There is a principle in life, “If you are not whole without something, you will never be whole with it.” Modern psychology will not teach restraint to gain freedom. It will often try to encourage a person to continue to do self-harm through their lifestyle while at the same time trying to find inner peace through the same lifestyle causing inner turmoil. Yet, natural law and common sense declare if what you are currently doing is causing you distress, stop what you are presently doing first.
Several times in my life, I have had the pleasure of working with people who have been in this crisis. All of these people are good people; I make no judgments about their lifestyle choices, moral codes, or desires. Simply making observations as compared to the principle under discussion.
Person 1, male, arrives onboard the USS Barry, an American Aegis Destroyer about the same time as I. Works as a cook. A hard-working person expresses his innermost desire is to obtain a tattoo. It has always been his dream to have a single tattoo. He thinks it will make him tough. Upon return to America, he gets a tattoo, then another, and then several more. He gets off on the pain, but with every tattoo, his soul becomes more and more distressed and anguished, and he begins to hate his appearance simultaneously and desires more tattoos. Because he was never a complete person mentally, he will never be complete with a tattoo without a tattoo. He does not understand why something which gives him pleasure through pain is also causing him more mental and spiritual anguish.
Person 2, female, sailor from the USS Barry, born and raised in a Christian home, always harbored doubts about religion but never voiced them. She always considered religion to be a restraint on freedom. She joins the US Navy, cuts ties to the religion of her youth, and claims she has never been freer. Her promiscuity is the stories of legends told in the engine rooms and back passageways of the ship. Her friends on board are scared she will crash and burn on some port visit and find a dead body where their friend used to be. This sailor thought sex would be the ultimate expression of freedom. Instead, it became the chains of her demise mentally, physically, and spiritually. When I met her, very little remained of the modest and good person she had been as she was growing up; by the time I left the ship, she was unrecognizable.
Two very good people, quick to help, hard-working, people of different backgrounds, but essentially the same. They discovered the same truth through two very different means, and the truth had nearly broken them when I left the ship. I grieve for my colleagues and their friends. By not knowing who they were and understanding their potential, the added freedoms and responsibilities of becoming adults were not the freedoms they expected but chains by which they bound themselves to paths of pain and destruction.
The Paradox
A paradox is anything that initially appears to be two opposing forces, but when studied, they are not opposites but are closer related than opposites. For example, one of the principles in understanding oneself and enjoying freedom is accepting restraints. Case in point, using person 2, had she exercised the modesty discussed in the religion of her youth, she would have found that sexual relations are improved with restraint, not ruined with discretion. Lies spread in society since the 1960s have claimed that sex is free, has no consequences, and can be engaged in without concern. All of these are absurd lies leading to the destruction of everyone who listens and becomes engrossed in the lifestyle of free sex. Hence, sexual restraint is a paradox; practicing restraint in sexual relations improves sexual relations, not hinders them, a contradiction, and freedom is found in restraint.
Person 3 has been observed the longest and is a family member, one of my younger brothers, to be precise. He has lived his life in a manner that has seen him restrained by external forces because he refuses internal restraint—losing good companions as wives, relationships with children, friends, and colleagues along the way. All of which has been difficult to witness, but the real tragedy has been the hero-worship heaped upon my younger brother by other more youthful siblings, leading them into dangerous and difficult paths. Hence, you could call Person 3 an amalgamate of four of my younger siblings, all of whom have chosen paths of appetite fulfillment instead of appetite suppressant.
By choosing to engage in appetite fulfillment, each of them has chased his one preferred appetite, to the exclusion of other all else, usually to the detriment of spousal relationships, children relationships, familial bonds, and responsibilities to society and themselves. Worse, the shell of these people forms a prickly wall around genuinely good people, who, if they would choose to learn, could be taught appetite suppression.
Training is Contingent Upon Choosing to Learn
One of the most difficult lessons I have learned is that those who choose to learn will, and those who choose to refuse to learn will as well. Nothing a teacher can do will change a student’s mind once it is made to refuse to learn. Unfortunately, this means that the teacher will witness a lot of struggles in the student, watch the student experience consequences, and be harmed physically and mentally from the choices made to refuse to learn.
Believe it or not, appetite control is a choice and begins with a desire to learn. The paradox in training is that when the desire to learn is stronger than the appetite to remain ignorant, the learner will produce the effort to change through learning. This is why appetite control is such a critical and fundamental topic for understanding. Desire is appetite, an appetite is a tool for good or ill, and bridling an appetite is every person’s job if they choose self-mastery as a means of self-regulation and self-improvement. When we choose self-mastery, we choose to become free!
Freedom is a paradox of bridled appetites to the greater realization that through suppressed appetite and controlled desires, a person can enjoy more, not less. Can learn and experience more, have more, become more, and realize more potential. Long have I been fascinated with racehorses, and the story of Black Beauty is one of my all-time favorites.
How are the best racehorses made? Sure, breeding helps. But, training is as, if not more, crucial. A good animal does not become a great animal until they are placed into the hands of a good trainer who puts restraints upon the animal. A bridle, a harness, a saddle, wrap their legs to protect against ligament strain, shoes on their feet, and much more. Then over time, the animal learns that the restraints, which at first were chafing and fought against, become the tools by which the horse achieves greatness. The same is true for humans, every human, and those who, throw the restraints, never achieve freedom, never achieve excellence, and refuse their potential for momentary happiness, all because of appetite.
Living in a representative government, the citizenry needs to understand this lesson and monitor those elected for people who refuse restraint. Those who refuse restraint will gather everyone who chooses to take a lazy route to their side, and in doing so, will ruin the representative government and destroy liberty for all. The debt so many representative governments face right now, which has reached critical mass stages, is due to unbridled appetite and appetite fulfillment for the masses when the government needed appetite restraint instead. The world’s problems in Afghanistan where rampant appetite fulfillment for the masses when appetite restraint was required. Terrorism is nothing but an unbridled appetite mixed with modern weapons and a desire to watch the world burn, more unbridled appetites.
Do we understand that only through restraining our appetites can we personally enjoy freedom? Do we teach appetite restraint to our children, knowing that when they control themselves, they can enjoy freedom, and help them to understand why appetite restraint is a good thing? Do we exemplify appetite restraint in society in speech, clothes, manners and encourage others to do similarly? If not, why?
© 2021 M. Dave Salisbury
All Rights Reserved
The images used herein were obtained in the public domain; this author holds no copyright to the images displayed.
Sharona struggled with being a mother, her boss was driving her crazy, and her mental health issues stemmed from both her boss and her nursing responsibility. Sharona plays a problematic role; does she provide nursing care for Monk or provide living assistance as a counselor? Concluding that stress can be a mental health issue when taken to extremes. Natalie Teager struggled with loneliness and a desire to be her own person outside of her family. Both mental health challenges that many people struggle with silently. Other supporting characters had substance abuse issues stemming from mental health concerns and personal choices, thus Monk’s subtlety and genius.
Communication presentation is the careful and concise logic behind selecting words to communicate an idea—the rules of grammar and punctuation aid in communicating correctly to enhance the sense and communicate the vision. Language is a grand and glorious tool for sharing ideas, empowering motivation, and building ideas into action items. Yet, for some reason, words have become cheapened by political positions, and I would see this trend cease forthwith. Presenting the first and second principles of language and communication:
Is the fear of the mob so significant that even without a mob, fear is spread, risks must be avoided proactively, and thoughts curtailed? I say NO! I defy the entire argument that word selection can cause exclusion. Why; because understanding is a choice! The only person who can choose to be insulted over a word is you! You own the emotions of the moment, and your emotional choices are not my concern! Do we understand this concept?
But what about those messages specifically designed to inflame, insult, denigrate, and deride? What changed? Nothing! The communication initiator desired to rile the primary audience, deny them this power over you, choose different emotions, and retain the moral high ground. The best response to a communication initiator who wants to rule your emotions is to deny them that power, and then that person goes away as irrelevant.
Like the expanded mind, choice leads to decisions, decision spurs action, and action will result in consequences. How you perceive the effects will drive the next series of choices, decisions, activities, and consequences. Liberty and freedom allow us the glory and the horror of choice and consequence. Thus, I plead with you, stop allowing your emotional decisions to be controlled by others! Cease the turmoil over language, speak simply, communicate clearly, and then rest knowing you have not intentionally caused harm. The audience is left to choose, and if they choose to be offended, those are not your consequences to suffer!
Hetro- or Homo- sexual, I do not care. If you and your partner are over the age of consent, generally accepted as 18 years, you may do as you like. All I ask is that you keep your bedroom theatrics in the privacy of your own home.
We can find the same family organizations, the same risks, and the same problems with abuse throughout history. Nothing in the modern family is new or unique. Greece, Rome, Egypt, Babylon, Israel, all communities of ancient date report the same problems in family dynamics, mainly to the detriment of the society practicing any family relationship except nuclear families. I am not the morality police, I am not the thought police, and I am not going to tell you how to live your life and handle your consequences. Heck, I have enough trouble just keeping my consequences dealt with; you may do as you see fit.
Childhood depression is up, anxiety, 
To fully understand the sexualization of children, one must first cut through the hype. The Centers for Disease Control (
I have reports from 
I know what you’re thinking, not another article on controlling emotions and feelings – well, yes. However, I wanted to approach this subject from a different tack. I discuss this topic so often because of the dearth witnessed in choosing proper emotional responses or not choosing an emotional response to the improvement of the environmental conditions in a situation. Across the globe, we find daily, even hourly, instances where emotional diatribes are ruling common sense, destroying logic, and creating hordes of emotionally charged people hell-bent on destroying. If I can help just one person understand this cycle of emotional abuse and then choose to correct their behavior, even if that person is only me, I consider these articles successful
Today’s title comes from Charles W. Penrose (n.d.), who penned the following poem, which has been set to music; the poem is based upon Proverbs 16:32, “One who is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and one whose temper is controlled than one who captures a city.”
As a kid, if my parents did not like another child’s behavior, I was refused the opportunity to play with that child for fear the child’s emotional behaviors would rub off on me, and I would begin to act like a nincompoop! Yet, as an adult, I can witness rampant emotionally charged conduct, and I have to tolerate nonsense due to helicopter parents, political choices, and the media; I think not! I firmly support 
Thus, on this Memorial Weekend, let us firmly recommit to 
Military commanders are taught there are two great sins in planning operations; one is waiting, and predictability and the other is indifference. Today, business leaders are instructed well by academics about the problems with waiting to make a decision, failing to act, and the costs of blown opportunities from taking too long to make a decision. But few have ever considered the costs of indifference. I intend to close this gap in education, using some recent examples and some history to reflect why indifference is a corrosive acid on the souls of men.
Let’s take Robert Solomon’s position that emotions are a choice, a judgment, and a social event. Indifference is not distinguishable from other emotions and remains a choice, a judgment, or a social event. Except one is not left trying to distinguish between indifference as emotion and indifference as lacking interest or caring. More to the point, if indifference was simply an emotion to choose, then indifference is apathy, and apathy is another emotion on the path to ruination.
Solomon makes a classic point in tying indifference to defensive mechanisms used in choosing emotional interactions for social situations. Indifference can reflect envy, resentment, hate, disdain, and the “opposite” of these emotions: love and respect—indifference embodying the individual’s psyche through emotional choices. When angry, frustrated, or time-pressured, how many times has the words “I don’t care” slipped out as the position when at another time the decision would not have been indifferent? Is the defensive aspect clear?
Public examples of indifference abound; one of the most obvious was the Beer Summit. President Obama’s indifference to police officers during the Henry Louis Gates arrest debacle in July 2009 reflected poorly in a socially political aspect for all his faults and all his other decisions. Thus the “
President Trump was criticized for caring too much about war zones and problems outside the United States, while the infrastructure crumbled and the poor suffered. President Obama was criticized for his refusals to enforce “Red Lines” being crossed with impunity and where internationally illegal weapons of mass destruction were employed. Which one was a reflection of indifference? Why? I am not getting into political discussions here; the topic is indifference, and recognizing indifference and the consequence from indifferent actions remains crucial to improving decision-making. Both presidents inherited situations where American Troops were in harm’s way, and these troop conditions rightly took priority in decision-making short and long-term. Yet, which president was indifferent? Why? Does indifference change solely because of political leanings? Why?
Societies, cultures, governments, and countries all rise and fall on the moral agency of the individuals in power, the common citizen, and the collective leaders of those groups of people. I have always liked the movie “The Fiddler on the Roof,” Tevye makes a statement about how without tradition, they would be as shaky as a fiddler on the roof. Bringing a mental image of a fiddler, balancing upon a roof, and having two options, climb down and resume playing, or learn to balance on the roof while playing. Both choices offer natural consequences that are easily understood, especially if you have ever worked on a roof.
I have consistently written about VA Leadership failures for several weeks, rightly calling out the administrators at the local VAHCS and VAMC, the VISN, and the Federal levels. Hospital leadership is not so different than leadership in any other industry, even though the VA has tried to make hospital leadership distinct. Herein lay the problem, an employee, a 
VA Secretary Denis McDonough
DNC-Consulting 