Voices in Our Heads

The underlying principle of my view on personality is that everyone has 'voices' in them that make up their personality. This is similar to the idea of having an angel on one shoulder and a demon on the other, only it's a little bit more complex than that. These 'voices' encompass all traits possible in human personality which means that every person holds within them the potential to be any sort of person. In everyday life the combination of external and internal influences, when working together, help our personalities to form in such a way as to designate how we behave in given situations, how we relate to others, how we view ourselves, how we understand the origin of life, our self-motivation, our sexual orientation, and many other things.

There are four basic 'voices' inside of every person. The Rebel, the Trickster, the Child, and the Rationalist. It is only the balance of these four elements which allows people to funcion 'normally' within societal rules.

The rebel has a need to control by force, to be different, and act out to attract attention to themselves. When they want, they want things their way, and will demand, bully, argue, or find some other way of getting what they want. They are in charge of temper. One person't rebel may be more prone to being physically violent than another person who's rebel may be more inclined to 'get even' when they are angry.

Next is the Trickster. Their primary objective is control by cunning. They prefer to control rather than be controlled, and they do so by manipulation of the people around them, rather than earning their control. The Trickster is generally responsible for wrong doings such as lying, stealing, cheating, or blackmailing. While generally portrayed as doing wrong, the Trickster is also in charge of humor and is capable of doing good if it serves a purpose for them.

Third is the Child which is in charge of artistic expression, creativity, and exploration. They bring generosity, naivety, honesty, and friendliness to our personalities. The Child in us is that part which allows us to 'throw inhibition to the wind' and run around barefoot in the rain. However, the Child is also associated with childlike or irrational fears or phobias such as arachnophobia, acrophobia, xenophobia, fear of the dark, and fear of dogs.

Finally, there is the Rationalist who is the mediator in our personality. They are in charge of getting us to meet deadlines, keep schedules, do our chores or jobs, and follow rules. The Rationalist is in charge of fairness, cleanliness, and rational thinking. Along with the rational thinking aspect comes understanding of schooling: English, math, history, and science. It is the Rationalist in all of us that allows us to be uninhibited or self-controlled.

In most humans these four work together to create the range of behavior that fits within our societal categories labeled 'normal'. Sometimes one or two of our 'voices' may act out and cause us to do things which we would not normally do. They may cause us to be irrational or do things to draw attention to themselves. Generally, though, the Rationalist has thought about it first and only allows us to do these irrational things if there is not much risk to our person or to someone else. The times outside of that category of 'generally' are the times such as the school shootings that have happened in the last few years in which the Rebel finally got tired of being suppressed by the rationality of the Rationalist and acted without the consent of the Rationalist to do what it was that they wanted to do. Those were times when the Rationalist simply did not have the power to maintain the level of 'normality' within themselves. If the balance of the four is lost then certain behaviors can almost become expected. Too much Rebel can cause abusiveness, pushiness, tyrannical desire for power, or drive for 'more', be it more money, more 'stuff', or simply more prestige. Too much Trickster can lead to thievery, criminal activity, drug abuse, or chronic lying. An overabundance of Child can cause immaturity and an inability to handle responsibility, as well as gullibility, or honesty with a blatant disregard for the feelings of others. And if there is too much power given to the Rationalist the person could become controlling, obsessive, or religiously extremist. Other problems which can arise from the imbalance of 'voices' are things like split personality disorder, which would be where the 'voices' do not recognize the existance of each other, or 'hearing voices' when the 'voices' are heard, but are fighting for power and all speak at once, rather than allowing the Rationalist to control the body. Most 'normal' people, however, are unaware that these 'voices' exist, which is fine becasue they don't have to worry too much about what part of them wants to do what, they simply do what they feel is right at that moment, which is really the combination of what all the separate parts of them wants to do.

One of the major life goals of the Rationalist is to decide for themself how life was created in the universe. I will call this the origin of life. All beliefs fall somewhere on a continuum with 'science' on one end and 'religion' on the other. I feel that all people are born with a tendency to believe one way or another, but environmental factors can play a part in our decision. For example, a person who is taken to church as a child and brought up in a strongly religious family will either follow it if they have a tendency towards religion, or reject it if they have a tendency towards science. On the other hand, a child with no particularly religious upbringing that is given the choice will tend to follow the tendency that they have, either religious or scientific, simply because that is how the world makes sense to them.

I feel that there is an even balance of free will and determinism at work in the personality of everyone. We are born tending to believe or behave a certain way, but we have to choose whether that's how we want to be or not. We can look at things outside of ourselves and decide how we feel about that behavior and either decide to imitate or reject that behavior. For example, my friend, Thomas, had a father that smoked, so when he, as a highschool student, began to smoke, he rationalized it by saying that his father did it so it was alright. I, on the other hand, also have a father that smokes, and I find it repulsive and would never even offer a lighter to another person if I knew that they were going to use it to light a cigarette. So the people around us (parents, teachers, peers, and daycare providers) and the environment around us (television, books, video games, and weather) offer us information to base our choices on. We are also born with the tendencey to be certain ways, but in the end we must choose who we will follow and who we will be.

In regards to our sexuality, the Rebel is also in charge of the masculine side of each person, and Tricksters are in charge of the feminine side of the personality. A perfect balance of the two will cause bisexuality. In men an extreme femininity or in women an extreme masculinity will cause homosexuality, but a tendency towards femininity in women and masculinity in men will cause heterosexuality. But always both are present in some form. When we look at our sexual personality each 'voice' has a specific area of control. I have already mentioned the role of the Rebel and the Trickster, but the Child is in charge of our fears or expectations about it including sexual fantasies, and the Rationalist is responsible for the control of sexual activity, including when is appropriate, whether or not birth control is used, and who it is appropriate to have sex with. For example, the male rapist will most likely have an over abundance of the Rebel's anger, abusiveness, desire for power, and drive to control through force which will be interpreted in their mind as meaning they can control women through sex. The seductress or nymphomaniac would be a woman with too much power on the side of the Trickster who wants power through manipulation of men. A person with too much Child to be controlled would either be afraid to have sex (again, the irrational fears) or have no inhibitions about it and have sex without regards to safety or societal ramifications. They may have many partners just because they can, or they may not date for a long time for fear of having to face sex at some point in the relationship. If a person has a strong Rationalist, then their sexual behavior will most likely reflect their position on the scinece-religion continuum, with a scientific person being led to experiment for the sake of learning what they like or don't like, and a religious person completely abstaining until marriage to satisfy their moral convictions.

As for our mental growth and development, it is done in two pairs. First the Child and the Rebel, in which stage we fight ourselves to find a balance between trust that others will meet all our needs and the desire to take whatever we want, whenever we want, even if it means hitting other children. We begin on the Child end of the scale at birth and move to the Rebel extreme somewhere around toddlerhood but we eventually reach a balance of the two where we can trust that the things we cannot control will be taken care of for our own well being but at the same time there are some things which we can and should control. About the time we reach a balance on this continuum we get the new continuum of Trickster and Rationalist in which we learn the difference between right and wrong and gain the ability to choose which behavior we will carry out. Behavior begins at the Trickster end of the scale where children can say, 'I know that this will hurt you, but I don't care,' and moves to the Rationalist end of the scale where children believe there is a right and a wrong and nothing in between. Eventually the balance is discovered, at which point we begin to know that sometimes the rules can be broken without very much in the way of consequences, but other times we need to do only what is right and not what is wrong. From this point on these original balances are tested and retested, confirmed or changed, but never forgotten.

According to my theory, personalities are far more complex than most people think they are. Instead of just one personality that is us, I feel that the more accurate description is that there are four personalities that control us. We work with them, and they work with what information they are given, but ultimately these four 'voices' in our heads decide what we are.