Unfortunate Features of Human Psychology – Jocko Excerpts

the approach here is essentially eclectic drawing upon ethological psychoanalytic and behaviorist theories it attempts to explain military ineptitude in light of five inescapable if unfortunate features of human psychology these are one man shares with lower animals certain powerful instincts and again these are like the root of what he’s talking about these five inescapable parts of our brains so we share with lower animals certain powerful instincts two unlike lower animals most men learn to control direct and sublimate these instinctual energies so right we got control over some of these things at least we’re supposed to we can at least frustrate them that’s a good word right we can at least frustrate them three while by far the largest part of this learning occurs in early childhood its effects upon adult personality are profound and long lasting again this is where you know you get into like uh you know freud and how you’re raised and all these little things that are in your childhood and i don’t know if that’s right or wrong i don’t know if that’s right or wrong because i think i’ve seen people that have been raised all kinds of different ways and end up all kinds of different ways but i think the end result is you end up with a personality regardless of where it comes from you end up with a certain personality or certain personal personality aspects that we can pid we can identify them four residues of this early learning and in particular unresolved conflicts between infantile desires and the demands of punitive morality may remain wholly unconscious yet provide a canker of inexhaustible anxiety again really tying our behaviors to what how we got treated when we were kids and if you got you know the room had to be clean you had to clean your plate like all those little things and again chiming if you guys think i’m wrong i’ve known people that were raised in a totally strict environment and they end up on one end of the spectrum and i’ve known people that raised in a totally strict environment they end up in a totally different person are there some root things that are overlapping sure but i think we have to look and maybe it’s just the way psychologically things play out you know but they’re there does he say unresolved yes so i think that has i think that word jumps out at me the unresolved part i think i think a lot of times people are able to come to terms with something from their childhood and and then own it right move past it um i think it’s the unresolved part that lingers right where there’s still there’s a bit of broken something there that hasn’t been addressed and because of that it continues to plague the individual as they try to move forward so maybe if i know you two and you both were raised you know in this super strict way and yet carrie was like you know what you know my my mom was just a little bit crazy and that’s cool and but dave was like they couldn’t let it go maybe that’s what makes dave you know a little bit a little bit a little bit harder in that respect or maybe you’re both raised by you know the hippie parents that didn’t care and you know carrie was like yeah i don’t need to care about anything it’s all good and dave was like you know i don’t want to end up like that you end up with a more militaristic mindset or a trauma hippie mom wrecks the van mm-hmm johnny moves on you know dave doesn’t dave dave bears the scar right is this thing hidden close to home to you man what’s going on here she’s bearing the scars i’m just saying yeah i really do i think respect the vet all right uh the last one when this anxiety becomes the driving force in life’s endeavors the fragile edifices of reason and competence are placed in jeopardy so that’s scary again regard for me regardless of the source of this personality trait that you end up with it if that be it doesn’t matter where it came from if you have it and it becomes the driving force in your endeavors that’s where we run into a problem and and i don’t want to say it doesn’t matter where it came from but regardless of what you think of that we know someone that’s hyper their ego is out of control like it doesn’t really matter i shouldn’t say it doesn’t matter where it came from but there’s nothing we can do about where it came from but if i understand that dave has a massive ego i’m not sitting there going well you know do i need to have him sit down on the couch you know and like let’s go go go hypnotism and break down where he got this giant ego from or might be like okay he’s got a big giant ego how do i work through this how do i get this you know how do i approach him with ideas so we can we can dwell on that a little bit where these people how these people end up like this and i think that is important to an extent is just if you can understand somebody a little bit better you can maneuver better um but regardless they end up you end up with these personalities different personalities i knew a guy um i mean i know you know there was a whole slew because when i got in the navy so it’s 1990 this had to be similar for you there’s a whole slew of my friends in the seal teams who parents were just straight hippies just freaking hippies like conceived at woodstock and whatever like just straight-up hippies and yet they took the most militaristic life that they could being a commando right so how’s that work yeah maybe it’s a reaction to that you know and vice versa have you ever known someone that had that hardcore strict religious upbringing and how do they end up wild freaking maniac you know i feel like that’s the generic go-to right where it’s like the rebel you know came from that strict catholic school you know whatever they just go the other way and it’s weird because you that’s not neither one of these things is like oh you went to a strict catholic school now you’re a rebel no there’s plenty of people that went to a strict graphic school they become strict catholics so that’s i think this is why and again i’m not a psychologist and i don’t even know enough about psychology but i’m saying regardless of my opinion because that’s all it is an opinion the result that you get is oh this person has a very rebellious attitude and he’s in my platoon how do i deal with him or this person has a massive ego he’s in my platoon how do i deal with them