In the ultimate scheme of things, opposing perspectives are non-separate from each other — their existence depends on each other. A perspective wouldn’t and couldn’t even exist without its correlating opposite.

While you spend time wrapping your head around that, keep in mind that just because perspectives are non-separate doesn’t mean they are equal. In fact, their non-separation is dependent on them being opposite from each other, not equal.

So let’s use a simple real life example. Say one person is ‘against’ war and the other person is ‘for’ war. Well, it’s self evident, with a few seconds of reflection, that one can’t be ‘against’ war unless others are ‘for’ war…and vice versa. Interesting right?

Well the deeper significance is that they are both dependent on each other — they are non-separate. They exist because of each other. They couldn’t exist without the other. However, they are quite obviously different perspectives — opposite perspectives even.They aren’t at all equal.

This is a crazy fascinating but essential paradox to keep in mind in any conflict scenario — non-separate does not translate to equal.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

When we think of conflict, we immediately assume the best solution is to somehow ‘resolve’ it. While I’m forced to use the word ‘conflict resolution’ to describe the DustMapper.com project, it actually isn’t at all the best choice of words. The attempt at conflict resolution is itself generally the problem.

That might sound like heresy, but it becomes clearer and clearer as I continue this project that this is the case.

The focus on this project, and the research conducted within, is conflict awareness – the explicit mapping out of conflict itself. Why? Because we realize that conflict is essential to the fabric of humanity, and essential to our very sense of being. It is conflict itself that is the source of insight.

What we’re hoping to do is express conflict in a more mature way. Thus, we hope we don’t have to resort to killing each other because conflict, nor ruining each other’s livelihoods. What we can do is learn to benefit and grow from the conflict itself.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

A great challenge for me – anyone – is keeping the judgmental process outside of the perspectives we either express or own.

What does that mean? It means taking the ‘objective’ component out of the ‘subjective’ process of communication.

Why would we want to do this? Isn’t this a step backwards? Actually not. Whether you believe there is such thing as ‘objectivity’ or not (that’s a different debate), it’s clear that the vast majority of what we have the capacity to share is simply our subjective perspective based on what we know, or even more important what we feel. We simply do not have the capacity to speak objectively. When we attempt to do so, we end up ‘judging’ (ie. in the eyes of Jesus Christ, sinning).

The height of maturity is the ability to stay true to our own perspective, but still allow room for other perspectives.

Here are examples where we can make subtle, but powerful, shifts in our language to more mature language:

• In a customer survey, instead of scaling ‘poor or excellent’ we could scale from ‘unsatisfied or satisfied’.
• In a musical review, instead of saying a piece of art is ‘good’ or ‘poor’, we can say ‘struck me’ or ‘didn’t strike me’.
• In a description of a person, instead of saying this person is ‘beautiful’ or ‘ugly’, we can say ‘I’m attracted’ or ‘I’m not attracted’.

Now I’m the first one to say I don’t always do this. The forces that be in the world we live make it inordinately hard to not only be aware of this, but also implement this.

Further, to be always doing makes language clumsy and awkward.  Finally, it’s often self-evident when we don’t intend to overstep our perspective – explicit language is generally not necessary.

When, then, should we do this? We do this when the consequences of miscommunication are greater than the effort involved in making such adjustment. This might end up being just 5% of our total communication, but an essential 5%.

This is generally true when describing people and our relationships with them – generally areas which are highly sensitive. This is also true of any formal or recorded statement.

It’s important to note it feels ‘better’ when we do this – if we’re sensitive to our own feelings, we realize we’ve created less karmic baggage, stepped on fewer toes, and freed ourselves from a great many ‘faux pas’ in the process. We also feel a stronger congruence between our feelings and our words, and a general sense of confidence in our expression and perspective.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

At one point, I used to say that perspectives can’t fit onto a scale – I used to say they are qualitative, not quantitative.

However, I’ve been reconsidering this position, as I’ve been finding each perspective has an equal and opposite counterbalance – I feel it’s built into the fabric of the universe.

Each perspective has it’s equal and opposite. However, when two perspectives are in relationship, there is automatic transcendence. Transcendence, while a concept that is often not helpful in the process, is the ultimate realization of truth, or non-duality, or non-separation of two counterbalanced perspectives.

The error comes, and the imbalance comes, and the whole host of societal ills come, when we try to assert our perspective as being superior to its counterbalanced perspective. No. It’s important to stand up for our own perspective to ensure it is properly represented, not to diminish its counterbalanced perspective in the process.

The superior perspective is ultimately not the one that is the better of the two equal and opposing perspectives, but the one that takes into account both perspectives.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

Dialog often shifts from one perspective frame, to another, to another, nonstop during the course of a conversation:

We might start expressing our own point of view, then take on the point of view of the person we are talking with.

From there, we might shift to a shared experience with the person we’re talking with, then shift to a collective experience of the group we both belong to, then shift to our unique individual interpretation of this collective experience.

From there, we might explore a different facet within our own individual interpretation, from there question the other person’s interpretation of our perspective, from there validate an assumption of their perspective we have.

All these perspective shifts happen continuously, constantly, in our dialogue — often without us even realizing they are happening.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

There are numerous reasons we relate to others — four of them are like, adoration, surface respect, and deep respect. Of these, only deep respect has essential value in relationship.

• Like is when someone is agreeable to us — they are those we stand with, laugh with, share stories with, enjoy hanging out with, and feel good around. Nothing wrong with this, but it doesn’t hit the core.

• Adoration is intimacy — they are those who are your doll, your baby, the recipient of your joy, warmth, and affection. Nothing wrong with this, but it doesn’t hit the core.

• Surface respect is honoring those who have a certain status. They are those who have wealth, fame, seniority, good looks, charisma, wisdom, or enlightenment. These qualities might seem great, but they don’t empower us. Nothing wrong with this respect, but it doesn’t hit the core.

• Deep respect in honoring those that have qualities that actually transform, engage, and move us. They are those we listen to, reflect on, and challenge. They are those whose words, actions, and presence empowers us, whether agreeable or not. This, and only this quality, hits the core.

Very often we get these jumbled up in choosing the relationships in our lives, as well as the relationships we allow in. Yet, time and time again, it comes down to deep respect, and I’d say deep respect alone, that has any redeeming quality in a relationship. The other qualities aren’t necessarily bad, and can even be fun and refreshing. However, they can only be supplementary, not the core, of a relationship. If they are the core of a relationship, we’ll be dragged down.

Note: this applies to everyone — from friends and partners to parents, siblings, and even children. It can be very difficult to question the value of our lifelong relations, but we might find being honest with their value more  important than simply pretending or assuming what it is.

The follow up question — can we learn to cultivate deep respect, or is it something that is just there or not? My friend @renzagliarobb once shook me up — yes, we can and should seek out the redeeming qualities especially in our family members. And I do agree. Flipping it around, I do feel a great many others could not offer deep respect because they couldn’t see past clouds in front of their eyes. So I do know it works both ways.

That said, deep respect cannot be forced, demanded, coerced, or even earned, contrary to popular notion. It doesn’t work that way. It can only occur as a natural result of clarity and wisdom, not obligation.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

All of us know someone who simply thinks and acts contrarian, just for the sake of being contrary. Mind you, this person doesn’t just share their own views, but actually tries to be different, seemingly for the heck of it.

Is this person just being an immature, pain in the ass? Is this person crying out for attention? Or is there a deeper significance to his desire to express something different?

Well, let’s take a look at the nature of perspective itself. Perspectives on the surface appear to be unique points of view through which each of us interpret the world. However if we look a little deeper, we find that perspectives seem to counterbalance each other. For every perspective on one hand, there’s an equally balanced counter-perspective on the other hand. Caution counterbalances innovation, restraint counterbalances freedom, feminine counterbalances masculine, and so on.

That said, there seems to be a primordial impulse in us to express, or even spontaneously develop on the fly, a contrarian perspective simply to offset current prevalent perspectives. It might have nothing to do with the person’s preexisting views on the world, yet nonetheless this perspective can be considered divinely inspired.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

It’s a near universal human tendency for us to get upset when we hear perspectives that seem to conflict with our own. Even those specially trained to keep their emotional outbursts at bay get subtly dismayed when their perspective has been contradicted.

Ok so what’s going on here? Our ego at play, of course.

Our ego’s job is to assert a perspective. That’s what it does. Our ego isn’t necessarily ‘bad’ — and unlike many futile spiritual efforts to do so, it never, in my opinion, can ever be destroyed.

What’s the solution? Maturity. Mature our ego by training it to realize how our perspective plugs into the world, not overrun it. Mature our ego by training it to see how our own perspective itself changes over time, often in fact changing into the very opposite perspective.

Through maturity and awareness, without stifling our ego, we learn to transcend the automatic disappointment we so often have when we hear different perspectives. This is the only viable path towards collective harmony.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

A resonant perspective is one that is in harmony with our own. In dialog for instance, when we hear a statement that in some ways taps into an experience we ourselves have, we have such a sense of resonance. Resonating perspectives might not even be the same as our own…just on a wavelength that synergistically vibrates with ours.

Resonance is not equivalent to agreement, I must make clear.  Resonance is a match on a  a vibratory level, whereas agreement is a deemed match on a cognitive process level. They certainly can overlap, but resonance has the sense of ‘synchronicity’ or ‘click’ to it, whereas agreement generally has some processing component – a statement is first determined to be in line to our own before we agree.

The music and sound analogies of these terms work very well in describing the felt experience of how our perspectives mesh, or don’t mesh, with others.  Resonance is a deeper level of ‘feeling out’ an interaction and the perspectives involved beyond what we might be used to.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

I’m going to look at a recent experience under the microscope to highlight the place of both courtesy and self interest:

I was waiting in line at the local baggage counter, and a woman simply walked right in front of me and called upon the attendant for her bags. I was a little miffed so I called her out on that, and she went back to her place. Then hardly a minute later, she went in front of me again and called the attendant for her bags. I called her out again, and she went back in place again. Then a minute later, it happened yet again. I actually yelled at her, creating an awkward moment for everyone.

So what was going on? Let me start by saying I am in India, though I am originally from the US. Let me also say that this is not the first time, nor will it be the last time, this has happened so blatantly. There ultimately seems to be different cultural perspectives involved on courtesy vs. self-interest.

In India, especially in larger cities, there are millions of people clamoring for service. There is no systematic safety net here looking out for people. While social service programs are getting started, for the most part, if you or your family have no money, you basically starve and die. If you aren’t looking out for you and your family, no one else will. Thus, the mentality here is very much self or family-interest. From her perspective, I assume, if she didn’t get her baggage, no system (ie. a queue) will ensure she gets it for her. She had to exert her initiative, and this mentality is burned deep in her system.

From my perspective, I have somewhat more trust in protocols. If I eventually wait my turn in line, I expect to be served, and everyone will be served, in proper order. That’s been my experience for the most part. She didn’t trust protocol, for good reason, and I did, for good reason.

Whose right? Well, it comes down to what I wrote last time about respecting perspectives  – it’s essential to assert our perspective, so long as we don’t trample on others. In her case, her self-initiative was certainly not a bad quality – she wanted to see to it she got served. The problem came from trampling on others in the process.

What would be an alternate behavior? If she was genuinely in a rush, she could request those in front of her to let her get her bags first. She could even have unilaterally stated that was what she was doing. I sense I would have admired that. However, by simply brushing past me and others, she trampled on our experience, and had to be totally called out.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

The principle I hope to share here is dirt simple…but so often neglected that I am compelled to write about it:

We each see the world through different eyes. 

This is obvious – no one is going to challenge this principle. However, if we take a closer look at the institutions in our world, we can see this understanding is mind-numbingly deficient.

Two examples are law and politics:

• Law – In law, we treat our case as inherently right, diminishing an opposing case in the process.
• Politics – In politics, we treat our position as inherently correct, diminishing an opposing position in the process.

Don’t get me wrong. It’s important — nay essential — we protect the sanctity of, and thoroughly give voice to, our own perspective.  However, what would law or politics look like if we didn’t disrespect other perspectives in the process?

Taken further, what if we didn’t frame other cases or positions as opposing us in the first place?

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

There are a few types of ‘self-centered’ perspectives often confused with one another. Below are three main types:

Self absorbed is being highly focused on one’s own point of view.
In other words, it is a fixation on the 1st person perspective.
Eg. “What do I think?”

Narcissism is being highly focused on the point of view of others of him or her.
In other words, it is a fixation of the projected 2nd or 3rd person’s perspective on the 1st person perspective.
Eg. “What does he think of me?”

Spiritual narcissism is being highly focused on the point of view of ‘God’ or ‘Dhamma’ or ‘Nature’ on him or her.
In other words, it is a fixation of the projected omni perspective on the 1st person perspective.
Eg. “What does God think of me?”

There is nothing wrong with any of these points of view, and we must note there are sub-distinctions within them as well.
Nonetheless, our maturation grows out of fully recognizing them.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

We must be clear that conflict is not bad — conflict is actually the friction through which our perspectives mature.

It is through conflict that we can mature our own perspective, and hopefully, discover its counterbalancing perspective in the world around us.

By maturing our own perspective, and simultaneously discovering the counterbalancing perspective, we envision both simultaneously.

By envisioning our mature perspective, and its counterbalanced perspective, simultaneously, we transcend the nature of conflict itself.

And that transcendence fulfills our purpose in the universe, at least for that single moment — a moment from which a brand new perspective once again emerges.

Dust Mapper
@dustmapper

An important choice to always consider is “walking away” from a conflict. However, there are at least three types of “walking away”.

First, there is “walking away, try to leave it behind”. This involves attempting to skip out on the conflict itself. This often leaves us with an unsatisfactory hole in our experience, and the conflict keeps pining on us. This attitude often results in long term stress or trauma, and can lead to a skewed perspective on past events. Unfortunately, it’s advocated by many counselors, mistakenly assumed to be an effective solution, discounting the long term repercussions.

Second, there is “walking away, come back later”. This is the realization that we’re not up to the conflict at hand at this moment, or the conflict scenario is itself not matured enough to be dealt with right now. Walking away gives space for us to breath, regain composure, reflect, gain clarity on what we seek, and realize a greater context. Further it allows other parties the same. Later, when ready, we can return to the source of conflict.

Third, there’s “walking away, nothing more left”. This is walking away when a conflict has ripened, when there is no more charge around the original issue, no more expression to be made, no more lessons to learn, or no more actions to be taken. This is the natural transcendence of conflict. It should be noted that many problems actually occur when we stay behind and don’t walk away from a matured conflict. Sometimes we stay in relationships we’ve outgrown or situations that no longer serve us or others. Not recognizing this peak can not only keep us stuck in life situations, but also lead to unnecessary tensions.

Walking away is a legitimate step to take in dealing with conflict. However, walking away in and of itself doesn’t mean a conflict is resolved. The converse is also true. Not walking away doesn’t necessarily mean that conflict is prevented. Having a clear sense of why we’re walking away is key.

This is the formal perspective of the corporation, entity, or organization that one belongs to or interacts with. There might be several layers within this, most often broken up into a team perspective, departmental perspective, and top level organizational perspective.

The corporate perspective is generally contained within the company’s formal documents, and are for all practical purposes, a lower order than the legal perspective of the country in which the corporation operates.

This should be differentiated from the informal perspectives of individuals within the corporation.

Integral Math (proposed): C-p

Some claim that brain activity leads to mental experiences. And there appears to be tons of evidence describing this. This reflects the standard materialist, matter over mind perspective.

Others claim that mental experiences lead to brain activity. And there appears to be tons of evidence describing this. This reflects the standard relativistic, mind over matter perspective.

However, if one examines closely, they’ll actually find they both occur simultaneously. In other words, mind and brain are synchronistically correlated.

This puts the entire domains of psychology and neurosience in a quandry.

Not only that, it puts the very assumption that a cause induces an effect into a quandry. If these two events (physiological change and mental experiences) occur simultaneously, then what’s causing what?

……

This is the central methodology by which we process the world around us. It is usually a reduced core set of principles or guidelines extracted from other larger perspectives.

Synonyms include modus-operandi and core movement (as discussed earlier).

Examples of these often take the form of ‘mantras’ or ‘questions’ we repeat over and over to ourselves, including “love my neighbor as myself”, “how do I make money from this situation”, “don’t be evil”, and “am I aware of my sensations?”.

This is the process by which one party appeals to the desires or wishes of another party, to prevent a feared repurcussion. This process often backfires when the appeased party catches on, and manipulates the framework to extort demands from the appeasing party.

This should not be confused with compassion. The distinction is that compassion is done without an ulterior motive and is a natural outflowing, while appeasement is motivated by fear.

This is the sum total set of ALL perspectives, direct and abstract, both subjective, intersubjective, and projected (ie. objective).

Many mix up the ‘objective’ perspective with the ‘omni’ perspective. However, our conventional use of the word ‘objective’ refers to a perspective derived from a certain methodology (such as the scientific method or mathematical patterns) rather than actually representing Totality.

Integral Math notation (proposed): omni-P

(I won’t use the infinity symbol, because most people wouldn’t be able to type it)