We who would make our own liberty secure must not allow our oppressors’ fears and hatreds thwart our plans to save ourselves and America lest we become our own enemies.
Our worst enemies are embedded in our subconscious minds. These enemies are our evil deeds and their memories — our pride, our selfishness, our malice, our unbridled passions, and our indifference to atrocities when we should have spoken up and stood up — which pursue us with a relentlessness that we cannot avoid. – Henry A. Wallace
Americans have become more vicious toward one another amid our usual disagreements. Fear, pain, contempt, astonishment, anger, anxiety, and hate prevail everywhere, splitting friends, families, communities and the nation. Philosophers have long said that in decadent eras like ours is now, people do atrocious things, e.g., elect deplorable leaders or sit idly by while their neighbors elect and abet enemies to the people.
We are a great distance from the standards of human freedom and domestic tranquility “promised” in our funding documents. The recovery of these standards demands that every American take a hard look directly at himself or herself, for the attainment of American democracy begins with individual selfness. To save our nation, we must first save ourselves; and there are steps one can take.
There are SIX STEPS to achieve the Power of Selfness:
Before you start, you must commit yourself to invariable truth. If you abandon truth, you abandon the path to power and freedom. If truth is variable, then no one can criticize oppressive, obstructive power because there will be no objective criteria upon which to make valid judgements of right and wrong.
The FIRST STEP is to choose to create your own SELFNESS. Human Beings’ unique capacity is the free-will to define who, what and how we will be irrespective of our at-birth circumstances. At-birth demography does not have inevitable control over destiny.
The SECOND STEP is personal insight, to know your real self. You must know who you are; why you are; what you have done; why you did it; what the consequences were of your past behavior; what you are doing now; why you are doing it; and what will be the likely consequences from your actions. Voltaire said that it takes more courage to confront one’s self than it does to confront an enemy on the battlefield. But most of us remain complete strangers to ourselves. As Socrates said, an unexamined life is not worth living.
The THIRD STEP is to gain as much factual knowledge and information as possible, acquired through your own senses, not that of others.’ We do not see the world as it is but as we are. Learn the difference between fact and opinion, even your own opinion.
If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary at various times in your life that you doubt all things, including, especially your own convictions.
A WISE MAN SAID: Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it; it is accepted and rumored by many; it is found in books; of the authority of the orator; or because it has been handed down for many generations. But after careful observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the benefit of all, then accept it and live up to it.
The FOURTH STEP is to learn how to apply knowledge, which is a skill, in a way that predicts successful outcomes.
The FIFTH STEP is WISDOM, where you always consider how your actions affect people, including yourself, and to care about that affect.
VIRTUE, the SIXTH STEP, is constituted by courage to pursue your objectives using only honorable means, and the power to persevere when things get tough. Obstacles test your character and your seriousness about wanting a higher quality of life.
VIRTUE, above all, must be based on TRUTH and FACTUAL REALITY, internally and externally, or Virtue will become an inexorable instrument of evil. Private and public acknowledgement of commitments, responsibility and accountability should not differ in the least way.
BEWARE: As you begin your personal transformation, people who were comfortable with who you were, especially the ones closest to you, will call you a hypocrite because of your past deeds. Do not allow anyone to press you to excoriate yourself for past “transgressions.” Self-flagellations will not gain ascendancy or get you clean. If you are steadfast in your striving for higher standards, every upward step will transform your life , and each step will get easier. Moreover, those who are sincere in their desire to be better themselves will be drawn to you like moths to a flame, seeking what you have. The courageous mind has a “magnetic” quality when manifested in positive external actions.
