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  %SEEKING LOVE MISLEADING DISINTEGRATIVE WAYS EVIL+960319
 %PERSONAL COMMUNAL INTEGRITY GOD CHILDREN CONFLICT+960319
%ALIENATION IGNORANCE EXAMPLE MENTOR ROLE MODEL SIN+960319
   %ATTENTION DESIRE FAVOR COVET POSSESSION CONTROL+960319
 %BEING-BETTER-THAN-OTHERS CLUB ORGANIZATION CHURCH 960319

     Seeking love  in misleading and dis-integrative  ways
and  byways  does  NOT  lead to  or  promote  personal  or
communal  integration.   All of God's children  need to be
taught  how to seek love in integrative ways and  by  ways
which lead  to  and promoting both  personal  and communal
integration.

     People  who have not known and are not familiar  with
what  true  love is do not know what it is that  they  are
seeking  when  they seek to know-and-enjoy  whatever-it-is
that  they  know is missing from their lives.   Thus  they
seek in inappropriate places,  in inappropriate ways,  and
with inappropriate people.

     We  know  we are missing out on something whenever we
are ignored and do not make a difference in other people's
lives.   Thus we  seek  attention  and we seek to  make  a
difference in other  people's  lives.    Because we do not
know how  to distinguish between integrative ways and dis-
integrative   ways   (for  lack  of  clearly   articulated
examples) we are prone to seek to make a difference and to
seek attention in dis-integrative ways---for  it is easier
to  get  attention  and  to  make  a  difference  in  dis-
integrative  ways;   than in integrative ways.   Thus  too
often  we seek to get attention and make a  difference  in
violent,   coercive,  manipulative,  deceptive,  arrogant,
pretentious, exclusive and alienative ways.

     If nobody (or few people) truly love us and/or we are
not  familiar through previous experiences with the nature
of  true  love---we  may  seek  to  be  desired,   wanted,
respected  or  otherwise the focus of  attention  in  dis-
integrative ways.   If the people around us are focused in
exclusive  ways upon cherished possessions,  useful tools,
and technologies; we may seek to fit into their pattern of
attention  and desires.   We may seek to be cherished as a
desirable  possession,  a  useful tool or  technocrat with
desirable   manipulative  skills---and  find  that   being
possessed,   used  as a tool or managed  for  technocratic
reasons  is  not  the  whatever-it-is that  we  have  been
missing out on.

     We may see that some people become the focus of  much
attention by unusual accomplishments which make them stand
out in the crowd as the focus of attention;  as in winners
of  races and winners of championship games.   We may thus
see  competition as the way to achieve whatever-it-is that
we have been missing out on.   If we seek to take that way
out  of not being truly loved, we may succeed  in becoming
the   focus  of  attention---only  to  discover  that  the
attention  we  get is more exclusive than it is inclusive.
Standing-out-in-the-crowd  has  a way of  being  standing-
away-from-the-crowd  and  so separated from others who  we
are viewed as being "better-than".

     If  we  see some people getting attention  by  being-
better-than others we may seek to get and enjoy  whatever-
it-is  that we have been missing out on by setting up  and
working  a program around being-better-than-others.    The
easiest way of being-better-than-others is to be in charge
of  the definition of being-better-than-others.   Thus  we
take  charge  of setting up our own definitions of  being-
better-than-others;   and discover that there is not  much
satisfaction in doing so all alone.  Thus we invite others
to  join  our "club"  which is dedicated to  being-better-
than-others  so that we can stroke each other  inside  the
clubs which are dedicated to being-better-than-others.

     In  tragic ways members of clubs which are  dedicated
to  being-better-than-others  tend  to  exclude each other
from their respective  exclusive  clubs, and so members of
different  clubs  are usually relatively ignorant of  each
other and do not understand each other.  When they live on
the same planet  and desire to use the common resources of
their common  planet  they often come into  conflict  with
each other over the prioritization of planetary resources.
When they seek to throw their garbage away in each other's
territories  they come into conflict.   When they seek  to
exclude each other from their own planet so that they  can
fully possess their planet for themselves---they come into
conflict.

     People  who are seeking to be fulfilled by  belonging
to clubs which are dedicated  to  being-better-than-others
are people who often come into conflict;  and usually they
are people who do not know how to leave conflict behind---
because  their  dedication to being-better-than-others  is
inherently a dedication to the generation and  maintenance
of   conflict.    They  cannot  conceive   a dedication to
conflict  resolution and peace-making through the ways  of
true love;  for such a dedication entails familiarity with
whatever-it-is that they are missing, and  so are ignorant
of.
                                                                                                                               
                         (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in      
                    (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy)  
                                                                                                                               
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