The Maladjusted Type

[Scrummy]

This Be the Verse
They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself.
-- Philip LARKIN

Regardless of type, we are all human, and humans are fragile creatures. In some sense, not one of us has escaped the ravages of a war that takes place on no other battlefield but our homes, our churches, our schools, our offices, even our bedrooms. We have, all of us, experienced those miniscule traumas that accumulate to shape our identity and serve to put a kink in the machinery of our psyche. In view of all that has been said, for and against certain types, on this forum, I think it would be helpful to consider that which constitutes the inherent qualities of a “type” and that which is an unhealthy pathology born out of maladjustment.

“Careful the things you say… children will listen…”
-- Stephen SONDHEIM

One’s parents (or lack thereof) seem to be the cause of some influential traumas. What can go wrong when there are no parents on whom to shape one’s ideas of how to act? What happens when one or both of the parents are negligent or even abusive? If they flat out do not understand their child? If they project their own insecurities onto their child? If they live vicariously through their child? Certain type combinations between parent and child can make some circumstances more likely than others, and consequently, some type will be more likely to come across the same issues with their parents no matter what type they happen to be.

" No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee."
-- John DONNE

And what about our society, our peers, our lovers? What crimes against our nature have been committed there? There is no doubt that some types just “fit in” better than others in some societies, and those that don’t will have to do a bit of fancy footwork to accommodate this discrepancy.

A bad romantic experience with our dual can set us up for quite a bit of stress and maladjustment. Duality is not only a study in compensation. It has a purifying quality to it. Those of you who have had a relationship with a healthy representation of your dual will know what I mean. There is something liberating in the dynamics involve that make one throw away all sense of inhibition. One’s conscious means of functioning are thrown out the window and the subconscious compulsions are allowed to come into play.

One tragedy of our education system here in the United States is that it is biased toward an XSXj student body. Those types unable to reconcile this discrepancy (i.e. NT’s; NF’s seem better equipped to adapt if given a shove or three, and XSXp’s seem not to give a damn anyway) are put at quite a disadvantage. Inability to succeed academically can have a profound impact on one’s conceptions of self-esteem, potential, and interests.

This bias extends past academia into all aspects of our society. By virtue of a democratic meritocracy, Baby Boomers have instilled in their children the following mantra: Stay in School – Get Good Grades – Go to a Good University – Study Hard – Get a Good Job – Make More Money Than Your Parents – Be Happy. Can someone say XSXj, again?

At the heart of the issue are the last two points about money and happiness. We have come to equate money (and LOTS of it) with happiness. It is a given that money makes the world go around these days… but parents seem to want to make sure that come time for wedding vows, their children never have to experience the negative side of things: worse as opposed to better, poorer as opposed to richer, sickness as opposed to health. What stigma there is applied to the starving artist! What disdain is there applied to the writer! What revulsion is there aimed at "regular folk" - the farmer, the store clerk, the grocery bagger, the trucker, the mailman! And God help the INFp poet.

Yet… not everyone is equipped to work their way through medical school, or law school, or engineering school. Many of these institutions have become mere diploma mills, where students enter, are subjected to mass testing, are graded – not by teachers on an individual level – but by machine (God bless the ScanTron corporation), and awarded their degrees year after year. God help the poor ISFp engineer who is forced by his parents to study neuro-surgery and has a breakdown come medical school.

I hope we can use this thread to differentiate between that which we regard as result of “type”, that which is a result of healthy development of our own unique personalities, and that which is a result of the various ways in which life has “screwed us all,” in the words of Kurt Cobain. What have you noticed about others, that causes unhealthy tendencies? What have you noticed about yourself?

[Catholic Schoolboy]

Auvi, I love you. You are brilliant you really are.

Thanks for this thread, thank you very much. I have much to say which I will do when I have had some sleep.

[UDP]

Good post.........
It would havebeen better than good if you didn't bring up the "demigod" Cobain. What's his type? I can't stand him.

=

I hope we can use this thread to differentiate between that which we regard as result of “type”, that which is a result of healthy development of our own unique personalities, and that which is a result of the various ways in which life has “screwed us all,” in the words of Kurt Cobain

Yes, I think it is important to differentiate between those two things. As long as there is no pity party...

Personal growth, or self cultivation perhaps, is something that always interested me regardless of personality typeor what preferences I may or may not have.

A bad romantic experience with our dual can set us up for quite a bit of stress and maladjustment. Duality is not only a study in compensation. It has a purifying quality to it. Those of you who have had a relationship with a healthy representation of your dual will know what I mean. There is something liberating in the dynamics involve that make one throw away all sense of inhibition. One’s conscious means of functioning are thrown out the window and the subconscious compulsions are allowed to come into play.

One tragedy of our education system here in the United States is that it is biased toward an XSXj student body. Those types unable to reconcile this discrepancy (i.e. NT’s; NF’s seem better equipped to adapt if given a shove or three, and XSXp’s seem not to give a damn anyway) are put at quite a disadvantage. Inability to succeed academically can have a profound impact on one’s conceptions of self-esteem, potential, and interests.

Nice.

I've had a relationship with someone that was probably a my opposite, or at least ESFx It was very, very very much a learning process. It hurt like a bitch for various reasons, but it totalyl opened my eyes to things in life that I didn't know about, like ..... feelings in general. It helped me a great deal in developing my theories about what love is (for me), and what relationship kind I want and/or need.

As far asout school systems go....... I think those are great points.
I know a lot of people who (as I'm learning new terms in my COMN class)..... who are being directly defined by other people and situations, and, as you said, this has impacts on their whole outlook of things. Their "inlooks" too, so to say.


I'm actually interested in seeing where this thread goes......

[science as magic]

I think all of these problems could be solved in a way if we were forced to interact more. What thinkest thou baby?

[UDP]

I think all of these problems could be solved in a way if we were forced to interact more. What thinkest thou baby?

............ I see what you mean, but I don't think that would be a cure all. If people were more knowledgable about personalities, and how people 'work' in general, I think it would 'improve things'


However, so many people take psych majors here in the USA. .......
I don't think we are really any better because of this. That's an odd tangent, though, so lets not go there yet

[maze]

=)

[Kirana]

i think that spirit and courage are to a large extent independent of type.

i have to think on the topic first. i do have things to say, i think.

[Creepy-]

i think that spirit and courage are to a large extent independent of type.

Ditto. Wil post more later. Good thread!

[Catholic Schoolboy]

It is so easy to blame bad parenting and bad relationships for bad behavior, so I must tread softly to avoid such unattractive things as self pity.


I know that there have been dreadful things placed on all of us by society. But what can be done? We are no better than animals, in fact we are the worst kind of animals. What other species subjects others to such cruel behavior? Why must we ridicule others and kill children in pointless wars? The answer though complicated is relatively easy to come by if you do not search to deep it lays neatly on the surface. The need for acceptance and the need to be right and the need to be understood, it is completely primal and it shows it’s self in that way. We are truly barbaric.

But the wounds inflicted on us must in turn be inflicted upon fellow man because they burden us and make us feel weak and empty. I admit that I have a terrible fear of any kind of criticism and thus I criticize others. I think about the effects of what I have said only after I have said them and I feel like shit. Apology is not adequate, and so I contribute to the cycle. I feel no better when I spread my pain so why must it be done? I don’t know. I struggle with this.

To think that this will ever stop, to assume that the world can indeed achieve peace, love and understanding, is to be naïve and pure. To be one of those few virgins of societies brutality, what bliss.

[maze]

=)

[mimisor]

dstf

[Cone]

You sound like my mother, Sycophant.

I think world peace is a meaningless thought, simply because people are already too busy trying to become more independent and self-sufficient.

[Raver]

I like this thread Baby. I despise the education system with a passion since it is hardly about learning and it is more about attaining useless knowledge and pieces of paper. Perceivers tend to have trouble adjusting to the education system in my opinion mainly due to the structured environment. It's all about equpping you for the roboforce in the conveyor belt of the economy. If school was really about "learning" then people would actually enjoy going to school and be a lot more intelligent as a result of it.

[Cone]

I think specific teachers should be blamed more than the school system itself. I have known blank, useless teachers and then I have known useful, highly inspiring teachers that could teach anything to anyone. Then there's always the phrase, "in order to learn, you've got to want to learn."

[Creepy-pokeball]

*nod* shitty teachers are one of my pet peeve's in life. And with Edu. masters as the most popular professional degree (estimated 1/5th of grad degrees)...ewww.

[Kirana]

i still can't quite articulate what i want to say on the subject. it has to do with being made to pick up a career that i didn't want. when you're a teenage kid, you're idealistic and you want take up a career that you like. but at the same time, you don't quite know what the real world is like. for my case, i wanted to be an environmental scientist. and my main source of advice on what the world was like was my parents. my mother drummed it into my head that i would starve as a scientist, that i would be poor. that i should get a first degree that is marketable etc. etc. and what is the difference between science and engineering anyway? you do one, and you can do the other. so i caved and did civil engineering.

then i did an MSc. in marine environment. it is NOT true that science is no different from engineering. i felt i wasted a lot of time and resources doing engineering. then when i got back i got a job (a good job, actually) using my first degree, but i don't like it. i don't like civil engineering, and the extra money doesn't change that. so now i want to go back to do what i love. irritating thing is that, my mom keeps telling me, 'it's too late to be a science expert now. you're stuck as an engineer.'

i hear a lot of stories about people abandoning careers based on a forced degree and went to do things that they like. and they aren't some dubious professions like 'starving artist' or 'interpretive dancer' either. they just want to be things like eco-tourism resort manager, or independent film-maker, or acoustics engineer - the sorts of jobs that are barred to them simply because their parents had only ever heard of the generic lawyer, doctor, engineer, and the new addition, IT (IT anything).

i don't know. children, teenagers, totally rely on their parents on advice on such life-changing choices. and i think it isn't responsible for parents to give advice all soaked in fear. i can't believe i was so stupid as to actually believe that scientists and lecturers are starving academics. and it was only later that i found out i actually had distant relatives who were scientists, and good ones too.

i've still not yet righted my career course; it will take a while. i need to amass resources of my own to qualify myself for a totally different career, then make the migration etc. etc. so i'm still a bit resentful about the whole thing.

i'm not even going to touch on maladjustment due to bad romantic experience.

[schrödinger's cat]

It all depends on where life hurts you. We've all got our Achilles heels. What hurts me hurts you too, but not as badly; you can shrug it off eventually, and you might feel that I'm just being a whimp if I can't. Once you're hit where it really hurts, I will feel that "ha ha, fancy telling me I'm weak when she can't even deal with that kind of problem!" ...which doesn't help one bit. It's best to be respectful and to keep an open mind. If we judge others based on what we ourselves are like, then we're going to misjudge them.

Every type has a particular weakness that should be treated gently. If you're hurt there, it's particularly painful, and it takes you a long time to recover. The kind of influence a tragedy etc. has on you depends on whether it hit you where it really hurts.

[Scrummy]

Thank you everyone for your responses. I want to respond to them individually when I have some time. It seems you all have much to say on the subject (and forgive me for opening a Pandora's Box... it is indeed vast and slightly ambiguous). I made a mistake in posting this thread prematurely, without having finalized at least an initiating model on which to base subsequent responses. The following is an analysis of one of my own maladjustments.

Analysis of the Debilitating Nature of Shyness
The first maladjustment I wanted to talk about is one that is very common among introverted types - that is, debilitating shyness. For my purposes I will define the term shyness as a feeling of insecurity during interaction (verbal or otherwise) with one's fellow human beings, inhibiting one's means of expression and communication.

The Introversion-Shyness Link: Does It Exist?
In the past, I have made the mistake of equating shyness with introversion. I have rationalized my fear of interaction by means of type. The fact that I was INFp became an excuse for increasingly antisocial, isolated behavior. The problem, of course, is that there are plenty of socially well-adjusted INFps out there. Where does one draw the line between the reticence that can be attributed to type, and that which is a result of my own maladjustment?

While it is true that introverts may generally be perceived as more shy than extroverts, there are plenty of exceptions to make one reconsider the link. Is shyness an inherent trait linked to introverted types, or does being introverted only serve to make one more likely to be shy, given the right set of circumstances? In order to understand this, I have had to reconsider my notions of introversion.

Jung originally differentiates between extroversion and introversion by means of two factors: the subjective (i.e., the subject - "I") in relation to the objective (i.e., the object - "it", "you", "him/her").

On the extrovert: Now, when the orientation to the object and to objective facts is so predominant that the most frequent and essential decisions and actions are determined, not by subjective values but by objective relations, one speaks of an extraverted attitude. When this is habitual, one speaks of an extraverted type. If a man so thinks, feels, and acts, in a word so lives, as to correspond directly with objective conditions and their claims [This is what Jung means when he speaks of "orientation."], whether in a good sense or ill, he is extraverted. His life makes it perfectly clear that it is the objective rather than the subjective value which plays the greater role as the determining factor of his consciousness.

On the introvert: The introvert is distinguished from the extravert (who is prevailingly oriented by the object and objective data) by the fact that, unlike the latter, he is governed by subjective factors... the introvert imposes a subjective view between the perception of the object and his own action, which prevents the action from assuming a character that corresponds with the objective situation. Naturally, this is a special case, mentioned by way of example, and merely intended to serve as a simple illustration.

Jung further notes the credo of the introvert: The world does not merely exist, in and of itself - it exists also, as I perceive it. Indeed, at bottom, we have absolutely no criterion that could help us to form a judgment of a world whose full nature was incomprehensible by the subject. Jung links extroversion with positivism (the idea of objective evaluation), and introversion with the acknowledgment that: all perception and cognition is not purely objective: it is also subjectively conditioned (and consequently, it is linked with subjective evaluation [feeling as opposed to thinking/ intuition as opposed to sensing]). For this reason, Jung deduces that the most uncommunicative type will be that of the introverted-irrational: Because they are introverted, and as a result have a somewhat limited faculty or willingness for expression, they offer but a frail handle for a telling criticism.

One must note the distinction in diction Jung makes, here. The introvert, because he concerns himself with the subject ("I") as opposed to the object ("it", "you", "him/her"), will have a limited faculty or willingness to express: Since their main activity is directed within, nothing is outwardly visible but reticence, reluctance, coldness [as opposed to "warmth"], or uncertainty, and an apparently groundless [note that this behavior is apparently without grounds] perplexity.

Examination of Shyness as Differentiated from Introversion
The aforementioned distinction is important because, at the crux of the situation, Jung is saying that the direction of one's interest determines one's faculty therein. In other words, the introvert may dislike having to express himself to others (i.e., direct his expression to the object [again, "it", "you", "him/her"]) because he does not find it valuable (what he values is the subjective [again, "I"]). Cone brought up an excellent point in another thread, in the same vein:

I would say that preferences correlate with biases and long-term goals, i.e. a feeling type may dislike mathematics because there are little benefits toward whatever feeling types value.

This explains the reticence of the introverted type. It is not that he is incapable of social interaction. It is that he sees the world as it relates to "I" and holds himself accountable to "I" such that any mention of the object serves to disorient him. One will note that this does not necessarily entail shyness. However, this inability to express oneself in terms of the objective may in fact make it much more likely for one to develop a shyness complex. If that inability is preyed upon by influential people in one's life (parents, peers, siblings, etc.), there is potential for maladjustment.

Behind shyness, there is an underlying sense of inferiority - a lack of self-confidence that prevents one from saying: "Dude... being an introvert and orienting myself through means of 'I' does not mean I can't interact with people in a relaxed and meaningful way!" How do we know that this is so? All you shy people will note at least one person in your life - a sibling, a friend, whoever - with whom you have been able to interact more or less uninhibited and freely. Likewise, we may be more comfortable in the presence of only a certain number of people, or in a certain environment. Certain type combinations are more conducive to this state of ease than others, I will admit. If one does not come into close and regular contact with those types conducive to healthy interaction in one's formative years, there is potential for maladjustment.

There are so many factor involved in causing such a maladjustment and lack of self-confidence. I'm sure we will be able to enumerate quite a few in this thread as we go on.

So... now that we have established what it means to be an introvert, and the implications on social interaction when one concerns himself primarily with "I"... what if a primarily introverted person actually does want to interact with his fellow human beings? What if he does want to partake in the sharing and exchanging of ideas? What if he just wants to make an emotional connection with another person, which can only be achieved by means of verbal and nonverbal communication?

Readjustment After Maladjustment
Well, it would help in identifying those factors which caused such a maladjustment to take place to begin with. In my case, I was not allowed the chance to interact with people who would stimulate my extroverted means of processing. My parents moved around quite a bit when I was younger. My dad was a very busy pharmacist, almost always at work (and none of his friends had kids my age). My mom stayed at home, but spoke little English and for this reason, could not find a means for me to meet the neighborhood kids when I was younger (and none of her friends had kids my age). For this reason, my social development was severely stunted come time for school. Once I started school, I was made more aware of these inadequacies by the other kids, thus compounding the problem.

I have been able to break free of much of these debilitating thoughts. Part of the process is actually acknowledging that there is a problem. I will never be considered "outgoing" by virtue of my type - it may lead me to be misunderstood or even underestimated by those around me, but it also allows me to keep in touch with my own understanding of the world, which is the beauty of the introverted type. The psychologist Bernardo Carducci (who specializes in social anxiety) describes shyness as something that must be "lived with successfully." In the more exacting lexicon of Socionics, we should replace "shyness" with "introversion." Being physically unable to express my self or make interpersonal connections when i want to, is not a trait of functional introversion. It is, baldly put, not healthy.

Happily, I've been able to rationalize most of my shyness away as irrational, unfounded, and unhealthy. Rational thought is one's most powerful tool against maladjustment. The rest of it really was "readjusting" myself. I had spent so much time brainwashing myself into believing I was socially-inept that it became a self-fulfilling prophecy. Now it was time to un-brainwash myself, and institute a new set of beliefs. I have done this mostly by concentrating on those instances where I am socially well-adjusted and outgoing, and by re-associating those feelings into my everyday interactions.

[diamond]

@Sychophant: last page you were talking about the need to let evil flow through you and pass it on to the next one, as maizemedley said.

It's kind of like trauma: when a person goes through a horrible trauma, the listener needs to hear it and absorb it. The listener experiences vicarious trauma and must become the speaker to a new listener who absorbs the trauma. And so on and so on in concentric circles like a pebble makes in the water. After so much absorption and translation of energy, the trauma has dissapated.

Criticism isn't trauma but it can follow the same path, I think. We are always translating and transmitting things to one another, in words and actions. I suspect you transmit a lot more than criticism.

Tis a highly imperfect world we live in and we are so much not perfect.

[mimisor]

...

[Creepy-aurora_faerie]

Good post.........
It would havebeen better than good if you didn't bring up the "demigod" Cobain. What's his type? I can't stand him.

I think Kurt Cobain was INFp....

[Scrummy]

You know everything was ok with me until I went to high-school, nothing of the kind troubled me. It's not the high-school in itself I guess it's just the age that we became aware of ourselves, self perception that is. And then I wasn't so confident in myself, all of a sudden. I just become more silent and solitary without any apparent external reasons. I think that is me, in fact, my true self. It's just now that I can see more clearly.

Thanks for reading! Part of the equation is that the individual actually have a desire to interact with others. I definitely agree that some introverts will express more of a willingness towards this sort of interaction (ISFps and INFps are usually considered the two most outgoing introverted types), while others may place it at less consequence (INTjs, for example). If you are more comfortable being silent and solitary, I think you are quite fine. However, if you cannot express your opinions, feelings, what have you, to others when you actually wish to do so, then I believe there might be something not accounted for by typology that needs to be addressed.

I'm realizing more and more that it isn't the shyness itself that we prize in our introverts; it's restraint, thoughtfulness, insight, a "softness" in the case of the feelers, a sense of quietude, etc. the absense of which would be keenly felt if the world were only extroverts. Shyness is a condition that prevents us from bringing to the world that which we have the potential to bring. In this sense, extroverts who tell us - "Hey! You should talk more!" - actually have a point, allowing that the introvert ctually does desire to talk to begin with.

[Scrummy]

I think all of these problems could be solved in a way if we were forced to interact more. What thinkest thou baby?

Well, part of the issue is that some of the people with whom we interact (especially in the formative years) are maladjusted themselves, and such interactions can actually be potentially harmful. I think you've got a point, though, in that the more people we interact with, the more likely we will find someone with whom we jive and with whom we can develop healthy concepts of behavior and understanding. In the context of Socionics, this often turns out to be fellow Quadra members. I think more interaction with the right people would help prevent these problems, but not necessarily solve them.

Personal growth, or self cultivation perhaps, is something that always interested me regardless of personality typeor what preferences I may or may not have.

This idea of self-cultivation (or, if you want to speak pop-psychology "breaking out of the box") is what I hope we can achieve by means of this thread. I've realized how much people on this board and other communities allow themselves to be defined by their typology, when they are merely using it as justification for unhealthy habits that could very well be turned around and/or improved upon without any negative consequence on ones' "identity" or unique personality.

i hear a lot of stories about people abandoning careers based on a forced degree and went to do things that they like. and they aren't some dubious professions like 'starving artist' or 'interpretive dancer' either. they just want to be things like eco-tourism resort manager, or independent film-maker, or acoustics engineer - the sorts of jobs that are barred to them simply because their parents had only ever heard of the generic lawyer, doctor, engineer, and the new addition, IT (IT anything).

i don't know. children, teenagers, totally rely on their parents on advice on such life-changing choices. and i think it isn't responsible for parents to give advice all soaked in fear. i can't believe i was so stupid as to actually believe that scientists and lecturers are starving academics. and it was only later that i found out i actually had distant relatives who were scientists, and good ones too.

You bring up excellent points that I've discussed with a lot of my peers - the world runs on much more than the lawyer, doctor, or engineer. There are markets out there that most of us have never even heard of. Forcing one's child to fit into a potentially misfitting mold while restricting them from other options is irresponsible and sets one up for a lot of frustration in the future.

The need for acceptance and the need to be right and the need to be understood, it is completely primal and it shows it’s self in that way.

These desires form the basis for our underlying motivations, and at times, they are at odds with the interests and motivations of those around us. In trying to be accepted, understood, to be right, most of us don't consider how it affects others. Sadly, virtue for virtue's sake is a concept a lot of people miss out on, or outright dismiss. Interestingly, Sara, if I've read you correctly, your analysis of human nature is actually very similar to the concept of karma in Hinduism. Here is what Eknath Easwaran says on the subject in an excellent introduction to his translation of the Bhagavad Gita. See if this jives at all with what you have said, Sara:

"The law of karma says that whatever you do will come back to you. If Joe hits Bob, and later Ralph hits Joe, that is Joe's karma coming back to him. This sounds occult because we do not see all the connections; but the connections are there, and the law of karma is no more occult than the law of gravitation. It states that the blow has to have consequences; it cannot end with Bob getting a black eye. It makes an impression on Bob's consciousness - predictably, he gets furious - and it makes an impression on Joe's consciousness as well.

"Let's trace it first through Bob. He might take revenge on Joe then and there, simply by hitting him back: that is "cash karma," where you do something and pay for it immediately. In these times, however, it is more likely that Bob will suppress his feelings, so that the consequences of Joe's blow do not show up until later - probably in ways that seem to have nothing to do with Joe or his fist. Karma is rarely so simple as this illustration, but in any case it should be clear that Bob's anger at Joe will have repercussions thoughout his relationships. Those repercussions will have repercussions - say, Bob goes home and explodes at his wife, and his wife gets angry at Ralph's wife, who takes it out on Ralph, who works with Joe; the next time Joe irritates Ralph, Ralph lets him have it. Poor Joe, rubbing his chin, can't have the slightest idea that he is being repaid for hitting Bob. All he feels is anger at Ralph: and so the chain of consequences continues, and Joe's karmic comeuppance becomes the seed of a new harvest.

"Most people have no idea how many others are affected by their behavior and example. It gives us an idea of how complex the web of karma actually is. No one, of course, has the omniscience to see this picture fully. But the idea of a network of such connections, far from being occult, is natural and plausible....

"The physical side of karma, however - hitting and getting hit back - only touches the surface of life. To get an inkling of how karma really works, we have to consider the mind.

"Everything we do produces karma in the mind. In fact, it is the mind, rather than the world, in which karma is planted. When Joe hits Bob, I said, there are effects on Bob's face and consciousness. But there are also effect's on Joe's consciousness. For one, by indulging a hot temper, Joe has made it more likely that he will indulge that temper again. He is a little different because of his action; he has made himself an angrier person...

"The Buddha says that we are not punished for our anger; we are punished by our anger. Anger is it's own karma. Joe may think he feels better for hitting Bob, but a physician would observe what is happening while Joe is getting heated up - watch his blood pressure soar and his heart race, measure the adrenaline and other hormones dumping into the body, and so on - and conclude that he is putting himself at serious physiological stress.Even if Ralph gets hit by him, Joe is hitting himself from the inside [I'll add that he is hitting himself not only in the physical ways Easwaran mentions above, but also psychologically and emotionally]...

"One fascinating point about karma: even if Joe does not actually strike anybody, the karma of anger is still generated in the mind and body...

"Aptly, Indian philosophy compares a thought to a seed: very tiny, but iy can grow into a huge, deep-rooted, wide-spreading tree. [And in those tragic cases where such a thought - or a thread of thoughts - blossoms into a full blown war, a case of genocide, etc... these show the full nature of karma] I have seen places where a seed in the crack in the pavement grew into a tree that tore up the sidewalk. It is difficult to remove such a tree, and terribly difficult to undo the effects of a generation of negative karma..."

[Catholic Schoolboy]

Auvi, you are lovely. Very good. That is exactly what I was talking about. Thank you for taking so much time with this it has been very insightful.

[Scrummy]

Auvi, you are lovely. Very good. That is exactly what I was talking about. Thank you for taking so much time with this it has been very insightful.

(Can I have a kiss now?)