CHAPTER 1
Beatitudes of Integrity, Law One Balance
"You are the sum total of all your thoughts." "You are what you eat." "Eat a balanced diet." "Too much of a good thing is not a good thing." "Do you live to work or work to live?"
Motivational phrases like these often move us to reach our goals and objectives. Finding balance is more about preventing self-destruction from extreme indulgences or being blind or prejudiced to synergetic functions and processes.
Moderation in all things is a philosophy that should be applied to most indulgences. Seeking balance makes us step back and review our motivations and potential risks that often lead us down a destructive path of obsession. Self-discipline is the measure of integrity that is a prerequisite to achievement. Moderation requires self-discipline. Without discipline, commitments are short-term deals with the devil. Extreme indulgences evolve into dependencies. When you can't trust the temptation, you may have lost your integrity. You can trust the alcoholic, but you can't trust the alcohol in the alcoholic.
Is stress an emotional response to the need to balance? Stressors are the measure of balance. There are good stressors as well as bad stressors. How we manage them — whether in business, our personal relationships, or our own personal development — will go a long way to bringing about joy in our lives. Taking an inventory of our stressors is the first step toward positive change. At the back of this book, please find attached a balance tracker form for you to help you manage the stressors in your life. The example below is a completed balance tracker form.
Highly respected French lawyer and political philosopher, Baron de La Brede et de Montesquieu argued for balance in government. His writings on the separation of power being essential to the people's liberty — namely legislative, executive, and judicial — have been core values prominent in many nation's constitutions. The drafters of the Constitution of the United States of America incorporated Montesquieu's philosophy. In the preamble of the US Constitution, the balance of power became the staple of its existence. The government, albeit the demonstration of order, is democratically controlled by the people it's charged to control. The Constitution says: "In order to form a more perfect Union, a social contract must be entered into by the government with its people." Montesquieu's separation of power philosophy ensured that the will of the one wielding the power is, more importantly, the will of the people.
For balance to prevail in government, it is imperative to ensure the synergy of socialism and a free market system. Political pundits have created a dichotomous logical fallacy between two models that unfortunately have become the paradox shaping economic politics, socialism versus capitalism. However, the integrity of economics is the marriage of both socialism and a free market, in what has been called the dual economy. Many of these pundits have fooled us into believing that selfishness is a prerequisite to becoming financially successful.
The most notorious of these fraudulent pundits was Ayn Rand, the Russian-American novelist famous for such books as The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. She is credited with defining how capitalism should be modeled. Her ideology lacked the I Factor, however, and gave a get-out-of-jail-free card for oligarchs to rig economies at the expense of eliminating the middle class.
Ronald Reagan was another pundit who believed this and forged the winner-take-all economic model, "Trickle Down Economics." The result of this scam has been more wealth to a small percentage of the community and consequently a struggling middle class. In 2017, wages are still out of line with the cost of living. According to political authors Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson in their book, Winner Take All Politics, contrary to conventional wisdom, the inequality of income since Trickle Down has yielded a 256 percent increase in income for the wealthier 1 percent and a 20 percent income growth for lower wage earners.
John Locke, who lived from 1632 to 1704, was an English physician and philosopher. He is commonly known as the "Father of Liberalism" as he influenced the American revolution's Declaration of Independence and introduced the theory of social contract, ignited enlightenment thinking, and defined inalienable rights for social contracts.
Scottish philosopher James Frederick Ferrier first used the word epistemology to describe a branch of philosophy concerned with the theory of knowledge, subjective (belief) and objective (facts). Locke and Ferrier challenged conventional patriotic propaganda as detrimental to resolving real problems of social disparity. They implored students of thought to ignore speculation and fabrication and to instead allow their beliefs to seek knowledge based on fact. Their influence on the founders of the new democracy led the leaders to write the greatest treatise of rights ever penned, the Constitution of the United States.
In 1688, John Locke wrote "Two Treatises of Government," a social contract between a sovereign people and its government that addresses the inalienable rights of citizenry to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. His framework inspired the authors of the United States of America's Constitution. A promise was made to all Americans, regardless of privilege, birthright, or fame. The Constitution's Bill of Rights is widely regarded as the apotheosis of human rights.
Without a dual economy, the average and poor wage earners of society will fall victim to the three epical failures of capitalism: greed, gluttony, and gouging. The oligarchs rake in excess and cheat lower income earners of a fair distribution of wealth — not equal but fair distribution. Why? It is human nature to follow subjective logical fallacy politics, bundled in subterfuge and sold on patriotic hyperbole, rather than forensically scrutinized facts. I feel pity rather than schadenfreude for the vulnerable.
US President Ronald Reagan convinced his constituency that if they elected him, he would cut taxes on the wealthy, and by default those oligarchs would in turn show their gratitude and trickle more wealth to the middle class. History has proven that the promise of inevitable generosity wasn't so inevitable.
Imagine if Bush hadn't deregulated Wall Street and the Great Bush Recession had been...
