Finding Truth

Learning About Oneself

We first consider only about truths regarding oneself: things that "only I can know for certain". For example: "which colour is more relaxing to me: forest green, sky blue, or something else?"

One's beliefs do not fully align with the truths that are available to be known.

. ' ' ' . .' TRUTH '. U,A: all that is actually true about myself . . . U . f,A: all that I believe about myself . ; ' ' . . .' . A '. . x: all other falsehoods . `. . .' . f ' ' ; . . . Belief . x `, .' ' ' '

One's beliefs might also include some falsehoods: "I'll enjoy seeing that band in a live concert", only to discover later that it's false ("That band is not as good live in person as they were on their famous live album.")

Discovering truths sometimes eliminates previous beliefs that are seen to be falsehoods. The belief circle shifts and the overlapping area A grows.

Involvement of Other People

The ability to get the help of other people enables one to discover truths about oneself via the perspective of others. The following refers to the specific notion of "team"

. ' ' ' . .' TRUTH '. O,A,B,C: all truths . . x,f,g,h: falsehoods x . O . . ; ' ' . . ' ' ; . A,C,f,g: what I believe when I am alone .' . A .'. B . '. . `. . C . .' . B,C,g,h: what I believe with the . ; ' ; . help/support of a team or group . f . g . h . . . . . x: all other falsehoods `, Alone .'. Team .' ' ' ' ' ' '

The reason to be on a team is to discover truths in the "B" section. These are truths that can be found only with the help of others. After some time doing such work, one may discover many truths in part B; but eventually most of what is there to get will have been gotten.

The reason to go "on walkabout" is to discover truths in the "A" section. These are truths that can only be found without the influnce of others' limiting beliefs.

Unfortunately, there are also falsehoods that occur: "f" represent the falsehoods that I believe in when I am alone. These come from truths that I cannot see or do not acknowledge, without the perspective of another, and things I am denying, etc. Avoiding "f" is a reason to be on a team.

But there are also falsehoods that present themselves when getting the support of others. We rely on others to see what we are blind to ourselves, and this often requires letting go of what we believe about ourselves and trusting someone else to see for us. But sometimes, others cannot see within us as well as we can see ourselves. This might be true with something highly subjective, such as my opinion of which colour is more relaxing (the forest green or sky blue example above). Sometimes men trust other men to be the judge on subjective things that are of monumental importance, and not at all possible to be seen by others — such as neurodiversity.

The Need for Aloneness:

Thus we see that some truths (like A) can be found only when alone, and some falsehoods (such as h) can only be seen as falsehoods while alone.

The Need for Alternation:

Now we consider the phenomenon of successive stages of learning. Sometimes the learning of a truth, or the un-learning of a falsehood, makes new truths available for discovery. It is like walking up a trail in the mountains, and reaching a hilltop or mountain pass from which new, higher places become visible for the first time.

The same is true for learning. In particular, learning some new truth of type "A", or unlearning a falsehood "h" will give access to more truths of type "B" that were previously inaccessible: the circle on the right now includes more of the "O" truth, and perhaps less of the "g" and "h". A man, now having learned more on his own, is able to more fully exploit the opportunities coming from the team.

Similarly, spending time on the team and acquiring more of the "B" truths, and eradicating some "f" falsehoods, will make the left circle move upwards to include more of the "O" and fewer of the "f" and "g", enabling discovery of more type "A" truth in a future period of aloneness.

This page was written in the "embarrassingly readable" markup language RHTF, and was last updated on 2025 Nov 05.

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