by John Doe 26 Replies latest jw friends
I can't say that any one quality is the best. Any quality in a person that is extreme can be bad.
----too much love become overbearing, too much joy become fake, too much honesty becomes rude, too much humbleness allows others to walk all over you.
just my opinion
Moanzy
So Moanzy, are you saying moderation is the best trait? ;-)
Yeah maybe Moanzy is on to something. All good traits are good but only in moderation. Thus moderation is the quality to covet.
Speaking of moderation, did you think it was weird how much emphasis JW's put on moderation and being balanced while at the same time telling you to be completely unbalanced when it comes to JW things?
GoodGirlBadGirl
In French qualité is only a positive term in common usage -- unlike English quality, which extends to "bad qualities" that the French would call défauts (more or less equivalent to "flaws").
A frequent saying in personality descriptions is il/elle a les qualités de ses défauts -- "s/he has the (good) qualities of his/her flaws". Meaning, you cannot have the positive side of a given character without showing also the negative sides specific to that character.
It is, I think, a strong point of the Western mindset (which might be traced back to the Hellenistic Christian definition of society/church as a body with different members and different functions, via the modern practice of work division for instance) that differences of personalities, qualities and roles are valued. This runs against the (also Western) tendency to individualism. If the individual were to be assessed as a self-enclosed whole, balance would be essential. But unbalanced individuals may be very helpful from a larger societal perspective.
Bottom line: at any given point in our personal evolution we are what we are, and as such we are being helpful -- although necessarily hurtful too. Judgement, including self-judgement, is pointless.
Nark baby, you're the first man who really "gets" me. :-D
Bottom line: at any given point in our personal evolution we are what we are, and as such we are being helpful -- although necessarily hurtful too. Judgement, including self-judgement, is pointless. - Narkissos
"Be who you are and say what you feel because those who matter don't mind and those who mind don't matter." - Dr. Seuss (like this, Narkissos?)
No point in judging, including yourself? Perhaps. However, if you're carrying this over to not considering who we are and trying to improve our negative traits, then I whole heartedly disagree. Self scrutiny and discipline are two of the things that makes humans great.
