So you wanna battle the forces of evil, huh? Well, I’ve got some good news, and some bad news. The bad news first: Francis Fukuyama was wrong. We’re not at the end of history. There is a lot of stuff going on that isn’t sustainable. That American way of life that all us military folks are so fond of? It isn’t exactly as accessible as it used to be. I’m sure everyone senses that there’s something not quite right, and most everyone is worried about the future. But what can you do about it? I’ll tell you what you can do, you can build yourself into an anti-fragile warrior endowed with the competencies necessary to fight the upcoming battles for liberty and the American way of life! How? Why, with master resiliency training (MRT) of course!
But I thought MRT was lame…
You thought wrong chief. MRT is simply a set of tools that allows us to put thousands of years of human progress and wisdom in the fields of philosophy, psychology, and yes, spirituality, into practice. MRT is organized into 6 core competencies that are all supported to some extent by a wider variety of tangible skills. These MRT skills are by no means exhaustive. I think you can count anything that contributes to each of the 6 MRT competencies as complementary to the hero’s journey to become an ultimate warrior. So what are these competencies that underlie the foundation of spiritual enlightenment and MRT alike? They are:
Self-Awareness
Self-Regulation
Recognizing Character Strengths
Mental Agility
Optimism
Connection
This article will focus on the first competency that I argue is most important if only because it is so useful/necessary to employ towards enhancing the other competencies.
Self-Awareness
This is where I have some unfortunate news as to why this journey isn’t so simple and my words here are likely insufficient in and of themselves to provide the fuel necessary to embark upon this quest: Adversity is required to build ultimate self-awareness competency.
It is the confrontation with powerful emotion that provides not only clues as to where to look, but the intrinsic motivation to look inward so that you may discover beliefs and values that have hitherto evaded your awareness. When you are particularly troubled by such a disconnect, asking yourself the big questions, who are you, and what do you want may provide an answer, even if you might not like it. No one can tell you what your highly particularized values will be, only you can discover them. I’ll share one of my most recently detected “icebergs” to provide an example of not only how this process works, but also how I’m very much still on this journey myself (as opposed to some guru who has it all figured out already).
Reading Michael McConkey’s excellent publication The Circulation of the Elites, I recently discovered another reason why I hate wokeism and the managerial class so much. I see diversity training and I hate it. I become very agitated. Disproportionately so. Why? My existential enemies would say it is because I’m a closet racist, and that this reaction is a consequence of so much implicit bias. Robin DeAngelo would call it White Fragility. Even thinking of this now pisses me off. Were this to be true, I have the fortitude to look within and accept it. I have never averted my eyes from truth, even though I might fear what I find. I long ago made the decision that I would rather know and deal with the consequences. When I gaze inward in this case, animus based on racial group is not what I find, so there must be another source for this disproportionate anger. Like I said, I was reading Michael McConkey’s substack and something stood out. He said he’s a phenotypic liberal. One innate attribute associated with this phenotype is a high degree of openness. I am a big believer in the utility of the 5 personality traits to succinctly explain the ways in which human personality varies. Upon reading this recognition on the part of Michael, I realized for perhaps the first time that I too am a phenotypic liberal with a characteristically high degree of openness. With this recognition, it clicked: The reason I hate the woke diversity training is because it essentially consists of a bunch of intolerant totalitarians low in openness (and possibly also agreeableness) wearing the masque of openness. How do we know? Because they can’t tolerate intellectual and ideological diversity. Those that truly have a personality of high openness and agreeableness would be willing to tolerate even those who might have beliefs they think are repugnant. I know I can. The fact that they won’t (or perhaps can’t) demonstrates that what we are witnessing here is a ruse. This ruse that mimes my own values while attempting to tell me that I am morally and spiritually lacking is infuriating, especially when it is coupled with an active attempt to get me to attribute this fury to unconscious bias.1
I don’t share this to outline what a great person I am. This is simply the result of an innate personality trait. It has its downsides where I might be too tolerant of those who might pose a danger to me and mine in some way. I can recognize this and appreciate the perspective of those low in openness, but not from those pretending to be high in openness. This deception is an indication that their true ends are not what they say. They seek only power and control at the expense of everyone else. This is a zero-sum social strategy that undermines the positive-sum strategies that I believe are required to knit civilization back together, but I digress, I only shared my own values in this regard to make the following point: You will need to confront strife and the accompanying powerful emotions to discover your most deeply held beliefs and values. What you find will be your own. No one can tell you what lies deep underneath the surface of yourself. If you can engage in good faith with the process of building radical self-awareness, your journey on the hero’s quest will have begun.
The #1 MRT Skill that Develops Self-Awareness
Although you can’t manufacture the strife (well, perhaps you can, but I wouldn’t recommend it), you can arm yourself with some skills so that when it inevitably arrives you can use it to help you achieve the higher orders of self-awareness required for spiritual enlightenment. The most important skill in this regard is “Detect Icebergs.” Basically, anytime you experience powerful emotion that seems out of proportion, you have probably run into an iceberg.2 There is some belief that is under the surface that is responsible. If you can identify this, it enables you to probe the depths to try to discover what it is that you believe that can make sense of this surprisingly intense emotional response. If you’re looking for a more specific way to get started with this investigation, then you can cue yourself by asking “What” questions. Here are some examples:
What was the most upsetting part of that?
What does what just happened mean to me?
What is the worst part about what just happened?
If you find yourself upset about something that you hear that you don’t think is true, ask yourself what if it is true? If true, why would that be upsetting?
Once you identify the belief, you might find that it isn’t completely rigid. After all, we can change our minds about things.3 If, on the other hand, it is something you believe very strongly that you are sure will never change, you have found a very important iceberg. Such beliefs are those that we must never act against, as doing so can open a rent in the soul into which the seeds of our destruction can easily be sown. Being able to appreciate the full size and scope of these types of beliefs and values will allow you to develop the kind of faith that Paul spoke of in the Bible when he talked of being “justified” or “aligned” with the Spirit. This type of faith is the ultimate source of resilience. Once you find it, you will have the most important tool you need to develop the other competencies and become a warrior for righteousness.
Unconscious bias has an entirely additional layer of chagrin for me because of the claim that it is impossible to sense it. Maybe impossible for people without exceptional self-awareness competency, but it is possible to bring your unconscious biases into your awareness. It is also sometimes possible to modify them. This involves the MRT competencies of self-awareness and mental-agility.
You can see a part of the belief on the surface, but the full nature of it in terms of size and scope is hidden underneath the surface. Also a great metaphor because of the implication that failing to appreciate what lies underneath the surface can cause the Titanic to be an allegory for your life.
This will employ the competency of mental agility.
Good stuff. Instantly uplifting.