The Power of Presence

Hello all,

I’m expecting today to be an intense one in NJ – first of all we’ve been watching the weather do its best to reach 100 – degrees and humidity (percentage – for those of you in “dry” climates) - kind of typical NJ late summer weather, yet somehow even after forty plus years of “expecting” it is catches me my surprise every time. “It can’t be this hot and humid, can it ... what are we in Singapore?” The answer is “No, you’re in New Jersey, of course.” ... well quoting that great philosophy Homer Simpson ... Duh! So anyway we’re also moving today and I’ll have the pleasure of NOT carrying boxes and furniture – just having my entire life upturned for about the next week. That’s Monday and here we go ...

Last week I left off with a discursion into the Catholic Church and Eric Hoffer ... leading up to a few brief comments on “Power and Language” ... that of course was after we opened the discussion of the ongoing Middle East conflict ... all in the service of illuminating the power and impact of the social construction of reality. I also promised that I’d begin moving forward towards specifics like “languaging” and specifically the power of “declaration” in languaging. Before I continue I want to make sure I’ve clarified one small point ... it’s “declaration” that makes agreements vital, i.e.: brings them to life, gives them life and keeps them alive.

There are many, many examples of this power of declaration from “social” life that indicate their power over agreements, some of which I’ve mentioned in previous postings. I’d love to go a bit deeper with regard to how these declarations get all stirred up into consciousness, the generative force of the mind that creates these declarations – especially the ones that haven’t been previously declared before, but that’s for another time. This time’s for the discussion of what it looks like when you’re in the presence of the power of declaration.

What most likely got me going on this path of wonder and curiosity into power and language ... and the relationship between the two started before I knew I was being fished into the game. It’s usually the way of things, when we are so young as to be totally open and malleable the world shows up and begins to shape us. This occurs so pervasively that we assume forevermore that this is ‘just the way it is’ - the world and everything in it. “Our” patterns are really not - “our” patterns at all, but a conglomeration of the dominant patterns that we’ve been exposed to over time. For most people this actually becomes the way it is – it becomes “the world” as they know it ... in total. There is no “other” option, no “other” consideration, no “other” possibility – and “like this” they are swept along like so much flotsam in the current of life. So often, as with flotsam, this is the product of some form of wreckage.

The way this most shows up is in the form of “sensitivities” the “triggers” of one’s life. The tonalities that we are so often subject to when we hear them used ... both positively and negatively impacting us apart from the content they surround. The expressions, gestures and postures people assume in interacting with us ... stirring up both familiar and long forgotten reflex responses ... again both positively and negatively. The movement, I personally love this one, the way a person literally moves themselves through the world ... overwhelming us with interpretations of the individual we perceive inside that movement. Yet who thinks of this in their daily conversations, the way a word is emphasized and inflected, reinforced with an expression, a gesture, the posture of the person speaking it to us ... at us, or especially their movement ... who I ask you again would pay attention and track the impact of such things ... imagine the way they move themselves overriding the content of their message ... who, WHO WOULD THINK SUCH A THING!

Yet no one is immune to these devices of communication in the construction of one of the most essential aspects of social reality – the construction of the personage of the individual who’s communicating ... who is the messenger?

This becomes essential information in determining what the message is, what meaning it has in your life ... how it will shape, influence and impact your life ... who is the messenger? Should I ... will I ... do I ... trust them? Is their word good? Are they believable? Can I trust myself to act on this information? These questions all require asking and answering in regard to the millions and millions of bits of information that assault the average person, in the average modern society every day ... and yet virtually every response and behavior that follows hangs more perfectly on the assumptions about the messenger than any other factor in the message. Let’s take a page adapted from McLuhan ... “The Messenger is the Message”

When you get that – that the messenger becomes the message ... “IS THE MESSAGE,” you are onto something.

This simple idea, the messenger is the message, is the background for so much of what we “believe” to be True. The world we live in is shaped by what be believe to be True more than any impact of what may actually be True. In fact our beliefs about what is True so overshadow all else that we can’t see what may be there pointing at the Truth. And nothing is more powerfully pervasive than our beliefs about others ... especially “those who have the answers or the power.”

Now of course you’re excused, especially if you’ve gone to school. You were taught extensively before the age of reason to believe what you were told from sources of authority, from the expert at the front of the room. Then you were conditioned to recognize the signals of authority and expertise so that you would respond appropriately when they were run by you. You would freeze all critical consideration and go directly to knee-jerk response - “Yes, that makes sense ... I agree.” Or you go to the “other” knee-jerk response, “No, that’s not what I think, I don’t agree with that.” Either way the conditioned response kicks in – just as it’s been programmed to do so under the right conditions. Every major leader of any kind ... benevolent, despotic, evil, psychopathic ... depends upon this conditioning and knows more about it’s fundamental “rules” than you do ... unless of course you’ve taken the counter-training program and become one of “them”

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Now before I go on I’d like you to consider this ...

What’s your reaction to the paragraph in blue above (for those of you who might not be seeing this in color – the two paragraphs back beginning with the words: “Now of course you’re excused ...”)? First just check what was your immediate response coming off that paragraph? Did you agree with it, or disagree with it – what was your mind doing with the content of it? Now think anyone “saying” this to you instead of writing it would see that response in you immediately and could then begin to use it to shape what came next from them to you. (Just a bit of info for the computer to digest.) Now for kicks go back and read it again ... this time phrase by phrase – not even sentences at a time, but literally phrase by phrase – and notice what your response it to each phrase. Notice that each of these phrases is a declaration. They force you to either believe them or dismiss them to continue in a logically connected manner with the reading of the next. This is designed to pull you into the narrative, the story, the description of what’s being “told” to you. Then the reading it again with an emphasis on the languaging of what’s written what do you notice? Do you notice the “emotive” quality of the phrasing? The word choices? How they demand that again you agree or disagree with what’s being written this time below the cognitive level but instead at the emotional level – how it makes you feel (about yourself mostly ... and then in turn about those who “did” this to you ... educated you). These are just two levels of consideration beneath the surface ... and that ‘s just a beginning, we could go much, much deeper – and if I had you in person I would, but for now you’ve enough to get the point as a beginning.

Now, add into all that someone who knows how to generate the markers of conviction, certainty and command. This “messenger” with such a message would surely be able to “sell it’ to the vast majority of listeners. Yet this message is largely innocuous compared to the kind of messages that shape social reality on the larger scale, e.g.: politics. And, many of these folks are being trained both overtly and covertly in the design of messaging to the masses. For now remember this – they believe you’re just one of the endless stream of human flotsam they have to sell their message to so they can run the show their way and take all the goodies home themselves. Now don’t get me wrong, they’re willing to share the goodies with those who catch them in the act – they have no choice but to do so, but they also know there won’t be too many they have to share with and there’s plenty to go around at this level.

The “trick” is to become one of them – at least at the level of knowledge and skills – and then decide how you will use your new found power. Ultimately it’s all you can do ... “choose.”

Well that’s a lot for one day ... and I’ll come to an end in this way: If I had to share only one thing about thinking with my children I’d teach them the ubiquitous invisible power of social conditioning and construction on their choices ... and then I’d teach them how to decide for themselves. This is an education either delivered discreetly or one that must be taken up deliberately if one wants to possess it, unfortunately very, very few of us have had parents with the knowledge, skills, experience AND foresight to build this into our education along with all the other “stuff” we were told we had to learn. Yet like Paul Atreides in Frank Herbert’s “Dune” we could all use a bit of “mentat” training ... and it’s never too late.

Hoping that for some of you this will be a wake up call ... or your alarm if you prefer ...

As always ... more to come,

Joseph – from NJ