The 5 Modes of the Human Condition

 I am realizing that this topic may be a bit big for just a blog.  So instead I am providing the following table to give you the short version of what I am in the process of writing.  I may have to look into electronic publishing for this topic.  But for those of you interested here is my perspective on the 5 modes of humanness.

The Human Condition

	The Human Animal	The Human Collector	The Human Intellectual	The Person of Faith	The Human Transcendent
Who am I	I am what I want or need	I am what I have or do	I am what I know	I am what believe	I am more than I can imagine
How others are seen	An end to meeting my desires	Someone I must compete with	Someone I must convince I am right	Someone who must believe as I do	Someone to invite on the journey
How possessions are viewed	Bring comfort	A sign of success	Only as valuable as they teach me new things	Temporal or a sign of God’s favor	Only have the value that we ascribe to them
How the future is viewed	Where is my next meal or fix	Something to prepare for	Something to plan for	Something predetermined	Something to embrace
Knowledge	Only as valuable as it helps me meet my needs	Helps me to collect more things and to be more successful in my work	The key to everything	Viewed suspiciously	A step towards wisdom
Right and wrong	Vague ideas – what is best for me is right	Culturally established norms	Something to be renegotiated as   more knowledge is gained	Firmly established moral values	From the greater good
How one feels alive	When the most comfortable	Striving/acquiring	Learning	Worshiping	Communing
How one feels about popular things/people	They are cool	Something to compete for	Something that validates	Viewed with suspicion	Popularity is neither good nor bad in and of itself
How threats are viewed	A threat is anything that makes me uncomfortable	A threat is anything that can take away my accomplishments	A threat is any idea that opposes what I know	A threat is any idea that opposes my faith	Something to rise above
Acts of kindness	Actively seeks them	God helps those who help themselves	Be Good for goodness sake	Something done to show God’s love or a required behavior to earn God’s grace	A way of life
Fear	Fear of the loss of comfort or Fear excites	Fear of the loss of material wealth or status	Fear of contradictory ideas	Fear of the power of sin and evil	Transcends fear
Feelings	Need to feel comfortable	Need to feel secure and/or accepted	Need to feel superior	Need to feel loved	Feelings only tell us how we feel
Control	Need to control others for safety or comfort’s sake	Need to control circumstances or   others for the sake of their goals	The need to control who knows what or has access to what knowledge	The need to control other’s behavior for holiness’ sake	Self-control is the only realistic control
Love	They may profess love for another, but that love is only there as much as that person gives them comfort and pleasure	Love is what you demand of others because you loved them through your gifts and actions	Love is a word found in the dictionary to approximates liking strongly	Love is the greatest commandment	Love is a way of life