Post Edited (One Love) : 12/30/2011 5:12:04 PM (GMT-6)

From here...

"We must be willing and able to go beyond ego to reach out to something more, to experience the parts of ourselves that have nothing to do with the agendas of our personalities. At the same time, we must also be willing to experience the limitation and pain that our ego's habits are causing us.

"Self-transcendence is difficult and fearful because it entails going into unknown territory, feeling, thinking, and acting in ways foreign to our personality, contrary to our past habits, at odds with our old attitudes and identity, and free of the old wounds and defenses of our childhood. In a sense, self- transcendence is a rebirth, a true transformation, the coming into being of a new person who is learning to leave the old ways behind and strike out into a new world....

"In the last analysis, learning how to transcend the ego involves nothing less than learning how to be open to love. Only love has the power to save us from ourselves. Until we learn to truly love ourselves and others—and to accept the love of others—there can be no hope of lasting happiness or peace or redemption. It is because we do not love ourselves properly that we lose ourselves so easily in the many illusions ego sets before us."

Interesting site, there. It builds on the understanding of how NATURAL personality types result in both compatibilities and incompatibilities in a fallen world where natural evil causes us to groan and travail independent of human incivility. From all the similar training I've read, the key is understanding that the golden rule requires certain applications of the platinum rule. Scripture says as much in saying we are to bear ONE ANOTHER'S infirmities. This is the key to understanding the way the ego is problematic. Many tend to assume that narcissism inheres in a specific personality type. In fact, there is a sense in which all types are narcissistic. This narcissism is the cause of many bogus over-generalizations which cause us to be oblivious to our own weaknesses and to misinterpret other people, thereby diminishing our chances of living harmoniously with one another.

When this is fully understood, it's obvious why scripture says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge and wisdom. Until we can be humble enough to submit ourselves to God, we can not possibly overcome the narcissistic ways we relate to other humans.

This is just why I decided NOT to buy "Take Care".  It's a siren song of sorts to have the whole cd.   Young people will be "raised" by Drake nowadays like I was "raised" by Ice Cube back in the early 90s.

Dang.

"Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity."

Post Edited (One Love) : 1/3/2012 3:37:21 AM (GMT-6)