Intelligence vs. wisdom

[seagrass]

If the personality chooses certain structures to incarnate with (personality, intent, style, goals etc.) Then would not their God also fit that style cognitively, spiritually, emotionally etc. in order to have symbiosis and harmony? To propel the intent/purpose effectively?

[Questioner]

seagrass, I explain what I mean about "your God" in post 44 on the Enneagram thread. You can then see how this is applied to each of the types.

[Plenum]

Note: If you think you recognize me from somewhere else, please use a private message to communicate and respect my forum pseudonym for now.

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My parents prized intellectual cleverness: wit, puns, crossword puzzles.

I grew up in a house full of books. Every week or two, we'd visit the public library, or occasionally a bookstore, to get more reading material.

My parents chose whatever topics inspired their sense of self-admiration for cleverness. Whodunit mysteries were a favorite of theirs, along with history books which baffled them with the variety of human nature. They got books with examples and step by step instructions to feed their understandings related to their hobbies, such as Dad's carpentry shop area in the garage, and Mom's cooking and gardening.

They worked hard to try to find what were the "right answers" in each of these areas. They liked logic puzzle books: If Mr. Green drives the blue car and the person in the white house walks to work, what color car does Mr. Orange drive?

I learned excellent study skills and how to logically analyze things, including things that make no sense.

Yet there was one section of the library that they totally ignored: the whole first batch of shelves in Dewey Decimal - 0's through 200's or so. The ones that had to do with psychology, emotions, ethics, spirituality, wisdom in decision-making. After all, they perfectly knew everything about all that, so why waste a second about what the defective little people had to struggle with?

As far as I can recall, my parents almost never admitted an experience of anything so human as what anyone else would call an emotional state. Except for two ways to measure the ways that others' misbehaviors forced them to suffer.

There was the embarrassment to humiliation axis, if other people, especially their children, failed to do enough spectacular things to make the parents especially praiseworthy.

And there was the frustration to anger axis, if other people, especially their children, failed to work hard enough to understand the right thing to do, whether or not clearly instructed.

A 2D plot could be made over time of the humiliation and rage that was, of course, the only possible response such reasonable could have to the inadequacies of their children, who put them to such inconvenience. The last word needs to spit with barely hidden fury to really convey its meaning.

Mom often "had to" discard relatives, friends, neighbors, doctors, religious leaders (with one exception I'll discuss in later posts); because they disappointed her by doing things that, of course, could only have one possible meaning: out of nastiness in their hearts, they must have spitefully chosen to not care any more about her.

Mom often "had to" be offended, dismayed, shocked, when random strangers didn't live up to The Rules, which she'd then proclaim to them and they, out of obstinate nasty stubbornness of course, refused to follow, or only grudgingly obeyed.

Mom's brother mentioned an anecdote from before I was born. My uncle happened to stop by right as Dad returned from an errand. She asked him about his errand, and he gave a detailed description (he was a computer engineer). She blew her top, proclaiming that of course the rule of polite living was that one answered a question expeditiously without beating around the bush! As always, Dad immediately sheepishly apologized, tried to figure out what to promise, and changed the subject.

A few months later, my uncle again happened to stop by right as Dad returned from an errand. Mom asked him about it and, as instructed, Dad gave a concise, terse answer. Mom blew her top, proclaiming that of course the rule of polite living was that one gave a full answer without forcing other people to have to ask pestering follow-up questions!

This was a daily occurrence.

I think that Dad saw the whole idea of emotions and spiritual matters as a big ball of confusion, best left to the little lady in whatever way would humor her instabilities.

Recently a forum member here had a post that commented on how service-to-self entities strive to increase the sense of separation and alienation between themselves and the rest of humanity. Reluctantly, I've had to agree that this describes my Mom perfectly, and that if she's still alive, I'm very unlikely to reach her in any way that matters at all to her. (More about that in future posts.)

After becoming familiar with the Law of One material, I've abandoned the sense of traditional Christian heaven that I never could believe in wholeheartedly, and hope instead that through a life review and a time of healing his spirit has since come to realize that his service of accommodation and appeasement lacked wisdom, and led to many hurtful experiences for his children.

Intelligence and wisdom are totally separate things.

Intelligence is a useful tool to increase the effectiveness of an entity that's vigorously made their Choice of polarity. If the choice is unconscious - as I believe my Mom's negative polarization, which so saddens me, to be - then intelligence can invent massively elaborate cover-ups for the truth.

My parents were intellectually brilliant, but they were also emotionally and psychologically very stupidly ignorant, by their own choice, and pretty much spiritually bankrupt. They made lousy choices and then tried to put off the pain of making better choices, by enduring the pointless consequences of their previous stubborn mistakes; and they thought this was virtue.

I was just a little kid that wanted love.

I've wasted most of four decades trying to get water from empty wells. In this incarnation, I likely never will feel the sense of security, self-worth and love that comes from someone knowing that they are well taken care of by good-enough parents. If it's true that we choose our parents as the best available way to fulfill our incarnational plans, then the only solution I can come up with so far as that Mom and I had some kind of deal to show each other the opposite sides of polarization, and to reject the other side no matter how much it hurt us to do so.

Yet the point of those early childhood experiences is to be confident in the Creator's love for us. I hang on Kahil Gibran's words about parents only being entrusted to parents, for a short time. My parents broke that trust, but the Creator still loves me on a deeper, closer, stronger, more enduring level than any human parent could. A new well, far away from the swampy mud and gravel pits, goes deep through the rock to a bubbling spring of living water deeper and cleaner by far than anything I was deprived of. Through the challenge of having to dig, I learned how to be compassionate with others who hunger for mercy and thirst for righteousness.

Thanks for reading, fellow seekers.

wow! that is one fantastic post Questioner.

I can definitely relate; intelligence and cleverness correspond to an 'IQ', and yet such things by themselves are only an ability, a skill with which to manipulate information.

wisdom, on the other hand, is a 'whole of life' faculty; and is of an integrative nature, rather than an analytical, deconstructive one.

great story.