blog traffic analysis
This is http://www.essayz.com/a8811011.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.} ========================================================== %REFLEXIVE EVALUATION PARADIGM INTEGRITY ADDICTION 881101 The integrity of a person or community depends critically upon provisions within the leading paradigm for the evaluation of the dominant ideals, values, goals, traditions, assumptions, etc. which are central in the life of the person and community. The situation is paradoxical and circular. If the dominant ideals, values, goals, traditions, assumptions make no unbiased provision for their own evaluation; they constitute a prison. To the extent that they make no provision for their own transcendence they are a prison. This is the practical meaning of idolatry. Those people and communities that practice idolatry make no provision for the transcendence of the objects of their worship. They are trapped by their devotion to their idols. Their worship does not point to anything of worth beyond the limited focus of the worship. With nothing of worth beyond the limited focus of their worship their ship of state has no reliable reference points to serve as the basis for navigation. Ultimately human and communal experience are relevant to the ideals, values, goals, traditions and assumptions which presume to lead behavior through decision making. When experience is ignored and repressed because of the compulsive worship of that which is not grounded in experience, the people who are trapped by their worship cannot learn from their experiences. They make the same kinds of mistakes over and over, never learning from their mistakes. Addicts and codependents are trapped in a paradigm which prevents them from learning from their own tragic efforts. Their failures are grounded in misleading ideals, values, goals, traditions and assumptions; not in technical weaknesses and inadequacies. They need to evaluate their conceptions of life in the light of their tragic experiences, and be honest about what their experiences are telling them. They need to consider alternatives to their paradigm and to be in conversation with different kinds of people about their experiences. They also need to be in conversation with people who have been trapped like themselves, but have started to recover from their imprisonment. Any effective provision for the evaluation of our highest ideals will involve open and honest dialogue with people who are dedicated to different ideals which we might consider as alternatives to our own. We can best recognize our own errors by comparing our efforts with the efforts of other people and how their experiences compare to our experiences. Different people are not a threat, they are a resource for our salvation from our prisons of limited perspectives and insights. We may be a resource to them in return. (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy) ==========================================================