Mercy plus Perceiver 97internal world of Mercy strategy is being filled with experiences, and my
internal world of Perceiver thought is working out how to connect these
experiences. In both cases, an interaction is occurring between Perceiver
and Mercy strategy.
Automatic Thought versus Internal World
While automatic thought and the internal world operate in the same
way, there is a major difference in the method by which information enters
these two aspects of thought: Automatic thinking appears to
have an „open door policy.‟ Any sensation which walks by the
gates to the mind is welcomed into the „storage shed‟ of
thought and placed within the appropriate niche. In contrast,
entrance into the internal world is „by invitation only.‟ Here, a
watchman stands at the door and carefully scrutinizes each
item which is asking to gain entrance. For Mercy strategy, this
watchman is identification, whereas belief stands guard over
the door to the internal Perceiver world.
Each of these options has its pros and cons. The benefit of
keeping the mental gate open at all times is that mental
organization can occur automatically and effortlessly. The
disadvantage is that there is no way to screen who and what
enters the mind. If most of the situations walking by on the street of life are
fairly civilized, then keeping the door open is not a problem. I suggest that
this is why people in our modern Western world tend to ignore the deep
questions of the internal world and instead allow automatic thought to
work out facts and principles: A civilized world screens out nasty
experiences and dangerous people, and therefore the automatic organizing
of automatic thought is good enough.
On the other hand, it takes effort to build an internal world. Each Mercy
experience and each Perceiver fact must be ushered in personally by the
guard at the door. Anyone who has gone through the struggle of
constructing a comfortable internal world of belief and identity knows that
it involves a lot of hard work. However, I would like to mention two
benefits that make this labor worthwhile.
First, building an internal world makes it possible for me to become
unique. If I rely on automatic thought for my personality, then chances are
that I am replaceable. There are probably thousands of other people with
my cognitive style who have grown up in similar cultures, gone to the
same kinds of schools, and therefore acquired a storage shed full of
Perceiver facts and Mercy experiences which are essentially identical to
mine. The only real difference between me and these other people is the
size, shape and color of the physical body which contains these mental
storage sheds. For instance, suppose that I as a Perceiver person base my
identity in an ability to make puns and deliver one-liners. Time and again I