This-essay is a8009282.htm which is available at the web-site www.essayz.com. See more notes at the bottom. Previous-Essay <== This-Essay ==> Following-Essay By-Months By-Years By-Words Webs of Like-&-Un-Like ESSAYS <==> Like-&-UN-Like This-One ========================================================== %RATIONALIZING EMOTIONAL BEHAVIOR 800928 Human relationships may be perceived in terms of sequences of responses. Each response is a behavior which elicits a further response. People who pride themselves on being rational tend to regard their behavior as rational, and such self-regard is itself a behavioral response. Rationalization is the name given to responses which through such self-regard mask essentially emotional responses---as if they were essentially rational in origin. When such masks are accepted at face value---human relationships are impossible to understand with any meaningful mutuality. Participants become actors without a common script---who are seeking to hide from each other and their lack of community, acting as if they were acting in terms of a common script. To understand human relationships we must be willing to perceive both the emotional and rational aspects of all human behavior, being suspicious of all masks which present a particular behavior as exclusively rational or exclusively emotional. Any effort to present behavior masked to appear to be other than the mixture which it is --- must be recognized for what such an effort is. It is alienative behavior which undermines human understanding and community. It is important to understand the origin of the motivation to be so deceptive. The origins may be found in previous intolerant behavior, or perhaps in previous masking of behavior which was not perceived as acceptable within a conformist community. It is rarely helpful to rip off people's masks in an effort to force honesty. Such efforts are essentially violent, lacking in basic mutuality which is the basis of meaningful honesty. Honesty may be elicited, it cannot be forced. Honesty may be elicited by a tolerant stance which indicates an ability and willingness to accept persons without masks---without rationalization in particular. People need to be helped to feel free to take off their masks because they perceive them to be unnecessary, and uncomfortable. People need to feel free to be true to themselves, rather than feeling that they are required to play dishonest roles to enjoy acceptability and social affirmations. Real people do not conform to any ideal conception of what it is to be a real person, and real people know that. (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in www.essayz.com Search for Integrity and Honesty (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy) ==========================================================
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