Strengths and Weaknesses

[Kodiak]

I've been pondering why God might have given us all both human strengths AND weaknesses rather than just strengths. If everyone had only strengths and no weaknesses, wouldn't life be much easier and less frustrating? And even though he did give us both, why didn't he give us all the same strengths and weaknesses?

After much thought, this is my theory. I think that the reason God gave us both strengths and weakness is so that we have to depend on each other for survival. In order to be happy, we must ask for help and for guidance in things we can't do or don't understand. So that person would look for someone who was more skilled at what they are having trouble with. For every person's weakness, another person has it as a strength. Because of this, we have to communicate with the people we are counting on to use their strength to make up for our weakness.

Communication leads to relationships, bonds, trust, and other things. Having weaknesses means we must communicate with others that have our weakness as a strength. So maybe the reason why we have both strengths and weaknesses is so that we learn responsibility, the value of friendship and love, the value of trust and who is trustworthy.

Needing someone to be there to make up for one of your weaknesses is way to make sure that you don't totally break off from society. If you had only strengths, then why would you need to stay connected with society? You would have no need to, since you could take care of yourself without problems. If everyone had all the same weaknesses and strengths, then again, why would you need to stay with people who cannot make up for your weaknesses? Once again, there would be no need. There has to be a balance.

Basically, this is what I think (through steps):
1. A person needs someone who has one of their weaknesses as a strength.
2. These two communicate and fulfill what is needed to be done.
3. Depending on how well the weakness was made up for, the one with the weakness learns trust and the one with the strength learns responsibility.
4. Because of the communication involved, depending on how they got along new friendships and bonds might have formed between them.
5. Balance is achieved between strengths and weaknesses.
6. Both are not breaking away from other humans and society.
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If my writing is a bit weird, sorry, it is almost 1:00am where I am and I'm sleepy. Anyways, what are your thoughts on this and what are your theories on why God gave us human strengths and weaknesses?

 

[Mr. Ripley]

I like your analysis.

Consider, though, that sometimes (perhaps oftentimes) other people use our weaknesses against us.

Some people require others to counterbalance their weaknesses. Sometimes, though, the individual has enough within himself/herself to be entirely self-reliant. This isn't to say weaknesses don't exist within such an individual, but certainly some weaknesses are more debilitating than others.

In some cases, people attach to others because they don't assign enough value to themselves. They come to rely on other people to fulfill them, but soon discover that fulfillment can only be attained by the ability to be content with yourself.

 

[Eudaimonist]

Needing someone to be there to make up for one of your weaknesses is way to make sure that you don't totally break off from society. If you had only strengths, then why would you need to stay connected with society?

I think your analysis is great, but I personally don't think that having "only strengths" would mean that we wouldn't need society. We have a need for friendship that has nothing to do with simply depending on the skills of others. Friends aren't merely useful. Without love and friendship, we would be starved for human companionship, even if we were very capable individuals. We would feel lonely. Other people are worth more than just their skills or advantages.

In fact, compatible strengths might be one important reason for friendship. We often like to be around people like ourselves -- who share our interests and skills. We may love their strengths, even if we share them. Basing friendship on mutual neediness can be a problem.

If my writing is a bit weird, sorry, it is almost 1:00am where I am and I'm sleepy.

I think you did a great job thinking through these issues. Keep on thinking!


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Kodiak]

Thank you both for your replies, what you say makes sense ^.^

I personally don't think that having "only strengths" would mean that we wouldn't need society. We have a need for friendship that has nothing to do with simply depending on the skills of others. Friends aren't merely useful. Without love and friendship, we would be starved for human companionship, even if we were very capable individuals. We would feel lonely. Other people are worth more than just their skills or advantages.

That is true. But there are certain people that don't particularly like being with or socializing with other people and avoid it at all costs (I personally know of someone like this). They are not interested in making friendships or relationships with people. They simply want to be alone. I do agree that friends should be worth more than just using their strengths, but some people just aren't interested in creating bonds with people at all and are only looking to get a job done. This isn't exactly a great frame of mind, but there are people like that out there. So, needing to have someone to make up for a weakness they have is a way of keeping people like that connected with society.

In fact, compatible strengths might be one important reason for friendship. We often like to be around people like ourselves -- who share our interests and skills. We may love their strengths, even if we share them.

Again, true. Sometimes it is our common strengths that attract one person to another. However, if everyone had the same strengths, then we would all be helping society in the same way as everyone else because there is no one to help in ways that are everyone else's weaknesses. So, certain things would either not get done or get done poorly. So maybe the reason we are sometimes attracted to people with common strengths and interests is because in the back of our minds we know that if we team up with them that a job will get done better. Like the old saying goes, two heads are better than one. So, people with common strengths may become bonded together and help out in places that are other groups of people's weaknesses.

 

[Received]

Hey, fascinating (and original) OP. Let me throw on my old people glasses and say that it's quite impressive (errr) that you (uuuhhh my back) are this smart (Matlock, where's Matlock?) at such a young age (I broke a hip, be back later).

That said, strength and weakness are (obviously) reflexive terms. If you don't have the strong in relation to the weak, you don't have strength or weakness. If the strong somehow become detached from society, they would then redefine their levels of power amongst themselves. Imagined financially, think of a group of people who all make over a million dollars a year who divorce themselves from society (of which they constitute the top five percent regarding wealth). They go and start a society amongst themselves, and with this new financial population, they redefine who is "rich" and "poor" according to how much money this population has. So it goes with strength and weakness. So whereas you're imagining the strength existing apart from the poorer society, this would necessarily not make them strong again.

This means that, with regard to the present society, the strong in a sense depend on the weak in order for their status as the strong to be what it is. Again, we can see this most clearly financially and with regard to the market. If it wasn't for the massive propaganda inherent in advertising, many people wouldn't be seduced by consumerism, and therefore the big corporations (at least those outside of the military-industrial complex) would be much, much smaller. They would probably still be the most financially strong, but not as much, and others would arguably be more likely to snuff the higher-ups in these corporations out. Without a docile and insulated public coupled with an ingenious advertising campaign (and the whack materialistic values inextricably linked with our culture's bloodstream), the rich simply wouldn't be as rich, and many arguably wouldn't even be rich at all. They therefore need the "weak" (i.e., less financially powerful) to be what they are.

 

[Received]

Put another way, power is a metaphysical bastard given the relativity involved with it despite the feeling of firmness that it gives. I've actually written a piece I'm quite proud of in my blog (despite the fact that it's still in my rambling period of prose), if I could link below:

Existential Pathos: Power

 

[quatona]

I tend to think that our greatest strengths are our greatest weaknesses, as well.

 

[Washington]

I've been pondering why God might have given us all both human strengths AND weaknesses rather than just strengths. If everyone had only strengths and no weaknesses, wouldn't life be much easier and less frustrating? And even though he did give us both, why didn't he give us all the same strengths and weaknesses?

Isn't it all part of his punishing us for the A & E thing?

 

[Kodiak]

Thanks for the replies, guys

And thanks for the compliment Dylan ^.^. And what you say does make a lot of sense. That could be another reason for having both strengths and weaknesses

and as for the A & E thing, Washington, I'm not sure xD