(painting by H. Goltzius)
I got into a fight with my partner a couple of days ago and she said to me that she hopes that someday I can find the perfect partner: a partner who will be chipper and available when I want her to be but who will go away when I’m busy, a partner who will say all the right things at all the right times, a partner who agrees with me whenever I need her too…she went on for a while. I can’t remember the rest.
Why can’t we make everyone be what we want, just by asking? Why does it always hafta turn ugly? I wanted her to tell me she loved me, to be nice to me, to tell me that I’m right. But the way I was asking her to listen to me was by telling her all the things she does wrong, all the ways that she has failed me, and all the things I must put up with to be with her. I tried to make her feel bad so that she would do what I wanted her to.
The word power has multiple definitions depending on whether you’re talking about physics, mathematics, computers, music, literature, sports, or social science. That last one is the one I’m talking about. And it’s the hardest one to get it to work right.
Power is a tricky, tricky little thing. It’s not baaaadd, per say…but it’s one of those things that you have to really be smart/wise to use it right, to not get carried away. Sort of like coffee or money or cheese. Having these these things around is wonderful, but once you get a little too much of any of them, well, bad things can happen.
Rudolf Steiner says that some demons (real demons) are formed when people try to bend other people to their will, ie, use their power inappropriately.
Mankind at present is still very far removed from [full understanding of] what it is to value and esteem the freedom of another. Think only how the modern man for the most part wants to overrule the mind of another, how he cannot bear someone else to think and like differently, how he wants to work upon the other’s soul.
[Demons] existence is solely due to the the fact that intolerance and oppression of thought have in various ways been used in our world. Thus we have learnt again today to know of beings which are just as real as the things which we perceive through our physical senses, and which very definitely produce effects in human life. (from Nature Spirits)
My therapist used to ask me if I would rather be right or happy. Based on my track record so far, it appears that I would rather be right. Humility is not my strong point.
humble. (L. humus, ground, soil). To exhume is to take out of the ground. The L. adj. humilis, one the ground, lowly, became Fr. humble, whence Eng. humble, mainly in the figurative sense. “To eat humble pie,” meaning to submit to humiliation, is a transfer because of the sound, from umble-pie, a pie made of umbles, from numbles, the entrails of deer. (Dictionary of Word Origins, Joseph Shipley)
We made up, but I have to admit, I tucked the numbles in my napkin and made a big fat demon. Gotta work on that one.
Sue, you are such a courageous human being! Such honesty to describe the power dance (I like it too!) you saw yourself engaging in. I go through worst scenarios. Thank you …your writing helped me a lot today…it was like looking at a mirror…
Ugh, mirrors! They’re everywhere! So much work to do 🙂 Thanks for your comments. Friends sure make the work easier.
*Sigh* Apparently it is ‘right’ for me, too… Hmm…
I love this honest, forthright description of the power dance…
Power dance…that makes it sound almost bearable! I like it better than “the fight for control.” Thanks for your response…
Demons, baggage, whatever you want to call it, we’re all encumbered by them. They are certainly what creates conflict in our relationships and keep us from being that ideal, enlightened person that we aspire to be, that potential that we recognized in each other when we first fell in love. What is important in a long term relationship, is to try to sustain that initial beautiful vision of our partner that we were initially so dazzled by, while accepting them whole, beauty, baggage and all. Also we need to try to do the same for ourselves.
The fight is always the same fight and it usually centers on us trying to improve our partner by pointing out their flaws and giving them lots of pointers on how they could be a better person if only they changed this or that personality trait! In my experience (32 years of marriage) the only thing that really works is to make a real effort to accept those flaws as part and parcel of each of us as individuals and to keep alive the flame (however small and flickering it may sometimes become!) of that vision of possibilities that first inspired us in each other.
Wow! Nice way to sum it up! Sorry so long in reply, must have missed this thread:)
Which came first, the problem or the sonuoitl? Luckily it doesn’t matter.
Is this about another way to make a homunculus (hUm…)? ah, there are so many plays on words that can come out of this! What a metaphor humble pie is, now that we know the derivation! And unfortunately, how much easier it is to make this kind of “spirit” than to incubate horse poop for forty weeks.
It would be quite interesting to examine the ethers around tea parties and congressional meetings after the name-calling that has been going on recently to see just how lively these spirits can be.
Tea parties are still happenin’…but I get the feeling that demons can be quashed with positive thinking. Eventually anyway:)