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In Our World of Divide and Conquer, the Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master House!
Miracles are not believed, even by those to whom they happen. A guru who thinks of oneself as having disciples has attachments. The ego is present in one. They are mentally held as possessions. An individual who is privileged to carry a message from the mountaintop down to one’s fellows should feel no envy of other messengers, no emotional disturbance at their success or one’s own failure. If one does, it means that the ego has inserted itself into one’s work and poisoned it. On the contrary, one which they could not hear for themselves. One ought to rejoice at their blessing, otherwise one is still worshipping oneself and not God. A true messenger will not look for followers but for those whom one can help. Exposed to flattery and obsequiousness though one will be, one will nevertheless keep quite free from pomposity and vanity. The teacher has to bear patiently with the defects and weakness of one’s students. If one’s insight were too limited, one’s compassion too small, and one’s calmness too superficial, one could not do this. Difference must be not merely tolerated, but seen as a fund of necessary polarities between which our creative can spark like a dialectic. Only then different strengths, acknowledged and equal, can the power seek new ways of being in the World generate, as well as the courage and sustenance to act where there are no charters. #RandolphHarris 1 of 23
Within the interdependence of mutual (nondominated) differences lies that security which enables us to descend into the chaos of knowledge and return with true visions of our future, along with the concomitant power to effect those changes which can bring that future into being. Difference is that raw and powerful connection from which our personal being is forged. Many people have been taught either to ignore their differences, or to view them as causes for separation and suspicion rather than as forces for change. Without community there is no liberation, only the most vulnerable and temporary armistice between an individual and one’s oppression. However, community must no mean a shedding of our difference, nor the pathetic pretense that these differences do not exist. Those of us who stand outside the circle of this society’s definition of acceptable people; those of us who have been forged in the crucible of difference—those of us who are less affluent, who are atypical, who are mature—know that survival is not an academic skill. It is learning how to stand alone, unpopular and sometimes reviled, and how to make common cause with those others identified at outside the structures in order to define and seek a World in which we can al flourish. It is learning how to take our differences and make the strengths. #RandolphHarris 2 of 23
We must learn to allow our unique qualities to make us strong for the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. They may allow for us to temporarily beat one at one’s own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change. And this fact is only threatening to those whom still define the master’s house as their only source of support. I believe most educators would agree that a high priority in education is to help individuals to acquire the learning, the information, and the personal growth that will enable them to deal more constructively with the “real World.” This is often the theme of commencement addresses, in which one expresses hopes or fears concerning how the new graduates will face and cope with the “real World.” It is often a topic in the final hours of intensive encounter groups, when individuals who have learned a great deal about themselves and about their interpersonal relationships are concerned about how they will behave when they return to their “real” lives outside. What is this “real World?” It is this question that I want to explore, and I believe that the direction in which my thinking has inexorably led me will be best portrayed by giving a number of personal commonplace examples. #RandolphHarris 3 of 23
A few weeks ago, I was sitting alone, late at night, on the deck of a beach cottage in norther California. As I sat there for several hours, a bright star on the horizon moved upward into clear view. A brilliant planet moved with the same slow, majestic speed from directly above me to a point well on my right. The star and the planet were accompanied in their movement by the Milk Way and all the other constellations. Obviously, I was the center of the Universe, and the Heavens were slowly revolving about me. It was a humbling experience (How small I am!) and an uplifting one (How marvelous to be such a focal point!). I was looking at the real World. Yet, in another corner of my mind, I knew that I, and the Earth beneath me, and the atmosphere surrounding me were moving at a breathless speed—faster than modern jet plane—in the direction I called east, and the stars and planets were, relative to the Earth, comparatively motionless. Although I could not see what I have just described, I knew that this—not the more obvious perception—was really the real World. On some level, we are aware that we are an infinitesimal speck on an insignificant planet in one of the minor galaxies (of which there are millions) in the Universe. We know that each of these galaxies are moving at an incredible speed, often exploding away from the others. Is this reality, too? #RandolphHarris 4 of 23
I am confused. However, at least there is one reality of which I can be sure: the hard wooden chair on which I sit, the solid Earth on which the deck rests, the stainless steel pen I hold in my hand. This is a reality that can not only be seen, but also felt and touched. These objects can sustain weight and pressure. They are solid. However, no, I know enough of science to challenge all this. The chair is made up of formerly living cells, intricate in their composition, composed more of space than of matter. The Earth is a slowly moving fluid mess, which shudders very frequently as it shrinks and cracks and crinkles. The road over which I drove yesterday had been a part of those shudders. One day in 1906, the Earth shrugged a little and the road cracked, and the western side of the crack was carried twenty feet north of its continuation on the other side. Solid Earth! And what about the reassuring hardness of my metal pen? They tell me it is composed of invisible atoms, moving at great speed. Each atom has a nucleus, and recent years have brought discoveries of more and more particles in those nuclei. Each particle is endowed with fantastically unbelievable characteristics; it moves in possibly random, possibly orderly trajectories in the great inner space of each atom. My pen is hardly the firm solid object that I so clearly feel and hold. The “real World” seems to be dissolving. #RandolphHarris 5 of 23
I am reassured, but also perplexed, by the statement of the great physical scientist, Sir James Jeans. He says: “The steam of human knowledge is impartially heading toward a nonmechanical reality: The Universe begins to look more like a great thought than a great machine.” Try that on your practical friend, or your plumber, or your stockbroker. Tell them, “The real World is just a great thought.” At any rate, the conception of a real World, obvious to anyone, is rapidly slipping completely out of my grasp. However, at least in the interpersonal World, I know my family and my friends; this knowledge is surely a solid basis on which I can act. However, then my memories trip me up. One needs only the simple occasion of a softly facilitated encounter group, where permission is given to express oneself, to discover how shaky our interpersonal knowledge is. Individuals have discovered in their closet friends and family members great realms of hidden feelings. There are previously unknown fears, feelings of inadequacy, suppressed rages and resentments, bizarre desires for pleasures of the flesh and fantasies, hidden pools of hopes and dreams, of joys and dread, of creative urges and unbidden loves. This reality, too, seems as unsure, as full unknowns, as any yet considered yet in this paper. So that individual is drive back to self: “At least I know who I am. I decide what I want t do, and I do it. That is for real.” However, is it? #RandolphHarris 6 of 23
If I talk to the behaviourist, one tells me, “You are nothing but the sum of your stimulus inputs and the conditioned responses you emit. All of the rest is illusion.” Well, finally we have reality. I am nothing but a mechanical robot. Or is that all? Where do my dreams come from? Perhaps that can be explained too. The I think of Jean, the woman who told me that her identical twin sister was driving back to her own home at night by a familiar route when Jean awoke in a panic of certainty. She phoned the highway police and told them, “There have been an accident on such-and-such a highway. It is a white car with his license and a lone woman driver.” There was a pause, and then the officer said, in a puzzled and slightly suspicious voice, “But how did you know about that lady? We only got the report of the accident two minutes ago.” What do we make of that kind of reality? That little episode opens up a whole train of thought about the inner Worlds and “separate realities.” In a World of possibility for us all, our personal visions help lay the groundwork for political action. The failure of academic feminists to recognize differences as crucial strength is a failure to reach beyond the first patriarchal lesson. In our World, divide and conquer must become define and empower. We need to foster interracial cooperation between races, cultures, occupations, lifestyles, and genders who do not love each other. Unity is powerful and important. #RandolphHarris 7 of 23
Feminists and other egalitarian movements have the same agenda, and that is to achieve equality for all of the group that they recognize. Many people are still caught up by discriminatory visions of the past, and those are being relived today. However, majority of society has educated themselves about humanity and the difference between people, and know that they key to survival is acceptance and understanding. To follow the Golden Rule, do on to others as you would have then do on to you. We all want to go to Heaven because Earth is not our final home. However, “the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord,” reports Romans 6.23. Humans of today are still being called upon to stretch across the gap of society’s ignorance and to educate humanity as to our existence and our needs. This is an old and primary tool of all oppressors to keep the oppressed occupied with the master’s concerns. Now we hear that it is the task of the young and mature to educate society—in the face of tremendous resistance—as to our existence, our differences, our relative roles in our joint survival. This is a diversion of energies and a tragic repetition of discriminatory thought. It is the knowledge of the genuine conditions of our lives that we must draw our strength to live and our reasons for acting. #RandolphHarris 8 of 23
Helping others to understand the art of proper living is itself an art. A person may be good and yet not a good teacher. Racism, sexism, Zeusophobia, homophobia, perennial disregard for law and order are real conditions of all our lives in this place and time. I urge each one of us here to reach down into that deep place of knowledge inside oneself and touch that terror and loathing of any difference that lives there. See whose face it wears. Then the personal as the political can begin to illuminate all our choices. The people have so much power and are coming out in masses and demanding changes, but violence is not the answer. Your mayors and governors are the ones who have control over how your state and local resources are distributed and they also have a strong influence in law enforcement, business and the media. You have the power to use all of people who are upset and want change to recall these people and put officials in office who will listen to you and build more affordable housing before expanding a theatre or erecting a sports colosseum, add more public transportation and supermarkets in communities that need them, and allocate more resources to educate, and make sure they make it to the classroom and are not eaten up on administrative costs and fees. #RandolphHarris 9 of 23
There is scarcely any neurosis in which the tendency to get rid of the self does not appear in a direct form. It may appear in fantasies of leaving home and becoming a derelict or of losing one’s identity; in an identification with a person one is reading about; in a feeling, as one individual put it, of being forlorn amid the darkness and the waves, of being at one with the darkness and the waves. The tendency is present in wishes to be hypnotized, in an inclination toward mysticism, in feelings of unreality, in an inordinate need for sleep, in the lure of sickness, insanity, death. And as I have mentioned before, in masochistic fantasies the common denominator is a feeling of being putty in the master’s hand, of being devoid of all will, of all power, of being absolutely subjected to another’s domination. Each different manifestation is of course determined in its special way and has its own implications. A feeling of being enslaved, for example, may be par of a general tendency to feel victimized, and as such be a defense against impulses to enslave others and also an accusation against others for not letting themselves be dominated. However, while it has also the secret positive value of self-surrender. #RandolphHarris 10 of 23
Whether the neurotic subjects oneself to a person or to fate, and whatever the kind of suffering which one allows to overpower one, the satisfaction one seeks seems to be the weakening or extinction of one’s individual self. One ceases then to be the active carrier of actions and becomes an object, without a will of one’s own. When masochistic strivings are thus integrated into the general phenomenon of a striving to relinquish the individual self, the satisfaction that is sought or attained by weakness and suffering loses its strangeness; it is put in a frame of reference that is familiar. The tenaciousness of masochistic strivings in neurotics is then accounted for by the fact that at the same time they serve as a protection against anxiety and provide a potential or real satisfaction. As we have seen, this satisfaction is seldom real except in fantasies about pleasures of the flesh or perversions, even though the striving for it is an important element in the general tendencies toward weakness and passivity. Thus a final question arises as to why the neurotic so rarely attains the oblivion and abandon, and thus the satisfaction, which one seeks. An important circumstance which prevents a definite satisfaction is that the masochistic drives are counteracted by the neurotic’s extreme emphasis on the uniqueness of one’s individuality. #RandolphHarris 11 of 23
Most masochistic phenomena share with neurotic symptoms the character of being a compromise solution of incompatible strivings. The neurotic tends to feel a prey to everyone’s will, but at the same time insists that the World should adapt itself to one. One tends to feel enslaved, but at the same time insists that one’s power over others should be unquestioned. One wants to be helpless and taken care of, but at the same time insists on being not only entirely self-sufficient but, in effect, omnipotent. One tends to feel that one is nothing, but is irritated when one is not taken for a genius. There is absolutely no satisfactory solution which could reconcile such extremes, particularly since both strivings are so strong. The drive toward oblivion is much more imperative in the neurotic than in the normal person because the former wants to get rid not only of the fears, limitations and isolations that are universal in human existence, but also of a feeling that one is trapped in insoluble conflicts and their resultant sufferings. And one’s contradictory drive toward power and self-aggrandizement is equally imperative and more than normally intense. Of course one does attempt to achieve the impossible, to be at once everything and nothing; one may, for example, live in a helpless dependence and at the same time exert a tyranny over others by means of one’s weakness. Such compromises one oneself mistake as a capacity for surrender. #RandolphHarris 12 of 23
In fact, sometimes even psychologist seem inclined to confound the two, and to assume that surrender is in itself a masochistic attitude. In reality the masochistic persons is, on the contrary, entirely incapable of giving oneself to anything or anyone; one is incapable, for example, of putting all one’s energies into the service of a cause, or of wholly giving oneself in love to another person. One can surrender oneself to suffering but in this surrender one is wholly passive, and the feeling or the interest or the person which is the cause of one’s suffering one uses only as a means to lose oneself for the sake of losing oneself. There is no active interplay between oneself and the other, but only one’s self-centered absorption in one’s own ends. Genuine surrender to a person or a cause is a manifestation of inner strength to a person or a cause is a manifestation of inner strength; masochistic surrender is ultimately a manifestation of weakness. Another reason why the satisfaction that is sought is seldom attained lines in the destructive elements inherent in the neurotic structure I have described. These are missing in the cultural “Dionysian” drives. In the latter there is nothing comparable to the neurotic destructiveness of all that constitutes the personality, of all its potentialities for achievement and happiness. #RandolphHarris 13 of 23
Let us compare the Greek Dionysian cult, for example, the neurotic fantasies of becoming insane. In the former the desire was for a transitory ecstatic experience serving to enhance the joy of life; in the latter the same drive toward oblivion and abandon serves neither as a temporary submergence leading to reemergence, nor as a means of making life richer and fuller. Its goal is to get rid of the whole tormenting self, regardless of its values, and therefore the intact part of the personality reacts to it with fear. In fact, fear of disastrous possibilities toward which part of the personality impels the whole is usually the only factor in the process that impinges upon awareness. All the neurotic knows about it is that one has a fear of becoming insane. Only when the process is separated into its component parts—a drive toward self-relinquishment and a reactive fear—can it be understood that one is striving for a definite satisfaction but is prevented by one’s fears from attaining it. One factor peculiar to our culture serves to reinforce the anxiety connected with the drives toward oblivion. In Western civilization there are but few, if any, cultural patterns in which these drives, even regardless of their neurotic character, can be satisfied. Religion, which offered such a possibility, has lost its power and appeal for the majority. #RandolphHarris 14 of 23
Not only are there no effective cultural means for such satisfaction, but their development is actively discouraged, for in an individualistic culture the individual is expected to stand on one’s own feet, assert oneself, and if necessary fight one’s way. In our culture to yield realistically to tendencies toward self-relinquishment involves the danger of ostracism. In view of the fears that usually debar the neurotic from the specific satisfactions for which one is striving, it is possible to understand the value for one of masochistic fantasies and perversions. If one drives for self-relinquishment are lived out in fantasies or in pleasures of the flesh practices one can perhaps escape one’s danger of complete self-obliteration. Like the Dionysian cults, these masochistic practices provide a temporary oblivion and abandon, with comparatively little risk of harm to the self. Usually they pervade the whole structure of the personality; sometimes they are concentrated on pleasures of the flesh activities, aggressive and successful in their own work, but are impelled from time to time to indulge in masochistic perversions such as dressing like the opposite gender or playing the naughty boy or girl and having themselves beaten. On the other hand, the fears that prevent the neurotic from finding a satisfactory solution of one’s difficulties may also pervade one’s masochistic drives. #RandolphHarris 15 of 23
If these drives are of a pleasure of the flesh nature one will then, in spite of intense masochistic fantasies concerning relations of pleasures of the flesh, keep away from pleasures of the flesh altogether, showing a repugnance toward the other gender, or at least grave inhibitions with pleasures of the flesh. Dr. Freud regards masochistic drives as an essentially phenomenon involving pleasures of the flesh. Originally he regarded masochism as an aspect of a definite, biologically determined stage of sexual development, the so-called anal-sadistic stage. Later he added the hypothesis that masochistic drives have an inherent kinship with feminine nature and imply something like living out a wish to be the opposite gender. His last assumption, as mentioned before, is that masochistic drives are a combination of self-destructive and drives dealing with pleasures of the flesh, and that their function is to render the self-destructive drives harmless to the individual. My point of view, on the other hand, may be summed up as follows. Masochistic drives are neither an essential phenomenon dealing with pleasures of the flesh nor the result of biologically determined processes, but originate in personality conflicts. Their aim is not suffering; the neurotic wishes to suffer as little as anyone else wishes it. #RandolphHarris 16 of 23
Neurotic suffering, inasmuch as it serves certain functions, is not what the person wants but what one pays, and the satisfaction one aims at is not suffering itself but a relinquishment of the self. Most of us are familiar with the often used but very true expression, “There, but for the grace of God, go I.” Perhaps we have even uttered it on occasion. However, do we sincerely believe it? I think not. If we truly believed it, we would be far less judgmental, much more compassionate toward, and quick to pray for our brothers and sisters in Christ. God has been a beneficial purpose in giving the thorn, whatever it was, to Paul. And it was God who gave it, even though it was given through the instrumentality of Satan. Satan certainly had no interest in curbing Paul’s temptation to pride; he would have wanted just the opposite. As in the case of Job, Satan undoubtedly wanted to drive a wedge between Paul and the Lord; he wanted Paul to turn against God. However, just as God and Satan had different purposes for Paul’s thorn in the flesh. God never allows pain without a purpose in the lives of His children. He never allows Satan, nor circumstances, nor any ill-intending person to afflict us unless He uses that affliction for our good. #RandolphHarris 17 of 23
God never wastes pain. He always causes it to work together for our ultimate good, the good of conforming us more to the likeness of His Son. “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers,” reports Romans 8.28-29. God’s purpose for Paul’s thorn is clearly stated in the text: “to keep me from becoming conceited,” reports 2 Corinthians 12.7. Sometimes God’s purpose for allowing pain in our lives is clear; more often, it seems, it is not. In fact, frequently a great part of the pain is the sheer irrationality of it. God never explained to Job the Purpose of his unbelievable pain. He left Job to suffer in the dark, so to speak. That is usually our experienced. Paul said the thorn was given to torment him. Other various translate the verb as “harass,” “buffet,” or “afflict.” The same verb is used in 1 Corinthians 4.11 where it is translated as “brutally treated.” Paul was brutally treated by Satan. The apostle Peter said, “Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour,” reports 1 Peter 5.8. The devil is cruel and vicious. He would devour us, if he could. He torments us to the full extent God allows. #RandolphHarris 18 of 23
However, as was the case when Joseph’s brother sold him into slavery, through the devil intends to harm us, God intends it for good. “You intended to harm me, but God intended if for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives,” reports Genesis 50.20. Paul’s reaction to this thorn was one of deep anguish. He said, “Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me,” reports 2 Corinthians 12.8. Although the turn was always present, there were probably times when its pain, whether physical or emotional or both, was unusually severe. It is likely that on three of those occasions Paul was driven to cry out to God for its removal. Mormon abridges the large plates of Nephi—he puts the small plates with the other plates—King Benjamin established peace in the land. About After Death 385. “And now I, Mormon, being about to deliver up the record which I have been making into the hands of my son Moroni, behold I have witnessed almost all the destruction of my people, the Nephites. And it is many hundreds of years after the coming of Christ that I deliver these records into the hands of my son; and it supposeth me that he will witness the entire destruction of my people. However, many God grant that he may survive them, that he may write somewhat concerning them, and somewhat concerning Christ, that perhaps someday it may profit them. #RandolphHarris 19 of 23
“And now, I speak somewhat concerning that which I have written; for after I had made an abridgment from the plates of Nephi, down to the reign of this king of Benjamin, of whom Amaleki spake, I searched among the records which has been delivered into my hands, and I found these plates, which contained this small account of the prophets, from Jacob down to the reign of this kind Benjamin, and also many of the words of Nephi. And the things which are upon these plates pleasing me, because of he prophecies of the coming of Christ; and my fathers knowing that many of them have been fulfilled; yea, and I also know that as many things as have been prophesied concerning us down to this day have been fulfilled, and as many as go beyond this day must surely comes to pass—wherefore, I chose these things, to finish my record upon them, which remainder of my record I shall take from the plates of Nephi; and I cannot write the hundredth part of the things of my people. However, behold, I shall take these plates, which contain these prophesyings and revelations, and put them with the remainder of my record, for they are choice unto me; and I know they will be choice unto my brethren. And I do this for a wise purpose; for thus it whispereth me, according to the workings of the Spirit of the Lord which is in me. And now, I do not know all things; but the Lord knoweth all things which are to come; wherefore, one worketh in me to do according to his will. #RandolphHarris 20 of 23
And my prayer to God is concerning my brethren, that they may once again come to knowledge of God, yea, the redemption of Christ; that they may once again be a delightsome people. And now I, Mormon, proceed to finish out my record, which I take from the plates of Nephi; and I make it according to the knowledge and the understanding which God has given me. Wherefore, it came to pass that after Amaleki had delivered up these plates into the hands of king Benjamin, he took them out and put them with the other plates, which contained records which had been handed down by the kings, from generation to generation until the days of king Benjamin. And they were handed down from king Benjamin, from generation to generation until they have fallen into my hands. And I, Mormon, pray to God that they may be preserved from this time henceforth. And I know that they will be preserved; for there are great things written upon them, out of which my people and their brethren shall be judged at the great and last day, according to the word of God which is written. And now, concerning this king Benjamin—he had somewhat of contentions among his own people. And it came to pass also that the armies of the Lamanites came down out of the land of Nephi, to battle against his people. However, behold, king Benjamin gathered together his armies, and he did stand against them; and he did fight with the strength of his own arm, with the sword of Laban. #RandolphHarris 21 of 23
“And in the strength of the Lord they did contend against their enemies, until they had slain many thousands of the Lamanites. And it came to pass that they did contend against the Lamanites until they had driven them out of all the lands of their inheritance. And it came to pass that after there had been false Christs, and their mouths had been shut, and they punished according to their crimes; and after there had been false prophets, and false preachers and teachers among the people, and all these having been much contention and many dissension away unto the Lamanites, behold, it came to pass that king Benjamin, with the assistance of the holy prophets who were among his people—for behold, king Benjamin was a holy man, and he did reign over his people in righteousness; and there were many holy people in the land, and they did speak the word of God with power and with authority; and they did use much sharpness because of the stiffneckedness of the people—wherefore, with the help of these, king Benjamin, by labouring with all the might of his body and the faculty of his whole soul, and also the prophet, did once more establish peace in the land. Being filled with the very essence of restoration and life, we beseech Thee, O Lord our God, that by the Heavenly Gifts which Thou art pleased to bestow on us, Thou wouldest grant us to cleave to things Heavenly; through Jesus Christ our Lord. #RandolphHarris 22 of 23
Elector of Saints, blessed is the person whom Thou choosest and callest to Thyself. With Thee is mercy, redemption, assurance, forgiveness; Thou hast lifted me, a prisoner, out of the pit of sin and pronounced my discharge, not only in the courts of Heaven, but in the dock of conscience; hast justified me by faith, given me peace with Thee, made me to enjoy glorious liberty as Thy child. Save me from the false hope of the hypocrite: May I never suppose I am in Christ unless I am a new creature, never think I am born of the Spirit unless I mind the things of the Spirit, never rest satisfied with professions of belief and outward forms and services, while my heart is not right with Thee. May I judge my sincerity in religion by my fear to offend Thee, my concern to know Thy will, my willingness to deny myself. May nothing render me forgetful of Thy glory, or turn me aside from Thy commands, or shake my confidence in Thy promises, or offend Thy children. Let not my temporal occupations injure my spiritual concerns, or the cares of life make me neglect the one thing needful. May I not be inattentive to the design of Thy dealings with me, or insensible under Thy rebukes, or immobile at Thy calls. May I learn the holy art of abiding in Thee, of being in the World and not of it, making everything not only consistent with but conducive to my religion. #RandolphHarris 23 of 23
BRIGHTON STATION AT CRESLEIGH RANCH
Rancho Cordova, CA |
Now Selling!
Brighton Station at Cresleigh Ranch is Rancho Cordova’s newest home community! This charming neighborhood offers an array of home types with eye catching architecture styles such as Mid-Century Modern, California Modern, Prairie, and Contemporary Farmhouse.
Located off Douglas Road and Rancho Cordova Parkway, the residents of Cresleigh Ranch will enjoy, being just minutes from shopping, dining, and entertainment, and quick access to Highway 50 and Grant Line Road providing a direct route into Folsom. Residents here also benefit from no Home Owner Association (HOA) fees, two community parks and the benefits of being a part of the highly-rated Elk Grove Unified School District.
Best of all, each Cresleigh home comes fully equipped with an “All Ready” connected home! This smart home package comes included with your home and features great tools including: video door bell and digital deadbolt for the front door, connect home hub so you can set scenes and routines to make life just a little easier. Two smart switches and USB outlets are also included, plus we will gift you a Google Home Hub and Google Mini to help connect everything together! https://cresleigh.com/brighton-station/home-site-79/
Refreshed with the participation of the sacred Gift, we beseech Thee, O Lord our God, that we may feel the effectual working of the rite which we celebrate; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord.






No one lives without accumulating stories. Many things in life offer useful guidance toward finding spiritual values in the World. The spirituality of a place might be marked with a well or drawing on the ground, or a monument, like a castle or mansion. When we place markers on historical battlefields or on houses where our ancestors were born, or where significant historical figures lives, we are performing a genuine spiritual act. We are honoring the special spirit that is attached to a particular place. Family is also a source and focus of spirituality. In many traditions a home shrine and special photographs honor family members. Rites of family gatherings, visits, storytelling, photographs albums, keepsakes, and even tapes of elderly relatives recording their recollections can be spiritual acts that nourish the soul. “The final state of the soul is to dwell with God or be cast out (1 Nephi 15.35).” The opportunity to voice memories to a person who both cares and understands is the most satisfying kind of completion. Story-telling is therefore far more valuable than it may seem. Realizing that such stories allow us to make an ending and find worth in the past elevates remembering and listening to their actual stature. We widen our solitudes by esteeming our memories and making use of them, instead of guarding them in a secret chess, disregarding them, or keeping them to ourselves. #RandolphHarris 1 of 7
Action and speech are indeed the two activities whose end result will always be a story with enough coherence to be told. The most important and challenging way to honor our ancestors is to fulfill our personal and potential life’s purpose here on Earth. It can take a lifetime to know our parents in their full humanness. As we get older, our respect for our parents’ achievements increases, as does our sympathy for their disappointments and letdowns. The more our own lives twist in unexpected and humbling directions, the more we realize that our parents had been similarly buffeted. We become our parents’ retrospective peers, seeing more of them as we attain each decade. To be fully understood, vulnerability has to be lived rather than merely witnessed. It is not easy to imagine that one’s own body, which is so fresh and often so full of pleasant feelings could slow down, become tired, and may not be as agile as it once was. One cannot imagine it and, in the end, one does not want to. Many of the realizations that rush upon us as we mature are simply not attainable earlier in life. When our parents need our help prior to passing into Heaven, the period after they pass away, and the time of life when we ourselves are weak and near passing, changes our perspective on life and what we scrutinize. #RandolphHarris 2 of 7
Indeed, it is this period of the relationship that is perhaps the most difficult and, at the same time, the most significant. However, knowing that there is a God who strongly protects against intrusion and violation might help nurture that spirit in our own lives and honor it in others. We may discover that there are ways to be spiritual that do not counter the soul’s needs for body, individuality, imagination, and exploration. Eventually, we might find that all emotions, all human activities, and all spheres of life have deep roots in the mysteries of the soul, and therefore are holy. As children, the chief illusion we project upon our parents are that they know what they are doing and that they have control over what happens. It does not occur to us that what appears to be inflexibility may actually be a cover for confusion, or what comes out of anger may stem from stress, or what seems to be neglect and a lack of concern may be the consequence of depression. If we allow them to account for themselves and to acknowledge the extent to which their actions stemmed from their own weaknesses, all of this can make sense later. The more hurtfully our parents treated us as children, the more crucial it is for us to try to ascertain the wounds of their upbringing. Otherwise, their weaknesses become holes into which we pointlessly pour or resentment. #RandolphHarris 3 of 7
Everyone of their failures has a story behind it, a history which has been carried forward and re-expressed rising out of a collective need for stronger union between the human and the divine. Exploring the implications of the soul allows us to learn our parents’ history and to see them as people, rather than to react blindly against them and risk replicating their hurts in our own lives. Turing the furor of our reactions into a reasonable quest for understanding is made easier when we are granted full access to our parents’ histories. Formal teachings, rites, and stories of religions provide an inexhaustible source of reflection on the mysteries of the soul. While listening to our mother or father, we might find ourselves standing in the powerful, streaming currents of time and fate. This may represent the stream of events and persons in which the individual finds one’s place. No one lives without making mistakes and incurring regrets, yet we all hope to be worthy of regard in the end. We learn from these formal sources how to understand and deal with the soul in special circumstances, and also how to understand similar images when they appear in dreams. We all hope that our parents survive into extended old age. Many cultures maintain that we each have a unique destiny to fulfill. #RandolphHarris 4 of 7
It is nice to have many generations in families being alive at the same time, leading to new opportunities for reworking and repairing relations between parents and children. This will also further the collective growth and maturation in the spirit realms. We are all children of parents, yet the ability to picture our parents as children can easily elude us. Like nothing else, such glimpses across generations permits us to comprehend those who shaped us and ultimately ourselves. We must find our soul’s purpose as an ethical and loving person. The ancestors are seen as allies in this process of remembering and a reservoir of power and backing to help us embody our potential in this lifetime. Conversely, when we have lost touch with a sense of greater purpose, if we are fortunate, the ancestors may bring about life changes aimed to guide us into greater contact with our soul’s longing and increased awareness of the agreements made before our birth. This may be an inspiring metaphor of the willingness to step courageously into the river of existence, instead of finding ways to remain safe, dry, and unaffected. The notion of reciprocity, of being helped and then helping in return, appeals to our basic requirement for balance and order. When children watch their parents take time out of their bust lives to help their parents, they learn that devotion can persist. #RandolphHarris 5 of 7
Children should realize that if they regret the longevity of their parents, they will actually be regretting their own future longevity. As we get to know our parents better, we have new opportunities for correcting old misconceptions. One young man was shocked by something his father did. His father never let anyone near his checkbook. However, he got a really bad trimmer in his hand, but still insisted on paying all his bills himself. One day, out of the blue, he called his son up and asked him to come over to help him write out checks. The son could not believe it. He was incredibly nervous when he sat down next to him to do it. Although he handles million-dollar budgets for his company, his hand also started to shake because he was so honored to help his father with his precious checkbook, as it was a bonding experience. In a way, the father was allowing his son to participate in the ritual of becoming the man of the house. His father’s trust was sweeter to this son than his achievement in the corporate World. Also, the father had the opportunity to see how important he was in his son’s life, despite his son’s having garnered every external success. #RandolphHarris 6 of 7
Extending leniency to our parents gives us hope that someone will do the same for us when we reach this position of physical need and spiritual reckoning. Even fumbled efforts at helpfulness and reconciliation are significant reckoning. Even fumbled efforts at helpfulness and reconciliation are significant for the hope that they instill and the example they set. People feel blessed to have their parents live so long and that hope is the essence of the commandment to honor our parents, making the prospect of living a long life less frightening. Whatever helps us to become more ethical, on even kilt, and open-hearted is one of the most powerful and sincere offerings we can make to our ancestors. An individual must take time every day to remind oneself that we are also spirits, that we are one with God, and to try to being about a deep realization that there is a power greater than oneself sustaining us; a wise counselor guiding us; a generous provider who is ready and willing to meet the needs of everyday life. We do not deny either the body or the mind, but we do affirm the spirit as the supreme presence and the superior principle of all life. We do come from this thing that we call life, or God, and we are fundamentally spiritual beings even while in the flesh. Therefore, in order to be whole, we must establish a right relationship within this trinity of our being, which is thought, feeling and action. #RandolphHarris 7 of 7
The soul’s indications are many, but they are usually extremely subtle. In the process of civilization, the far most important thing is the aim of creating unity out of the individual human beings. It is true that the aim of happiness is still there, but it is pushed into the background. It almost seems as if the creation of a great human community would be successful, we should focus on the benefit of the soul. The soul does not necessarily benefit from long, hard work, nor from fairness of any kind. Its effects are achieved more with God than effort. While it is true that science must deal with cause and effect in practical applications, it is also true that in physics the antiquated idea of cause and effect has been eliminated, which means that things do not always work in the way they are supposed to, basing the performance on precedent. Just because an individual has worked a long time and is fair about it, does not mean one will have the benefits of soul one wants. Nor should any individual enter such work innocently, agreeing to work hard, and then expect something for their labour. This consumer logic is based on fairness and reasonableness, and has nothing to do with the way the soul operates and may be the least effective way to seek out the soul’s power. #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
The soul is more mysterious. The developmental process of the individual can thus be expected to have special features of its own which are not reproduced in the process of human civilization. Just as a planet revolves around a central body as well as rotating on its own axis, so the human individual takes part in the course of development of humankind at the same time as one pursues one’s own path in life. However, to our dull eyes the play of forces in the Heavens seems fixed in a never-changing order; in the field of organic life we can still see how the forces contend with one another, and how the effects of the conflict are continually changing, as though it were the envelope of the soul. Much of the civilization of the future may oppress the life of the individual today. We lose opportunities to know ourselves for our motives and our secrets because people just want to open our boxes and pry into our lives when we may not even to share a cup of coffee with them. Disregard for privacy, increasing technology is at the forerunner of this conflict. Do we need to expose everything that is hidden? Do we need to understand all mysteries? We are used to hearing about the great revelations of science—the discovery of atoms, particles, and DNA—and so quite naturally we think that mysteries are there to be solved. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
People have at all times set the greatest value on ethics, as though they expected that it in particular would produce especially important results. And it does in fact deal with a subject which can easily be recognized as the sorest spot in every civilization. Ethics is thus to be regarded as a therapeutic attempt—as an endeavor to achieve, by means of a command of God to get rid of the greatest hindrance to civilization, namely, the constitutional inclination of human beings to be aggressive towards one another; and for that very reason we are especially interested in what is probably the most recent of the cultural commands of God, the commandment to love one’s neighbor ur as oneself. From the point of view of soul, it is just as important, maybe more important, to check the urgency of curiosity and suspicion, to allow certain things to remain distant and buried, to trust one’s soul mate or mate soul with things that should not be brought to the light of day. Because we know that science cannot get along without dealing with cause and effect any more than a farmer can get along without planting crops if one expects to reap a harvest. If we want an unbroken bond with an individual, we have to respect their privacy so our relationships will be tightened by reverence. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
The special lesson in the power of soul is learned in the moments of thought when it is decided by someone that their chest would remain closed. The soul, too, does not trouble itself enough about the fact of the mental constitutions of human beings. It issues a command and does not ask whether it is possible for people to obey it. On the contrary, it assumes that a human’s soul is psychologically capable of anything that is required of it, and our soul has unlimited mastery over on beings. One can easily overpower another person and discover his or her secrets, but by preserving their privacy, one maintains one’s power. In general, we keep our power when we protect the power of others. The commandment, “Love thy neighbor as thyself,” is the strongest defense against human aggressiveness and an excellent example of the respect God expects of us. You ever heard that Summer bodies are made in the Winter? That means if we want to tone up our bodies, we start before the Summer arrives to achieve our goals. Likewise, we should start preparing for Heaven, while we are on Earth. There is time. We still have the farmer, planting time, and harvest season, but we also have an alternative. There is also a choice and volition introducing a personal factor. Humans have free will. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
The fateful question for the human species seems to be whether and to what extent their cultural development will succeed in mastering the disturbance of their communal life by the human instinct of aggression and self-destruction. New causes bring new effects, and every sequence of cause and effect takes place in something which is greater than cause or effect. Freedom is where it is perceived and in such a degree as it is recognized. Such an attitude is scientific and mathematical. The soul practices a different kind of math and logic. It presents images that are not immediately intelligible to the reasoning mind. It insinuates, offers fleeting impressions, persuades more with desire than with reasonableness. In order to reach the soul’s power, one has to be conversant with its style, and watchful. The soul also gives us a vision that nothing is solid, everything is moving, shifting, changing. Even though we view the Universe as a mass of solid facts, God is the supreme cause and has liquid laws, for matter is spirit reduced to its greatest thinness. We focus on the purpose of life because the ultimate objective of our mortal journey has been revealed by our Creator, who said, “If you keep my commandments and endure to the end you shall have eternal life, which is the greatest of all the gifts of God.” #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
The reward is worth the effort. God’s gift of eternal life is subject to conditions established by him. “Behold, are not the things that God has wrought marvelous in our eyes? And who can comprehend the marvelous works of God? Who shall say that is was not a miracle that by God’s word the Heaven and the Earth should be; and by the power of this word humans were created of the dust of the Earth; and by the power of God’s word have miracles been wrought (Mormon 9.17)?” God allowed us to come to Earth with freedom to choose our own course. In his great love, he did not leave us alone. He provided a guide—a spiritual Global Positioning System (GPS)—to help us achieve successful navigation and tracking in our journey. Spiritual nature is love and truth and beauty. The Bible refers to the spirit moving upon the face of the deep, which means absolute intelligence thinking within itself. This is but another way of saying that the starting point of every creation is the word of God or the word of Universal intelligence. Our excruciating experiences will develop in us an unshakable faith in God. We have a great heritage of love—love of God and love of humankind. It is an inheritance of sobriety, independence, hard work, high moral values, and fellowship. #RandolphHarris 6 of 6
Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty. The social structural conditions to which the poor are exposed (chronic unemployment and under-employment, low income, lack of property ownership, absence of saving and chronic shortage of food, money, medical care, and other necessities of life) give rise to distinctive patterns of community and family disorganization. These, in turn, produce a distinctive set of beliefs, attitudes, and values (that is, strong feelings of marginality, of helplessness, of dependence, and of inferiority, weak ego structure; confusion of sexual identification; lack of impulse control; strong present-time orientation, with relatively little ability to defer gratification and plan for the future. The cultural of poverty, however, is not only an adaptation to a set of objective conditions of the larger society. Once it comes into existence, it tends to perpetuate itself from generation to generation because of its effect on the children. By the time underprivileged children are age six or seven they have usually absorbed the basic values and attitudes of their subcultural and are not psychologically geared to take full advantage of the changing conditions or increased opportunities that may occur in their lifetimes. #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob, and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe. Initially (time/generation I) structural conditions of poverty give rise to subcultural patterns (that is, family and community disorganization), and both of these create in children and adults the patterns of individual personality and behavior characteristic of the poor (for example, weak ego structure, inability to delay gratification). For persons who first become poor as adults (for example, as a result of migration, economic depression, drought, and so forth), this personality and behavior pattern is an adaptation to changed structural conditions. However, their children know nothing else and tend to recreate the same subcultural patterns and to pass on these same personality and behavior patterns to their children. And so on for succeeding generations—a shared set of individual beliefs, values, and attitudes (cultural of poverty) become self-perpetuating and may persist in spite of changes in the larger structural conditions. Saving our planet, lifting people out of poverty, advancing economic growth, these are one and the same challenge. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
New generations resemble preceding ones because they confront the same structural conditions and hardships. A housing crisis is increasing poverty levels in California. As of now, 51 percent of adults live in middle-income households, and 29 percent live in lower-income households, while only 20 percent live in upper-income households. The lack of affordable housing, and apartments for middle class, and lower-income families is the reason so many people are struggling to make it. The median cost of a house is now $500,000.00, which is twice the national cost, and homelessness is rapidly increasing across the state. While the region’s median household income is $61,320.00 and the nationwide median is $53,291.00. In contrast the poor are bring in between $14,000.00 to $24,000.00 a year, and there is no place less than $1,000.00 a year for rent. As long as poverty, injustice and gross inequality persist in our World, none of us can truly rest. Poverty, including rates of unemployment, crime, school dropout rates, and drug use, are assumed to be the result of behavior preferred by individuals living within conditions of poverty. The culture of poverty theory presumes the development of a set of deviant norms, whereby behaviors like drug use and gang participation are viewed as the standard (normative) and even desired behaviors of those living in low-income neighborhoods. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
Alternatively, individuals behave in ways that are nominally illegal, like participation in the underground economy or participation in gangs, not because they wish to do so or are following cultural norms, but because they have no choice, given the lack of educational and job opportunities available in their neighborhoods. In other words, individual living in poverty may see themselves as forced to turn to illegal methods of getting money, for example by selling drugs, simply to survive within the conditions of the hot economy. Poor children generally share the values, beliefs, and attitudes of the larger society, but as they experience the same lack of socioeconomic opportunity as their parents, they adopt the peculiar social and individual modes of response that characterize the culture of poverty. Also, some people who turn to selling drugs, for instance, to make a living, after they get started, they are not willing to turn to conventional means of earning a living because some of them can make $10,000.00 in a weekend, others have reported making $60,000.00 a month, and they are not willing to give that up to make $10 an hour, as they are making more than a lot of doctors. Hard core drug users spend approximately $60 billion a year on drugs. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
Although the dealers are putting their lives and freedom in danger with every transaction they make, and many do get shot and beat up, they feel it is worth it because the money gives them something to live for. They can buy brand new cars, houses, and where there is money, there are a lot of beautiful women. If the set of structural conditions persist, they will recreate the same sociocultural and personality patterns in the new generation. Living in poverty and being unable to participate in the economy is oppressive. People are walking on eggshells. If they are accepted for affordable housing, it is a blessing, because most of the waiting lists in most cities are 20,000 people long. Then affordable housing is no way to live. The people are usually the undesirable people like criminals, uneducated, prostitutes, and drug attics. Also, because most people in affordable housing are on government assistance, they do not work due to physical disability or serious mental problems and tend to be dirty, loud, rude, and violent. They also attract a lot of homeless people and that is why people do not want affordable housing in their communities. The solution would be to give people vouchers, like a supplement to their rent, so they could spread out the undesirables, and they are not segregated to one apartment building or neighborhood. #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
When affordable housing is erected in high-income areas, the strong housing prices drop very locally and then it radiates outward over time. The new low-income building can lead to a loss of approximately $17 million, as the poverty values individual decrease by 15 percent. That is why education is to important. Education promotes equality and lifts people out of poverty. It teaches children how to become good citizens, how to work for a living, and the righteous values. Education is not just for the privileged few, it is for everyone. It is a fundamental human right. When people are educated it changes their culturally patterned ways of thinking, feeling, and behaving that will be passed on from one generation to the next. That is why a lot of people in the early 19th and 20th century enlisted in the armed services, it taught them discipline and provided education benefits, and helped them learn to deal with society. “The poor and the needy search for water, but there is none; their tongues are parched with thirst. However, if I the Lord will answer them; I, the God, will not forsake them. I will make rivers flow on barren heights, and springs within the valleys. I will turn the desert into pools of water, and the parched grounds into springs.” (Isaiah 41.17-18) #RandolpHarris 6 of 6
A variety of interpersonal and intrapersonal processes lead people to underestimate the degree to which the personality of others is in varying degrees from one relationship to another. They also help to explain why outsiders often misjudge the character of a relationship. Not only are many facets of a relationship shrouded in privacy, but an outsider’s view is greatly colored by his or her relationship with each partner. The partners are different persons to some extent when interacting with the outside observer than they are when interacting with each other. Also, each partner’s assessment of a relationship, like its form, is unique, dependent as it is on the distinctive characteristics of the persons involved and the history of the relationship. Relationships are occurring at two levels, the cognitive and the emotional. People may experience a variety of feelings and engage in particular behaviors they feel belong with a specific type of relationship. Their responses reflect individual differences in personality, including their responses reflect individual differences in personality. They also reflect shared cultural and subcultural definitions of the appropriate feelings and behavior of person who are linked in a particular relationship, as friends, as lovers, as parents and child, and so forth. #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
Attractions appears to be augmented by both unpleasant as well as pleasant experiences. Emotional arousal whatever its source, optimistic or pessimistic, maybe experienced as attraction or love and is likely to happen because of the existence of an ideology in Western culture that suggests how persons in the early phase of a heterosexual relationship are supposed to feel. These ideas about how a person should feel and behave when in love are reflected in popular songs and literature throughout the Western World. I have often wondered because of the media, do people actually understand their own emotions, feelings, attitudes, and beliefs, or are the just being programmed by the media and do not understand it? “I want all my clothes designer, I want someone else to buy them. If I can’t get it right now, I don’t want it. Give me all of your attention, give me Summer in the Hamptons. If I cannot get it right now, I don’t want it,” are the lyrics of a song by Kim Petras called I Don’t Want it at All. The lyrics are significant because it shows the attitude of many youth and adults today. They want fancy things and your love, but are not willing to work for it or wait. Society has become increasingly materialistic and focuses on products and instant gratification. After all, people are willing to spend ten hours waiting in line to buy a $1,000.00 phone just because it is new. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
We are raising a bunch of Machiavellian persons, and they consider their goals to be of prime importance. The more extreme the Machiavellianism, the greater harm the person will be ready to indirectly (or perhaps directly) inflict on others to achieve their own goals. If parents were serious about helping their children retire in the future, that $1,000.00 could be put in a wealth account, and at a 6 percent a year interest rate over 65 years, it would produce $44,145 in tax-deferred savings. That is enough for a retired person to live on for a year. Also, the existence of a wealth account from birth would encourage more saving. Delaying gratification and spending can be beneficial. And if parents or grandparents invested $20 more a month, for twenty years, when the child retired that account would be worth over $240,000.00. It requires mindful planning and self-reflection to accomplish bliss within your life. When people go to work they goal is to create more freedom and happiness. The Holy Spirit works sanctification in our mind and soul in the present, and our Heavenly Father will align our minds with our spirits, so we are happier. The more we align our thoughts, will, and emotions with our flesh, instant gratification, and materialism, the less joy we experience. We must renew our minds daily in order to align our thoughts, will, and emotions with the Holy Spirit. And we are happiest when that worthy purpose is the kingdom of God. Labor much in the spirit, wrestle with God in mighty prayers, that he will pour out his Spirit upon you. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
Attraction can be explained in some part based on what is generally acceptable or thought of as normal. Love occurs as a rule in heterosexual relationships rather than in same sexed ones because of our culture encourages the labeling of states of arousal and consequently the experiencing of emotions in the form of love. The development of identity interdependence, along with sexual exploration and other activities typical of courtship, leads to both pleasurable and, at times, uncomfortable states of arousal. The heightened expectations concerning these matters fostered by romanticism, and the uncertainty of their realization, may explain why the intensity of feeling during this early phase of the initiation and consolidation of a relationship is followed by a more placid phase where uncertainty and unevenness in the rewarding quality of experience are replaced by certainty and routine, and the feeling between partners become more like those identified as companionate love. Companionate love is a kind of bond that is characterized by a deep commitment to one another, such as in a long-term marriage where the passion has left but not the deep affection for one another. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
The intensity of feeling characteristic of romantic love or passionate love does appear to recur, either where the situation is heavily laden with supporting cues and definitions, for example, a second honeymoon, or during periods of heightened physiological arousal. A variety of interpersonal and intrapersonal processes lead people to underestimate the degree to which the personality of others is in varying degrees different from one relationship to another. They also help to explain why outsiders often misjudge the character of a relationship. Not only are many facets of a relationship shrouded in privacy, but an outsider’s view is greatly colored by his or her relationship with each partner. The partners are different persons to some extent when interacting with the outside observer than they are when interacting with each other. And that is why married men are sometimes deemed more attractive than single men. Not only are they stable, but outsiders see how nice they are to their wife and children and it paints a picture that makes a man look monogamous and stable and that is what people look for in a mate. Whereas, single people seemed to be influenced by popular culture and are just looking for instant gratification and materialism. #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
Commitment can be both viewed as a process and a state of mind. Perhaps because homosexuality is not seen as something desired by parents, many children repress their true feelings and marry the opposite gender because they feel it is the right thing to do. Not that I question Kevin’s sexuality on the situational comedy This is Us, but he was not ready to settle down with his girlfriend because he was not really happy with his life and he forced himself to go buy her three engagement rings, and showed up at her door step, but ended up tell her that he saw nothing but misery in their future because he was not happy with his personal life and did not want to be forced into a marriage, but would marry her if that is what she wanted. That just might explain why companionate love is what happens to most people after years of marriage. They just stick together because it is comfortable and they are committed to each other. Also, because opposite sex couples are deemed as more normal, it could by why homosexual tend to display characteristics that are not in alignment with their gender roles. Perhaps they assume they need to emulate a different gender role to be homosexual. For instance, most gay men are very flamboyant and call each other girl. Whereas a lot of gay women tend to be masculine. Acts of commitment not only increase outcomes and resulting attraction, but are also inherent in the development of power within a relationship. #RandolphHarris 6 of 6
A stunning first impression is not the same thing as love at first sight, but surely it is an invitation to consider the matter. We are drawn to people, inspired by them, and even strengthened by their examples. If first impressions are sufficiently favorable, persons will be motivated, when they begin to interact, to provide behaviors that will result in favorable outcomes to the other, and to the degree each is successful in this respect, they become progressively motivated to provide rewards that will maintain the relationship. Character is like a tree and reputation like a shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing. One of the most important rewards that persons exchange as a relationship develops is support for each other’s view of themselves as persons, their self-concepts. How do you and I become so converted to the truth, so full of faith, so dependent on God that we are able to meet trials and even be strengthened by them? A fundamental purpose of Earth is personal growth and attainment. We will have challenges, even difficulties, where decisions of great importance must be made so that we can grow, develop, and succeed in this mortal test. #RandolphHarris 1 of 7
Gratefully, God’s love is perfect. God has moved so deeply in the hearts of so many. Some people regard unconditional love is something that is real, and the most real things there is. The most consistent finding in the empirical literature on attraction is that persons are attracted to others whom they perceive as accepting them as they see themselves and who allow them to behave in a self-validating manner. Thus, in the early phases of interaction, each person begins tentatively to reveal one’s self to the other. The process of self-disclosure involves first, information about the self that each feels relatively confident about and relatively certain that the other will find acceptable. We may disclose information about our intellectual aptitude, or athletic abilities to see how we relate to others. This type of comparison helps us decide whether we are superior or inferior to others. Disclosures about abilities or talents can also make us more relatable to others. For instance, 80 percent of people find faithfulness as a top attribute they find attractive about a person. A sense of humor is important and it makes people seem more intelligent. #RandolphHarris 2 of 7
For long relationships, individuals tend to prefer others who are altruistic, kind, and do good deeds. Being involved in a charity is seen as a really attractive trait. Other studies have shown the people with dogs are generally more attractive also because they have a capacity to love and care for another being over a long term. We want to make ourselves open to others, through self-disclosure, but we also want to maintain a sense of privacy. If someone knows too much about you upfront, it might impede them from going further in the relationship because they see it as too much of a risk or hassle. Later in the process of self-disclosure, persons revel more intimate details about which they are less confident, hence in greater need of social validation, and which they are less certain will be regarded favorably. Revelations at this level play an important part in the process of self-creation. As a relationship develops, each person feels sufficiently secure to try out or tentatively display new elements of identity. Such displays may take the form of revealing hitherto private hopes and fears about the self, or more indirectly, of recounting to the other past or current episodes of behavior where the person behaved in a fashion viewed as confirming some nascent element of self. #RandolphHarris 3 of 7
Studies of the self-disclosure process generally find that, in the early part of a relationship at least, each person tends to pace the process of disclosure by revealing to the other information about the same level of intimacy. As in any other exchange, persons feel obligated to adhere to the norm of reciprocity. To the extent that one person’s revelations at progressively more intimate levels are increasingly rewarding in terms of signifying regard and trust to the other partner, the latter feels obligated to return revelations thought to be of equal rewarding value. However, disclosures that are too intimate often highlight character, personality, or other kinds of sensitivity information, thus decreasing congeniality. People who make intimate disclosures too early in relationships are often perceived as insecure, which further decreases someone’s interest in them. One time I was walking by a fancy Italian restaurant, and two guys in their forties were on what seemed to me as their first date, and one of them was telling the other guy about how painful his recovery from cancer was. The guy he was with replied, “Oh, gees,” and picked up a bread stick and ate it. He seemed rather pensive and I got the impression that it would probably be their last date. The process of self-disclosure contributes to another basic interpersonal process, the growth of trust, which in turn further facilitates more intimate disclosure. #RandolphHarris 4 of 7
While there is not complete agreement on a definition of trust, a key element appears to be a sense of certainty that the trusted person will not behave at some point in the future in a way that endangers anticipated favorable outcomes of the trusting person. When first dating, you want to make an individual feel good and talk about things that make them happy. It is like you are selling yourself in a sense. People have options and they do not want to get attached to someone who might drain them of their emotional or financial resources. Each person’s revelations of progressively more intimate details concerning one’s self, and their acceptance and confirmation by the other, give assurance that any resultant vulnerability will not be exploited, either because both partners are equally vulnerable or because each perceives the exchange of progressively more intimate details as a sign of increasingly close interpersonal ties. Generally, as the details get more intimate, that means that the emotional bond in the relationship is probably increasing. So, when the relationship seems to be getting more serious, that is a good time to tell a person sensitive information about yourself that might affect them wanting to have a long-term commitment with you, and that is only fair. #RandolphHarris 5 of 7
More than likely if a person cares enough and can deal with it, then they will likely continue in the relationship because they are already emotionally and somewhat financially invested. For instance, some people have commitment issues and cannot figure out whether they want to move to another part of the country or go back to school, or even just a plan to get a cup of coffee with a friend. One might be reluctant to disclose that he or she has problems making choices, from something as small as choosing what movie to see, to something more significant like signing a lease for house. The fact that persons perceive the intimacy of disclosure as indicative of attraction allows the self-disclosure process to function as a pacing device in the development of a relationship. By the depth of disclosure to another, a person may indicate one’s degree of emotional involvement in the relationship. While our emphasis so far has been on the manner in which self-disclosure allows for maintenance and creation of self-elements, an extremely important reward, self-disclosure provides each partner with information concerning other outcomes as well. Persons learn what kinds of behaviors have reward value to each other and which behaviors are costly. This information, in turn, can be used as a guide in arriving at mutually satisfying patterns of exchange that become a part of the structure of interdependence that constitutes the relationship. #RandolphHarris 6 of 7
As you get to now a person who seemed to be commitment issues, you might begin to understand that person has a lot going for one’s self, and just needed to meet someone who is trustworthy. That individual might be optimistic, loving, and a sincere individual who wants to settle down. People are capable of changing, but not until they are ready to understand how things are controlling their lives. It requires both willingness and openness to new insights and new activities before one is able to take the first step in successfully challenging relationship issues. God has given us the capacity to exercise faith, that we may find peace, joy, and purpose in life. However, to employ its power, faith must be founded on something. There is no more solid foundation than faith in the love Heavenly Father has planned. Lord, make us an instrument of your peace. Grant that we may not so much seek to be loved as to love. God, who from among all your angels, chose the Archangel Gabriel to announce the mystery of the Incarnation, mercifully grant that we who solemnly remember him on Earth may feel the benefit of his patronage in Heaven, who lives and reigns for ever and ever. Bless it be. #RandolphHarris 7 of 7








Success happens when we are truly ready, not just when we want it. Be patient. Set yourself up for success. And, always believe that you day is on the way! The individual can be both cause and the consequence of society. The family is typically seen as the source of the child’s inadequacies, which the school must correct and overcome. The process of social comparisons is ubiquitous in the classroom. The age homogeneity and lack of formal status differentiation in the class cohort make it a fertile ground for the operation of social comparison process as a means of social differentiation. This differentiation occurs largely on the basis of perceived ability and achievement, and each student knows where he or she stands with respect to his or her classmates. The class, therefore, serves as a reference group for the student, not necessarily in the normative sense (although it may indeed be a source of norms and values) as much as in the comparative sense (that is, as a standard of evaluation). The family, by contrast, is primarily a normative reference group. There may even be a boomerang effect, under these circumstances, in that the socialize may develop in ways opposite to those intended by the agents of socialization within these contexts. #RandolphHarris 1 of 12
Parents are to preside over their families in love and righteousness and are responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their families. Fathers and mothers are obligated to help one another as equal partners. The conscience obligates people to their offspring, compelling them to be good citizens and to think of their children as investments so they can be the cause of a successful society, not the consequence of a World gone wrong. The role of a parent is much more than the social construction of reality or the product of the state. Parenthood is of a divine origin, and it to include goodness and perfect love so that your children turn out to be God’s work and glory. God is extremely concerned with the work and development of his eternal children. One of the inborn structures of the mind or personality is the id. The id is an unorganized chaotic mentality, and the sole aim of which is the gratification of all needs, the alleviation of hunger, self-preservation, and love, the preservation of the species. As people develop, it is important to teach them to gain control over their emotions, attention, and behavior in early years, as they are coming in contact with the environment. #RandolphHarris 2 of 12
One needs to be conscious or aware of the mental processes which occupy one at any given time. The ego is a processing awareness of the environment, henceforth strives to curb the lawless id tendencies whenever they attempt to assert themselves incompatibly. Neurosis is a conflict between the ego and the id. The ego, aware of the forces of civilization, religion, and ethics, refuses to allow motor discharge to impulses emanating from the lawless id, and will block them from attainment of the object towards which they aimed. The ego defends itself against these impulses by repressing them. In the real World, we see adults who are driven by the id. They are emotional savages, unable to control their urges and act out. Imagine if the World was ran by people like that. People who did not speak, but acted out of emotional urges and them pretended they did not know what they did wrong. The World would be in a stage of chaos. Sometimes the id can break through as a substitutive formation on paths over which the ego has no control, and obtrudes itself on the ego as symptoms. As a result of this process, the ego will find itself more or less impoverished, its integrity threatened and hurt, and hence it continues to combat the symptom in the same way as it had defended itself against the original id impulses. #RandolphHarris 3 of 12
This whole process constitutes the picture of the neuroses, or rather of the transference neurosis, which compromise hysteria, anxiety hysteria, and the compulsion neuroses, in constriction to the so-called narcissistic neuroses, melancholic depression, and to the psychoses, schizophrenia, paranoid conditions and paranoia proper, in which the underlying mechanisms are somewhat different. In a psychosis, the illness results from a conflict between the ego and the outer World, and the narcissistic neurosis from a conflict between the ego and the super-ego. For just as the ego is a modified portion of the id as a result of contact with the outer World, the super-ego represents a modified part of the ego, formed through experiences absorbed from the parents, especially from the father. Fatherhood exposes us to our own weaknesses and our need to improve. Fatherhood requires sacrifice, but is a source of incomparable satisfaction, even joy. The ultimate model is our Heavenly Father, who so loves us. Fathers manifest that love as they labor in the service and support of their families daily. If by his example as well as his words, a father can demonstrate what fidelity to God looks like in daily living, that father will have given his children the key to peace in this life and eternal life in the World to come. #RandolphHarris 4 of 12
The super-ego is a modified part of ego, formed through experiences absorbed from the parents, especially from the father. The super-ego is the highest mental evolution attainable by humans, and consists of a precipitate of all prohibitions and inhibitions, all the rules of conduct which are impressed on the child by his or her parents and by parental substitutes. The feeling of conscience depends altogether on the development of the super-ego. Therefore, mechanisms of the neurosis are attributed to the unconscious factor of the mind. Psychoanalysis calls it the psychology of depths because it is the role of the unconscious mental process. Neuroses are characterized by anxiety, depression, or other feelings of unhappiness or distress that are out of proportion to the circumstances of a person’s life. They may impair a person’s functioning in virtually any area of his or her life, relationships, or external affairs, but they are not severe enough to incapacitate the person. Affected patients generally do not suffer from the loss of the sense of reality seen in persons with psychoses. The psychoanalytic approach to treat neuroses involves helping the patient to become aware of the repressed impulses, feelings, and traumatic memories that underlie his or her symptoms, thereby enabling that individual to achieve personality growth through a better and deeper self-understanding. Also, people are so over zealous to label others that they do not seem to understand the difference between being a little sad and being depress. So, sometimes people report that they are depressed, when they are actually just sad. #RandolphHarris 5 of 12
Despite their growing abilities, some children and adults sometimes find it difficult to regulate their thoughts and emotions in ways that allow them to succeed at new tasks. Many psychiatrists prefer physical approaches, such as psychotropic drugs to treat neuroses (including antianxiety agents and antidepressant and antipsychotic drugs). This will allow the patient to face and overcome new developmental challenges, from getting along with others to learning novel academic skills. In addition, at these times, close relationships with meaningful authority figures, including teachers, managers, parents, law enforcement, the President, veterans, people who serve the country, doctors, a leader of the church, or a lawyer can help children and adults learn to regulate their own behavior. Contextual dissonance could be a source of the distress. That refers to the situation of being a member of an underrepresented group in a classroom (or other contexts, for that matter) in the basis of a trait or characteristic that is disvalued by the majority group, and it impacts the individual’s self-esteem. There could be a social identity context such as race and social class, competence context, and value context, and being an underrepresented subgroup on any of these dimensions can have a negative effect on the student’s self-esteem. #RandolphHarris 6 of 12
That is why I do not see having pride in one’s heritage as a bad thing. When people feel a sense of pride about who they are, they are more willing to deal with being an underrepresented group peacefully and they are able to communicate their needs and concerns to an authority member in a healthy way. When someone upsets them, they know it is better to walk away than acting out or seeking revenge. Mental health is more than just labeling someone. To assess someone’s mental health, you really have to get to know that individual and understand their psychology. The negative consequences of an underrepresented status within the immediate interaction context, in relation to social comparison process, operates more forcefully at the face-to-face level rather than when society is the frame of reference. That is why there can be negative consequences of school integration for self-esteem for certain individuals, and negative psychological consequences of being in the underrepresented status on the job. That is why the classroom organization is important for learning of general social norms. We should be patent, but approach our goals with a sense of urgency. We cannot stroll to our goal. Build momentum by taking consistent and daily actions towards what you want. #RandolphHarris 7 of 12
School is important as a transitional institution between the family and job. Conduct in the family and conduct on the job are governed by contrasting normative principles. School provides the bridge between these two institutions by exposing the child to a set of experiences that facilitate learning and internalizing the norms of independence, achievement, universalism, and specificity. The goal of school, in producing competent citizens is carried out not only through the formal program of instruction aimed at developing cognitive skills, but also through the less conspicuous development of other general norms. Because the interaction between teacher and pupil is much more role specific, and more temporary, the distinction between the person and the position becomes much clearer in the school than it is in the family. The child comes to see that teachers, unlike mothers, are interchangeable. Also, they are paid to be fair and look out for your best interest, but it is important to understand that this is a formal relationship, and to see it as that. Independence and achievement are norms that are more relevant to the conduct of pupils, and because they are the basis for evaluating pupils, they have greater psychological consequence for the child. #RandolphHarris 8 of 12
Independence refers to doing thing on one’s own, and connotes such others attributes as accepting responsibility for one’s acts and being self-motivated. We are accountable and will be judged for how we use what we have received. This eternal principle applies to all we have been given. Cheating and formal testing are two aspects of classroom operations that bear directly on the norm of independence. Achievement is perhaps the strongest norm of all. The concept denotes activity and mastery, the striving against some standard of excellence. It is closely tied to the main mission of the school—to teach students to evaluate the extent of their learning. Being constantly evaluated in the classroom, and the evaluations are public means that the implications of this situation go beyond the mere learning of social norms, they go to the heart of the child’s conception of self. Success, based on one’s own efforts, is good for self-esteem and builds confidence in one’s abilities. Failure is not, and public failure is worse. It also has fewer resources than does the family for protecting the child’s self-respect in the face of failure. However, even for those who are more successful on academic criteria, school can be hard on self-esteem. They must constantly work to maintain their status, and few go through this socialization experience without experiencing some failure. #RandolphHarris 9 of 12
Nonetheless, by attempting to avoid feelings, these students, by their actions, increase the probability of actual failure. This is one of the serious, unintended, and undesirable consequences of classroom socialization. Sometimes pressures are generated that lead to patterns of adaptation that are considered undesirable. The educational system perpetuates the economic order and contributes to the integration of youth into the labor force, mainly through a structural correspondence between its social relations and those of production. The relationship of the educational system is supposed to replicate the hierarchical division of labor which dominates the workplace. And some people do not do well in school because it may be a harsh and alien place that devalues much of what they have learned in their family context. For these children, school may be more difficult because it is also a re-socialization situation and the values that they are learning to conform to, as well as the education they are receiving may scare their family, who may be in the poverty segment of society. The relationships between children and teachers are powerful mechanisms for change. When student feel that a teacher believes in them and supports their growth, they feel more confident both academically and socially at school. #RandolphHarris 10 of 12
When children feel more secure at school, they are more prepared to learn. What is fairly distinct about socialization in childhood peer groups is the effect it has on the child’s development and validation of the self; the development of competence in the presentation of self through role-taking and impression management skills; and the acquisition of knowledge left residual or avoided by adults in their socialization of children. The key to the importance of the peer group in the socialization of these domains is the friendship bond. Friendships are based on egalitarian relationships of mutual support and acceptance, where a wider latitude of behavior is allowed than in most other relationships, and where there is no explicit responsibility on the part of friends to change or shape each other’s development (in contrast to parent/child relationships). Since a great deal is tolerated in friendships, the individual is freer to explore and express a wide range of behavior and self-conceptions without fear of condemnation. Friendship relationships are especially appropriate for the mastering of self-presentations and impression-management skills, since inadequate displays will usually be ignored or corrected without severe loss of face. #RandolphHarris 11 of 12
Create a great reputation. A solid reputation is like a fine art, easy to ruin and hard to create. Typically, success in athletics and academics is very important for boys and girls, but girls are also more concerned about being popular with peers. Hence, status in the peer group and classroom functions to provide an alternate source of self-esteem and perhaps to repair self-esteem damaged by other factors. For many if not most of those arriving at school for the first time, the community is the most varied institution in which they have ever experienced—perhaps ever will experience. To become leaders in our diverse society, students today must have the ability to work with people from different backgrounds, life experiences, and perspectives. Dear Lord, we pray to you for the well-being of our families. Creator grant us the strength of heart, mind, and body so that we may be to stand forthcoming trials and tribulations we have to face. Almighty Father, make us so strong as to be able to face the touch obstacles of life, profession, and education so we have exposure to peers with a deep and wide variety of academia interests, viewpoints, and talents in order to better challenge our own assumptions ad develop skills we need to succeed, and to lead, in an ever more diverse workforce and increasingly interconnected World. And it really helps when you have no one to talk to about abuse or bullying when a person in a position of authority lets you know they know. It gives a person hope that someone will save them and to just hold on. That reduces the likelihood of an individual hurting one’s self to escape the torment. #RandolphHarris 12 of 12