life with a new attitude and a new ethical code. With this growing feeling for spirituality may come, in some case, a new feeling for refinement, an aesthetic appreciation of the beautiful; in others, it may be some virtue or quality which reflects the sensibility or inspiration. It is a power which affects one in a strange way. At one and at the same time it isolates one from one’s fellow humans, yet units one with them as well. One is isolated because this functioning on a higher level of consciousness makes one feel like some strange visitor from outer space, just arrived on our ancient planet. However, one can enjoy the sense of Being whether isolated or surrounded by others. Although one may quite precisely and clearly understand what is happening to one, an extra-Worldly awareness develops in parallel to the spiritual development. It is a feeling of what other persons are, their mood at the time, their general disposition also. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20
The times when one is brought into memorable awareness and reverent worship of the true God, the moment when the illuminative flash permeates one utterly, may have far-reaching effects on one’s later years. For one can then see the ego’s life as it really is and make new decisions concerning it which could only have been arrived at when out of the ego’s clutches. One comes away from these glimpses hushed into peace, awed by their mystery, and filled with goodwill to all beings. This attitude toward them is an absolute imperative, but it does not mean that one is to put oneself in their hands, at their mercy, by submitting to their desires, yielding to their faults. Seek forgiveness from anyone you have hurt. Forgive the people who have hurt you, release any bitterness you have been harbouring, and forgive yourself. If you are going to go forward in life, you must quit looking backward. To trust God is to be enabled to trust oneself at the very core of one’s being. Once we have been grasped by God’s affirmation of us, we have experienced love at the very heart of things, a love that cannot and will not let us go. And the power of that love begins to make all things in this fragmented World whole again. We have seen how a person’s God-given actualizing tendencies can be thwarted—how authentic responses to life can deteriorate into manipulative patterns, then into character styles, and finally, into psychotic conditions. The process could be visualized as an ever-constructing downward spiral of fear that squeezes out of a human life the God-inspired call to greatness. The other side of the human experience is the upward spiral of expansion. In this process, a person begins to manifest individual greatness by operating more and more in an actualizing way from one’s core. Our central thesis is that perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4.18). This healing love causes the joyful expansion rather than the fearful constriction of the human personality. The Greek word that is used in the New Testament for this perfect love is agape. This could be translated as spontaneous, altruistic love that involves unselfishly willing the highest good of another. It is a love that cherishes, affirms, and respects the uniqueness of another person. When we say in religious language that “underneath are the everlasting arms,” we are symbolizing the agape dimension of the love that God has for every person and that is to be experienced in one’s core. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20
Love is the only way to comprehend another life form. However, no one can become fully aware of the very essence of another human being unless one loves that individual. By the spiritual act of love, one is enabled to see the essential traits and features of the beloved person to actualize these potentialities. By making one aware of what one can and of what one should become makes these potentialities come true. It is being in contact with unresolved fear at the center of the personality that results in the manipulatives styles of living that we have examined. However, when we feel deeply loved, understood, and accepted in the core of our being, then our fears are healed changes and we find ourselves on the road to actualizing. Our ability to be sincere with ourselves, with God, and with other humans is really proportionate to our capacity for sincere love. And the sincerity of our love depends in large measure upon our capacity to believe ourselves loved. Most of the moral and mental and even religious complexities of our time go back to our desperate fear that we are not and can never be really loved by anyone. Whether or not one feels loved by God, one is. So a basic step in actualizing is to trust that, whether or not one understands it, one is deeply loved and affirmed by God in the core of one’s being. Prayer alone does not bring deliverance. It is the prayer of faith that brings deliverance. When you believe God and release your faith in prayer, it is conceived in the womb of the spirit and will be manifested. It will be brought forth, if you hold fast to your confession of faith. It is as though a child is conceived in its mother’s womb. When you believe you receive, your answer is then conceived in your spirit. Time may pass before it is manifest; but just as sure as a child will be delivered from its mother’s womb, so will the answer to your prayer come forth in due season. You have need of patience that after you have done the will of God, you will receive the promise of the Father. (Hebrews 10.36.) Patience is a spiritual force which undergirds your faith and causes you to be constant through the trial. Here is one of the problems. So many times we have thought God said to hold fast to the prayer. However, that is not it at all. He told us not to use vain repetitions as the heathen who think God will hear them because of repeating it over and over. No. That is not what God said in His Word. He said, When ye pray, believe. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20
So I am going to release my faith when I pray. Therefore if I release my faith when I pray, God says that I shall have it. It is settled then. It is finished, thank God. I do not care if it looks worse in the morning, I will not take it up again in prayer, but will hold fast to my confession. Now let me qualify some of those statements. If you go for a long period of time and your request is not manifested, but is still getting worse, you have missed it somewhere. If you have missed it, admit it and ask God where you missed it. You have missed it somewhere if it is not working. Dear Lord in Heaven, I thank You, Father, that my future happiness and fulfillment are not determined by the pains of the past. Thank You that Your mercies are new every morning. Today, I choose to believe that You have good things in store for me. Grandfather Great Spirit all over the World, the faces of living ones are alike. With tenderness they have come up out of the ground. Look upon your children that they may face the winds and walk the good road to the Day of Quiet. Grandfather Great Spirit, please fill us with Light. Give us the strength to understand, and the eyes to see. Please teach us to walk the soft Earth as relatives to all that live. There are parents in our midst who mourn a beloved child taken from them in the freshness and vigour of youth, for whom they planned and hoped, upon whom they lavished loving care and affection. There are those who recall a sister or brother, now no longer among the living, with whom they grew up in happy fellowship, loyal and devoted companions who shared with them the experiences of childhood and youth. With tender emotion we all recall friends and companions who were dear to us in life and whose friendship and understanding were a constant benediction to us. In this solemn hour, we recall the members of our congregation who have answered Thy summons. They shall ever be remembered in this sanctuary which they loved and served. We reverently recall the martyrs of America of all ages, whose ranks have been tragically augmented by untold numbers of our brothers in our generation. Never shall we forget those who sacrificed their lives for the sanctification of Thy name. We remember also the heroes and righteous humans all nations who lived and died for justice, truth and peace. Though our departed are no longer with us, their memories are forever enshrined in our hearts and their influences abides with us, directing our thoughts and deeds toward the lofty purposes they cherished and for which they strived. O Lord, as we recall out departed and the blessings they bequeathed unto us, we pray Thee to keep their souls united with ours in the bond of life. May our faith, like their, be strong, our devotion to the Torah unfaltering, our love for America constant, and our concern for America and humanity unceasing. For as we identify ourselves with the life, hopes, and traditions of an eternal people, we, ourselves, takes on the aspect of eternity. May we so live that when our years draw to a close we, too, shall be remembered for good and for blessing. Amen. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20
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Don’t You Dare Make a Mistake! It is Your Fault!
Millions of adults today are still suffering as a result of the negative words of their parents spoke over them as children. However, mental health problems do not define who you are. They are something you experience. I can relate to your pain. Trust me. At times, many of us feel trapped in situation we cannot bear, and are stuck around people we would rather never seen, but I have seen people go from the darkest moments in their lives to living a happy life. Change what you can, manage what you cannot. Your present circumstances do not determine where you can go. A series of retrospective studies tested hypotheses about early family-of-origin experiences in bipolar disorder, with mixed findings. Interviews with adult bipolar patients, corroborated by family informants, about their childhood experiences revealed some potentially pathogenic family experiences. During their early childhood, the majority of patients in this study occupied special family positions, such as the first-born or youngest child, the “favourite” child, or the child assigned special responsibilities. As children these patients were also pressured for achievements, which were rewarded when accomplished. Not surprisingly, the children were also high achievers in the school setting. These children left homes as perfectionist without the skills to succeed on their own. For most, symptoms emerged concurrently with their departure from their families. This pattern was more or less unique to early-onset cases, and thus may represent just one possible interpersonal path to bipolar disorder. In some studies, patients with bipolar disorder have described their childhood experiences as similar to those of healthy controls. For example, such patients were indistinguishable from medical controls on reports of parental bonding. They also described their family environments while growing up as similar to those of healthy controls on dimensions such as expressiveness, conflict, independence, cohesion, and control. There are no differences between patients with remitted bipolar disorder and normal controls in the reports of parental rejection or overprotectiveness, although the patients reported less emotional warmth from their parents. From a sample that consisted mostly of women with bipolar disorder, it was discovered that 53 percent reported a history of abuse. #RandolphHarris 1 of 16
However, a related study showed equally pronounced histories of abuse in patients with borderline personality disorder, but rates lower than 5 percent among a comparisons sample of psychiatric controls, which included patients with bipolar disorder, antisocial personality disorder, and schizotypal personality disorder. It is debatable whether early experiences in the family of origin are etiological in bipolar disorder. Early-onset cases may experience a particular patten of special attention and demand for achievement, which sets up excessive needs for dependency and attention. Such experiences can lead to envy from others, competition, and ultimately loneliness. These conflicts are thought to explain the extreme moods swings in bipolar disorder: “The oscillation in mood correspond to internalization and externalization of the conflict; during the phase of depression all interest in the external environment is lost with symptoms of guilt and apathy, whereas in the manic phase the obverse is true. This argument notwithstanding, many of the standard family environment variables that have been implicated in the origins of other mental health problems have not emerged as significant discriminators between patients with bipolar disorder and other members of the population. Consequently, the early childhood experiences of these patients are generally unremarkable. Many adult psychiatric patients can be found still residing with their parents. Such individuals remain in the family of origin in lieu of developing a separate family of orientation. Social relationships and communication in this context are powerful predictors of the course of bipolar disorder. One such predictive variable is EE (expressed emotions), which is evident in attitudes and behaviours reflective of criticism and overinvolvement. These are expressed during a standardized interview between a parent and researcher, and are implicitly assumed to be manifested in family interactions and relations. When patients with bipolar disorder were followed over a period of 9 months after hospital discharge, those who returned to high-EE families were 5.5 times more likely to relapse than patients discharged to low-EE family environments. #RandolphHarris 2 of 16
In a related study, families of patients with mania were as likely to be high-EE as were families of patients with schizophrenia. In this study, 90 percent of the patients with mania who resided with high-EE relatives had poor clinical outcomes over the course of a 9-month follow-up period, in contrast to 54 percent of the patients who lived inlow-EE families. Another study by this term indicated a relapse rate of 92 percent over the course of 2 years for patient with bipolar disorder who returned to high-EE households, compared to only 39 percent among those who returned to low-EE households. The mean duration to relapse was similarly suggestive: 34 weeks for those who lived in low-EE environments. A unique aspect of this study was the inclusion of both high-EE parents and high-EE spouses. Comparisons reveled that parents scored considerably higher than spouses on the EE dimensions of overinvolvement and criticism, suggesting that EE may be especially problematic when patients reside with their families of origin as opposed to their families of orientation. EE may reflect a parent’s tendency to react negatively to disturbances presented by the psychiatric patient upon one’s return to the home. This criticism and overinvolvement are likely to be taxing for the patient, thus precipitating an exacerbation of symptoms and relapse. It is assumed that EE, as assessed in a private interview with a family member, manifests itself in the family’s actual social interactions. However, this expectation has not always been borne out empirically. Family EE may also interfere with effective treatment of patients with bipolar disorder, especially in cases where family members might otherwise be able to play a role in the treatment process. Research findings on bipolar disorder and EE are remarkably similar to those on schizophrenia and EE; in both cases, EE appears to be a strong predictor of relapse. Perhaps something in the nature of these two disorders simultaneously engenders attitudes of hostility and overinvolvement in parents, and extreme sensitivity to this among patients. Regardless of the explanation for the similarity, the parallel findings on family EE and relapse for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder again illustrate how these two problems occupy neighbouring positions on the continuum from extreme disturbances to complete normality. #RandolphHarris 3 of 16
The behavioural counterpart of EE in family interactions is AS (affective style). Where as EE is coded from an interview with a family member in the absence of the patient, AS is coded from actual family problem-solving discussions. Families are categorized as negative, mixed, or benign in their AS. Families a negative-AS profile are profile are prone to making harshly critical, guilt-inducing, and intrusive “mind-reading” statements during family problem-solving discussions. In the study mentioned above, 91 percent of patients with bipolar disorder discharged to negative-AS families had poor clinical outcomes over a 9-month observation period, compared with 55 percent from benign-AS families. On the other hand, the patients who returned to benign-AS families actually showed steady improvements in their social adjustment. As might be expected, negative AS is evident not only through relatives’ verbal behaviours, but in their nonverbal behaviours as well. Negative-AS parents of patients with bipolar disorder engage in fewer affiliative nonverbal communication behaviour such as smiling, head nodding, forward leaning, and illustrator gestures during family discussions, when contrasted with benign-AS parents. These are behaviours that people look for to feel supported and accepted by others. Collectively, these findings anew that the harsh and rejecting behaviours of key relatives, as manifested in AS, are associated with a poor prognosis in bipolar disorder. Both EE and AS may be overt signs of family stress and distress. If one adopts a systems perspective, it makes little sense to ask whether EE and AS are responses to a patient’s illness or causes of it. In systems theory, all parts and their processes are related to all other parts and processes in the system. Although it has been argued that many family characteristics in cases of bipolar disorder are consequences of the patients’ illness, and indeed many may be, family dynamics such as EE and AS have been documented to predict subsequent changes in patients’ symptomatology, indicating that patients’ symptoms are influenced by their family interactions. #RandolphHarris 4 of 16
Furthermore, empirical evidence indicates that patients find their parents’ negative-AS behaviour to be stressful. At the same time, it should be obvious that parents’ social interaction behaviours are not entirely independent of and unresponsive to their children’s distress and communication problems. In fact, in bipolar disorder, a patient’s affective attitude toward a parent is predictive of the parent’s AS. In schizophrenia, the parent’s AS. Thus, in bipolar disorder, there are reciprocal interpersonal patterns that may maintain the disorder. What makes EE and AS so stressful for recovering patients? For most people, their parents are the last line of defense against an otherwise cruel World. When there is no solace to be found in other interpersonal relationships, most expect to find at least some support from family-of-origin members. These are relationships of obligation, and during hard times, they may represent the only refuge available. When these family relationships turn hostile, overinvolved, and emotionally reactive, what was once shelter from the stresses of life becomes a stressor itself. What makes the stressor particularly caustic is the fact that it is a powerful violation of expectations and may signal the end of any available social support, leaving a patient with feelings of total rejection and alienation. CD (communication deviance) involves the use of odd, idiosyncratic, amorphous, and fragmented language during social interaction. Parents of patients with schizophrenia are prone to exhibit CD; however, problems with CD may not be specific to these parents. In fact, parents of patients with mania are indistinguishable from those of patients with schizophrenia in overall level of CD. Certain types of CD, such as odd word usage (using words in odd way, leaving words out of utterances, uttering words out of order, use of unnecessary words—exempli gratia, “There were a number of different distinct times down the entire road when she could not get that act together”) and tangential responses (failure to acknowledge others’ statements—exempli gratia, Patient: “When are we going to leave?” Parents: “That is a beautiful painting”), are actually more prevalent among parents of patients with mania. These patients exhibited CD patterns similar to those of their parents. #RandolphHarris 5 of 16
The coding scheme used to assess CD overlaps considerably with the TDI (thought disorder index) as used in an investigation. CD is undoubtedly a manifestation of thought disorder through communication with other people. An obvious conclusion might be that parent-child similarities in CD represent genetic transmission of thought disorder. However, a social learning account would also predict a parent-child association in CD, whereby the parent models bizarre communication behaviour that is then incorporated into the child’s discourse. Like many other behaviours acquired through observational learning, children may just assume that if their parents engage in the behaviour, it is the right thing to do. Simply interacting with a parent exhibiting CD, or observing an interaction with another family member, may lead a child to believe that “this is the appropriate way to talk to other people.” In either case, parents of bipolar patients exhibit problems with CD that are of the same magnitude as the problems of parents of schizophrenia patients. In both disorders, this deviant communication pattern can also be detected in the patients themselves. Bipolar disorder is associated with additional family relationship problems. The family interactions of patients with bipolar disorder are marked by a high percentage of control attempts by both patients and parents. This battle for control is more pronounced than in families of patients with schizophrenia. The majority of family members who care for patients with bipolar disorder report at least moderate burden, especially due to the patients’ mister, irritability, and withdrawal. These family relationship problems can also affect the course of the disorder. For example, 67 percent of patients undergoing treatment for bipolar disorder who indicated that they had good relations with their extended families had no major recurrences over a 4-year follow-up period, compared to only 20 percent of those patients who had poor relations with their extended families. The scientist who foresees a happy abundant future for humankind (because of technological advance) while so many of one’s colleagues are preparing the weapons to wipe out the species itself, is either insane or incapable of non-specialized thinking. If the scientific gropers-in-the-dark were allowed fully to explore, and their political masters to exploit, the atom until all its energy were released, our Earth would either blow up into pieces and all humankind with it, or else have its atmosphere so poisoned by radioactivity as to make any life within it impossible. #RandolphHarris 6 of 16
However, it is not in the World-Mind’s World-Idea that this shall be allowed. The so-called progress of humans in this direction will be arrested. They will be allowed to injure themselves, since they insist on playing with these dangerous forces, but not to destroy oneself. This one event has dominated the intelligent human mind in the twenty-first century more than any other. This release of the atom’s energy has forced a rethinking of the human position in politics, society, health, and economics. The social, economic, and political problems which have developed with the development of science, and its use in industry, have reached their ultimate in the hydrogen bomb. In one does not soon renounce all nuclear weapons, this is the Frankenstein monster which will destroy its master. The worth to humankind of an invention or a discovery depends on the uses made of it. If these are warlike and destructive to an appalling degree, then it might have been better for humankind to have continued in ignorance. The World has moved too far from the quest of religious values to the quest of Earthly ones; it is passing too quickly from faith in the legends to faith in the machine. Many have been forced to stop and think about the failure of science to improve humans despite its success in improving their tools. For the nineteenth-century naivete about “progress” which had believed one would inevitably lead to the other, has been exposed for the foolish thing it is. Progression forwards, which is what we have witnessed in this scientific age, is not the same as progress. Then end of all one-sided growth is usually catastrophic. This is true of the outer World of science as of the inner World of humans themselves. If the wonderful achievements of the science in controlling physical energies have now become highly dangerous to humans, this is simply because they are unbalanced by equal knowledge of one’s own nature and equal achievements in controlling it. The greater the pressure produced by this machine age, the greater is the revolt against it. Foolish materialists call this revolt escapism. Whether it appears as a turning to the arts or to mysticism, it is the cry of the human soul seeking to remember again that it is a soul. #RandolphHarris 7 of 16
If every invention which has benefited the human species has also introduced evils or disadvantages not presented before, too often that has been due to human misuse or greed, materialism or ignorance. I know there is some belief that not only has human capacity been extended by modern scientific knowledge but also that human character has been improved by modern civilization and culture. I doubt that this is so. As modern technological civilization increased in power, the size of its problems increases too. Even without a war the mere belief that they have to go on improving their nuclear knowledge by experiments and nuclear weapons by tests is leading to a disastrous result—the poisoning of the entire human race and the damaging of its organs, or its children’s organs, and the deforming of its next generation. If they are all to be lost again in the vast humanmade calamity, of what use are all these vaunted conquests over Nature? Control of mind by electronic machines is being actively sought by researcher without conscience, devoid of ethics, sorcerers using twenty-first century science. Humans’ success in using their knowledge of the working of the external World can come only if it is linked with the knowledge of the working of one’s own psycho-physical mechanism and function. For if the first leads one into self-destruction, as it is now doing, the second can control and safeguard one against such an ill destiny. To believe that the old past was quite barbaric, that the new present is quite civilized, as do those who pin all their faith to the “progress” brought about by science, shows definite ignorance of the past and lack of insight into the present. Moreover it also shows a dangerous lack of humility; dangerous because the first need of humanity to so be humble, is to confess its failure and admit its weakness. Technological triumph, if held in equilibrium by spiritual intuition, can lead to a glorious civilization, but without such intuition, it can lead to humankinds’ destruction. It is not enough for our civilization to express the discoveries arising out of scientific knowledge. It must also express the ethics arising out of spiritual knowledge. The manipulative pattern of being a Complaint Christian begins when the child learns that one can win the approval of parents or others by pleasing and placating. The child mistakes getting their approval for being love. So we can say that one becomes stuck on the love polarity. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16
The problem is that in getting the approval of others, one makes everyone else the judge and master. Therefore, one must constantly repress feelings of strength or anger, and instead feel only love and weakness. One fears that if one expresses rights, strength, or power, others will withdraw their approval and retaliate with rejection or abandonment. What one does not see is that in living up to everyone else’s expectations and demands, one sacrifices one’s own individuality and originality. Without the rhythms of anger and strengths, the complaint Christians is easily taken advantage of by others. Of course, one allows this to happen over and over again because of the fear of expressing anger or irritation. This person is like a “crying doormat,” who invites people to step over one—then feels miserable and abused when they do! Because Complaint Christians are unable to stand up to others, or even to day no or disagree with them, their love loses its genuineness. The love that they could have degenerates into a sticky, parasitic dependence. The body type reflects dependence, as the muscles are underdeveloped and flaccid. The price of constantly living the “nice guy” or “nice girl” role is fatigue, resentment, and inner emptiness. Also, in living one’s life to gain other people’s approval, one’s God-given identity remains undeveloped. The payoff for such a lifestyle is the occasional crumb of approval or pat on the head that one receives for being so nice to others. At the character level, the pleasing and placating pattern degenerates to overt dependence. Now the person denies all personal power and responsibility for shaping one’s life and becomes a clinging vine around someone else’s life. One constantly looks to the other person for what to feel, what to say, where to go, what to believe, and infinitum. This person feels that if the other person dies or leaves one will be completely lost and helpless. Many popular songs reflect this misguided approach to love with such lyrics as “without you I would nothing.” Unfortunately, this exaggerated sense of dependence might be true, but it certainly is not a virtuous trait. It means that one is neurotically dependent and incapable of feeling, thinking, and choosing for oneself. Many unhappy marriages are made by one partner’s being overly dominant and the other’s becoming excessively compliant and dependent. #RandolphHarris 9 of 16
Because of our cultural standards, Christian women especially seem to fall into the compliant trap. They are taught as little girls that their sole mission in life is to grow up, have a family, and take care of a husband and children. What the are not given is a healthy dose of self-esteem so that they are deeply attuned to their own wants, needs, desires, talents, and gifts. So life becomes slavery as they become frantically busy, self-sacrificing, and often desperately lonely. The fallacy of the complaint syndrome is that one erases oneself in order to “love” others. However, the Bible—as well as good psychology—says clearly to love others as ourselves; that is, to be as concerned about our own growth and well-being as we are about theirs. It also means developing a healthy interdependence in relationships as opposed to the desperate dependence of the complaint person. In its psychotic form, the complaint lifestyle gives way to depression. Somehow it creeps into the awareness of the person that one is nothing but an empty hull. All the beliefs, values, feelings, and opinions that one has belong to someone else. One has completely lost touch with one’s inner being. Psychotic depression is the result of years of constricting the inner rhythm of feelings. The final result is immobility and paralysis. The depression reflects the psychological reality of always being pressed down by the demands, desires, and expectations of others. The person finally loses hope and becomes numb. Even the body takes on a sagging and down-in-the-mouth appearance over the years. The face may feign a smile on the surface, but the evidence that deep sorrow and loneliness are underneath is shown by the wrinkled in the brown, eyes, and at the corner of the mouth. Since the Compliant Christian long ago lost touch with one’s own dignity, anger, and power, the years of being everyone’s slave have now taken their toll. The psyche collapses under the one last demand that is finally too much. The ultimate, tragic expression of psychotic depression is suicide. Bethany is a middle-aged housewife, and she underwent two years of therapy. The settings ranged from an in-patient psychiatric unit to a growth-oriented church group. During these two years, Bethany made excellent progress in moving from apathy and self-hate to a position of active and caring involvement in life. #RandolphHarris 10 of 16
Although Bethany made three suicide attempts during the two years, a combination of prayer and effective psychotherapy finally enabled her to learn to stand on her own feet, take responsibility for her own life, tell others how she really felt about things, and regain faith for living an interesting and fulfilling life. Bethany has now reentered family, church, and community life with far more awareness and skills for coping than she had ever thought possible. Bethany’s life shows once again that it is possible to reverse even the most vicious patterns of self-destruction. Of course, it is always best to discover destructive patterns in one’s life ling before they bear bitter fruit. Perhaps the reader will be able to apply insights gained in the study of this report to enjoy greater self-awareness and understanding of others. In the center of the Process of Deterioration is fear. It is sometimes quite sobering to realize that, whatever else hell is, it is certainly the brutal process of dehumanization that eventually leaves a person numb, rigid, alone, disoriented, and shut up. In the deterioration to various levels of manipulation, character disorder, and psychosis, we see a separation from one’s God-given invitation to actualization and a descent into the abyss of hell. Everyone is a mixture of manipulative styles and character types. We live within the context of a fallen and twisted reality. The “mystery of iniquity” is passed on from generation to generation. It contaminates culture, education, politics, economics, religion, and the sophisticated social systems of this World. Defenses are learned strategies; we are not born with them. Once we discover how we make ourselves tense, rigid, and controlled in our posture toward life, we can begin to reverse the process. That is at once the burden of responsibility and the potential for joy for all human beings. There is light at the end of the tunnel! There is hope for the troubled, entangled, and imprisoned individual. Our faith in the creative grace that will lead us to wholeness is warranted. However, the process of growing out of our psychological ruts is not without risk and pain. We may have to experience the real travail of owning our feelings and leaning to express them honestly to others before we begin to enjoy the celebration of restored meaning in our lives. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16
Every way of being stuck can be understood as an overt or subtle distortion of humans’ existential calling: to love oneself, others, and God wholeheartedly. This is where it becomes important to realize that praying about our life situation must be combined with the courage to do something about it. Otherwise our “prayers” are only a form of avoidance—a flight into fantasy and magical thinking. God may truly inspire us along the wisest pathway for our lives, but we must take the responsibility for doing the walking or we will never get anywhere. And if we take a wrong turn, we must have courage to back up and try a new pathway. A strong feeling of fear, anxiety, hostility, guilt, or depression may be a signpost that indicates that one has gotten off the track. If one becomes aware of these feelings, and exercises the courage to look for new and different options, then growth can be restored and one is back on the path of healthy living again. The fruits of that direction will also be felt in the personality as peace, joy, and excitement. No one has escaped developing certain nonactualizing or manipulative patterns. However, an awareness of how these patterns are being acted out in one’s life creates the possibility of experimentation with new alternatives, growth, and change. This possibility is the hope of the actualizing Christian. It is the invitation of Christ to each individual, and the joy of a God who delights in giving good things to those who seek Him. It is also the finest meaning of salvation, redemption, and the grace of God. Most parents want the best for their children, yet too often, many slip into being harsh and critical with their children, constantly finding fault in something one’s children are doing. Negative words will cause children to lose the sense of value God has placed within them. As parent, one has a responsibility before God and society to train one’s children, to discipline them when they discovery, to lovingly correct them when they make wrong choices. However, one should not constantly micromanage one’s children. If one continually speaks words that discourage and dishearten, before long you will destroy your child’s self-image. And with your negative words, you will open a door, allowing the enemy to bring all kinds of insecurity and inferiority into one’s child’s life. Some many people are still living in pain, as adult, due to hurtful words their guardians used with them when they were children. #RandolphHarris 12 of 16
If you speak negative words over your children, you are cursing their future. Moreover, God will hold your responsible for destroying their destiny. With authority comes responsibility, and you have the responsibility as the spiritual authority over your child to make sure that one feels loves, accepted, and approved. Beyond that, most children get their concepts of who God is and what He is like from their parents. If the parents are mean, evil, spiteful, bitter, trifling, and harsh, inevitably the children with grow up with a distorted view of God and humanity. If the parents are loving, kind, compassionate, forgiving, accepting, and righteous, the children will better understand God’s character. It is your responsibility, while you have the opportunity, to speak God’s blessing in your children’s lives. And know that your words will impact them long after they are grown. What you are passing down to the next generation is really something you should think about. O Lord, how would You characterize my trust in this life? Let me put it another way. What is the greatest solace I can have under the big sky? Is it not You, my Lord God, whose mercy is without end? Where else would I do so well but sitting alongside You on Your throne? When can anything be bad if You are around me? I prefer to be a pauper because of You. I would choose rather to vagabond around the World with You than to travel Heaven without You. Where You are, there Heaven is. Where You are not, there Death and Hell are. Heavenly Father, please help me to speak words of blessing into the lives of my family and friends and the community, as well as to others You all to grace my life. Today, and always I choose to see the good, the beneficial things in those around me, rather than the negative, and I will reinforce and encourage those things that honour You. God, you are my desire, and so I feel I have to sigh after You, cry out and implore You. When all is said and done, there is no one I can fully confide in; no one who will give me the help I will need when I am pinched by the unforgiveness of life. No one, that is to say, except You alone, my Lord God. You are my hope, my trust, the consoler of my soul, and the best friend I could ever have. “Everyone looks for a way to get ahead,” reports Philippians 2.21. You, offering me salvation and spiritual progress, give me an edge. #RandolphHarris 13 of 16
Even if You expose me to various temptations and adversities, You manage to turn the whole thing to my advantage. You have, my dearest Lord and Friend, this well-known habit of tempting the daylights out of Your friends! One of the keys to answered prayer is to believe you receive when you pray. What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them,” reports Mark 11.24. The faith principle of Mark 11.23 states that you can have what you say. It is a faith principle which you can employ everyday be speaking right words. Another key to answered prayer is to speak in agreement with your prayers daily. Control the words that come out of your mouth. For example, one day I was having a problem with a tractor. It had given me trouble a couple of times and I wanted to say, “That thing comes apart everytime I take it to the field.” I knew better than to say it, but it just rose up within me and it wanted to come out so bad. I told my wife I would just love to make a bad confession here, but I did not dare do it. I have trained myself to believe that what I say will come to pass. My mind is renewed to God’s Word. Jesus went on to say in verse 24 that it will also work in prayer. You can use the same principle in prayer. He shall have whatsoever he saith. He did not have it then, but he shall have it. Many Christians cancel their prayer with unwise words. Mark 11, verse 23, is a faith principle. It is not a prayer scripture. Verse 24 says, Therefore (or because of this faith principle) I say unto you, What things soever ye desire when ye pray, believe that ye receive them and ye shall have them. Whatsoever things—whatsoever things you desire. He did not say, “If it is God’s will for you have it.” He said Whatsoever things you desire when you pray, believe that you receive them. Now when are you going to believe that you receive them? You are not going to believe it when you see it, if you go by the Word of God. You must believe it when you pray. He said, “When you pray, believe.” What is the evidence that I received when I prayed? Faith is the evidence of things not seen. (Hebrews 11.1). If I believed that I received this morning when I prayed, I would not dare get up tomorrow morning and pray the same prayer. That would be proof that I had not believed. #RandolphHarris 14 of 16
Somebody says, “But it has not manifested yet.” It does not say, “believe when it is manifested.” When ye pray, believe, that ye receive them, and ye shall not have them. It does not say you have them, but you shall have them. They are not manifest yet, but you have received God’s Word. Therefore you have received them in your spirit. How can you receive something that is not manifest yet? You receive it in your spirit. Your spirit human receives it as done. When you are praying, you are operating in the spirit realm, not in the intellect. You are tapping the spiritual resources of God. You need to realize, in doing this, that you do not have the same physical evidence that you do when you are operating in the natural realm. Things may look worse after you have prayed. In fact, some have told me, “You know, after we agreed in prayer, it got worse.” Do not get excited about that. Did you believe when you prayed? Did you believe when we agreed you received it? The thing that will determine whether you believed it or not is: When the circumstances look worse, do you still believe what we agreed? For instance, you are needing a certain amount of money and you pray believing you receive. When you get up the next morning, you find the heater will not turn on and it is freezing outside and your neighbour has the key to your mailbox and has been stealing your mail. Are you still believing that you received your financial needs met? Most people would not. They will say, “Oh, dear Lord, just I figured, it did not work out.” There is such a thing as prayer just to be praying. We might even call it religious praying. It is praying just because it seems like the thing to do—not believing anything, just praying. Evidently, this was the case in the 12th chapter of Acts. James had been killed and Herod proceeded to take Peter also. Peter therefore was kept in prison: but prayer was made without ceasing of the church unto God for him. You find that the whole church was praying; but it must have been religious praying for, when the angel let Peter out, he went to the house of John Mark’s mother where many were praying: And as Peter knocked at the door of the gate, a damsel came to hearken, named Rhoda. And when she knew Peter’s voice, she opened not the gate for gladness, but ran in, and told how Peter stood before the gate. #RandolphHarris 15 of 16
Up until now, everything seems to be rather normal, but listen to the confession of those that were praying: And they said unto her, Thou art mad. However, she constantly affirmed that it was even so. Then said they, It is his angel. However, Peter continued knocking: and when they had opened the door and saw him, they were astonished. Sensuous during life, do not deny me in death! Wash me with scent of apple blossom. Anoint me the essence of lilac. Fill my veins with honeysuckle nectar. Sprinkle me with perfume of purple violets. Envelop me in shroud saturated with fragrance of freshly mown meadow hay. Rest me in moss velvet Earth. Cover me with soil exuding flavour of maple and oak leaves. Command a white birch to stand guard! O Lord, what is human, that Thou art mindful of them? And the son of man that Thou considerest one? Yet Thou hast made one but little less than divine, and hast crowed one with glory and honour. Yea, Thou hast implanted in humans the faith to overcome disillusionment and despair, the power to resist evil, the wisdom to use one’s gifts nobly, and the will to transform chaos and misery into harmony and happiness. When we loose the bands of wickedness, free the oppressed, feed the hungry, clothe those without garments, bring cheer into the lives of those in distress, when we strive for justice and the coming of Thy Kingdom, we invest our life with high significance. Physically we are like unto a breath but spiritually we can attain divine heights. Our God and God of our fathers, in this hour scared to memory, when the past and the future merge, we thank Thee for the blessings that we have come to us through the love and devotion of our dear ones. For many of us, this hour recalls the memory of beloved parents whom Thou hast removed from their Earthly tasks and called unto Thyself. We are ever mindful of the devotion with which they tended and guided us, the sacrifices they made, the joys and comforts they brought us, the teachings and traditions they sought to impart unto us. They are forever bound to us by undying love. There are those among us who call to mind a departed husband or wife. They recall the affectionate bonds formed in Thy presence, the faith and understanding, the struggles and hopes, the trials and griefs, the fears and joys they shared together. #RandolphHarris 16 of 16
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There is No Need to Impose a Greater Burden on a Human than a Human Can Bear!
I would not say I invented tack, but I definitely brought it to its present high popularity. I have no idea what my public image is and would rather not, you know. ‘Cause I got my feet firmly planted in the cheeseburgers, here, man. A body politic can be measured in two ways: namely, by the size of its territory and by the number of its people. And between these measurements there is a relationship suitable for giving the state its true greatness. Humans are what make up the state and land is what feeds humans. This relationship therefore consists in there being enough land for the maintenance of its inhabitants and as many inhabitants as the land can feed. It is in this proportion that the maximum force of a given population size is found. For if there is too much land, its defense is onerous, its cultivation inadequate, and its yield surplus. This is the proximate cause of defensive wars. If there is not enough land, the state finds itself at the discretion of its neigbours for what it needs as a supplement. This is the proximate cause of defensive wars. If there is not enough land, the state finds itself at the discretion of its neighbours for what it needs as a supplement. This is the proximate cause of offensive wars. Any people whose position provides it an alternative merely between commerce and war is inherently weak. It depends on its neighbour; it depends on events. It never has anything but an uncertain and brief existence. Either it conquers and changes the situation, or it is conquered and obliterated. It can keep itself free only by means of smallness or greatness. No one can provide in mathematical terms a fixed relationship between the size of the land and the population size which are sufficient for one another, as much because of the differences in the characteristics of the terrain, its degrees of fertility, the nature of its crops, the influence of its climates, as because of the differences to be noted in the temperaments of the humans who inhabit them, some of whom consume little in a fertile country, while others consume a great deal on a barren soil. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20
Again, attention must be given to the greater or lesser fertility of women, to what the country can offer that is more or less favourable to the population, to the country can offer that is more or less favourable to the population, to the number of people that the legislator can hope to bring together through one’s institutions. Thus, the legislator can hope to bring together through one’s institutions. Thus, the legislator should not base one’s judgment on what one sees but on what one foresees. And one should naturally attain. Finally, there are a thousand situations where the idiosyncrasies of a place require or permit the assimilation of more land than appears necessary. Thus, there is considerable expansion in mountainous country, where the natural crops—namely, woods and pastures—demand less work; and where experience shows that woman are more fertile than on the plains; and where a large amount of sloping soil provides only a very small amount of flat land, the only thing that can be counted on for vegetation. On the other hand, people can draw closer to one another at the seashore, even on rocks and nearly barren sand, because fishing can make up to a degree for the lack of land crops, since humans should be more closely gathered together in order to repulse pirates, and since in addition it is easier to unburden the country of surplus inhabitants by means of colonies. To these conditions for instituting a people must be added one that cannot be a substitute for any other, but without which all the rest are useless: the enjoyment of the fullness of peace. For the time when a state is organized, like the time when a battalion is formed, is the instant when the body is the least capable of resisting and easiest to destroy. There would be better resistance at a time of absolute disorder than at a moment of fermentation, when each human is occupied with one’s own position rather than with the danger. Were a war, famine, or sedition to arise in this time of crisis the state inevitably is overthrown. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20
This is not to say that many governments are not established during such storms; but in these instances it is these governments themselves that destroy the state. Usurpers always bring about or choose these times of trouble to use public terror to pass destructive laws that the people never adopt when they have their composure. The choice of the moment of a government’s institution is one of the surest signs by which the work of a legislator can be distinguished from that of a tyrant. What people, therefore, is suited for legislation? One that, finding itself bound by some union of origin, interest or convention, has not yet felt the true yoke of laws. One that has no custom or superstitions that are deeply rooted. One that does not fear being overpowered by sudden invasion. One that can, without entering into the squabbles of its neighbours, resist each of them single-handed or use the help of one to repel another. One where each member can be known to all, and where there is no need to impose a greater burden on a human than a human can bear. One that can get along without peoples and without which every other people can get along. If there were two neighbouring peoples, one being unable to get along without the other, it would be a very tough situation for the former and very dangerous for the latter. In such a case, every wise nation will work very quickly to free the other of its dependency. The republic of Thlascala, enclosed within the Mexican empire, preferred to do without salt, rather than buy it from the Mexicans or even take it from them for nothing. The wise Thlascalans saw the trap hidden beneath this generosity. They kept themselves free, and this small state, enclosed within this great empire, was finally the instrument of its ruin. One that is neither rich nor poor and can be sufficient unto itself; finally, one that brings together the stability of an ancient unto itself; finally, one that brings together the stability of an ancient people and the docility of a new people. What makes the work of legislation trying is not so much what must be established as what must be destroyed. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20
And what makes success so rare is the impossibility of finding the simplicity of nature together with the needs of society. All these conditions, it is true, are hard to find in combination. Hence few well constituted states are to be seen. In Europe there is still one country capable of receiving legislation. It is the island of Corsica. The valour and constancy with which this brave people has regained and defended its liberty would well merit having some wise human teaching them how to preserve it. I have a feeling that one says that little island will astonish Europe. In 1956 the American Telephone & Telegraph Company creaking under the burden of exploding communications demand, began introducing new electronic technology that made it possible for callers to direct-dial their long-distance calls. Today, it is possible to video call people in other countries and see their images while you talk to them. With technology, the consumer has taken on the tasks previously done for one by the television and a phone operator. In 1973-74 the oil squeeze triggered by the Arabian embargo sent gasoline prices soaring. Giant oil companies reaped bonanza profits, but filling-station operators had to fight a desperate battle for economic survival. To cut costs many introduced self-service fuel pumps. In 2021, gasoline prices are still soaring and it has become a national security issue to get Americans off foreign fuel. This is being done by the introduction of electric vehicles, which will only use negligible amounts of gasoline. However, many experts consider electric cars more of an intermediate technology because they are not very viable for a long-term supplement for fossil fuels, due to the fact that they need charging stations, the batteries need a mineral component that is in sort supply in nature and only found in Africa, and we also have natural disasters, which will make electric cars a risk in the long run. Some are being equipped with solar panels, but without sun that is not much use and will also drive up the price of cars that are already expensive and complicated to repair due to all the new technologies and computers. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20
As a result, more than a dozen alternative fuels are in production or under the development for use in alternative fuel vehicles and advanced technology vehicles. Biodiesel, which is made from vegetable oils, animal fats, or recycled cooking grease is being considered for use in diesel vehicles. Ethanol is a widely used renewable fuel made from corn and other plant materials. It is blended with gasoline for use in vehicles. Hydrogen is a potentially emissions-free alternative fuel that can be produced from domestic resources for use in fuel cell vehicles. Natural gas is a domestically abundant gaseous fuel that can have significant fuel cost advantages over gasoline and diesel. Propane is a readily available gaseous fuel that has been widely used in vehicles throughout the World for decades. Several emerging fuels are considered alternative fuels under the Energy Policy Act and may be under development or already developed and available in the United States of America. These fuels may increase energy security, reduce emissions, improve vehicle performance, and stimulate the U.S. economy. Some of these emerging fuels are considered alternative fuels under the Energy Policy Act of 1992 and may qualify for federal and state incentives and laws: Biobutanol, Dimethyl ether, Methanol, and Renewable hydrocarbon biofuels. Additional fuels, such as ammonia, may also meet the criteria for alternative fuels when used in limited quantities. There are also vehicle conversions that can be done to retrofit conventional vehicles and engines so they can operate using a different fuel or power source, so do not throw away your car now, or think it will be obsolete in the future. However, more research is needed to characterize the impacts of these fuels, such as necessary vehicle modifications, required fueling infrastructure, human health impacts, greenhouse gas emissions, and tailpipe emissions. All of this may seem out of this World, but back in 1974 only 8 percent of gas stations were self-service. When consumers had to start pumping their own gas, some people did not know how to and motorists tried to put the fuel hose into the car’s radiator. Shortly afterward, however, the sight of consumers pumping their own gas became a common place. Today, 90 percent of gas stations are self-service. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20
The introduction of electronic banking, which not only began to break down the pattern of “banker’s hours,” but also increasingly eliminated many teller positions, leaving the customer to perform operations previously done by the bank staff. However, some consumers trust the human beings more than the machines and not all services can be performed by a machine. Nonetheless, getting the customer to do part of the job—known to economists as “externalizing labour costs”—is scarcely new. That is what self-service supermarkets are all about. The smiling clerk who knew the stock and went and got it for you was replaced by the push-it-yourself shopping cart, self-checkout lines, and bagging your own groceries. While some customers lamented the good old days of personal service, many like the new system. They can do their own searching and they wind up paying a few cents less. In effect, they are paying themselves to do the work the clerk has previously done. Today this same form of externalization is occurring in many other fields. The rise of discount stores, for example, represents a partial step in the same direction. Clerks are far and few between; the customer pays a bit less but works a bit harder. Even shoes stores in which a supposedly skilled clerk was long regarded as a necessity, are moving to self-service, shifting work to the consumer. The same principles can be found elsewhere, too. More things come knocked down for supposedly easy assembly at home…and during the Christmas season, shoppers in some of the proudest old New York stores have to make out sales slips for clerks unable or unwilling to write. A thirty-year-old government worker in Washington, D.C., heard strange noises emanating from his refrigerator. The customary thing to do in the past was to call in a mechanic and pay one to fix it. Given the high cost and the difficulty of getting a repair person at a convenient hour, Jensen Ackles read the instructions that came with his refrigerator. On it he discovered an 800-telephone number that he could use to call the manufacturer—Whirlpool Corporation of Benton Harbor, Michigan—free of charge. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20
This was the “Cool-Line” set up by Whirlpool to help customers with service problems. Ackles called. The man at the other end then “talked him through” a repair, explaining to Ackles exactly which bolts to remove, which sounds to listen for and—later—what part would be needed. “That guy,” says Ackles, “was super-helpful. He not only knew what I needed to do, he was a great confidence builder.” The refrigerator was fixed in no time. Whirlpool has a bank of full-time and several part-time advisers, some of them former service field employees, who wear headsets and take such calls. A screen in front of them instantly displays for them a diagram of whatever product is involved (Whirlpool makes freezers, dishwashers, air-conditioners, and other appliances in addition to refrigerators) and permits them to guide the customer. Whirlpool gets thousands of these calls each year. The Cool-Line is a rudimentary model for a future system of maintenance that permits the homeowner to do much of what a paid outside mechanic or specialist once did. The Cool Line was actually the first toll-free customer service support program in the United States of America. Made possible by advances that have driven down the cost of long-distance telephoning, it was the precursor for YouTube or Internet videos that actually display step-by-step fix-it-yourself instructions on the computer or home television screen as an adviser speaks. The development of such a system has been revolutionary and for countless numbers of people, has allowed them to reserve the repair mechanic only for major tasks, or turn the mechanic (like the doctor or social worker) into a teacher, guide, and guru for prosumers. However, if you are like me, the Internet can make all tasks seem easy, and even if they are, for some people they may cause more damage than good and end up costing themselves more money in the long run. Things are not always as easy as they look, and even if a repair works for an expert, you may cause damages. There are often times things you may not realize and so sometimes it is best to have the repair person do even a simple job for you. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20
We had seen a pattern that cut across many industries—increasing externalization, increasing involvement of the consumer in tasks once done for one by others—but now, we are seeing that freedom and power being usurped. For many people, that is a good thing. New warranty programs are sweeping the nation and for under a hundred dollars a month, and in some cases more, consumers can buy warranties on just about anything from computers, mobile phones, and vehicles. These warranties can last the lifetime of your product, too. This is a good thing because it is saving people thousands of dollars on repair jobs. The important thing is to buy one before something goes wrong with your product. And these warranties can be a good thing because as cars get more expensive, lenders are willing to loan consumers money for older cars because they can also purchase an extended warranty, which means they are more likely to pay their loans off because if something goes wrong with the car, all their car payment money will not be going to auto repairs. However, many people still would rather do-it-yourself or take it to the shop without buying an extended warranty and that is okay, too. As recently as fifty years ago in the United States of America, only 30 percent of all electric power tools were sold to do-it-yourselfers; 70 percent went to carpenters or other professional craftsmen. Today, those figures have flipped. Only about 20 percent are sold to professionals; fully 80 percent are bought by consumers who, more and more, are doing-it-themselves. Working with one’s hands used to be looked down upon (at least by the middle class), it is not a sign of pride. People doing their own work are proud of it. Many people also prefer to find independent contractors in the hopes of keeping costs low and getting superior quality work. Schools, universities, and publishers are busy offering an avalanche of how-to courses and books. Both rich and poor are caught up in the book. In Cleveland, home-repair instruction is offered in public-housing projects. In California, owner-installed saunas, spas, and decks are popular. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20
In Europe, too, the so-called “DIY revolution” is under way—with a few variations based on national temperament. (German and Dutch do-it-yourselfers tend to treat their projects very soberly, set high standards, and equip themselves carefully. Italians, by contrast, are just beginning to discover the DIY movement, many older husbands insisting that it is degrading to do the work themselves.) Once more the reasons are multiple. Inflation. The difficulty of getting a carpenter or plumber. Shoddy work. Expanded leisure. All these play a part. A more potent reason, however, is what might he called the Law of Relative Inefficiency. This holds that the more we automate the production of goods and lower their per-unit costs, the more we increase the relative costs of handcrafts and nonautomated services. (If a plumber gets $650 for a one-hour house call and the same $650 will buy a new laptop. Relative to the cost of the other good, one’s price has risen substantially.) For such reasons, we must expect the price of many services to continue their skyrocketing climb in the years ahead. And as these prices soar, we can expect people to do more and more for themselves. In short, even without inflation, the Law of Relative Inefficiency would make it increasingly “profitable” for people to produce for their own consumption, thus transferring further activity from Sector B to Sector A of the economy, from exchange production to presumption. As many people are looking to preserve their money and products, some are also figuring out better ways to function in society by understanding the human mind. Many people with schizophrenia appear to have social-cognitive deficits that interfere with their ability to process social ques. The inadequate recognition and processing of social cues are related to poor social skills more generally among people with schizophrenia. One common method for assessing social decoding is with a test known as the Profile of Nonverbal Sensitivity (PONS). #RandolphHarris 9 of 20
The PONS test presents a series of vignettes of nonverbal behaviour through varying audio (filtered for speech content) and video clips. After each clip, subjects are presented with two alternatives and must choose the one that was conveyed in the clip. People with schizophrenia perform more poorly on the PONS than do either healthy controls or psychiatric controls. On related perceptions tests, people with schizophrenia appear to have deficits in interpersonal problem recognition and in their ability to paraphrase and summarize the feelings of an actor presented on a videotape, DVD, or digital media. The nature of the communication-decoding skills deficits of people with schizophrenia is such that they exhibit more false-positive. Concrete social cues are actual sights (exempli gratia, facial expressions) and sounds (exempli gratia, tone of voice), whereas abstract social cues are inference about affect, rules, and goals of a social situation (exempli gratia, “He is upset,” “She is trying to get her way”). This may reflect a tendency toward overinclusive thinking; that is, people with schizophrenia may falsely identify social cues and make inferences that are not consistent with the situation. An alternative hypothesis—that schizophrenia interferes with vigilance for social cues—has been effectively ruled out. The ineffective processing of social information extends to schizophrenic patients’ processing of their own social behaviour. In a study, patients with schizophrenia rated the social appropriateness of their own behaviour significantly higher than judges did. However, there were no self-other differences in the ratings of psychiatric or healthy controls. This suggests a loss of contact with social reality that may be unique to schizophrenia. Considerable evidence suggests that people with schizophrenia experience deficits in both information processing and emotion recognition. These two deficits converge in the research on decoding facial expressions of emotions. The ability to detect and read other people’s emotions is an essential social skill that contributes to effective communication and social relations. This is a specific social skill that is impaired in many patients with schizophrenia. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20
When asked to judge emotional expressions in photographs of faces, subjects with schizophrenia perform more poorly than healthy controls, failing to detect or misreading other people’s facial expressions. Interestingly, this decoding skill deficit is pervasive across all facial recognition tasks, emotion or otherwise (exempli gratia). However, there is mixed evidence on whether patients with schizophrenia exhibit a deficit in detecting eye contact from other people. There is also some evidence to suggest that such patients may be able to recognize an emotion, but they that may be unable or unwilling to use an appropriate word to describe the emotion. From their extensive review of the literature of social expression of emotion and schizophrenia, two general theories explain patients’ deficits in recognition of facial emotions. The first holds that these are secondary to a right-hemisphere brain abnormality. This portion of the brain has been linked with the perception of facial emotion. The second theory is based on a social-cognitive deficit that develops out of a desire to avoid social interaction and guard against exposure to arousing stimuli. In either case, it is clear that people with schizophrenia have difficulty with this basic but important social decoding skill. Collectively, the research on social cue recognition and processing, and on perception of facial expressions in particular, clearly indicates problems with communication-decoding skills for those with schizophrenia. These poor decoding skills may make it difficult for people afflicted with schizophrenia to lean the social conventions of the culture at large and to recognize other people’s emotional states accurately. Failure to do so may help to explain why people with schizophrenia experience such difficulties establishing and maintaining personal relationships and a social support network. Are social skills deficits just a consequence of schizophrenia? Undoubtedly the symptoms of schizophrenia have profound effects on such processes as social cognition, communication, and message processing. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20
However, premorbid social behaviour problems and poor social competence are hallmarks of risk for schizophrenia. To illustrate this phenomenon, researchers followed groups of children who are at risk for psychosocial problems as a function of being born to a parent with a mood disorder, schizophrenia, or no mental health problem. During childhood, there were no differences in the social competence of the three groups. However, by adolescence those at risk for schizophrenia had lower social competence as rated by their parents and themselves. When college students were classified as being at risk for schizophrenia on the basis of scoring high on measures of perceptual aberration, magical ideation, nonconformity, and physical anhedonia, at-risk subjects performed more poorly on a role-play test of social skill and chose more odd and hostile responses on a multiple-choice test of interpersonal problem solving. A recent German study showed that evidence of social disability (exempli gratia, no marriage or stable partnerships) was evident during a prodromal period, as early as 2-4 years prior to formal diagnosis. This premorbid or prodromal social competence has proven to be a good predictor of age at first hospitalization, and of the prognosis for those who develop schizophrenia. Collectively, this research shows that poor social skills are already evident among those prone to schizophrenia, well before the onset of symptoms. However, since poor social skills are not specific to schizophrenia, their prodromal status must be understood as nonspecific. People with schizophrenia often have serious problems with social skills. In severe cases, their social and communication behaviour cannot be distinguished from those with mental hindrance and/or organic brain impairment. Among patients with certain subtypes, such as catatonic schizophrenia, social behaviour may be nearly nonexistent. The social skills deficits associated with schizophrenia involve both encoding and decoding skills. As encoders of communication, people with schizophrenia will exhibit communication, people with schizophrenia will exhibit communication failures. Their speech is difficult to understand, and their train of thought difficult to follow. Their enunciation is sometimes poor, and their use of nonverbal behaviour is often inappropriate and suggestive of disengagement and a desire not to communicate with others. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20
As decoders, people with schizophrenia appear to struggle to understand others. They have a difficult time reorganizing basic social cues, and reading the nonverbal behaviours or others, such as facial expressions of emotions. When asked to provide information based on the behaviour of others, they tend to draw unconventional conclusions that simply are not warranted by the behaviour observed. A number of prominent themes in the literature on social skills deficits and schizophrenia may explain some of these deficits. First, it is apparent that some of the problems with social behaviour associated with schizophrenia may be impaired due to their inhibited sociability. Their social behaviour is suggestive of a desire to withdraw from and avoid others, possibly because of shame and/or anxiety about interacting with other people. Rates of social anxiety and social phobia are relatively high among patients with schizophrenia. Social anxiety interacts with cognitive dysfunction and skill deficiency to hamper the social performance of people with schizophrenia. If they do not use them with any regularity, even people with reasonable social skills will experience atrophying of these skills. Many people with schizophrenia may start out with poor social skills, never having fully developed them as adolescents or young adults, only to see them worsen as a result of years of social withdrawal and avoidance. Finally, psychomotor disturbances that are associated with schizophrenia, many of which have physiological/biological bases, may interfere with effective social behaviour. The use of gesture, posture, facial expression, and eye contact may al be disrupted in concert with more general psychomotor disturbances that are common in schizophrenia. These may colour the social behaviour of patients in such a way as to impair basic social skills. It is perhaps understandable that a disorder as severe as schizophrenia is often accompanied by other psychological problems. These problems, like schizophrenia, have equally strong ties to interpersonal interaction and relationships. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20
Research results indicate that the lifetime prevalence of any mood disorder (major depression, dysthymia, and manic episode) is a staggering 74 percent among those with a primary diagnosis of schizophrenia. Results from this same study show a 72 percent lifetime prevalence of any anxiety disorders, and a 60 percent lifetime prevalence of any substance use disorder. For the majority of people with schizophrenia, therefore, other serious psychological problems are evident. Why are so many people with schizophrenia depressed, anxious, or involved in alcohol or other substance misuse? Admittedly, there are cases in which these problems are evident in the prodromal stages of the disorder. However, an interpersonal perspective would explain many of these problems as features precipitated by the gross deterioration of interpersonal relationships apparent among those with schizophrenia. Presumably, as the symptomatic behaviours become more evident and bizarre, other people (including close family members) react negatively toward the person with schizophrenia. The extreme social isolation that is common among patients with schizophrenia could itself contribute to depressive symptoms. Add to that isolation delusional, and sometimes paranoid, thinking about other people, and the potential for depression is obvious. These same delusional thought patterns could also create a severe anxiety over dealing with other people. People with schizophrenia are often fearful of others, and sometimes with good reason when one considers how they may have been treated by people in the past. From this perspective, a profound social anxiety might be viewed as secondary to the amalgamation of cognitive and interpersonal problems that is an integral part of schizophrenia. Almost half of all patients with schizophrenia have some form of anxiety disorder, and approximately 17 percent have social phobia in particular. Finally, interpersonal problems may lead people with schizophrenia to turn to drug or alcohol use, just as they do for others. #RandolphHarris 14 of 20
People often seek consolation in drugs or alcohol as either an escape from or mechanism for regulating an abrasive interpersonal environment. From an interpersonal perspective, it is not surprising that schizophrenia is highly comorbid with problems such as depression, anxiety, and substance use disorders. The problems are clearly sensitive to troubled interpersonal relationships, and troubled interpersonal relationships are dominant in the clinical picture of schizophrenia. A complete understanding of this most serious mental health problem is impossible without serious consideration of the family context in which a patient was reared and/or resides. The social support that is so badly needed by people with schizophrenia appears to be something that their families cannot provide. In fact, the “social support” that their families do provide may cause more hard then good. Schizophrenia sufferers often exhibit poor social skills in both the encoding and decoding domains of interpersonal communication. The three interpersonal domains addressed in this report—poor family-of-origin relations, poor general personal relations, and poor interpersonal communication (social skills deficits)—are by no means independent of each other. The shame and social withdrawal evident in the interpersonal conduct of people with schizophrenia may be the direct result of such experiences in their families of origin. The difficulties in establishing and maintaining effective and satisfying personal relationships are no doubt secondary to poor social skills. Developing person relationships requires at least some basic social skills. Without these skills, a person with schizophrenia may be doomed to a rather solitary and lonely interpersonal existence. This may leave the patient literally at the doorstep of the only interpersonal network that will accept one: the family of origin. In some cases, this may simply extend and protect the experience of schizophrenia. To regard all material improvements as a move away from spirituality, to assert that science and the industries based on it are absolutely evil, is unfair and untrue. The grim needs of war pushed technological advance ahead at an amazing speed. This advance may be used either to make us more materialistic or to make us less so. In itself it is neutral. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20
There is a line of connection which can be traced from the appearance of gentle Jesus Christ to the terrors of the Inquisition. There is another line which can be traced from the work of pioneer scientists like Galileo and Bacon to the work of atomic scientists like Einstein and Oppenheimer. If Jesus’ gospel was a message from God, science was a different kind of revelation from God. Both Inquisitional tortures and Hiroshima’s horrors are evidences of what humans have done to the fine things entrusted to them. It is for the humans themselves to undo their misdeeds and not wait for a Saviour to do it. The responsibility is theirs. It was the prevalence of superstition in all departments of human life, activity, belief, and thought which brought about the needed counterculture of the exact sciences. However, under the various superstitions there was not seldom some measure of covert fact and hidden truth. Science has itself become, because of its one-sided, self-made limitation, and through refusal to depart from materialistic views, a sort of superstition. Technical skill, verified experiment, and laboratory research are necessary and valuable, but their presence ought not to be considered. Hence we witness today such evils as the pollution of nature and the poisoning of human nutriment. There is no other way out now than to compensate for the missing elements, to broaden culture in a basic way—a coexistence previously believed to be impossible. “The Lord your God; the Lord your God has chosen you to be a special people to Himself out of all the peoples on the face of the Earth. The Lord did not set His love upon you and choose you because you were more in number than any other people, for you were the fewest of all people. However, because the Lord loves you and because He would keep the oath which He had sworn to your fathers, the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you out of the house of bondage, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. Know, recognize, and understand therefore that the Lord your God, He is God, the faithful God, Who keeps covenants and steadfast love and mercy with those who love Him and keep His commandments, to a thousand generation,” Deuteronomy 7.6-9. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20
O Lord, blessed be Your word, sweeter than money, and thicker than President Trump’s bank account. What could I do in these great sore spots and tight spots unless You comforted me with Your Holy Words? Until I finally arrived at the Gate of Salvation, what should I watch out for, what should I have to endure? Please grant me the Final Good. Please make my passing from this World to the next a smooth one. Please remember me, God of mine, and set me on the straight and narrow to Your Kingdom. Amen. “Be strong in the Lord and in His might power,” reports Ephesians 6.10. Our words are vital in brining our dream to pass. It is not enough to see your dreams simply by faith or in your imagination. You have to begin speaking words of faith over your life. The moment you speak something out, you give birth to it. This is a spiritual principle, and it works whether what you are saying is good or bad, positive or negative. In that regard, many times we are our own worst enemies. We blame everybody and everything else, but the truth is, we are profoundly influenced by what we say about ourselves. “We are snared by the words of our mouths,” reports Proverbs 6.2. There are several ways that you can release the ability God’s ability in prayer. One can release God’s ability through speaking faith-filled words. If you will team both of these together, speaking faith-filled words in prayer, then it will become a mighty force working for you. We are dealing primarily with the releasing the ability of God through prayer, through accurate prayer. If answered, inaccurate prayer will spell trouble. That is why one must learn to guard one’s tongue and speak only faith-filled words over one’s life. Simply put, one’s words can either make or break one. Prayer is not telling God our problems. Jesus said, “Your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him,” reports 6.8. For years, I thought to pray was to tell God the problem. No. That is not praying. Telling God the problem is complaining. Prayer is not trying to change God’s mind. God changeth not. God never commanded us to repeatedly verbalize our pain and suffering. He did not instruct us to go around discussing our negative situations, airing our “dirty laundry” with all of friends and neighbours. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20
Have you ever wondered why Jesus said, “Whatsoever ye shall bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven: and whatsoever ye shall loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven,” reports Matthew 18.18. All Heaven will stand behind what you say in prayer. However, not only will it work in prayer, it will also work in the things you speak. You can loose the ability of the Inquisitor against yourself by the words of your mouth, even in prayer. Therefore, God told us to speak constantly of His goodness, to speak of His promises in the morning at the breakfast table in your new Cresleigh Home, in the evenings around the dinner table in your Cresleigh Home Quick Move-In Residence 1, at night before bed Cresleigh Home Site 15 Residence Four plan, which includes over $12,000 in options and upgrades. Continually dwell on the good things of God. If you simply focused on the good things of God’s Word, you could experience a new sense of joy in your Cresleigh Home. In the 16th chapter of Matthew, Jesus Christ is teaching His disciples principles of prayer and Jesus knew how to teach prayer accurately. If anyone knew how to pray, I believe Jesus did. So let us see what Jesus said about prayer: “But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard from their much speaking. Be not ye therefore like unto them; for your Father knoweth what things ye have need for, before ye ask him,” reports Matthew 6.7-8. Notice Jesus Christ said that the Father knows the need before we ask Him. So we can determine from the Word of God that you do not get your prayer answered before you need it answered. I believe we can safely pull that out of this scripture and say it is not a fact from the Word of God: Praying is Not telling God you need. Some people have prayed, “Lord, I need white shaker cabinetry with soft-close doors and drawers,” and “Lord I need Flat screen prewire in the Great Room and owned solar.” He knows, but He does not answer prayer on the basis of need. If He did, there would be no needs. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20
Need is not what moves God; faith does. Vain repetitions do not move God; faith does. Much speaking does not move God; faith does. And if you are always talking about your problems, do not be surprised if you live in perpetual defeat. You must stop talking about the problem and start talking about the solution. Stop speaking words of defeat, and start speaking words of success. Do not use your words to describe your situation; use your words to change your situation. Prayer the same prayer over and over does not cause God to move; faith does. Asking according to His will for asking will move God. When you pray, believe you receive; that moves God. Set the tone for the entire day as soon as you get out of bed. If you wait until you have read the morning newspaper, you will start your day with all sorts of sad, dreary news. Try starting your day with some good news by speaking God’s Word over your life! The moment you wake up, begin to give new life to your dreams by speaking words of faith and success. Understand, avoiding negative talks is not sufficient. That is similar to buying a model home with no furniture or electricity. If you are going to make a house a home, you seen a place to sleep and lights to see. You have to be aggressive. We have often prayed, “Father, if it is Your will, let it be done.” If it is not, we will just go on suffering, thinking we are being humble, when we are really being ignorant of God’s Word. We need to know who determines whether or not our prayer is answered. God is not the one who determines the outcome. You determine whether or not you receive. If we could just cast all that on the Lord and say, “Oh well, if it is God’s will, it will work out and if it is not, it will not,” that would be good. That is a cop-out. I did it for years until I realized that it was not working. If your prayer life is working, if you are getting your prayers answered, I would not change the way I was praying. However, if not, I would change it, I tried it the other way and it did not work for me. I changed it and found something that works. If you have been on the same road for twenty years and have not yet arrived, you should know that you were on the wrong road. Let us get on the right road by being accurate in prayer. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20
Start using your words to move forward in life, to bring to life the great things God has in store for you. “With the hear one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation,” reports Romans 10.10. This same principle is true in other areas. When you believe God’s Word and begin to speak it, mixing it with your faith, you are actually confirming that truth and making it valid in your own life. Father, I thank You that You are my healer, and that You promised me in Psalm 118 that I will live and not die and I will declare the words of the Lord. I boldly declare this truth in my life. I know that all Heaven’s attention with God will come to back up the declarations I made in Jesus’ name. Thank You, Father that I can align my words with Your Word. Today, I am speaking words of success, health, and love about my life, that I will be strong spiritually, that my body will be well, and that my life will have eternal significance. I who am the beauty of the green Earth and the white Moon among the stars and the mysteries of the waters, I call upon your souls to arise and come unto Me. For I am the soul of nature that gives life to the Universe. From Me all things proceed and unto Me they must return. Let My worship be in the heart that rejoices, for behold—all acts of love and pleasure are My rituals. Let there be beauty and strength, power and compassion, honour and humility, mirth and reverence within you. And you who seek to know Me, know that your seeking and yearning will avail you not, unless you know the Mystery: for if that which you seek, you find not within yourself, you will never find it without. For behold, I have been with you from the beginning, and I am that which is attained at the end of desire. The Angels came a-mustering, a-mustering, a-mustering, the Angels came a-clustering around the sapphire throne. A-questioning of one another, of one another, of one another, a-questions each one of his brother around the sapphire throne. Pray who is he, and where is he, and where is he, and where is he, whose shining casts—so fair is he—a shadow on the throne? Prayer, who has up to Heaven come, to Heaven come, to Heaven come, through all the circles seven come to fetch the Torah down! I will rejoice and exult on Simhat Torah. The Branch of David shall surely come on Simhat Torah. The Torah is a tree of life; it is life to all; for with Thee is the fountain of life. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob rejoiced on Simhat Torah. Aaron, Joshua, Samuel, David, and Solomon rejoiced on Simhat Torah. The Torah is a tree of life: it is life to all; for with Thee is the fountain of life. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20
Cresleigh Homes
Nope, you aren’t seeing things…our bedroom at Brighton Station Residence 3 is large enough for a sitting area, too! 😍
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Haunted by a Counteracting Spell—My Whole Soul Withering!
God created man He committed Lucifer a position of authority in relation to the Earth and its surrounding planets. For this reason, Satan is called the “god of this World” in the New Testament. This angelic creature of surpassing beauty and intelligence, however, initiated a rebellion against God. This explains the entrance of sin, suffering, and death into a universe which had been “good” as it came from God’s creative hand. The Scriptures do not attempt to tell us why God permitted sin to invade His World, for His reasons are among the “secret things” which “belong unto the Lord our God,” reports Deuteronomy 29.29. We cannot fully understand how or why an infinitely holy God brought about the possibility of evil, nor can we explain the origin of pride and rebellion against Him. However, by faith we are assured that God is holy, wise, and loving. Our confidence in Him enables us to believe that behind His permission of sin, suffering, and death lies infinite holiness, wisdom, and goodness. The Bible simply affirms that the angel Lucifer, now called Satan, became proud and rebelled against his Maker. Lucifer, the daystar, succumbed to pride and revolted against God. Apparently many angels joined in the rebellion, for the Bible speaks of “angels that sinned,” reports 2 Peter 2.4, “angels who kept not their first estate,” reports Jude 6, and Revelation 12.4 in figurative language describes the red dragon (Satan) as pulling down a third of the stars (angels) from Heaven with his tail. Satan and his followers have been cast out of Heaven to Earth. They hate God and His people, and have neither desire for nor hope of salvation. The terms “evil” and “foul” are sometimes used to describe the evil spirits who make up Satan’s army. Even the name “Satan” means adversary, and the word “devil” portrays him as one who accuses or criticizes. #RandolphHarris 1 of 16
The fall of Lucifer made him an implacable enemy of God, a false accuser, and a liar whose every activity is marked by deceitfulness. The devil today is the leader of a vast host of evil spirits who are organized into a military-like structure. However, remember that Satan, though intelligent and powerful, is not omnipotent, omniscient, nor omnipresent. He can be in only one place at a time, but his myriads of assistants can largely make up for his inherent finiteness. With their help he tries to lead people into sinful practices and introduces false doctrine into the professing church. Though fallen humanity possess an evil nature, many of the completely inhuman and unnatural evils of society are at least in part traceable to the devil and his evil spirits. The widespread confusion and strife within the realm of professing Christendom is also partly due to Satanic activity. Evil spirits seek to divide and corrupt the church. However, remember, Satan was originally sinless and the most glorious of all created beings. In 1324 A.D., Dame Alice Kyteler (such apparently being her maiden name), the facile princeps of Irish witches, was a member of a good Anglo-Norman family that had been settled in the city of Kilkenny for many years. The lady in question must have been far removed from the popular conception of a witch as an old woman of striking ugliness, or else her powers of attraction were very remarkable, for she had succeeded in leading four husbands to the alter. She had been married, first, to William Outlawe of Kilkenny, banker; secondly, to Adam le Blund of Callan; third, to Richard de Valle—all of whom she was supposed to have got rid of by poison; and fourthly, to Sir John le Poer, whom it was said she deprived of his natural senses by philtres and incantations. #RandolphHarris 2 of 16
The Bishop of Ossory at this period was Richard de Ledrede, a Franciscan friar, and an Englishman by birth. He soon learnt that things were not as they should be, for when making a visitation of his diocese early in 1324 he found by an Inquisition, in which were five knights and numerous nobles, that there was in the city a band of heretical sorcerers, at the head whom was Dame Alice. The following charges were laid against them. They had denied the faith of Christ absolutely for a year or a month, according as the object they desired to gain through sorcery was of greater or less importance. During all that period they believed in none of the doctrines of the Church; they did not adore the Body of Christ, nor enter a sacred building to hear mass, not make sure of consecrated bread or holy water. They offered in sacrifice to demons living animals, which they dismembered, and then distributed at cross-roads to a certain evil spirit of low rank, named the Son of Art. They sought their sorcery advice and responses from demons. In their nightly meetings they blasphemously imitated the power of the Church by fulminating sentences of excommunication, with lighted candles, even against their own husbands, from the sole of their foot to the crown of their head, naming each part expressly, and then concluded by extinguishing the candles and by crying Fi! Fi! Fi! Amen. In order to arouse feelings of love or hatred, or to inflict death or disease on the bodies of the faithful, they made use of powders, unguents, ointments, and candles of fat, which were compounded as follows. They took the entrails of cocks sacrificed to demons, certain horrible worms, various unspecified herbs, dead men’s nails, the hair, brains, and shreds of the cerement of boys who were buried unbaptized, with other abominations, all of which they cooked, with various incantations, over a fire of oak-logs in a vessel made out of the skull of a decapitated thief. #RandolphHarris 3 of 16
The children of Dame Alice’s four husbands accused her before the Bishop of having killed their fathers by sorcery, and of having brought on them such stolidity of their senses that they bequeathed all their wealth to her and her favourite son, William Outlawe, to the impoverishment of the other children. They also stated that her present husband, Sir John le Poer, had been reduced to such a condition by sorcery and the use of powders that he had become terribly emaciated, his nails had dropped off, and there was no hair left on his body. No doubt he would have died had he not been warned by a maid-servant of what was happening, in consequence of which he had forcibly possessed himself of his wife’s keys, and had opened some chests in which he found a sackful of horrible and detestable thing which he transmitted to the bishop by the hands of two priests. The said dame had a certain demon, an incubus, named Son or Art, or Robin son of Art, who had carnal knowledge of her, and from who she admitted that she had received all her wealth. This incubus made its appearance under various forms, sometimes as a cat, or as a hairy black dog, or in the likeness of an African, accompanied by two others who were larger and taller than he, and of whom one carried an iron rod. Dame Alice was declared to be a sorceress, magician, and heretic, and it was demanded that she should be handed over to the secular arm and have her goods confiscated as well. One of Dame Alice’s accomplices was Petronilla of Meath, she was made the scapegoat for her mistress. The Bishop had her flogged six times, and under the repeated application of this form of torture she made the required confession of magical practices. She admitted the denial of her faith and the sacrificing to Robert, son of Art, and as well that she had caused certain women of her acquaintance to appear as if they had goats’ horns. #RandolphHarris 4 of 16
She also confessed that at the suggestion of Dame Alice she had frequently consulted demons and received responses from them, and that she had acted as a “medium” (mediatrix) between her and the said Robert. She declared that although she herself was a mistress of the Black Art, yet she was as nothing in comparison with the Dame from who she had learnt all her knowledge, and that there was no one in the World more skillful than she. Petronilla of Meath also stated that William Outlawe deserved death as much as she, for he was privy to their sorceries, and for a year and a day had worn the devil’s girdle round his body. When rifling Dame Alice’s house there was found “a wafer of sacramental bread, having the devil’s name stamped thereon instead of Jesus Christ, and a pipe of ointment wherewith she greased a staffe, upon which she ambled and galloped through thick and thin, when and in what manner she listed.” Petronilla was accordingly condemned to be burnt alive, and the execution of this sentence took place with all due solemnity in Kilkenny on 3rd November 1324. Dame Alice fled the country. “With regard to the other heretics and sorcerers who belonged to the pestilential society of Robin, son of Art, the order of law being preserved, some of them were publicly burnt to death; others, confessing their crimes in the presence of all the people, in an upper garment, are marked back and front with a cross after they had abjured their heresy, as is the custom; others were solemnly whipped through the town and the market-place; others were banished from the city and diocese; others who evaded the jurisdiction of the Church were excommunicated; while others again fled in fear and were never heard of after. And thus, by the authority of Holy Mother Church, and by the special grace of God, that most foul brood was scattered and destroyed.” Possibly Dame Alice and her associated actually practiced magical arts, and if so, considering the period at which it occurred, some can see why the Bishop took the steps he did. #RandolphHarris 5 of 16
However, others suspect such baser motives as greed of gain and desire for revenge. John XXII was elevated to the Papacy. The attitude of that Pope towards magical arts was no uncertain one. He believed himself to be surrounded by enemies who were ever making attempts on his life by modelling images of him in wax, to be subsequently thrust through with pins and melted, no doubt; or by sending him a devil enclosed in a ring, or in various other ways. Consequently in several Bulls he anathematized sorcerers, denounced their ill-deeds, excited the inquisitors against them, and so gave ecclesiastical authorization to the reality of the belief in magical forces. Indeed, the general expression used in the Bull Super illius specula might be applied to the actions of Dame Alice and her party. He says of certain persons that “they sacrificed to demons and adore them, making or causing to be made images, rings, and so forth, with which they draw the evil spirits by their magical art, obtain responses from them, and demand their help in performing their evil designs.” Heresy and sorcery were now identified, and the punishment for the former was the same as that for the latter, burning at the stake and confiscation of property. The attitude of this Pontiff evidently found a sympathizer in Bishop de Ledrede, who deemed in necessary to follow the example set by Head of the Church, with what results we have already shown: thus we find In Ireland a ripple of the wave that swept over Europe at this period. It is very probable, too, that there were many underlying local causes of which we can know little or nothing; the discontent and anger of the disinherited children at the loss of the wealth of which Dame Alice had bereft them by her exercise of “undue influence” over her husbands, family quarrels, private hatreds, and possibly national jealousy helped to bring about one of the strangest series of events in the chequered history of Ireland. #RandolphHarris 6 of 16
Mrs. Sarah Winchester’s arrival was a sensational event. The Santa Clara Valley was thrilled by this dramatic entrance of a millionairess; they those freight cars sidetracked in Santa Clara, unloading rich imported furnishings; by building activity that mushroomed an eight-room farm house into a 26-room mansion, the first six months. Here was game for all! They talked about Mrs. Winchester! Gossiped would be a more fitting word, gossip no one claimed to like-but everyone enjoyed. Talk begat rumors and as the years passed and new towers and gables rose behind the six-foot hedge of Llanada Villa, the rumors grew to established legend. There had been a thunderstorm in the valley. Every door was shut, every dog in its kennel, every rut and gutter a flowing river after the deluge of rain that had fallen. Up at the Winchester mansion, which seemed to be supernaturally growing, the fawns on the estate were venturing their timid heads from behind the trunk of trees, and Mrs. Winchester has risen from her knees, and was putting back her prayer-book on the self. In the garden, April roses, unwieldy with their full-blown richness, and saturated with rain, hung their heads heavily to the Earth; others, already fallen, lay flat upon their blooming faces on the path, where Agnus, Mrs. Winchester’s maid, would fund them, when going on her morning quest of rose-leaves for her lady’s pot-pourri. Ranks of white lilies, just brought to perfection by today’s sun, lay dabbled in the mire of flooded mould. Tears ran down the amber cheeks of the plums on the south wall, and not a bee had ventured out of the hives, though the scent of the air was sweet enough to tempt the laziest drone. The sky was still lurid behind the boles of the upland oaks, but the birds had begun to dive in and out of ivy that wrapped up the mansion. This thunderstorm took place more than a century ago, and must remember that Mrs. Winchester was dressed in the fashion of that time as she walked out from behind the squire’s chair, now that the lightning was over, and, with many nervous glances towards the window, sat down before the tea-urn, and the muffins. #RandolphHarris 7 of 16
We can picture her fine lace cap, with its peachy ribbons, the frill on the hem of her cambric gown just touching her ankles, her embroidered stockings, the rosettes on her shoes, but not so easily the lilac shade of her mild eyes, the satin skin, which still kept its delicate bloom, though wrinkled with advancing age, and the pale, sweet, puckered mouth, that time and sorrow had made angelic while trying vainly to deface its beauty. The room in which she sat was a pleasant old-fashioned drawing-room, with a spider-glass window, carpet, tawny wreath on the pale blue; blue flutings on the walls, and faint gilding on the furniture. A huge urn, crammed with roses, in the open bay-window, through which came delicious airs from the garden, the twittering of birds settling to sleep in the ivy close by, and occasionally the pattering of a flight of rain drops, swept to the ground as a bough bent in the breeze. The urn on the table was ancient silver, and the china rare. There was nothing in the room for luxurious ease of the body, but everything of delicate refinement for the eye. At this moment a rolling sound struck upon the ears. The lady rose from her seat trembling, and folded her hands together, while the tea-urn flooded the tray. Presently pretty Agnus of the rose-leaves appeared at the door in flutter of blue ribbons. “Please, madam, a lady has arrived, and says she is expected. She asked for her apartment, and I put her into the room that was got ready of Miss Marriot. And she sends her respects to you, madam, and she will be down with you presently.” Hardly had she spoken when the door again opened, and the stranger appeared—a small creature, whether a girl or a woman it would be hard to say—dressed in a scanty black silk dress, her narrow shoulders covered with a white muslin pelerine. Her hair was swept up to the crown of her heard, all but a little fringe hanging over her low forehead with an inch of brows. Her face was brown and thin, eyes black and long, with blacker settings, mouth large, sweet, and melancholy. She was all head, mouth, and eyes; her nose and chin were nothing. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16
This visitor crossed the floor hastily, dropped a courtesy in the middle of the room, and approached the table, saying abruptly, with a soft Italian accent: “Madam, I am here. I am come to play your organ.” “The organ!” gasped Mrs. Winchester. “Yes, the organ,” said the little stranger lady, playing on the back of a chair with her finger, as if she felt notes under them. “It was but last week that the handsome signor, your son, came to my little house, where I have lived teaching music since my English father and my Italian mother and brothers and sisters died and left me so lonely.” Here the fingers left off drumming, and two great tears were brushed off, one from each eye with each hand, child’s fashion. However, the next moment the fingers were at work again, as if only whilst they were moving the tongue could speak. “Your son,” said the little woman, looking trustfully at Mrs. Winchester, while a bright blush shone through her brown skin, “he often came to see me before that, always in the evening, when the sun was warm and yellow all through my little studio, and the music was swelling my heart, and I could play out grand with all my soul; then he used to come and say, ‘Hurry, little Bianca, and play better, better still. I have work for you to do by-and-by.’ Sometimes he said, ‘Brava!’ and sometimes he said ‘Eccellentissima!’ but one night last week he came to me and said, ‘It is enough. Will you swear to do my bidding, whatever it may be?’ Here the black eyes fell. And I said, ‘Yes.’ And he said, ‘Now you are my betrothed.’ And he said, ‘Pack up your music, little Bianca, and go off to San Jose to my American mother, who has an organ in her house which must be played upon. If she refuses to let you play, tell her I sent you, and she will give you leave. The spirits are always high and about. You must play all day, and you must get up in the night and play. You must never tire. You are my betrothed, and you have sworn to do my work.’ I said, ‘Shall I see you there, signor?’ And he said, ‘Yes, you shall see me there.’ I said, ‘I will keep my vow, signor.’ And so, madam, I am come.’” #RandolphHarris 9 of 16
The soft foreign voice left off talking, the finger left off thrumming on the chair, and the little stranger gaze in dismay at her auditor, pale with agitation. “You are deceived. You make a mistake,” said Mrs. Winchester. “My son—” began Mrs. Winchester, but her mouth twitched, her voice broke, and she looked piteously. “Yes, yes, said the little foreigner. “If you have though him dead have good cheer, dear madam. He is alive; he is well, and strong, and handsome. But one, two, three, four, five’ (on the fingers) “days ago he stood by my side.” “It is some strange mistake, some wonderful coincidence!” said Mrs. Winchester. “Let me take you to the gallery,” murmured the mother of this son who was thus dead and alive. “There is yet light to see the pictures. She will not know his portrait.” The bewildered wife led her strange visitor away to the long gloomy room at the west side of the mansion, where the faint gleams from the darkening sky still lingered on the portraits of the Winchester family. “Doubtless he is like this,” said the madam, pointing to a fair-haired young man with a mild face, a cousin of Mr. Winchester, who had been lost at sea. But Bianca shook her head and went softly on tiptoe from one picture to another, peering into the canvas, and still turning away troubled. However, at last a shriek of delight stated the shadowy chamber. “Ah, here he is! See, here he is, the noble signor, the beautiful signor, not half so handsome as he looked five days ago, when talking to poor little Bianca! Dear sir and madam, you are now content. Now take me to the organ, that I may commence to do his bidding at once.” Mrs. Winchester said faintly, “How old are you, girl?” “Eighteen,” said the visitor impatiently, moving towards the door. “And my son has been dead for fifty-four years. That is his father. We tried to have another child after the tragic death of our daughter, but I miscarried,” said Mrs. Winchester. Up the grand staircase the little woman followed Mrs. Winchester. The mansion was fitted with much great luxury and richness. The appointments of the mysterious Grand Ballroom was built almost entirely without nails. It cost over $9,000 (2021 inflation adjusted $242,038.24) to complete at the time when an entire house could be built for less than $1000 (2021 inflation adjusted $26,893.14)! #RandolphHarris 10 of 16
The silver chandelier from Germany illuminated the room quite well, the was a robust fire blazing in the fireplace, and the walls, floors, and ceiling were made of six hardwoods—mahogany, teak, maple, rosewood, oak, and white ash. The most curious elements of the Grand Ballroom are the two leaded stained-glass windows, each inscribed with a quote from Shakespeare. Ironically, the ballroom was never used to hold a ball. Mrs. Winchester had invited a celebrated orchestra from San Francisco to perform at her home, but scheduling conflicts prevented the visit. The spirit must have known Mrs. Winchester wanted to hear live music. The appointments of this room announced it the sanctum of a woman who depended for the interest of her life upon resources of intellect and tastes. However, with all the luxury in the Grand Ballroom, what stood out most to Bianca was nothing but a morsel of biscuit that was laying on a plate. “May I have it?” said she eagerly. “It is so long since I have eaten. I am hungry.” Mrs. Winchester sat Bianca down and told her how she lost the baby. “There was a party of men, who named themselves the “Devil’s Club,” and they were in the habit of practising all kinds of unholy pranks in the country. They had midnight carousings on the tombstones in the Grove Street Cemetery; they carried away helpless old men and children, who they tortured by making believe to bury them alive; mock feast. On one occasion there was a very sad funeral from the village. The corpse was carried into the church, and prayers were read over the coffin, the chief mourner, the aged father of the dead man, standing weeping by. In the midst of this solemn scene the organ suddenly pleaded forth a profane tune, and a number of voices shouted a drinking chorus. A groan of execration burst from the crowd, the clergyman turned pale and closed his book, and the old mad, the father of the dead, climbed the altar steps, and, raising his arms above his head, uttered a terrible curse. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16
“He said that if Mr. Winchester did not give him the ‘Colt,’ that his family would meet with tragedy. The Colt is a legendary gun that was created in 1835, during the appearance of Halley’s Comet, and the chamber could hold 13 bullets. It was made by a blacksmith who tinker with the occult. In German tradition, the blacksmith ends his work on Saturday by striking his anvil, chaining the Devil for another week. So anyway, he cursed Mr. Winchester to all eternity, he cursed the organ he played, that it might be dumb henceforth, except under the fingers that had now profaned it, which, he prayed, might be forced to labour upon it till they stiffened in death. And the curse seemed to work, for the organ stood dumb in the church from that day, except when I purchased it and put it in my Grand Ballroom as a reminder of my miscarried son. William used to hammer away at the organ so many laborious hours. He only stopped when our daughter was born, but shortly after birth she passed away. William went back to locking himself up in the ballroom with the organ, but one day I hid myself among the curtains, and saw him withering on his seat, and heard him groaning as he strove to wrench his hands from the keys, to which they flew back like a needle to a magnet. It was soon plainly to be seen that he was an involuntary slave to the organ; but whether through madness that had grown within himself, or by some supernatural doom, having its cause in the old man’s curse, we did not dare to day. By-and-by there came a time when I was wakened out of my sleep at nights by the rolling of the organ. He wrought now night and day. Food and rest were denied him. His face got haggard, his bread grew long, his eyes started from their sockets. His body became wasted, and his cramped fingers like the claws of a bird. He groaned piteously as he stooped over his cruel toil. I was afraid to go near him. I tried to put wine and food between his lips, while the tortured fingers crawled over the keys; but he only gnashed his teeth; I retreated from him. At last, one dreadful hour, we found him a ghastly corpse on the ground before the organ. The doctor said he died from tuberculosis.” #RandolphHarris 12 of 16
“From that hour the organ was dumb to the touch of all human fingers. I had it shipped here when I moved to the Santa Clara Valley and built this beautiful room for it. Many, unwilling to believe the story, made preserving endeavours to draw sound from it, in vain. However, when the darkened empty room was locked up and left, we heard as loud as ever the well-known sounds humming and rolling through the walls. Night and day the tones of the organ boomed on as before. It seemed that the doom of the wretched man was not yet fulfilled, although my family rests in the cemetery. As time went on, the curse of this perpetual music was not removed from the house. Servants refused to stay about the place. Visitors shunned it. I left this house for several years, and returned; left it, and returned again, to find my ears still tortured and my heart rung by the unceasing persecution of terrible sounds. At last, but a few months ago, a holy man was found, who locked himself up in the cursed and mysterious Grand Ballroom for many days, praying and wrestling with the demon. After he came forth and went away the sounds ceased, and the organ was heard no more. Since then there has been peace in the house. And now, Bianca, your strange appearance and your strange story convinces me that you are a victim of a ruse of the Evil One. Be warned in time, and place yourself under the protection of God, that you may be saved from the fearful influenced that are at work upon you.” Little Bianca went fast asleep, her hands spread before her as if she played an organ in her dreams. “We will save you from your horrible fate!” Mrs. Winchester whispered, and had the butler carry the girl to bed. In the morning, Bianca was gone. Mrs. Winchester found the girl’s chambers empty. “She is just a wild thing,” thought Mrs. Winchester, “as would rush out at sunrise to hear the larks!” and she went forth to look for her in the meadows, behind the fruit orchard in the estate’s deer park, and found nothing. She returned, her quest had been unsuccessful. The little international girl had vanished. #RandolphHarris 13 of 16
A second search after breakfast proved also fruitless, and towards the evening there was panic and distress. Mrs. Winchester sat in the palour. The servants, with pale faces, were huddled together in whispering groups. The haunted organ was booming and roaring again through the mansion. Mrs. Winchester hastened to the fatal Grand Ballroom, and there, sure enough, was Bianca, perched upon the high seat before the organ, beating the keys with her small hands, her slight figure swaying, and the evening sunshine playing about her weird head. Sweet unearthly music she wrung from the groaning heart of the organ—wild melodies, mounting to rapturous heights and falling to mournful depths. She wandered from Mendelssohn to Mozart, and from Mozart to Beethoven. Mrs. Winchester stood fascinated awhile by the ravaging beauty of the sounds she heard, but, rousing herself quickly, put her arms around the musician and forced her away from the mysterious Grand Ballroom. Bianca returned the next day, however, and was not so easily coaxed from her post again. Day after day she laboured at the organ, growing paler, and thinner, and more weird-looking as time went on. “I worked so hard,” she said to Mrs. Winchester. “The signor, your son, is he pleased? Asked him to come and tell me himself if he is pleased.” Mrs. Winchester got ill and took to her bed. The butler swore at the young international star and roamed abroad. Agnus was the only one who stood by to watch the fate of the little organist. The curse of the organ was upon Bianca; it spoke under her hand, and her hand was its slave. At last she announced rapturously that she had a visit from the brave signor, who had commanded her industry, and urged her to work yet harder. After that she ceased to hold any communication with the living. Time after time Agnus wrapped her arms about the frail thing, and carried her away by force, locking the door of the fatal chamber. However, locking the chamber and burying the key were of no avail. The door stood opened again, and Bianca was labouring on her perch. #RandolphHarris 14 of 16
One night, wakened from her sleep by the well-known humming and moaning of the organ, Mrs. Winchester dressed and hastened to the unholy room. Moonlight was pouring down the staircase and cascading on the stained-glass windows. It shone on the marble bust of the late Mr. Winchester, that stood in the niche above Mrs. Winchester’s sitting-room door. The Grand ballroom was full of it when Mrs. Winchester pushed open the door and entered—full of pale blue moonlight from the window, mingled with another light, a dull lurid glare which seemed to center round like a dark shadow, like the figure of a man standing by the organ, and throwing out in fantastic relief the slight form of Bianca writhing, rather than swaying, back and forward, as if in agony. The sounds that came from the organ were broken and meaningless, as if the hands of the player lagged and stumbled on the keys. Between the intermittent chords low moaning cries broke from Bianca, and the dark figure bent towars her with menacing gestures. Trembling with the sickness of supernatural fear, yet strong of will, Mrs. Winchester walked forward with the lurid light, and was drawn into its influence. It grew and intensified upon her, it dazzled and blinded her at first; but presently, by a daring effort of will, she raised her eyes, and beheld Bianca’s face convulsed with torture in the burning glare, and bending over her the figure and the features of William Winchester! Smitten with horror, Mrs. Winchester did not even lose her presence of mind. She wound her strong arms around the wretched girl and dragged her from her seat and out of the influence of the lurid light, which immediately paled away and vanished. She carried her to her own bed, where Lisa lay, a wasted wreck, raving about the cruelty of the pitiless signor who would not see that she was labouring her best. Her poor cramped hands kept beating the coverlet, as though she were still at her agonizing task. Mrs. Winchester prayed a way might be shown by which to put an end to this curse. She prayed for Bianca, and then, thinking that the girl rested somewhat, stole from the room. She thought that she had locked the door behind her. #RandolphHarris 15 of 16
She went to the blue séance room with a pale, resolved face, and, without consulting anyone, sent to the village for a bricklayer. Afterwards she sat by the foreman, and explained to him what was to be done. Presently, Mrs. Winchester went to the door of Bianca’s room, and hearing no sound, thought the girl slept, and stole away. By-and-by she went downstairs, and found that the bricks had arrived and the foreman already begun his task of building up the Grand Ballroom door. He was a swift workman, and the mysterious ballroom was soon sealed safely with stone and mortar. A few hours went by and no one had seen Bianca. The house was searched, upstairs and downstairs, in the garden, in the grounds, in the fields and meadows. No Bianca. Mrs. Winchester made inquiries everywhere; she pondered and puzzled over the matter. In the weak, suffering state the girl was in, how far could she have crawled. Meanwhile, the mansion was still growing by leaps and bounds from 8 room, to 26 room, a nine-story tower, 156 more rooms, as if it was under construction by legions of ghosts. A few years went by, and still no one had seen Bianca. When one night, Angus decided to quit. “I love you dearly, and it breaks my heart to go away, but the organ…I am frightened out of my life, I cannot stay, Mrs. Winchester.” “Who has heard the organ, and when?” asked Mrs. Winchester, rising to her feet. “Please ma’am, I heard it years ago, the night you went away—the night after the door was built up. I heard it again this morning.” “No,” said Mrs. Winchester; “it is only the wind.” However, as pale as death she flew down the stairs and laid her ear to the yet mortar. All was silent. There was no sound but the monotonous sough of the wind in the trees outside. The Winchester mansion was shut up and deserted for many years. At night, passers-by heard ghostly music wafting from the dark mansion. The bell in the belfry high in the gables tolled regularly at midnight to summon incoming flights of spirits. Later it rolled again to warn these visitors to return to their sepulchers. However, once a week these departed one relaxed and faced in the Great Ballroom. #RandolphHarris 16 of 16
Winchester Mystery House
Any plans for the weekend? Come hang out at the Winchester Mystery House 😉 winchestermysteryhouse.com
A 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle .
The Winchester Mystery House would like to wish you a safe and Happy Halloween 🎃
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Yeah, You Sure Do Have a Problem!
Just because you do not understand it, does not mean It is not so. Contemporary investigations of family relationships and schizophrenia center more on explaining the course than the cause of the disorder. There are, however, some notable instances where researchers have employed family-of-origin variables to predict the onset of schizophrenia. Three family variables that have been, and continue to be, particularly influential in this area are communication deviance, expressed emotion, and family affective style. In the classic family approaches to schizophrenia, patients’ families often have odd and unfocused styles of interacting with each other, perhaps in the service of sustaining pseudomutuality. Members of these families have difficulty establishing and maintaining a shared focus of attention through their discourse. Out of this original set of studies and hypotheses about family interaction and schizophrenia emerged a very influential line of research on communication deviance. It has been theorized that people learn to focus their attention and derive meaning from external stimuli through their interactions, particularly with parents, during the early years of life. Odd and deviant styles of communication among the parents were presumed to interact with biological predispositions to contribute to thought and communication disturbances in children who are unable to relate to and understand their parents. A considerable body of evidence indicates that a family affected by a member’s schizophrenia will communicate in odd, idiosyncratic, illogical, and fragmented language, even when that member is not present. Topics of conversation will often drift or abruptly change direction, with a lack of closure. Such interactions are marked by a blurred focus of attention and meaning. This characteristic style of family communication has been labeled CD (communication deviance). #RandolphHarris 1 of 20
Traditionally, CD has been assessed from transcripts of parents’ responses to projective tests such as the Rorschach or the Thematic Apperaption Test (TAT). These responses are generally made in the absence of the child. People with schizophrenia may have a contorted peculiar language and misinterpratations of social and verbal language. This is referred to as interactional communication deviance (ICD), and it classifies parents’ discourse into categories such as idea fragments (exempli gratia “But the thing is as I said, there’s got…you can’t drive in the alley), contradictions or reactions (exempli gratia, “No, that’s right, she does” and ambiguous reference (exempli gratia ‘Kids stuff that’s one thing but something else is different too). Abundant evidence indicates that CD is higher in parents of patients with schizophrenia than it is in parents of either patients without schizophrenia or healthy controls. It is particularly intriguing that this distorted form of communication is highly reminiscent of the communication style that typifies the person who actually has schizophrenia. It is therefore unclear whether parental CD reflects a genetic effect that is evident in both parent and child, or a parental behaviour that contributes to the child’s problem. The onset of schizophrenia can be predicted. In one study, parents from families with moderately disturbed teenagers each responded to TAT protocols, from which measures of CD were taken. Fifteen years later, the lifetime prevalence of schizophrenia in the children was assessed. High CD in the parents was strongly associated with the appearance of schizophrenia-spectrum disorders in some of the family of offspring at follow-up. In a similar study, disturbed high-risk adolescents were followed over a period of 5 years. By the end of the study, approximately 10 percent of those whose parents who were low or intermediate in CD went on to develop schizophrenia, whereas 56 percent of those whose parents were high in CD developed schizophrenia. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20
Other researchers on CD has examined its role in the course of schizophrenia. For example, one group of patients with schizophrenia and their parents were followed for over the course of 1 year. Within the 12-month period of the study, slightly over 50 percent of the patients has experienced a relapse. Parental CD at the time of the patients’ discharge was significantly higher among the parents of those who relapsed versus those who did not. However, in the assessment of parental CD at time 1, there were no differences among parents of those who did versus those who did not relapse. As it turns out, the parents of those patients who relapsed exhibited a dramatic increase in their CD over the course of the study. This investigation indicates that returning to a home with high CD will increase the likelihood of relapse. The results of an adoption study conducted in Finland illustrate the power of parental CD to influence schizophrenic outcomes in children. Children who were genetically at risk or predisposed to develop schizophrenia, were especially likely to develop the disorder when reared by an adoptive family that was high in CD. However, among the low-risk adoptees, there was no relationship between CD in the adoptive parents and thought disorders in children. These findings suggest that parental CD may be a family stressor that interacts with a preexisting diathesis to influence the development of schizophrenia. It is reasonable to wonder whether parental CD is a repose to schizophrenia in a child. Interaction with a person afflicted with schizophrenia may possibly bring about CD. However, the parental CD is not a consequence of living in a household with someone who has schizophrenia. In addition to distorted verbal behaviour, parental CD may be accompanied by problematic use of nonverbal behaviour. Parents who are high in CD also exhibit gaze aversion and rigidity in facial expression while interacting with their children. These are powerfully disconfirming behaviours. At the same time, they fit well with poor focus of attention that is the hallmark of CD. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20
When a high-CD parent “interacts” with a child, both verbal and nonverbal behaviour suggest that the parent’s thoughts and emotions are elsewhere, and that there is some tension between the parent and the child. Consequently, the child may be met with fragmented and disconfirming behaviour in both the verbal and nonverbal channels when interacting with the high-CD parent. It appears that parental CD functions as a type of stressor that affects the course and outcome of schizophrenia. When parents’ communication is particularly amorphous and peculiar, children may become confused and uncertain about even basic and fundamental social realities. This confusion undoubtedly has functional significance in the course of the schizophrenia, as it is so central in the constellation of symptoms that make up the disorder. It is difficult to read the transcripts and hear the speech of a high-CD parents, and not wonder about the parent’s own mental health, aside from that of the child. It is therefore understandable that when patients are discharged into the care of such parents, they offspring remain at risk for future relapse. Early investigations of family expressed emotion (EE) identified a pattern of criticism, overinvolvement, overprotectiveness, excessive attention, and emotional reactivity that appeared to create a vulnerability to relapse and poor social adjustment among patients with schizophrenia. EE represents an attitude of criticism and emotional overinvolvement on the part of the parent, which is expressed during an interview with a researcher or clinician. Originally a special interview procedure, known as the Camerwell Family Interview, was employed to assess family EE. The construct is operationalized through the frequency of critical remarks, degree of hostility, and the degree of emotional overinvolvement expressed by a family member during the interview. Generally, parents who express more than six criticisms during the interview are characterized as high in EE. EE is a combination of four behavioural characteristics: intrusiveness; anger and/or acute distress and anxiety; overt blame and criticism of the patient; and an intolerance of the patient’s symptoms. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20
One study revealed that patients who returned to a home with high-EE relatives exhibited a 9-month relapse rate of 51 percent, whereas only 13 percent of those who returned to a low-EE family relapsed. Family therapy programs that improve communication and problem solving, thus lowering EE, have been shown to lower relapse rates significantly. Recently discharged patients with schizophrenia who returned to either high-EE or low-EE families were examined. Patients from high-EE families exhibited more odd and disruptive behaviour during a family interaction approximately 6 weeks after hospital discharge than did patients from low-EE households. Relatives in the high EE households were more critical of the patients when they verbalized unusual thoughts than low-EE family members were. Studies such as these clearly paint a picture of a vicious circle in high-EE family relations: These parents respond to a patient with a lot of criticism, because patients from these households appear to exhibit more bizarre and disruptive behaviour than patients from low-EE homes. It is likely that the negative reactions they receive from their families contribute further to the potential for relapse among patients. A review of 25 studies on family EE indicated a 50 percent relapse rate, over a period of 9-12 months, among patients discharged to high-EE families, but only 21 percent among those with low-EE relatives. These findings indicate that the odds of relapse are increased by approximately 2.5:1 for patients discharged to high- versus low-EE relatives. Similar findings are evident in a recent meta-analysis of this literature, indicating an effect size of r =.30 for the association between family EE and relapse. Studies of family EE show that three factors are prominent in protecting a patient with schizophrenia from relapse. The first factor is low-EE in the relatives who live with the patient. For better or worse, most patients are discharged back to their families of origin. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20
When family members harbour critical and hostile attitudes toward a patient, the likelihood of relapse is high. On the other hand, low-EE, which may be indicative of greater tranquility, support, acceptance, can greatly reduce the probability of relapse. A second protective factor is low (id est, less than 35 hours per week) face-to-face contact with high-EE parents. Again, avoiding the agitating effect of high-EE family members appears to pay some dividends. The final protective factor identified is whether a patient is maintained on medication. Obviously, those who comply with medication regiments are at reduced risk for relapse. These authors argue that of the three factors, low-EE in the family is most important in reducing relapse within a year from discharge, as it appears to have a prophylactic effect regardless of compliance with medication. Family EE may function as a stressor that precipitates relapse among recovering patients with schizophrenia. The experience of a psychological problem as profound as schizophrenia can leave a recovering patient in a very fragile psychological and social state. Even though symptoms may be under control and in remission, the interpersonal disruption that is associated with this disorder may still be evident, leaving the patient in a precarious state of interpersonal behaviours, the patient may have minimal opportunity for seeking social support and validation from other sources. The end result of this state of affairs may be relapse into an episode of schizophrenia upon being pressed by EE from family members. There is reason to believe that parents who are particularly high in EE may have psychological problems of their own. Studies found that lifetime rates of major psychiatric disorders were 100 percent in high-EE parents of patients with schizophrenia, and only 44 percent in parents who scored low on measures of EE. Although this 44 percent lifetime prevalence rate for the low-EE parents may seem high, it considered normal when contrasted with other studies, suggesting that these parents as a group are no different from those in the general population. The amazingly high rate of psychiatric disorder in the high-EE parents raises the possibility that EE may be a marker of genetic transmission of mental illness. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20
Family EE is assumed to be a stressor that evokes psychiatric symptoms in a patient. Do patients find high-EE to be stressful? To explore the issue, patients with schizophrenia were asked to discuss happy and unhappy memories from their lives. Patients with high-EE parents recalled significantly fewer positive memories that involved their parents, compared to patients with low-EE parents. Overall, parents were featured in twice as many positive as negative memories. However, high-EE parents were featured in roughly equal proportions of positive and negative recollections. The study provides at least indirect evidence that high-EE parents are experienced as stressful by patients with schizophrenia. Research on family EE continues to flourish. In addition to being a useful and reliable predictor of relapse, EE may be fruitfully understood as a familial risk indicator for schizophrenia. High-EE parents are especially likely to have their own history of psychopathology. Thus parental EE may signal a possible genetic transmission of psychopathology. High-EE parents feel that their own psychological problems were overcome though internal efforts. Whether family EE is viewed as a predictor of relapse or a risk factor, one can interpret it within a diathesis-stress framework, in which this conflictual and hostile family attitude functions as a stressor on the patient. At the same time, however, it is important to bear in mind that EE may also reflect parents’ frustration and appraisal of the burden of dealing with their son or daughter with schizophrenia. Whereas EE reflects the content of communications, CD reflect the form of communication. As if to make a potentially disruptive family situation worse for patients with schizophrenia, families are that are high in CD also tend to be high in EE. Consequently, patients may be dealt a double dose of problematic interactional exchanges with their family members. It is little wonder that patients discharged to parents high in EE, who are also likely to express unclear, odd, and fragmented ideas, are at such a high risk for relapse. When the two variables were put side by side in the same investigation, family CD proved to be a more powerful predictor of schizophrenia outcomes (exempli gratia, number of relapses, time hospitalized, ratings of psychosocial functioning) then family EE. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20
Affective style (AS) is a measure of the verbal behaviour of family members during discussion of a conflict-laden issues with the patient present. Whereas EE is an attitude of hostility, criticism, and overinvolvement expressed by a family member during an interview in the absence of the patient, AS represent the family members’ actual verbal behaviours when interacting with the patient. It may be viewed as the behavioural manifestation of the attitude indexed by the expressed emotion construct, but this relationship has been difficult to establish empirically. Although AS and EE are close related and perhaps overlapping constructs, a distinct body of literature exists on AS, indicating that (like EE) it is often predictive of relapse among patients with schizophrenia. Measures of AS are typically taken from a series of brief family discussions about a current unresolved problem in the family. As might be expected, these conversations pull for substantial emotional expression. The conversations are then transcribed, and the family members’ speech content is coded for support, criticism, guilt induction, and intrusiveness. The unit of analysis for the coding is typically six lines of uninterrupted speech by a single speaker. The results of the coding are used to classify families into one of three profiles AS profiles: benign, intermediate, or poor. Benign-As families display a lack of negative behaviours (id est, personal criticism, guilt induction, and critical or neutral intrusiveness) during their interactions. Intermediate-As families are those who express some negative but some positive speech behaviours (id est, primary support) during the family discussion. Finally, poor-AS (also referred to as negative-AS) families are those in which one or both parents exhibit negative verbal behaviours, but no positive verbal behaviours. In one of the first AS studies, 65 families of high-risk, disturbed, but not psychotic adolescents participated in the family discussion. The adolescents were then assessed at a follow-up 5 years later. When a broad schizophrenia-spectrum diagnosis (exempli gratia, including schizoid personality disorder) was used as the outcome criterion, only 8 percent of adolescents with a benign-AS family profile at time 1 received a schizophrenia spectrum diagnosis at time 2. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20
Among those with an intermediate-AS family profile at time 1, 50 percent were diagnosed at time 2. This figure increased to 59 percent among those with a poor-AS family profile. Although it has been found that the best prediction of schizophrenia-spectrum disorders involved a combination of As and Cd, it is clear that family AS is a marker of risk for schizophrenia. In a longitudinal study of even longer duration, a group of moderately disturbed teens and their families were followed over a period of 15 years. The families participated in the typical conflict discussion. They were then classified as either negative- or benign-AS. Results for the study indicated that within those families classified as benign-AS, no cases of extended schizophrenia-spectrum disorder developed over the 15-year interval. However, almost all the schizophrenia-spectrum cases observed at time 2 occurred in the context of a family where one or both parents were high in EE and As. Like the studies on EE, the early studies on AS clearly supposed the hypothesis that family expression of criticism and hostility, in the absence of any supportiveness, indicates a risk for the development of schizophrenia-spectrum disorders among high-risk adolescents. These findings are consistent with early research showing that many psychiatric patients use mental hospitals as a refuge from stressful environments, in which they seek a carefree lifestyle. In addition to being a risk factor in the initial development of the disorder, AS may also predict relapse. In one investigation, patients with schizophrenia whose families had benign-AS profiles at the time of their discharge from the hospital evidenced a 40 percent rehospitalization rate over the next 12 months, whereas those who returned to negative-AS families had over twice the rate (83 percent) of rehospitalization. Even more striking are the findings for AS in concert with medication compliance: Patients with negative-AS families and noncompliance with medication exhibited a 100 percent rehospitalization rate, compared with only 17 percent among those with benign-As families and medication compliance. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20
Of further interest is the fact that researchers were tested for, and it was largely ruled out that the possibility that those patients from negative-As families were sicker in the first place and therefore more likely to relapse. This finding suggests that it is unlikely that family AS is merely a reaction to the severity of a child’s illness. Approximately 70 percent of those families characterized by excessive criticism and emotional overinvolvement at initial assessment remained that way over the course of the study, regardless of the patient’s clinical status. Furthermore, about 20 percent of the parents become more critical over the course of the study, despite the fact that the patients’ condition actually improved. For most families, AS reflects a relatively stable and enduring style of interaction, which is resistant to treatment and independent of the patients’ recovery status. The connection between family AS and rehospitalization could be the result of at least two different processes. The most straightforward hypothesis is that family AS is a stressor that pushes an already fragile individual “over the edge.” Experiencing a serious psychological problem can leave a recovering patient in a delicate psychological state, as noted earlier. The criticism and intrusiveness evident in a negative-AS household have the potential to strain the already sensitive patient to such an extent that the full disorder may redevelop. An alternative but related hypothesis is that family AS is a stressor that pushes the recovering patient out of the household and back into the hospital, in an effort to seek refuge from the family. Most people would find a negative-AS household to eb an aversive environment. It is understandable that almost anyone would want to get out of such an environment. For the patient with a learning history that involves being taken care of in a hospital, remission and readmission may be functional, in that it removes one from the stressful confines of the negative-As family origin. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20
Is negative AS specific to families of patients with schizophrenia? Several studies have been conducted to explore this issue, and these generally suggest that the problem is particularly exaggerated in such families. For example, when compared to parents of patients with bipolar disorder, the parents of patients with schizophrenia have been found to make more intrusive and critical statements toward the patients after discharge from the hospital. When compared to families of patients with anorexia nervosa, families of patients with schizophrenia were much more likely to have negative-As profiles. In this sample, only 1 of the 11 families of patients with anorexia nervosa had a negative-As profile. Family AS appears to have a relationship with both the onset and course of schizophrenia. At the same time, the variable has not been as widely embraces as CD or EE. This is due to problems with reliably rating AS. Consequently, the variable appears almost exclusively in research studies of the group at or from UCLA who originally developed the construct. Nevertheless, the available research findings indicate that it is a family interaction phenomenon with potential equal to CD or EE in explaining considerable variance in the course of schizophrenia. Modern conceptualizations of family interaction and schizophrenia fit well within a diathesis-stress framework. Some individuals may harbour a biological predisposition to develop schizophrenia. This predisposition is more formally known as the diathesis. It is unquestionably stressful to live with parents who communicate in odd and illogical ways, and who are unable to establish and maintain a shared focus of attention. It is equally stressful to live with parents who harbour as well as express attitudes of hostility, criticism, and overinvolvement. Sadly, many of these destructive and stressful family interaction patterns cooccur. The confusion and disorientation that parental CD produces, and the guilt, shame, and bewilderment about ego boundaries that parental EE and negative AS create, have the effect of combining flame and fuel among those with an existing predistortion toward schizophrenia and/or trigger relapse. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20
Current evidence indicates that one could question the mental health of any parent who exhibits excessive hostility, criticism, and emotional overinvolvement toward a child, along with an inability to establish and maintain a shared focus of attention in discussions that have a bizarre tone and structure. These family variables have an undeniable role in the course and in some cases onset of schizophrenia. It is not possible to fully understand and predict this disorder without at least some consideration of the family context in which a patient with schizophrenia was reared and into which one is discharged. The upsurge of interest in Eastern religion and Western cults is welcome, and may help a turn to the Good; but it has its negative side in a matching interest in Evil with a capital E. These evils, sufferings, and calamities exist for all, the good and the bad; such is the human lot. Whether in politics or in society, there is widespread double-talk, publicly upheld untruth, and differing views expressed. Many people have had their eyes opened to the depth and extent of the evil in humans, and they have become sad over it. Today nobody needs to become illumined in order to see the same thing. If some humans wish to withdraw from the World, disgusted with its repeated brutalities and malignances, need we wonder? Because the Universe is a manifestation of the Divine, it must be divinely guided. Therefore its history must be divinely controlled. What has happened in human World affairs so recently and so dramatically is not outside the divine will. What is happening today is just as much inside it. The degenerative process which replaces the universal-mindedness of Goethe by the fanatic narrowness of Goebbels, the calm wisdom of the earlier man by the obscene insanity of the later one, is a subject for reflection. The good and the evil in humans is such long-associated partners that cooperation of the good alone between humans is impossible. At some point of their contact, in some way, the reptilian evil will creep in and make its unpleasant discordant presence felt. Hence universal brotherhood is only a beautiful dream, to be shattered upon awakening to the ugly facts. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20
The lives of so many good humans in our time have moved inexorably to disaster, like the gloomy story of a Greek tragedy, that the helpless but friendly onlooker may well wonder where God is. A period so filled with confusion and so rife with evil, drives thoughtless people to more sensuality and materialism but thoughtful ones to more aspiration and higher values. O Lord Jesus, Your life was such a small stretch in human history, and even that was despised by Humankind. Despite what the history of the World has said and done, grant that I may imitate You in all respects. “The servant is not greater than the master, nor the student, the teacher.” That is how Your Matthew put it (10.24). We Devouts will be exercised in this life because there is where we will find our Salvation and True Sanctity. Outside of these applications of the spiritual life, whatever I read or hear about You will not give me the same pleasure as knowing You personally. “Truly I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and cast into the sea,’ and does not doubt in one’s heart, but believes that what one says is going to happen, it shall be granted to one. Therefore I say to you, all things for which you pray and ask, believe that you have received them, and they shall be granted you,” reports Mark 11.23-24. If you are in a touch situation today, now more than ever you need to guard what you say and now allow any negative, destructive words to come out of your mouth. Scripture says, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue; and you will eat the fruit thereof,” reports Proverbs 18.21. In other word, you create an environment for either good or evil with your words, and you are going to have to live in that World you have created. If you are always murmuring, complaining, and talking about how bad life is treating you, you are going to live in a pretty miserable, depressing World. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20
You will always be tempted to use words to describe negative situations, but God wants us to use our words to change our negative situations. Do not talk about the problem, talk about the solution. Receive the Cross from Jesus Christ’s very hand. Carry it as Jesus handed it over to you, carry it to the death. Truly the life of a good self-actualized is the Cross, and the Cross is the passage to Heaven. The Cross is an uphill trudge, and once begun, you cannot just stop and turn around and go downhill. Ah, my friends, let us make the trudge together—Jesus will be with us. It is because of Him we took up this cross, and it is because of Him we will preserve in the Way of the Cross. He will lead the way, and we will follow. If He falls, we will help. And the other way around. Look, there Jesus is. Our King enters before us. He will fight for us. Let us follow him virilely, and no one will fear the terrors. Let us be prepare to die bravely in war. “Let us not fear the terrors. Let us not bring disgrace on our glory,” as the First Maccabist would say (9.10), by fleeing from the Cross. “Let the weak say I am strong. Let the oppressed say I am free. Let the sick say I am healed. Let the poor say I am well off,” reports Joel 3.10. Started calling yourself healed, happy, whole, blessed, and prosperous. Stop talking to God about how big your mountains are, and start talking to your mountains about how extraordinary your God is. When you are facing obstacles in your path, you must boldly say, “Greater is He who is in me than one who is in the World,” reports 1 John 4.4. “No weapon formed against me is going to prosper,” reports Isaiah 54.17. God always causes His loved ones to triumph. Stop complaining about lack and limitation and start declaring, God supplies all of my needs in abundance. Stop complaining that nothing good ever happens to you and start declaring, “Everything I touch prospers and succeeds.” We must stop cursing the World. Let us start loving God’s creation. There is a miracle in your mouth. If you want to change your World, start today by changing your words. #RandolphHarris 14 of 20
Never pray your problem. If you pray the problem, it will get worse. If you pray the problem, you loose the ability of the enemy. Pray the problem and it will grow greater and your faith will flee away on the wings of doubt. Pray the thing you desire. Go to the Word of God and find out what God said about it. You will find that the Word says, “What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them,” reports Mark 11.24. So you would pray the desire: “Father, I desire my husband to be saved and filled with the Holy Spirit. I ask You to send labourers across his path to witness to him. As I am praying right now, I believe that I receive it in the name of Jesus Christ. I cast all my cares over onto You; and when I get up in the morning, I will not pray about it again. I will continue to thank you. Father, I want to speak words that are consistent with Your Word; may my words be filled continually with faith and hope, and may they create an environment in which You can do great and mighty things in and through my life.” Now you have returned God’s Words to Him, He will perform it. Now that may not happen overnight. This is where the force of patience is exercised. Learn to be silent to the Lord as is mentioned in Psalm 37, verse 7. Do not use vain repetitions. Do not pray the same prayer over and over (but if you are just learning to pray, do what you can, God hears all prayers). Do not be held in bondage. I am a farmer by trade and let us say that I have just planted a field of cotton. Now, if I went out and said the next morning, “Man, something is wrong. This cotton is not coming up. Let us plow it up and plant it again,” would it not be foolish? The next day the same thing happened. If I kept doing that, I could plant 365 days and still not produce any cotton. We need to become as smart in the spiritual realms as we are in the natural. That kind of farming practice will cause one to go bankrupt quick! Our prayers many times have held us in bondage, causing spiritual bankruptcy. No one would dare plant a garden and next morning dig it up. Well, Sarah Winchester might. He plants and flowers and trees were known to grow years overnight. However, for most of us, it takes time for these things to happen. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20
God has certain laws that He operates under. He had regulated Himself by His Word. God has the power to do anything. However, so many times He cannot use His power in our behalf because if He did, it would violate His Word. That is one thing God cannot do! He cannot violate His Word. If He did some of the things we ask, He would have to lie to do it. We have prayed beyond His ability to answer because of our violation of His rules concerning prayer. Jesus said, ‘What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them.” Some of you have been praying all the bad things, the problems. If God did what you really desire, then He would violate His Word. He said that you can have what you say when you pray, and you have said the problem in prayer over and over until all you are seeing and believing is the problem. Have you ever prayed, “Lord, it is not working out. It is not getting any better”? Well, I was praying that every prayer one morning and the Lord spoke something into my spirit. If I heard it in my ears, it would not have been any louder. He said, “What are you doing?” I said, “Lord, I am praying.” He said, “No, you are not; you are complaining!” A lot of folks are complaining, thinking they are praying. They are telling God their problems. In Matthew, chapter 6, Jesus said that the Father already knows the problem. He already knows what you have need of before you ask Him. Then there is no need to pray the problem. What we need to do is zero in one the answer. Pray and speak the answer; cast the problem over on Him. The enemy has deceived the Christians into praying the problem. Did you know the more you pray the problem, the more you say the problem? The more you say the problem, the more you will believe in the problem. The problem will grow because you are keeping it always before you. It is just like fertilizing the problem. It will grow bigger and bigger. You tell others about it and they will say, “Yeah, you sure do have a problem.” They will agree with you, and then they will tell someone else. Finally, you will have fifty people agreeing that you have a problem. “Then you do have a problem! For Jesus said, ‘If two of you shall agree on Earth as touching anything, it shall be done,’” reports Matthew 18.19. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20
Now you can see the deception of the enemy. He has deceived us by twisting the Word of God around so we use it against ourselves. The adversary does not care how much you pray. One does not care how much you go to church. If one can distort the Word of God so that your prayers are ineffective, one has defeated you. Yes, you may make it to Heaven, but you may not do anything while you are here on Earth, except suffer, struggle along, and feel sorry for yourself. Many people get the idea that they are just suffering for Jesus; when, in fact, if they would just act on the Word of God and stand against the enemy, rebuking one in the name of Jesus, they could live in success. There is success in the name of Jesus Christ. “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the enemy, and one will flee from you,” reports James 4.7. The Helpless Christian is in the same yacht with the ret of humanity in having weaknesses. The only difference is that even when a trusting relationship with God has been established, the Helpless Christian still feels the fear of being overwhelmed by life. This person feels that one hardly has the right to exist, much less grow. The Helpless Christian is stuck on the weakness polarity. Out of a sense of fear, the Helpless Christian distorts a religious commitment by reaming infantile and dependent. This person’s fear takes one of two forms. First, one may see God as the Great Rescuer and so stay helpless and continually wait for God’s help. Or, second, one may feel so overwhelmed by God because one is so big and by contrast one is so small that there is nothing else to do except sit shaking one’s boots in one’s presence. Either way, fear blocks growth. This person is unconsciously relating to God in the same manipulative ways that one has learned to relate to others. The helpless person has never learned to stand on one’s own feet. The body structure often reflects this in that the upper torso is often somewhat caved in, making the person appear fragile. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20
The Helpless Christian may experience a very nice payoff for infantile and dependent behaviour. There are many people who would like nothing better than to constantly rescue and take care of such a needy person. So the individual secretly enjoys the big fuss made over one’s difficulties, needs, and problems. If one dummies up, and does not learn to think for oneself, then others can be tricked into doing all the thinking. If one never has enough faith for anything, then other can be made to do the praying. If one is not willing to face life and learn to cope with it, the others can be hooked into giving advice, making decisions, and taking all the responsibility that should rightfully be one’s own. So the Helpless Christian says, “I cannot do it; I give up.” And the rescuers says, “That is all right; we will do it for you. Since getting in touch with one’s own strength and adequacy will mean accepting new responsibility, the Helpless Christian may prefer to continue seducing others into doing the thinking, feeling, and acting. Of course, one unknowingly pays the terrible price of remaining a psychological and spiritual infant throughout life. The other factor that may exert an unconscious influence on the attitudes and behaviour of the helpless person may be early traumatic experiences with family or peers. It is highly probable that the person has felt overwhelmed, humiliated, or severely taken advantage of while growing up. Therefore, one no longer trusts anyone. One does not even trust oneself, because there is a residual feeling of terror and helplessness about not being able to cope with life on one’s own. When people carry residual feelings of shame and embarrassment, as well as patterns of promiscuity into their adult Christian life, they may never experience an emotional reliable relationship, and it will be extremely difficult to understand others. That will make one an all too easy mark for predators. One must decide to face one’s life, and this will allow for the experience of new hope and lead to the discovery of a deep desire to amount to something. One will then take an active interest in determining how things will turn out for oneself, and be surprised that one’s choices can make such a big difference. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20
This enlightenment will allow an individual to build friendships with humans that are genuine and supportive and allow one the dignity of being oneself. One will take an active interest in one’s careers, education, and hobbies and this disciplining time and energy will allow one to reach long term goals of vocational excellence. Then one day one will feel, “I am really loved. God loves me. And I can tell that some of my friends love me. And I am starting to love myself!” It may not be easy, but one can make real progress in climbing out of the rut of helplessness and apathy. At the manipulative level, the helpless Christian uses tactics of withdrawal and avoidance in order to escape the demands of responsible growth and self-direction. At the character level, some people may find themselves cold, aloof, and emotionally detached from others. In psychological terms, we souls say that the person is developing a schizoid character. In lay terms, we could say that the person is becoming lifeless and devoid of feeling. Having at some point felt a denial of the right to a fulfilling life, one is now determined never to again feel the pain of betrayal. Thus one psychologically locks oneself into solitary confinement and becomes numb to life, avoiding relationships and taking comfort in a hermit-like life where there is no emotional energy invested in another living thing except a dog or a cat. The passion, the interest or excitement with life, and the vision for fulfillment of one’s destiny are all gone. Encountering such an individual, one wonders if there is a person at all inside the stiff, fortified body. At the psychotic stage, helpless people melt silently into schizophrenia or an ultimate kind of “shut-offness” from the World. Not having learned how to live in the real World, they create a World of their own. Going further, they regress to an earlier, totally dependent form of infantile behaviour, relying on forces outside themselves for even the most simple bodily needs. This is both an alarming and depressing picture. Yet it is happening in people’s lives. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20
If you find some of these tendencies unfolding in your own life, we urge you to begin reversing the pattern. The material throughout this report, coupled with your own desire and prayer, ought to provide you with many good options for growing out of the rut of being a Helpless Christian. If you feel that pressures in your own personality make it impossible to grow or change in healthy directions, then it would be wise for you to prayerfully seek a relationship with a competent professional counselor or therapist. Many people nowadays are benefiting from several weeks or months of individual group counseling or therapy with a qualified professional. Mother, Father, God, Universal Power, please remind us daily of the sanctity of all life. Please touch our hearts with the glorious oneness of all creation, as we strive to respect all the living beings on this planet. Please penetrate our souls with the beauty of this Earth, as we attune ourselves to the rhythm and flow of the seasons. Please awaken our minds with the knowledge to achieve a World in perfect harmony and please grants us the wisdom to realize that we can have Heaven on Earth. O Lord, open the Heavens and please pour down your rain. Yes, Lord, please refresh us, and pour down your spirit. Pour water on the thirsty land, and stream on the dry ground; pour your spirit upon our offspring, and your blessings on our descendants. Your Heavens above, rain down your righteousness; let the clouds show it down. Let the Earth open wide, let salvation spring up, let righteousness flourish with it; as You, the Lord, have created it. Please, loving God, bring us rain to renew the ground, to replenish our dams, to bring some chance of feed, to bring the possibility of some reward to those who have toiled so hard. We turn to you in faith and hope and love. With permission of Him who is exalted above all blessing and adoration, revered above all hymns of praise, wise in heart and might in strength and power, sovereign of the World and Lord of all creation, and with permission of all the righteous ones of this congregation, gathered here this day to rejoice in the Torah, and assembled to complete, then reverently to begin again in joy to read the Torah, stand forth, stand forth, stand forth, Hatan Bereshit. Inasmuch as you are chosen to be the first to perform so perfect a command, how great is your privilege, exceedingly great your reward! #RandolphHarris 20 of 20
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Liberty Can Be Acquired, but it Can Never be Recovered!
If you could trace out the intricate ramification of the effects of all your actions, you would find that the good ones were eventually shadowed by evil, and the evil ones brightened by good. This idea may seem strange when first heard of, and may require some analysis to make it seem plausible. However, if you ponder on it, you will begin to understand why modern European thinkers like Schopenhauer and Spengler and modern thinkers reject the belief that the World’s evil is growing less as much as they reject the assertion that it is growing more. If we compare the general moral level of different centuries, some sort of balance between the good and evil can be seen. If we are to look for any striking advance in the good, we shall have to look for it not in the masses but in single individuals who are seeking and nearing the Overself. This is because our planet is like a class at school where the average standard remains not too widely different. The progress and deterioration which appear at times do not alter this fact, since they appear within these maximum and minimum levels and shifts about from one part of the planet to another. There is no room here for undue optimism but neither is there any for undue pessimism. The savage of low degree may be taught the tricks of science until one shoot from atomic artillery instead of from stringed bows, but one still remains a savage. Recent history has shown this plainly and revealed civilization as a fact in technics only and as a myth in morals. Coming events cast their good or evil configuration beforehand upon calm, sensitive souls. That the unseen hand of destiny is unfolding the vivid scenes of a unique drama is evident of them. That the contemporary currents of World-throbbing happenings are but presages indicating that a radical shift-over in human existence is upon us is also clear to them. In geological history, earthquakes are a means adopted by Nature to restore a disturbed equilibrium. In human history, wartime World-upheaval is both karma’s way of attaining equilibrium in an unbalanced society and evolution’s way of making another spurt forward. #RandolphHarris 1 of 18
The opposition has its role to play in this World-crisis. Even while obeying its own evil nature, it is frightening half of humankind with its menaces and undermining their confidence in keeping alive for a reasonable period. These are the forces which foment hatred and disrupt society, which deny truth and garble fact. We are victims of a civilization which does not know where it is going, trivial in purpose and corruption in character. Strife or hate, dissension or violence rears its fearsome face in every quarter of the globe, like some hydra-headed dinosauric monster. We dwell in chaos and violence, in a World that knows no peace without and feels none within. The lunacy which has poured into the political demagogues and their followings, the pseudo-artists and their audience, has spread into the religio-mystics and their believers. The evil which is present in the World may show a new, exaggerated, and deceitful form but in itself is no new thing. On the contrary, it is an ancient thing. Plato predicted that if one of the gods came to this Earth, he would not be allowed to live. His ethical ideals would be rejected in practice. His physical presence would be removed in murder. The universal despair which has crept the World—a World which has watched the savings of many years dwindle or disappear within a year or two, which has found its jobs become daily less secure—induces people to draw a slender comfort from that hope which is supposed to spring eternal in the human breast. The hope formulates in the possibility of hearing that Fortune’s wheel will now turn for them. Perchance the facts will relent tomorrow, relentless though they have been in the past. The old stand-bys such as religion and a good bank-balance are going or have already gone. If, in their anxiety, they summon planetary support to allay their fears can one blame them? We are struggling into a finer epoch. However, because we are and have been struggling blindly, the course of events has and had to get worse before getting better. #RandolphHarris 2 of 18
From one point of view, the atomic bomb has created wholly new problems. From another point of view, it has only pushed to the front for urgent dealing quite old ones. Both are correct. The second World war now belongs to the past. Yet nobody feels that peace has come, everybody fears what the future might bring. None of us is living happily ever after. Evil humans and dangerous forces thrive today as they did in the past. It is the danger and tragedy of our generation that just at the time when humans’ power to injure one’s fellows has reached its peak, the religious checks and controls of hurtful propensities have fallen to their lowest influences. Internal disquiet and external disorder characterize our times. Inside oneself, the Good, the True, and the Beautiful may seem to be the governing forces; but outside oneself, in the World of toiling and fighting humans, the Bad, the False, and the Ugly may seem dominant. Humankind has proved itself unworthy to handle powers of atomic destructiveness and unable to manage its affairs without stupidity or its relations without evil-doing. Life today is filled with too many cares or uncertainties for anyone in any part of the World to enjoy complete happiness. Although our practical duty involves resistance to evil, it should be clear that such resistance is itself an evil, but it is the lesser of two evils and a necessary result of the imperfect side of human nature today. It plays the same part in each individual’s life that a law enforcement agent plays in the social life. The presence of the law enforcement agent is an indication of the presence of the criminal. With the development of human character, criminal tendencies would disappear and with them police forces. However, we cannot anticipate that time so far as the immediate present is concerned, although we ought to deal with the crime in the most enlightened way possible. The malevolent energies and destructive forces which have been abroad in our time tell us how strong is the evil that lies mixed with the good in humanity’s heart. #RandolphHarris 3 of 18
One need not have a low opinion of the human race to conclude that there is sufficient evil in it—whether petty or serious—to make a sloppy sentimental idealization of character just silly and perilous. Schizophrenia is a formal thought disorder (actually a family of disorders) characterized by symptoms such as bizarre delusions, hallucinations, disorganized speech, grossly disorganized or catatonic behaviour, inability to initiate and persist in goal-directed activity, affective flattening, and impoverished and disorganized thinking evident in speech and language behaviour. These symptoms are grouped into two classes: positive (an excess or distortion of normal functions) and negative (loss of normal functions). Such symptoms must be present for at least a month, but in some cases may persist for years. An important diagnostic criterion of schizophrenia is social/occupational dysfunction. Consequently, it is virtually true by definition that people afflicted with schizophrenia experience problems in their interpersonal relationships. Unlike many other mental disorders considered in this report, schizophrenia is a relatively rare disorder. The lifetime prevalence of schizophrenia is estimated at approximately 1 percent. African Americans are often misdiagnosed with schizophrenia. Physicians tend to overemphasize psychotic symptoms and underemphasize symptoms of depression, compared to other racial-ethic groups. African Americans are three times as likely to be diagnosed as schizophrenic. Although it is rare, schizophrenia is characterized as probably the “most terrible” mental disorder. Relapse rates in schizophrenia are alarmingly high, and, are undoubtedly influenced by interpersonal interactions. In the area of general personal relationships, it is clear that people with schizophrenia experience interpersonal rejection and conflict, and have impoverished social networks. The interpersonal rejection these people encounter is linked with their difficulties in the interpersonal communication domain: They exhibit sever deficits in social skills, involving both the encoding and decoding of social information. #RandolphHarris 4 of 18
Given the magnitude of their problems in all three of the other domains, it is not surprising that patients with schizophrenia are very unlikely to form stable romantic relationships or marry; for this reason, family-of-orientation experiences are not considered in this report. There is a high degree of comorbidity between schizophrenia and other psychosocial problems, such as depression, anxiety, and substance use disorders. Schizophrenia, like most other forms of deviant behaviour and psychopathology, is manifested in interaction. In schizophrenia, the individual develops their own symbolism, and schizophrenics develop their own referents for conventional symbols. According to this position, communication has multiple levels of meaning; these include not only a literal content, but metamessage at a higher level that provides information about the interpretation of the message content and/or relationship between the sender and receiver. A person with schizophrenia was presumed to be the net result of prolonged exposure to dysfunctional families. Schizophrenic communication prevents others from understanding the self, and thus avoids potentially aversive responses from senders (often parents) of communication. Another attribute of schizophrenia is mystification. Mystified communication involves ambiguities, misunderstandings, and misidentifications of issues and topics. Mystification is evident in a process whereby a person responds to the other in terms of one’s own needs, but at the same time behaves as if one is really responding to the needs of the other. For example, an aging mother may respond to her son’s nutritional needs by giving him a lot of calcium-rich foods, when in fact it is the mother who is in need of additional calcium in her diet. Such parent—child interactions were thought to have teleological significance in the development of dysfunctionally symbolic relationships that ultimately produce symptoms of the disorder. #RandolphHarris 5 of 18
During the first few years of a child’s life, the members of a family develop an internalized system for interacting and relating to each other. A person who is labeled as “schizophrenic” is caught in a maze of confusion, misunderstanding, and contradictions. These mystifications reach back several generations in the family. Consequently, current family mystification may be induced by prior generations and/or a response to such family histories. Schizophrenia is marked by delusions, hallucinations, apathy, thinking abnormalities, and “split” between thought and emotion. In schizophrenia, emotions may become blunted or very inappropriate. For example, if a person with schizophrenia is told one’s father just died, one might smile, or giggle, or show no emotion at all. Schizophrenic delusions may include the idea that the person’s thoughts are being controlled, that thoughts are being broadcast (so that others can hear them), that thoughts have been “inserted” into a person’s mind, or that thoughts have been removed. In addition, schizophrenia involves withdrawal from contact with others, a loss of interests in external activities, a breakdown of personal habits, and an inability to deal with daily events. There are different types of schizophrenia. It has four major subtypes. Disorganized type: schizophrenia marked by incoherence, grossly disorganized behaviour, bizarre thinking, flat or grossly inappropriate emotions. Catatonic type: schizophrenia marked by stupor, rigidity, unresponsiveness, posturing, mutism, and, sometimes, agitated, purposeless behaviour. Paranoid type: schizophrenia marked by a preoccupation with delusions or by frequent auditory hallucinations related to a single theme, especially grandeur or persecution. Undifferentiated type: schizophrenia in which there are prominent psychotic symptoms, but none the specific features of catatonic, disorganized, or paranoid types. #RandolphHarris 6 of 18
An increased risk of developing schizophrenia may begin at birth or even before. Women who are exposed to the influenza (flu) virus or to rubella during the middle of pregnancy have children who are more likely to become schizophrenic. Malnutrition during pregnancy and complications at the time of birth can have a similar impact. Possibly, such events disturb brain development, leaving people more vulnerable to a psychotic break with reality. Early psychological trauma (a psychological injury or shock) may also add to the risk. Often, the victims of schizophrenia were exposed to violence, sexual abuse, death, divorce, separation, or other stresses in childhood. Living in a troubled family is a risk factor. In a disturbed family environment, stressful relationships, communication patterns, and negative emotions prevail. Deviant communication patterns cause anxiety, confusion, anger, conflict, and turmoil. Typically, disturbed families interact in ways that are laden with guilt, prying, criticism, negativity, and emotional attacks. Although they are attractive, environmental explanations alone are not enough to account for schizophrenia. For example, when the children of schizophrenic parents are raised away from their chaotic home environment, they are still more likely to become psychotic. Evidence has grown stronger in recent years that heredity is a factor in schizophrenia. It now appears that some individuals inherit a potential for developing schizophrenia. They are in other words, more vulnerable to this disorder than other are. How could someone inherit a susceptibility to schizophrenia? Amphetamine, LSD, and similar drugs produce effects that partially mimic the symptoms of schizophrenia. Facts such as these suggest that biochemical abnormalities (disturbances in brain chemicals or neurotransmitters) may occur in schizophrenic people. It is possible that the schizophrenic brain produces some substance similar to a psychedelic (mind-altering) drug. People with schizophrenia are on a journey back to the void, detaching themselves from reality in order to preserve their essential being, with the ultimate goal of breaking through to a higher consciousness or enlightenment. #RandolphHarris 7 of 18
The idea of a journey back to the past is usually related to prenatal intrauterine trauma. Some advocate “rebirthing” therapy, complete with dance and rhythmic drumming as a treatment for such ailments. Tragically, in April 2000 in the state of Colorado, a 10-year-old girl was smothered to death during a rebirthing therapy session. The critical characteristic of schizophrenia lies in the aberrant symbolic processes—in the distortion of perception, meaning, and logic. The family is the dominant force that shapes these distortions in perception and meaning. These were thought to result from blurred boundaries (id est, parents’ behaving inappropriately for their gender and age). A family affected by schizophrenia handles attention and meaning by communicating in ways that are odd, blurred, fragmented, and poorly integrated. In this way everyone can divert and diffuse threats to the harmonious identity of the family by being ambiguous and unclear. However, this style of interaction is presumed to come at the price of the child’s healthy self-identity and psychological development. This is why family therapy is recommended for children who are acting out. It gives the doctor time to treat communication deviance, which may also be part of the problems and why a child may be displaying symptoms of mental illness. “When a human’s ways are pleasing to the LORD, He makes even one’s enemies to be at peace with one,” reports Proverbs 16.7. If you will trust in God, He will fight your battles for you. It does not matter what you are going through, or how big your opponents are. Keep an attitude of faith. Stay calm. Stay at peace. Stay in an optimistic frame of mind. And do not try to do it all your own way. Let God do it His way. If you will simply obey His commands, He will change things in your Favour. You may be going through great difficulties, and you are tempted to think, “I am never going to get out of this. This is never going to change. I am never going to win in this situation.” #RandolphHarris 8 of 18
However, the Bible says, “Do not get weary and faint in your mind,” reports Hebrews 12.3. Remember, you must first win the battle in your mind. Stand strong. When negative thoughts come, reject them and replace them with God’s thoughts. When you are in that attitude of faith, you are opening the door for God to work in your situation. You may not see anything happening with your natural eyes, but do not let that discourage you. In the unseen realm, in the spiritual World, God is at work. He is changing things in your favour. And if you will do your part and keep believing, in due season, at the right time, God will bring you out with the victory. Desire nothing outside of God’s walls and it will give you peace inside the walls. Make the external surrender, and you will be invited to join God. In addition to what God already knows, God wants to us how to say no to ourselves once and for all. Do not interrupt God, do not contradict Him, and above all, do not whine! “Follow Me,” that is what God said to Matthew, and that is what he recorded in his Gospel (9.9); indeed, that is what he did. “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” God said that also, and His Joh noted down what He said (14.6). Without the way, there is no going. Without the truth, there is no knowing. Without life, there is no living, that is to say, no life at all. The key is to choose the right thoughts, to keep your mind set. Not just when you feel good, not just when things are going your way, not just when you do not have any problems, but even in the tough times of life—especially in the difficult times—you must keep your mind set on the good things of God. Stay full of faith. Stay full of joy. Stay full of hope. Make a conscious decision that you are going to stay in an optimistic frame of mind. Some people take one step forward and then two steps backward. They are happy and in a good attitude one day, then the next day they are negative and depressed. They make a little progress, then they back up. Because of their vacillating faith, they never really get to the place God wants them to be. They never experience the success God has in store for you. #RandolphHarris 9 of 18
My dear friend, you must be consistent. You attitude should be: I refuse to go backward. I am going forward with God. I am going to be the person He wants me to be. I am going to fulfill my destiny. If you will maintain that mind-set, God will continually work in your life. He will fight your battles for you. He will give you peace in the midst of a storm, and He will help you live that life of victory He has in store for you. God is the Way you ought to follow, the Truth you ought to believe, the Life you ought to hope for, God is Way Inviolable, Truth Infallible, Life Interminable. God is the straightest road, the supremist truth, the truest life, the blessed life, the uncreated life, actually. If you stay on in God’s life, you will learn about Truth, and Verity will set you free; that is what God said to the Jewish people who believed in Him; and that is as John recorded it (8.32). At last you will get the handle on Eternal Life. Tough talk for the not-so-tough! “If you want to enter the Eternal Life, keep the commandments,” reports Matthew 19.17. If you want to learn the truth, believe in God. If you want to possess the holiness of the next life, then say no to the Worldliness of the present life. If you want to rejoice in the next World, then “humble yourself in this World,” reports Matthew 23.12. If you want to reign with God, then carry the cross with God. Only those who get on with the carrying will find the beatudinous way, the True Light. Thank You, Father that I am not alone in this life. You are with me, no matter what challenge I am facing today, and You help me to take that next step of obedience. Today, I will trust You to fight my battles as I move forward in my life. “When you pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heath do,” reports Matthew 6.7. Remember that we are talking about the prayer of petition. Some says, “What about Jesus? He prayed the same prayer three times in the Garden.” That was the prayer of dedication –“Not My will, Lord, but thine be done.” #RandolphHarris 10 of 18
You can pray the prayer of dedication over and over, but when it comes to a petition, be specific and rest in the Word of God. Remember the 400 prophets of Baal. Elijah said, “You offer your sacrifice and the god that answers by fire, He will be God.” So they cried, begged and pleaded and Elijah said, “Why do you not cry a little louder; maybe he is asleep.” They began to cry louder and even cut themselves. These are the heathen that Jesus was talking about when He said, Use not vain repetitions as the heathen do. They just kept praying about the same thing. They prayed from morning on up into the evening to avail. Then Elijah had twelve barrels of water poured on his sacrifice and prayed a short prayer just once and down came the fire. It is not the length of the prayer that moves God. Nor will you be heard for your “much speaking.” God answers prayers on the legal ground of the new covenant. We have authority to use the name of Jesus. We have a covenant with the Father through Jesus. Jesus has sealed it with His blood and God will honour the name of Jesus. That name is above every name. I remember being in a service one night in a certain church and a lady stood up and said, “I want you all to pray for my husband, he is getting worse. He will not go to church and I have been praying for him every day for 25 years. He just keeps getting meaner.” The Spirit of God spoke up on the side of me and said, “She has been holding fast to the problem all these years. If she had prayed in faith, she would not have prayed all those other 24 years. She would have praised Me and thanked Me that My power was working in his behalf and her husband would have been saved many years ago. However, she had bound Me from the situation by the word of her mouth. Now there is no doubt in my mind that, every time she prayed for her husband, she said, “My husband is getting meaner. He is not getting any better. He will not go to church with me.” And the Word teaches that you shall have what you say. (Mark 11.23.) Now you can see the mistake she made. #RandolphHarris 11 of 18
Jesus said, Whatsoever things ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them. She did not desire for her husband to get meaner. She did not desire for him to stay at home. Why was she praying that way? She was deceived by Satan and held in bondage by the words of her own mouth. In fact, she was holding her husband in bondage by the words of her own mouth. In fact, she was holding her husband in bondage also. She had taken him out of God’s hands and He could not work on her behalf because in prayer she was saying the things she did not desire. She was holding fast to the problem. Never pray your problem. If you pray the problem, you loose the ability of the enemy. Pray the problem and it will grow greater and your faith will flee away on the wings of doubt. When the genuine strength of the actualizing Christian becomes distorted into manipulative pattern, it is expressed as inflexible striving and achieving. This is what we have talked about in the past. When it deteriorates even further, to the character level, the person develops a rigid personality. The rigid personality strives to appear strong, competent, and capable at all times, and becomes a workaholic. As if this were not enough, this person continually dictates to others how they too ought to work themselves to death, judging them for being less dedicated than he or she is. Therefore, such an individual becomes more and more isolated from friends and colleagues, and tramples on other people’s feelings without the slightest awareness of what had been done. Having lost sensitivity to the gentle promptings of the Holy Spirit, the rigid person may set out to accomplish very worth goals but int the process, do much damage and destruction because of this steamroller approach to life. Since this person is afraid to feel the fears, anxieties, and weaknesses that are part of everyone’s existence, an almost frantic preoccupation with busyness eats up the time and energy that could go into prayer, meditation, and quiet recollection that would enable one to discern once again the still small voice of the Lord. #RandolphHarris 12 of 18
The rigidly striving Christian has never learned that the grace of God enables one to share openly and honestly one’s deepest fears, doubts, and inadequacies. Perhaps only through the ultimate outcome of this lifestyle—heart attack, ulcers, or nervous breakdown—will one finally admit and humbly accept one’s limitations. Perhaps only then will one know that the love of God does not depend on any project one could ever accomplish. Perhaps then one can be delivered from the do-get-go syndrome, which like a giant leech, has sucked the life energies out of many a well-intentioned Christian. As the Striving Christian approaches the psychotic stage, the behaviour becomes characterized as manic, or extremely excitable. One is obsessed with unrealistic feelings of elation and an exaggerated sense of power. A frenzied compulsion for constant activity develops, and all sense of rhythm and Spirit-led direction in life is lost. There is no time for rest, recreation, or renewal. There is only a blinding blur of busyness in the striving to maintain the illusion of strength that has dominated this life. Our culture actually encourages the Striving Christian in this self-destructive pace. One may be given a plaque for the most sales, a raise in salary for getting so much work done, or a banquet at which selfless efforts for the corporation or church are extolled. However, in the end, the striver will suffer an early death and a disrupted family life. We must recognize how far such a lifestyle departs from the truly biblical principle of resting and trusting in the Lord for everything that concerns our day-to-day living. As the Psalmist says: “Trust in the Lord, and do good; so you will dwell in the land, and enjoy security. Take delight in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord’ trust in him, and he will act. Be still before the Lord, and wait patiently for Him,” reports Psalm 37.3-5 and 7. Should you find yourself described in this section, be aware that there are ways for getting out of the striving lifestyle. Probably the most effective ways are to experience genuine love through your prayer life with God, or through your relationship with others. There is no doubt that you will have to reevaluate your priorities in life. Yet this can pave the way for some exciting discoveries. #RandolphHarris 13 of 18
Another good direction is to begin sharing some of your weaknesses and fears with friends, spouse, or family. Of course, this means risking what other people might think of you. However, it also means that you are fed up with giving them a false impression and that you are now ready to disclose more of your real feelings, values, and desires. As you become more “human”—that is, balanced in experiencing both strength and weakness, both confidence and vulnerability—chances are that people will see you as more down-to-earth and approachable. Then you can know that the relationships you develop with others are real and genuine. We invite you also to open your deepest self to God, since He knows everything about you and loves you perfectly! Learn to love Him back, not for what you might get from Him, but just because He is so precious and lovable. Just as an architect, before putting up a large building, surveys and tests the ground to see if it can bear the weight, the wise teacher does not begin by laying down laws that are good in themselves. Rather, one first examines whether the people for whom they are destined are fitted to bear them. For this reason, Plato refused to give laws to the Arcadians and to the Cyrenians, knowing that these two peoples were rich and could not abide equality. For this reason, one finds good laws and evil humans in Crete, because Minos had disciplined nothing but a vice-ridden people. A thousand nations have achieved brilliant Earthly success that could have abided good laws; and even those that could have would have been able to have done so for a very short period of their entire existence. Peoples, like men, are docile only in their youth. As they grow older they become incorrigible. Once customs are established and prejudices have become deeply rooted, it is a dangerous and vain undertaking to want to reform them. The people cannot abide having even their evils touched in order to eliminate them, just like those stupid and cowardly patients who quiver at the sight of a physician. #RandolphHarris 14 of 18
This is not to say that, just as certain maladies unhinge humans’ minds and remove from them the memory of the past, one does not likewise sometimes find in the period during which states have existed violent epochs when revolutions do to peoples what certain crises do to individuals, when the horror of the past takes the place of forgetfulness, and when the state, set afire by civil wars, is reborn, as it were, from its ashes and takes on again the vigour of youth as it escapes death’s embrace. Such was Sparta at the time of Lycurgus; such was Rome after the Tarquins; and such in our time have been Holland and Switzerland after the expulsion of the tyrants. However, these events are rare. They are exceptions whose cause is always to be found in the particular constitution of the states in question. They cannot take place even twice to the same people, for it can make itself free so long as it is merely barbarous; but it can no longer do so when civil strength is exhausted. At that point troubles can destroy it with revolutions being unable to reestablish it. And as soon as its chains are broken, it falls apart and exists no longer. Henceforward a master is needed, not a liberator. Free peoples, remember this axiom: Liberty can be acquired, but it can never be recovered. For nations, as for humans, there is a time of maturity that must be awaited before subjecting them to the laws. Youth is not childhood. For nations, as for humans, maturity must be awaited. However, the maturity of a people is not always easily recognized; and if it is foreseen, the work is ruined. One people lends itself to discipline at its inception; another not even after ten centuries. The Russians will never be truly civilized, since they have been civilized too early. Peter had a genius for imitation. He did not have true genius, the kind that creates and makes everything out of nothing. Some of his things he did were good; most of them were out of place. He saw that his people was barbarous; he did not see that it was not ready for civilization. #RandolphHarris 15 of 18
Peter wanted to civilize it when all it needed was toughening. First he wanted to make Germans and Englishmen, when he should have made Russians. He prevented his subjects from ever becoming what they could have been by persuading them that they were something they are not. This is exactly how a French tutor trains his pupil to shine for a short time in his childhood, and afterwards never to amount to a thing. The Russian Empire would like to subjugate Europe and will itself be subjugated. The Tartars, its subjects or its neighbours, will become its masters and ours. This revolution appears inevitable to me. All the kings of Europe are working in concert to hasten its occurrence. During the First Wave most people consumed what they themselves produced. They were neither producers nor consumers in the usual sense. They were instead what might be called “prosumers.” It was the industrial revolution, driving a wedge into society, that separated these two functions, thereby giving birth to what we now call producers and consumers. This split led to the rapid spread of the market or exchange network—that maze of channels through which goods or services, produces by you, reach me and vice versa. With the Second Wave, we went from an agricultural society based on “production for use”—an economy of prosumers, as it were—to an industrial society based on “production for exchange.” The actual situation was more complicated, however. For just as a small amount of production for exchange—id est, for the market—existed during the First Wave, there continued to be a small amount of production for self-use during the Second. A more revealing way of thinking about the economy, therefore, is to think of it as having two sectors. Sector A comprise all that unpaid work done directly by people for themselves, their families, or their communities. Sector B comprises all the production of goods or services for sale or swap through the exchange network on market. #RandolphHarris 16 of 18
Seen this way, we can now say that during the First Wave, Sector A—based production for use—was enormous, while Sector B was minimal. During the Second Wave the reverse was true. In fact, the production of goods and services for the market mushroomed to such an extent that Second Wave economists virtually forgot the existence of Sector A. the very word “economy” was defined to exclude all forms of work or production not intended for the market, and the prosumer became invisible. This meant, for example, that all the unpaid work done by women (and some men) in the homes, all the cleaning, scrubbing, child-rearing, the community organizing, was contemptuously dismissed as “non-economic,” even though Sector B—the visible economy—could not have existed without the goods and services produced in Sector A—the invisible economy. If no one were at home minding the children there would be no next generation of paid workers for Sector B, and the system would fall of its own weight. Can anyone imagine a functional economy, let alone a highly productive one, without workers who, as children, have been toilet trained, taught to speak, and socialized into the culture? What would happen to the productivity of Sector B if the workers flowing into it lacked even these minimal skills? Though ignored by Second Wave economists, the fact is that the productivity of each sector depends heavily on the other. Today, as Second Wave societies suffer their terminal crisis, politicians and experts still bandy about economic statistics based entirely on Sector B transactions. They worry about declining “growth” and “productivity.” Yet so long as they continue to think in Second Wave categories, so long as they ignore Sector A and regard it as outside the economy—and so long as the prosumer remains invisible—they will never be able to manage our economic affairs. #RandolphHarris 17 of 18
For if we look closely we find the beginnings of a fundamental shift in the relationship of these two sectors or forms of production to one another. We see a progressive blurring of the time that separates producer from consumer. We see the rising significance of the prosumer. And beyond that, we see an awesome change looming that will transform even the role of the market itself in our lives and in the World system. All this takes us back to the millions of people who are beginning to perform for themselves services hitherto performed for them by some doctors. For what these people are really doing is shifting some production from Sector B to Sector A, from the visible economy that the economists monitor to the phantom economy they have forgotten. They are “presuming.” And they are not alone. This is what I want to happen: that our Earth mother may be clothes in ground corn four times over; that frost flowers cover her over entirely; that the mountain pines far away over there may stand close to each other in the cold; that the weight of now crack some branches! In order that the country may be this way, I have made my prayer sticks into something alive. May the Earth continue to live. May the Heavens above continue to live. May the rains continue to dampen the land. May the wet forests continue to grow, then the flowers shall bloom, and the people shall live again. With permission of God, great, mighty and revered, I will raise my voice in psalm and song to thank Him and to praise Him who dwelleth high in light, that He hath kept us in life and preserved us in His unfailing love, and hath brought us near to be joyful in the Rejoicing of the Torah, the Torah that gladdens that heart and enlightens the eyes, prolonging the days and adding strength unto all those who love the Torah and heed its precepts and admonitions. Thus may it be acceptable before the Almighty to grant life and grace, and to crown with virtue, who has been chosen to complete the reading of the Torah. Stand forth, stand forth, Hatan Hatorah. By the merit of this deed, may you be deemed worth by the God we revere, to behold children and children’s children delighting in the Torah. O Mighty God, Your fingerprints are scattered across all of creation. Through each thing You have created, You show Your glory. Your caring and gentle nature are on display for all to see and experience. You open the heavens and bring the waters down from above. Lord, this very day we ask that You open the flood gates. Bring down nourishing rains, that the land may be quenched and bring forth much fruit. Amen.#RandolphHarris 18 of 18
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Discovering the rules of society best suited to nations would required a superior intelligence that beheld all the passions of humans without feeling any of them; who had no affinity with our nature, yet knew it through and through; whose happiness was independent of us, yet who nevertheless was willing to concern itself with ours; finally, who, in the passage of time, procures for oneself a distant glory, being able to labour in one age and find enjoyment in another. (A people never becomes famous except when its legislation begins to decline. It is not known for how many centuries the institution established by Lycurgus caused the happiness of the Spartans before the rest of Greece took note of it.) Gods would be needed to give humans laws. The same reasoning used by Caligula regarding matters of fact was used by Plato regarding right in defining the civil or royal humans one looks for in one’s dialogue The Statesman. However, if it is true that a great prince is a rare man, what about a general legislator? The former merely has to follow the model the latter should propose to one. The latter is the engineer who invents the machine; the former is merely the workman who constructs it and makes it run. At the birth of societies, it is the leaders of republics who bring about the institutions that forms the leaders of the republic. One who dares to undertake the establishment of a people should feel that one is, so to speak, in a position to change human nature, to transform each individual (who by oneself is a perfect and solitary whole), into a part of a larger whole from which this individual receives, in a sense, one’s life and one’s being; to alter humans’ constitution in order to strengthen one’s life and one’s being; to alter humans’ constitution in order to strengthen it; to substitute a partial and moral existence for the physical and independent existence we have all received from nature. In a word, one must deny humans their own forces in order to give one forces that are alien to one and that one cannot make use of without the help of others. The more these natural forces are dead and obliterated, and the greater and more these natural forces are dead and obliterated, and the greater and more durable are the acquired forces, the more too is the institution solid and perfect. #RandolphHarris 1 of 18
Thus if each citizen is nothing and can do nothing except in concert with all the others, and if the force acquired by the whole is equal or superior to the sum of the natural forces of all the individuals, one can say that the legislation has achieved the highest possible point of perfect. The legislator is in every respect an extraordinary human in the state. If one ought to be so by one’s genius, one is no loess so by one’s office, which is neither magistracy nor sovereignty. This office, which constitutes the republic, does not enter into its constitution. It is a particular and superior function having nothing in common with the dominion over humans. For if one who has command over humans must not have command over laws, one who has command over the laws must no longer have any authority over humans. Otherwise, one’s laws, ministers of one’s passions, would often only serve to perpetuate one’s injustices, and one could never avoid private opinions altering the sanctity of one’s work. When Lycurgus gave laws to one’s homeland, one began by abdicating the throne. It was the custom of most Greek cities to entrust the establishment of their laws to foreigners. The modern republics of Italy often imitated this custom. The republic of Geneva did the same and things worked out well. (Those who view Calvin simply as a theologian fail to grasp the extent of one’s genius. The codification of our wise edicts, in which one had a large role, does one as much honour as one’s Institutes. Whatever revolution time may bring out in our cult, so long as the love of homeland and of liberty is not extinguished among us, the memory of this great human will never cease to be held sacred.) In its finest age Rome saw the revival within its midst of all the crimes of tyranny and saw itself on the verge of perishing as a result of having united the legislative authority and the sovereign power in the same hands. Nevertheless, the decimvirs themselves never claimed the right to have any law passed on their authority alone. Nothing we propose, they would tell people, can become law without your consent. Romans, be yourselves the authors of the laws, therefore, does not or should not have any legislative right. And the populace itself cannot, even if it wanted to, deprive itself of this incommunicable right, because, according to the fundamental compact, only the general will obligates private individuals, and there can never be any assurance that a private will is in conformity with the general will until it has been submitted to the free vote of people. I have already said this, but it is not a waste of time to repeat it. #RandolphHarris 2 of 18
Thus we find together in the work of legislation two things that seem incompatible: and undertaking that transcends human force, and, to execute it, an authority that is nil. Another difficulty deserves attention. The wise humans who want to speak to the common masses in the former’s own language rather than in the common vernacular cannot be understood by the masses. For there are a thousand kinds of ideas that are impossible to translate in the language of the populace. Overly general perspectives and overly distant objects are equally beyond its grasp. Each individual, in having no appreciation for any other plan of government but the one that relates to one’s own private interest, finds it difficult to realize the advantages one ought to draw from the continual privations that good laws impose. For an emerging people to be capable of appreciating the sound maxims of politics and to follow the fundamental rules of statecraft, the effect would have to become the cause. The social spirit which ought to be the work of that institution, would have to preside over the institution itself. And humans would be, prior to the advent of laws, what they ought to become by means of laws. Since, therefore, the legislator is incapable of using either force or reasoning, one must of necessity have recourse to an authority of a different order, which can compel without violence and persuade without convincing. This is what has always forced the fathers of nations to have recourse to the intervention of Heaven and to credit the gods with their own wisdom, so that the peoples, subjected to the laws of the state as to those of nature and recognizing the same power in the formation of humans and of the city, might obey with liberty and bear with docility the yoke of public felicity. It is this sublime reason, which transcends the grasp of ordinary humans, whose decisions the legislator puts in the mouth of the immortals in order to compel by divine authority those whom human prudence could not move. (And in truth, there has never been among a people a single legislator who, in proposing extraordinary laws, did not have recourse to God, for otherwise they would not be accepted, since there are many benefits known to a prudent human that do not have in themselves evident reasons enabling one to persuade others.) #RandolphHarris 3 of 18
However, not everybody is capable of making the gods speak or of being believed when one proclaims oneself their interpreter. The great soul of the legislator is the true miracle that should prove one’s mission. Any human can engrave stone tablets, buy an oracle, or feign secret intercourse with some divinity, or train a bird to talk in one’s ear, or find other crude methods of imposing one’s beliefs on the people. One who knows no more than this may perchance assemble a troupe of lunatics, but one will never found an empire and one’s extravagant work will soon die with one. Pointless sleights-of-hand form a fleeting connection; only wisdom can make it lasting. The Judaic Law, which still exists, and that of the child of Ishmael, which has ruled half the World for ten centuries, still proclaim today the great humans who enunciated them. And while pride-ridden philosophy or the blind spirit of factionalism sees in them nothing but lucky impostors, the true political theoretician admires in their institutions that great and powerful genius which presides over establishments that endure. We should not, with Warburton, conclude from this that politics and religion have a common object among us, but that in the beginning stages of nations the one serves as an instrument of the other. Giant historical shifts are sometimes symbolized by minute changes in everyday behaviour. One such change—its significance all but overlooked—occurred early in the 1970’s when a new product began invading the pharmacies of France, England, Holland, and other European countries. The new product was a do-it-yourself hormone human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) test. Within a few years, an estimated 15 to 20 million such kits had been sold to European women. Soon advertisements in American newspapers were clamouring: “Pregnant? The sooner you know, the better.” When Warner-Lambert, an American firm, introduced the kit under its brand name it found the response “overwhelmingly good.” According to our report, the global pregnancy testing market size is estimated to be worth $136 Billion US Dollars as of 2021. Furthermore, it is forecasted to grow to $174 billion by 2026, which is a 5.1 percent increase. Year, nearly 8 million women in America used these tests, but it is still recommended to seek medical attention to confirm the results and find out how to plan for life with a baby growing inside you. #RandolphHarris 4 of 18
Manufacturers focus on new product launches, expansions of their markets, mergers, and collaborations and this is having a beneficial influence on the pregnancy testing market. Planned or meant pregnancies have increased the awareness among women, offering immense growth opportunities to the key players. Some people see this as sidestepping the physician. However, self-care—the idea that people can and should be more medically self-reliant—is a fast-rolling new bandwagon…Across the land, ordinary people are learning to handle stethoscopes and blood pressure cuffs, administer breast self-examinations and Pap smears, even carrying out elementary surgical procedures. However, you want to make sure that you are having a healthy baby, and find out what special needs your child may have, what kind of diet and exercise routine you need, and so forth. So, it is important to seek medical advice. Do not know the symptoms, you cannot hide a growing baby and they will not just go away. It is a human life and this is a very serious situation, so one needs to consult a professional and find out the proper methods of caring for a fetus. Today, many mothers and fathers are becoming educated parents. Overall, 77.1 percent of women initiate prenatal care in the first trimester of pregnancy; 4.6 percent began prenatal care in the third trimester, and 1.6 of women receive no car at all. Schools offer courses on everything from foot care to “instant pediatrics.” And people are checking their own blood pressure in coin-operated machines located in more thousands of shopping centers, airports, and department stores in the United States of America. As government and health insurers Worldwide implement measures to control costs, public hospitals are operating on tighter budgets, while private facilities are receiving lower reimbursements. These measures are triggering a transformation of the purchasing process that is changing the way that medical products are bought and valued and who is paying for them. In the past, few medical instruments were sold to non-physicians. However, a growing share of the instrument market is destined for the home. #RandolphHarris 5 of 18
With the aging population, driven by declining fertility rates, and increasing life expectancy this represents a need for more self-care. Sales of otoscopes, ear-cleaning devices, nose and throat irrigators, air purifiers, dehumidifiers, humidifiers, other instruments, articles, apparatuses, or machines that are used in the prevention diagnosis, or treatment of illness or disease, or for detecting, measuring, restoring, correcting, or modifying of the function of the body for some health purpose. The early account for nearly 33 percent of total healthcare consumption, and specialized convalescent products are all booming, as individual take on more responsibility for their own health, reduce the number of visits to the doctor, and cut short their hospital stays. Healthcare eCommerce is anticipated to be over $435 billion by 2025. Hospitals are buying 53 percent of all sold medical equipment, but consumer demand is also growing. The United States of American remains the largest medical device market in the World: $156 billion (40 percent of the global medical market). By 2023, it is expected to grow to $208 billion. Personal healthcare spending for the population segment is approximately $22,000 per person, $4,100 for children, and an estimated $9,800 for working people. The elderly population is expected to expand from less than 8 percent of the population to more than 21 percent of the total population by 2060. Healthcare expenditure if expected to grow from $3.5 trillion to $6 trillion in 2027, an average annual growth rate of 5.5 percent. The industry includes almost 2 million jobs in the United States of America, including both direct and indirect employment. Medical technology directly accounts for well over 300,000 of these jobs. In California alone, there is an expected demand for almost 450,000 new allied healthcare workers through 2024. The American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC) predicts a shortage of as many as 122,000 physicians by 2032. If the health care patterns were equalized across race, insurance coverage, and geographical location, the United States of American will need an additional 95,900 doctor immediately. By 2025, there will also be a forecast shortage of more than 400,000 home health assistants, and 29,400 nurse practitioners. There will also be shortages in other health care professions. #RandolphHarris 6 of 18
On the surface all this might create a new fad of unlicensed medical professionals and individuals taking health care into their own hands, or deferring their needs to veterinarians to reduce costs. The rust to treat one’s own problems (instead of paying a licensed professional to) reflects a substantial change in our values, in our definition of illness, and in our perception of body and self. There is a notoriously strong association between social anxiety and loneliness. Loneliness is associated with many of the same features as social anxiety—namely, a lack of optimism about interpersonal encounters, low sociability, avoidance of others, and poor social skills. Like socially anxious or depressed individuals, lonely people devalue communication with others and view their own communication skills negatively. Social anxiety is positively correlated with loneliness, and each of these problems is negatively associated with various aspects of social skills. Another large sample survey study showed tht apprehensions about public speaking and apprehension about dyadic interaction were both positively associated with loneliness. Most explanations of the relationship between social anxiety and loneliness argue that loneliness is a consequence or result of social anxiety. Socially anxious persons tend to approach social interactions with discomfort and nervousness. As a consequence, other people tend to respond unfavorably to these awkward and reserved interactions. The disrupted and unpleasant interactions, with their attendant negative responses from others, have the obvious effect of leaving socially anxious persons longing for mor satisfying and intimate personal relationships. In more extreme cases, such as full-blown social phobia, avoidance of social contact may sever as a temporarily effective means of managing and coping with the anxiety. However, this coping mechanism comes high price. Eventually, all but the most inherently antisocial individuals, anxious or not, become painfully lonely as a result of prolonged avoidance of social contact. There are four mechanism that can cause socially anxious persons to become lonely. First, the reticent interaction style of socially anxious people may be misinterpreted as aloof or snobbish. This is thought to prompt others to avoid the anxious persons, therefore producing feelings of loneliness. #RandolphHarris 7 of 18
Second, some people have a desire for sociability despite feeling socially anxious. Not that sociability and shyness are distinct concepts. Although it may sound paradoxical, many socially anxious people would actually like to socialize with others. The problem is that they feel such encounters will go badly, and they will in some ways be worse off than if they just avoid the encounters altogether. Therefore, among those socially anxious people with a desire for social contact, loneliness is expected to be prevalent. Third, many stressful events (exempli gratia, moving away from home for the first time, loss of a spouse through death or divorce) present many interpersonal challenges and create feelings of uncertainty. Such events are inherently threatening and anxiety-provoking. Coping with them often requires a great deal of social skills. Of course, the people least equipped with these skills, such as socially anxious individuals, have the greatest cause for anxiety. In such cases, loneliness becomes a likely outcome. Socially anxious people have a pessimistic style of social cognition that is likely to cause loneliness—namely, blaming themselves for social failures and seeing personal flaws as fairly stable, unchangeable traits. For example, if a man goes on a date with a woman and it goes badly, if he interprets this as a result of the fact that “I am just no good with women,” it stands to reason that one should experience anxiety over such encounters in the future. The interpretation of the past failures suggests that the same outcome is inevitable in similar future encounters. There is a notoriously strong relationship between social anxiety and depression. Among those seeking clinical attention, the comorbidity between social anxiety disorder and depression is between 40 percent and 50 percent. It is believed that social anxiety creates a predisposition to developing other psychological problems, and that it precedes the development of the depression in most cases. It is impossible to overlook the striking similarity in the interpersonal foundations of social anxiety and depression. Each is associated with poor social skills, interpersonal rejection, loneliness, and problematic experiences in the family of origin. If depression is often secondary to social anxiety, one must wonder whether the interpersonal phenomena that have been linked to social anxiety are mostly the result of comorbid depression. #RandolphHarris 8 of 18
These three possible connections between social anxiety and depression are worthy of consideration. First, they suggest that depression may be the result of repeated self-presentational failures. Feelings of chronic failure in social situations may produce a sense of learned helplessness that culminates in depression. This account places social anxiety (self-presentational concerns) before depression in the causal chain of events. A second possibility is that depression may predispose people to experience social anxiety. This is due to the negative effect of depression on effectiveness in social encounters. This possibility is useful for explaining the social skills deficits that have been documented in both depression and social anxiety. Third, depression and social anxiety may each be caused by a common third variable: social exclusion. When people are excluded and isolated, they may come to simultaneously doubt their social abilities (social anxiety) and question their self-worth (depression). This proposition is a useful explanation for the interpersonal rejection that is concomitant to both depression and social anxiety. One of the challenges for future research on interpersonal aspects of social anxiety will involve the identification of interpersonal phenomena that are caused by social anxiety, by depression, or by both problems. In most of the existing research on social anxiety, there is not often an assessment of comorbid depression, much less an attempt to control or account for its influences on interpersonal behaviour. However, such a research strategy would be useful for refining our knowledge about the interpersonal aspects of both depression and social anxiety. When a child is abused by a family member, social anxiety disorder is a very likely outcome. Parents may also model excessive concern with the opinions of others and isolate their children from varied opportunities for social interaction. Social anxiety is marked by a pervasive tendency to expect negative outcomes for social interactions. Furthermore, social anxiety often coexists with loneliness and depression. These three are something of a “holy trinity” in psychosocial problems. They share many phenomenological features, such as doubts and questions about self-worth, and have many common interpersonal correlates, such as social skills deficits and interpersonal rejection. #RandolphHarris 9 of 18
Of the four primary distortion of Christian life, which also affect non-Christians, the pattern of the Striving Christian may well be the most subtle. Does not everyone admire the Christian who is industrious, busy, and constantly on the go? It is not a great virtue to burn oneself out for the kingdom of God? Do we not praise the person who weathers every storm, overcomes every temptation, and always has the victory? The striving Christian is stuck on the strength polarity. Somewhere along the line of personality development, this person received the message that work, personal achievement, and competitive performance are the things that make life meaningful. If perfectionistic standards are not met, one is afraid of being judged as being inadequate or unworthy. The corollary to this assumption is that play, fun, recreation, and the joy of intimate relationships with others are a waste of time. Hard, continuous work replaces love as the central goal of life. Achievement is the one note that the Striving Christian plays compulsively day after day. Most probably, the Striving Christian was hurt early in life when one, like all children, felt psychological and spiritual hunger for unconditional affection and love from others. At an unconscious level, this person feels betrayed that this deep human need was not adequately met. Love was probably given only for being a “good girl” or a “good boy.” This child was probably told not to be sentimental—that it is a doggy dog (dog-eat-dog) World, so it is necessary to toughen up and get to work to have any success out there. There is a saying that “God helps those who help themselves.” Even though this saying has some wisdom in it, it can easily become only a rationalization for putting more emphasis on performing, accomplishing, and getting ahead, rather than on living oneself and others. The saying appears nowhere in the Bible. The Striving Christian suffers under the heavy burden of perfectionism. One is the Pharisee of the modern-day life. Since the joy of being loved or loving others is lacking, one works oneself to death trying to appear worthy. #RandolphHarris 10 of 18
It then becomes difficult for this individual to understand the grace of God because one is trying so hard to be perfect and please everyone. It becomes almost impossible to feel genuinely loved by God, because one is constantly giving attention to meriting or earning that love. However, love is a gift, and, despite all the accomplishments, the Striving Christian has the worst time simply accepting it. So one jumps back on the treadmill of life seeking another project, thinking up another program, or contriving another emergency. Unconsciously, this person is still trying to please mom and dad and even God. The striving business executive needs to have a perfectly efficient organizational machine in which persons are manipulated as thought they were objects or statistics. The striving housewife compulsively cleans the house as though it were a museum showcase, not a home in which people enjoy living together. The perfectionistic student makes a ritual out of mastering technique, memorizing trivia, and making high grades. The striving church worker may become so preoccupied with “saving souls” that one neglects completely the deeper opportunity for understanding, loving, and growing in relationships with other people. Unfortunately, self-awareness and sensitivity to others are often lost in the struggle to achieve perfection. One remains a spiritual infant. There is another important dimension to this stuckness. The Striving Christian has been given the idea that always acting strong is a virtue, and that experiencing one’s weakness, limitation, or vulnerability is a humiliating experience. Indeed, one was probably embarrassed as a child or young person for disclosing personal fears, doubts, hurts, and faults. So instead of admitting and confessing needs and weaknesses to others, one has learned to bottle everything up inside. This person develops a psychological rigidity that other people can sense. Especially spouse, children, and colleagues will sense the tenseness, irritability, and distance. One avoids honest sharing with one’s family and mainly invest energy in solitary projects. The inner attitudes that a person lives by are inevitably reflected physically. The body of the Striving Christian is often stiff and rigid. Tension is stored in the neck and shoulder muscles, as well as around the area of the jaw. Rather than walking with a relaxed and natural gait, one develops a hurried, tense walk that reflects the inner need to always appear busy and productive. #RandolphHarris 11 of 18
Psychosomatic symptoms such as high blood pressure, chronic muscular tension, migraine headache, or lower back pain often accompany this style of living the Christians who adopt the striving lifestyle might blame the disorders of the body on the devil. One might rationalize this physical deterioration by thinking: “Look how much I am doing for God. The devil must be punishing me for being such a hard-working Christian.” What one does not recognize is that the one who is punishing and abusing the body that God fashioned is oneself. The Striving Christian is so caught up in seeking status, wealth, or acclaim that one constantly ignores the God-given warning signs of a body that is gradually breaking down long before the Lord intended it to. However, rather than own up to one’s limitations and take responsibility to give and receive love without the heavy criterion of achievement and performance, the Striving Christian is off to another convention, off to buy another piece of property, off to preach another sermon, off to start another program. In therapy, many Striving Christian realize in their success, they are lonely. They worked so hard to get there that they have no one they can really connect with. These adults often times come to terms with the fact that the as a youth, they had not gotten the kind of unconditional love others receive. Instead, the attention they received was mostly for doing things well and performing well or for warning their way. And that is how they spent their adult years. With awareness, however, one can relax more in life and take things more as they come instead of wearing oneself out, trying to make them happen. One can slowly learn how to love oneself whether or not one achieves. However, instead of being an eagle on top of a mountain peak, keep in mind you could, instead, being a carb on the bottom of the barrel, trying to pull others down to your life. So, the Striving Christian is not always a curse. We will focus more about the different types of Christians and some things that go along with those personality traits in upcoming reports. For now, I want to focus on some other material before the end of this report. #RandolphHarris 12 of 18
O Lord my God, who created me to look like You, please grant me this grace You keep talking about, the one that is greatly necessary for salvation. Perhaps it will help me get hold of my lowest nature—it is dragging me down to sins and into Perdition. I feel in my flesh the law of sin contradicting the law of my mind, as Paul so haply put it to the Roman (7.23), and lashing me with silken bonds to sensuality. I am helpless! Help me! I cannot resist my passions unless Your Most Holy Grace, branded hotly into my heart, assists me. “Incline your ear and hear the words of the wise, and apply your mind to my knowledge; for it will be pleasant is you keep them within you, that they may be ready on your lips. So that your trust may be in the LORD,” Proverbs 22.17-19. Your grace is necessary, and a great grace it has to be if it is to do the job. My nature has to be overthrown. It is been plaguing me since adolescence. That was God’s appraisal of human nature in the aftermath of the flood, at least as it was recorded in Genesis (8.21). Yes, it was through Adam, our Primal Father, that our nature was pocked and pummeled by Sin until it finally fell. And from that moment on, as Paul reminded the Romans (5.12), the punishment left that terrible strawberry blotch on the human soul. Since that time Dame Nature herself, who was fathered by You in Your goodness and rightness, has been in a compromising position. Poor babe, now that she has slipped from her pedestal, she has had to shop such putrid wares as Vice and Weakness and Corruption. A mere remnant of her former self, though, she still has power enough in her little finger to grab your foot and drag you under the bushes where all mortal and venial sins are committed. Modest, like an ember in the ask, is the force for good that remains in her, that is to say, Natural Reason. Up to this point in human history, it is managed to survive as if in a dear but dark night. It still has the ability to distinguish good and bad and to discern the distance between truth and falsehood. All this Natural Reason can do, but, oh, the powers she has lost! To logick the Universe, illumine the Truth, restore Sanity to its own terribly troubled affections. Hence it is, my God, that as the Letter to the Romans has said (7.22), “I am truly delighted with the rules of engagement You have laid down for the interior self.” However, then again, I knew Your commandment would be good, just, and holy, arguing as it does that every evil and every sin has to be fled. However, oh, the reality! Again the Letter to the Romans, the next verse (7.23). However, “when I follow the law of sin, I am enslaved by my flesh.” Which is, I think, another way of saying, I err more in favour of Sensuality than Reason. Romans again (7.25). #RandolphHarris 13 of 18
Thence it is then that, again from the same chapter in Romans, but an earlier verse (v. 18), “I want to do good for You, but I often find I just cannot pull it off.” Hence I often propose a flurry of actions that far exceed the grace in my purse. Thence, my infirmity returns with a vengeance, and I have to advance to the rear. Hence, it happens that I know the path of perfection and see clearly where it is on the map. Thence, donkeyed as I am by the deadly weight of self-corruptions, I just cannot climb any faster or indeed any higher. Oh, how much I need You, O Lord, You and You grace! To begin well, not to flag in the middle, to finish strong! Without it I cannot do anything; that is if I remember correctly John on God as the Vintner and You as the Vine (15.5). With Your grace comforting me and in You I can do everything; that is as Paul encouraged the Philippians (4.13). Many have heard it before and have heard it many times: Your mind is similar to a computer. One of the most important bits of information that you need to reinstall in your mental computer is that you are successful and not a failure nor a victim. “If God is for you, who can be against you,” reports Romans 8.31. When negative, discouraging thoughts come, cast them down immediately, and make a conscious choice to dwell on what God says about you. For instance, a thought comes to you that you are getting sick or that you have some serious aliment. Refuse to dwell on that. Just say, “Father, I thank You that You are restoring health unto me. I thank You that I am going to live and not die, that I will declare the works of the Lord.” O Truly Celestial Grace! Without You there would be no proper merits, nor would any of the gifts of nature have any value! Without grace, O Lord, there would be no validity to, no vitality in art, wealth, beauty, courage, talent, eloquence. These gifts of nature are common to both the good and the bad. However, the appropriate gifts for Your Elect are Grace and Love; emblems of You and Eternal Life worn on the sleeves of Your Elect. This grace has an eminence of its own. Without it there is no such things as the gift of prophecy, the operation of miracles, the revelation of Theology, the reasoning of Philosophy. #RandolphHarris 14 of 18
When the thought comes to you that you are not going to get a promotion at work or your proposal for a big project will be rejected, reject that soft of thinking and declare instead, “Father, You promised that no good thing will You withhold when I walk righteously. And by being obedient You blessings will chase me down and overtake me, so I thank You that You have blessed us with good things in store.” Without Charity and Grace, neither Faith nor Hope nor any of the other virtues are acceptable to You. “However, when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking,” reports Matthew 6.7. Jesus Christ cut away some religious theology right there. I had always heard that if you just keep praying, God would finally answer you. “Just keep on praying, keep bombarding the gates of Heaven!” Some think if you can get more people praying, you will finally talk God into it. However, you are not going to change God by your praying. God said, “I am the Lord, I change not,” reports Mal. 3.6. You can change yourself by praying and get yourself in line with the Word so God can answer. Prayer changes things, but it does not change God. Hezekiah is a good example of this. God sent a prophet to tell him to get his house in order for he was going to die. Hezekiah turned his face to the wall, prayed, repented, and changed his position before God. The God said, “You will live fifteen more years.” Many think that he prayed and changed God’s mind. For years I thought that was true, but he did not change God’s mind. It was God’s will all along that he live a full life, but Hezekiah got out of His will and God said that this would cause him to die a premature death. When he repented, God said, “Now you will live.” You do not change God by your praying, for He does not change. For years I thought God did not want me to have whatever I was praying about, so I was trying to talk Him into letting me have it. I thought my job was to keep pestering Him like I did my Earthly daddy, until He changed His mind just to get rid of me. No, God does not operate that way. Faith moves God, not prayer alone. O beautiful grace! How You make the poor in spirit rich with virtues! How You make the rich into persons of humble heart! Come, each morning, descend on me, let me break my fast with You consolation. If You do not, my soul will falter, my intellect buckle. #RandolphHarris 15 of 18
Reprogram one thought at a time by going back to the Bible, where you discover that God will always cause you to triumph. God said whatever you put your hands to is going to prosper and succeed. He says that you are blessed and cannot be cursed. People may try to tell you that your dreams are not going to come to pass, that you are not able to go any further in life. However, do not believe those lies. God said you are well able to fulfill your destiny. When you go through disappointments in life—and we all do—or when you face a setback and it looks as though one of your dreams had not become successful, keep believing. When it looks like you cannot go any further and humans are destroying the World and ruining your life, remember, God is in control of the entire Universe for He created it. God is in control of your life, guiding you and protecting you. His plans for you are good and not evil. Do not make the mistake of sitting around feeling sorry for yourself. No, put on a brand-new attitude. Take what God has given you and make the best of it. You know the truth; you were born to be a success and that will set you free. You may be near your Promised Land. God may be about to part the Red Sea for you. God has great things He wants to do in your life. He wants to promote you. He wants to increase you. God wants to heal your body, He wants to restore your marriage, He wants to renovate your house, He wants to bless you financially, He wants to warm your heart. You are on the verge of a miracle. Do not lack faith and do not let anyone rob you of your destiny. Obey the law, stay in church, be a good Christian so no one can trap you. If you get your thinking in lines with the Ten Commandments, nothing will be able to stop your righteousness. No obstacle will be too high, no situation too difficult. Just have faith! Remember, the enemy always fights the hardest when he knows Go has something great in store for you. The darkest battle, the darkest storm will always give way to the brightest sunrise. Keep believing. I beseech You, O Lord, that I may find grace in Your eyes, as Abraham begged favour of the three lordly gentlemen suddenly in front of his tent, as Genesis recorded it (18.3). I know from the Great Paul in his Second Letter to the Corinthians (12.9) that “Your grace is always enough to do the job.” I say that now, and I will say it again, even though I do not get all the other things my lousy nature desires. #RandolphHarris 16 of 18
If I am going to be taxed and vexed by many trials and troubles, I have nothing to fear from evil. That is to say, so long as Your grace is with me. The Psalmist himself could live and die on that promise (23.4). That is my courage, my counsel, and my help. It is stronger than all my enemies combined; wiser than all the wisdoms universal. “Do not get tired of doing what is right, for in due season you shall reap if you faint not,” reports Galatians 6.9. It may be hard right now, but remind yourself that you have the power of God inside of you. You can do what you need to do. Step out in faith, knowing that Almighty God is on your side. Decide to go with God. Even if negative thoughts bombard your mind in the morning, and you are unhappy, find something to be thankful about and praise God. “This book of the law should not depart out of your mouth but you should mediate on it day and night. Then you will prosper and have good success,” reports Joshua 1.8. That is my courage, my counsel, and my help. It is stronger than all my enemies combined; wiser than all the wisdoms universal. Grace teaches truth, monitors the monastery, illumines the soul, lightens pressures, banishes sadness, reduces fear, nourishes devotion produces tears. What am I without her, but dead wood, the dry rot of a family tree not good enough even for the Final Fire? If I may, the Collect of the Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost: “May Your grace, O Lord, always precede me and succeed me, and keep my mind constant only on good works, through Jesus Christ, You Son. Amen.” Father, I am going to dare to believe what You say about me, rather than what anyone else says. Please help me to fill my mind with thoughts that are pleasing to You, thoughts that will cause me to progress all the way to my Promised Land. The remembered glimpse helps one to go on living, because its recap—true is both a possibility and a spur. The one gives one hope, the other determination to provide conditions which may renew it. It is a spiritual miracle, for it is not only transforming one’s character but also releases some latent powers. Because it gives new hope, fresh encouragement, and the prospect of eventual relief from trouble, the glimpse is like a rainbow in the sky. It reminds one that a providential love is still behind the World and one’s own existence. #RandolphHarris 17 of 18
The glimpse will help one to live through the dark periods that may come, when otherwise one might succumb to despair. The remembrance of most of those years spent in the World is dim but the remembrance of these exquisite interludes is vivid. One will remember it as a momentary benediction, something to be saved from the tragic inexorable fleetingness of life. What one discovers during these deepest possible experiences becomes a part of one. The more one exposes oneself to these moments of alignment of mind, the more will negative outbursts and destructive passions calm and die away. The extraordinary thing that this illumination, the most important even that can happen to a human being, lessens one’s feeling of self-importance. The memory of this day will last longer, mean more, and touch deeper than any other. Spirit of God in the clear running water, blowing to greatness the trees on the hill, Spirit of God in the finger of morning, please sill the Earth, bring it to birth and blow where You will. Blow, blow, blow till I be but breath of Spirit blowing in me. Down in the meadow the willows are moaning, sheep in the pasture land cannot lie still. Spirit of God, creation is groaning, please fill the Earth, bring it to birth and blow where You will. Blow, blow, blow till I be but breath of the Spirit blowing in me. Spirit of God, every human’s heart is lonely watching and waiting and hungry until Spirit of God, man longs that you only fulfill the Earth, bring it to birth and blow where You will. Blow, blow, blow till I be breath of the Spirit blowing in me. Thine, O Lord, is greatness and the power, the glory, the victory and the majesty; for all that is in the Heaven and on the Earth is Thine. Thine is the kingdom, O Lord, and Thou art exalted supreme above all. Exalt the Lord our God, and worship at His footstool; holy is He. Exalt the Lord our God, and worship at His holy mountain for the Lord our God is holy. May the Father of compassion have mercy upon a people who He loving tended. May He remember the covenant with the patriarchs; may He deliver us from evil times, curb the evil inclinations in the people whom He hath tenderly protected, and graciously grant us enduring deliverance. Many He abundantly fulfill our desires and grant us salvation and mercy. O God, or Creator, you are the source of all life. It is through your divine providence and infinite power, that the wonder and splendour of all creation surrounds us. How majestic is your name in wall the Earth. We pray to you whom calms the raging waters and commands the wind, to provide of us with sufficient rain to meet our needs. Not only during this time of drought, but always, we are mindful of our dependence on you for all that sustains our body and soul. We pray for the cooling, gentle rain that will once again bring life to the fields and crops that feed us, restore the colourful rainbow of flowers and the cooling shade of trees. We also pray for those who are suffering from natural disasters. May the look to you for strength to restore their lives and heal their wounded land. Please helps us to always be good stewards of your creation and care for the many resources of this Earth. May your grace refresh our souls. We ask for these blessings through the intercession of Mary, Queen of Heaven and Earth. Ametn. #RandolphHarris 18 of 18
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I am Worthless and I Cannot Trust Anyone!
My dear friend, pay close attention to the movements of Nature and Grace, because they can be very subtle, sometime quite contrary. It takes a spiritual and enlightened Devout to discern them. Hence, let God discern them for you. Every Devout has one’s heart set on good, as indeed does all Humankind—Aristotle, God’s pagan philosopher friend, put that down right at the beginning of his Nichomachean Ethics (1.1). And every Devout pretends there is something good in what he says and does. And so it is that many Devouts fall by having clouded their own minds into thinking they were doing something good when, actually, they were doing something quite bad. Horace, God’s pagan poet friend, expresses much the same sentiment in his Poetic Art (25). Natura, Dame Nature is familiarly known, is hot, and as if to prove her point, she had dragged any number of Devouts under the bushes; she is a tramp, a deceiver who always gets her way. Gratia, as Lady Grace, is commonly known, cool, walking in the Garden at twilight, pruning all the deadly nightshade; she is not pretentious or fallacious and has the pure intention of doing everything for God, in whom all Finality rests. First Thessalonians recommends much of the same thing (5.22). Natura will not entertain the possibility of death; nor does she allow herself to be oppressed, overwhelmed or underwhelmed, or tamed by a master. Gratia, though, truly strives to mortify herself, she asks for direction, desires to be taught, and has no intention of dancing in innocents in the fountain; that is to say, she resists sensuality. She thrives under discipline and abhours the thought of disciplining someone else. However, she lives, stands, and exists under God, and because of God she has always prepared to defer to every other human creature. Here God refers you to First Peter (2.13). Natura labours only for her own advantage and looks only to what financial gain she can squeeze out of a situation. #RandolphHarris 1 of 18
Gratia has it the other way around. She expresses no interests in promoting or advancing her own career; she does only what will be good for others. First Corinthians (10.33). Natura freely accepts honours and decorations she does not deserve. Gratia attributes all honours and decorations to God, on whose bountiful breast they should be proudly displayed. Psalms (29.2). Natura likes to be in control; when she is not, she fears confusion and contempt, disgust and disgrace. Gratia likes protocol and rejoices when she is asked to suffer some contumely for the name of Jesus. Acts of the Apostles (5.4). Natura likes to lounge about in silk and have her body bathed in milk. Gratia cleans up quite nicely, thank you very much, but she does not spend a lot of time in front mirror; there is too much to do, too many people to help, for her to loll around. Natura surrounds herself with curious and objets d’art and abhours the cheap and the dull, ad if she knew the difference. Gratia does not clutter her residence with cutesy artifacts; no bibelots or furbelows for her; she delights in humble fabrics with simple designs and swans about in secondhand splendour. Natura has to keep pace with the latest fashions, is a bad winner and a poor loser, and bristles at the slightest barb, real or imagined. Gratia takes the long view, with Eternity at the end of the scope. She hardly notices when things come into, let alone when they go out of, fashion; nor do her lips go pouty when she is slapped in the face with an insult. That is because she keeps her treasure and joy where it is truly secure, that is to say, in the Vaults of Heaven. Matthew (6.20). Natura has to have one of the everything. Slower to give than to receive—that is her motto. Gratia, however, prefers none of anything, develops the common touches, avoids particular friendships, and had modest needs and desires; that is because she judges it “more blessed to give than to receive.” Acts of the Apostles (20.35). #RandolphHarris 2 of 18
Natura has a fondness for creature comforts, flashy displays, witty dinners. Gratia is attracted to God and the virtuous life, does not invest in unguents or ointments, turns her back on the World, detests carnal desires, restricts her travels, and blushes when she had to appear in public. Natura’s not beneath getting her jollies by sipping the sort of drinkies that make her skin crawl. Gratia’s not above seeking a little consolation for herself, but she finds it in God alone; her delights are not in the visible World of the Summum Malum, but in the invisible World of the Summum Bonum. Natura’s a heartless businesswoman. No pro bono work for her. As for remuneration, she expects better than equal pay. In lieu of that, she will trade up to preference or praise from those who set the standards. For her benefactions, partly and tawdry as they are, she wants instant public recognition. Gratia, on the other hand, seeks nothing ephemeral, certainly not a reward; she prefers God, the greatest reward of all. She does with only a few necessities in this life, a comb and a brush and just enough diet to get her through to the next life. Natura arranges a ball for a thousand of her closet friends—as if she had that many!—not so much for them to dance and to sing as for her to boast about the stateliness of her home and the lengthiness of her lineage. She flashes her teeth at the powerful and rubs up against the rich. And she is assembled a virtual retinue of viragos like herself. Not so Gratia. She feels affection even for those who have shown no signs of friendliness. Nor does she surround herself with yea-sayers and gainsayers. She takes no extraordinary pride in her distinguished family or historical home, and rarely lets slip the Virile Virtue is the major domo managing her estates. She favours Lazarus to Dives, feeling more warmly for the indigent than for the potentate. She rejoices with Truth and politely refuses Untruth. She has this habit, annoying to some, of exhorting the good to yearn for greater charisms; as for herself, she yearns only to be assimilated through virtues to the Son of God. Matthew (5.44) and First Corinthians (12.31). #RandolphHarris 3 of 18
At the hint of famine or drought, Natura begins to binge. In the face of want, Gratia keeps on an even keel, eating and drinking like a bird. Natura quickly turns the conversation back to herself, always pestering and pummeling until she gets her own way. Gratia begins with herself, but very quickly leads the conversation back to God, whence everything came in the first place. She ascribes nothing good to herself, nor does she give off even the faintest aroma of arrogance. She is neither contentious or sententious. And she submits her senses and intellects for the Divine Examen by Eternal Wisdom. Natura wants to know all the secrets and to hear the latest news; she appears in public with daring dress and brazen mouth. She acts audacious and talks salacious, yet desires to be thought gracious. Gratia, though, does not care a fig about that latest in fig leaves. That is because this whole thing had its start with the Primal Corruption; that was when there lay over the Earth nothing new and nothing lasting. So she trains her senses to avoid Vain Complacency and Empty Ostentation, humbly hides in herself what is considered laudatory and wonderful in others, and seeks in every situation and every branch of knowledge to find something for the praise and honour of God. She does not wish to advertise the importance of herself or the magnitude of her gifts, merely to choose that God be blessed when He gives His gifts; after all, He is the One who has showered everyone else with gifts, and just for the love of it all. Gratia is supernatural light. She is a certain special gift of God, properly a little sign of God’s favour to the Elect, and a pledge of Eternal Salvation. She is meant to lift up Humankind from Terrenals to the Celestial Lovables, that is to say, to make a carnal Devout into a spiritual Devout. Ephesians (2.8). Therefore, I say, the sooner Nature’s impediments are removed, the freer Grace’s improvements will flow. And when that happens, the interior Devout will be reformed according to the image of God by a new series of daily visitations. That, according to Colossians (3.10). #RandolphHarris 4 of 18
On February 9, 1831, at Kirtland in the presence of twelve elders, God gave the people His law by revelation as He had promised. This is the law as given by the Lord that govern His church: Hearken, O ye elders of my church, who have assembled themselves together, in my name. Hearken and hear and obey the law which I shall give unto you. Ye shall go forth in the power of my Spirit, preaching my gospel, two by two, in my name, lifting up your voices as with the voice of a trump, declaring my word like unto Angels of God. And ye shall go forth baptizing with water, saying, Repent ye, repent ye, for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand. And from this place ye shall go forth into the regions westward. Ye shall build up my church in every region, until the time shall come when it shall be revealed unto you from on high, when the city of the New America shall be prepared that ye may be gathered in one, that ye may be my people, and I will be your God. The elders, priests, and teachers of this church shall teach the principles of my gospel which are in the Christian Bible and the Book of Mormon, in which is the fullness of the gospel. And they shall observe the covenants and church articles to do them, and the Spirit shall be given unto you by the prayer of faith, and if ye receive not the Spirit ye shall not teach. Then the Lord gave commandments similar to those he gave through Moses to the children of America, which we refer as the Ten Commandments: Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not lie. Thou shalt love thy wife with all thy heart, and shall cleave unto her and none else. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not speak of evil of thy neighbour, nor do one any harm. If thou lovest me, thou shalt serve me and keep all my commandments. Thou wilt remember the poor, and consecrate of thy properties for their support, and inasmuch as ye impart of your substance unto the poor, ye will do it unto me. Every human shall be made accountable unto me a steward over one’s own property. Thou shalt not be proud in thy heart; let all thy garments be plain, and their beauty the beauty of the work of thine own hands, and let all things be done in cleanliness before me. Thou shalt not be idle; for one that is idle shall not eat the bread nor wear the garments of the labourer. The Lord gave instructions concerning those who were sick when he said: And whosoever among you are sick, and have not faith to be healed, but believe, shall be nourished with all tenderness. #RandolphHarris 5 of 18
And the elders of the church, two or more, shall be called, and shall pray for, and lay their hands upon them in my name; and if they die, they shall die unto me, and if they live, they shall live unto me. Those that die in me shall not taste death, for it shall be sweet unto them; and they that died not in me, woe unto them, for their death is bitter. One that has faith in me to be healed, and is not appointed unto death, shall be healed; one who has faith to see shall see; one who has faith to hear shall hear, the lame who have faith to leap shall leap. And they who have not faith to do these things, but believe in me, thou shalt bear their infirmities. Concerning the storehouse, the Lord said: Thou shalt stand in the place of thy stewardship; thou shalt pay for which thou shalt receive of thy brother. And if thou obtainest more than that which would be for thy support, thou shalt give it unto my storehouse, that all things may be done according to that which I have said. Thou shalt ask, and it shall be revealed unto thee in mine own due time, where the New America [Zion] shall be built. Concerning the keeping of the law, they were instructed: And again, every person who belongeth to this church of Christ shall observe to keep all the commandments and convents of the church. This was the law of God given to govern the church in the latter day. Had the Saints heeded, it much of the trouble they afterwards experienced might have been avoided. If we will heed it, we shall be able to build New America and receive the promise of the kingdom. This is one of the most important documents ever given to the church. Everyone, even the very young person, should study it carefully. A few days after the revelation concerning the law of the church was given, another revelation was given thought Joseph Smith for the church in which instructions were given that no one was to receive revelations and commandments for the church except Joseph Smith. #RandolphHarris 6 of 18
The Saviour said: And this shall know assuredly, that there is none other appointed unto you to receive commandments and revelations until one be taken, if one abide in me. However, verily, verily I say unto you, that none else shall be appointed this gift except it be through him. In this revelation the Lord was instructing that if Joseph Smith should not remain faithful, or if he should die, still that one he had designated as his successor should continue his work as a prophet. And no one would have this power to appoint his successor, chosen by Joseph Smith, should be one who would teach the same things he taught, and whose teachings would be in harmony with the Scriptures as found in the Bible, Book of Mormon, and the revelations previously given. Hence it does not follow that there exists in God anything besides relation in reality; but only in various names imposed by us. If the divine perfection contained only what is signified by relative names, it would follow that it is imperfect, being thus related to something else; as in the same way, if nothing more were contained in it than what is signified by the word “wisdom,” it would not in that case be a subsistence. However, as the perfection of the divine essence is greater than can be included in any name, it does not follow, if a relative term or any other name applied to God signify something imperfect, that the divine essence is in any way imperfect; for the divine essence comprehends within itself the perfection of every genus. In the day that Jesus Christ was teaching, they were operating under the Law. The prayer that Jesus taught His disciples to pray was under the old covenant. You will notice that it did not include the name of Jesus. New Testament prayer is prayed in the name of Jesus. The New covenant prayer is different, for it is governed by the rules of the new covenant. The New Testament is a new contract. It is the will of the Lord Jesus Christ, sealed with Jesus’s own blood. It is established on better promises. If the old had been perfect, it would not have passed away; but finding fault with it, God made new covenant. “However, as it is now, He [Christ] has acquired a [priestly] ministry which is as much superior and more excellent [than the old] as the covenant (the agreement) of which He is the Mediator (the Arbiter, Agent) is superior and more excellent, [because] it is enacted and rests upon more important (sublime, higher, and nobler) promise. #RandolphHarris 7 of 18
“For if that first covenant had been without defect, there would have been no room for another one or an attempt to institute another one. However, He finds fault with them [showing its inadequacy] when He says, Behold, the days will come, says the Lord, when I will make and ratify a new covenant or agreement with the house of America and with the house of California,” reports Hebrews 8.6-8. And this is your new contract. There are many people that have been saved and filled with the Spirit for years, yet have never read their contract. They are quick to tell you that you never know what God will do. They do not realize that their new contract reveals what He will do! “And in that day ye shall ask me nothing. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, He will give it to you,” reports John 16.23. Here Jesus is beginning to teach the disciples new covenant rules for prayer. “In that day.” What day is He talking about? After the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Ghost has come—in that day when the new covenant is in operation—then, “ye shall ask nothing.” You see, Jesus supplied every need the disciples had while He was with them. He also fed the multitude in the wilderness. When Peter needed some tax money, Jesus told him to go fishing and the first fish he caught would have the tax money in its mouth. Jesus healed the sick, raised the dead, cast out demons. Even with all this taking place, He turned to them one day and said “It is expedient for you (of it is better for you) that I go away, for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you,” reports John 16.7. In other words, “Until I go away, the Holy Ghost will not come and the new covenant will not be in force.” Jesus said that this new covenant was even better for us than if He had stayed here on Earth. “One that believeth on me, the works that I do shall one do also; and greater works than these shall one do; because I go unto my Father,” reports John 14.12. We were to do the greater works after the Holy Ghost came. #RandolphHarris 8 of 18
“And in that day ye shall ask me nothing. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, He will give it you. Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full,” reports John 16.23-24. If your joy is not full, then you need to ask so that you may have the full joy Jesus Christ promised. His will for us under the new covenant is that our joy be full. Jesus taught us to pray to the Father in the name of Jesus. We have authority to use His name, but we are not to pray to Jesus. Somebody says, “Yes, but the Lord knows what I mean.” Well, that is true. I am sure the Lord does know what you mean, but He does not answer prayer just because He knows what you mean. He answers prayer when you pray according to His rulebook—the Bible. You must fulfill your part of the covenant or contract. The one element that makes prayer work is faith. Faith is a spiritual law designed to unlock the treasures of the unseen. Sometimes people will classify this one or that one as a faith teacher. If you teach the Word of God, you are a faith teacher. The Word of God is the Word of faith (Romans 10.8-9). Prayer gets its power from faith, and faith works by love. Somehow down through the years we have gotten the idea that prayer makes faith work. It does not. Faith makes prayer work. Faith will work without prayer, but prayer will not work without faith. You can put your faith to work through prayer. “And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise one up,” reports James 5.15. The physical regimes and disciplines of prayer can purify the body and restore health, but it is not sufficient to answer the mind’s questionings, nor to still the heart’s yearning for peace. When one gives too much importance to the practice of the bodily disciplines, they become obstacles on the way, new attachments that have to be broke. It is a matter of faith. If you concentrate your mind upon the Word of God and have faith, you will see beneficial end results that are health-giving and therapeutic. Following the Ten Commandments will help one overcome faults, which left alone would make prayer impossible. #RandolphHarris 9 of 18
The psychic purpose of faith has physical benefits. The aged, the studious, and the overworked particularly need these benefits of more vigour, more buoyancy, quicker response, and better functioning. The drudgery of daily life exhausts the body and the mind, whereas the philosophic exercise of faith, prayer, and the Word of God invigorated them. Too many people focus their minds upon the violence of the fake news media and gossip, and as one would expect, these sources become embedded in their minds, hearts, and souls, instead of the Word of God and it produces disharmony in the home, family, workplace, amongst friends and causes people’s hearts to wax cold. The TV news media is so violent and full of negative information because they are intended to bring about the greatest result of illness and chaos in the shortest time. Others make use of natural satisfactions by tuning into the scripture, which is intended not only to correct the errors which wrong habit has introduced into the World, but also to let live, when actions are righteously done, assist in keeping the mind and body fit and vital. Some people have tapped into the Word of God for natural healing, which must be accompanied by the appropriate medical attention for the ideal recovery. The glimpse is impermanent, its satisfaction fugitive; but it leaves behind a residue of hope and revelation which the impermanent and fugitive pleasures of the World can never do. Those who catch this glimpse are not necessarily better persons than others, not even wiser persons. However, having caught it, the result cannot fail to make them better and wiser. Yet their goodness will not be of a kind that is outwardly measurably by Worldly approval, nor their wisdom by Worldly success. The rapturous exaltation soon dissolves in the humdrum toil and play of every day. However, its cleansing remembrance does not. It is only desires and lusts which fade and leave one, but even the prying curiosities which express themselves at every level from mere gossip to the majestic investigations of science. #RandolphHarris 10 of 18
The human who tries for years vainly to transcend one’s human nature is released by this experience. One no longer tortures oneself practising excessive asceticisms. The stillness ends one’s quest, or rather its struggles and strivings; but if it passes away, as it usually does, one will at least know now what to look for again. It will affect one to the extent that one will always venerate its memory. One must come to see that, by valuing and applying philosophic attitudes to the troubles and vexations of the World, one is truly recalling those moments of uplifting and joy which glimpse provide. This is another way, and one of the best, in which they can bear good fruit (products) for one. For these delicate dreamlike experiences one can draw strength and courage to endure either the World’s buffeting or one’s personal difficulties. Evidence is accumulating to suggest that certain experiences in the family origin may predispose people to develop social anxiety disorder. The family’s contribution to the development of social phobia can be organized into two distinct areas of influence: (1) child-rearing styles, and (2) parental modeling of social concerns combined with restricted exposure to social situations. The family environment in which a child is reared can have a substantial impact on the child’s concurrent and future mental health. The rates of highly rigid (low-adaptability) and enmeshed (high-cohesion) family structures in families of children with social anxiety are double those of families in the general populations. Adults with social phobia tend to recall their parents as less caring and less affectionate, but at the same time as overprotective. This noxious combination of parental behaviours is associated with a host of other psychological problems for offspring. Parental overprotection can send a message to the child that the World is a harmful dangerous place from which the child needs protection, since the child is incapable of taking care of oneself. As with other psychological disorders, an increased incidence of childhood trauma and abuse is evident among those with social anxiety disorder. Childhood physical abuse rates to higher in both males and females with anxiety disorders, and childhood sexual abuse rates to be higher particularly in women with anxiety disorders. #RandolpHarris 11 of 18
In a related study of patients with anxiety disorders (panic disorder, agoraphobia, and/or social phobia), childhood trauma was evident in 63 percent of the cases, as compared to 35 percent of controls. However, histories of sexual and/or physical abuse were found to be most specific to those patients with social phobia. Analyzed representative samples drawn from the National Comorbidity Survey to explore the relationship between life experiences and various phobias had some interesting results. Resulted of this particular study showed that sexual assault by a relative, and exposure to verbal aggressiveness between parents, had unique effects on social phobia onset in women (as opposed to specific phobia or agoraphobia). The occurrence of childhood (id est, before the age of 18) sexual abuse makes the development of social anxiety disorder two to four times more likely. Sexual and physical abuse, particularly when perpetrated by a relative, conveys an interpersonal message of (1) devaluation (“I am worthless”) and (2) uncertainty (“I cannot trust anyone”). When people carry these psychological burdens into their future social relations, they are undoubtedly fearful of further rejection and devaluation, and suspicious of how they will be treated by others. These are key symptoms of social anxiety. A second family-of-origin process that may contribute to social anxiety disorder involves parental modeling of social concerns. Virtually all behavioural, cognitive, and affective learning from direct experience can be achieved vicariously be observing people’s actions and the consequences for them. The family is near-ideal context for modeling and social learning. Parents of children with social phobia are often excessively concerned with the opinions of others. In a study of over 2,700 adolescents, middle school students completed a self-report instrument describing their family environments. Students who were classified as high in social anxiety described their mothers and fathers as being more concerned about the opinions of others, and more ashamed of their sons’ or daughters’ shyness. This study is note worthy in that the participants were currently residing with their parents and were still in the process of being actively reared by them. Many, if not most, of the studies on family-of-origin environment and social anxiety disorder are retrospective in nature and obviously susceptible to recall bias. #RandolphHarris 12 of 18
Related to the modeling of parent concerns is the restricted exposure to social situations. If the child has limited exposure to social situations, then the child rarely has the opportunity to learn that social situations are not typically harmful. Indeed, individuals with social anxiety disorder often indicate that they were isolated by their parents when growing up, and that their mothers tended to avoid social situations that were anxiety-provoking. The socially anxious middle school students in the study also indicated that their parents were less socially active than parents of nonanxious student. Collectively, these findings reveal that people with social anxiety disorder may not have had sufficient opportunities for varied social interaction while in their families of origin. This social isolation corrupts opportunities for developing a sense of confidence and mastery in social situations. Experiences in the family of origin can be instrumental in the development of social anxiety disorder. Specifically, emotionally distant but overinvolved and controlling parenting, physical and sexual abuse, modeling of parental social anxiety, and social isolation have all been identified at elevated rates in the histories of individuals with social anxiety disorder. Although there is some evidence to suggest an inherited genetic predisposition to anxious, this predisposition is not specific to social phobia. Social phobia may in fact run in families in a relatively specific fashion. Thus is there is not a specific genetic predisposition responsible for this finding, it would seem that family environment is instrumental in this transmission. There are savage creatures, moral monsters, and insane terrestrial beings who look like humans but have only partially entered into the human species in their passage up from lowers ones. Having human faces and limbs, digestive organs, is not enough to render them worthy of human classification. If there is so much more interest in the spiritual truth, there is also much more interest in its sinister reversions and perversions, the misuse of drugs and the abuse of pleasures of the flesh, influencing others through mental means for selfish ends, and worship of the powers of darkness. Young naïve and unbalanced persons seeking occult thrills and excitements, or recklessly curious about (to them) psychical novelties, are brought into foul malignant circles where their character is degraded and their understanding twisted. “I can do everything with the help of Christ who gives me the strength I need,” reports Philippians 4.13. #RandolphHarris 13 of 18
We draw to our lives that which we constantly think about. If we dwell on the negative, we will attract negative people, experiences, and attitudes. If we dwell on our fears, we will draw in more fear. You set the direction of your life with your thoughts. The choice is up to you. You do not have to entertain every thought that comes to mind. The first thing you need to do is ascertain where that thought is coming from. Is that thought from God, is it your own thought, or is it a destructive thought from the enemy? If a thought is negative, most likely it is from the enemy. If it is a discouraging, destructive thought; if it brings fear, worry, doubt, or unbelief; if the thought makes you feel weak, inadequate, or insecure, it is not from God. You need to deal with it immediately. “We should cast down every wrong imagination and take into captivity every wrong thought,” 2 Corinthians 10.5. That simply means do not dwell on it. Get rid of it immediately. Reject it, and choose to think on something optimistic. If one makes the mistake of dwelling on the enemy’s lies, one allows the negative seed to take root. And the more one thinks about it, the more it will grow like a weed, and kill all the plants you desire. The desired plants, in this case, are like the Word of God, faith, and love. The weed is like negative thoughts. Now, you do not want to let the weed grow so strong that it over takes your garden and spreads to your neighbour’s yard and through the community, until all the pretty plants and green grace is gone. “Incline your ear and hear the words of the wise, and apply you mind to knowledge; for it will be pleasant if you keep them within you, that they may be ready on your lips. So that your trust may be in the LORD,” reports Proverbs 22.17-19. Your mind is similar to a computer. However, what we often fail to consider is the fact that what you program into your computer will dictate how well it will function. How unwise it is to complain, “I hate this computer! It never gives me the right answer; it never does what I want it do it.” Think about it: You can have the most powerful computer in the World, but if you program it with the wrong software or with misinformation, it will not be able to function as the manufacturer intended. #RandolphHarris 14 of 18
Beyond that, there is a myriad of negative information lurking around, waiting for an opportunity to destroy your mind and faith in God. Such negative information can get into a perfectly good person’s mind and contaminate its thoughts. Before long, the person will start to become depressed and malfunction. Then this malfunction will spread to your school work, family, friends, and career and you will lose pleasure in everything. However, keep in mind, you are not defective, you have just received untrue information about yourself from people who want to hurt you. We were created in the image of God. Before we were ever formed, He programmed us to live abundant lives, to be happy, healthy and whole. However, when our thinking becomes contaminated, it is no longer in line with God’s Word. We make serious mistakes and wrong choices. We go through life with low self-esteem, worries, fears, feelings of inadequacy and insecurity. Making matters worse, we pass on our negative attitudes to others. When you recognize these things happening, you must reprogram your mind. You must change your thinking. Understand that you are not defective. Some people contain much cruelty and hatred. To inflict suffering on others gives them pleasure: and this could include cold-blooded scientists and politicians, misguided idealists and statesmen, obsessed drug addicts and one-sided vivisectors. The World today, more fiercely than ever, is a battleground for this ancient conflict between Right and Wrong. Various kinds and degrees of madness have appeared in the World in various expressions—in the forms of immorality, in the frictions of politics, and in the teachings of religion. If there is infinite love in or behind the World, there is also infinite suffering in the World. The evil forces have stirred up evil events and provocative crises, and striven to get the masses to react to them in an evil way. “I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses, beneficial and negative; therefore, God says choose life,” reports Deuteronomy 30.19. This is not a once-and-for-all matter. It is a choice we have to make on a moment-by-moment basis. We have to choose to dwell on what is right, rather than on what is wrong. Choose to focus on what you have, not what you do not have. Choose to think righteous thoughts. God has programmed you for success. #RandolphHarris 15 of 18
You cannot prevent negative thoughts from coming into your World, but you can control whether or not you copy those thoughts into your behaviour and actions. If you stand guard over that entrance and keep your mind focused on the good things of God, the Bible says that “God will keep you in perfect peace,” reports Isaiah 26.3. If you choose to dwell on righteous thoughts, you can have peace in the midst of your storms. Dwell on the truth that no weapon formed against you can prosper. If you start thinking these kinds of thoughts, you will be filled with faith and confidence, no matter what comes against you Monday through Sunday. Father, I get shaken up so easily by events in the World, and in my life. Please help me to keep my mind centered on You, and on the truth of Your Word. Please help me to have an optimistic, faith-filled attitude in the midst of difficult days as well as the good days. The mystics, in claiming that God is to be discovered in the self are well aware of what they are saying. It is by neglecting self that so many people have become really incapable of finding God. In the battle for survival, one of the ways of dealing with fear is to rigidify one’s response to life. Human beings have a deep, instinctive need to be loved and affirmed. When they are not loved, and are discounted instead—as inevitably occurs in growing up—they experience great pain, hurt, and fear. In order to survive, a person may adopt a specific defensive stance in life rather than dare spontaneous expression and risk being hurt again. One literally gets scared out of being one self. Such a person becomes like a piano player who gets stuck playing one note on the assumption that this is the only note that is safe to play. Many Christians gets stuck playing one note, rather than expressing the entire symphony of their personalities. There are four types that evolve out of being stuck on the four polarities and they are somewhat like characters one would read about in a novel. However, we are running out of time today, and will not be able to cover all the martial, but will in the coming week. #RandolphHarris 16 of 18
Nonetheless, these character traits can be seen from a humorous point of view, characterized like comic strip figures. A psychological portrait can have the fascination of a novel the humour of a comic strip. What we seek to do further is to explain the dynamics of such behaviour. Each of us reflects some of this behaviour and can grow from learning about it. We encourage the reader to keep a sense of humour as well as an attitude of understanding about such typical human foibles. We often grow most when we can laugh appropriately and with love at ourselves. Sometimes there is a pain or fear in seeing certain things about ourselves. Our suggestion is that that kind of pain is okay—even essential if one is to grow. It is like coming out of a dark cave and feeling painful sensation in our eyes at the first ray of the sun. After awhile we become accustomed to the light, and the temporary pain is replaced with permanent joy of seeing! In organization the presentation of the four primary ways that Christians get stuck in their growth, we wish to use the categories of the Striving Christian (strength polarity), the Helpless Christian (weakness polarity), the Critical Christian (anger polarity), and the Compliant Christian (love polarity). For each of these categories, we will develop the deterioration process from manipulative level to character style to psychosis. In describing these three levels, we will use commonsense words to explain the meaning of all clinical terminology. Now, keep these four types of Christians in mind, and we will cover them later this week in the upcoming lectures. Earth teach me stillness as the grasses are stilled with light. Earth teach me suffering as old stones suffer with memory. Each teach me humility as blossoms are humble with beginning. Earth teach me caring as the mother who secures her young. Earth teach me courage as the tree which stands alone. Earth teach me limitation as the ant which crawls on the ground. Earth teach me freedom as the eagle which soars in the sky. Earth teach me resignation as the leaves which die in the fall. Each teach me regeneration as the seeds which rise in the spring. Earth teach me to forget myself as snow forgets its life. Earth teach me to remember kindness as dry field weep with rain. #RandolphHarris 17 of 18
O God, in whom we live and move and have our being, please grant us sufficient rain and snow, so that, being supplied with what sustains us in this present life, we may seek more confidently what sustains us for eternity. Heavenly Father, we beg your protection, please save us from the perils of drought and fire, so that we may continue to serve you in good health, safety, and peace. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit forever and ever. We praise You, Eternal God—God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, Leah and Rachel. You are the Eternal God, who causes the wind to blow and the rain to fall—for a bless and not for a curse, for life and not for death, for plenty and not for scarcity. Creator God, bless us with water poured down from the sky. As surely as your word stands forever, so let the rain fall. Bring to life the water of the California Valley and surrounding terrain. Please open up your water spouts on high and let rivers of water flow, and send forth the blessing of lands on your heads, on our crops, and in our reserviours. Please bless us again that we may be energized to praise your name and to feed the hungry. May the rains come quickly and bless us through Jesus Christ by water and spirit. For the beauty and constancy of creation, we give You thanks; for our abuse and neglect of Your good, creation, we ask for forgiveness; for rain to refresh our bodies and to satisfy the parched Earth, we appeal to your mercies. For the sake of Your Son, our Lord Christ, who calmed the seas, O Father, please bring us rain. Thou who helpest the poor, save us. O Redeemer and Deliverer, do Thou cause us to prosper. Thou Rock of Ages, please answer us in the day that we call. Holy and revered God, please save us. Merciful and Compassionate One, do Thou cause us to prosper. Thou who keepest the covenant, please answer us in the day that we call. Thou who upholdest the innocent, please save us. Sovereign of eternity, do Thou cause us to prosper, Thou who art perfect in Thy ways, please answer us in the day that we call. Hear, O America: the Lord our God, the Lord is One. One is our God; great is our Lord; holy is His name. Extol the Lord with me, and together let us exalt His name. #RandolphHarris 18 of 18
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Randolph Harris II International Institute 