Episode Transcript
Are you caught up in the story while missing the point?
The story holds profound meaning when you grasp its underlying principles. I was narrating an incident where a client was facing a challenge. As always, I chose to articulate from the core of the issue, in the form of a story.
As we all know, proper guidance isn't control. To truly help anyone, you guide people to seek real-time answers that will help them, not turn them into a paying addict.
Suppose you go to a Doctor who keeps you sick, by supporting your illness, giving you ways to keep being ill, with no cure in sight. The only people who benefit are the Doctor, the insurance company, and the hospitals.
Anyone or anything that seeks to control your life under the guise of protecting you is a dangerous con artist of the worst measure.
Imagine learning self-defense from someone for a fee. And the paid instructors' end answer was to call them when you get attacked, and they will be on their way.
Instead of just seeking information, we should strive to cultivate wisdom. As I was deconstructing the situation into manageable parts, a common thread emerged.
The story became the focal point and not the premise behind it. For example, A person hires a woman and pays her less money than a male, and allows a culture of blatant sexual harassment to thrive.
Is money the point? Is sexism or male chauvinism the point? No. The fact is the blatant disrespect of fundamental human rights.
Yes, fair pay and policies to address issues are essential. But without a culture that respects human rights, what significant change can we expect?
Unfortunately, the inability to seek the premise of a situation is often used by predators and con-people in the form of the "Red herring, and Strawman argument.
A straw man argument is a logical fallacy where someone misrepresents their opponent's argument to make it easier to attack, while a red herring is a distraction that introduces an irrelevant topic to divert attention from the original issue. The key difference is that a straw man directly distorts the existing argument, whereas a red herring creates a diversion by bringing up an entirely new subject.
Straw man argument.
For instance, if I tell you that the reason you don't have money is because someone who also has no money moved into your town, while I am filling my pockets with money, that makes no sense and is obviously not the reason you have no money.
The reason both of you have no money is that I am stealing it from both of you. And if I keep each one distracted, each party gets poorer, and I get richer.
Additionally, if I offer any solution, the premise will still be you getting poorer, and me getting richer.
Being able to see from "square one" is the term I use because you cannot be fooled, swayed, or misled when you know the premise and are not distracted by the presentation.
Unfortunately, from relationships to work and societies, the ability to see through the presentation to the authentic point can become an issue of life and death, literally.
When emotions, fear, and anxiety are added to the mix, people will easily replace facts with fantasy and distractions.
Quick story: Two guys are down on their luck. One guy is a con man. The con man hears the circus is in town and offers to remove all of the elephant poop for no fee. The circus owner quickly accepts the arrangement.
The con man sets his friend up on the corner to sell 50 lb bags of elephant poop for $25.00, with the strict instruction to answer every inquiry with, "look at the size of an elephant!"
A man approaches and says, he grows prize vegetables, and would this elephant dung help? The con man's friend says, "look at the size of an elephant." A lady who grows prize roses. A farmer inquires about the elephant poop and gets the same answer.
By the end of the week, the two men made over $7,500. The con man's friend can't wait to continue the enterprise. However, when the con man says that the selling is over, he is surprised and angered to hear that.
The second guy disagrees with the statement and resumes selling the following week. But, within hours, he is flooded with people who used the elephant poop, which killed all of the things that the dung was used on.
The people who purchased the elephant poop were given a useless, nonsensical answer, and only regarded the size of an elephant.
Had the clients realized the words of the question were not included in the answer, the answer would have been disregarded as rubbish.
The three cardinal rules remain: Has the source proven time and time again to have a good heart? Has the source continually shown to have your best interest at heart? And lastly, do they really understand and have competency in the subject?
As we all know, we live in the age of predators, with no human decency, and whose "Gods are money and power." There has never been a greater urgency to think for ourselves and protect the human species as a whole.
In protecting ourselves in the spirit of the human collective, we make the world a better place for everyone who is not a predator.
There is strength both mentally, physically, and spiritually in numbers.
Be a light to yourself and others.
So, my friends, until next time. Be good to yourself. And don't do anything to others you don't want done to you.
Peace and Blessings.
How about that?
