144 A Programmer’s Guide to the Mind
strategy must now also identify with the experience of being „horrible and
disobedient.‟ The question is, how can this guilt be resolved? What
punishment or spanking can remove this condition of being „horrible and
disobedient‟? Suppose that Johnny tries to reject his Perceiver 'belief' that
me and „horrible and disobedient‟ belong together. The only way he can do
this is to „stand up‟ in the Perceiver room, turn to face the emotional glare
of his mother‟s image in the Mercy room, and declare that her words are
„false.‟ But how can he manage that? If he successfully attacks the
memories of mother which live within his internal Mercy world, then he is
also destroying the emotional foundation for Mercy strategy, for his
internal Mercy world is built around the emotional absolute of his parents.
Maybe Johnny could survive mentally if he managed somehow to
oppose his mother, but what if Johnny‟s 250 pound, 6 foot 4 inch father,
who can do everything better than Johnny, turns to him and tells him in a
commanding voice: “You are a stupid, rotten jerk who can‟t do anything.”
As far as Johnny‟s Mercy internal world is concerned, his father is god.
Standing up to this authority figure would be like trying to rebel from the
core of his Mercy internal world; the result would be mental fragmentation,
a fate worse than almost any pain. If Johnny‟s belief in the „godness‟ of his
father ever did begin to waver, then his dad would only need to take him
behind the woodshed and apply physical pain to re-mesmerize Perceiver
strategy in his son into 'believing' that father really was god.
Let us summarize. If Johnny‟s father says that “Johnny is a rotten,
stupid jerk,” then Johnny is faced with one of two choices. First, he can
accept the words of his father and live with inescapable guilt. He will
always 'know' that he is „rotten, stupid, and a jerk.‟ Second, he can reject
the words of his father and live with fragmentation. The emotional core of
his Mercy internal world—all of the emotional images associated with
father, will be suppressed. They will then survive under the surface as an
evil Mercy multiple, ready to torment. The emotional experiences
associated with father will still be there, but they will live behind a false
wall erected within the Mercy room.A
People with status are the ultimate source of emotional 'truth.'
Rejecting this 'truth' involves rebelling from the source of 'truth.'
Rebelling from an authority causes me to question all his 'facts.'The only way that Johnny can successfully reject the Perceiver 'truth'
of his father without becoming fragmented within his Mercy internal world
A The Exhorter, Contributor, and Facilitator persons often achieve
independence from parents through this route of rebellion. It works, but
makes them somewhat schizophrenic, and motivated therefore by the
suppressed condemnation of parents and culture.