Never be afraid to ask for help

[Steppingfeet]

...if you speak up and ask something be done about it, isn't that committing the same act of control?

That paradox is what has kept me (mostly) silent about the topic for years. I have also noticed it has kept me from speaking my mind in general as much as I'd like to for fear of overly critical words.

I understand and 100% support being a mirror to those who need it. But I think what I am talking about goes well beyond being a mirror and strays into criticism with the goal of control, whether conscious or subconscious.

This has been a conundrum at different points in my own life as well. Is expressing a viewpoint at odds with the other person's, especially if you don't approve of or agree with that persona's thought-action-expression, a form of control? Are you attempting, through your own expression, to "correct" their thinking or behavior so that it more closely conforms with your own?

I think that such a motivation (to correct, control, or overly influence) could (and probably frequently is) present, but I think that one can still offer a reflection that is scrubbed of those motivations. In this particular case, people can offer (and have offered) a viewpoint that is challenging to the viewpoint that A1 formulated, but isn't offered with a need or desire to control A1.

It can be a delicate situation though. I think that one of the safest, cleanest ways to express a reaction is to talk about how you feel in response to the other's actions. (Close to Tanner's reply.) Namely, the whole "I/you" language thing. Express your own difficulty, your own process, your own confusion, your own different viewpoint as it applies to yourself. You (the "I") then become the primary focus of the expression.

It's not always easy to speak to every situation in that mode, though. I agree with Manniz and Horuseus that love balanced with wisdom won't always yield a nod of approval and a total confirmation of the other's point of view. You may have information or a perspective that could be quite beneficial to the other self (per their own interests/desires), and needs to be expressed. Like Horuseus said, break the door down and tell your self-starved friend that there are, in actuality, like three leftover burritos in the fridge.

I think that one can simultaneously a) recognize the sacred right of the other self to form their own perception regardless of how delusional* it may be, while b) seeking to honor and protect the other's free will, while c) offering critical analysis and expressing disagreement with the content of the point of view.

Peas and love, GLB

*Though reality is ever the subjective thing, I think that some viewpoints can deviate or regress so wildly from the objective space between us, and in such an unhealthy or pathological way, that the viewpoint may rightly labeled "delusion". Though the same label can unfairly be used in emotional terms to strongly condemn or reject a viewpoint that is not actual delusion but is just significantly different from your own, or different from the collective's. The concepts presented in the Law of One potential candidates for that latter category.