Striking a balance | INFJ Forum

Striking a balance

jimtaylor

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May 19, 2010
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I have always believed that there is balance in all things which is part of why I have done rather well in economics and statistics. Anybody who studies these two subjects knows that you have anomalies that appear outside of the norm but for the most part things fall into a median range. It is the same in many sciences like the effects of gravity and the transfer of motion. It seems to me that everything is always trying to find a balance. As put before, with every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Now looking beyond just a scientific or academic perspective, I believe this can be applied to all facets of existence including the psychological and emotional balance within individuals.

Going beyond just a collective balance of each of our actions having some impact upon our environment, I want to look at the impact within. Now I am sure that there are many books out there on such things and they probably have gone into much deeper thought than me but I have not read them so I cannot comment. So essentially what I am trying to argue here is that just as everything in the universe has to strike a balance, we as individuals also must find a balance.

In this initial post, I want to look at a topic that I have been obsessing over the last couple of weeks and that is good versus evil. I came to all this as I was watching people while seeing the multitude of personalities interact and the different dramas play out. I began to notice that everything in some way shape or form came to a balance or is still coming to a balance. That is another thing in this regard is that the balance might take some time to come around. It could be instant or it could take years before the equilibrium is found.

In regard to good versus evil, I want to focus internally to each individual and how it impacts their environment. The basic argument I want to make is that there is no such thing as a wholly good person or a wholly evil person but that people contain the ability to be both. I know that some are going to immediately roast me for this statement and come to the defense as it is within our nature to believe in the best in others but please understand that just because somebody has the potential to do evil, it does not mean that they are.

For the most part, people are always going to fall into the median, even internally. Most are going to be in the middle ground as far as evil and good goes. They will commit equal amounts of both to certain degrees. Now sadly this brings up the biggest weakness of any argument of this type, it is purely speculative and improvable. There is too much left to the individual to decide what is evil versus what is good which is why I cannot and will not go into specific examples.

Since I cannot go into specifics it makes it difficult to explain the mental process I am going through at the moment but I will try my best. Since for the most part people are going to fall into the median, this means that most will only be able to do moderate amounts of good or evil. The good or evil they do will have limited impact to the world as it will most likely only be felt by those in their immediate environment and those who are close to the individual.

A balance is struck by the fact that for the most part you might have 100 individuals doing some moderate good which will be balanced by 100 individuals doing some moderate evil and these individuals will trade places. It is not always the same 100 doing good or evil. They switch because besides finding balance within the environment they are finding balance within.

Besides this middle ground of people; which is rather boring to study, you will have the extremes that exist in the world. These are those rare individuals who have the potential to do both great evil and great good of which the impact will be huge upon the environment and will be felt by many. Like the median individuals these rare individuals must also strike a balance internally, so this is where I state that nobody can be wholly anything but this is also where choice and actions come into play.

These rare individuals have a choice to make and it may throw things out of balance and since the universe is always trying to find balance, they will be eliminated to find the balance or a shift might happen. Look at some of the most remembered names in history and for the most part they die young or die shortly after doing whatever impact they had potential for. This is of course not always true and I am not suggesting that the universe killed them. What killed them is the opposite reaction of their action.

I can use a specific example of Martin Luther King Jr. in this case. His purpose and desires where strong and created a strong following but also a strong opposition. This opposition was the external balance but despite his death, a change still happened. This is what I think you could call an equilibrium shift. Going to simple economics you have two lines, supply and demand. Both can move because of certain factors or both can shift, creating a new equilibrium. These rare individuals I think are capable of causing these equilibrium shifts for better or for worse.

Now going back to my other argument, Martin Luther King Jr. did great good but he could have also done great evil. With his inspiring speeches and devoted followers, he could have inspired great evil. He could have inspired violence and hate towards his opposition but he did not. This is that choice that I stated but the potential for evil still existed. The two are eternally tied and for as long as there is good, there will be evil. Now even though he did not choose to accept this evil, it still existed within him which does not make him evil. Also though because of his choice, his life was lost. If he had chosen to be one of those median individuals he probably would have never been killed but his impact on the world would have been minimal.

The question now, is what does this all matter? Trust me, I have asked myself that question a hundred times and I still don