The post is in letter correspondance format
Oh yes Brad, you cannot be closer to the truth. I wouldn't deny that one should put oneself in another's shoes, but it is for nothing if one does not follow it up by getting to the point of the aim of using PC to engage someone in a social setting, which is get into their minds/psyches/souls/spirits and persuade and get it to listen to your point of view. If I did position myself above Rowling (if at all), at least I made sure to position myself above her AT THE CORRECT TIME AND SPACE! (no pun intended), which is after I have gained her trust and respect through PC, and not before---which is the sense of the 'above' that I think you are referring to---the arrogant and callous type. By this reasoning, wouldnt you say professional communication is about trying to get above others, although no communicator expert ever say that. But that is really the philosophy of all of professional communication; to try to get above others WITHOUT seeming like trying to get above, isn't that right? Would anybody argue otherwise? That is why I argue that it is very appropriate and encouraged to get above another after empathizing, because that is the truce period when the other's defenses are sufficiently disarmed!! Getting above is fine as long you DON'T GET FOUND OUT, which means you DO IT AT THE CORRECT TIME in the social interaction. If you can't find the correct time on the same day, you wait days, months or years. Maybe it would help if I made a simpler example, but it is really simplistic and used only because I want to get straight to the point. It goes as such: you can commit a crime, just make sure you don't get found out! Just to clarify again, I'm not saying PC is a crime or corrupt just because your ultimate aim is a contrived one--- to finally get above the other at the end after all the small-talk and role-playing. Rather I am only trying to simplify matters by using the example solely to show you the similar philosophies between the 2 belief systems. The philosophy is the only thing similar, everything else is different.
I think that is the essence of PC, would anybody disagree? (I'm fine with disagreement). You want to get across AND into the mind/psyche/soul/spirit/nature of another. PC is used to get across, but it ends there. Not that you don't need any more PC after you have felt you gained the trust and confidence of the other; you still do, but you do not need as much PC once you get across or connected with the other's minds/souls/psyches.
Besides - what is the core principle of respect? Isn't it to do something good unto the other? You do not actually do any obvious good thing unto the other when you respect, such as helping to carry a heavy bag of groceries for an elderly woman, because that is caring. But caring and respect nevertheless share the same core principle of doing good unto others. I think everybody only ever understands respect to be UNSPOKEN, UNDEMONSTRATED care or good unto others. I think everybody also understands what respect is but has the tendency to misread it as OBLIGATION! When a school-going child greets his teacher along a school corridor, it isn't immediately clear whether it is obligation or respect. In fact the child himself wouldn't have a clue, but deep down within his heart/psyche/mind, he is greeting from one of the 2 values that is a function of societal, cultural and familial values he has been exposed to. Therefore there is DISTINCTION in trying to show, in PC, respect in a SPOKEN AND DEMONSTRATED way (that is of course presuming you know how to do it, and you do it correctly), if anything so that everybody clearly knows and sees RESPECT in action and not obligation because you only just met the other not long. If saying or giving opinions to Rowling in writing here or in speech face-to-face with her does only GOOD ( your sense of good obviously, which of course is debatable but I will not talk about it much here. That's complicated!) to her being/person/mind/soul/spirit/nature/psyche, and you are pretty sure it is good (I'm not trying to say I'm pretty good though, because that would be a big turn-off, and I really mean it with all my heart), then you have shown the highest level of respect demonstrated and spoken to the other which is different from the type of respect we are used to. In a word, you have shown active respect, which distills to love-in-action. When you merely empathize with another, you only respect his physical agent, because you are role-playing only to his senses, reactions, feelings, outward vibes, body language/posture. And although these physical indictors came from a mind/soul/spirit/psyche, you are not tackling the mind/soul/spirit/psyche PER SE. You are only tackling the proxies of the mind/soul/spirit/psyche which presents themselves in the physical fleshly form. You overlook the chance to do any good at a deeper level in his psyche/mind/soul/spirit, and that is the respect that I am so concerned with, because it is a respect (or good done unto the other) that hits right at the core. It is the same with effective solutions. Effective solutions are long term solutions that hit right at the root of problems, not their borderlines. But I'm not saying respect during the initial stages of professional communication in empathizing is redundant; I would say it is the gateway to a GREATER and more honourable type of respect ( of love!) that you can show to the other, that of which hits right at his core/soul/mind/spirit. But this is preconditioned upon the fact that the professional communicator knows what he is doing (what is 'good' and 'bad' for SOMEONE ELSE!!!) , what is 'correct' and 'incorrect' and knows how to do it properly, and is also pretty sure he is RIGHT! (That is not to say you are to think I am right about anything, if at all). And in fact the Greek and Latin root word of respect follows closely to the definition I gave, that of which to do good unto others.
I have no issue if Brad thinks I have belittled Rowling either due to a misread of the text and the deeper message of love and care, or some objective or subjective assessment based on his experience in professional communication, because everybody is entitled to opinions, especially a well-known professor!
Neither do I hate Rowling for that cannot be consistent with my message of love that I mentioned above. Didn't I mention in other posts that professional communication must be about consistency? Also, when I said in my previous post that people who love Rowling do not really know what they are really in love with (a monster---I presumed people would think that because I didnt fill in the blanks!), people, especially fans of Rowling here, naturally get incensed and start making assumptions that I have something against Rowling and call for my 'death' the same way they thought I called for Rowling's death. But I think that is the challenge of PC which is to 'see' beyond individual words and paragraphs into the deeper meaning of the text I wrote, thereby allowing you glimpses into my psyche/mind/soul/spirit/nature.
It actually borders on the impossible to be able to accurately size up a deeper meaning or the mind/psyche/soul/nature of someone that the point of human fraility is indomitability.
To Rowling,
Forever with love
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