Psychology | the Wakefield Doctrine

Tuesday -the Wakefield Doctrine-

April 25, 2023 By clarkscottroger

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

…we were referencing the concept of secondary and tertiary aspects (in the Wakefield Doctrine).

Early on in this blog, the effects of ‘the other two’ aspects provided a proper answer to those who would ask, “Most of the time my son-in-law behaves in manner very much that conforming to the personality type of a clark. But then, not often, but frequently enough, he gets all sentimental and… well, like one of those rogers. You know, very social, quite analytical. So which is he?”

So the thing about secondary and tertiary aspects: we have the potential, but unlike that fact that we grow up and develop our social strategies and style of interacting with the world, a significant secondary (or tertiary) aspect is not inevitable. Especially to a noticeable level, evident in the person’s behavior.

There are some people who manifest their predominant worldview with no sign of a secondary or tertiary. Poster-people for the three predominant worldviews.

The thing about secondary aspect, (especially), is that they (the behavior, attitude, traits and social style that are a person’s response to a given personal reality, i.e. the Outsider(clarks), the Predator(scotts) or the Herd Member(rogers)) tend to manifest only at time of duress. In a bad spot, nothing the person does helps, emergency behavior. Just a flash of behavior that is in contrast to the person on a day-to-day basis.

There is also the case of a significant secondary aspect that is aroused by something within the person’s life that is of standout value. I am an example of that.

Running out of time.

here, read this:

Hey! wait! wait a minute!!

the second topic should be, ‘Fine!! I get there’s a secondary and tertiary aspect. But, by definition (and future RePrint post) the ‘other two’ may be difficult to distinguish from each other. How do we do that?”

“Enough of the theory!” the Wakefield Doctrine “…the real world, tell how it does us any good in the real world, holmes”

November 20, 2013

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

Alert Reader Denise writes:

“…Doctrine! It has provided me with much insight into rogers. In a nutshell: they will always be the ones to say no. They will do nothing to disturb the boundaries, the lines that frame their world. clarksneed to take notice of this. The sooner the better. I leave it in your hands, Clark, to explain to new readership the why. Maybe you need to write the answer in the form of a post.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And since we are talking about rogers**

Our Friend Zoe says to us in a Comment, she says:

“… my new roger is settling in to his new environment a bit too well… coveting my office…I loan my office out readily without reservation, but he made it very clear by saying ” I want that office… when are you leaving?” and has left telltale signs of his usage… I may have a rogerian twist and be a clark at heart… but never piss off my scott.“

Sorry. The ‘damage’ is done.

Not to ‘baby-coat’¹ our assessment, but you are witnessing a roger challenging your membership in the herd. How is that possible, you ask? The frickin guy got there 20 minutes ago and he thinks that he can include himself in the group? ( you say with not a little emotion). What gives him the right to try that? If you are in possession of any of these thoughts, I hate to tell ya, but you have just painted yourself a lovely shade of blue². It is totally ‘too late’.

Not ‘too late’ to make things right, restore the proper balance, achieve an understanding among the players in this little drama…. just ‘too late’ to avoid a ‘conflict’ with the roger in your environment.

If he had perceived you as another roger or a scott he would have:

presented his credentials, not to meet your approval but to allow him to ‘tune himself to the herd’ (you know how the sound of cattle and herds of cows are often presented as a single ‘MOO’ ? well, I think our Progenitor roger will attest to the fact that what is heard as a single MOO is, in fact, comprised as a harmony among the members… your roger probably started with presenting some of his history to everyone he came into contact with…to hear the pitch of his new herd)

presented his ‘soft-underbelly’ if he thought you were a scott (at least, a predominant scottian female)… but this observation is moot, because in that particular tango, the woman leads… (at least initially and to the extent that the average person is able to see

So… now you have yourself a roger feeling like he can enhance his standing in the herd by making you appear more and more the Outsider. Remember, a dominance move by a roger, in contrast to that of a scott is never made ‘alone’. While he may appear to be addressing the matter of use of the office space to you directly, most of his efforts are actually directed to the others in your environment. rogers always work in the context of the group, the herd. It is this ‘contexting’ that rogers will base their strategy on, that and, be on the lookout for (him) invoking referential authority. ( Hey, I know you love your space..I respect that, but we were talking about how, with the practice growing we all need to work together more…”)

All kidding aside. you now have a problem that, interestingly enough, can be seen as a manifestation of the trap that would appear to an inherent aspect of the desire for self-improving oneself. You rightly know that you can ‘over-come’ this person’s attempt to reduce the quality of your personal work environment. But at what price? The Doctrine states that we all retain access to those two worldviews that are not our predominant worldview. In your case, (we hear you say), ‘ a clark with secondary rogerian and tertiary scottian aspects’. but…. but! here is where the conflict begins to manifest. (If) you are a clark, then your personal reality is that of the Outsider…which makes perfect sense given your situation. You can access your scottian aspect and inter-act with this roger as would a scott, and as we have already said, if this were a scott-on-roger thing, none of the the above would be happening. So, you can dominate the roger rather decidedly. But then what? Will you trade your predominant (clarklike) worldview for a victory in a single circumstance? Or… is there a way to reach an understanding with this person? unfortunately, the Wakefield Doctrine says ‘no’.

Well, sorta. We’re playing with the words now. clarks think, scotts act and rogers feel. So, if you want to reach an understanding, you are out of luck. That is not to say that there is nothing you can do, but it should not be thought of as an understanding.

Lets return to a strategy we have previously offered: ‘love your roger‘ This is still the preferred strategy, but it will require a bit more….finessing. Yes, you should ‘love your roger‘, but that does not mean (as is all too often the case with clarks), you must allow him to do as he wishes. But, to love your roger requires that you relate to him on an emotional basis… more than that! you must regard him on an emotional basis. We’re using italics here to convey the idea that, if you are able to know him completely on an emotional basis you will be relating to him as a member of the herd. That’s right! trade that lovely azure coat for a comforting wrap of brown and white spots!

(will continue later today…. )

Wait a minute!! If you haven’t seen it yet, watch the scott and roger…. everything is right there. (the roger looking to left and right for the herd that is his context, his invoking referential authority, his offering of emotional currency…his love).

1) a rogerian expression of sorts… a fascinating characteristic use of language found only in rogers…here, go to the page on rogers down towards the bottom

2) a reference to the description of a clark in the context of a group, or perhaps it would be more realistic to say, ‘a clark in contrast to a group’ in any event, the term ‘blue monkey’ is a remnant of grad school days when we learned of (or came to believe that we learned of) an experiment in which one young monkey was painted (more likely dyed) blue and returned to his troop, you can imagine the result. In the Wakefield Doctrine we use the blue monkey image several ways, as a symbol of the innate outsider-ness that clarks exhibit when in a social setting, and it is also used to refer to (a) clarks self-sabotaging by make an extra effort to ‘contrast their differences.

Filed Under: Featured, Psychology, the Wakefield Doctrine Tagged With: clarkscottroger, self-improvement, the Wakefield Doctrine, Understanding Human Behavior

RePrint Monday -the Wakefield Doctrine-

April 24, 2023 By clarkscottroger

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

Quick reprint post.

(Note: I removed the links in the post. At the time, I was writing ‘Almira’ the only way I knew, i.e. ‘live’. I’ve since closed the access to the story in the belatedly-but-still-hopefully-mistaken-belief that no traditional publisher would touch a story that has been on the internet. In any form. Be that as it may, since the Wakefield Doctrine is intended as a tool to aid the process of self-improving oneself, I will just have to wait until I’ve developed my rogerian tertiary aspect* to sufficient proportions as to making self-publishing a possibility**.

Monday -the Wakefield Doctrine- “sure, it’s meant to help even the challenges inherent in Monday!”

April 11, 2016

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

(hey! glad you asked! yes, the Wakefield Doctrine is gender-neutral)

Yes, as Vincent Vega said to Lance, in Pulp Fiction, “that’s a bold statement.” But true. The Wakefield Doctrine is not just a fun way to augment the time honored practice of people-watching (people-watching motto: “I say, William, although no one has yet to invent television I quite enjoy having a guide to how people will behave. Rather than taking the fun out of watching strangers interact, it positively enhances my enjoyment. And, no, since you’re asking, I have no idea why I should speak with some sort of British accent.”)

Seriously though, if you learn the characteristics of the three worldviews, (that account for the three personality types of the Wakefield Doctrine), not only will you know more about the other people in your life (both intimately, and ‘in passing’, the Doctrine offers the opportunity to gain insight into: the intensely banal thoughts of the bicyclist riding along side the road, oblivious to all except how recognizable they must appear/ the distracted mind of the girl at the convenience store, who smiles at you and yet nods at something you don’t see, her green-streaked hair somehow managing to draw attention to her army-issue jump boots (worn with a mini skirt)/ the teacher who really seems to enjoy singling you out for not having read the assignment, even when you have done the reading, he insists on finding something lacking in your understanding/ the girl that your best friend insists would be willing to go out with you, you’re totally confident when you have your friend in the room, you even got her to laugh that one time, but the thought of calling…directly and asking her out, without there being a punchline at hand to spare you the humiliation of a no/ the boss who seems to be so friendly when you happen to talk, alone in the breakroom, who’s a total ballbuster at staff meetings, all of these situations (and the rest of a regular Monday work/school day) are more….. something-able for knowing the Wakefield Doctrine.

Try it today! Warning!! If you learn the characteristics of the three worldviews sufficiently to correctly identify (a person’s) predominant worldview (clark, scott or roger), they will act in the manner that you read here in the Doctrine. But that’s not the warning, (that, that first part? is actually the fun… I mean, like you’ll be all, “hey! how’d they know to say that… is this a trick?! is everyone in on this Doctrine thing? no way!! somebody must’ve put them up to it“), the Warning is that, once you ‘see’ the clarks, and scotts and rogers in your life, you may not be able to not see them. You’ve been warned.

If you’re one of the 6 people that I ‘know’ that I don’t have an email or Facebook address for, then you might not know that Chapter 2 of ‘Almira’ is out and available to read. So, here: click on this and read. (New Readers? ‘Almira’ is a Serial Story about Dorothy Gale, (home from Sarah Lawrence College the Summer after her freshman year), and Almira Gulch, (a woman that we all thought we knew and were correct to hate), and how a person can know the truth and still not understand how different life can be for the other person. Come on and sign up and ‘Follow’ Almira. A Chapter each week, like in the Reader’s Days of Old.)

ok, real quick:

clarks (Outsider) the people who seem to have so much potential and yet appear determined to hobble themselves in their efforts to offer what they have, to those around them, forgetting that for most people, to accept a gift requires an acknowledged relationship, (on some level, anywhere from ‘passing on the street’ to ‘intimate baring of all’), and getting a note from the girl who sits next to the guy in the other row is not quite direct enough.
scotts (Predator) the one friend you love to be with and, (on too many occasions), relieved to get safely away from, these are the ‘life of the party’ and ‘the death of me’ people and they have much to teach the rest of us, but only by example. Live the moment, embrace life and run faster than the bear.
rogers (the Herd Member) the person who knows the right way… to live and to work and to love, (the caveat is to find out what they mean, before you try to do it with them)… they’re reasons that we’re all not huddling under the bushes waiting for a chance to get to the stream for a life-maintaining sip of water…. the reasons that the Facebook is gathering our lives and making all that information tidy and useful (for a change)

* we are, all of us, born with the potential to relate ourselfs to the world around us consistent with (the relationship) characterized by the Outsider(clark), the Predator(scott) and the Herd Member(roger). While we all settle into one, (and only one), of these three, we never lose the potential to experience the world as do ‘the other two’.

Our ‘personality type’ is as the world experienced by our predominant worldview (e.g. I’m a clark). ‘The other two’ are referred to as the secondary and tertiary aspects. Sometimes these other aspects are significant, sometimes not. Example: my secondary aspect is (a) significant scottian (‘scoe-shun‘) and my tertiary, a minimal rogerian (‘row-jeer-rhianne‘)

** well, ’cause the qualities of the roger are necessary for sucessful self-publishing. Extra credits to any New Reader for telling us what it is about the rogerian worldview that makes this so

Filed Under: Featured, Psychology, the Wakefield Doctrine Tagged With: clarkscottroger, personality types, the Wakefield Doctrine

TToT -the Wakefield Doctrine-

April 23, 2023 By clarkscottroger

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

This is the Doctrine’s weekly contribution to the Ten Things of Thankful bloghop. Each week we compile a list of the people, places and things that have, in time recently passed or lodged in the distant memory like a shard of mirror stuck in the plaster in an old building. We list them in a list and link it to the TToT. You’re invited to read and enjoy or write, link and (also) enjoy.

For this week:

1) Una (Saturday Day morning tv)

2) Phyllis

3) the Wakefield Doctrine

4) the Una garden (Phase I Winter’s Rest Soon to be Disturbed)

5) the Zombie Christmas Project Phase Phive (Hey! Readers Clap your hands. Maybe thats all the zombie tree needs to to flourish)

6) Cottage project: Patio and walkway. Gathering bids. Hopefully this Summer

7) Six Sentence Story bloghop

8) something, something

10) Secret Rule 1.3 from the Book of Secret Rules aka the Secret Book of Rules) “…getting to, like, Grat #6 means if you don’t sabotage yourself, you’re home free for the week… almost. To dodge the hubris arrow, best to wait until this, Number 10 before citing it as a Grat. (PS… go back and do something with that blank at Number 9!)

music vids

Filed Under: Featured, Psychology, the Wakefield Doctrine Tagged With: self-improvement, the Wakefield Doctrine, Understanding Human Behavior

Photacious Phyriday -the Wakefield Doctrine-

April 21, 2023 By clarkscottroger

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

The proper, as defined as the creators, Jenne and CE, name of this bloghop is ‘the Unicorn Challenge?

Appy-polly loggies for my abscence last week. Like a weight lifter trying to come out of retirement, I totally underestimated my capacity to deal with a special event at another bloghop, while still creating something for ‘the ‘corn’. I trust Jenne and ceayr will suffer my insufficiency and permit me to again participate in their marvelous 250-word-limit photo prompt event.

Prompt photo:

I stop at the end of the dock and try to remember my path in reverse.

Closing my eyes doesn’t help. The pre-dawn silence screams of disassociated context. A footstep on broken shells, like china cups grinding in a wool blanket; the thud of a car door, rock-skipped over the water, its origin the far side of the anchorage.

I don’t belong. As soon as the first suburban mariner arrives, weighed down with sunscreen, bottled spring water and a family he never dreamed of, I will be trapped here.

Forever out of place, quarantined in time.

Had I only not, in a moment of denial, like Adam insisting the dietary Warning was just a hungry man’s dream, stepped off the boat and onto the dock. Angry and resentful after tying up in port after too-long-a-trip with too-small a catch, I put my foot on the rail and the body followed.

My anger shouted to the midnight port: no more nights in a foc’sle reeking of exhausted men and worn-out dreams, no more working the deck that, like a runaway spouse, offered only unpredictable days and boring nights. What could be worse?

Where I was now, a place clean and reeking of privilege, as alien in form as it is in time.

My vessel, my home, the wooden Eastern rig FV Christine Denise, is nowhere to be seen in a harbor where she would have been as out of place as child’s wish in the treasury of the Vatican.

Filed Under: Featured, Psychology, the Wakefield Doctrine Tagged With: personality types, the Wakefield Doctrine

Six Sentence Story -the Wakefield Doctrine-

April 19, 2023 By clarkscottroger

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

This is the Wakefield Doctrine’s contribution to the Six Sentence Story bloghop.

It is hosted by Denise. And this week, we’re having ourselfs a ‘Poetry Slam’.

While the format is as it has always been, i.e. stories involving the prompt word and being no more (or no less) six sentences in length; this week Denise is inviting all to incorporate or otherwise include a poem. Freeform, iamwhatIam pentameter, limerick or shout-at-the-audience-with-conviction, whatever style moves you, the stage is yours. The venue is the Six Sentence Café & Bistro; the lights are low, the beverages are plentiful and spirit unconditional. (New Readers? the bar is along the right-hand wall as you enter, most everything else is to your right. Being a converted textile mill, the ceilings are high, the floor is scarred wood and the stage is all of two steps up, set along the interior wall facing a whole bunch of round-top tables with spindle-wood chairs.)

The Prompt Word

SECOND

The tall, thin man stepped into the cigarette-hazy column of light and stared at the darkened room. The audience, night plankton glowing behind cigarettes, splotches of life waiting for some evolutionary lightning bolt to galvanize them into a higher form of life. Plucking the microphone, he turned away, like an Adam 2.0, his chromium apple to be consumed in private; away from hand-me-down spouses and jealous gods, he ate of it.

“Bah WAAAHHHHHHH!!!!

Our lives begin on the exhale… surprise protest at the unexpected slap from a dry giant, torn from the sea world of peace and contemplation, held aloft by the heels in cruel parody of the weightless posture in the quietdark sea where everything was provided and nothing denied;

Spitting our lungs clear, the sounds around us mask the silent, but compelling inhale, and so begins our love affair with couplets, dyads of life to be more concise;

Breathing in and breathing out, inhale and exhale; this fundamental rhythm, the most benign tyranny, both a chain that binds the spirit to the earth and wings pulling upwards, pretending heaven is in reach, demanding without words we accept it’s rough measuring more of our capacity to endure;

We grow if we are lucky, are healthy if blessed, the inhales and exhales as natural as each breath

Like the rest of nature, our breathing responds to the demands of the world, in storms and in drought, our respiration adjusts, no more ambitious a goal than ‘one more inhale-exhale’;

Man and Woman, confront demands on this rhythm of life, we are, but as Godlets, (as we were informed, by that in-My-image thing), we adjust our breathing to the world as we experience it, not merely and automatically as it is experienced;

as children we breathe without thinking, in sync with our surroundings, the most fundamental barometer of the environment: demands and lessons, reinforcement and persuasion, temptation and punishment, an orchestra of one lead by a multitude of conductors,

as the child learns music, the first and simplest of songs scored for the small ensemble of family, then, like Diana Ross we desire recognition and dream of contrarian scores for impromptu groups of other-not-family; each new rhythm of breath develops as fast as we can meet new people and take on new roles

as solitary lifeforms we refuse to be surprised, or, to be more honest, we deny like fig leafs before a neutered angel, our need to find another to manifest our couplet song; our breathing strives to match another and sometimes it does/sometimes it tries/other times we fail in earnest simpatico,

the stutter of first tears, a most compelling of breaths, the embracing of laughter the most treacherous of invitations, the matching of love, at first the surest of bets despite our insistence on how synchronous our breathing might be, in and out…up and down… finally, for one, alone with a consolation prize of temporary Godhood as a new breath is introduced to the world;

they say that life is a number of inhales and exhales, that breathing is the definition of life itself

that is almost true

there are two times when this irreducible pairing, that dyad formed when coming into the world, is violated: when we’re born and again when we die;

our death is marked by an inhalation,

by inhaling, we claim membership in the world, however, when over-taken by mortality, we have no need for the downbeat of the exhale, the rhythm of breathing the last, the other half of the rhythm of life is left for the living to appreciate, the departed no longer needing the comfort nor the confirmation from the world around them”

The tall, thin man replaced the microphone on it’s chrome spire, looked out over the crowd and after a second, smiled toward the private alcove, to the far left,

“There once was a man from the Vineyard

Who thought his mind would Life’s path make clear

The closer he got, the more grew the fear

On the fringes he remained, unwilling to let down his guard.”