Assertiveness

 

On Page 20 of his book, The Passionate State of Mind, Eric Hoffer has an entry which I will copy and then comment on.

 

Hoffer: “Men will try to assert and prove themselves by whatever means and under every sort of condition. A successful social technique consists perhaps in finding unobjectionable means for individual self-assertion.

 

It is permissible to wonder what other means for the demonstration of individual worth are likely to develop in a nonacquisitive society.”

 

My response: We want each individual to be acquisitive and to maverize.

 

Hoffer: “Vying in creativity is not a likely substitute for vying in acquisition—not only because creativity is accessible only to the few, but also because creative work is without automatic recognition.”

 

My response: A society of self-realizers would do creative work to assert themselves for each for his own sake and his own appreciation, and if neighbors approve or pay him for his artistic endeavors, great; if not, he will not quit creating fine products for a lifetime because God the creator and artists, commands each maverized supercitizen to live in God’s image and likeness, behaviorally.

 

Each maverizer is to assert himself by his economic work and activity to, and by his commitment to the state, the community, and to getting married and rearing up healthy, productive children too.

 

Hoffer: “The nonacquisitive society is likely to develop into a combination of army and school. People will prove themselves by winning citations, degrees, medals and rank. Whatever else we cure by eliminating greed we do not cure life of its triviality.”