DiscussWorldIssues - Socio-Economic Religion and Political Uncensored Debate - View Single Post - Competition- Does it matter?

**SteantyjetMaw** · 10-03-2009, 05:06 PM

my assessment of personality traits as a psychotherapist over 19 years is that the notion that ,"you just have to win, no matter what", is exactly the trait i expect to uncover in the psychopathic, or sociopathic personality.

that's interesting, mike. i tend to see dominance as being the driving force behind the psychopath's behavior. however i was interested to see some recent research that failed to show dominance as a factor, and i have been curious about it ever since. the fellow who did that research is a social psychologist & a colleague of robert hare (you might be familiar with him as the fellow who developed the "hare's pcl" test for psychopathy).

in my view, neither competitiveness nor dominance would be at the core of a psychopathic personality, since i follow yochelson & samenow's idea that the driving force behind psychopathy is attempts to escape from a profound deficit of a sense of self, a state of mind they call "zero state." i don't mean to nitpick definitions here, because there are so many different conceptual frameworks of psychopathy, each using its own different terminology, that it would be easy to get linguistically lost. it's just that since i decided that psychopathy is essentially a habit of behavioral dominance, you are the first person i've heard express a similar idea.

metamike writes:
"to put it simply, the more you feel that you are connected to all things, the less competition you will need."

very good point, mike. it's hard to disagree with that.

could i ask for an opinion by the mods on this topic? metamike and i are taking this topic to clinical discussion. it certainly has relevance to discussions of spirituality. at the same time, i don't want to get the forum bogged down in technical definitions. can we proceed on this topic for a ways if we agree to make an effort to keep it at a level of public discourse & try to avoid in-house jargon? thanks!

paul

[mod note: yeah, let's keep hare, yochelson & samenow out of it!

seriously - keeping in mind it's not a private conversation, and the topic is competition - layman's terms of engagement, gentlemen, please...]

10-03-2009, 05:06 PM	#26
SteantyjetMaw Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 566 Senior Member	my assessment of personality traits as a psychotherapist over 19 years is that the notion that ,"you just have to win, no matter what", is exactly the trait i expect to uncover in the psychopathic, or sociopathic personality. that's interesting, mike. i tend to see dominance as being the driving force behind the psychopath's behavior. however i was interested to see some recent research that failed to show dominance as a factor, and i have been curious about it ever since. the fellow who did that research is a social psychologist & a colleague of robert hare (you might be familiar with him as the fellow who developed the "hare's pcl" test for psychopathy). in my view, neither competitiveness nor dominance would be at the core of a psychopathic personality, since i follow yochelson & samenow's idea that the driving force behind psychopathy is attempts to escape from a profound deficit of a sense of self, a state of mind they call "zero state." i don't mean to nitpick definitions here, because there are so many different conceptual frameworks of psychopathy, each using its own different terminology, that it would be easy to get linguistically lost. it's just that since i decided that psychopathy is essentially a habit of behavioral dominance, you are the first person i've heard express a similar idea. metamike writes: "to put it simply, the more you feel that you are connected to all things, the less competition you will need." very good point, mike. it's hard to disagree with that. could i ask for an opinion by the mods on this topic? metamike and i are taking this topic to clinical discussion. it certainly has relevance to discussions of spirituality. at the same time, i don't want to get the forum bogged down in technical definitions. can we proceed on this topic for a ways if we agree to make an effort to keep it at a level of public discourse & try to avoid in-house jargon? thanks! paul [mod note: yeah, let's keep hare, yochelson & samenow out of it! seriously - keeping in mind it's not a private conversation, and the topic is competition - layman's terms of engagement, gentlemen, please...]
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