Author: Tep Bessell

To learn more about the VisionCircles methodology and the OSCAR method click here or visit our Bookstore.

Check out the number of times you heard in conversation, saw on social platforms and/or you used the words crazy, insane, syndrome, radicalized, mentally ill, narcissistic, stressed, burnt-out, polarized, role model, best version of myself, socialized, self-image, self-esteem, and on and on. Based on the ways that people in Western culture use psychological language to speak about people everywhere, it appears that we believe that almost everyone in the world except me has “mental health issues”. 

I am going to use the OSCAR method: 1. observing my self-talk about what I am saying to myself and what other people are saying out loud about “mental health”; 2. sorting out my thinking about my assumptions, my expectations and what and who I am valuing regarding my self-talk about mental health; 3. connecting my vision of who and what are important to me when I am speaking about “mental health”; 4. acting on my new insights about the difference between mental health and mental well-being; 5. reviewing the  results of my actions based on my new insights about mental health and mental well-being.

The observations made by all the resources of my common-sense tell me, as they tell all scientists, that I am one whole acting beingof many dimensions and combinations interacting with each other. The resources that make up my common-sense are: 1. The physical world given to me immediately in my perceptions: 2. The spiritual world of my own self-reflecting being of which I am immediately conscious in my self-speech; 3. The mental products of the culture given to me in the activity of language; and, 4. The self-evident principles of reason given to me in my critical rational self-speech about everything presented to me. As an acting being I am always in motion in the physical, mental, psycho-social and spiritual dimensions of my being. I am conscious of myself as a unifying, enduring, valuing, self-organizing, self-correcting, created and creating being of truth, goodness and beauty. In the simple activities of home carpentry and plumbing I need to know the truth about what things are and how they work, if I want a good and beautiful house. If I want a good and beautiful home, I need to know who I am and who my spouse and children are and how we function together.

We can understand ourselves and the physical things of our world. How do I know that the beliefs about the kind of being that I am, about the kind of being all human beings areand about what and who I value are true?  

The evidence is self-evident to me. Humans speak to me all the time about creating forms of truth, goodness and beauty in their scientific theories, in their work, in family relations, and in the institutions of society. I see the results of their self-speech and the results of my own self-speech in what we produce. Everyone is trying to become what they intuitively feel about being human and what they rationally speak about to become fully human in their actions.I can see for myself the evidencein the heroic actions of human beings and in the simple actions of humans caring for each other in times of emergency that my beliefs are true.

I also see another truth. I am a limited being. I see and feel the gap between the way that I am and the way that I could be. I stand freely between the powers of my being that have been given to me and the possibilities of actualizing them for my own well-being and the well-being of all humans.

It is self-evident to me that there are humans that choose to become and do become the actors of truth, goodness and beauty in their own unique ways. It is also evident to me that there are humans that choose not to accept that they are limited. They choose and believe that there is no gap between who they are and what they are becoming.  They believe that they themselves are the evolving truth, goodness and beauty who are changing the physical and social world into their likeness by their physical-social-psychic actions.

It appears to me that these two different beliefs get mixed into our speech and are used together without paying attention to what we are saying. For example, the public and the media commentors speak about the diminishing mental faculties of President Biden.  Are they saying that he has mental health issues? If so, why do these same people judge him to be irresponsible for having issued executive orders that flouted the Supreme Court’s ruling on student loan forgiveness? Does President Biden know the condition of his mental faculties? If so, how does he know? If he does know, how is it possible for him to have only a “mental health” problem? Do his actions indicate other kinds of problems in other dimensions of his being? If he does not know his mental condition, how can he be blamed by the public for what he has done?

My initial observations lead me to believe that as a society we use precise language when we are speaking about things and about the functions related to our work. Bankers, carpenters, dentists, plumbers, and all of us at work think about what we are going to do and how and why we are going to do it. Carpenters know the qualities of wood and measure twice to cut once.

When we speak about human actions that disrupt the usual flow of our routines, we use either the labels of “mental health” to speak about all unlawful actions stretching from serious crimes to loitering or the language of etiquette such as the labels, inappropriate and unacceptable, to speak about human behaviors that are an offense to our social rituals rather than an offense to our sense of justice.

In the second stage of the OSCAR method common-sense recognizes the gaps and contradictions in our self-talk about “mental health”.  Common-sense advises us to examine critically, that is, to measure what we are saying to ourselves and what other people are saying about “mental health” against the self-evident truths presented in our mind-body-spirit being in this universe. This activity of thinking about what we are saying to ourselves about our own existence in this universe is not difficult to do. We do this critical common-sense thinking about our thinking all the time at work, if we are interested in succeeding at what we are doing.

We all have standards in our work. We measure the quality of our performance against standards. The objective standard is made up of a precise knowledge about the structure and the operations of the things that we work with to produce clearly defined results.  At work we take for granted the subjectively known critical common-sense standards of hard work, perseverance, effectiveness, efficiency, excellent results, achievement, profit and rewards that we value.

However, small and large corporations pressured by outside influences have written into their mission statements and strategic plans imposed practices that make up their corporate cultures. Some of the corporate values may not be attuned to what we value. Those in the corporation that deviate from the “corporate culture values” are referred to as problem people.

For example, the values of diversity, inclusion and equity have been written in to corporate mission statements and into many government procedures that regulate our institutions. The reason? To correct universal mental-social disorders such as white supremacy and many other social disorders. These disorders have been invented by whom?  We can hypothesize that a loosely knit group of people that are committed to the fundamental transformation of our traditional society are the inventors of these specific labels of mental health social disorders.

We have a natural tendency to give a name to the object of our thinking. In our scientific-technological society we have a habit of speaking about human behaviors and naming them in the same way that we speak about the behaviors of things. We know that we can fix the behaviors of things. We unreflecting believe that we can also fix the broken behaviors of human beings.

First, we must label the disorder. Since human beings are living things, we use biological and medical labels to name the disorders under the umbrella name, mental health. Medical doctors must track down the cause of our pain-ridden bodies to fix them. Mental health practitioners that use the medical model believe that they can restore the mental health of our dysfunctional and pain-ridden psyche by naming and diagnosing our broken behaviors. They believe that they can track down the source of all out-of-order human behaviors in our body-psycho-social dimension that distinguishes us as human on the evolutionary scale.

My self-speech about who I am, what I am, and who and what I value, raises doubts about what I learned in the social sciences as opposed to what I learned in the natural science of physics. What kinds of activities am I doing when I am speaking to myself about what things are and about who I am and what and who I value?  Am I going to find the answers to my questions in the activities of my body-psycho-social dimensions of my being?

Why is it that I ignore my self-speech about the kind of being that I am, when I am thinking about my “mental health”? Why is it that mental health practitioners reduce human actions to observable behaviors? When people talk about human agency, exactly what do they mean by being a human agent? Are the answers found in the body-psycho-social dimension of my being?

These questions and many more lead me to question the assumptions and the expectations of the undefined “they” that reduce all human actions to the category of “mental health”. If I assume that the only way to know human beings, of which I am one, is by means of the scientific method, then it makes sense to reduce all human actions to observable physical behaviors. Scientific statements about human behavior must be validated by observable measured evidence resulting from repeated control tests.

Therefore, according to this way of speaking, to know human beings means that I can only speak to myself and to other speakers and listeners about the images of human beings that are presented to me in sensation. Does this conclusion make sense?

Scientists speak to themselves and each other about the ways that can bypass the changing appearances of things given in sensation, because they want to speak about the objective structure of things and their operations that they intuitively know are behind the images of things. When I am speaking to myself about myself, are the objects of my self-reflecting speech and thought only about the images of myself given to me through my sensations?  My critical common-sense tells me that statements about what and who I am based only on images of myself are not even scientific. Scientists intuitively draw on the mental immaterial resources of the mind such as mathematics to speak about the physical world.

Critical common-sense tells me that the scientific way of knowing humans is necessary because there is a physical dimension to our being. However, I need to know the interactions among the mind-body-psyche dimensions of my being.The source of the symptoms of my out-of-order behaviors could be a genetic disorder and/or an organ disorder such as the brain. The source might be a psychological cognitive disorder of overgeneralizing or not controlling my desires. Most symptoms of negative emotions according to Victor Frankl, a psychiatrist, a neuroscientist and a philosopher, can be traced to the confusion in our mind about who and what we are, about who and what we value and about the meaning of living. My critical common-sense tells me to know myself and other human beings scientifically, if I want to be physically healthy. But critical common-sense also tells me that scientific knowledge is far from being sufficient to know and understand the whole human being.

In the second stage of the OSCAR method I am thinking about my self-speech to discover the assumptions underlying the way that we use the label, mental health, in our everyday language to cover all the out-of-order behaviors of human beings. It appears that we assume that social scientists present us with a near perfect model of the structure and operations of a human being just as physicists present us with a near perfect model of the structure and operations of the atom. Is that assumption true?  Let’s test it.

If a person is experiencing frustration, anger, depression and stress with a person or persons that they believe that they love, how will he or she solve the contradiction between the negative emotions that they are experiencing toward them and the love that they vigorously proclaim for them? If the person himself or herself believes that he or she has a mental health issue or is “in an unhealthy relationship”, how will he or she go about solving the problem? Most people will probably locate the cause of their painful emotions outside their own consciousness in the other person’s behaviors and/or dysfunctional organs or in a dysfunctional organ or operation of their own bodies. They feel helpless because they believe that the cause of their painful emotions is outside their conscious control.

The successes of cognitive behavior therapy, formerly known as rational-emotive therapy, demonstrate that irrational beliefs that violate the logical rules of thinking account for a large amount of our painful emotions. We intuitively know that our thinking will have physical consequences. Even bank robbers know that their anxiety will get in the way of a successful heist. Crooks can reduce their anxiety and improve their performance by developing the mental habit of ignoring their moral intuitions that are a source of anxiety.

The self-practice of cognitive behavior therapy is successful in restoring emotional balance. The theory is based on the ancient philosophical materialistic attitude that the purpose of life is to experience the pleasures of mind and body. However, it is insufficient for those that believe that the purpose of one’s existence is to live a full creative life. The person practicing cognitive behavior therapy needs to examine if the theory’s underlying materialistic attitude is completely rational. Our irrational beliefs about the kind of beings that we are and what and who we value can account for several physical and psychological disorders.

If we express out loud our self-talk about what we are saying to ourselves about our painful relationships and if we step back to question if our assumptions about what we believe and about the consequences that we expectare reasonable, we will spot our irrational beliefs. We begin to feel the truth of our rational self-speech that tells us that we are agents of truth that can correct our errors. We do not have a “mental health” problem. We have a mental habit problem of not engaging ourselves in self-reflecting speech to correct our irrational beliefs about whom and what we are and about who and what we value.

Critical common-sense tells us that we are one mind-body-psyche-spirit beings that is created and creating to become who and what we value. Critical common sense tells me to stay attuned to all the activities of all the dimensions of my being that are self-evident to me in my self-speech and are evident to me in speaking with self-reflective speaking human beings.

A symphonic orchestra is a useful metaphor to keep in mind in the next stage of the OSCAR method. Although the members of the orchestra are individuals with their feelings for and their understandings of music, they listen to each other, they read from the same composition, and they heed the conductor’s directions to produce the musical beauty of the one whole performing orchestra.

In the third stage of the OSCAR method we want to creatively discover and connect practical ideas that are attuned to the vision of the human being as one mind-body-psyche-spirit being agent of truth, beauty and goodness. Like the symphonic orchestra that functions in unison, the human being has many dimensions each with its own structure and functions that work together according to unifying principles that are understood by people that develop the habit of self-reflecting speech.

Unlike the symphonic orchestra human beings are the directors and the authors of the composition created from the resources given to us. Our vision of becoming the complete person of the person that we are moves the activities of all our dimensions to create habits of thinking and behaving that will actualize our vision.

The last two steps of the OSCAR method are to put into action our mental and behavioral habits that we tailor to the specific situations of our lives. Then we use our critical common sense to review the results of our actions. 

Although we use the word health that applies directly to states of living bodies, we use it in metaphorical ways to speak about the states of wholeness and of effective functioning of the objects of our speech such as a healthy economy. If we use them metaphorically to speak about the mental activities of human beings, the implied erroneous assumption is that “mental health” originates in the activities of our brain and that behavioral disorders, such as drug addiction, is a disease. To assume that the energy of the activities of our human consciousness that account for our being human comes from a force outside our control does not make sense to the activities of my critical common-sense self-speech.

We are in the habit of speaking about ourselves in the language of the evolutionary social scientists that believe that the activities of the mind emerge from the evolving energy of matter. My critical common-sense beliefs about what and who humans value such as free speech tell me that I believe that I know my belief that humans are body-mind-psyche-spirit beings is true. My critical common-sense also tells me that the hypothesis of biological evolution makes sense. My critical common-sense self-speech tells me that biological evolution accounts for my self-speech makes no sense. My critical common-sense also tells me that American citizens have mental habit problems about understanding the kind of being that humans are and about understanding who and what they value. We are flooded with the popular languages of the social sciences and the natural sciences that most of us do not understand.

The OSCAR method of self-reflecting speech of thinking about our thinking about what we are experiencing is a traditional way of developing mental habits to understand the truths and limits of the language of the evolutionary social scientists. It is a way of entering into dialogue with my own being and with those that share my beliefs and with those that do not share my beliefs about who we are.

My critical common-sense advises me to heed the call of the intuition of all the dimensions of my being and to practice the mental habit of speaking about the state of the well being of my mental activities that are striving to know truth and do good.

To learn more about the VisionCircles methodology and the OSCAR method click here or visit our Bookstore.

To learn more about the VisionCircles methodology and the OSCAR method click here or visit our Bookstore.

One of the aims of the OSCAR method is to develop the mental habit of thinking about our thinking, our emotions and behaviors as they are responding to events in our world. In the first step of observing we are using our common-sense like everyone to speak to ourselves about our responses to the 2024 November 5 election.  If we are really upset, we ask ourselves, “Why am I cursing at the TV?”, “Why am I telling myself to calm down?” or “Why am I so worried about what I am about to say about the 2024 November 5 election?”.

Why-questions about my own thinking, emotions, feelings and behaviors and/or those of my fellow citizens prompt me to step back and to use my critical common-sense to examine what I am saying to myself about myself and/or other people.   In the second stage of the OSCAR framework, I am sorting and labeling my emotions, thinking, feelings, behaviors, assumptions, expectations, and what and who I am valuing that are embedded in my self-talk. To examine implies that I am going step back to use my critical common sense to take a measure of my assumptions and expectations underlying my emotions and behaviors to see if they are in tune with truths that are self-evident to me. For example, it is evident to me that I cannot expect pleasant emotions, if I am not thinking clearly and logically.

If I am experiencing an upsetting emotion, my common-sense that is made up of the intuitive activities of my mind-body-spirit is telling me that there is disorder within my internal world or external world.  I intuitively know that when my mind-body- spirits are in harmony I feel good. If I am not feeling good, my critical common-sense counsels me to step back and to examine what I am saying to myself.

The mental habit of self-reflection means that I am responding with my critical common- sense to my upsetting emotions. I tell myself to sort out and to critically examine all my responses to track down the internal and external contradictions causing the mental noise that I am experiencing.

On the one hand, I am the kind of being that clearly knows that mental contradictions do not make rational sense and that clearly knows that I ought to love what is good for me. On the other hand, I am a limited and inattentive being. Sometimes I am not aware that I am speaking to myself in contradictory ways.  Sometimes I am not clear about what is good for me in specific situations.

If I want to feel good, I need: 1. to stay attuned to the rhythms of my mind-body-spirit; 2. to learn from my culture general principles that intuitively ring true to my critical common- sense; 3. to discover and understand for myself what specific actions are true and good for me in my situation. 

My critical common-sense tells me that culture is my activity of dialoguing with the best mental products of the human mind that speak about our internal and external world. Common-sense tells me that humans of all cultures provide me with a huge reservoir and resource of life-giving ideas that can enrich my mind. Like all reservoirs we need to keep an eye on all the contributors to make sure that none of them is polluting the universal reservoir of human knowledge from which we learn and to which we contribute new understandings.

I know that it takes time to know my own mind-body-spirit.  My time is simply the activities of my mind-body-spirit working in harmony to make rationally clear to myself my felt intuitions about what and who are important to me.  In the activity of sorting out my self-talk about my internal and external worlds, I am getting rid of the errors in my thinking behind my negative emotions and self-destructive behaviors by being attentive to truths that are self-evident to me. My restored psyche that is in tune with my mind-body-spirit can all work together in my self-talk to create personal ideas to speak clearly to myself about who and what that I feel are most important to me.

In the third stage of the OSCAR framework, I am ready to examine the results of the 2024 November 5 election results in the light of my corrected observations and in the light of who and what I value most.  Armed with a clear vision of the meaning of what I am doing when I vote, I am ready to create practical ways of responding as a person and as a citizen to the results of the 2024 November 5 election.

In the last two stages of the OSCAR method I will put into action practical ideas that I discovered in my self-dialogue to resolve the problem that has been upsetting me. After I act, I will review the results of my action.  If I do not get the results that I expected, I will revise my plan with better practical ideas.

The following is a self-dialogue about accepting the results of the 2024 November 5 election.  Although the self-dialogue does not follow the OSCAR method step by step, all the elements of observing, of labeling negative emotions and behaviors, of correcting irrational thinking, of valuing who and what are important,  of distinguishing the presenting problem from the fundamental problem, of analyzing the fundamental problem in the light of what and who we are valuing, of creating practical ways to actualize what we value, of putting into action our practical ideas and of reviewing the results of our thoughtful plan are in the self-dialogue below.

It is better to use the words, the OSCAR method, to show the progression of thought in creative thinking.  However, in practicing the OSCAR method, it is better to use the words, the OSCAR framework, because we need an elastic term to accommodate the intuition and spontaneity of creative thinking.  For example, the following self-dialogue uses the pronouns I and we, because we intuitively know that there is no dialogue without a speaker and a listener. Although we intuitively know that we are the kind of beings that are never alone, nevertheless, we can falsely believe that we are alienated from ourselves, each other and the universe.

Let’s listen to the following self-dialogue that probably will partially or wholly resonate with you.

I picture the common-sense meaning of the word, problem, as an obstacle in my way, or a gap that prevents me from going from here to there or an opposite force preventing me from moving forward. The obstacle can be mental or physical or both. But I can speak to myself in different ways about how I am picturing the obstacle, the gap and/or the opposing force.  Suppose I tell myself to look at the situation from a different angle.   As I move my thinking and body around the object, I see possibilities that can close the gap or that can overcome the opposing force. I begin to welcome the problem as a challenge to create a solution.

The emotional bipolar response to the last three elections on the part of democrats and republicans tells me that it’s time for all of us to take a long hard look at our common faith in The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution.

How many times have we turned around a tool or a gadget in our hands to figure out how to use it?  If we turn our minds around our common faith by telling ourselves to take a second look at the assumptions and expectations that we took for granted about our common faith in The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution, we might not be so surprised about the “problems” that some citizens are experiencing about the results of the 2024 election of November 5.

Taking a second look at what happened is another way to say we are monitoring our thinking about our beliefs about the way that we are functioning in everyday life.  If a business deal didn’t turn out the way that I expected, I ask myself, “What went wrong?  What was I thinking?”.  By asking these questions I am starting the process of monitoring my thinking after the fact.  To make sure I’m successful the next time, I need to take a closer look at the assumptions and the expectations behind my failed actions.

The activity of looking at my experiences in the light of my self-talk powered by the feelings of what is important to me presents me with the challenge to speak clearly to myself about what and who I hold in high esteem. In the activity of reflecting on what is important to me, I see clearly that I am a valuing person who is lining up from top to bottom who and what I hold in high esteem.

It is evident to me that I am a thinking, loving, valuing and acting being all the time. I am not like a machine.   I cannot stop living and make believe that I have static parts like a car that are out of order. Sometimes I think that I can fix myself by repairing the defective parts and by putting them back in order. Then I just have to push the starter button to resume living a smooth life. It is evident to me that I am not a machine, so stop thinking that way.

The election of November 5 is an occasion to monitor our thinking to develop an insight into my attitudes and the attitudes of the electorate regarding our common faith that seems to be more felt than spoken in public.

If I step back to look at the emotions that I am feeling about an event that did not go my way, they will trigger my self-talk about why it was so important to me to experience the consequences that I had expected.  Was it the money that was important? Was it my ego that was important? Was it just the pleasure of seeing things work out just as I expected? Was it the positive consequences for other people that were so important to me?

From the get-go, was I in tune with the order of what and who I value most in life before I voted on November 5, 2024?On November 5 or before did I pay attention to whom and what I was thinking about, loving and valuing when I was filling out my ballot?

The kind of emotions and the intensity of the emotions stimulated by the results of the election will give us a clue about the line-up of who and what are most important to us.  The line-ups could be: 1. God, I, spouse, family, friends, career, country; 2. ego, power, money, career, family, friends, country; 3.making a new world (without pain, inequalities and limitations), political power, community, freedom from oppression, or 4. one of many other line-ups.

If I am clear about the order of whom and what I value, I am ready to commit myself to transform the beliefs of our common faith into action.  I will define myself by what I do. Our fellow citizens will define themselves for us by acting according to their commitment to the beliefs of our common faith in The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution. We will tell others who we are in our words, and we will tell others what we are in our actions.  It makes no sense to be told who we are and what we are by the social scientists, if we are free creating beings created by God.  It is time for me to stop the nonsense talk of labeling citizens right, left, radicalized, and on and on. I can label things and behaviors but I ought not label persons.

My common-sense tells me that my beliefs about what and who are most important to me can be true or false. Critical common-sense tells me: 1. that truth means speaking about the way that I exist, the way that persons exist and the way that things exist: 2. that there is a difference between the way things are, and the way they appear to me: 3. that there is difference between the way I and persons exist and the ways that I perceive myself and the way that I perceive persons to be: and4. that I better stay intuitively, intellectually and physically in tune with the person I am, if I want to avoid deceiving myself with false images about myself, about other persons and the world.

Can I be a hundred percent sure that I totally and accurately capture in my logical answers the truth about the way that I exist? Critical common-sense tells us that the answer is no. Our common faith means that I believe that I may understand and that I hope that I will love and be loved eternally by the loving and merciful Creator.

If my emotional responses to the election are propelling me into a state of euphoria or sinking me in a swamp of depression, I better ask myself if I know that my beliefs are true, if I can clearly tell myself what my line-up of priorities is about who and what are important to me, and if I can give myself convincing reasons why I believe that my line-up is true.

Both political parties claim to be the standard bearers of “American values”.  Is the criterion for knowing and confirming “American values” the positive or negative emotions stimulated by election outcomes that please one party and not the other?   It makes more sense to check out our emotions against the American common faith in the beliefs of The Declaration of Independence and the American principles of self-governance of The Constitution than against the blank, senseless label, evolving “American values”. I love the country of America because I value and I believe all citizens value the truth of our common faith in the self-evident principles of self-governance.

What is the criterion for committing myself to the American common faith and for accepting the self-evident principles of self-governance? I am the one speaking to myself about the way that I exist. My line-up of priorities of what and who are important to me will be in tune or out of tune with the intuitive sense of the way that I am experiencing my own existence in my self-talk. In my self-reflective speech with other human beings, I am one spirit-mind-body working with fellow citizens to accomplish our ideals. I believe that I have good reasons to believe that The American common faith and the American principles of self-governance are in tune with who I am as a creating and created being and with my line-up of who and what are important to me.

The creators of our founding documents and the thirteen states, after long rational deliberations, committed themselves to proposition that all humans are created free and equal by God.  Elections are moments when citizens express their commitment to the country’s enduring common faith that inspires human scientific thought to achieve a more economic, social and political unity.

When Eisenhower defeated Stevenson in the 1952 and 1956 elections, the country did not go up and down like an emotional yoyo.  It seems that the emotional responses to the last few elections indicate a challenge to understand our rational common faith. Maybe the reason for our lack of understanding is that our institutions of education are not in tune with The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution.  Maybe people that express emotional distressover the election outcomes want the country and The Constitution to evolve without The Declaration of Independence and the theistic-spiritual-scientific attitude that inspires them.

Instead of waving the flag of American values, I better check out if I am in tune with myself in all my personal actions, if we are in tune with the beliefs and principles of our founding documents in all our social and civic actions and if the members of the democrat and republican parties are in tune with themselves and The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution in all their political actions.

If we want to function well behaviorally and emotionally, common-sense tells us to think before we act.If we want to live creatively, productively and justly with each other, critical common-sense tells us to submit our beliefs about what we are, who we are and what the world is to our self-reflective speech to see if our beliefs are in tune with our intuitive sense of the way that we exist.

If Americans work at understanding our common faith in the beliefs and principles of our founding documents, prudence and justice tell us to keep our foot on the gas pedal of thinking about and valuing our rational common faith so that we may understand it better to speak about it in a practical way in public.

Critical common sense tells us that there exists within the citizenry a diametrically opposing faith that wants to fundamentally transform America into a country inspired by a faith in atheistic materialism.  If the believers of the many sects of atheistic materialism had worked at understanding their faith, they would not have experienced a volatile mixture of depression and anger after the election results.

If believers of both faiths are challenged in public to present a rational understanding of their beliefs, we would stop the nonsense talk about left and right, about the left being crazy, about the right being immoral, about free-creative-created-beings being radicalized and on and on.  In our present situation the atheistic-materialistic-militant faith infiltrating our institutions excludes believers in God and speech about God within its ranks.  Butthe theistic-spiritual-scientific attitude of America’s common faith includes believers and non-believersand their speech about God.

Because the atheistic progressive philosophy is political and educational activism, the atheistic humanists that want to fundamentally transform our founding documents have control of our educational and political language.

Maybe we are taking for granted our common faith in our political, civic and social discourse.  Ourmistrust in our institutions that was widespread before the November 5 electionwarns to speak about, know and live our common faith in all our institutions. Why? An opposing faith is being practiced in our educational, judicial, political, law enforcement, military and media institutions under the guise of progressive programs such as DEI.

The opposing faith must be articulated in public and confronted.  It seems that we are more concerned about etiquette, appropriateness, acceptability, and on and on than knowing and understanding our common faith and knowing the beliefs of the atheistic-materialistic faith that is attempting to eradicate it. The level of discourse needs to be jacked up a notch to that of critical common-sense and of communal self-reflective speech and of confrontation about our common faith in the spirit of genuinely caring for each other including those politically depressed and angry. Otherwise in the next election those experiencing euphoria might end up in the swamps of depression.

To learn more about the VisionCircles methodology and the OSCAR method click here or visit our Bookstore.

To learn more about the VisionCircles methodology and the OSCAR method click here or visit our Bookstore.

Use the OSCAR method to clear the fog.

The question about whom to vote for is camouflaging the more important questions of what I am voting for in this election and the follow-up question of why I believe that the what question is so important. We have always taken for granted that the democrat, republican and other parties, except the communist party, and their candidates shared the common faith in the beliefs and principles of The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution inspired by a theistic-spiritual-scientific attitude aimed at forming a more perfect union. Just as Jason in the Greek mythological story escaped being destroyed by the monsters of Scylla and Charybdis guarding the entrance to the Black Sea in his quest for the golden fleece, the founders of our country created the political documents that protect us from being crushed by the monsters of theocracy and dictatorship.

The issues in play today are those pertaining to the first amendment, the heart and spirit of the country that protects us from the two monsters. At the time of the Kennedy-Nixon debates about seventy-five percent of the country trusted our elected representatives and our government and educational institutions to act according to our common rational faith. In the run-up to the 2024 election that trust has plummeted to percentages in the low thirties. In the past our rational faith in the ideals and principles of our founding documents generated hope and trustthat we would succeed in achieving our life plans to satisfy our financial, security and career needs. Young people are not feeling that trust and hope.

All the unhappiness attached to discrimination between groups of people and to the imbalance of the distribution of material goods are in large measure rooted in systems of government that deny the self-evident truth that humans ARE equal and free to govern themselves. We cannot think about what we are and who we are without speaking freely with other human beings that are equally free. The Constitution is inspired by this self-evident truth. Yet, we all have a tale to tell about the inhuman behavior of one group of humans toward another groupof humans throughout the ages.

Governments such as the Soviet Union formed by an atheistic-materialistic attitude and by the denial of self-evident truths aim to wipe out inhuman behavior by the dictatorship of the people’s government. The atheistic-materialistic-social sciences attitude that is infiltrating our educational institutions and threatening our Constitution promises one harmonious pure world, provided we surrender the self-evident truths in The Declaration of Independence and the right to free speech and free thought in The Constitution.

In every election Americans come together for two reasons. They commit themselves to our common faithin our enduring values that all humans are created free and equal by God. The second reason is to vote for the best people with the best plan who give their word to defend The Constitution and to abide by its principles to achieve the common good of the whole country and the good of different interest groups by creating conditions to facilitate the solutions to our social and economic problems.

A month before this election seventy-five percent of voters believe that the country is on the wrong track going in the wrong direction. The main problem confronting voters is to get back on the track of our founding documents that is going in the right direction.

My neighbor complained that the oak floors in his living room and dining room creaked when people walked on them. He decided to tear out the floors and replace them. The contractor discovered that some of the beams were rotten.  A functional problem turned into a structural problem. Citizens are discovering that under our functional problems about our economy, our borders, our schools and our justice institutions, we have the beginnings of structural problems especially with the first amendment beam.

We can have a biologically functional problem caused by external conditions, but if we have a structural problem, we will also have a functional problem that will slow us down.  Our country has a structural problem. The beams of The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution are being rotted out by diversity-inclusion-equity programs and other programs rooted in the atheistic-materialistic-social sciences attitude.

Some leaders and members of the contemporary progressive democrat party are calling for a fundamental transformation of our common faith in American culture. Traditional democrats of which I am one are silent. I believe that American culture means that citizens use their best human thinking to respond to the radical questions about human nature, human society and God and to our questions about how to solve our functional practical problems within the American world of free speech, self-governance and thoughtful communal sovereignty protected by The Constitution.

No person is radicalized. We are self-reflecting speaking beings raising radical questions to uncover radical answers about our universe and ourselves, so that we can function mentally at our best to lovegenuinely whom and what we hold in highest regard. To be radicalized means that we are not thinking by ourselves and with other citizens about our radical questions.

The creators of our founding documents made a fundamental decision to form a representative government of sovereign citizens inspired by the traditional theistic-spiritual-scientific attitude. Succeeding individuals, either born in the country or seeking citizenship, pledge their word to our living rational creed in the beliefs and principles of The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution that are our compass and our source of energy on our journey to a good life.

The divisions that contemporary American citizens are experiencing in the personal, social, political, moral, religious, and moral dimensions of their lives are rooted in two opposing attitudes toward themselves, nature, society, and God. Our divisions are not about different ways to answer questions about our financial, health, security, and career needs. The either/or existential crisis is about committing or not committing ourselves to our common rational faith that triggers wisdom and courage to solve our practical problems.

The country has two opposing, not competing, systems of the free press formed by opposing fundamental attitudes. The country has two opposing educational systems formed by opposing fundamental attitudes. The country has two opposing legal systems formed by opposing fundamental attitudes. The country’s common faith is internally and externally under siege by the foreign faith that labels our common faith bad faith. The supposed good faith camouflaged as American progressivism is revisionist Marxism inspired by the ancient atheistic-materialistic attitude toward the human being, society and God.

Just about anyone over the age of forty speaks about these divisions with the language of opposites in their expressions such as, the country is upside-down, and the country is inside-out. Our definition of the problems on the surface about inflation, violence, illegal immigration, abortion, a two-tier justice system, genderism, racism, and the divided educational system are grounded in the roots of the two fundamental opposing attitudes toward nature, humans and God.

The problem of voting is whether I want to think about my thinking about root causes. If I do, for a start I can think about the Chinese Communist Party rooted in the atheistic-materialistic-social science attitude of revisionist Marxism that opposes our founding living documents rooted in the theistic-spiritual-scientific attitude that defines The United States. When politicians say that the Chinese Communist Party does not share our values, the opposition of the two fundamental attitudes toward human beings, society, natural science and God ought to hit all of us right between the eyes.

I believe that a reasonable and solid hypothesis to solve our structural and functional problems states that if we are attentive to our living founding documents rooted in the theistic-spiritual-scientific attitude,our country that is being divided by revisionist Marxism parading under the flag of social progressivism and rooted in the atheistic-materialistic-social science attitude can get back on track.

My hypothesis is based on my reflective self-speech about my observations of the widening divisions in all our institutions that I judge to be provoked by a cabal of progressive democrat self-anointed leaders calling for a fundamental change of the American culture. These divisions are facilitated, either out of ignorance or lack of courage, by non-responsive democrats, independents, republicans, the free press and any other like-minded groups of citizens thinking about how to govern our country effectively,

In this first phase of the OSCAR method of creative problem solving, I am observing my own self-talk about my observations, and I am listening and thinking about the observations of fellow citizens. When the surveys say that we are on the wrong track and that we are going in the wrong direction, the obvious questions are, “How did we get here?”,“What is the right track?”, “What is the right direction?”, ”How to get on the right track?”. One obvious area to search for an answer to our questions is our educational institutions.

Not until the pandemic and the zoom home classrooms did parents find out what was going on in those pre-pandemic classrooms.  We need to search thoroughly to determine if the attitude producing the kind of academic content and teaching going on in our educational institutions is in tune with the Declaration of Independence and The Constitution. Aristotle warns us thatif the spirit of our educational institutions is not in tune with our constitution, our constitution will die.

After completing the first phase of speaking with ourselves and fellow citizens about our observations, the ensuing phases in the OSCAR method are:

2. Sorting out our positive and negative thinking and emotions; sorting out the order of our values according to which we value what and who are so important to us; sorting our reasonable and unreasonable assumptions and expectations;

3. Creatively thinking to produce practical ideas that will strengthen our common faith in The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution and to produce useful ideas that will resolve our economic, social, security, health and educational problems;

4. Prudently judging what candidate and what plan resonate more with the beliefs, principles and ideal values of our common faith before I act, that is, vote;

5. Reviewing the probable consequences and revising, if necessary, my vote for the people and the plan that I expect will solve the fundamental problem of getting our institutions on the Constitutional track and will solve the problems of inflation, illegal immigration, and others.

All methods about material things are presented in sequential order, but humans do not always think in a step-by-step way to solve human problems. We bounce back and forth spontaneously between several ways of thinking. The OSCAR method incorporates the essential ways of thinking to do creative problem solving.  The most important activity in the first step is to speak with ourselves about what we are observing and to speak with each other about what we are saying to ourselves about our observations.

Einstein said that if you give me one hour to solve a problem, it will take me fifty-five minutes to define the problem and five minutes to solve it. In the first, second and third phases of observing, sorting out and creatively connecting, we are defining the problem by seeing the gaps and contradictions between actualizing the ideals of our common faith in our institutions and by speaking with ourselves and other citizens about the country moving in the wrong direction.

I am always intrigued by political candidates that say things like: “I will get the job done”, “I will protect American values” and “I have programs that will solve your kitchen table problems”. As the politician is speaking, I am speaking to myself about what he/she or the desired pronoun is saying. I want to make sense to myself about what the candidate believes about the job and what he or she means about protecting American values. For example, I am asking myself questions about the kitchen table problems.

I grew up in an apartment building in the Bronx. We didn’t have a kitchen table.  The kitchen was too small. Are politicians assuming that all kitchen table problems are the same? Am I expecting this political party or that political party to solve my kitchen table problems? Is my understanding of “getting the job done” the same as politicians’ understanding of “getting the job done”?

I’ve got a problem when I feel and see the gap between the way my life, my family, my neighborhood, my country, and my representative government could be acting and the way I, my family, my neighborhood, my country and my representative government are acting.

I’ve also got a problem when I feel and see opposing ideals, powers and actions knocking me off track, because they are either clashing in me, within my family, within our country and within our institutions or pulling us apart.

I have both problems, because I tacitly know and intuitively feel in myself the inherent worth ofpersonswho strive to become the actualization of their ideal selves. Just focus on the response of citizens pulling together even at the risk of their own lives to help fellow citizens suffering human and physical losses from the hurricane, Helene.  The evidence  confirms that we are potentially and actually thinking and loving beings that want to continue to realize our oneness and harmony with ourselves, with each other, with our surroundings and with the Source of it all. Progressivism starts with the opposite belief that we are separated from each other, oppressed by each other and defined by our appearances and our socio-economic place in the economic engine that one day will produce highly functioning human beings.

When I am speaking about organizing American citizens, I am speaking about self-moving persons organizing themselves within a politically living body of relationships according to a living contract that its creators named The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution of the United States of America. The creators pledged their word and their possessions to the new covenant, not to a party of people charged to administer andto care for our institutions. Succeeding generations keep the living covenant in existence, if each person pledges his or her word to the beliefs and principles written in the founding documents. Given the accuracy of our thoughtful observations, a significant percentage of citizens are pledging their word to a party instead of to The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution.

A symphonic orchestra is a better analogy to see both problems of the gap between our ideal values and the questionable practices of our institutions and of the clashing of opposing attitudes present in our institutions as one problem. The two aspects of our institutions when they are functioning well are: behaving in ways that are congruent with the principles of The Constitution and faithfully moving toward forming a perfect union. The achievement of these two goals can be seen as one practical problem. We want to solve the problem of the gap between the possibility of what we could do and the actuality of what we are doing; and, simultaneously, we want to eliminate the noise made by citizens that are not in harmony with each other and with our common faith.

A symphonic orchestra functions beautifully because the different instruments and musicians are attuned to the true C note; all the different musicians areattuned to their musical instruments and to other musicians; the different instruments are attuned to the musicians and to other instruments; all the musicians are playing the same composition; and, the conductor, attuned to the composition and its movement, is leading by drawing the best performance from the musicians and from himself/herself toward harmony and unity with each other that they and the audience all see and love.

Just as the conductor and the musicians are performing to actualize the musical composition, I am, in the act of voting, performing to actualize The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution.I want each citizen toenjoy the goods and rights common to each citizen. I want all citizens as a country to continue to pursue our own good in the activities of forming a more perfect union in accordance with our common faith. There is always room for everyone to participate and for novel interpretations.

The reasons for making this judgment are based on my reflective observations and the thoughtful observations of fellow citizens.  The fact that North Carolina University found it necessary to institute a school based on the creation of a culture of free thought and free speech is a clear warning sign that the living constitution is threatened. 

Everyone tacitly feels and knows that the first amendment, the heart of the country, is under attack in just about allour institutions by elected and non-elected officials of our representative government.

It seems to me that at this critical juncture in our history the answers to my what and why questions in this election need to be answered before I answer the question, “Who is the better candidate with the best plan to solve the long-term structural problem about the preservation and growth of our institutions and the immediate functional problems about our economic, social and international dilemmas?”.

The American spirit and the country will endure, if attentive Americans create novel solutions that are in tune with The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution.

To learn more about the VisionCircles methodology and the OSCAR method click here or visit our Bookstore.