This is http://www.essayz.com/a9502272.htm Previous-Essay <== This-Essay ==> Following-Essay Click HERE on this line to find essays via Your-Key-Words. {Most frequent wordstarts of each essay will be put here.} ========================================================== %DIFFERENT KIND COMMITMENT DISINTEGRATE CONSEQUENCE 950227 We will do well to recognize, describe and talk about what unambiguous features Are in common to commitments which lead towards both personal and communal disintegration; and what what unambiguous features area in common to commitments which lead towards both personal and communal integration. We will further do well to recognize, describe and talk about the fact that both kinds of commitments have many features in common, and and to articulate what such AMBIGUOUS features are. We become tragic actors when we regard any of such AMBIGUOUS features as sure signs of commitments which lead towards disintegration, or as sure signs of commitments which lead towards integration. The following words (and cognates of them) used alone without qualification are often ambiguous and may point towards features of people, commitments, ideals, and values which lead ambiguously towards either disintegration or integration: ENTHUSIASM DISCIPLINE SACRIFICE OBEDIENCE ORGANIZE PRECISE PERFECT FULFILL COMPLETE ATTRACT BOND ATTACH INTEREST ATTEND FREE EXPECT PROMISE FAITHFUL DOCTRINE RITUAL SCRIPTURE TRADITION HABIT RESPECTED HONORED APPEARANCES ASSUMPTIONS RATIONAL LOGICAL SYSTEM SUBMISSIVE AGREEABLE CONFORMAL We may note that obeying dictators is often disintegrative. Addicts and alcoholics are often preoccupied with perfection. There are many disintegrative habits. Many wives have been submissive to abusive husbands. People have been faithful to tyrants. The following words usually point rather unambiguously towards features of people, commitments, ideals, and values which lead towards disintegration: COERCIVE VIOLENT ARROGANT DISHONEST DECEPTIVE SUPERFICIAL CONTROLLED MANIPULATED DICHOTOMOUS ALIENATED EXCOMMUNICATED ESTRANGED EXCLUSIVE ADDICTIVE FIXATION COMPULSION UNBALANCED IMPRISONED EXTREMIST FANATICAL FEARFUL REVENGE PUNITIVE VENGEANCE CONDEMNATION JUDGMENTAL LEGALISTIC ADVERSARIAL ELITIST OPPRESSIVE PREJUDICED ARBITRARY CAPRICIOUS The following words usually point rather unambiguously towards features of people, commitments, ideals, and values which lead towards integration: GENTLE HUMBLE HONEST TRUTHFUL RESPONSIVE OPEN BALANCED INCLUSIVE FRIENDLY RECONCILE LIBERATION MODERATION FORGIVENESS MERCY MUTUALITY HEALTHY COHERENT COOPERATION WHOLE HOLY PATIENCE It is not possible to make absolutely reliable separations between words which point without ambiguity, and those which point with ambiguity. The distinctions are always somewhat ambiguous; yet there is some truth in the distinctions which are made above. We may point more reliably by combining words. The ambiguities which are associated with individual words may for the most part be removed by carefully combining words in pairs, triplets and phrases. The common mistake which is made is to regard individual words as pointing unambiguously towards features of people, commitments, ideals, and values which lead towards integration---or towards disintegration. Naively loading such individual words with positive or negative connotations can have tragic consequences. Consider the following pairings of words: ARROGANT VIOLENCE HUMBLE GENTLENESS COERCIVE MANIPULATION HONEST FORGIVENESS DISHONEST CONTROL FRIENDLY INCLUSION VENGEFUL EXCOMMUNICATION BALANCED RESPONSES ELITIST REVENGE GENTLE MERCY (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy) ==========================================================