Article of the 3R’s

There seems to be a large amount of resistance in the ranks today. You may have heard of the 3R’s in the educational system, they are not the same 3R’s that this article is talking about. This is about a thought process. Would you like to know the thought process that is behind all divorce? Would it be valuable to know about the most destructive thought process in the world? This thought process is behind all of world hunger. It’s behind all wars. It is literally like shooting yourself in the foot. If you knew that you were about to literally shoot yourself in the foot would you do it?

Imagine this, a hollow tipped bullet explodes from the barrel of a .45 cal. semi-automatic pistol! The bullet then tears its way into the top bridge of your right foot, completely disintegrating the top bone structure. The bullet shatters into thousands of pieces of shrapnel as all hollow point bullets do. Each tiny piece of shrapnel tears flesh and destroys all the bones in your foot completely severing your right foot from your ankle! The now empty end of your right leg is spraying blood everywhere! You collapse in horrified shock at the visible tendons, ligaments and bones on the end of your gory ankle.
Would you ever consciously do that?! No sane person would ever do it! The 3R’s is a thought process that is just as destructive as blowing off your right foot!

The kick in the head is that you probably have already been there today! It’s just like the programs in a computer. Only the computer is your mind. And just like any program, once it starts, it will run to completion, unless it is stopped somewhere in the middle. The 3R’s are destructive anywhere, but not nearly as nasty unless they are allowed to run to the finish. If you can see that you are in the middle of the program and then stop it right there, then you will save yourself!

Let’s look at this. The first R is resentment. The word resentment means many different things to people, so that we are on the same page of the play book, Let's define the word resentment for this arena. Resentment is any negative emotion (call it whatever you like, anger, pissed, hurt, depression, sadness, frustration, ect.) that you feel as a result of something you THINK was said or done. The thing that is noteworthy here is that it didn’t even have to really happen!!!! All that has to happen is that we THINK it occurred and that’s enough to go to resentment. Resentment in and of itself is not very harmful at all. It’s the next R that it leads to that starts the real harm.

Resistance is the next R. Again so that we are all on the same page of the play book, for this arena resistance is defined as the cutting off of communication from, or the complete separation from, or any lack of acceptance of what is so. Resistance is what is happening when two people who love each other roll to opposite sides of the bed with backs to each other, neither will be the one to concede, at that point it is more important to be right then to have what they want.  Resistance is when you call into work or school with an alien creature eating its way out from the inside when you are really O.K. You are only experiencing an eye problem, you just can’t see going to work today. I think you get the idea.

If you want to do some work with this, a piece of paper and a pen. See if you can write at least 10 different forms of resistance that you often employ in your life.

The third R is revenge. In this arena, revenge is defined as simply, the getting back. The sad thing is that revenge is such a habit that you hear about it everywhere. "I don’t get mad, I get even." It’s on every side. People are even proud of themselves for doing it! Revenge is where the real harm is done. Humanity takes a great deal of revenge on themselves! Smoking, alcohol abuse, drug abuse, body abuse, nonproductive eating, lack of exercise, and laziness are all examples of self revenge.

Isn’t it odd? The program of punishment is in us so strongly that even after we are past the age when our authority figures punished us, we do it to ourselves! When we were kids, when we were "bad" we were punished. Could it be that self revenge is a result of the individual thinking he\she is bad so they punishes themselves? Think about it. Does it apply to you?

Revenge against others has a few million ways of showing up. The nasty part is that revenge is so subtle. Humans do it without consciously knowing they are doing it! The little comment under your breath, cheating on taxes, purposely being late on a financial obligation, gossip, and many millions of other ways of revenge hurt folks. Revenge is the absence of "And it harm none, do what thou wilt." In the presence of revenge everyone loses.

Let’s look at a parable that happens all too often. John Averageman is an executive at an important company. John has a medium sized staff of people under him. He gets this idea that it is time for an employee meeting to get everyone working more together than before. John has his secretary type up a memo to the staff talking about the meeting the next morning, to start at 8:00. Do you have a picture of Mr. Averageman?

John gets home, does the usual dinner thing, watches a little television (that really positive favorite of all, the news) and then showers and lays out his suit for the next day.

The next morning, John’s foggy vision focuses as he opens sleep filled eyes. He paws around the night stand table next to his bed for the much needed spectacles to see the world with. He puts them on his face and peers through the fingerprints at the clock.

DAMN!!!!!

The clock reads 8:10! John bounces out of bed pissed! What is telling John how to feel right now? I submit to you that it is his alarm clock.

Mr. Averageman runs into the master bathroom to prepare his appearance for work, he doesn’t have time to shave. John throws on his suit, ties his crooked tie, and heads for the stairs.

Meeting him at the stairs is his seven year old son, rubbing his sleepy eyes.

"God-damnit! You are going to be late for the bus! Hurry the hell up will ya?!!!! You are always such a pain in the ass!!" (John Jr. gets to enjoy a wonderful low self-esteem, believing he is "such a pain in the ass" for the rest of his life now.)

John gets to the kitchen.
"I work pretty god-dammed hard to bring home the bacon in this house, you’d think I would be able to get to eat some of it. Where is the !@#!^$#&#() breakfast??!!!!"
John’s wife gets no hug, no kiss, no love today...

He gets to the door. It’s raining buckets of water outside. He runs for the car, slips on the wet concrete, slams into the car, opens the car door and hits his head as he climbs inside. John looks at the gas gauge. His 17 year old daughter used the car last night, burned all the fuel, and failed to replace it! Now he has to take the car to get gas making him even later than he already is. Has this ever happened to you?

What’s telling John how to feel now? Do you think he is in control of his feelings?
John gets to work. Just inside the front door, he sees the elevator at the end of the hall, the doors are open. Inside the elevator, he sees his work buddies. They are laughing hysterically. For a moment, just a moment, John is out of it and smiles. He runs for the elevator door.
"Wait for me guys!"
As soon as he gets inside the elevator door, they all shut up instantly.
"What’s so funny guys?"
"Nothing John!" (snicker, snort....)
"C’mon... what is it? Share the joke...."
"Nothing ... it’s nothing!" (snicker...)
What is John thinking now?
"FINE!!!!"
John jams his finger into the control panel stopping the elevator, not even on his floor. He climbs the stairs the rest of the way to his office. It’s raining even harder outside.

The end of the work day comes. John goes to his car. He heads out of the parking lot. There are big pools of water formed everywhere because of the fact that it has been and still is just storming like crazy all day. Normally John takes a right turn out of the lot to get home, however, he sees all of the people that were in the elevator this morning standing on the left corner waiting for the bus.

He gets this evil look in his eyes.. breaths a bit harder now. John punches the gas peddle! Squeals out of the lot sliding to the left and hits that gargantuan puddle of muddy, smelly, cold water next to the left curb like Moses parting the Red Sea.

All the guys on the curb are soaked to the bone! They are PISSED!!!

John says,
"YESSSSSSS!"
All of the men look at each other and look back at the back of the speeding car. One says,
"Hey! That was John in that car! Well he can just frigging forget his surprise birthday party on Friday!"
You see, The 3R’s can build up all day, or they can happen instantly. Watch for them. Go find someone you have been in the R’s with. Go make it right with them.