Bias Control

Bias

Bias can lead to restrictions or they can become a form of disability. On the other hand, too much unnecessary focus on a thing may eventually  lead to some sort of addiction. Never prematurely stop your search for your hidden talents. If you are not restricting yourself, you would really know that you have been giving Love with all your Heart and dormant skills that you are trying to re-awaken.

"Normalcy bias" (tendency to believe that the world around you will stay normal) may distort our reality. Many would like to think that the world would remain the same or at least everything immediately around them will remain secure and stable all their lives. It may border on delusions that everything will remain as they are for as long as one is not ready for any change. For example, it causes anxiety towards retirement if you fail to secure yourself financially. Retirement is something to look forward to for those that accepted the fact that we are still students throughout adulthood learning much more things we could possible imagine. School does not end after graduation. Your diplomas are actually just among the many your limitless Hearts can attain. People with normalcy bias may learn a few tricks from those who have "preparedness bias". These people prefer to be safe than sorry. They prepare for the worst possible scenario and are taking  considerable stress to assure their safety and survival.

Those with "preparedness bias" may need periods of rest or normalcy. They have been stretching their abilities in order to be ready to overcome nearly all obstacles long before they actually happen. However they have problems communicating with the other group and are usually misunderstood because of how they present themselves. Both groups are crippled and they could not really move forward if they will not find a way to speak though the heart.

Another, which we can call "toy bias" may trap one on the play stage beyond adulthood. There are toys for kids while there are bigger toys for the bigger kids we call adults. What are those toys you've been upgrading? Do you have an old addiction you had since childhood? Are you a gadget freak? However, playing and having fun with toys in the game of life could make life easier for many. Be reminded that not all nice toys are man made.

On the other hand, the very few with "higher pursuit bias" are brought to the lonely place of providing, guiding and overseeing the rest of humanity.  Some of them are tempted to play a monopoly game where they can toy around some quite stubborn people with not so high pursuits and who also lack the needed skills.

The more people develop bias for higher pursuits, the less potentially abusive monopolies will be established. But when more of the toy biased dominates, the more our world will accumulate junk toys that eventually pollute the entire planet causing human and animal death and suffering. If you are among the toy biased, drastically change your mindset and lifestyle to moderation and attempt to curb your misdirected over-consumption now. The higher pursuit providers will have no choice but to slow down and match their production with your moderate consumption of uncontaminated stuff. We all depend on each other in many ways than we originally thought we were.

Each of us are to blame if blaming itself is not a waste of time.

We can begin correcting this by explaining to infants and young children that they need to try out other things other than their favorite food or toys or activities. Do not force it down their throats. Their young brain wirings normally exhibit extreme distractibility. Teach toddlers by example since despite this distractibility they also can't control themselves but copy your every move. Show them pictures and movies and books that illustrate Patience, Restraint or Temperance. Expose them to pure uncontaminated nature (if there are still places like that left in the world) on a more regular basis and for longer hours if that is at all possible. Remember moderate consumption of uncontaminated goods.

The same for early and late childhood as well as adolescents. Say "No" firmly when appropriate. Avoid leaving the kid to grandparents (not applicable to all of course) who usually have less energy to train the kid. Help the child adjust the volume of his voice when talking. Remind him constantly to adjust the voice volume to socially acceptable levels. Do not expect patience to develop completely earlier than late childhood since most brains are not wired for Patience and other related Input control skills before that time. Make humanitarian endeavors appear like child's play so that your kid will become more familiar with such activities that it becomes deeply incorporated into the awakening environment friendly biosphere culture of the future. Teach him the basic life skills that we lost because of our culture of convenience.

What good will a young genius rocket scientist kid be if the economy fails or typhoons wreak havoc and the kid has no survival skills. Does your kid know some form of first aid? As adults, have you any idea how to do basic life support using chest compressions without breaths? Are we really walking the talk of Loving Life? Or are we stubbornly fixated to our own little addictions that ruin life? Do we have a caring Heart?

As adults, we developed Hearts attached to ownerships and concepts of hoarding. Even hoarding of special knowledge. Since that time, we have been subconsciously accumulating stuff at a rate more than our skills could find time to use them. We did not develop skills of adding  value to anything we get our hands on and sharing it with others. Those commodities become junk as soon as we crave for the latest thing. We trashed our world while we pampered ourselves. It is now a time to help and give. Stop hoarding. What we have today may all be thrown to waste if everything collapses. No one will ever use those resources that were tucked away for some rainy day if we do not use them now. Try to determine what you have been accumulating all this time. What are your addictions? Do you really believe that is what you will be doing all your life? Have you tried to do other stuff without necessarily totally giving up on your first biases or wants?

I invite the spiritual gurus to come down from their recluse and teach people how they fixed their Hearts. Show the masses how you can empower them with real world skills they can use everyday. I invite  the efficient tangible wealth generating sons of industrialists to extend a helping hand and empower the masses so we can help clean the environment we all screwed up with our insatiable consumptions. We are here ready to help as soon as we are slowly empowered with new knowledge and skills. We would also appreciate it if you allow better education to trickle down through our dilapidated educational systems.

Everyone, try new stuff you think will be helpful for everyone. Try not to restrict your preferences because you are actually capable of less self-restrictions than you'll ever know. Yes you can always get a partner who can complement your weaknesses. But if they leave or pass away for some reason, you are once again left disabled. Try to learn things you never had before. You do that and you will closely approach being fully interdependent.

This is not about the accomplishment or the destination. It is about our common journey into the bright environment friendly biosphere culture of the future that we all long for as one big human family sharing our different colorful experiences.

Finding the right partner in life or business or project

The most important question really is if your prospect or potential partner has the appropriate heart, mindset and skill-set that it takes to let you live the life you need and want. Of course they should want and love to be with you in the first place.

So how do you know if that person is the "right" one? How would you know if he will indeed become what he wants to become in the future?

1 Know what life stage you are in (Please read about the different Life stages of Human Development in this blog even if they are still work in progress), then know what life stage your partner is in.  Guided by the stages, dream of the world you want to have and focus on the positive things about it.

2 Based on your dream, list and prioritize your Values of choice in life.

3 Based on your chosen Values, develop the necessary skills related to that Value. Develop effective communication/empathy skills—laying on the table all your strengths, dreams and expectations/aspirations /needs early. Pick and plan your journey through the different stages  together with your partner. Fill it up with as many activities you like that will let your Values grow in harmony. Modify and improvise along the way. (I have enumerated a few Values and tabulated them with the associated skills in my paper drafts. Those are not posted here yet as I still have to re-list them on the comments sections below each stage being discussed in this blog. Please bear with me)

4 Touch as many other lives as you can in your own ways with the partner you committed to.

Now this may appear boring to some, especially those with the less abstract minds-the visual thinkers. But it may highly appeal to the complex thinkers, social thinkers and organized thinkers. Hopefully I can find a way to make it more interesting by adding pictures.



Tendencies and Attachment styles


People in the crawl stage may have tendencies to become extremely or persistently dependent. Review their profile (Please read about the different Life stages of Human Development in this blog even if they are still work in progress).

People in the walk and run stages may exhibit combinations of being dependent or extremely independent to occasional strong aversion from very dependent types. Review their profiles again if necessary.

People in the fly stage and beyond may also exhibit combinations but usually possess more of interdependent qualities rather than very dependent or very aversive/reclusive profiles. They can work and compensate or carry the baggages of people exhibiting the other two kinds of attachment style.


General Advise from Psychologists

Psychologists may give a general advise for the people who are seeking partners to target the interdependent types. For chances are, these types would adjust to complement the others thereby stabilizing the relationship.

My view on these

Regardless if you already have a partner or you are still seeking for one, you may find it helpful for both parties to know where they are in the stages. They should communicate to understand one another, agree to take a certain path and develop the necessary knowledge and skill to get there. In other words, you can make the relationship work if you put your hearts to it. And enjoying your journey together and with more and more people included in your expanding circle may be more important than any kind of accomplishment or destination. This is not to belittle any genuine attempt at goal setting.

You might want to try to become interdependent yourselves. Care may be taken not dwell too much in being extremely dependent or extremely aversive. Learn to work a harmonious relationship with any type of people you meet.

Fly Stage (Job Free)

"You can quit your job anytime you wish now. You do not even try to bargain with yourself about quitting your old job or temporary career because you know that your time is better devoted to more important stuff ... helping and empowering people in your areas of interest... consciously avoiding prolonged dole outs if possible."

"A school kid was asked the question...do you like math?.. The kid answered... I am the only one at school who likes math... Everyone else I know hates math. They don't enjoy thinking about numbers... He was asked a follow up question.. So what do you want to say to your friends about it? ... The kid answered candidly .. Well they better find ways to make learning math more fun coz they will need it when they grow up.."

Fly Stage

Now riding on 4-wheels rather than on 2-wheels. Make sure you read about the "Crawl Stage", the "Walk Stage" and the "Run Stage"..

Emotions

These may be among your more prominent emotions.

You have achieved interdependence and self sufficiency. You show people tools to cope up. You can cope calmly and effectively.

You can manage rejection and know where it is coming from. You are highly empathic with good communications skills. You are sensitive to the needs of others and are capable to provide them with what they need.

You invest much time and energy with satisfying your partner or friends, and empowering them sooner than later

If the other person finally becomes empowered and interdependent with your humble help even without them knowing it, you feel joy.

You can really make lasting commitments after careful thought and reflection

Fear is nearly non existent. Love takes over.

Bad habits are nearly  gone but their lessons are well remembered .

Time may begin to slow down again. You are still very motivated /driven.  You enrich your heart through values,  knowledge and skills. Your values, knowledge and skills are returning satisfactory results.

You feel more confident about investing and wish to share the abundance and blessings that you have with others.

Compassion, charity, a genuine concern for human welfare ….. Your small successes in achieving goal after goal after goal leads you ever closer to your dream and higher purpose in life. You can almost touch your dreams which are much larger than you and are not about you.

You are spending comfortably now that you are financially independent.

You feel it unnecessary to live below your means at this point because of the silly fact that your simple lifestyle can be supported by your growing tax contribution.

Living below your means is an old habit that is hard but not that difficult to break.

You can quit your job anytime you wish now. You do not even try to bargain with yourself about quitting your old job or temporary career because you know that your time is better devoted to more important stuff ... helping and empowering people in your areas of interests...avoiding prolonged dole outs if possible.

Your old job (if you had any) is just a back up or plan B.

Your financial plan is serious and you may even be planning to hire professional financial planners for your growing projects. Your financial plans are very detailed and hard to retain by memory.

You take advantage of good insurance policies. You and your assets are fully covered by insurance. That is partly because you know how to control  and manage risks. Later you will replace those insurance with your Values.

Health is one of your top concerns.

You keep the habit of "paying yourself first" reserving the money/ideas for future bigger investments.

You are passionate in empowering everyone willing and able hoping that you replicate yourself in like minded people.

Aside from empowering others, you can not do anything else but empathize with stagnating people in the complacency stage who are trying to avoid the retirement phase they dread because of their mindset. To those who cannot break loose from an old mindset, you still try to help provide them with work that they can cling to.

Goals

Your  salary more than meets your basic needs. But you need the leverage of partnership to help other people beyond your current reach.

You may plan to quit your job soon so you can start spending more time with your family and other more important things other than work (job).

Your dream is a lot bigger.

You found a higher purpose and meaning in life.

You live to enjoy some luxuries which are usually related to food and parties, travel, cultural development, beauty and health...care of your residual income.

You seriously plan for immediate retirement from your job.

Your asset allocation is far from being conservative.

Emergency fund can support you for months to years without any sort of income.

You know that personal insurance will protect you as the primary income generator while you make your initial run.

You continue to save and invest for tangible and intangible wealth to help empower others.

You get the attention of the "established value-poor cash-rich abusive people" .

Your for-profit and non-profit projects are beginning to enter the global scene.

Asset flow pattern

Your cash flow pattern begins to follow that of the rare genuine asset-rich people. Your salary/active income/earned income is your secondary income. Passive income shoulders all your basic living expenses as well as luxuries.

You have solid wealth building assets rewarding you with a genuinely rich lifestyle.

Your values strengthen other related values. You have identified and nearly developed all necessary skills you need.

You house is now designed for practicality and utmost safety. So as your cars.

You attract opportunities. Banks and friends want you to take their money and grow it for them.

You have more than adequate resources or credit in case of emergency.

Skills

You have developed life skills and business skills.

You can easily inspire people to follow their own dreams.

You talk with their spirits rather than their emotions.

You can easily convince other people that your ideas are always bigger and better.

You know how to manage your team's talents. You continue practicing/ sharpening your business and life skills which include selling, buying/investing, leadership, communication, money management, financing, accountability, planning, quantification, innovation, orchestration, etc.

You have the capacity to build, support and maintain global organizations with the help of local and/or international partners.

You just don't read about history.. You make history.

Team

You have almost if not already put together the best team.

You hire the best professionals that money can hire ...people who can protect your assets.

You look up to your mentor (if any) who has more solid experience. Your family and even your most doubting friends seek your advice. You can pick up valuable lessons from kids.

In the comment section I MAY post recommendations or directions you can take to sharpen your values

Run Stage (Motivated)

"A complete about face... You avoid procrastination... You have the ability to make things happen... You just go out and do it... You drop the victim mentality... You create your own world... You do all that and so much more surprisingly at the same time not making new enemies in the process... "

Run Stage

Analogy is that you are now riding a three-wheeled vehicle. More stability but still not as many on the top would want it, right? Make sure you already read about the "Crawl Stage" and the "Walk Stage" before reading this.

Emotions

These may be some of your most dominant emotions.

You experience a re-awakening of the young human Values you possess. Strong feelings of Love, Charity, Justice, Hope, Temperance, Order and Fortitude etc are deeply felt.

You are taking these Values and their fruits of knowledge and skills to new heights.

Passion for learning and helping are much much stronger.

You have less fears but with healthy doses of anxiety.

Your greatest obstacles are your very own bad habits that you try to identify, monitor and improve on everyday ...everyday.

You feel time moving so fast. You are motivated /driven.

You are willing to grow your Values, knowledge and skills beyond your diploma beyond retirement.

Your growing Values help give you an unexplainable kind of security and freedom.

Much of your fears of investing and borrowing money may be gone because you are learning how to manage risks. 
You forgive the repentant.
You tame the proud with your meekness and wisdom. You gain respect. You reflect positive qualities and others could feel it.
You don't make tantrums when your honor is smeared. You know that there will always be mature people who know you better.
You feel relatively alone because there are a few like you.
You may feel the same feelings as those in the crawl or walk stage. But you developing feelings that are more characteristic of the next stage (fly stage).

Goals

These may be some of your goals.

Despite living a fair to good life, the degree of empathy you try to develop allows you more to accommodate and embrace more risks, stress and workload acting to improve the life of others beyond your family or the limited reach of your "diplomas" or formal academic /vocational training. You are among the few who realize that empathy (among many other skills) can allow human civilization to move forward to a better future.

Your  salary more than meets your basic needs. But you need the leverage of partnership to help other people beyond your current reach. Your partners believe in your plans.

You may plan to quit your job soon so you can start spending more time with your family and other more important things other than work (job).

Your dream is a lot bigger.

You found a higher purpose and meaning in life.

You live below your means even if you can afford some luxuries.

You plan to delay gratification for a few years (maybe 3-5 years) to achieve even higher unselfish goals.

You want to build wealth for the long-term (not short term to end around retirement) at the same time develop fortitude, faith, determination, perseverance and a burning desire that would never fade.

You know that sudden riches without the proper mindset and skill-set or emotional maturity would be short-lived.

You seriously plan for early retirement.

You align your risk tolerance to an appropriate asset allocation strategy. You either adapt a balanced asset allocation strategy or an aggressive "enhanced growth" strategy. Emergency fund is respectable (15-20% of income).

You know that personal insurance will protect you as the primary income generator while you make your initial run.

Aside from paying taxes, you try to "pay yourself" and specifically reserve that for future investments. You now do not work to save to occasionally pamper yourself ...but you now try to save more to grow your tangible and intangible wealth in order to help empower others.

You plan to compete with the "established value-poor cash-rich abusive people" so that the less empowered will have much better alternatives.

Skills

You are beginning to hear about the more appropriate skill-set you never took seriously.

You know you have to develop those necessary life skills skills for tangible and intangible wealth building.

You understand  "good debt" and leverage more than ever. You know they are just among the many alternative tools.

Your job earns you a nice monthly salary (probably nothing or probably 10-750 thousand pesos) but you just can't wait to grow your assets so you can possibly quit your job entirely (if you had any) at the soonest possible chance.

You now realize that jobs are really risky in the long term (it takes so much of your valuable time that should have been spent for your own dreams rather than another persons dreamworld) and so now you regard your job as transitional or a stepping stone ...to be replaced with smarter options as you prepare for possible early retirement from that old job to take on new work that builds your dreams.

You may be trying to develop entrepreneurial skills or you may be trying to set up a non profit organization for the benefit of a bigger community. Or you may just be linking your projects with established benevolent industrialists or financial angels since you do not focus to much on money.

Your financial vocabulary and communication skills may be growing fast.

You are beginning to write a more serious but attainable short- and long-term financial plans with considerable detail and with real deadlines.

Asset allocation strategy is being geared for balanced or enhanced growth.Your asset column if being flooded by intangible assets.

You are better able to track all your resources and expenses...

Adding, reading and analyzing numbers now interests you. You may not know how to deal with numbers or math but you understand how to use them. You know what to count.

You have better budgeting skills.

You are more aggressive.

Your emergency fund and intangible contingencies will last for long periods of time.

You understand the life of successful people (cash-poor asset-rich people).

You begin learning how to write ...including letters asking support for your charitable projects. You like selling...selling mostly good ideas (not necessarily commodities/products) to other people who readily buys them.

Improving interpersonal skills. Improving emotional intelligence. Increasing number of people who respect you. Decreasing number of people you hurt. You are trying to develop people skills to attract people to your causes.

Improving systems skills. Better time management skills. Better organizational skills to run your cause or project.

Better leadership skills to lead your staff.

Your survival skills are better.

You love life and you "walking the talk". You have basic skills to save lives.

Cash-rich, asset-poor abusive people do not understand you and thinks you are crazy because intangible assets are not that significant in their way of life.

Order: Slowly strengthened and  achieved by skills mentioned above.

Restraint: Materialistic thoughts and negative feelings are tamed.

Justice: You are more forgiving even to unpleasant people...yet you guard the defenseless and oppressed.

Fortitude: No one can stop you from defending the poor..and winning the battle..you conquered fear itself.

Compassion: You see your old helpless self in other needy folks. You are more empathic ... and you take ACTION because you are growing the SKILLS

Love: Enriched by the above-mentioned values.

Asset flow pattern

Your cash flow pattern begins to follow that of the rare genuine asset rich people. Your salary/active income/earned income answers your basic living expenses for now. You plan to let a growing passive income shoulder all your expenses soon. Passive income (in contrast to active income above) is still building up but still inadequate to be the one answering basic living expenses.

You can identify real assets from liabilities. You have discovered their real meanings.

Your lifestyle is not excessive because you can easily control your liabilities.

Lifestyle is slim and trim. You want a simpler, safer house or car.

You are learning to read financial statements.

You believe that the increasing velocity of passive income is more important than stagnant positive cash flow.

You are on the hunt for better opportunities.

You use the leverage of "good debts" that may fuel your first wealth building assets.

You have adequate resource or credit in case of emergency.

A child is considered a blessing rather than some sort of investment or financial vehicle. Alternative education (which you may have personally concocted) augments a carefully selected educational system for your child (if any) and are among your top concerns.

Health is wealth. Values, knowledge and skills are wealth. Intangible wealth becomes more stimulating than sensationalized news or material wealth.

Team

You have an accountant.

You may or may not have a lawyer in your team.

You hire professionals who can drive your investment vehicle the way you want it.

You are trying to build a solid team whose members are always far specialized than you.  You are seriously and actively trying to surround yourself with people or professionals (as mentioned above) who are specialized in their own fields that can help you reach your higher goals faster. You  leverage on their skills.

You look up to your mentor (if any) who has more solid experience.

Your friends and some family members seek advice from you.

Recommended activities to achieve this stage and prepare for the next stage may be posted below..

Walk Stage (Complacency)

"Almost everyone favors a happy lifestyle ... avoiding stress ...staying relaxed and complacent ...only doing what makes them and their immediate social support happy

A few ...though appearing as though they are doing the same things that most people are doing ... Also exert a little itsy bitsy time to consciously strive to develop Values that they also treasure a little more ..."

Walk Stage
 

Sometimes I imagine this as a phase when you ride a two-wheeled vehicle. Still looks dangerous but a little better. I love motorbikes and occasionally ride a big bike or scooter. That explains the wheeled vehicle analogies.

Emotions

These may be among your most dominant emotions.

You just have to achieve and maintain your independence and self-sufficiency, and you often avoid intimate or close relationships with another person (on an individual perspective) ...or if not applicable, you are avoiding stress from strangers, other unknown families or man made institutions or the rest of the global human family whom you think is not your family (from the perspective of an independent family unit you are hiding from the unsafe world)

You are sensitive to signs of control or influence on your world by a partner or friend or institution. Even though you want a sense of belongingness, you feel uncomfortable with too much closeness/intimacy (pls view from different perspectives like above).   You do not expect others to reciprocate your positive feelings. It does not concern you. You can manage rejection better than in the former stage. Poor communication skills.

You may have a tendency to avoid inconveniences.

You tend to be emotionally distant to people beyond your perceived obligation.

If the person/institution you consider as "others" begins to leave you alone, then you feel comfortable.

You may be the type that automatically tries to avoids commitments...although you want a stable one someday... or you are in a commitment but somehow fail to maintain the spark it once had.

You feel that you will be okay as long as you keep your current job.

There is a temporary feeling of stability since you have enough resources within your reach at your disposal.

 Your job makes you feel "secure". Time is still relatively abundant. You have time to find anything that will entertain you.

You may still be willing and open to work/think harder for longer hours in return for more salary, energy or power.

You feel lost without your job.

You are not comfortable with loans/debts.

You fear losing money if you invest.

Goals

These may be some of your goals.

Although salary is enough to meet your basic needs plus maybe occasional luxuries, you are open to a better compensation.

But since you are living a good life, this is not a priority concern so you do not act to improve your condition.

You are enjoying the benefit of a good scholastic/professional education or a nice stable passive income/supply of energy/resources.

You are less dependent on others and you want to keep it that way for as long as it takes.

All you may know to keep your money is to cut up on costs.

You want to make sure your parent/guardian/husband /wife doesn't die ahead of you, because he/she is the primary income generator.

Assets

Emergency fund can go as high as 500k.

You do not keep a separate account for future investments.

You may have a house or car which you believe are among  your greatest assets.

You may be living in your own house or leased apartment.

You may have insurance.

You may not be loaning money and other tangible assets.

Still building your intangible assets.

There is still lack of balance and harmony. Your current lifestyle will stop right after retirement. You do not track your assets.

Poor planning skills. No concrete contingencies.

Still poor input and output controls or focus and restraint sometimes to the point of neglecting distant needy others.

Lacking in courage/fortitude

Charity may be in the form of stagnant regular small donations from P10 to maybe P100 weekly or a stagnant regular cash donations/gifts totaling about P200 to P50,000 annually

Dreams are personal and simple.

( You think you are surviving but you may slip back to the former stage in case of any major life event)

Skills

You have good to excellent vocational/professional skills.

Your financial skills are still poor.

Financial planning skill is still poor.

You adopt a conservative or "saver" asset allocation strategy.

You still do not keep track of all your expenses. Poor resource/inventory tracking skills.

Adding, reading and analyzing numbers does not interest you.

You begin learning how to budget but not necessarily successful every time.

You do not have short-term and long-term plans that are specific, detailed, realistic, measurable, attainable and timed.

Cost-cutting may be your ONLY or a major strategy. You are not aggressive.

Your emergency fund is small

You do not know how to sell and you may even hate selling.

You think selling is a skill of sales representatives that go door to door.

You may believe that there is no such thing as "good debt".

Poor systems and organizational skills.

 Your survival skills are poor.

Few first aid skills can be recalled. Fading basic life support skills... if you had any.  Some may know "Hands only" CPR or CPR without breaths.

Asset flow pattern

Your cash flow pattern follows those of the poor or the middle class. Earned income may support an above average living lifestyle. So you can earn more from your job ...than you spend.... there is unused surplus.

If you are single, some shopping habits develop.

You may own a few expensive things you bought for yourself and that you consider as assets.

You may have a credit card.

You may have bank or personal loans.

If you marry, suddenly … you have a combined income.

But shopping is controlled with occasional sprees.

Private education for your child (if any) and health may be one of your top concerns.

You may have a house or a car which you believe are real assets.

Team

These are the advisers you have.

You may have a regular accountant or PA

You may have a standby lawyer. 

Aside from the above, your immediate and fewer older family and friends are still your advisers.

Crawl Stage (Dependence)

"There was this poorly nourished kid; he woke up again for the nth time hungry. He was awaiting for his father who he knew just went out to find him food...it has been days now. He fell asleep again and in his dream...there he saw a woman carrying an infant in her weak forearm ... With eyes almost crying just as if she was begging for water for the dehydrated infant in her falling arms. The little infant, wrapped in a dirty thin linen, had very thin limbs partly exposed to the humid caressing winds, dark skinned, dry open mouth... flies occasionally land on the infant's cracking lips...

This dreaming malnourished kid was moved .... Grasped her plastic bowl still with some water ...stretched his arms to the teary eyed woman ... He was actually offering her his last can of water... Before the woman could reach the water ...he fell asleep within his dream ....this time it was different. He woke up and he somehow was not hungry. He did not realize he died.

Now the next scenes are mixed with a story that I can not recall where I got. As this malnourished boy in the above story was taken with the winds...he saw kids with a different skin color, accompanied by healthy adult women trying to celebrate the ceremonious opening of a small drinking well which was actually funded by a teen-aged boy who traveled from afar now standing there. This donor boy actually worked and earned a few hundred dollars in his home country ....within  his community... practicing all the life , organizational, selling, planning and orchestration skills he has at a young age ...after having been inspired and moved by what he saw on television one day. I can not recall the details where I read something that narrates this but somehow these pictures got stuck on my memory. 

I see genuine human values of Love, Charity, Compassion, Fortitude, Justice and Order in both kids ... both gave everything they had... They are not in the "crawling stage" as we would think... 

The first scenario may not happen everyday ...but the second scenario ...which is more complex ...actually did happen.... I hope this can inspire some of us..."

Crawl Stage

 

Below is a rough list. The final format may be a questionnaire form that can be tallied and analyzed to roughly point where one is among the different stages. The ideas may describe the time when we were more dependent. It may be a period when we can not support a lifestyle. This may be analogous to a situation when we ride a one-wheeled vehicle. Looks pretty risky.

Emotions

You need support to keep you alive, breathing, stable and happy.

Your greatest fear is not having enough financial support/salary /resources/ energy.

You cling to job security or a position of borrowed/delegated power.  You may feel you're on top of the world when you eventually get it. You may feel you have all the time in the world.

You are willing and open to work/think harder for longer hours in return for more salary, energy or power.

Feelings of desperation, insecurity, paranoia and doubts may haunt you … especially if you have no job and no liberating skills.

You long for independence and self sufficiency.

You are very sensitive to rejection.  You feel anxious that people may not reciprocate the feeling. This may or may not paralyze you.

You invest much time and energy with feelings and yearnings of getting someone to cling on to.  You over-analyze people ...maybe to the extreme. The innocent actions of others may appear threatening or often misinterpreted.

If the other person provides care, security and reassurance, you feel calm.

You may be the type who can make commitments without much thought.

Goals

These are your primary goals.

You want a better incentive/fee/salary/compensation/education as soon as possible. You wish you had a better job.

You may want to further improve your professional skills as this would equate to a better job.  You value a good scholastic/professional education.
You want a real friend.
You have to live with a guardian or parents.

You want to wean off your dependence on others.

If you may have any serious dream at all, you dream of someone to really take care of you or ... more money/power because you believe it will answer all or most of your problems.

Assets

You have no emergency fund.

You do not keep a separate account for future investments.

You never personally bought yourself a house or car which you believe can be your greatest assets.

You have no permanent address.

You may be living with your family or friends.

You do not have insurance and you may think it is unnecessary.

You borrow money and other tangible assets.

Still building your intangible assets.

There is lack of balance and harmony.

You receive more than you give.

Poor input and output controls or focus and restraint sometimes to the point of abusing others.

Lacking in courage/fortitude

Love, charity and compassion in the form of social smiles, hugs, kisses, embraces.

Skills

These are your present skills.

You may have good to excellent vocational/professional skills.

Your financial skills are very poor.

You may not have any leadership skills.

Poor planning and asset management skills. 

You have a loose financial plan.

You do not keep track of your spending habits.

Adding, reading and analyzing numbers may not interest you much. You have no time counting your daily/weekly/monthly expenses.  You think it is a waste of time.

You may have all the skills above but you tend to take advantage of everything and everyone you can get your hands on

You don't think much about your own safety or others safety.

Some may mostly be concerned  about their own life that smearing it apparently ends everything.  Some may be suicidal just to keep your image untarnished.

You know that life exists but you can not really support life.

Poor bidirectional communication skills. If ever you are good in communications, it is one way and linear.

Asset flow pattern

Your asset flow pattern follows those of the poor. Relatively, you spend (a lot) more than you earn OR you just can not produce (by yourself) enough to satisfy your basic needs.

You may be deep in "bad debt".

Your lifestyle is bare and basic.

Your basic needs are being handled or nearly covered by allowance or "baon" or credit or alimony or pensions. No significant assets you earned by your own sweat ...some may be getting support from tax money contributed by other people (with or without their permission), or support from parents. Some may be emotional vampires (if we talk of the intangibles)

No substantial savings.

You will do anything and everything to source out power/energy/physical needs with or without permission. May exhibit childish or adult type tantrums if deprived.

Team

You get support and advice from this team:

The only advisers you have are your immediate family and a handful of friends (if you have any).

No personal assistants/secretaries. You think they are totally unnecessary.

Recommended extra-curricular activities:

See comments section later...

The 5 Basic Life Stages of Human Development

This section boldly attempts to discuss the different stages of human development in order to shed first light or serve as a rough guide or rough "roadmap" to man's higher purpose in life.

Crawl Stage

Walk Stage

Run Stage

Fly Stage

Float Stage

Whether the person is married.. with kids...or not ..... whether the person lives in the past with a tribal mind ...or in the present with a nationalistic mind ...or in the future with a biosphere mind..., he would have to go through these simple stages of human development.

Whether you stagnate in one stage... move backwards... or move forwards, your heart will dictate it...because these stages involve value formation originating from the heart... (remember that the heart develops first before the brain ... the heart pretty much decides where the brain will grow...the heart can sustain the body without the brain...and of course you know that commercial ads target the emotion and the heart).

I think it would be safe to assume that thoughts are from the brain while values are from the heart ... If one would argue that values also emanate from the brain, then I would counter that the heart and brain can be called brain altogether ... Both organs have extensive neural networks ending in non motile neurons in the brain and motile myocardial cells in the heart. Anyway there is no point in arguing since another may claim that he has more extensive neural networks in his behind.

enough jokes to break the ice ... more ice and boring stuff in a few days time...

Part 2. Values Produce Skills that Can Help Solve Global Problems

Part 2

As has been illustrated in the above story, we can clearly see that genuine values can really invite wisdom and skills that are needed to achieve a particular dream. It is just that not many people now are dreaming and writing serious goals and preparing to meet those goals by developing the appropriate skills. Many just do not have the Heart and are just too overwhelmed with too much work, leisure and distractions. We are not conscious of what we really need to BE and DO and HAVE.

Whether or not food production will be significantly curbed by climate changes and regardless if food prices shoot up...I think this is a time for global cooperation.. And I mean global.. .Not one nation can tackle this alone... Before we go global, I will have to point you to what you and I can do as individuals to jumpstart this humble but doable project.

No finger pointing needed...if somebody were to...we would all be blaming ourselves....

the problem is not outside each one of us ...it was WITHIN each of us all this time .... In the same way the problem of hunger is rooted inside us..in our hearts... Our Hearts are hungry.

Now let us hold that thought ...seriously try to understand what it means.

I think it is another way of saying that if we just decide to finally solve all our problems, we could indeed be able to..... All we really need is to change Hearts. But what do we mean when we say Heart... We hear it in sermons ...or biology class ...or in public areas... But most of the talk is vague..

This is my take on it... It is boring stuff, but somewhere inside  I am sure you would agree.

We can change our hearts in this way among other ways...

Part 1. Values Produce Skills that Can Help Solve Global Problems

Part 1

There was once an ordinary couple who came from the barrios/provinces. They DREAMED of having a nice academic education...quite understandable for this was not a priority of their parents who had lived all their lives in the remote areas of a small developing  nation.

The couple finally succeeded and graduated with their long-awaited diplomas validating their acquired skills in agronomy/agriculture . ..they both worked in an agricultural university and subsequently got connected with an international research institution for rice. They had kids.

Together with their kids they wanted to help solve the global problem of hunger in their own small way...and so together they DREAMED.

Synchronicities and small coincidences happened through the years . When the father, being a skillful junior rice scientist, wanted to check if rice crops can be grown without seeds ... (crazy idea) .. referring to  rice dry stems left after harvesting the top ... or those dying rice stubbles nearly crushed to the ground with intact roots.... question was , can those still be made to regrow from its base near the old roots ...(a very weird concept or insight of rice growing that he got from keen UNBIASED OBSERVATIONS of nature) ... Although really weird, this unusual insight becomes more acceptable if you think that grasses and some trees can actually begin re-growing from the base near its roots ...even with the plant's near death type of experience... it still fights for its life and begin to grow back as soon as the rain comes...Life really does find a way... Nature always springs back to life... 

One of the scenes of unbiased observations was when an ordinary farmer from a remote location and her ordinary child was playing with a native mat called "banig", laid it on the newly harvested area of rice while awaiting for the return of his farmer father. Cut rice stubbles under the mat were crushed to the ground and weeks later ... fresh shoots were growing from the intact base even if the remaining stubbles have all dried up. This was noticed by the junior scientist dad on his way to monitor an unrelated pilot project near the area. That was his route.

This finally lead to a research proposal which did not immediately got approved for launch due to its weird concept not really found in scientific books.

But eventually the proposal got approved and it proved to be very feasible. After harvest or cut stubbles are then being lodged intentionally to allow the rice to re-grow immediately. The technology slowly matured to perfection. The manual lodging (known as "lock lodging technology" ...google it) became mechanized (Rolodge Advance Rice Ratooning) and all that needs to be done is put up a management staff and training facility, partner with large institutions for immediate dissemination to the countryside areas where the conditions would allow it.

Early projects with an FAO offshore branch was short-lived ...and projects with the government were relative failures..... failure begins soon after a nice media coverage was out. As if magically the funding would disappear and suddenly redirected to more pressing concerns... Whatever those concerns were, I hope food can also ...one day ...be squeezed into their priority list. And I hope someone better than the best ones we already approached is listening. It remains to be seen. .. I am actively working so that the WILL of the hungry and the rest of the COMPLACENT people must somewhere spark... I hope it will not be too late for us to realize this in our lifetime.

What do you think should the next step be if you are an ordinary person in that developing country? What can you do ...aside from pray or wish your heart out? I need your answers. This is not a trick question. No answer is wrong. Answers in "Tagalog" or "Taglish" are welcome.

Want Your Needs

We have external basic needs like food, water and shelter. We also have internal basic needs ... like Love.

If it is necessary for us to enjoy basic external needs, it would follow that we also have to fulfil our internal Needs.

Until we do that, we have not attained our purpose. Therefore what we need to do is to experience how we master our own selves. We need is to fix ourselves from the inside. Once we fixed the inside, then that is the only time we can fix the outside. But a lot of us do just the opposite never realizing the better approach.

So many wise people throughout history talk about the Heart. From their collective wisdom, we will try to ponder what that word really means.

The hearts of many today are stuffed with a bunch of seemingly boring things that we tend to keep for almost eternity. Once we believe we already have these so called values, we tuck them away forgetting all about them because of apparently more important things. We continually pack our Hearts with what we think is more significant.

We still do not realize that these seemingly ignored intangible things can lead us to a life of meaning, purpose and other higher pursuits.

Yes we can make our current lives even more interesting than they are now. Ordinary people do have a real chance of becoming competent enough to help solve the hardest global problems we can ever encounter. I can give you an example of how any ordinary people can empower themselves to help solve very big perennial problems like hunger.

This could all start with a list. A list such as the one I show below. This is actually my own list. Hopefully I could fully develop at least one if not all of them during a lifetime:

Love

Compassion

Justice

Fortitude

Order

Hope

Prudence

Let us take, as an example, the living Value of Order. If one consciously tries his best to develop it within himself, he could one day move oceans and mountains. Order can readily be recognized in people who make a big difference in the world just by their innumerable skills in creating or orchestrating charitable projects on an ever expanding scale. Some may not even have money but could still be effective and successful. Surely nobody can steal these treasures that a person keeps in his Heart rather than in his pocket. In this context, Order not only means having a clean and tidy desk or room. Order is now seen on the level of organizational skills, strategic planning and delegation skills, risk and asset management skills and the like. Yes all together, these enumerated skills do make up a person with the Human Value of Order developed in tremendous proportions. Would you be willing to develop your preferred Values? Because I am sure that you can if you only put your Heart on it.

These living Values although relatively difficult to cultivate is still very possible to acquire.

If I just say I can love and just believe in my mind that I do without having Fortitude and Order, I know I cannot express full Compassion and Love. The reason is that without Order, I may not be organized enough to express Love to the needy folks beyond my very small reach outside my home or my diploma. Each of us has the capacity to actually Be more and Do more than that.  It is just that we only think and believe that we cannot and so we nearly lost the ability to do so.  Just verbally or mentally proclaiming that we love is us merely a first step. It is very similar to "wishing". A wish is nothing but a mere ambition for a man without the many skills that make up the Value of Order.

I would have to attempt to tackle these skills associated with our Human Values so we can work on ourselves as we go through the challenges of Life.

Love begets other related Values as I described above. These supporting Values in turn beget related supporting knowledge and skills. Therefore without achieving skill/competency, we may be just wishing or watching rather than owning and living the Human Value.

Ambition is quite good for a child who could still only wish without necessarily having the skill or competence to be someone he wants to become in the future. To a grown man, however, ambition may indicate some sort of a developmental lag. More is expected from adults. We must even do more than our current leaders. Many of whom have apparently been exhibiting dismal performance. Leadership is also a skill. So we lag so much in many aspects of our development.

But don't get me wrong. It is not a bad thing to lag. What is not so good is to stagnate for so long. But understand that we are all on our own unique paths to perfection moving at different paces.

So the next time you think that your neighbor is slow. Examine and fix yourself first. Then if your neighbor is willing, help empower that person.

In the next article I shall attempt to illustrate how ordinary people with "non extraordinary values" have been trying their best to help solve one of the biggest global problems...hunger.