Parameters and Paradigms

I posted a tweet, recently, asking,

"Do your paradigms define your parameters,

or do your parameters define your paradigms?"

At some point during Jr High math, the concept of parameters was introduced which I found to be quite enlightening. I grew to see life and people in terms of individual parameters - that which defines boundaries of possible action such as values, circumstances, experience, personality, etc... While any number of possible actions could be a response to a given situation, an individual's parameters will identify which options are automatically excluded and which are most likely. (This is likely a large part of how I started noticing people's patterns and anticipating their responses.)

Paradigms are more like existing templates, usually of an external source. Politics, school of thought, nationality, ethnicity, science vs humanities, religion vs atheism, etc... This concept was brought to my attention in an anthropology class in which the liberal, feminist teacher liked to challenge and dismiss religion for its common sense of 'Tradition' (complete with singing and hands raised as known from Fiddle on the Roof). While I am not seeking to start a debate about which is 'right' - a ridiculous waste of energy, usually - I hope the evidence of the chosen paradigms is clear.

The point of my question is to consider whether your parameters are constricted to the boundaries of the paradigms you choose to accept or do you build your own boundaries, with what paradigm influences you choose, be they more or less evident?

Simple example.

American government has formed into a two party system. Other parties exist and people even run for office under those parties. But the strength of the democrat and republican parties is such that, without a major revolution of sorts, no other party will replace those two. The parties are the paradigms. To vote a person of a particular party means you ultimately vote for the whole party's platform. Does that mean you are obligated to therefore view the world and American issues according to that party's paradigm and only that paradigm? I sincerely hope not. 

Laying my thoughts out like this, it may well seem obvious, in the 'duh' kind of way, that people consciously would prefer to define their own parameters. In many ways, we all do. I would posit, however, that many are more rigid in their thought patterns than they might expect.

Wait, what do thought patterns have to do with this?

How do you think we define our parameters?

Food for thought.

On a side-note, if you can observe and discern another person's parameters - their motivations and principles, their character and so-forth - you can learn to anticipate the reactions and behaviors of those around you. This takes attention/observation and a certain level of active awareness. It also takes time, which may vary from person to person, influenced by many factors such as openness, self-awareness, how talkative they are, etc.

For example, one man I knew suggested at my speaking a need for help due to my illness that I should go back to the one he knew was my abuser rather than bothering people like him. Clearly troubling and upsetting. Months later, I heard him state his deep belief that under all the 'problems' a family might have, they are all actually good in the end. Suddenly, his dismissal (though still inappropriate) made much more sense.

I call it 'tipping the hand'. We all do it eventually. Some might feel threatened by that idea, but if you are introspective enough to be self-aware and honest about it, I think it would only feel threatening if you don't like what you find. If you know yourself, you might find that it makes things easier to simply be up front about things to begin with. Many don't understand why I am open and immediately so, but these very concepts are what help build my parameters.

Mirrors

The year after I moved away from home, I was at a friend's house for the holidays and came across The Pretender, a TV series from the late 1990s, while browsing their story collection. Since my work had an automatic week off built in between Christmas and New Year's, I had ample time to devour this new story.

With food for the body and food for the mind, I tend to go through a sort of seasons. At one time, I may always crave cheese, or tuna salad, or my veggie concoction... Then I'll hit a point where that item is no longer fulfilling and I'll rarely eat it over the next year or so. I suspect it has to do with particular nutritional needs at any given time. The same applies to stories. When I come across the right story at the right time, it become integral to my diet until whichever insight need has been fulfilled. This explains my pre-occupations that were so focused on Merlin a couple months ago and The Avengers a couple months before that. (I have long been aware of this pattern, I simply explain it for the reader's understanding.)

In the case of The Pretender, the most obvious connection is found in the back-story of a hero who had been held captive since, being discovered as a genius, childhood who finally escaped the people who only wanted to use and control him while learning and experiencing the normal life elements he had missed in captivity. Being in the process of breaking with home and extricating my identity and will from the messed-up manipulations and expectations and demands that kept me bound to it, the literal fight for understanding and independence and the joy of being free resonated deeply in my spirit.

The were many specific parts of the show that also left deep impressions, but the one that was most important was in an episode about identity. I do not remember the particulars, the season, episode title, episode details, etc... What I do remember is that Jarod, the hero, had reason to remember back to his time in 'The Center' (where he'd been held captive) when he refused to solve some puzzle because he'd become aware that he had never even seen his face in a mirror. He didn't know who he was or where he came from, where his parents were, even his last name. He knew they wouldn't give him any other information, but at the moment, he needed to know what he looked like - to see what/who he was.

During this same time period, I'd been struggling with the recognition that while the gospel taught me that God loved me and that I could find peace in doing my best, my dad's constant echoes and his perception of me (recall that these perceptions had me to the point of feeling guilty for even existing...) would regularly drown out that peace. It was a fair roller-coaster ride trying to handle the polar opposites. It was also greatly upsetting in trying to understand how the man who should be my protector was my greatest torment and how the one who should love me most constantly thought such evil of me. My nature has always been one to respond quickly to expectations and guidance so to be treated with such a heavy, emotionally rough hand left deeper wounds than might otherwise have been suffered.

Reflecting back, further in time, I have always had a talent for avoiding notice (surely made stronger by trying to avoid further negative attention at home) to the point that I'd be surprised to see myself in a picture. I'd also be surprised to see what I looked like since, even having a mirror, I'd never actually look at myself, just focus on the particulars that needed attention - hair, eyelashes for mascara, etc... I think I was scared to see that I really was the terrible, worthless person God surely despised the way dad always made me out to be. In fact, to see myself, having no intrinsic value, I had to look through the eyes of others. Furthermore, walking around the halls in high school, I often felt like a pair of floating eyeballs: seeing, observing, but never seen. Never part. All there was to see was either neutral or negative.

When I made it to this particular episode (perhaps on the second time through, I can't be sure), all these elements had been percolating for some time. When Sydney, Jarod's mentor/handler, finally obtained permission to let him look in a mirror, Sydney told him, "This is who you are." I'm pretty sure I paused the show for quiet because at the same time, it was as if a concept unfolded in my mind. It was symbolized by a tall, standing mirror that I knew was my dad's, with him in front of it. I was standing apart. To make the meaning more readily understood, imagine everyone with their own mirror. But I didn't have one. I had to go by the reflections in everyone else's mirrors. Returning to my image of just my dad's mirror, it was as though the Spirit told me to take a close look at his mirror. It was covered with dirt and grime and dust and stains. Suddenly I understood that dad's view of me was so negative not because I was so horrible, but because the means he was using to view me was filthy. When I heard, "This is who you are" I also 'heard' Heavenly Father say, "You need to use my mirror to see who you really are, not his, not theirs. Your own. Mine."

It was, for me, a revolutionary concept. Probably basic for many others, but then many others have not lived my life with my personal nature, either. I cannot say I have it down all the way, but with every passing year, my own mirror is clearer and the reflections of others less so. I still stumble and get distracted sometimes, but then something reminds me of this epiphany and I remember to look in the right mirror again. I'm writing this blog now because I just went through this process again this week.

This concept reminds me of the scripture in 1 Corinthians 13:12.

 12 For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.

Someday all the mirrors will be clear and we won't get distracted and confused by the distorted reflections of smudged looking glasses, dirty mirrors. Someday we will know, without question, the value God sees in each of us and in each other. Until then, we just need to be careful about our mirrors. Are we using our own, and are we keeping them as clean and clear as we can? It will affect how we judge others. It will affect how we judge ourselves.

(P.S. If any of you have watched The Pretender, you may have noticed it begins to leave a darker feeling the further it progresses. I did not realize that until trying to watch it again last year when I found I had to only watch a few shows at a time to avoid a build-up of home feelings and thought patterns in my mind. I can only assume that having come so freshly from such a negative situation and still freshly battling the wrong patterns, the show's 'vibe' meshed so well with what I had come from it was unnoticeable at the time. Once I was far more free of it, the distinction was much more apparent.)

Resonance

I think I am naturally something of a reflective person and I often consider why I respond as I do to various situations and even how that compares to the reactions of others. I'd wonder why something that had a great impact on me would leave no mark on others while things that had little meaning to me would be so disturbing someone else. I finally came to the conclusion that it comes down to the issue of resonance.

Scientifically speaking, resonance is defined by the World English Dictionary (see dictionary.com) as:

The condition of a body or system when it is subjected to a periodic disturbance of the same frequency as the natural frequency of the body or system. At this frequency the system displays an enhanced oscillation or vibration.

In human terms, we all have a core identity complete with beliefs and motivations central to said identity. I came to realize that the things that resonate with us are the things that touch on some part of what we already hold to.

On a superficial level, consider that the reason I found Jericho, the TV series about a post-apocalyptic America, so intriguing is because it mirrors the fall of the Nephite civilization in the Book of Mormon on certain levels and also reflects parts of my personal expectations of the state of the nation in general prior to the Savior's second coming. Someone who does not anticipate (in the literal definition of expecting something will be rather than necessarily 'hoping' for it to be) the same things will not find the same resonating effect.

Or consider King Uther from the BBC Merlin (strong competition for my new favorite series). When he came to Camelot, he was witness to and champion against the extreme misuses of magic in the kingdom. His reign was built upon correcting a gross imbalance of power. Then, when his wife (this version strays on a number of points from the original Mabinogion, and even later Le'morte d'Arthur) died at childbirth from a backlash of magic, his honest distrust and natural antagonism were magnified into outright hatred and brutality. Rather than being able to recognize that not all those who practiced magic did so to the detriment of others, he could only see those who used it for wickedness and therefore condemned everyone.

I have seen it at work on many levels in my own life. For one example, my natural desire to travel, my innate wanderlust, has been augmented by experiences of the inconstancy of my particular family and certain 'friends' which emphasized in my own mind the value of moving on and leaving the negative behind. New starts and change feel like fresh air to me rather than the hated terror of change that others seem to perceive.

I can hear someone asking, "This is all very interesting, but what value does it give?" Consider the wisdom of the ages (attributed to multiple cultures and individuals) to 'Know Thyself'. The more a person can recognize the truth of who and what and why they are, the more control they have over their actions and lives. A person who has an intrinsic understanding of what makes them tick is far less vulnerable to the machinations and manipulations of others, be they man or 'demon' (for those readers of the Christian variety). It gives the person a much stronger foundation upon which to stand lending towards a greater confidence in self and life. And should an honest survey of self turn up something unpleasant, that person then has the wherewithal to make adjustments and counter the negatives found. It is a process that has helped preserve my sanity coming from an abusive home and one I recommend my readers seriously consider employing in their own lives.