Home » Pakistan (Page 53)
Category Archives: Pakistan
Minds Rule the World—But What Rules the Mind?
Human life partakes of the untravellable inscrutable and indeterminate law of God. The only true separate agent intellect is God, whose light of understanding fortifies the human agent intellect. Prayer is the most powerful form of energy one can generate, it supplies us with a flow of sustaining power in our daily lives. Once we have steeped our souls in prayer can every anguish calmly bear. The word “God” stands not for a specific being but for a verbal expression: supreme or highest being. Become aware of God, in whose presence you are while you pray, then take a formula of prayer and recite it with perfect attention both to the words you are saying and to the being you are saying them. Our souls are from God alone; thus human reason and will are free. The human soul is directly created by God. It is an incorporeal substance; operationally, however, the soul functions as the vivifying form of the body. Thus, the name “soul” (anima) is derived not from it essence, but from its operation as form of the body, which is accidental to that essence. Since the soul is a substance in itself, it is immortal, surviving the body because it is not dependent upon it. Rather than saying that the soul is in the body, we should say that the body is in (that is, participates in the existence of) the soul. #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
The will is placed in the soul, and who can enter there but he that created the soul? Divine commandments and prohibitions, as well as reward and punishment, reflect human freedom to obey and disobey since divine justice and retributions is incompatible with determinism (the doctrine that all events, including human action, are ultimately determined by causes external to the will; meaning that human beings have no free will and cannot be morally responsible for their actions). People who do not believe in God and have wicked ways are the ones who will say that someone is affecting their behavior or compelling them to act in a certain way because they do not want to take the moral nor legal responsibility for their actions. And in their mind, these excuses make them feel better about hurting others or sinning. However, God’s foreknowledge of anything could be the cause of its coming to being, and if that is true, then all things would have to be eternal, having existed always, since God has always known of them. Therefore, God has knowledge of things as they are actually constituted. God is not like man, who profiles individuals, then spends over a decade trying to make his bogus predictions come true. You cannot predict what you do not know, even if you manipulate a subject. God knows before anything happens that it will happen. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
Furthermore, God is cognizant of what one’s choice will be before one makes it. Since God’s knowledge is not causative, human will is free. Thus, God can know the outcome of an individual’s future choice without determining such an action. God’s knowledge is incidental. His foreknowledge of a phenomenon is not its cause for coming into being. All human decisions are thus in a free climate—they may just as freely occur as not occur—because God’s knowledge of a future event is not the cause. The compatibility of God’s omniscience with human free will, this knowledge is incomprehensible to the limited human mind, since God’s knowledge is a priori (derived by reasoning from self-evident propositions) and part of his unknowable essence, whereas human knowledge is posteriori (derived by reasoning from observed facts). Thus, humans cannot understand how God can immutably foreknow the possible without rendering it necessary. The power to perform one among a number of alternative actions is given to every human. If one wills to turn oneself into a good path and to be righteous, the power is one’s to do so; and if one wills to turn oneself into a bad way and to be evil, the power lies in one’s control to be that way. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
In reality, the undoubted truth is humans are self-determining beings, as they have deliberate rational judgment and act according to their desire or will, free of external constraints, as long as there is no external compulsion controlling an individual. If God had decreed that a person should be either righteous or wicked or is there were something inherent in one’s nature which irresistibility drew an individual to a particular course, what would be the purpose of life? What would be the purpose of church and The Good Book? What would be the purpose of teaching God’s love and forgiveness? By what right or justice could God punish the wicked or reward the righteous? God determines that one can choose, but not what one chooses. After one exercises his or her freedom, the consequences of one’s choice is determined. The consequences of an individual’s actions, since they are subject to the natural order that God has created or to chance. One’s choice, however, is free. Understanding of choice not only necessitates the act being within one’s power, but also the combination of deliberation, a mental act, and desire. Actions caused by desire are determined by predisposition or habituation, it is also possible that there are actions that are the result of deliberation and choice. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
The majority of human actions are not caused, but determined. Even though human choice is determined by a casual chain initiated by God, humans are responsible for their choices. Success is not measured by what an individual accomplishes, but by the opposition one has encountered, and the courage with which one has maintained the struggle against odds. Open your heart to God and you will see the jewels of wisdom and treasures fine. God will intervene and reunite the body with his blessings with joy and life and strength. God will remind one of what it means to be safe in one’s body. And when an individual cannot hear God’s reminders, he will draw closer and speak sublimely to your soul until the pain melts into the comfort of his presence. The Lord helps to leave behind frustration fatigue, bitterness, anger, and sadness. Hear the voice of God and accept his guidance. God will love your mind, body, and soul to a good place. One where individuals will feel his blessings and support. A place where we are inspired to gracious living. Those with broken hearts and fragmented lives will be blessed with healing, as their circumstances will change, allowing peace and prosperity to come into abundance. Those who have plenty will share the richness of their souls. Trust in God’s certainty and become consumed by calmness, as ultimate reassurance cradles you. With God all things are possible. #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
What are the comprehensible terrors of humans compared with the interlinked terrors and wonders of God! The eyes, though they do not tell all, they tell much. The eyes are the keys of character, the mirrors of the soul. God will dispel your fear and end your stress and wipe away any worry from your mind. You and those you care about will find good health and complete recovery. God will make known this healing power and give comfort and shelter. All who are tired will be granted restorative sleep and safe passage. Beauty and pureness are everlasting; they are of God, and can never die. They may for a moment be obscured, but they shall reappear in brighter lustre. Angels have charge over them that they dash not their foot against a stone. Let us turn to the pleasant face of God in what is about us. Some people believe that enjoying their garden is a form of prayer, because it is showing an appreciation for the natural blessings that are provided by God and their soul is silently praying and being thankful for what they are enjoying. That love of Earth, which is a recognition of God. God sees at one view the whole thread of our existence, not only that part which we have already passed through, but that which runs forward into all the depths of eternity. God’s knowledge is perfect and immutable over all that is knowable. And through faith in God, the rest of your life will be the best of your life. #RandolphHarris 6 of 6
Healing Your Broken Heart without a Transplant
Education should direct moral goodness to its highest stage, benevolence. Merit may be either great, high, general, or beautiful (aesthetic). Faith is the beginning and, although not produced by reasoning, is neither forced nor blind. It seeks to understand (intelligere) what it cannot comprehend (comprehendere). Hence, the truths of revelation are to be reasoned about, since it is in our reason that we are made in the image of God and since there, through Christ who is the Word of Wisdom and the source of dialectic, that we receive divine truth. The assent of faith is intellectual rather than voluntarist. Many Christians estimate difficulties in the light of their own resources, and thus attempt little and often fail in the little they attempt. All God’s giants have been weak people who did great things for God because they reckoned on his power and presence with them. God has great things in store for his people, and they ought to have large expectations. God is pure thought, caring for human suffering, beyond emotion. We have the ability to choose life to flow in our hearts again, after an offense ripped through our life and shredded our heart, we may feel like we will never be the same. You are right, you will never be the same but you can be stronger, even better, more mature in Christ because of it. #RandolphHarris 1 of 8
The existence of God is arrived at by reflecting on the contrast between the eternal and transitory and enlarging on the dependence of body on mind. God has in himself all the power to defend you, all the wisdom to direct you, all the mercy to pardon you, all the grace to enrich you, all the righteousness to clothe you, and all the goodness to supply you, and all the happiness to crown you. God is constrained by no force outside himself; nevertheless, creating is not an arbitrary exercise of will but an act that reflects a necessity of the land’s successors were to qualify. The World is made according to preexisting Ideas, although these patterns are not things but concepts in the mind of God. What God is infinitely surpassing the analogies we use to think about him. God is Supreme Good. One day, you may even be thankful for the difficult lessons in life, in an odd way you would go through it again, to be transformed the way God transformed you! May God’s blessing be poured out over you. God takes our pain and suffering and uses it to mature us and make us vessels of honor and pillars of truth. Only God can do that! After forgiveness is granted, we need to love that person unconditionally. These are no constraints on the human mind, no walls around the human spirit, no barriers to our progress except those we ourselves erect. #RandolphHarris 2 of 8
Consider not what is done but in what mind it is done, as courage is a door that can be opened from the inside. There is an interrelation of ends and means; of motives, objects, and circumstances; and of intentions and results in determining the morality of acts. There is vice in the concupiscence of the flesh and in the concupiscence of the soul; sin, however, does not lie in these inclinations but in the intentions and consents that grow out of them, and so virtue is also exercised by not consenting to what should be done. The deed itself adds nothing to the morality, good or bad, of what is purposed. This is a matter of personal conscience, which is binding even when mistaken. Although a morality of pure intention was remote from the medieval temper, it seems that we are obliged to strain after what is good. When we bless our enemies, we refrain from talking negatively about them. We are challenged to help them with their needs. We pray for direction, power of the Holy Spirit to come upon their life, and that the Lord would draw unto himself, cleanse them and bless them. “Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and noting shall by any means hurt you,” reports Luke 10.19. #RandolphHarris 3 of 8
Morality does not consist in external observances but in the mind and heart. Sin is less an injury inflicted than a contempt of God; virtue, less doing what is respectable than living in love with God. A real common nature is wholly present in each member of the species, and individuals differ from one another by their accidents, not their substance. Anyone can forget a petty matter of insult, a personal affront. However, if one has been led step by step into an involvement where the substance was trust itself, bared one’s soul, and then been deeply betrayed in the sense of handed over to one’s enemies, outer or inner, then forgiveness takes on great meaning. Revenge impulsively surges in response to wrong, and becomes perversely delicious to those possessed by it. Vengefulness, resentment, and moral hatred cloud judgment but seem sweet to the one they possess, transforming a peaceful character into a connoisseur of violence. Personal and national credos proudly anchor themselves in tales of unfairness and the glories of retaliation. Oceans of blood and mountains of bones are their testament. It is an addictive cycle. However, without forgiveness, human life is worse off. #RandolphHarris 4 of 8
Forgiveness is a virtue, and expresses a commendable trait of character. And what makes that characteristic itself valuable? It is about Godliness, namely truth-telling, responsibility-taking, spiritual and moral growth, reconciliation, and love. We necessarily measure our actions according to some conception of good. Our success or failure, both in discerning accurately the nature of good, and in living up to that conception, decisively mold the moral character of our lives. These are practical ideas, and we ignore them at our peril. To understand the World, one must reduce the shadow to an enemy that must be fought and ultimately triumphed over through prayer and faith in God. God will bring out better emotions, which have been dormant in the heart. A common nature will assert its power; the wall of separation will be demolished and the greater the distance at which one had imagined to be from God will be replaced by his sympathy more touching to one’s feelings. A new spring will be given to your life. Ambition will be aroused, kindly emotions awakened; life will have some beauty yet. There will be a silver lining to the dark clouds manifesting the warmth of heart towards the World. #RandolphHarris 5 of 8
My soul magnifies the Lord. In the presence of God and all the company of Heaven, God has created and delivered many of us from so many dangers, and filled our lives with so many blessings. The mercy of God is incomprehensible and his loving-kindness will tenderly lead us to repentance. We will turn to this Eternal God, detesting the sins of our past life with all our hearts and all our strength, and humbly desire and ask for grace, pardon, mercy, with entire absolution from our sins, in virtue of death and passion of that same Lord and Redeemer, on whom we lean as the only ground of our being. Many people walk around with their eyes closed blaming others for their problems. However, those who believe in God renewed in the sacred promise of faithfulness to God made in our names will renounce the Devil, the World, and the flesh, abhorring their accursed suggestions, vanities and lusts, now and for all eternity. This is an active process of transforming emotional distress into a process of self-refection, attribution or religious meaning and spiritual growth. The soul is your psychological part composed of your mind, will and emotion. It is the part of your inner being created by God for the purpose of reflecting and expressing God. #RandolphHarris 6 of 8
All of us have trauma, injuries, memories and enemies that can sabotage our lives. We are walking around with wounds, pain, broken hearts, and bitterness in our minds. Satan wants us to dwell on these wounds, relive and them and recycle them driving us to drink, or some other self-medicating distractions. And when Satan cannot find fault with your actions he will try to remind you of downfalls of those you love to break you down. When the right traumatic memories are relived, a cascade of emotions and conflicts are manifested. The longer we live without healing, the longer the enemy can strangle our futures, hopes and dreams as well as destroy our ability to realize God’s abundant life in the present. Surrounding ourselves with superficial friends, ignoring the hurt, and pretending nothing is wrong is simply masking the deep trauma that we need to heal. With emotional healing, it takes time and work. We have to know that God is with us, and the rest of your life will be the best of your life. God is even allowing scientist to heal broken heart without transplants. Japanese researchers are planning a clinical study that would involve attaching heart muscle cells made from stem cells to the heart of gravely ill patients to help recover cardiac functions. #RandolphHarris 7 of 8
The clinical study to treat heart disease will be the World’s first of its kind. A team of researchers at Osaka University, led by Professor Yoshiki Sawa is studying induced pluripotent stem, or iPS, cells which can develop any kind of body tissue. The scientists plan to create sheets of heart muscle cells from iPS cells that do not easily trigger rejection. The sheets will be applied directly to the hearts of patients with serious heart disease. The procedure will be carried out on three patients aged eighteen or older by March of 2018. The team also says that two cases of iPS therapy for retinal disease have been carried out in Kobe, Japan, and that a clinical study on regenerating spinal cells is also awaiting approval at Keio University in Tokyo, Japan. The iPS cells could help patients recover their body functions, whereas their only hope had been organ transplants. This treatment could also greatly reduce the costs of health care insurance and save lives. It is clear that we need more than just medication and this is a step in the right direction. We never become truly spiritual by sitting down and wishing to be so. #RandolphHarris 8 of 8
Mystery and Magic at the Winchester Mansion
Whoever has been so fired in one’s own spirit by the overwhelming thought of the Divine Being as to kindle the flames of faith in their heart of their fellow humans, has thereby proved oneself to be a prophet of the living God; and thus every great historic religion dates from a genuine inspiration by the Eternal spirit. The Winchester mansion attracted a recorded 27.5 million visits in 1923, when the state of California only had a population of 4 million (3.991 million to be exact). On its best day, the mansion drew more than 700,000 visitors. That the mansion was built at all, however, was something of a miracle. To build it, the Sarah and William Winchester confronted a legion of obstacles, any one of which could have—should have—killed it long before it was completed. Together, the Winchesters’ and their architects had conjured a dream castle, whose grandeur and beauty exceeded anything each singly could have imagined. The house was furnished with the finest materials and was a showcase of Victorian elegance and taste. It is a maze of Victorian craftmanship—there were gold and silver-plated chandeliers, imported Tiffany art glass windows, German silver and bronze inlaid doors, Swiss molded bathtubs, rare precious woods like mahogany paneled walls, and rosewood and parquet floors. Cabinets and fireplaces made of teak, maple, oak and white ash. #RandolphHarris 1 of 8
Believe or not, the key to the massive front door was made of solid gold. Early in her residence, Mrs. Winchester planned a grand reception and sent hundreds of gold-engraved invitations to all the prominent valley residents. Visitors wore their best clothes and most subdued expressions, as if entering the great Winchester cathedral. Some wept at its beauty, others rejoiced as if they have a revelation of God, as the moonlight cascaded through the beautiful art glass windows. At that time, the Winchester mansion had 600 rooms, was 100,000 square feet, bisected with a ten-story tower and sat on 161 acres of beautifully landscaped gardens, with spouting fountains and blossoming orchards. A sumptuous midnight banquet was the main feature that night, guests were served beef bourguignon, tartiflette, and quiche on honeycomb platters of crystal glass, 12 inches in diameter made by Tiffany & Co, along with the table being set with a $800,000.00 solid-gold dinner service (which was counted at the end of the night to make sure every piece was put away in one of the mansion’s six huge safes). The dinner was supported by a famous orchestra for added entertainment. The mansions was patrolled by a pack of ferocious Hell Hounds, plus, of course she had her staff or armed bodyguards. #RandolphHarris 2 of 8
The crowing feature of which was the wine. A 1787 Chateau Lafite, was served out of a Tiffany & Co. refresher set in handblown glass with a 68-ounce pitcher and of course, 13-ounce glasses. For dessert, they tasted a new snack called Cracker Jack and a new breakfast food called Shredded Wheat, and brought elegance and tradition to the table by serving the treats out of 12-inch harmony bowls made of crystal glass by Tiffany & Co. The mansion employed two hundred Egyptian and German employees, who were paid in gold coins. There are still more than 10,000 windows, nine kitchens, 47 fireplaces, which are all hand carved and no two alike. And while no one claimed to like gossip, girl, they gossiped about Mrs. Winchester more than any Wendy interview—and everyone enjoyed it. Talk begat rumors and as the years passed and new towers and gables rose behind the 16-foot hedge of Llanda Villa, the rumors grew to established legend. There were also twenty-five distinct Victorian guest houses on the property. Everything about the Winchester mansion was exotic and, above all, immense. Mrs. Winchester also had a sacred blue séance room, where her secret rendezvous with the spirits took place. #RandolphHarris 3 of 8
The house was over a square mile, and some people were more impressed with the Winchester mansion, so much so that it eclipsed the tower of Alexandre Eiffel, Madison Square Garden. Mrs. Winchester is reported to have had dinner with Susan B. Anthony, Thomas Edison, Henry Adams, Archduke Francis Ferdinand, Nikola Tesla, Jane Addams, Francis Ellingwood Abbot, and his wife but when President Theodore Roosevelt’s entourage passed, he expressed desire to visit the greatest event in the history of this country since the Civil War, at the World famous mansion, but at the great front door, our nation’s leader was more than astonished to be coldly told by the Butler, “Mrs. Winchester is not home!” The Winchester mansion was one of the first in the World to utilize wood insulation. Mrs. Winchester used brass cornerplates on many stairways to prevent dust pocket, and she invented an inside crank to open and close the outside shutters. Her 46 fireplaces were the first hinged iron drops for ashes and concealed wood boxes. The tier of tubs in her immense laundry had moulded-in wash boards. Mrs. Winchester also rode in regal splendor. First with a Victoria with livered coachman. Then a French Renault, a Buick Town-Car and two Pierce-Arrows, one done in stunning lavender and gold. #RandolphHarris 4 of 8
Mrs. Winchester had a remarkable memory and knew location of every piece of material in the mansion, even in the vast store-rooms. Some of the built-in innovations were decades ahead of the times. Annunciators installed in all rooms could signal her whereabouts to the servants. Illuminating gas was manufactured by a new process directly on the grounds. She improvised a window catch patterned after the Winchester rifle trigger and trip-hammer. Mrs. Winchester was very strong minded and firm, but always fair and kind. Laziness, theft, gossip or revealed confidence met with instant dismissal. Something magical had occurred in that mansion, and it was beyond doubt, but darkness, too had touched the house. Scores of workers had been hurt or killed in building the dream, their families consigned to poverty (for looting the mansion). And a fire had killed more, and an assassin had allegedly gone on a rampage targeting members of elite classes. Worse had occurred, too, but these revelations emerged only slowly. A murdered had moved among the beautiful things the Winchesters had created and the mansion was so large that he would sneak in and out at night killing guests. #RandolphHarris 5 of 8
Mr. Abbot’s young wife was drawn to the Winchester mansion by the prospect of business and she and many other young women had disappeared, last seen at the mile-long Winchester mansion. Later, Francis Abbot and his colleagues learned of the anguished letters describing daughters who had come to California and had fallen silent. The press speculated that scores of people must have disappeared within the building. After completing “The Syllogistic Philosophy,” Francis Abbot allegedly committed suicide at his wife’s grave. Even Lizzie Halliday was startled by what the fact that such grisly events could have gone undiscovered for so long, and people started to suspect that there really was supernatural activity going on inside of the Winchester mansion and that the Winchester family was being stalked and killed by ghost. Enough strange things began happening to people to make the claim seem plausible. For the supernaturally inclined, the death of the butler alone offered sufficient proof. America is every whit as sacred as Judea. God is as near to you and to me, as ever he was to Moses, to Jesus, or to Paul. Wherever a human soul has uttered its sincere and brave faith in the Divine, and this bequeathed to us the legacy of inspire words, there is the Holy Bible. #RandolphHarris 6 of 8
Humans impose their own way of life on nature, and transforms it into something with a human shape. There are in consequence two levels of nature: an upper level of human nature and a lower level of physical nature. We are born into the latter World, but do not really belong to it. It is natural to people to be moral, civilized, and socially disciplined; it is unnatural to live like wild beasts. Human’s present relation to nature can hardly be expressed except by paradox. Certain human qualities, such as chastity, are natural, on the human level of nature. The nature God had originally planned for humans was that of the Golden Age or the Garden of Eden: this was lost at the Fall, but in some measure, is recreated by the disciplines of civilization, morality, religion, and the arts. People are subject to death, and on the physical level of nature there can be no more natural event than death. Yet death was not a part of the order originally planned for humans and in that context death is unnatural. Witchcraft, a perceived facility to summon evil spirits and demons to do harm to others, was linked to religion to the extent that the medieval Church had powers to punish those who dabbled in magic and sorcery. Its priests were able to exorcise those who had become possessed by malign spirits. #RandolphHarris 7 of 8
During the 16th century, many people believed that witchcraft, rather than the workings of God’s will, offered a more convincing explanation of sudden and unexpected ill fortune, such as the death of a child, bad harvests, or the death of cattle. Witch-hunting became an obsession in some parts of the country. An estimated total 60,000 people were executed during the witch trials. Those accused of witchcraft were portrayed as being worshipers of the Devil, who engaged in such acts as malevolent sorcery at meetings known as Witches’ Sabbaths. In 1552, Parliament passed the Witchcraft Acts which defined witchcraft as a crime punishable by death. It was repealed five years later, but restored by a new Act in 1562. The circling of the immortal Heavenly bodies in the sky is the most eloquent symbol of the order and harmony of the nature that was originally intended for human beings. In 1736, Parliament passed an Act repealing the laws against witchcraft, but imposing fines or imprisonment on people who claimed to be able to use magical powers. At the level of society (or at least the groups of human beings that existed in the evolutionary past), religious belief promotes cooperation, mutual respect, and solidarity, and these features help the group to survive. God wants us to love our neighbors, as we love ourselves, which means show respect. #RandolphHarris 8 of 8
Faith Laughs at the Impossible
He fumbles at your spirit as players at the keys before they drop full music on; God loves with a great love the person whose heart is bursting with a passion for the impossible. Faith laughs at the impossible. Life with nothing, but material things and money is lonely, if no one really loves you and you have no real friends. People sit around smiling and talking and pretending to be good people, pretending to be worthy, and others play into the delusion because they temporarily are desirable due to success or money. However, when one uses people and takes all they can get from them and then forgets the individuals who helped them gain success, the same thing will happen to you. The friends that your money and newly found popularity has allowed you to rent will drain you faster than Jerry Brown’s Delta Twin tunnel project will drain the Sacramento River. And then when you are desolate and in need, your reputation will make people want nothing to do with you. While you smile and make people feel sorry for you, you can only work the system for so long. I am happy that I have learned to forgive people who have done me wrong because I do not want bitterness to poison my soul. However, even though I have forgiven some, I will never forget what these individuals did, and just because I have forgiven you, it does not mean that I like you—I simply let go of the pain I was holding on to. #RandolphHarris 1 of 11
Successful propagandists have succeeded because the doctrine they bring into form is that which their listeners have for some time felt without being able to shape. In my silence, I would love to forget, but restitution has not come quite yet and with one accord I keep pushing forth. I stretch my heat to heal some more. The soul changes and develops through time as it gains further self-determination and self-awareness. Forgiveness means to restore or give back, it is a restoration of oneself, which reinstates the originating bond and allows us to become present with love. Our belief that we are inherently sinful, a state of separation and alienation that seems beyond correction from Heaven or Earth, causes us to experience guilt over what we believe we have done and even more basically, who we believe we are. As a result of this sense of basic wrongness and wrongdoing, we will fear the punishment we are sure is forthcoming because that is deserved. We are seemingly helpless in the face of the basic anxiety and terror that inevitably accompany the belief in our own guilt. When we are mad, we are typically being blocked by something that has been placed in our way. People are unable to control the past or the future, but who remain firmly based in the present can manage their circumstances more effectively. #RandolphHarris 2 of 11
Forgiveness is a great gift. It releases the captive; the guilty sinner is set free from the penalty that was due. Understanding restores broken relationships and welcomes a fresh start, and extends a hand and a promise for some kind of future relationship. Conflicts do not mend themselves. People always want to give a situation time and see if the issue will clear up on its own. Yet, the offense will stay, until forgiveness is extended, processed and worked through in a healthy way. If one never goes through the process of forgiveness and release, the offense and pain will reoccur. However, there may be some situations where unconditional love is not the answer. Some offenses committed may dissolve a relationship forever. There are some shattering sins like abuse that can be so tragic and demoralizing that one may be wise to set boundaries around one’s life to stay away from the offender. God does ask us to forgive other people, but he does not want us putting ourselves in danger because one could suffer a life-threatening attack upon one’s life. Therefore, it is important to use great discernment and wisdom. Do not allow yourself to face situations that are so tragic and horrific that they could change one’s life forever. Loss of faith is ever one of the saddest results of sin. #RandolphHarris 3 of 11
Lies is lies. However they come, they did not ought to come, and they come from the father of lies, and work round to the same. Sin is fun to some for a season and if they do not see negative consequences quickly, they will continue in their poor choices. Making others suffer with fresh pain and gaping wounds from being assaulted with sinful acts can alter the offender’s life also. Forgiveness may be granted, but the law of attraction still operates, often inflicting the ones involved with the assault great pain and loss. Some reaping goes dormant for a while, and then the consequences are revealed at a later time. By forgiving the offender, it releases us from the bondage to the dark side and pain. It enables us to let go of resentment, anger, anxiety, and stress. We are alive and we know it. Although self-awareness gives rise to unbridled awe and joy, it can also lead to the potentially overwhelming dread engendered by the realization that death is inevitable, that it can occur for reasons that can never be anticipated or controlled. Humanly constructed beliefs about reality shared by individuals in a group serve to manage the potentially paralyzing terror resulting from the awareness of death. Therefore, to provide meaning and value we bestow psychological equanimity in the face of death. #RandolphHarris 4 of 11
For a moment, think about dying. All the sentiments of Worldly grandeur vanish at that unavoidable moment which decides the destiny of humans. This should intensify one’s striving to protect and increase aspects of Worldviews and self-esteem that are conducive to one’s longevity. This reflecting on the conclusion of life also projects negative reactions towards those who violate cherished cultural values. Write down what you specifically think will happen to you when you die and once you are physically dead. Terror management theory serves a couple of psychological functions, it is a way of trying to increase an individual’s faith and supply a sense of personal worth that is attained by believing that one is living up to the cultural system’s standards and values. Many people are worried about the outcomes of their lives because they are not in a place where they feel secure, but when they see that they are doing all that they can and have increased their faith in God, it removes some anxiety because God made promises to provide for those who believe in him and are living righteous lives. Terror management theory is supposed to be a way to protect against fear of death and allowing, at the same time, creative expansion and development. #RandolphHarris 5 of 11
Love is faith, and faith, like a gathered flower, will ruthlessly live on. Let your life decision be governed by your own beliefs and values and feelings, your sense of who you really are and who you want to be, and not social engineering designed to scare or shame one out of one’s single status. Loneliness should not be equated with a fear of being loved. Everyone has times when they are alone. Being alone and lonely, and the fear of being isolate for the rest of one’s life can make an individual feel insecure, anxious, and depressed. However, some people accept being alone and realizes that they are unloved and will probably spend their life alone until someone goes out of their way to show compassion and altruism towards this individual, and that action awakens the persons heart and makes the individual value humanity and people more. It also restores their faith and makes them want to get to know people because they see that there are kind people in the World. Also, a person can enjoy their own company. Loneliness can be a response to a specific situation or event, such as the death or extended absence of a loved one. Or it can occur when there is a relationship where there is anger and resentment or a lack of loving communication. #RandolphHarris 6 of 11
One of the commonest of daily experiences is that of our recognizing our friends. A less common, though still fairly familiar, experience is the decision that a certain person is or is not the person he claims to be. The problem of personal identity is that of clarifying the principles beings these indispensable processes of reidentification. To reidentify someone is to say or imply that in spite of a lapse of time and the changes it may have wrought, the person before us now is the same person we knew before. When are we justified in saying such a thing? We are never justified because sameness and change are, in themselves, incompatible. It is almost paradoxical to say that something has changes and yet is still the same. There is nothing special about the case of person in this connection, except, of course, that we might, as persons ourselves, be expected to be more concerned about this case or might be expected to have access to some of the facts needed to deal with it. One set of such facts is the private set of thoughts, feelings, and images that each of us has, and rapid are the changes in them which our identity has contend. #RandolphHarris 7 of 11
All thinking is merely detour from the memory of gratification (taken as a purposive idea) to the identical cathexis (concentration of emotional energy on an object or idea) of the same memory, which is to be reached once more by the path of motor experiences. Thought must concern itself with the connecting-paths between ideas without allowing itself to be misled by their intensities. However, it is obvious that condensations of ideas and intermediate or compromise-formations are obstacles to the attainment of the identity which is aimed at; by substituting one idea for another they swerve away from the path which would have led onward from the first idea. Such procedures are, therefore, carefully avoided in our secondary thinking. It will readily be seen, moreover, that the pain-principle, although at other times it provides the thought-process with its most important clues, may also put difficulties in its way in the pursuit of indentity (memory) of thought. The pain-principle is this: If you can understand why and how pain works to keep your from organizing your life, then you can address it head-on and create a plan for overcoming it. True faiths rests upon the character of God and asks no further proof than the moral perfections of the one who cannot lie. It is enough that God has said it. #RandolphHarris 8 of 11
Hence, the tendency of the thinking process must always be to free itself more and more from the exclusive regulation by the pain-principle, and to restrict the development of affect through the work of thought to the very minimum which remains effective as a signal. This refinement in functioning is to be achieved by a fresh hyper-cathexis, effected with the help of consciousness. However, we are aware that this refinement is seldom completely successful, even in normal psychic life, and that our thinking always remains liable to falsification by the intervention of the pain-principle. Those of us who are avoiding organizing because it is painful will never make lasting changes in our environment or life. We will continue to peck away at the problem, only to find ourselves stuck in the same self-defeating cycle of disorder. The fulfillment of these wishes will no longer produce an affect of pleasure, but one of pain; and it is just this conversion of affect that constitutes the essence of what we call repression. The memories from which the unconscious wish evokes a liberation of affect have never been accessible to the preconscious (Pcs), and for that reason this liberation cannot be inhibited. #RandolphHarris 9 of 11
It is precisely on account of this generation of affect that these ideas are now accessible even by the way of the preconscious thoughts to which they have transferred the energy of wishes connected with them. True and lasting order does not come without going through the struggle against self that leads to change. Without learning about ourselves, becoming aware of our habits, and facing the costs of our disorganization, we cannot emerge from our state of disorder. As we struggle through our process we gain skills and make new commitments to establish and protect our quality of life. Once we have gone through the pain, we do not particularly want to repeat it, so we become more committed to maintenance. The blessing of the pain principle is that you will emerge from your process with greater self-awareness and newfound skills to create and maintain order. We have developed our psychology on our own responsibility. Perception then transforms into spiritual vision. This evolution evokes a supportive response from the highest levels of consciousness for it takes great power to overcome the gravity of the Earthly life and its habits of perception. The act of worship is an entreaty and invitation to these higher energies for assistance in one’s spiritual endeavor. #RandolphHarris 10 of 11
Faith is living, daring confidence in God’s grace, so sure and certain that an individual could stake one’s future on it a thousand times. Take the limits off of God and release your faith in uncommon ways. God is extraordinary, and believe that he will increase your health, prosperity, and happiness, taking you forward into the fullness of your destiny. There is an inner light that shines through the mist of human beliefs and frees individuals from the bondage of fear and limitation. Walk with God, and learn all the ways of life and freedom. Travel with God from this day, and be united in the perfect bonds of everlasting unity. And the manifestation of the spirit is given for the common good. To one there is given through the spirit of message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge of the same spirit, to another faith by the same spirit, at another gifts of healing by that one spirit, to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another interpretation of tongues. All these are the one of one and the same spirit, and God gives them to each one as he determines. #RandolphHarris 11 of 11
We are Like Ships that Clash in the Night
It is suspense, it is hope, that make the food of misery; certainty is always endured, because known to be past amendment, and felt to give defiance to struggling. There was advice, much of it of course from New York. The advice that rankled most came from Samuel Ward McAllister, the self-appointed arbiter of New York society. Appalled by the vision conjured by Sacramento’s King’s arena, of crème and rabble mixing in such volume and with such indecorous propinquity, Ward McAllister in a column in the New York World advised: it is not quantity but quality that the society people here want. Hospitality which includes the whole human race is not desirable. I urge Sacramento hostesses to hire some French chefs to improve their culinary diction. In these modern days, society cannot get along without French chefs. The person who have been accustomed to delicate fillets of beef, terrapin pate de foie gras, truffled turkey and things of that sort would not care to sit down to a boiled leg of mutton dinner with turnips. I should also advise that they do not frappe their wine too much. Let them put the bottle in the tub and be careful to keep the neck free from ice. For, the quantity of wine in the neck of the bottle being small, it will be acted upon by the ice first. #RandolphHarris 1 of 5
In twenty-five minutes from the time of being places in the tub the wine will be in a perfect condition to be served immediately. What I mean by a perfect condition is that when the wine is poured from the bottle it should contain little flakes of ice. That is a real frappe. The thing is Ward McAllister was serious. Ward McAllister was one classy voice, and it was clear to everyone that he spoke with the sanction of New York’s blue bloods. Among Sacramento’s leading citizens there was also a deep fear of being second class. No one topped Sacramento in historical architecture, Mc Mansions, and plush landscapes, but the city’s upper echelons there was a veiled anxiety that the city in its commercial advance may indeed have failed to cultivate the finer traits of man and woman. Mrs. Caroline Astor, undisputed queen of New York society, created a social aristocracy of unparalleled extravagance and exclusivity. Mrs. Astor’s list of “Four Hundred” were the bread and butter of this era’s high society. She was an arbiter of social acceptability while also working to keep the undesirables in their place. The King’s arena was a giant white banner waved in Mrs. Astor’s face. #RandolphHarris 2 of 5
I remember how it seemed to float, then, down the melancholy glory of that track upon the sea, away into the World of dreams. With its gorgeous classical buildings packed with art, its clean water and electric lights, and understaffed police department, the King’s arena was Sacramento’s conscience, the city wanted to become. Days too often destroys an air-built castle at the moment of its completion, without the least ceremony or remorse. As we let go and allow God to work out our issues in life, happiness becomes self-proclaimed and effortless. There is less required from the outside World to be experiences. We let go of the illusions of others as the source of our happiness. Instead of looking to get from others, we now look to give. People seek to be with us. We kiss the stars, we rise, we are your main desire. Your flesh, we are. Cold, we are so cold. Your mouth, these words, silence. It turns humming, we laugh, my head falls back. Moon hangs around my head, a blade over my head, reminds me to do before I am dead. Night consumes light and all I dread reminds me what to do before I a dead. Sun relines, heats my mind, reminds me what to leave behind. #RandolphHarris 3 of 5
Light eats night and all I never said reminds me what to do before…I am to see you, to touch you, to feel you, to tell you; reminds me. Now, Lord, our God, hear the prayers and petitions of your children. For your sake, Lord, look with favor on your desolate sanctuary. Give ear, God, and hear; open your eyes and see the desolation of the city that bears your Name. We do not make requests of you because we are righteous, but because of your great mercy. Lord, listen! Lord, forgive! Lord, hear and act! For your sake, my God, do not delay, because your city and your people bear your Name. Besides accounting for our knowledge of right and wrong, the moral sense closes the gap between moral knowledge and moral behavior by providing a motive for moral behavior. Since moral knowledge consists of feelings of pleasure and uneasiness, the prospect of enjoying or avoiding these feelings is a sufficient motive for pursuing virtue and avoiding vice. If moral knowledge were not ultimately a matter of feelings, it would be possible for someone to know a certain kind of action is virtuous but still have no motive for doing it. The moral sense also enables us to account for our approval and condemnation of actions and character as following from our being pleased or pained by them. #RandolphHarris 4 of 5
God determined us to be pleased by benevolent actions; and when nothing interferes with the moral sense, we count benevolence a virtue and malevolence a vice. Consciousness advances itself when it is provided with essential information which then becomes activated by intention. This in turn prompts inspiration, humility, and surrender, and these tendencies become progressively more operative. When dominant, they lead to dedicated and perseverance. In addition to these aspects of consciousness, progress is greatly assisted by expert guidance and the usefulness of spirituality. Father, God, you said that you would supply all of my needs according to your riches. You are God, the Lord my provider. What is impossible is possible with you. And you promised my end would be better than my beginning because all things are going to work together for my good. Thank you that you are faithful to your word and will work mightily in my behalf. I know that by believing in your power, God, that surpassing greatness is released. I am not discouraged by the size of the task, for the Lord God is with me. He will see to it that it is finished completely. God’s power is at work in my life. #RandolphHarris 5 of 5
With More Knowledge We can Create Better Work and a Feeling of Knowledge
The fields of air are open to knowledge. The person who can join ideas with the most propriety will separate them with the greatest nicety. Human well-being (eudaimonia) is the highest aim of moral thought and conduct, and the virtues are the requisite skills and dispositions needed to attain it. If the code of ethics are taught to people for several successive generations, the code will become congenital. Every individual inherits some predisposition from one’s predispositions from their predecessors, and later generations are therefore supposed to be more advanced intellectually than earlier ones. Good is what gives people pleasure in the long run. Ethics is the science of conduct, and conduct deals with the adjustment of acts to ends. The lower animals find their satisfaction in using the environment to their best advantage; human beings find their satisfaction, or happiness, in a similar way. Appropriate adjustments result in pleasure; inappropriate adjustments result in pain. We ought to look to our own pleasures, but we ought to do this by using intelligence, which gives us some insight, no matter how small, into what the future may bring; present pleasures may be outweighed by possible future pains. #RandolpHarris 1 of 5
Unlike primitive people, we have the ability to form ideas about remote ends, and disaster befalls us easily when we refuse to entertain such ideas or to construct them in accordance with the scientific data available to us. In fact, the whole conception of a moral consciousness is no more than a rule emphasizing the need to consider the consequences of its actions, to examine whether more or fewer possible benefits to itself and to society would result. The notion of duty is also a rule emphasizing the need to consider future benefits in contrast with present temptations. Without the feeling of duty we would simply act for ourselves alone and, in this way, in the long run act against our own best interests. Much earlier in history, an analysis of utilitarianism and biological behavior leads us to concrete educational proposals. Since people are in constant struggles with environmental forces, they ought, first and foremost, to be subjects that will help them most in this struggle. A knowledge of science, therefore, is crucial because it is the primary means by which people may be able to avert possible natural disasters. After the sciences, one ought to study psychology, education, and the social sciences because these will give insight into ways of resolving family and social problems. #RandolphHarris 2 of 5
The antiquated Roman literature survives, and creates for us an intimacy with the classic ages, which we have no means of forming with the subsequent ones. Light literature is the garden and the orchard, the fountain, the rainbow, the far view; the view within us as well as without. The choice public will have good writing for light readings. All art is convention of one kind or another, and each demands its own interpretation. People should also study art because it produced the kind of satisfaction that needs no justification nor analysis in terms of future satisfactions. It is an immediate good in itself, producing an immediate feeling of mental well-being. Learning should begin by introducing the child to actual experimental situations from which one should deduce the law involved. The child should be taught to regard the World as a place in which one must makes one’s own decision in accordance with the best scientific data. Therefore, teachers should encourage initiative and free expression of ideas, and they can best do this by being actively engaged in inquiry and study. A teacher who is interested in one’s work, will be more apt to produce research oriented students. #RandolphHarris 3 of 5
Ardent souls, ready to construct their coming lives, are apt to commit themselves to the fulfillment of their own vision. Life never seems so clear and easy as when the heart is beating faster at the sight of some generous self-risking deed. We feel no doubt then what is the highest prize the soul can win; we almost believe in our power to attain it. There is nothing that human imagination can figure brilliant and enviable that human genius and skill do not aspire to realize. What we strive to gratify, though we may call it a distant hope, is an immediate desire: the future estate for which people drudge up city alleys exists already in their imagination and love. The people who have many gratifications are apt to wander in imagination from daily and familiar joys, and confidently to reach after things yet untried. No human being springs forth from the womb as a fully-grown, sophisticated, wise, ready-for-anything adult. Nor does one possess all the necessary skills for effectively interrelating when one comes into the World. We have to learn the techniques of relating to other humans. However, we do bring some characteristics into the World with us. Exactly what is inherited and what do we learn? #RandolphHarris 4 of 5
The newborn child is new in a lot of ways. One’s new at being out in the open. One is new to one’s parents, and they are certainly new to the child, even though the baby has been pretty close to one of them for nearly a year. The baby is doing new things to meet some familiar needs, too. When the baby was a resident inside of the mother, the baby had a nice thing going—the most comfortable, most protected environment it is possible to imagine. Until birth, the infant is pretty much a product of their heredity. Heredity refers to the genetic traits and characteristics that are inherited—that come with the child when one is born, passed down from the parents. It is as possible for a baby to know something without having been at school, as it is to have been at school and to know nothing. Almighty God, kindle, we pray, in every heart the true love of peace, and guide with your wisdom those who take counsel for the nations of Earth, that in tranquility your dominion may increase until the Earth is filled with knowledge of your love; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God and forever. The rest of your life will be the very best of your life. Happy Canada Day. Amen. #RandolphHarris 5 of 5
Memories of a Lifetime–I Stumbled on this Photograph
The heart is initially no more than an enlarged blood vessel, and eventually becomes the four-chambered structure found in human beings. Every great discovery is just like perception, an operation of the understanding, an immediate intuition, and as such the work of an instant, a flash of insight. They are not the result of a process of abstract reasoning, which only serves to make the immediate knowledge of the understanding permanent for thought by bringing it under abstract concepts, i.e, it makes knowledge distinct, it puts us in a position to impart it and explain it to others. The experience we undergo is the result of the interaction between reality and the particular human organism, but even though we are required to acknowledge the existence of the external stimulant, we can never know exactly what it is like it our own right. This is a unique case in that, although we can investigate the effects of the stimulant, the cause is inherently unknowable. The keenness of the understanding in apprehending the casual relations of objects which are known indirectly, does not find its only application in the sphere of natural sciences (though all the discoveries in that sphere are due to it), but it also appears in practical life. #RandolphHarris 1 of 14
Since we cannot know the nature of reality apart from its effects, we are led to a belief in some Unknowable; this does not mean, however, that we are committed to a belief in the existence of God. First of all, our complete dependence on sensory data for knowledge makes it impossible for us to tell whether this Unknowable is at all comparable to any kind of divine substance. We are never in the position to test whether our idea of what the Absolute is, corresponds to what it actually is. Second, reasoning, which is no more than an advanced physical ability by which an organism can meet environmental problems, cannot cope with data that are not reducible to observables. When such an endeavor is made, reasoning, like any machine whose function is abused, breaks down. Consider what occurs when we attempt to analyze a concept whose reference is take to be necessarily outside of the domain of experience—the concept of God. All questions are either unanswerable or productive paradoxes. If there is a God, then how did he come into existence? If he created himself out of nothing, then how can something come out of nothing? #RandolphHarris 2 of 14
The fact that God is treated as an immanent, existing or operating within; inherent, permanently pervading and sustaining the Universe, rather than an external power, does not eliminate the questions that are raised with theism. It is still impossible to imagine the Universe arising uncaused out of nothing. This is why I believe that the Universe is like a sea-walnut, which produces its own light to sustain life and ward off predators, but is contained in the ocean. It is only logical that we would think of the Universe as existent in some potential form prior to its becoming actual; and even if it were meaningful to speak of the potential Universe, the question would still remain how a potential Universe could have been created. Are we then necessarily led to atheism? No. The fact that we do not know whether a God exists does not mean that therefore no God exists. The rejection of theism and pantheism entails only that we can have no knowledge about the Unknowable, not that the Unknowable does not exists. At most we can simply say that we do not know whether there is a God. #RandolphHarris 3 of 14
Many religions still cling to beliefs that arose because primitive people could not account for natural phenomena. Thus, the notion of a soul, or of a ghost, arose because primitive people could not account for dreams, shadows, and reflections. All such phenomena led to the belief that people were dual personalities, one of which remains unchanged regardless of changes in the visible human. From this conception there gradually developed the theory that there were eternal, unchanging, omnipotent personalities. In this way, people came to believe in gods; and, for similar reason, the Judaeo-Christin God has many strictly human traits. This religious anthropomorphism which depicted God as filled with hatreds and desires that were appropriate only to human beings. Nevertheless, religion can serve as a means of fostering friendships and cooperation among human beings and also of guaranteeing the retention of the most worthwhile values of the past. Furthermore, religion can be useful as a way of developing interest in the various enigmas that are found in the Universe, a means of motivating people to initiate scientific inquiries. #RandolphHarris 4 of 14
The fact that we can never know what the Unknowable is in itself does not imply that we cannot have any genuine knowledge. Good sense or prudence signifies exclusively understanding at the command of the will. However, the limits of these conceptions must not be too sharply defined, for it is always that one function of the understanding by means of which all animals perceive objects in space, which, in its keenest form, appears now in the phenomena of nature, correctly inferring the unknown causes from the given effects, and providing the material from which the reason frames general rules as laws of natural now inventing complicated and ingenious machines by adapting known causes to desired effects; now in the sphere of motives, seeing though and frustrating intrigues and machinations, or fitly disposing the motives and the people who are susceptible to them, setting them in motion, as machines are moved by levers and wheels, and directing them at will to the accomplishment of the ends. Deficiency of understanding is called an intellectual disability. It is dullness in applying the law of causality, incapacity for the immediate apprehension of the concatenations of causes and effect, motives and actions. #RandolphHarris 5 of 14
A stupid person has no insight into the connection of natural phenomena, either when they follow their own course, or when they are intentionally combined, i.e., are applied to machinery. A stupid person does not observe that persons, who apparently act independently of each other, are really in collusion; that person is therefore easily mystified; and outwitted; one does not discern the hidden motives of proffered advice or expressions of opinion. But it is always just one thing that the individual lacks—keenness, rapidity, ease in applying the law of causality, i.e., the power of understanding. The domain of phenomena of the Unknowable is characterized by features which are not controllable by our desires or even by our manipulations. Certain relationship consistently appear in spite of our objections or antagonistic attitudes. Also, in all objectsions, including ourselves, there are many varying degrees of energy—or force. These aspects of reality are manifestations of the Unknowable, and information about them is the only kind of knowledge human beings can obtain or ought to see. #RandolphHarris 6 of 14
It is clear that knowledge, for human beings, is not a study of the Unknowable but rather of the manifestations of the Unknowable among phenomena. There are beginnings, middles (or periods of equilibrium), and ends; but all these processes take place in a finite space and a finite time. A person is born; one matures; one passes on, generally. Similarly, a society begins, reaches a stage of equilibrium, and is destroyed by something internal or external. All around us we can see the workings of the law of evolution and dissolution, but we can never know whether the Universe as a whole is undergoing this process. Feelings, too, arise through evolution. Life seeks to survive, and feelings of pleasure are necessary to sustain this urge. If the organism experiences no rewards for maintaining its own life and reproducing its kind, if there were no sense of accomplishment, then the urge to survive might easily be extinguished. Therefore, behavior that contributes to survival is accompanied by the feeling of pleasure, and behavior that endangers survival is accompanied by the feeling of pain. #RandolphHarris 7 of 14
Similarly, feelings of sociality and sympathy developed in human beings because in the struggle for survival people came to recognize that human cooperation is necessary, and the pleasures that accrue to the feeling of sociality were the rewards that guaranteed the continuation of such cooperation. The development of the feelings of sociality and sympathy led to the emergence of a new kind of entity, society, which is the subject of sociology and ethics. Here, too, the principle of evolution holds. Society, like other organisms, has its period of infancy, of maturity, and death. Therefore, strive to possess yourself of what you have inherited from your ancestors. The problem would appear more difficult if we could admit that they leave no traces whatsoever behind them. However, our memories are colored by emotions, judgments, and quirks of personality. What we remember depends on what we pay attention to, what we regard as meaningful or important, and what we feel strongly about. Memory structure is that pattern of associations among items of information stored in the memory. #RandolphHarris 8 of 14
I stumbled on this photograph, it kind of made me laugh, it took me way back, back down memory lane. I see the happiness, I see the pain where I am. I see us standing there, such a happy pair. Love beyond compare. The way you held me. No one could tell me that love would die. Why, oh why did I have to find this photograph? Gaps in memory, which are common, may be filled in by logic, guessing, or new information. Indeed, it is possible to have memories for things that never happened (such as remembering broken glass at an accident when there was none). People with pseudo memories (false memories) are often quite upset to learn they have given false testimony. A filmed automobile accident was showed to people. Afterwards, some participants were asked to estimate how fast the cars were going when they smashed into each other. For others the words bumped, contacted, or hit replaces smashed. One week later, each person was asked, “Did you see any broken glass?” Those asked earlier about the cars that smashed into each other were more likely to say yes. (No broken glass was shown in the film.) The new information (smashed) was included in memories and altered them. #RandolphHarris 9 of 14
The updating of long-term memories is a common problem in police work. For example, a witness may select a photo of a suspect from police files or see a photo in the news. Later, the witness identifies the suspect in person (in a lineup or in court). Did the witness really remember the suspect from the scene of the crime? Or was it from the more recently seen photograph? Even an innocent person may be remembered as the criminal. It is quite possible for a photo to update or blend with the original memory. Many tragic cases of mistaken identity occur this way. Indeed, the fading of memories and the weak affect of impressions which are no longer recent, which we are apt to take as self-evident, and to explain as a primary effect of time on our psychic memory-residues, are in reality secondary changes brought about by laborious work. It is the preconscious that accomplishes this work. Networks of associated memories may help explain a common experience: Imagine finding a picture taken on your sixth birthday or tenth Christmas. As you look at the photo, one memory leads to another, which leads to another, and another. Soon you have unleashed a flood of seemingly forgotten details. This process is called redintegration. Redintegrative memories seem to spread through the branches of memory networks. #RandolphHarris 10 of 14
Many people find that such memories are also touched off by distinctive events from past—like a visit to Grandma’s kitchen, pleasant scents, going to the farm, the seashore, a doctor’s office, the perfume or after-shave of a former lover, and so on. The key idea in redintegration is that one memory serves as a cue to trigger another. As a result, an entire past experience may be reconstructed from one small recollection. Personally, I have had no real anxiety-dreams for a few months, but I do recall one. The dream was very vivid, and showed me my beloved mother, with a peculiarly calm, sleeping countenance, carried into the room and laid on the bed by two (or three) persons with birds’ beaks. I awoke crying and screaming, and disturbed my parents’ sleep. The peculiarly draped, excessively tall figures with beaks I had taken from the illustrations of the Philippson’s Bible. I believe they represented deities with the heads of sparrowhawks from an Egyptian tomb-relief. The analysis yielded, however, also the recollection of a house-porter’s boy, who used to play with us children on a meadow in front of the house; I might add that his name was Philip. #RandolphHarris 11 of 14
It seemed to me then that I first heard from this boy the vulgar word signifying sexual intercourse, which is replaced among educated persons by the Latin word coitus, but which the dream plainly enough indicates by the choice of the birds’ heads. I must have guessed the sexual significance of the word from the look of my Worldly-wise teacher. My mother’s expression in the dream was copied from the countenance of my grandfather, whom I had seen a few days before his death snoring in a state of coma. The interpretation of the secondary elaboration in the dream must therefore have been that my mother was dying; the tomb-relief, too, agrees with this. I awoke with this anxiety, and could not calm myself until I had waked my parents. I remember that I suddenly became calm when I saw my mother; it was as though I had needed the assurance: then she is not dead. However, this secondary interpretation of the dream had only taken place when the influence of the developed anxiety was ready at work. I was not in a state of anxiety because I had dreamt that my mother was dying; I interpreted the dream in this manner in the preconscious elaboration because I was already under the domination of anxiety. #RandolphHarris 12 of 14
The latter, however, could be traced back, through the repression to a dark, plainly disturbing period I had in my life, which had found appropriate expression in the visual content of the dream. It was a time when I felt like savage humans were trying to break up my family, and take the only people who cared about me in the World away, and then do away with me. As I grow up, and I think most adults are the same, they fear losing their parents and siblings because you have known them all of your life and that is all you have in this World. And while after you lose a parent, you can still feel their presence and sense them looking over you, but that sense of communication in the physical World is gone and that means so much. People spend so much time on social media, but think about it this way. What if someone took away everyone you care about in your life and replaced them with social media profiles and pictures and videos was your new community and social circle, but never actually see them in person. You would feel isloated, incomplete, and alone. Do not let social media rob you of reality and life. We are only here on this planet for so long and once you lose someone you care about chances are you can never talk to them again. #RandolphHarris 13 of 14
Make more time for your family and spend time with the people you love. Ask your grandparents to recall vivid and important autobiographical memories and what do you get out of it? Up to a point, the results are like the memories of people at any age: Most recollections come from the 2 or 3 most recent years. Fewer and fewer autobiographical memories come from earlier years, tapering off back to childhood. However, something interesting occurs for older adults as they scan over a lifetime. If you tally their memories, you will find a bulge or bump in the curve between the ages of 10 and 30. In other words, many more memories come from this period than would be expected. Why do memories from this period of life stand out for older adults? Because memories formed during this time are encoded in ways that make them easier to retrieve later in life. Just why these years are so memorable is not known. However, if you are between the ages of 10 and 30, take note: These are the days, my friend. You know me. Every time you try to forget who I am, I will be right there to remind you again, you know me. Answer me when I call, God, defender of my cause; you set me free when I am hard-pressed; have mercy on me and hear my prayer. #RandolphHarris 14 of 14
Seek Not to Mystify the Mystery
A spirit of reform is a salutary temper of the times; because there is at all times need for reformation. Some believe that people only emerged from savagery with the help of the civil state and penal laws, as well as through the deliberate invention of gods in order to inspire fear in the evildoer. The belief that virtue can be taught is universal among many philosophers, so much so that some have regarded it as their sole distinguishing feature. The effect of this doctrine upon society was revolutionary, since it implied that anyone, after instruction, might become qualified for the exercise of power, and it leaves no special place for privilege by birth or the inheritance of a special family or class tradition. The greatest object in the Universe, is a good person struggling with adversity; yet there is still a greater, which is the good person that comes to relieve it. The idea of a personal God who is the creator of the natural World with its casual connections as well as the supreme source and bearer of values can be satisfy all the facts of experience. God who would regenerate society must first regenerate himself, and then his virtues must act as a contagion acts, by contact of human with human. #RandolphHarris 1 of 14
A great voice is an ocean. You cannot drain it. It is something found—an addition to the wealth of this life. This God sufficiently unifies the scheme of things to overcome the disjunction between fact and value, and yet, since he is less than an all-inclusive absolute, he allows for that relative independence and diversity that seem to be a presupposition of genuinely personal and individual experiences. Our manners and customs go for more in life than our qualities. Time, patience, and fortitude often conquer fate. The presence of evil in the World creates difficulties for any theistic solution, but the fact of evil is not fatal, if we bear in mind that the solution offered is not a rigid monism. God limits himself by his creation, for moral values can be realized only by being free beings, and the gift of freedom makes possible evil as well as good. In spite of the evil that may, and does, arise, such a World is not only better than any World that lacked freedom but alone can be setting of the creation of value. What caused Satan to be cast from Heaven? Perhaps the reason Lucifer and the other angels fell from Heaven is because they were forced to be good. They were not given freedom like humans to choose to be good or evil. #RandolphHarris 2 of 14
Chance and change love to deal with one’s settled plan, not with their idle vagaries. Incidents little in speculation are great in the eye of fortune. Satan supposedly fell from Heaven because of pride that originated from his desire. While Satan was the highest of all the angels, he was not happy. Little did he know of his life to come, he was not very sure, for one thing, that the good he aimed at would not be obtained. Satan wanted to be God instead of a servant of God. He desired to rule the Universe. Therefore, God cast Satan out of Heaven as a fallen angel. Supposedly, Satan acted as leader of the fallen angels. These demons, existing in the invisible spirit realm yet affecting our physical World, rebelled against God, but are ultimately under God’s control. There is an ongoing spiritual war between God and Satan, good and evil. However, Satan masquerades as an angel of light deceiving humans. We should not fear Satan’s limited power. We ought to be wise, however, in resisting his tactics. Every prohibition conceals a desire. An unconscious impulse need not have originated where we find it expressed; it can spring from an entirely different place and may originally have referred to other persons and relations, but through the mechanism of displacement, it reached the point where it comes to our notice. #RandolphHarris 3 of 14
Though angels and demons live in the World, they do not wage war as the World does. The weapons the good angels fight with are not weapons of the World. They have divine power to demolish strongholds. They demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and they take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. The intellect is a nobler power than the will. Both civil and ecclesiastical power derive ultimately from God, but the civil power proceeds through the medium of society; the people concertize authority received from God in the person whom they designate as rulers. Observational learning is achieved by watching and imitating the actions of another person or by noting the consequences of a person’s actions. In other words, information is imparted by example, before direct practice is allowed. The value of learning by observation is obvious: Imagine trying to tell someone how to tie a shoe, do a dance step, crochet, preach, or play a piano. Anything that can be learned from direct experience can be learned by observation. Often, this allows a person to skip the tedious effects of attempting to accomplish something by trying various means until the correct one is found. #RandolphHarris 4 of 14
Witches are believed to be able to exercise a malign influence even after death unless they are buried with their toes downwards. Culmstock is a village and civil parish in Mid Devon, England, about 12 miles from Tiverton. Not very long ago, a woman suspected of being a witch, was buried in this way within twenty miles of Tiverton. In no part of the country is witchcraft more believed than in the Culm Valley. There is a local saying that there are enough witches in the valley to roll a hogshead of cider up the Beacon Hill, at Culmstock, and old people living there are not ashamed to say that they believe in witchcraft. The witches are two kinds—black and white. The former profess to have the power to condemn those on whom they are asked to cast a spell, to kinds of misfortunes: the latter impose on credulous clients by making them believe that they can remove evil spells and bring good fortune—for consideration, of course. For obvious reasons visits to witches are generally kept dark, but every now and again particulars leak out. In Culmstock district, not so very long ago, a young girl went with her mother to a witch, in order to get a spell cast over an errant swain, who was suspected of bestowing his affections on another. #RandolphHarris 5 of 14
The witch professed to be able to bring the young man back to this young lady, or to condemn him to all kinds of torture, but her price was prohibitive, and so the young man was left to marry whom he would. Farmers are the witches’ most profitable clients, and it is a noteworthy fact that they generally contrive to visit the wise woman when they are away from the house, at market. A few years ago, farmers used to go to Exeter for many mils round to consult a witch whenever they had any misfortune, and it is commonly reported that they can get the same sort of advice in the city at present day. At many farmhouses Bibles are kept in the dairies to prevent witches from retarding the butter-making operations. “I am witched,” or “I must have been witched,” are expressions heard in Devon every day in the week. Generally speaking, it is animals that are supposed to sustain the most harm from being overlooked. The loss of cattle that have died has been put down to the power of evil spirits, and according to many superstitious people, witches have a peculiar power over pigs. These are only hints, but a careful elaboration of them would show how important they may become for understanding of the development of civilization. #RandolphHarris 6 of 14
In the analytical consideration of taboo phenomena we have hitherto allowed ourselves to be guided by their demonstrable agreements with compulsion neurosis; but as taboo is not a neurosis but a social creation we are also confronted with the task of showing wherein lies the essential difference between neurosis and product of culture like taboo. A young man who believed his pigs had been bewitched was told, not so long ago, to take the heart of a pig, stick it full of pins and needles, and roast it at the fire. He did this believing this would check the mortality among his swine. The power of truth; its conquest is slow and laborious, but if once the victory be gained it can never be wrested back again. Besides the ideas we have as yet considered, which, according to their construction, could be referred to time, space, and matter, if we consider the, with reference to the object, or to pure sensibility and understanding (i.e. knowledge of causality), if we consider them with reference to the object, another faculty of knowledge has appeared in humans alone of all Earthly creatures, an entirely new consciousness, which, with very appropriate and significant exactness, is called reflection. #RandolphHarris 7 of 14
From the knowledge of perception, we derive that a reflected appearance is on it. For primitive people believe in an animation of human individuals. Human beings have souls which can leave their habitation and enter into other beings; these souls are the bearers of spiritual activities and are, to a certain extent, independent of the bodies. Originally souls were thought of as being very similar to individual; only in the course of a long evolution did they lose their material character and attain a high degree of spiritualization. The soul conceptions are the original nucleus of the animistic system, that spirits merely correspond to souls that have become independent, and the souls of animals, plants, and there were formed after the analogy of human souls. How did primitive people come to the peculiarly dualistic fundamental conceptions on which this animistic system rests? Through the observation, it is thought, of the phenomena of sleep (with dreams) and death, which resembles sleep, and through the effort to explain these conditions, which affect each individual so intimately. Above all, the problem of death must have become the starting point of the formation of the theory. #RandolphHarris 8 of 14
To primitive humans the continuation of life—immortality—would be self-evident. The conception of death is something accepted later, and only with hesitation, for even to us it is still devoid of content and unrealizable. Very likely discussion have taken place over the part which may have been played by other observations and experiences in the formation of the fundamental animistic conception such as dream imagery, shadows and reflection, but these have led to no conclusion. If the primitive human reacted to the phenomena that stimulated one’s reflection with the formation of conceptions of the soul, and then transferred these objects to the outer World, one’s attitude will be judged to be quite natural and in no way mysterious. All are the necessary psychological product of the myth-forming consciousness, and primitive animism may be looked upon as the spiritual expression of human’s natural state in so far as this is at all accessible to our observation. There is a universal tendency among humankind to conceive all beings like themselves and to transfer to every object those qualities with which they are familiarly acquainted and which they are intimately conscious. #RandolphHarris 9 of 14
Sailing with sealed orders, we ourselves are the repositories of the secret packet, whose mysterious contents we long to learn There are not mysteries out of our selves. Animism, witchcraft, and such is a system of thought, it gives not only the explanation of a single phenomenon, but makes it possible to comprehend the totality of the World from one point, as a continuity. This behavior can still be demonstrated in the life of today, either as worthless survival in the form of superstition, or in living form as the foundation of our language, our belief, and our philosophy. Myths are based upon animistic foundations, but the detailed relation of myths to animism seem unexplained in some essential points. What is a country village without its mysterious personage? 2010 January 13, Pagan worshippers are suspected of weaving horses’ manes to cast spells on the animals after police investigated a series of bizarre incidents. Almost 20 animals were targeted over a period of three months. Residents in Hemyock, Culmstock, and Clayhidon, Devon, Exeter as well as parts of Dorset and Somerset started a horse watching scheme after incidents were reported. #RandolphHarris 10 of 14
Police initially believed the horses were being marked for theft by organized criminals until it was discovered that none had been stolen. Officers now suspect white witches who practice knot magic are using the horses to help them cast spells. It is thought that Pagan gods have a close connection with horses, which adds strength to spells that incorporate the animals. To surround anything, however monstrous or ridiculous, with an air of mystery, is to invest it with a secret charm, and power of attraction which to the crowd is irresistible. We can easily guess that magic is the earlier and more important part of animistic technique, for among the means with which spirit are to be treated there are also found the magic kind, to frighten away a ghost with noise and cries is a form of pure sorcery; to force him to do something by taking his name is to employ magic against him, and magic is also applied where spiritualization of nature has not yet, as it seems to us, been accomplished. Magic must never serve the most varied purposes. It must subject the process of nature to the will of man, protect the individual against enemies and dangers, and give him the power to injure his enemies. #RandolphHarris 11 of 14
Magic is used to assist the gods against evil demons. Every night when the Sun God Ra in ancient Egypt sank to his house in the glowing west he was assailed by hosts of demons under the leadership of the archfiend Apepi. All night long he fought them, and sometimes by day the powers of darkness sent up clouds even into the blue Egyptian sky to obscure his light and weaken his power. To aid the Sun-god in this daily struggle, a ceremony was daily performed in his temple at Thebes. A figure of his foe Apepi, represented as a crocodile with a hideous face or a serpent with many coils, was made of wax, and on it the demon’s name was written in green ink. Wrapt in a papyrus case, on which another likeness of Apepi had been drawn in green ink, the figure was then tied up with black hair, spat upon, hacked with a stone knife and cast on the ground. There the priest trod on it with a stone knife and cast on the ground. There the priest trod on it with his left foot again and again, and then burned it in a fire made of a certain plant grass. When Apepi himself had thus been effectively disposed of, waxen effigies of each of his principal demons, and of their fathers, and mothers, and children, were made and burnt the same way. #RandolphHarris 12 of 14
The service accompanied by the recitation of certain prescribed spells, was repeated not merely morning, noon, and night, but whenever a storm was raging or a heavy rain had set in, or black clouds were stealing across the sky to hide the Sun’s bright disk. The fiends of darkness, clouds and rain felt the injury inflected in their images as if it had been done to themselves; they passed away, at least for a time and the beneficent Sun-god shone out triumphant once more. The Biblical prohibition against making an image of anything living hardly sprang from any fundamental rejection of plastic art, but was probably meant to deprive magic, which the Hebraic religion proscribed, of one of its instruments. Modeling as a powerful effect on behavior. In a classic experiment, rain is produced by magic means, by imitating it, and perhaps also by imitating the clouds and storm which produces it. It looks as if they wanted to play with rain. The Ainos of Japan, for instance, make rain by pouring out water through a big sieve, while others fit out a big bowl with sails and oars as if it were a ship, which is then dragged about the village and gardens. #RandolphHarris 13 of 14
However, the fruitfulness of the soil was assured by magic means by showing it the spectacle of human sexual intercourse. To cite one out of many examples; in some parts of Java, the peasants used to go out into the field at night for sexual intercourse when the rice was about to blossom in order to stimulate the rice to fruitfulness through their example. At the same time, it was feared that proscribed incestuous relationships would stimulate the soil to grow weeds and render it unfruitful. After looking at magic and rituals and superstitions, it seems to me that being a good person and believing in God and having faith seems to be the easier thing to do. Everything else takes all the rituals and potions and spells and probably drives some people mad. Almighty God, our Heavenly Father: We have sinned against you, through our own fault, in thought, and word, and deed, and in what we have left undone. For the sake o your Son our Lord Jesus Christ, forgive us all our offenses; and grant that we may serve you in newness of life, to the glory of your name. May the Almighty God grant us the forgiveness of all our sins, and the grace and comfort of the Holy Spirit. Amen. #RandolphHarris 14 of 14
A Charm against Yielding to Temptation
Things perceived as real are real in their effects. As from the direct light of the Sun to the borrowed light of the moon, we pass from the immediate idea of perception, which stands by itself and is its own warrant, to reflection, to the abstract, discursive concepts of the reason, which obtain their whole content from knowledge of perception, and in relation to it. As long as we continue simply to perceive, all is clear, firm, and certain. There are neither questions nor doubts nor errors; we desire to go no further, can go no further; we find rest in perceiving, and satisfaction in the present. Perception suffices for itself, and therefore what springs purely from it, and remains true to it, for example, a genuine work of art, can never be false, nor can it be discredited through a lapse of time, for it does not present an opinion but the thing itself. However, with abstract knowledge, with reason, doubt and error appearing in the theoretical, care and sorrow in the practical, illusion may at moments take the place of the real. Chance actions differ from erroneously carried-out actions only in that they disdain the support of a conscious intention and really need no pretext. They appear independently and are accepted because one does not credit them with any aim or purpose. #RandolphHarris 1 of 11
In the sphere of abstract thought, error may reign for a thousand years, impose its yoke upon whole nations, extend to the noblest impulses of humanity, and, by the help of its slaves and its dupes, may chain and fetter those whom it cannot deceive. We execute them without thinking anything of them, by mere chance, just to keep the hands busy, and we feel confident that such information will be quite sufficient should one inquire as to their significance. In order to enjoy the advantage of this exception position, these actions which no longer claim awkwardness as an excuse must fulfill certain conditions: they must not be striking, and their effects must be insignificant. It is the enemy against which the wisest people of all times have waged unequal war, and only what they have won from it has become the possession of humankind. Culture is constantly threatened by a relapse into barbarism and disorder that would make history sheer meaningless succession. Against perpetual decadence people struggles heroically to establish limited zones of law, order, and cultural significance. To succeed is this for a time, they must do violence to their own natures by imposing on themselves a hard discipline and accepting moral isolation amid their mediocre fellows. #RandolphHarris 2 of 11
This means living in conformity to the ethic of the producers and seeing the good life to be a cooperative creative enterprise carried on in a self-reliant spirit. Against the good things to be obtained rather than a way of acting. In the consumers’ view typical goods are welfare, prosperity, distributive justice, and the classless society, things to be aimed at for the future and enjoyed if secured. Enterprises undertaken in that spirit were based on envy and inevitably fell under the control of adventure (usually intellectuals) who duped the masses. Such instances are citizens revolting, peasant wars, anti-Semitism, and contemporary welfare-state socialism. It has often been said that we ought to follow the truth even although no utility can be seen in it, because it may have indirect utility which may appear when it is least expected; and I would add to this, that we ought to be just as anxious to discover and to root out all error even when no harm is anticipated from it, because its mischief may be very indirect, and may suddenly appear when we do not expect it, for all error has poison at its heart. #RandolphHarris 3 of 11
The symbolism in the infantile life of the normal plays a greater role than was expected psychoanalytic experiences. A doctor, on rearranging his furniture in a new house, came across a straight, wooden stethoscope, and, after pausing to decide where he should put it, was impelled to place it on the side of his writing-desk in such a position that it stood exactly between his chair and the one reserved for his patients. This act in itself was certainly odd, for in the place, the straight stethoscope served no purpose as he invariably used a binaural one; and in the second place, all his medical apparatus and instruments were always kept in drawers, with the sole exception of this one. However, he gave no thought to the matter until one day, it was brought to his notice by a patient who had never seen a wooden stethoscope, asking him what it was. On being told, she asked him why he kept it there. He answered in an offhand way that that place was good as any other. This, however, started him thinking, and he wondered whether there had been an unconscious motive in this action. Being interested in the psychanalytic method, he asked me to investigate the matter. #RandolphHarris 4 of 11
The first memory that occurred to him was the fact when a medical student, he has been struck by the habit his hospital interne had of always carrying a wooden stethoscope in his hand on his ward visits, although he never used it. He greatly admired this interne, and was much attached to him. Later on, when he himself became an interne, he contracted the same habit, and would feel very uncomfortable if by mistake he left the room without having the instrument to swing in his hand. The aimless of the habit was shown, not only by the fact that the only stethoscope he every used was a binaural one, which he carried in his pocket, but also in that it was continued when he was a surgical interne and never needed the stethoscope at all. From this, it was evident that the idea of the instrument in question had in some way or other become invested with a greater psychic significance than normally belonged to it—in other words, that to the subject it stood for more than it does for other people. The idea must have become unconsciously associated with some other one which it symbolized, and from which it derived its additional fullness of meaning. #RandolphHarris 5 of 11
I will forestall the rest of the analysis by saying what this secondary idea was—namely, a phallic one; the way in which this curious association had been formed will presently be related. The discomfort he experienced in hospital on missing the instrument, and the relief and assurance the presence of it gave him, was related to what is known as a castration complex—namely, a childhood fear, often continued in a disguise form into adult life, lest a private part of his body should be taken away from him, just as playthings so often were. The fear was due to paternal threats that it would be cut off if he were not a good boy, particularly in a certain direction. This is a very common complex, and accounts for a great deal of general nervousness ad lack of confidence in later years. The stethoscope association was formed through many connections. In the first place, the physical appearance of the instrument—a straight, rigid, hollow tube, having a small bulbous summit at one extremity and a broad base at the other—and the fact of its being the essential part of the medical paraphernalia, the instrument with which the doctor performed his magical and interesting feats, were matters that attached his boyish attention. #RandolphHarris 6 of 11
He had had his chest repeatedly examined by the doctor at the age of six, and distinctly recollected the voluptuous sensation of feeling the latter’s head near him pressing the wooden stethoscope into his hat; he found it interesting that the doctor should carry his chief instrument concealed about his person, always handy when he went to see patients, and that he only had to take off his hat (i.e., a part of his clothing) and pull it out. At the age of eight, he was impressed by being told by an older boy that it was the doctor, who was young and handsome, was extremely popular among the women of the neighborhood, including the subject’s own mother. The doctor and his instrument were therefore the objects of great interest throughout his boyhood. Probably because the boy also wanted to be popular as an adult. It is probable that, as in many other cases, unconscious identification with the family doctor had been a main motive in determining the subject’s choice of profession. It was here doubly conditioned by the superiority on certain interesting occasions of the doctor to the father, of whom the subject was very jealous, and by the doctor’s knowledge of forbidden topics and his opportunity for illicit indulgence. #RandolphHarris 7 of 11
The subject admitted that he had on several occasions experienced erotic temptations in regard to his women patients; he had twice fallen in love with one, and finally had married one. This shows that the way a lot of adults act and the things they do, are behaviors they learned in their childhood, which appear to be enjoyable or pleasurable to them and they want to do these things to others when adults. For me as a boy, when I would visit my doctor, Dr. Ezekiel, would have Gold Dial soap in his office and when I would wash my hands I remembered how good it smelled, and if a doctor used it, it must be good stuff. So, that Gold Dial is the only hand and bath soap I used because I want to smell good like Dr. Ezekiel. Also, as a child growing up, we lived in a nice suburban community where everything was new and clean and nice and quiet, and everyone had jobs, and so that is what kind of life style I want for my adult life. When people ask me about what I like most about being a son, I always reply, “Everything.” And even when talking to my parents now I try to conceal my true feelings at times and say something pleasant. #RandolphHarris 8 of 11
Like, if I do not like someone and do not want to go to their party and my parents ask me about it, I will say something like, “I am very excited about the party, but I am busy that day. I am sure they will have good company and food as always.” Sometimes, however, I feel like I try too hard to be nice and pleasant and it really takes a lot of energy. I am more of a person who likes to be quiet, mind my own business and keep to myself, but when living in a city and not the suburbs, it requires one to be more social. Now back to the subject, the next memory he has was of a dream, plainly of a homosexual-masochistic nature; in it a man, who proved to be a replacement figure of the family doctor, attacked the subject with a sword. The idea of a sword, as is so frequently the case in dreams, represented the same idea as mentioned above to be associated with that of a wooden stethoscope. The thought of a sword reminded the subject of the passage in the Nibelung Saga, where Sigurd sleeps with his naked sword (Gram) between him and Brunilda, an incident that had always greatly struck his imagination. #RandolphHarris 9 of 11
The meaning of the symptomatic act now at last become clear. The subject had placed his wooden stethoscope between him and his patients, just as Sigurd had placed his sword (an equivalent symbol) between him and the maiden he was not to touch. The great act was a compromise-formation; it served both to gratify in his imagination the repressed wish to enter into nearer relations with an attractive patient (interposition of phallus), and at the same time, to remind him that this wish was not to become a reality (interposition of sword). It was, so to speak, a charm against yielding to temptation. I might add that the following passage from Lord Lytton’s Richelieu made a great impression on the boy: “Beneath the rule of men entirely great, the pen is mightier than the sword. I wear my pen as others do their sword,” and that he became a prolific writer and uses an unusually large fountain pen. When I asked him what need he had of this pen, he replied in a characteristic manner, “I have so much to express.” We all live in different psychological Worlds, there is no correct view of a life situation. #RandolphHarris 10 of 11
A person who feels that his or her view of a life situation has been understood feels freer to examine it objectively and to question it. (Accepting and understanding the perspective of another person can be especially difficult when cultural differences exist.) Heavenly Father, you have filled the World with beauty: Open our eyes to behold your gracious hands in all your works; that rejoicing in your whole creation, we may learn to serve you with gladness; for the sake of the one through whom all things were made. May we commend to your fatherly goodness all those who are in any ways afflicted or distressed, in mind, body, or estate; [especially those whom our prayers are desired]; that it may please you to comfort and relieve them according to their several necessities, giving them patience under their sufferings, and a happy issue out of their afflictions. God, you made us in your own image and redeemed us through Jesus Christ, your Son: Look with compassion on the whole human family; take away the ignorance and arrogance and hatred which infects our hearts; break down the walls that separate us; unite us in bonds of love; and work through our struggle and confusion to accomplish your purpose on Earth. #RandolphHarris 11 of 11
The World is My Idea—I Gave My Heart to Thee
The World is my idea—this is a truth which holds good for everything that lives and knows, though human beings alone can bring into reflective and abstract consciousness. A useful approach is to let the love for God replace the willfulness that is driving the seeking. One can release all desire to seek and realize that the thought that there is anything else but God is a baseless vanity. It can be seen that both the body and the mind are the result of the innumerable conditions of the Universe and that one is at best the witness of this concordance. Out of an unrestricted love for God arises the willingness to surrender all motives, and expect to serve God completely. If one really does this, he or she has attained to philosophical wisdom. It then becomes clear and certain to that individual that what one knows is not a Sun and an Earth, but only eyes that sees a Sun, hands that feels an Earth; that the World which surrounds us is there only as an idea, i.e., only in relation to something else, the consciousness, which is oneself. If any truth can be asserted a priori, it is this: for it is the expression of the most general form of all possible and thinkable experience: a form which is more general than time, or space, or causality, for they all presuppose it. #RandolphHarris 1 of 14
Time, space, and causality, which we have seen to be just so many modes of the principle of sufficient reason, is valid only for a particular class of ideas; whereas the antithesis of object and subject is the common form of all these classes, is that form under which alone any idea of whatever kind it may be, abstract or intuitive, pure or empirical, is possible and thinkable. No truth therefore is more certain, more independent of all others, and less in need of proof than this, that all that exists for knowledge, and therefore this World, is only object in relation to subject, perception of a perceiver, in a word, idea. This is obviously true of the past and the future, as well as of the present, of what is farthest off, as of what is near; for it is true of time and space themselves, in which alone these distinctions arise. All that in any way belongs or can belong to the World is inevitably thus conditioned through the subject. The World is idea. I have noticed in the course of our psychoanalytical work that the psychological state of an individual in attitude of reflection is entirely different from that of a person who is observing the psychic processes. Light is a great enemy to mystery, and mystery is a great friend to enthusiasm. #RandolphHarris 2 of 14
It is curious to imagine people of the World, busy in thought, turning their eyes towards the countless sphere that shine above us, and making them reflect only images their minds contain. In reflection, there is a greater play of psychic activity than in the most attentive self-observation; this is shown even by the tense attitude and the wrinkled brow of the individual in a state of reflection, as opposed to the mimic tranquility of the person observing. In both cases, there must be concentrated attention, but the reflective person makes use of their critical faculties, with the result that one rejects some of the thoughts which rise into consciousness after one has become aware of them, and abruptly interrupts others, so that one does not follow the lines of thought which they would have otherwise open up for the individual; while in respect of yet other thoughts one is able to behave in such a manner that they do not become conscious at all—that is to say, they are suppressed before they are perceived. In self-observation, on the other hand, one has but one task—that of suppressing criticism; if one succeeds in doing this, an unlimited number of thoughts enter one’s consciousness which would otherwise have eluded one’s grasp. #RandolphHarris 3 of 14
We cannot deny the existence of matter, that is, of solidity, impenetrability, and extended figure (to deny which would be lunacy), but in correcting the popular notion of it, and in contending that is has no essence independent of mental perception; that existence and perceptibility are convertible terms. These words adequately express the compatibility of empirical reality and transcendental ideality. With the assistance of the material thus obtained—material which is new to the self-observer—it is possible to achieve the interpretation of pathological ideas, and also that of dream-formations. As will be seen, the point is to induce a psychic state which is in some degree analogous, as regards the distribution of psychic energy (mobile attention), to the state of the mind before falling asleep—and also, of course, to the hypnotic state. On falling asleep, the undesired ideas emerge, owing to the slackening of certain arbitrary (and, of course, also critical) action, which is allowed to influence the trend of our ideas; we are accustomed to speak of fatigue as the reason of this slackening; the emerging undesired ideas are changed into visual and auditory images. The inward reluctance with which any one accepts the World as merely one’s idea, warns one that this view of it, however true it may be, is nevertheless one-sided, adopted in consequence of some arbitrary abstractions. #RandolphHarris 4 of 14
In the condition which it utilized for the analysis of dreams and pathological ideas, this activity is purposely and deliberately renounced, and the psychic energy thus saved (or some part of it) is employed in attentively tracking the undesired thoughts which now come to the surface—thoughts which retain their identity as ideas (in which the condition differs from the state of falling asleep). Undesired ideas are thus changed into desired ones. And yet, it is a conception from which one cannot free oneself. There are many people who do not seem to find it easy to adopt the required attitude toward the apparently freely rising ideas, and to renounce the criticism which is otherwise applied to them. The undesired ideas habitually evoke the most violent resistance, which seems to prevent them from coming to the surface. However, the essential condition of poetical creation includes a very similar attitude. If you complain of a lack of creative power, the reason for your complaint lies, it seems to me in the constraint which your intellect imposes upon your imagination. Apparently, it is not good—and indeed it hinders the creative work of the mind—if the intellect examines too closely the ideas already pouring in, as it were, at the gates. #RandolphHarris 5 of 14
Regarded in isolation, an idea may be quite insignificant, and venturesome in the extreme, but it may acquire importance from an idea which follows it; perhaps, in a certain collocation with other ideas, which may seem equally absurd, it may be capable of furnishing a very serviceable link. The intellect cannot judge all these ideas unless it can retain them until it has considered them in connection with these other ideas. In the case of a creative mind, it seems to me, the intellect has withdrawn its watchers from the gates, and the ideas rush in pell-mell, and only then does it review and inspect the multitude. You worthy critics, or whatever you may call yourselves, are ashamed or afraid of the momentary and passing madness which is found in all real creators, the longer or shorter duration of which distinguishes the thinking artist from the dreamer. Hence your complaints are of unacomplished aspirations, for you reject too soon and discriminate too severely. And yet, such a withdrawal of the watchers from the gates of the intellect, such a translation into the condition of uncritical self-observation is by no means difficult. #RandolphHarris 6 of 14
Most of my patients accomplish it after my first instruction. I myself can do so very completely, if I assist the process by writing down the ideas that can flash through my mind. The quantum of psychic energy by which the critical activity is thus reduced, and by which the intensity of self-observation may be increased, varies considerably according to the subject-matter upon which the attention is to be fixed. The theme to which these point is, of course, always the history of the malady that is responsible for the neurosis. Pay attention to what occurs to you in connection to your dream, and interpret the details, not the mass; like this, it conceives the dream, for the outset, as something built up, as a conglomerate of psychic formations. While overcrowding and pollution rank high on the list of environmental stresses, they are only two of the many challenges that press for attention. Let us sample some of the solutions that psychologist have provided for environmental problems. Many problems that we are seeing arise is urban fears. The way people think about the environment greatly affect their behavior. Mental maps of various areas, for instance, often guide actions and alter decisions. A case in point is a study done in Sacramento, California USA. #RandolphHarris 7 of 14
In Sacramento, California USA, researchers found that an existing school bus route contributed to truancy. The problem was that many of its stops were where children where afraid of being attacked and beaten. The solution was that by doing an environmental assessment, psychologist developed a picture of environments as they are perceived by the people using them. An assessment often includes such things as charting areas of highest use in buildings, using attitude scales to measure reactions to various settings (such as school, businesses, and parks) and even having people draw a version of their cognitive map of a building, campus, or city. In the case of the school children, residents of the neighborhood were asked to rate how much stress they felt when walking in various areas. The result was a contour map (somewhat like a high- and low-pressure weather map) that showed the areas of highest perceived stress. This stress map was then used to reroute school buses to low-pressure areas. Cause and effect thus constitute the whole nature of matter; its true being is this action. This relation is no conclusion in abstract conceptions; it does not arise from reflection, nor is it arbitrary, but immediate, necessary, and certain. #RandolphHarris 8 of 14
When the children had been tested, prior to rerouting the school buses, the test showed that the noise they were facing was quite damaging. Children from the noisy schools were compared with similar students attending schools farther from the disturbances. These comparison students were from families of comparable social and economic makeup. Testing showed that children attending noisy schools had higher blood pressure than those from quieter schools. They were more likely to give up attempts to solve a difficult puzzles. And they were poorer at proofreading a printed paragraph—a task that requires close attention and concentration. A recent study of children living near a fairly new airport in Munich, Germany, found similar damaging effects. The greater tendency of the noisy-school children to give up or become distracted creates a serious and unnatural intellectual disability, which can be corrected by a reduction of external threats and noise pollution. This situation may even reveal a state of learned helplessness caused by daily, uncontrollable blasts of sound. Even if such damage proves to be temporary, it is clear that noise pollution (annoying and intrusive noise) is a major source of environmental stress for children, adults, nature, and pets. #RandolphHarris 9 of 14
Researchers have linked noise with impaired learning ability, less tolerance for frustration, and a reduced willingness to help others. A major finding of environmental research is that much of our behavior is controlled, in part, by specific types of environments. Society is an aggregate of interacting individuals whose relations are governed by role-confronting rules and practices which give their actions their characteristic significance. Moreover, communities seem to have a lifespan greater than that of any generation of individual members, which cannot be explained, as might that of a corporation, by the continuities of constitutional procedures. It is, rather, that from generation to generation there passes an attachment to a common set of symbols and a common history, a participation in a collective representation in a collective consciousness—a common culture, in short—which enables members to identify one another where other criteria are uncertain, which gives the society its cohesion, and which provides the standards by which its members’ actions are regulated and assessed. Boundary maintenance is a necessity for every society. #RandolphHarris 10 of 14
To possess an identity, a society must furnish criteria whereby its members can identity one another, since their actions and attitudes toward one another will be different from those toward outsiders. Society’s existences depend so crucially on commitment to common values and collective components that the political boundary tends to settle automatically the limits of the society. People have talked of the society to which they belong, they have thought primarily of the social order contained within the boundaries of a state and sustained by its organized power. Our notion of a society as the most inclusive framework of social interaction depends on the political not only for its boundary maintenance but also for its very identity. There may be a danger that pressing the antitotalitarian, pluralistic account so far that it dissolves the state, it will lose thereby its capacity to define the society. We cannot tax our way out of problems either. So many people are worried about their retirements because the rents are going up so high, cities becoming overpopulated and democrats spent all the Social Security money, so we had to sell the post office to pay the rent on the White House. #RandolphHarris 11 of 14
The California bag ban, which requires stores to stop including the price of bags with the food, but to charge the consumers an extra fee per bag, was a tax disguised as an environmental protection project, and has killed more than 2,000 manufacturing jobs, slowed down lines at grocery stories, which reduced productivity, and it has also eliminated the jobs of the people who bag your food and help you push your cart out to your car. Not only that, but the bags are thicker, and more harmful to the environment and wildlife. And many people get back to the house and find they have squashed their bread, broken their eggs, or spilled shampoo all over the meat by trying to force more than they should into into a bag. People who are trained to package your food know how to properly distribute the amount and types of food per bag, and have it down to a science, where consumers do not. Also because bags are an option, people are now going into stores a wheeling out carts loaded with goods and not being immediately detected, which is causing store to reduce hours, services, and cut back on jobs to offset cost, and charging consumers more for items to make up for lost revenue. In addition, people who buy food on credit cards, at the end of the year, end up possibly spending hundreds of dollars on plastic bags for their food. Then the cigarette tax in California, comes at a time when the state makes the cultivation, sale and distribution of marijuana legal, in hopes that people will not spend $10.00 on a pack of cigarettes, but instead buy some weed, get high, and forget that they are going broke. Just puff on a joint all day long. #RandolphHarris 12 of 14
We do not want people smoking marijuana, and I cannot even believe the state of California would make it legal for recreational use. People walk down the streets getting high and you and your kids are stuck behind them and getting contact high. Marijuana alters your state of mind and is a dangerous controlled substance, which the federal government still deems as illegal. Then, it was pretty much a law that all liquor had to be carried out the stores in bags, so that kids would not see it and be influenced to drink. However, with the bag ban, people are now walking around sucking on cans of Colt 45, pints of vodka, and jugs of Carlos Rossi. The concept of community in California is getting lost, and being replaced by a model of conflicting pressure groups operating within a very nebulously defined area. A civil society has social organization including the market economy and the forces of civil order, and realizes the ethical ideas and ethical spirit. Under leadership of Governor Jerry Brown, the rifts developed in the social fabric are an effort to keep people in ignorance. Idols and sources of delusions set forth in California, and as rationalists, we need to unmask these ideologies. The reality would offer a different face in society. Under Jerry Brown, no one has stopped to see how these circumstances have influenced social forces on the human mind. We need a superstructure, which is the starting point in the development of the modern society of knowledge. #RandolphHarris 13 of 14
It is not our consciousness which determines our existence, but on the contrary our social existence which determines our consciousness. Be wary of false preachers who smile a lot, dripping with practiced sincerity. Chances are they out to rip you off some way or another. Do not be impressed with charisma; look for character. Who preachers are is the main thing, not what they say. A genuine leader will never exploit your emotions or finances. People who are insincere are not good and will be punished by God. Infinitely merciful God, most tender Father of souls, and in a particular way, you carry with special tenderness between your divine arms, I come to you and ask you, through love and merits of your sacred heart the grace to comprehend and to do always your holy will, the grace to confide in you, the grace to rest securely through time and eternity in your loving divine arms. If life be harder, love makes it also stronger, and only this love can be blessed a thousand times. I believe in you Lord, and strengthen my faith. I give my heart to thee and I so enclose it in thee that it may never be separated from thee. I am all thine, and take care of my promise. It is time to restore sanity, justice, and to do your fair share, obey the laws and practice righteousness. #RandolphHarris 14 of 14
Randolph Harris II International Institute 