TIT 4 TAT: The Basic Backdrop of Life.

TIT 4 TAT: The Basic Backdrop of Life.
By Bill Cottringer

“Reputation is not of enough value to sacrifice character for it.” Miss Clark.

All of life, upon due reflection, seems to be a variation of one very basic rule commonly known as—Tit for Tat (literally blow for blow). This a priori “contract” asks for a reasonable exchange and balance to resolve conflicts in three main areas of life:

• Conflicts within yourself (self-growth).
• Conflicts between you and others (relationship growth).
• Conflicts between all of us and life itself (humanity growth).

World religions and philosophies promise very hefty outcomes for playing the Tit for Tat game by their prescribed rules of truth:

• Christians promise eternal life for following Jesus.
• Buddhists promise Nirvana for dissolving one’s ego into the oneness.
• Moral philosophers offer happiness for living a good life.

One thing seems to be apparent and that is when the exchange of “this for that” gets too far out of balance, like the current increase of a “something for nothing” mentality, more serious conflicts occur. In fact, all types of failures—from simple disappointments and frustrations to bizarre behavior to deadly destruction and violence—spring out from some degree or another of an imbalanced exchange in the Tit for Tat rule.

Here are some of the living examples of this Tit for Tat rule that can both create or resolve the basic conflicts above:

• We are given the gift of life in exchange for our respecting and experiencing it, in living a good life.
• Couples commit to each other for them both to get more out of life than they can alone—doubling joys and halving sorrows so to speak.
• Employers give employees jobs and pay in exchange for their work to help everyone be successful.

The problems and conflicts in life, work, relationships, and play begin occurring when people start interpreting what is originally expected as the Tit for Tat exchange and then start expecting certain returns on their investments. And, we all have an internal thermometer that tells us when the Tit for Tat exchange is under or over-weighted on either side of the see-saw. We think we are keeping accurate score, but our memories are far from being objective score-keepers. For instance, one very bad exchange is remembered as 100 whereas one very good exchange is remembered with one less zero. This is ‘the one bad apple in the barrel spoiling the others’ phenomenon. The end result is we feel cheated and that can drive us to reconfigure the Tit for Tat game more on our own terms and liking. Then it is mayhem from there on out.

The most difficult realization we can grapple with is the one that tells us a hidden reality you have to discover the hard way. This is: Even though this Tit for Tat rule exists as a backdrop to all of life, you can never predict the content of either side and when you fool yourself into believing you have, you usually don’t get what you really want, at least for very long. Expecting a certain result from anticipating a certain exchange, and keeping score of particular things you are giving and getting, never has the desired outcome. Why? Because in doing that, you are missing the whole point of life and why the Tit for Tat rule came before us.

The whole purpose of the Tit for Tat rule is to find out exactly what Tit and Tat are, as a surprise finding that brings authentic happiness, satisfaction of success, genuine contentment and meaningful fulfillment. What better outcome could anyone expect? Join life in discovering what Tit gets you what Tat! Here are three simple things you can do to get there:

• Stop and think about what you do or don’t do to get or not get what you expect, knowing you usually get what you expect.
• Focus on yourself doing what you know you need to do in order to expect the right thing and get it.
• Pause and adopt a tentative wait-and-see attitude to enjoy the surprise outcome better.

“When you do the right things you always get the right results; sometimes this just doesn’t happen quick enough or come in the package we expect, to know the truth of this matter.” ~The author.