Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

Remember a couple of weeks ago, I posted a draft of an article for the newsletter (of) the writers group I belong to? I got my copy this morning of this month’s newsletter and there it was; well, that’s the ‘butterflies’ reference in the subtitle today. I’m surprised and pleased at how uncomfortable I am.*

One of the interesting side effects of this article is only today becoming apparent. Since I reference the Wakefield Doctrine in it, there might very well be visitors to our favorite personality theory blog. And, per the classic 50’s and 60’s TV trope:  ‘My god, you didn’t say that you’d invited (Father Ryan/ Mr. Dithers/the Mayor) to dinner! This place is a mess!’ I am, at the moment, all,  ‘Damn! why didn’t I set aside time to edit and re-write some of those Pages on clarks, scotts and rogers!”

No, not that there’s anything to the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers that needs to be changed or updated,  just that my writing was… early-in-development. (Can I get a ‘oh man, what a clark you’re being!’  thank you, zoe)

Back in the day, posts ’round here used to run in the 300-400 word range; 600 words would be the exception rather than the rule. Of course, I was writing a post a day with topics ranging from ‘chilled pickles’ to ‘music used as background music in TV commercials’.

My goal then, (as it is now), was to write ‘the perfect Wakefield Doctrine post’.

The perfect Wakefield Doctrine post would be something a Reader could read once and immediately experience the world and the people (that make up our worlds**) from the perspective of the Wakefield Doctrine; to begin see the clarks, scotts and rogers. With the understanding they would acquire from this one post, the Reader would know more about the people in their lives than they did prior to reading, ‘Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine’.

Still trying to write that perfect post. Today seems like a good day to try (again).

The Wakefield Doctrine is a tool that affords us a way of seeing the people in our life through a perspective that will amuse us, depress us and maybe even cause us to say, “Of course! If they’re acting that because they are a clark or a scott or a roger, then that means it has very little to do with what I said or did or implied. That makes perfect sense!”

How? Imagine that everyone is born with the potential to experience the world (with) three distinct and characteristic natures. The reality of the Outsider(clarks), the world of the Predator(scotts) and the life of the Herd Member(rogers). At a very early age, we all settle into one (and only one) of these three realities. We develop our social strategies, styles of interpersonal relationships, in reflection of the world as we are experiencing it. Our ‘personality types’ are, at once, both an insight into what we see and a reflection of our best efforts to make the most of life as… and Outsider, a Predator or a Member of the Herd. (While we all live in and experience one of the three worldviews, we never lose the capacity to respond as if we were in one of ‘the other two’. At times, usually under duress, we can exhibit a response not typical of our ‘normal’ selfs.)

That’s all it takes! Learn the easy indicators of the personality types, (clarks: bad posture, electic sense of fashion, wild-creativity and a tendency to mumble self-denigration) or (scotts: impulsive, attractive, decisive and explosively mercurial temperament) or (rogers: charming, sociable, fastidious and good with numbers (or any other aspect of the world that one would hope remain constant) and go out there and watch.

Warning. It’s been found that once a person has learned enough to recognize the clarks, scotts and rogers in their world, they kinda can’t not see the clarks, scotts and rogers.

* I’m a firm believer in the wisdom of ‘what doesn’t make you hide under the bed, makes you better and stronger’. In the early days of this blog, a lot of things caused me to have that classic approach-avoidance struggle of ‘what if they hate it/maybe you’re pushing it’. In any event, it’s there and so am I.

** I might argue that, from the perspective of the Wakefield Doctrine, reality is mostly ‘the people in our world’