Life is hard, we all know that. Work can be frustrating, relationships can be difficult, social conventions, organizations, laws, and various other institutions place roadblocks in the way of our goals. We struggle with our own demons in every aspect of our lives. It can be tough.

THEE is a mirror of life, so THEE can be hard. But it can help make it easier in the end.

I’ve been fortunate enough to have a mentor during my journey through the taxonomy. You might not be so lucky. So I’m going to outline probably the greatest challenge I’ve faced in hopes that as you explore THEE, you might be able to avoid my mistakes and realize that there are and will be mistakes.

 It all comes down to me. I am who I am. I’ve spent my entire life forming opinions, coming to conclusions, deciding what is good and bad, helpful and unhelpful, virtuous and not virtuous. In short, I’ve developed quite a network of biases. This is natural, I’m sure.

 For example, when I was deep into the Interacting for Benefit framework a while ago, I had a real problem with the idea of power-centered people. I remember writing in my notes something along the lines of: “I know these people are necessary in society, but I just can’t help thinking that they need to be reformed or something.”

In the Deciding & Achieving framework, it was the structuralists. I didn’t necessarily look down on structuralists, I just could not grasp thinking like that. It’s so, I don’t know, structured.

 My latest challenge is in the Your Better Self framework, where I seem to be viewing the pleasure quest as somehow inferior.

Why is that?

THEE will, in many cases, actually show you why. For example, there’s a page in the Interacting for Benefit framework called Not Seeing Eye to Eye where antagonisms between different mentalities are outlined and explained. For my part, I’m cause-centered, which puts me at odds with power-centered people because I put a high value on freedom and autonomy. Power-centered people want to control others, which is directly antagonistic toward people wanting freedom and autonomy. Makes sense, right?

Ultimately, bias has to be suspended. And if you confront your own bias, ask yourself why this is happening. I might be wrong, but my current theory as to why I’m having issues with the pleasure quest is that I’m on a meaning quest and I see the pursuit of pleasure as lacking meaning.

 THEE simply is not useful as a tool for judgment and its purpose is quite the opposite. We’re looking to help usher in a new era of self-awareness where people have a better understanding of themselves and others. Having this kind of awareness can (refer to the first paragraph) help you understand why your work is frustrating you, where the difficulties in your relationships lie, and how you are constrained in terms of your goals so you can either sidestep those roadblocks or realize that you’re wasting your time and energy.

More often than not, the problems in society don’t revolve around what’s wrong with individuals, but in how they relate to and interact with each other.

As for you, if you get into THEE and you have any questions, concerns, criticisms, if you feel like something doesn’t make sense, or you just want some direction, please contact me. I might not personally have the answers (you and I are on this journey together after all) but I can direct you to someone who does.

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