What's your favorite disguise? [/meta]

posted by letter shredder @ 11:59 a.m. on 1/20/2006

"Great art is about conflict and pain and guilt and longing and love disguised as sex and sex disguised as love..."
                                          -- Lester Bangs, Almost Famous



Tuesday, November 29, 2005

Strong Suits

posted by letter shredder at 10:23 AM

As defined in Landmark Education, strong suits are one's fundamental and automatic ways of being that produce results yet leave him/her unfulfilled.


Perfect story to understand a strong suit (as given by Alain Roth):
There was this lady who had a crush on this guy in high school. She liked him so much. On the night of the school dance, he went towards her. And when she thought he was about to ask her, he asked her best friend who was sitting beside her. At that moment, she failed. She told herself she wasn't beautiful. She failed to be beautiful.

The guy became her best friend's boyfriend. But she waited. The time came that the two had a fight and she made sure she was there to comfort him. Immediately after the breakup, she was there for him, listening and comforting him as he cries.

It became them. Eventually, they got married. And many times the guy would say, "I love you because you are caring."

Everytime he tells her that, she's hurt. Coz everytime he tells her he loves her because she's caring, she remembers she isn't beautiful.


Most of the time, a person may have three prevalent strong suits and other strong suits may branch out from them.


This isn't the truth but, as Aljor said, one may consider the development of strong suits as one way one operates his/her life. Let me represent the three strong suits as X, Y and Z.


X is acquired at 3-4 years old, when one learns the facility of language. Something happens that he/she thought something is wrong because he/she failed to be U and chose to be X. It is also possible that he/she thought he/she failed to be X so she decided to be X.


Y is usually acquired at 13-15, when one wants to feel the sense of belongingness. Something happens wherein he/she decides that he/she failed to be, say V. Then he/she thinks that X isn't enough that she decides to be Y too. So he/she has X+Y.


When he/she is already an adult, something happens wherein he/she fails to be, say W. Since X+Y isn't enough, he/she also decides to be on his/her own and becomes Z, X+Y+Z.


As I mentioned earlier, many other strong suits may branch out of X,Y and Z. And the things that happened where one fails to be may reoccur. And when one acquires the three, he/she invalidates everyone else, thinking that no one would be more X, Y or Z.


So I've gone into much introspection and had several orgasms, purely ontological though (thus, the name of my other blog).


As of now, I have my X, Y and Z identified:
X = being intelligent
Y = being strong
Z = being different


Now, I'm not ready to go much into detail and how I acquired them. I'm not even sure that what I have in mind are correct.


Well, these strong suits all came from the failure to be. Probably, U, V and W to me. So whenever I use these strong suits to become successful, I am also reminded of U, V and W, making me unfulfilled. These strong suits also get bankrupt. They also don't work at times.


Because of my independence, I also have problems working in groups and I often question authority. Because I am strong, I cannot find any man strong enough for me or at least for my personality. I find no guy any different from any other guy as well.


I have to admit I am taking enough courage (see, I'm strong) to tell you these failures:
U = secured
V = lovable
W = attractive


And when I admit that one is more X, Y or Z than me, I become present to my failures of being U, V and W.


They may be true, they may be not. But this is really one way I'm looking at my life now. And there is no way that I could FIX these failures. I only have to acknowledge them.


I'm really being honest right now. And I know I may not really look good.


So, what are your strong suits?

0 revealed their disguise